Have you ever wondered how restaurants get their coffee to taste so good
First of all, restaurants are in the business of pampering you so they devote much more time to the perfection of a good cup of coffee. Sometimes Ill remember a restaurant just because of their excellent coffee.
So what are their secrets and how can you duplicate this recipe at home It may surprise you to find out that the French Press brewing method could be the secret in achieving that restaurant quality taste.
Most fine restaurants use a press pot, also known as the French Press, which produces an extremely rich cup of coffee.
Press pot coffee is coffee steeped for 3-4 minutes between 195 to 205 degrees F. It produces a thicker and much richer taste than an auto-drip machine can produce.
A disadvantage of the French Press is it may leave trace amounts of coffee sediment. But the rich taste more than makes up for the small amount of sediment at the bottom of your cup.
So first, start off with a quality medium roast coffee, which is what most restaurants use. I can give you a couple of good recommendations.
Seattles Best Breakfast Blend, Starbucks Breakfast Blend or Starbucks Sulawesi Coffee is 3 excellent choices. These are full-bodied coffees yet very smooth tasting. They are some of our best sellers at PerfectCoffees.com and work well for French Press brewing.
You want to grind the coffee slightly larger than you would for drip coffee. Too fine of a grind will produce a bitter cup of coffee. If your grind is too coarse, the coffee will taste weak. A quality grinder is the best thing you can do to improve the taste of French press coffee.
Remove the plunger from the press pot and put 1 rounded tablespoon of coarse ground coffee per each 6oz. of water into the pot. You can adjust this to your own taste.
Coffee is 99% water so use clean filtered or bottled water free from chlorine and other minerals that affect the taste of coffee.
Boil the water and remove it from the heat for five minutes before you pour it. This will give you the 195 to 205 degree water that is ideal to brew with. Now pour the 195 to 205 degree water over the ground coffee.
Stir the coffee to get total saturation of the grounds then place the plunger on top of the pot and let the coffee steep for 3 to 4 minutes.
Depress the plunger slowly to push the grounds to the bottom of the pot.
Serve all the coffee in the pot after the 3 to 4 minutes of steeping. Otherwise the coffee will keep getting stronger.
If you have any left, you can always transfer it to a clean, preheated air pot or a stainless steel Thermos. This will keep the coffee hot about an hour without hurting the flavor.
The French press brewing method definitely takes more time but gives us the result we are looking for. Restaurant quality coffee in the comfort of your own home.
Copyright © 2004 PerfectCoffees.com. All Rights Reserved.
This article may be re-published "as is" unedited as long as the authors bio paragraph resource box and copyright information is included. The URLs in the resource box should be set as hyperlinks if used on a web page.

About The Author

Gary Gresham is the webmaster for www.perfectcoffees.com where you can purchase quality coffee, tea, cups & mugs, coffee gifts and delicious desserts online. He offers a free monthly coffee newsletter at www.perfectcoffees.com/newsletter.html.
Gary@perfectcoffees.com

I served this dish at an event I catered and people are still talking about it a year later. The lobster base used in the sauce can be found at stores offering specialty foods or you can order it off the internet. If you

Food poisoning is related to unsafe food, a dirty kitchen, and dirty kitchen appliances. If you follow some safety rules, food poisoning will never occur.
Your Refrigerator
1. Freezing does NOT kill bacteria; it only controls their growth. Common bacteria grow rapidly at 60

