The Food Section: Appetizers

How to Cook Sausages

Don't prick your sausages. "poach" them in hot oil.

Boy Scouts and Dutch Ovens

Boy Scouts master art of Dutch Oven cooking [thespectrum.com]

How To Turn Your Kitchen Into a Science Lab

Dry-Ice Martini and Electric Cake [New York Times]

In Season: Autumn Leaf Pies

Savory and sweet Autumn leaf Pies [not martha]

Author Mark Kurlansky (he of Salt) on How to Store Your Oil

Essential Oil [Bon Appetit]

No Knead Bread in Only Five Hours

Seeking a shorter route to Jim Lahey's famed no-knead bread, which requires a lengthy 14 to 20 hours of time to rise, Mark Bittman has created a new variation on the technique which speeds the rising time to 4 1/2 hours.

There's a bit of a cliffhanger at the end of the video that accompanies the column and recipe. Lahey joins Bittman and critiques the speed version of the bread for its lack of crust and crumb and then suggests yet another way to quicken the rising time (this time, incorporating hot water and red wine vinegar). Unfortunately, we don't get to see the results of his variation in the video and so are left wondering, will it work?

No-Knead Bread: Not Making Itself Yet, but a Lot Quicker [New York Times]
Speedy No-Knead Bread Revisited [New York Times (video)]

Baking Tip: Just Add Hardware

Michel Suas, "guru of artisan bread," offers this tip for creating the right amount of steam when baking a baguette: "Suas recommends preheating a cast-iron Dutch oven filled with nuts and bolts. This creates mass at the bottom of the oven, which will result in heat retention. Have some crushed ice ready (it melts more slowly than ice water). When you transfer the bread to the oven, cover the nuts and bolts in the Dutch oven with the ice, and immediately shut the door to trap the steam."

The breadmakers' guru [San Francisco Chronicle]

Freezing for Fall

Want to savor summer's berry bounty when the season is over? Just freeze them.

Wrapper's Delight

The technique of wrapping (and grilling) meat and fish in banana, fig, or grape leaves imparts flavor, while protecting the fillings inside.

Big Mac Inspires Eric Ripert

Superchef Eric Ripert discovers burger inspiration in McDonald's hamburgers, at least in terms of their design: While he can't say the flavor is great, he praises their size and proportions, the scale of their toppings, and their uniform consistency.

Easy Cherry Juice

Want to make cherry juice, but don't want to bother with removing the pits? Just grind them in a blender and strain well.

Cooking 101

The San Francisco Chronicle spotlights 10 essential cooking techniques, from breading to making a vinaigrette.

Spatchcocking for Summer

Michael Ruhlman reminds readers that spatchcocked chicken season is upon us.

Tricks of the Trade

At Food & Wine, chefs share 30 quick kitchen tips for everything from using a disposable razor to peel delicate vegetables to the best way to store cheese (loosely wrap it in parchment paper).

In Search of the Perfect Pudding

From flan to pot de crème, the New York Times explores four different roads to perfect chocolate pudding.

Twice Cooked

Experimenting with roasted flour, Clotilde Dusoulier squeezes cookies from her hands.

Mastering the Microwave

The microwave isn't just for re-heating leftovers. Using the right ingredients (mainly vegetables), it's a "whiz-bang steaming oven."

Omelet Odyssey

In search of the perfect omelet.

Debunking Food Myths

Mark Bittman wants to set you straight about your kitchen wisdom.

Building a Better Steak

How can a hanger steak obtain the flavor of dry-aged beef? Just add fat and (meat) glue.

Caramel for Beginners

How to make the perfect caramel.

Chocolate Meets No-Knead Bread

What happens when you combine chocolate with Jim Lahey's no-knead bread recipe?

In Praise of Leftovers

Food writers Matt Lee and Ted Lee extol the virtues of "KLO" ("killer leftovers").

Airport Dining Guide

New York magazine's guide to navigating airport cuisine.

Foraging for Fungi

Hunting for wild mushrooms in the Midwest.

Best Broth

Chefs share their tips for making the perfect stock.

Easy As Pie

Secrets of pie crust perfection . . . revealed!

Take a Stab

How to kill a lobster, courtesy of chef Eric Ripert.

Gazpacho 101

Lobstersquad's gazpacho how-to in four parts (I, II, III, IV).

Ain't No Party Like a Yakitori Party

In the Los Angeles Times, Russ Parsons goes gaga for grilling Japanese-style: "This summer, instead of repeating the same endless cycle of chicken breasts and steaks, hamburgers and hot dogs, why not try grilling on the wild side?"

Cabbage Transformed

A la Carte offers a short history of choucroute, plus details on how to ferment your own sauerkraut.

