ahead and prep the ingredients before you begin cooking. This is traditionally known as mis en place or
“everything in its place,” and it is absolutely key to a
pleasant and victorious cooking experience!
Wet versus Dry Measuring: It’s important to
measure your wet and dry ingredients differently.
Wet ingredients require a liquid measuring cup,
which usually looks like a glass with a handle and
markings that designate volume. Liquid measuring
cups are specifically designed so that, if you squat
down so that your eye is at measuring line level, you’ll
get an accurate reading. If you were to try to use
dry ingredient measuring cups for liquid you would
1) likely spill some and 2) get a slightly inaccurate
measurement. To properly measure dry ingredients,
you want to scoop them so that they’re a bit overly
full, and then use a butter knife to scrape any excess
off across the top. Before scraping, I suggest tapping
the cup gently on the countertop, to remove any air
and make sure you’ve actually filled it properly.
Making Sauces, Dressings, Seasoning Mixes,
and Condiments: If an ingredient list includes a
subsection for any of these, look for when to make
them in the instructions. Often they don’t need to be
made first and instead can be made when something
else is cooking or marinating or cooling.
Oven Rack: I always use the middle rack. If I’m
baking two things at once, I use the middle and
bottom third rack and switch positions of the pans
halfway through the cooking time.
Use Binder Clips for Parchment: When lining
a loaf pan or other baking dish with parchment,
this is a game changer—use small binder
clips to hold parchment paper down around the
edges of a loaf pan or baking sheet; you can keep
them on during baking if they are metal. Other
ways to manage your parchment include 1) greasing
the dish before adding the parchment; 2) crumbling
the parchment into a tight ball, then unfolding
to make it more malleable; and 3) taping it down
with regular adhesive tape—this will be fine in
the oven.
Make Ahead: All casseroles can be assembled the
night before and baked the next day, but they will
need another 5 to 10 minutes baking time because
of the chill.
Leftovers: All estimated lengths of time for keeping
leftovers with meat assume the meat was fresh, not
ready to expire, when the item was prepared.
Room Temperature Ingredients: Some recipes
will specify room-temperature ingredients, and
this is not to make your life more difficult! At room
HOW LONG CAN YOU FREEZE FOODS?
This chart assumes that the food you’re freezing is fresh going into the freezer.
COOKED
RAW
