5 kitchen rules I LOVE to break.
Foodie rebellion at its finest.
Hi there,
How’s it going over there? Abigail and I taught an extra fun (and delicious, duh!) meal prep class yesterday. Our students were engaged, we were in the flow with our timing and banter, and Abigail is out of town this week, so while we normally split the food up fairly evenly after class, she left me with all the dishes we cooked up so my fridge is absolutely stocked with goodies.
If you missed yesterday’s class (the menu was Greek inspired an is so yummy) and would like to take it on demand, you can find that here. Or purchase the summer class pack and get yesterday’s on demand class straight to your inbox and July and August’s classes at a big discount!
Yesterday’s class required a bunch of grating, so we had my trusty microplane out and in use a few different times. While she used it to zest a lemon, Abigail mentioned that she loves the tool but finds it a pain to clean. Which is when I admitted to the dirty (well actually, clean…) little secret, which has, in turn, inspired the topic of today’s newsletter:
Kitchen rules and the ones I love to break.
When it comes to kitchen rules, there are some you’ll find me evangelizing from the rooftops—salt in your pasta water? Hell yes. An unstable cutting board? Hell no! But as I’m sure you’ve gathered, there are a few common kitchen practices you’ll find me regularly ignoring. Let’s run down my big five, starting with the one I mentioned during class yesterday:
I put my microplane in the dishwasher. *Gasp!* Yes, they’re technically dishwasher safe, but the company recommends hand washing to increase the tool’s longevity. But I’ve had mine 2ish years, regularly dish wash it, and it’s still going strong. And whenever the time comes to replace it, I think I’ll feel okay about spending $15ish given all the convenience dishwashing has provided over the years.
You’d better believe this went straight into the dishwasher! I may or may not treat expiration dates as light suggestions rather than hard and fast rules. I won’t dive too deep on this for liability reasons (mostly kidding!), but I trust my own sense of sight, smell, and *little* tastes pretty deeply. And anyway, a lot of the time, an expiration date is actually a sell-by date! Why waste food?
Sometimes, I forget to rinse my rice. Not always, but when I do, I don’t really notice much of a difference. I know this is a big no-no for some, but for me, it’s what works!
If I’ve made something using a store-bought sauce and you ask me if the dish is homemade, I’ll answer yes! If you’ve been following along with me for a while, you likely already know this. Watch me make a few semi-homemade gems here.
Even if a recipe calls for it, you’ll never catch me using unsalted butter. Yes, even recipes for baked goods! I find that salted butter brings a bit more depth-of-flavor. I’ve never had a dish or baked good wind up over-salted because I went for the salted stuff when a recipe called for unsalted. And I’m known by many as a salty, salty lady—both in behavior and in terms of where my palette leans ;) Finally, I find stocking two types of butter really annoying! So salted butter it is!
I’m sure if I sat and thought about it, I could think of a few more common cooking mandates I break on the reg—would this be a fun series? I’m also curious, do you break some of these too? Maybe some of my little cooking indiscretions are cardinal sins in your kitchen? Do you have a rule or two you break that I didn’t mention? I’d love to hear from you. Feel free to respond directly to this email, leave a comment for the group to see, or DM me over on IG. You know I love to chat.
Okay, that’s it from me. I hope you have a lovely, well-fed, rebellious week ahead.
With love and a tip of my chef’s hat,
Erica
Want more? I’m so flattered! You can also follow me on Instagram, pop over to my YouTube channel, or check out my blog where you can find my tips-laden e-book collection.
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