Pitchfork Fondue

Gourmet on the pleasures of pitchfork fondue: "It works like this: You pick your preferred steak...then you stand in line, tell some guy how you want it cooked and he literally sticks it on a pitchfork and 'fondues' it in a cauldron of boiling oil."

Quick Cool-Off

How to turn watermelon into sorbetto in less than half an hour.

Fresh from the Microwave

How to make instant tomato sauce using your microwave oven.

Moveable Feast

Even if you only have a terrace, you can build a portable salad box to grow your own greens.

Cyber Egg

The making of a "cyber egg" in pictures.

"Poor Man's Sous-Vide"

Shrimp in a Ziploc bag and other methods of cooking seafood and meat slowly at low temperature, yielding texture and flavor that Regina Schrambling calls "an almost transcendental experience."

Just Add Baguette

To remove any bitterness from asparagus, chef Kurt Gutenbrunner suggests tossing a few pieces of baguette into the cooking water.

Saran Wrap Solution

To get rid of cork taint, just soak your wine in plastic wrap: polyethylene absorbs trichloranisole and makes an infected wine drinkable.

Kitchen Wisdom

Today's Los Angeles Times food section is all about culinary technique, from cooking fish whole to mixology, making stock, and glazing. See also: In the New York Times, Julia Moskin finds, contrary to popular belief, that cooking with cheap wine "works fine."

Liberate Your Mustard

Soy sauce, chili pastes, and vinegar "could easily line fallout shelter shelves," writes Regina Schrambling in Salon. So, why do we compulsively refrigerate these and other foodstuffs?

Deep-fried Everything

Experimental deep-frying with cookie dough ("ten times better"), gummy worms ("crunchy"), and hard-boiled eggs ("The battered outside is like bread, so it’s like eating fried eggs with buttered toast"). Via aht.

Baking in a Can

How to bake quick breads in a can. See also: How to bake a cake in a jar.

Bacon Popcorn

Is everything better with bacon? How about popcorn fried in hot grease? Via CHOW.

Baked Fontina with Garlic, Olive Oil, and Thyme

Technique: The Red Cat's baked fontina with garlic, olive oil, and thyme is "a streamlined, simplified version of fondue without the fondue pot, without the cans of Sterno, and without the wine, cornstarch, or other supporting ingredients."

Technique: Immersion Blended Polenta

Technique: Give your wrist a rest and use an immersion blender to cook polenta without whisking.

Canned Cakes

Technique: How to bake a cake in a jar.

Sweet Meets Savory

Technique: Potato chip cookies and other sweet meets savory combinations.

Molecular Gastronomy How To

Technique: How to pronounce Grant Achatz (it's "'Grant A-kitz,' as in 'Packets'"), sort meat glue from spherification, and other essentials for understanding molecular gastronomy.

Cooking with Slate

Technique: Cooking with slate tiles can be dangerously delicious.

David Rakoff on Pomegranates

Technique: Author David Rakoff's method for rendering seeds from a pomegranate.

Rugelach...secrets

Technique: Baker and cookbook author Dorie Greenspan shares the secrets behind great rugelach.

Pancake Primer

Technique: Mark Bittman's pancake primer.

Thanksgiving Eitiquette

Technique: Thanksgiving etiquette dos and don'ts: "The mesmerizing effect of lighted candles can be an effective tool for keeping children at the table, as is the promise of a post-dinner session on the new PlayStation 3 if they stay put through the main course."

Mushrooms Baked in a Bag

Technique: Funghi al Cartoccio al Forno (mushrooms baked in a bag).

Clean Your Mugs

Technique: Use denture cleansers to get rid of tea and coffee stains from your mugs.

Turn Your Tomatoes into Conserva

Technique: Turn your late summer bounty of tomatoes into a conserva, "a miraculous substance that's both more intense and more useful than canned tomato sauce, and dramatically sweeter and more tomato-y than canned paste. It's a secret ingredient you can add to virtually any winter dish to faithfully recall the glories of summer, and give new depth of flavor to your cooking."

Canning Phobia

Technique: Writer Nancy Davidson gets over her fear of canning: "I have always avoided canning and preserving because of a somewhat irrational fear of accidentally poisoning a dinner guest with botulism.

Uber-Ice Cream Cake

Technique: Figuring out how to make mille-feuille de pain d’épices et glace vanille, the uber-ice cream cake, is a nine year journey.

Pyramid-Shaped Watermelons

Technique: Watermelons shaped into the form of pyramids are the hot new thing. Next up: melons shaped like bottles.

Small Kitchen Design

Technique: Not Martha shares her tips for storage solutions in a small kitchen.

