On cracking eggs: There’s a thin membrane on the inside of an egg’s shell. When you crack an egg, you’re actually aiming to break that membrane. If you crack the shell but the membrane’s still intact, the egg won’t split cleanly and most likely you will get shell pieces in your food. Figuring this out reduced my shell-in-food mishaps by something like 80%.
On butter: Real butter (the kind that comes in sticks) is meant to be kept at room temperature when you’re going to use it. It lasts a week or more that way in a butter dish. I somehow didn’t realize this until I was past thirty. I used margarine all my life, because I thought it was normal for butter to be rock-solid and completely unspreadable, as it is when taken out of the fridge.
Butter is meant to be kept at room temperature only if you’re going to use it as a spread. If you mostly use it as an ingredient, or for flavoring vegetables, it’s better to keep it refridgerated.
Two boring items of cooking interest:
On cracking eggs: There’s a thin membrane on the inside of an egg’s shell. When you crack an egg, you’re actually aiming to break that membrane. If you crack the shell but the membrane’s still intact, the egg won’t split cleanly and most likely you will get shell pieces in your food. Figuring this out reduced my shell-in-food mishaps by something like 80%.
On butter: Real butter (the kind that comes in sticks) is meant to be kept at room temperature when you’re going to use it. It lasts a week or more that way in a butter dish. I somehow didn’t realize this until I was past thirty. I used margarine all my life, because I thought it was normal for butter to be rock-solid and completely unspreadable, as it is when taken out of the fridge.
Butter is meant to be kept at room temperature only if you’re going to use it as a spread. If you mostly use it as an ingredient, or for flavoring vegetables, it’s better to keep it refridgerated.