Have you ever wondered how a restaurant can get a dish of pasta to your table in about four minutes when you know it takes ten minutes just to cook the pasta Does the water on their stoves boil at a higher temperature than the water on yours Do they know a trick that you dont As a matter of fact, they do.
They parboil, or partially pre-cook their pasta; so when an order comes in to the kitchen, a cook can turn out a dish of perfectly al dente pasta in a minute or two. Pre-cooking is a worthwhile technique for home cooks, because it enables them to pull together a great sit-down meal in practically no time, no matter how busy their day may have been.
Its also a great method to use when you plan to serve pasta for a crowd. I once catered a party for fifty, where I had a "pasta bar." With the assistance of one helper, and two propane burners, I served fifty portions of freshly cooked pasta al dente without holding anyone up in the buffet line.
To parboil pasta at home, bring a large pot of salted water at least six quarts to the boil. Add one pound of pasta and stir until the pasta wilts in the case of spaghetti or linguine and becomes submerged. When the water returns to a full, rolling boil, cook the pasta for exactly two minutes, then drain, shock in ice water, and drain again. Note: Strand pasta like spaghetti or linguine will be brittle, so handle them with care.
Place the pasta in a container large enough to hold it, then add enough olive oil to just coat each strand. Cover and refrigerate until needed. Parboiled pasta will keep, refrigerated, for four to six hours.
Note: Coating pasta with olive oil flies in the face of conventional wisdom that says, "Never coat pasta with olive oil. The sauce wont adhere to the pasta." Well, conventional wisdom aside, sauce sticks to parboiled pasta like glue. What else can I say
When its time to cook dinner, bring a large pot of salted water to the boil, add the pasta Youll note that the pasta has softened over the time youve had it refrigerated. This is perfectly fine., cook for one or two minutes, then drain in a colander. Be sure to taste after a minute or so. The pasta cooks quickly. Serve as you would any pasta that you had cooked for eight to ten minutes.
Again, this is a great, worthwhile technique to use at home, because you can parboil the pasta at a time of day when youre not juggling three or four other tasks, like preparing a sauce, or a salad. And when its time to prepare the rest of dinner, youll feel more confident in the outcome, because you can focus more of your attention on the other parts of the meal.
Try this technique once, and you could be hooked. You may not be serving fifty or sixty people per night, but youll be cooking just like a chef in a neighborhood Italian restaurant.

About The Author

Skip Lombardi is the author of two cookbooks: "La Cucina dei Poveri: Recipes from my Sicilian Grandparents," and "Almost Italian: Recipes from Americas Little Italys." He has been a Broadway musician, high-school math teacher, software engineer, and a fledgeling blogger. But he has never let any of those pursuits get in the way of his passion for cooking and eating. Visit his Web site to learn more about his cookbooks. http://www.skiplombardi.com or mailto:info@skiplombardi.com.

Peaches, plums and nectarines are a rite of summer - and a must for healthy summer skin
NC-Its a sure sign of summer: mounds of sweet, juicy peaches; plump, flavorful plums; and aromatic nectarines that seem to arrive with the warm days of late spring and leave with the first cool autumn breezes.
Perhaps its just a coincidence that these same peaches, plums and nectarines - long considered a delicious source of nutrition like most fruits and vegetables - are also important sources of antioxidants, essential for maintaining healthy skin. When the sun begins to shine, these fruits begin to work their magic.
A recent study conducted by the University of California - Davis found that these three summer stone fruits are rich in phenolic compounds which act as antioxidants, and include ascorbic acid Vitamin C, carotenoids orange or red colored substances found in many fruits and provitamin A/beta-carotene.
Heres how antioxidants work to protect the skin. Photoaging - skin cha

1 lb Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled, cooked and cubed
3/4 cup Summersweet Lobster and Shrimp Dip or Chicken Cilantro Dip
1/4 cup light mayonnaise
1 small red bell pepper, coarsely diced
1 small green bell pepper, coarsely diced
2 stalks celery, coarsely diced
1 stalk green onion, finely chopped
1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
1 tsp salt
Freshly cracked black pepper to taste
Italian parsley for garnish
Mix 3/4 cup dip with 1/4 cup mayonnaise. Place cooked, cubed potatoes in a medium bowl. Toss with dip/mayo mixture as desired. Add remaining ingredients except parsley and combine well. Chill. Prior to serving, garnish with parsley. Serves 4 - News Canada

About The Author

News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web.
News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial "fill" items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

I was sitting there watching one of my favorite tv shows when a cookie craving hit me. As I watched one of the main characters take her chocolate chip cookies off the baking sheet, I drooled at the prospect of some freshly baked cookies.
I wanted something that was easy, quick, and didnt require me to go out and buy ingredients. So I searched the Internet, figuring peanut butter cookies would do the trick. I was surprised to find a peanut butter cookie recipe that didnt require flour. In fact, it didnt require many ingredients at all.
My curiousity peaked, I tried it out:
Flourless, 3 Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup sugar or 3/4 cup, if you prefer
1 large egg
1 cup peanut butter crunchy or smooth