Use Your Senses

Technique: A la Carte on using your senses in the kitchen: "My eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and fingers are all cooking tools. Although I don’t keep them in my gadget drawer, I still use them everyday in many useful -- sometimes subtle, sometimes obvious -- ways."

Old-Fashioned Cottage Cheese

Technique: A handful of cheesemakers are still making cottage cheese the old-fashioned way, with only milk and cultures and no additives like carrageenan, modified food starch, or cellulose gum.

Pre-salting

Technique: Chef Judy Rodgers and the art of pre-salting.

In Praise of Zongzi

Technique: In the San Francisco Chronicle, Olivia Wu writes in praise of zongzi, "Chinese tamales" composed of bamboo leaves wrapped around rice-based fillings. She compares Cantonese and Shanghai variations and shares tips and recipes for making them at home.

In Praise of Wood Grilling

Technique: In the Los Angeles Times, Russ Parson praises wood-fired grilling and shares tips on how to achieve tasty results at home using wood chips.

Food for Kids

Technique: A taste test with the offspring of Michelin-starred chefs, shopping with a cheese-loving 7-year old, and a report on Jamie Oliver's school meals project are among the articles featured in the Observer Food Monthly's "Food for Kids" issue.

Going Leafless

Technique: In the Los Angeles Times, the leafless salad is a revelation.

Bellagio Fountains, Recreated with Mentos and Soda

Technique: The Bellagio hotel's swooning, swirling fountains, recreated with 200 liters of Diet Coke and more than 500 Mentos.

Absorption Pasta

Technique: Absorption pasta -- "coat the pasta with a little olive oil, add just enough liquids to cover, and cook until desired tenderness." See also: Alain Ducasse's Olive Mill Pasta, a TFS approved recipe using this cooking method.

Mozzarella and Lemon Leaves

Technique: When mozzarella di bufala is sliced, sandwiched between fresh lemon leaves, and grilled, it absorbs a citrus essence and becomes imprinted with the mark of each leaf.

Chicken Tricks

Technique: Beer can cooking, spatchcocking, indirect heat, and other methods for achieving success grilling a whole chicken.

Art of the Cure

Technique: Governmental regulations on food safety are slowly killing the ancient craft of curing salumi. See also: Our own experience curing guanciale at home.

In Praise of Poaching

Technique: In praise of poaching.

Close Shave

Technique: Shaving raw fruits and vegetables razor-thin has a transformative effect on their texture and flavor.

The McBruschetta

Technique: The "McBruschetta" and other behind-the-scenes creations of bored fast-food cooks.

From Lab to Table

Technique: Flasks normally found in a scientific laboratory make for uncommonly good wine decanters. "Not only do they look cool, they do their job superbly," writes wine writer Eric Asimov.

Cooking in Your Sleep

Technique: A chef can cook omelettes in his sleep (french fries, too), but he fears he will set his home on fire.

Of Pig Butchering and Climate

Technique: Of pig butchering and climate: "Precipitative, damp or misty weather not only militates against fine crackling, it also tends to make the outsides of our home-cured salamis a little clammy."

Risotto Time

Technique: In the Los Angeles Times, Russ Parsons sings the praises of risotto, compares rice varieties, and recites the "four circles of risotto": soffriggere, tostare, bagnare, mantecare (fry, toast, bathe, and beat in the fat).

Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream

Technique: Using liquid nitrogen to make ice cream can be as delicious as it is dangerous.

Bob Ross Inspiration

Technique: Late TV painter and personality Bob Ross provides the unlikely inspiration for a Sunday brunch.

Cooking with Lettuce

Technique: Lettuce leaves don't have to remain confined to the salad bowl. Whether stir-fried, blanched, or pureed with butter (to enrich sauces), "lettuce can be cooked, too, and deliciously so."

Egg Perfection

Technique: In pursuit of the perfect eggs.

Introducing eggpeeling.com

Technique: There's more than one way to skin a cat, and the same appears to be true for eggs. Eggpeeling.com is a site devoted to using various devices -- from saws to drills -- to separate eggs from their shells, complete with videos and ratings. Via jw.

Eggs and Virtue

Technique: Taking the virtuous path toward egg cookery: "Every egg has a purpose or end. Since a good egg is a tasty egg, and a tasty egg is a fresh egg, one's eggs must be fresh — indeed, they must be consistently so."

Jambonnette Quiz

Technique: True or false? A jambonnette is a cute little baby jambon (ham). False. It's a stuffed chicken leg.

Sunken Cheese

Technique: A Quebec cheese company which recently dropped 800 kg of cheese into the Saguenay fjord, north of Quebec City, in the hopes of improving its flavor, has lost its sunken cheese.

Les Omelettes

Technique: A la Carte considers the history of