Every chef has a few food hacks that they use in every day. Food hacks are small, astonishing tricks to do something quicker, faster, or easier. Food hacks accelerate the cooking and preparing process and are fun to use as well. I am sure you have many of your own which you use frequently, which is why we have made this list to fill your food hack arsenal even more. We have carefully curated some of the hacks that we think are the best and that will be extremely useful for you in the kitchen. Enjoy!
- Use cookie cutter molds for pancakes
Everyone has made pancakes before, that is a simple fact. Pancakes are a food that nearly everyone enjoys and loves to have for breakfast. While there are many ways to customize your pancakes after they are cooked with syrup, chocolate chips, fruit etc. There isn’t a lot you can do to make them stand out before or while they are cooking. Every pancake pretty much looks the same with its circular/oval shape and form. However, there is one way to make your pancakes look a whole lot more interesting and that is with cookie cutter molds. By putting cookie cutters in the pan and pouring the pancake mix in them, it makes the pancakes come out in that shape as opposed to being round. This makes pancakes so much more fun and puts a new twist on them.
- Spray cooking spray on guacamole to prevent it from going brown
If you have ever made guacamole before and left it out for too long, you definitely know what I am talking about. Leaving guacamole out for even a fairly short amount of time can make it go brown and rotten. It ruins the flavor and makes the precious guac go to waste. However, with a simple food hack you can change all this. By spraying a small amount of cooking spray on the top of the guacamole it prevents it from going brown for a much longer period of time. This way you can easily save your guacamole for later without having to worry about it going brown. This is an easy food hack that everyone who makes guacamole should definitely use. Lemon juice can also be used for the same purpose!
- Use a warm glass to soften butter
When you need softened butter for buttering bread or putting it in a bowl for a recipe, it can take a very long time to soften. If you put it in a microwave, it can end in the butter fully melting and turning to liquid which is not what you want. To soften butter but not fully melt it, there is an easy food hack you can use. Warm up a glass by either pouring hot water on it or putting it in the microwave for 15 seconds. Once it is warm, place the cup on top of the butter and wait. The heat from the cup will soften the butter and make it spreadable and soft. This saves a lot of time from waiting for it to soften right out the fridge and is a really easy hack to use.
- Make your fingers wet to easily pull out eggshells
When cracking eggs into a bowl, everyone, including pro chefs have gotten a piece of eggshell into the bowl as well. Getting eggshell out a bowl can be a pain, especially when you want to get your cooking done fast. Using just your fingers can be a tedious process and waste a lot of time. Fortunately, there is a very simple food hack that can greatly help you get eggshells out with less effort. Run your fingers under some water and attempt to get the eggshell out again, it is so much easier. Grabbing the eggshell is a breeze and will make getting it in the bowl not much of a big deal anymore.
- Keep cookies moist by storing them with a piece of apple
Everyone loves the taste of a fresh chocolate chip cookie right out of the oven. They are hot and moist and taste way better than one that is five days old. Many people try to eat as many cookies as they can when they come out of the oven as they are never as good the next day, but what if there was a way to change this. After your cookies have come out of the oven, store them in a Tupperware container with an apple wedge. Yes, an apple wedge. The general way of putting cookies in a container with nothing else leaves cookies dry as there is not enough moisture in the container. An apple wedge gives the cookies moisture which makes them taste fresher for longer.
- Use a rubber band to easily open jars
I am sure you have been there when you just can’t open a jar, no matter what how hard you try. This can waste a lot of precious time and is a huge struggle in the kitchen. The conventional ways such as using a kitchen towel sometimes work, but not always. Luckily, there is an even better method of opening jars that will save you a countless amount of time in the kitchen. If a jar is just not opening, find a rubber band and wrap it around the lid. This increases friction, making the lid more easily come off. One reason lids can be so hard to open is they are slippery, this method easily solves that.
- Freeze fruit to make fancy ice cubes
Have you ever had a cold glass of water with ice cubes in it and wanted to sparkle it up a little bit. One way to make your drinks far more interesting is instead of making and using ice cubes, freeze pieces of fruit. Some great fruits to use are berries, apples, and lemons. If it is a big fruit, slice it up into ice cube sized pieces and put it in the freezer overnight. If you are using berries, you can put them straight in with no cutting needed. Once frozen, these pieces of frozen fruit can be used just like ice cubes. They cool down your drinks and give them a bit of extra fruity flavour as well. This is a no brainer for anyone who likes cold beverages.
- Remove the avocado stem to tell if it is ripe
There is nothing worse than an overripe or under ripe avocado. Under ripe ones are tough and not spreadable, while over ripe avocados are brown and taste rotten. With avocados, it is hard to tell if they are ripe or not as they are covered in skin which prevents you from seeing. As always, there is a food hack for this. Find the stem of the avocado (at the top) and take it off. Underneath, you will see the colour of the avocado itself and from there you can tell if it is ripe or not. If it is too bright, it is under ripe, if it is too brown, it is over ripe. If it is right in the middle then you have a delicious ripe avocado. This is an easy trick that all avocado lovers should without a doubt use.
- Use a bowl of water to check the freshness of eggs
The freshness of eggs can sometimes be hard to tell purely by looking at them. It is important to have fresh eggs as rotten eggs taste terrible and leave you sick. Luckily, there is an easy way to test whether an egg is fresh, nearly rotten, and rotten. All you need is a large bowl of water, that’s it. Grab your eggs and place them into the bowl of water. If an egg is fresh, it will sink and rest on its side at the bottom of the bowl. If it is soon to be rotten, it will sink to the bottom but stay up right; eat these eggs as soon as you can. If it floats and does not sink, chuck it out as it is rotten and can get you sick. If you are working with eggs frequently, this is a hack you can’t miss.
- Use a piece of bread to keep brown sugar soft
Brown sugar needs to be kept soft, otherwise it will go hard and won’t be able to be used properly in cooking. To keep your brown sugar soft and moist, place a piece of bread in with it. This sounds weird, and it definitely is. Like the apple wedge with the cookies, the bread keeps the brown sugar moist and soft, making it fresh and usable for longer. You may think that overtime, the bread will go mouldy, but since it is surrounded by sugar, it won’t happen as fast and you will not need to change it very often. This is a great use for stale bread that needs to be thrown out and it puts it to good use. Keeping brown sugar soft is a must have in your kitchen and this is an easy simple way to do this.
Overall, food hacks are an ingenious way to make cooking a little bit easier. We hope you have gained a lot of knowledge from this article and that you have learned a few food hacks that you will use later on.
