Tag Archives: Culinary

Grater

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Grater

Grate the cheese.

  • A grater is also known as a shredder, and by pressing the food against the grater and moving the food down along it, it shreds the food into smaller pieces.
  • Graters come in a wide variety of shapes and styles, including the traditional box grater, and the plane grater, although most have a steel plate with sharp edged holes.
  • It is believed that French François Boullier invented the grater in the 1540s, due to a surplus supply of cheese, although the surplus was short lived, and so graters were very rarely used in the following centuries.
  • Due to the significant excess of cheese in the early 1500s, much of the cheese hardened due to longer storage times, so grating the cheese made it more usable.
  • Graters can cut fingers or knuckles if you strike your hand on one, so care needs to be taken while grating.

Cheese , Grater, Shredder, Metal, Plastic, Tupperware, Handheld, White Stand, Ten Random Facts

  • Coconut graters are used as musical instruments in Jamaica.
  • The first grater was made out of pewter, a type of metal mainly made of tin, and can be seen in the Muséum du Havre in France.
  • Graters were reintroduced in the 1920s by Jeffery Taylor from Philadelphia, a cheese shop owner, after he read about Boullier’s invention, and his first grater was said to be a sharpened metal shower drain.
  • Cheese; some vegetables; citrus rinds; chocolate; and other hard, or semi hard foods can be grated, which allows them to cook or melt more quickly, or they can be used as a garnish.
  • Graters became popular in the Great Depression because grated cheese appeared to have greater volume, which was an advantage to those who could not afford large  quantities of food.
Bibliography,
Grater, 2013, Wikipedia, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grater>
Salar, S 2007, The Cheese Grater, Magnetic Salmon and Other Little Known Facts, <http://magneticsalmon.blogspot.com.au/2007/12/cheese-grater.html>

Honey

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Honey

Yummy… and sticky.

  • Honey is a food made by bees, or other insects, and the main ingredient is nectar, which is processed by the insect.
  • Honey bees are the most well known honey makers and produce the most common honey, and there is evidence that this type of honey has been eaten by humans for thousands of years.
  • Honey can absorb moisture from the air, so it is best kept in a sealed container so that it does not become fermented due to the honey’s yeast content and the increased moisture.
  • Honey contains a combination of almost 70% fructose and glucose, and has about the same sweetness as cane sugar.
  • Crystallised honey melts at 40°C to 50°C (104°F to 122°F), and if honey is heated above 70°C (158 °F), it kills the yeast content of the honey, and this is called pasteurised honey.

 Honey, Glass, Clear, Yellow, dark, Crystalize, Ten Random Facts, Sweet, Australia

  • There are a few different types of honey, including creamed honey – a crystallised whipped honey mixture; raw honey – which usually contains small amounts of pollen and wax; and filtered honey – normally found in supermarkets.
  • Honey has significant nutritional and health benefits, with antiseptic, antibacterial and antioxidant properties, and has been used medicinally for at least 2,000 years.
  • Honey is often used to sweeten things such as drinks, used as a spread, or commonly used in cooking, and is the main ingredient in mead, a type of wine.
  • China, Turkey and the Ukraine produced the most honey in the world in 2012.
  • It is advised not to feed young children under the age of one, honey, as their young digestive system does not destroy the bacteria present in the honey, and this can cause botulism, a rare but fatal disease.
Bibliography:
Honey, 2013, Wikipedia, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honey>

Watermelon

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Watermelon

Refreshing, on a hot day.

  • The scientific name for watermelons is citrullas lanatus, and they grow on a vine-like flowering plant from the family Cucurbitaceae, which is the family of squashes, melons and gourds.
  • Watermelons are believed to be native to southern and tropical Africa, where it grows in the wild.
  • Watermelons have a smooth outer casing that can be green, yellow, black or white in colour, often with dark stripes, and they normally have a juicy red interior, although they can also be white or yellow inside.
  • Watermelons were eaten in Ancient Egypt, and watermelon seeds have been found in Pharaoh tombs.
  • One beehive is normally placed for every 4000 square metres (1 acre) of watermelon plants, so that they can be effectively pollinated.

Watermelon, Cut, Halves, Seedless, Pattern, Green, Red, Ten Random Facts

  • Watermelons take from 80-95 days to mature, and be ready for harvest, depending on the variety.
  • China produced almost 70 million tonnes (77 million tons) of watermelons in 2011, which was over 66% of the world’s production.
  • Watermelons contain significant amounts of Vitamin A and C, and water makes up approximately 91% of a watermelon’s weight, and 6% is sugar.
  • Some Japanese watermelon farmers have been known to grow watermelons in glass cubes, which produces cubic watermelons, that enables the watermelons to be stacked more easily.
  • The seeds and rind of the watermelon are nutritious and edible, and even though it is common for people to discard the rinds and just eat the flesh, they can be made into pickles, jams, candy, stir-fried, or cooked in curries or other dishes, or eaten raw, and the juice of the watermelon can be made into wine.
Bibliography:
Watermelon, 2013, Wikipedia, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watermelon>

Cucumber

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Cucumber

These facts are as cool as a cucumber.