Combine sugar and egg in mixing bowl, stirring until smooth. Add peanut butter and mix thoroughly. Roll into walnut-sized balls.
Place the balls on ungreased cookie sheets at least 2" apart. Flatten with the tines of a fork, then turn the 90 degrees and use fork again t create cross hatches.
Bake 10 minutes at 375 degrees Fahrenheit or until done. Let cool in pan for 1 minute before removing to cooling rack. Leaving them on the sheet for too long will make them hard.
Yes, the cookies are soft after they come from the oven. I dont know how long they stay soft out in the open though, as I had a couple of cousins come over while they were baking and we all pretty much destroyed the cookies.
Still, if you plan on keeping them or any other type of cookies for that matter for a while, then put a slice of bread on the bottom of an air tight container and place the cookies on top. If you have any cookies left when the bread gets hard, replace the piece of bread.
I hope you try this peanut butter cookie recipe and love it. I know Ill be pulling this one out whenever a cookie craving hits me again.

About The Author

Get Your Just Desserts twice monthly at: http://www.koripuckett.com/just-desserts. Tried and true dessert recipes from an average Jane who just loves experimenting with baking.

As Thanksgiving approaches, newspapers, mega-stores, and food producers have recently begun their annual advertising assault to get your turkey dollars. Yet I suspect that huge numbers of people are living in dread and anxiety because theyre uncertain about how their turkeys will turn out. Some will produce turkeys that are a long way from being fully cooked, while others will produce overcooked, tough birds in need of resuscitation.
Has this been a problem for you Do you follow a recipe to the letter, dutifully preheating the oven, timing the recipe precisely, only to have your dish come out nearly raw, or burned beyond recognition
I suggest that for an investment of approximately $5.00, you can improve your chances for cooking well-roasted foods by 90%. Another investment of approximately $10.00 will bring your chances to near perfection. And when I use the term investment, I mean that your $5.00 will pay you dividends in the form of well-roasted food for the indefinite future. Im talking about thermometers; specifically, oven thermometers.
If your oven is more than ten years old, the cooking temperature could vary-in the worst case-by as much as fifty degrees from the temperature youve set on the dial. So if a recipe tells you to cook a roast of beef at 375 F., you could be cooking at anywhere from 325 F to 425 F. and have no way of knowing, until you discover that when you remove your dish from the oven, what youve cooked is overcooked, undercooked, or somewhere in between. But not well cooked.
For approximately the price of a meal for one at McDonalds, you can feel assured that your oven is set at the temperature youre seeking, even if youve had to set the dial at 350 F. in order to arrive at a temperature of 375 F. The typical recipe that calls for, say, cooking something for fifteen minutes per pound, was very likely tested in an oven calibrated to cook at the expected temperature, or an oven fitted with an inexpensive oven thermometer.
Oven thermometers are readily available at the local chain hardware store, or in the kitchen gadget aisle at the local mega-store. The two most popular types, are coil or dial thermometers, and liquid, in which a colored liquid-usually alcohol-expands in glass as it heats, and registers the temperature on a scale. In both cases, the thermometers will have a kind of hook at the top that will enable you to hang them from one of the racks in the oven.
When youve bought your thermometer, its a good idea to put it into boiling water for about five minutes, to see that it registers somewhere close to 212 F. If not, it may have some mechanism for adjustment, or you can simply return it to the store for another.
To test your ovens thermostat, hang the thermometer from the middle shelf, and pre-heat the oven to 350 F. If your thermometer reads 350 F. youre home free. But if the thermometer is, say, ten or twenty degrees off one way or another, try the experiment again, setting the oven to 375 F. If the temperature is off by the same factor, then youll know to set the thermostat with that factor taken into account when you want a particular temperature; 360 F. in order to get 375 F., e.g.
Equipped now with an oven thermometer, and having calculated the necessary adjustment on your oven to produce the desired cooking temperature, I recommend an additional $10.00 investment in an instant-read meat thermometer. By inserting this type of thermometer into meats as they are cooking, it will provide you with-as the name suggests-an instant reading of the meats internal temperature. This is an extremely useful device, because it helps you to account for the vagaries of cooking that go beyond simply knowing that your oven is set to the correct cooking temperature. Your standing rib roast of beef may look photogenic after two hours at 375 F., but until it reaches an internal temperature of 130 F. for medium-rare, it isnt fully cooked.
Gaining the confidence that your oven is set to the correct temperature is not then, the full story. It may be the case that the rear of the oven is hotter than the front, for example. You may notice, as you continue to experiment, that your roast browns far more quickly in the back than in the front. This is where you need to begin to improvise. Very likely, it will simply be a matter of turning your roasting pan one hundred eighty degrees midway through cooking. It could also be the case that youll need to cook foods on a lower rack of the oven. But knowing that youre cooking at the correct temperature is 90% of the battle. The sorts of problems Ive mentioned will be obvious-as will their solutions.
Finally-and this doesnt have to do with ovens, per se-is the issue of carry-over cooking. Nearly any recipe you read for roasted meat of any kind, will instruct you to let the meat rest for a period of time before carving. During this resting period, the meat will continue to cook in varying amounts. For example, a standing rib roast of beef will add about five to ten degrees to its internal temperature while resting for approximately twenty minutes. Therefore, its a good idea to remove your dish from the oven at about five degrees shy of your target temperature. Again, this is a task that would be impossible without an instant-read meat thermometer.
You could certainly buy more sophisticated timers for your roasting tasks. One popular model that retails for between $30.00 and $40.00 is digital, magnetic, so that it sticks to the oven door, and has a fireproof probe that can go into the meat roasting in your oven. And you can program it to beep when your meat has reached the desired internal temperature. Another, more expensive model, has a remote timer that you can carry up to seventy feet from the oven, and it too will beep to remind you that your meat is done. But you can get wonderful results with the least expensive models too.
So make a small investment in your oven. It will repay you with huge dividends in confidence that your roast will be medium rare; that your chicken will have a wonderful crust, yet be moist and juicy; that your meat loaf will make you a legend in the kitchen. And when your friends and family gather around your holiday table, they will proclaim this years turkey to be the best one ever.

