100 Quotes by Claire Saffitz

When making any pureed soup, don't blend all the liquids and solids together at once. Hold back some liquid at first and use it to thin the soup as needed. You can always add more liquid, but there's not much you can do to fix a too-thin soup.

Gluten - the elastic strands that give bread its chewy texture - forms when certain proteins in flour interact with water, which is desirable in bread, but not tender cake.

Lame blades can dull relatively quickly, so after slashing several loaves the blade won't slice through the dough with tremendous ease. (When this happens, don't throw it away - it's still sharp enough to score duck or pork skin, or shave paper-thin slices of garlic and chives, like a hot knife through butter).

Always deep fry in a nonreactive, heavy pot with high sides, like an enameled Dutch oven. A heavy pot ensures even heating which means more even cooking.

Whipped ganache is a great gateway icing if you're working your way slowly into the vast world of egg-based buttercreams. It's just a few ingredients and far superior in flavor to the basic butter/sugar/milk frosting.

Deep-frying properly requires you to keep the oil at a precise temperature range depending on the food. If you're frying in more than an inch of oil you really should invest in a deep-fat thermometer so you can monitor the temperature and know when to adjust the heat.

I always keep some variety of dumpling in my freezer for convenience, but frozen homemade pierogi are a special treat.

Cooking for a crowd during the holidays takes a lot of time and effort, so we understand the desire to outsource as much of the work as possible.

Turmeric or cinnamon? Nuts or raisins? The players may change, but the fundamentals of fluffy, fragrant pilaf are always the same.