  • Cucumbers are generally torpedo shaped edible fruit or vegetables, and a fruit bearing creeper vine from the family Cucurbitaceae, the family of gourds.
  • The scientific name for a cucumber is cucumis sativus, and some of the varieties are apple cucumber, continental or telegraph cucumber, lebanese cucumber and pickling cucumber.
  • Cucumbers are native to India although they have been grown in Egypt, Greece and Rome for thousands of years.
  • Bees (normally honey bees) are often transported to cucumber farms where there aren’t bees, because cucumbers need them to for pollination.
  • China was the top producer of cucumbers in 2010 with 40,709,556 tonnes (40,066,610 tons), producing over 70% of the world’s cucumbers.

Cucumber, Cut, Long, Telegraph, Green, Seeds, Plate, Raw, Australia, Ten Random Facts

  • Cucumbers have edible skin and seeds, and are most often eaten raw, but are also eaten cooked, sliced and pickled.
  • Cucumbers are made up of 90 – 96% water, and as a result they were often brought as provisions on desert trips.
  • Cucumbers can be green, white or yellow in colour, depending on the variety and the age of the fruit.
  • Cucumbers should not be stored near fruit, especially apples, tomatoes and melons, as they will age quicker.
  • Cucumbers have very little nutritional value, and the flavour is mostly contained in the seeds, which become bitter the older the cucumber gets.
Bibliography:
Cucumber, 2011, Fresh for Kids, <http://www.freshforkids.com.au/veg_pages/cucumber/cucumber.html>
Cucumber, 2013, Wikipedia, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cucumber>

Edible Mushroom

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Edible Mushroom

Eat edible mushrooms not poisonous ones!

  • Edible mushrooms are fleshy, edible food from the species macro-fungi.
  • Edible mushrooms are eaten by humans, and cultivated ones are often eaten raw in a salad, or cooked in stirfries, stews, sauces and other dishes.
  • Wild mushrooms need to be thoroughly inspected and identified to see if they are edible, as they can often be poisonous, even if they look edible.
  • Edible mushrooms have a long history in China and have been eaten in that country hundreds of years BC.
  • Edible mushrooms are cultivated in a least 60 countries.

Mushroom, white, edible, eat, five, lots, bunches, Ten Random Facts, Australia

  • There are over 20 species of mushrooms that are edible.
  • Some mushrooms are used in traditional medicine, and are called medicinal mushrooms, although they are not necessarily considered edible.
  • Some species of mushrooms are poisonous when raw, and when cooked the toxins are eliminated, and are then edible.
  • China is the biggest producer of mushrooms in the world, harvesting over 45% of the world’s mushrooms, and producing 1,458,952 tonnes (1,608,219 tons) of edible mushrooms in 2008, followed by the United States with 329,816 tonnes (363,560 tons) in 2008.
  • Edible mushrooms contain very large quantities of vitamin D2 if they have been exposed to UV light, even for a short time, and a serve of mushrooms can easily give a person more than their recommended daily requirements of vitamin D.
Bibliography:
Edible Mushroom, 2013, Wikipedia, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edible_mushroom>

Maple Syrup

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Maple Syrup

Amber coloured syrup.

  • Maple syrup is a flavoured syrup from the sap of certain maple trees, tapped mainly during early spring over a 4-8 week period, when the stored winter starch in the roots and trunk rises in the tree and is converted to sugar.
  • Maple syrup was first collected, made and used by the indigenous North Americans.
  • Quebec, Canada, produces three quarters of the world’s maple syrup, with Canada exporting over US$141 million worth of maple syrup every year.
  • To collect maple syrup sap, holes are bored in the maple trees; special taps are inserted into the holes; and the sap drips into the bucket underneath or into tubes that go direct to the processing building.
  • To produce maple syrup, the sap is boiled to remove  most of the water content, the liquid is then filtered to remove any small sugar crystals, and what remains is maple syrup.

Maple syrup, gold, amber, flavour, food, canada, 100% brookdale real,

  • Although maple syrup is mostly sucrose and water, with its sugar content being over 60%, it contains a significant  amount of manganese and zinc.
  • Maple syrup is most often used on pancakes, waffles, and French toast, although it is also used as a sweetener and flavouring in baked goods, drinks and other food items.
  • Maple syrup was the main food sweetener in North America and the United States in the 1600s and 1700s, and remained so until after the American Civil War in the 1860s, when cane sugar became more cheaply, and readily available.
  • Approximately 40 litres (10.5 US gallons) of maple syrup sap, makes 1 litre (0.26 US gallons) of maple syrup.
  • Imitation maple syrup is also produced, and usually doesn’t contain any maple sap syrup, or very little, and is an inferior product and generally much cheaper than real maple syrup.
Bibliography:
Maple Syrup, 2013, Wikipedia, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maple_syrup>
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