About The Author

Skip Lombardi is the author of two cookbooks: "La Cucina dei Poveri: Recipes from my Sicilian Grandparents," and "Almost Italian: Recipes from Americas Little Italys." He has been a Broadway musician, high-school math teacher, software engineer, and a fledgeling blogger. But he has never let any of those pursuits get in the way of his passion for cooking and eating. Visit his Web site to learn more about his cookbooks. http://www.skiplombardi.com or send questions or comments to info@skiplombardi.com.
skip@skiplombardi.com

The basics of tasting wine are relatively simple to learn. Once the fundamentals are mastered, the nuances and details can be enhanced over a lifetime. Like any other skill, tasting wine requires practice, and consistency is probably the most important factor.
One helpful strategy an aspiring wine taster can pursue is tasting with a friend that has superior knowledge. Questions can be addressed, and you will quickly become comfortable with this unnecessarily intimidating subject.
Another important strategy for a beginning wine taster is to taste several wines side-by-side that share at least one common variable. This could be the varietal, style, AVA of origin, or any combination of the three.
Tasting blind will minimize any prior opinions or stereotypes. You may be surprised to discover that less-expensive wines are more pleasing to you.
The Essentials of Tasting Wine
It is imperative that you taste in spotlessly clean glasses. The most common contaminants in unclean glasses are invisible molecules left behind by cleaning products. Even high-end restaurants can be guilty of this faux pas. It is best to thoroughly hand wash glasses with unabrasive soaps and hot water.
It is beneficial, but not necessary to use varietal-specific glasses when tasting wine. Research has shown that the shape of glasses really does make a difference in the sensory experience.
Overview of the Tasting Process
Wine tasting employs much more than just the taste buds, although they are very important. Your palate is a term for how taste buds on your tongue translate particular flavors to your brain. The palate can perceive only four basic flavors: sweetness, sourness, saltiness, and bitterness. Most of the subtle flavor components of wine are actually picked up by ones sense of smell.
Although many of our daily perceptions are unconscious, making a concerted effort to pay attention to several things makes the tasting process more educational and rewarding. Despite the mystique that surrounds many wine "experts", tasting wine can be broken into simple steps. Wine knowledge usually stems from practice and confidence, not any inherent superiority.
Of course, some people have more developed senses than others. An extreme example is Robert Parker, widely regarded as the most influential wine critic in the world. Mr. Parkers tasting ability is derived from his natural ability to be keenly aware of his senses.
It is within the grasp of the vast majority of people to confidently differentiate varietals, styles, flavor profiles, and flaws when tasting wine. Tasting wine requires not only a grasp of your senses, but also the ability to articulate with the proper vernacular your thoughts about a particular wine.
Relevance of Sight in Tasting Wine
Your sense of sight will reveal a lot about a particular wine before smelling and tasting it. Immediately after pouring, check to see how clear the wine is. While haziness may simply indicate a full-bodied, unfiltered red wine, in any other style it is usually cause for concern. Wines will often taste the way that they look an unrefined look may indicate a clumsy, unfocused wine.
Viewing the color of the edge of a wine in a glass will give you an indication of its maturity or lack thereof. Mature, aged-worthy reds will have a deep crimson, or even brownish look. Too much brown usually means that the wine is past its prime. the rim of a white wine will generally be light yellow in youth, and and progress to an amber color with age.
After your initial visual impressions, swirl the wine in your glass. While this may be tricky at first, you will pick it up quickly. This reveals the "legs". The more wine sticks to the side of a glass, the higher the alcohol content.
The Role of the Sense of Smell During Wine Tasting
As mentioned earlier, many of the subtle "tastes" of wine are actually perceived by your sense of smell. While there are only four perceptible tastes, there are thousands of different scents. Revealingly, sinus congestion will stop even the most experienced and accomplished wine taster in his/her tracks. Smell is perceived through the upper nose as well as through the back of the throat. Molecules of different scents are registed by the olfactory bulb in the sinuses.
Before smelling a wine, swirl the glass again to reveal the aroma. When smelling a wine, attempt to put any familiar aromas into the context of previous tastings. This is the fundamental basis for increasing your knowledge of tasting wine.
After smelling the wine, the majority of registered perceptions occur very quickly. Sense of smell is very delicate and easily overwhelmed. Smelling the same thing repeatedly becomes less and less revelatory in rapid succession. If you do not immediately pick out the array of aromas in a wine, relax for a minute or two, then try again.
The Actual Tasting Begins
After experiencing the aroma of a wine, it is logically time to taste. Swirl the wine once more, and then swallow a small sip. After your initial impression, take a slightly larger sip and make an effort to coat your entire mouth. This is called, "chewing" the wine. Before swallowing, aerate the wine in your mouth. While this makes a slightly strange sound, the enhanced flavors and aromas that are released are more than worth it.
Another important component in the tasting process is touch, or how the wine feels in your mouth. Major variables to be aware of are the body of the wine, serving temperature, and astringency. The body of a wine includes the depth of flavor and alcohol content. If these components are underrepresented, a wine will taste dilluted.
Serving temperature is an important variable that mainly hinges on the varietals that compose a particular wine. A crisp Sauvignon Blanc will taste flat at room temperature, and should be chilled. On the contrary, a well-aged Cabernet Sauvignon will not reveal its true complexity when served too cold. The incorrect serving temperature for a wine will adversely affect both the aroma and flavor.
Astringency is basically a synonym for bitterness, and is caused by excessive or unmellowed tannins. Great red wines often taste astringent in their youth, but develop into opulent masterpieces when mature.
I hope that you believe that proper wine tasting skills are within your reach; because they certainly are. Mankinds ancient enjoyment of wine is largely derived from the fact that our senses, feelings, and preferences are the basic components of what makes us human.

About The Author
Ben Bicais lives in the Napa Valley and is the webmaster of http://www.california-wine-tours-and-accessories.com.
ben@california-wine-tours-and-accessories.com

To understand what a Scoville Unit is, one must understand what they measure. All hot peppers contain capsaicinoids, natural substances that produce a burning sensation in the mouth, causing the eyes to water and the nose to run, and even induce perspiration. The primary capsaicinoid, capsaicin, is so hot that a single drop diluted in 100,000 drops of water will produce a blistering of the tongue.
Capsaicinoids are found primarily in the pepper