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Simple tips to make home-cooked food look professional
Cooking Tips for Hot Weather
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When temperatures are high, it’s hard to keep your cool in a hot kitchen. The refrigerator is working overtime, and cooking on the range or running the dishwasher just adds more heat to the room.
But with a few tweaks to your routine and your appliances, you can keep the kitchen comfortable—and even save energy. Here are some hot-weather cooking tips from the experts at Consumer Reports.
The Refrigerator
In our refrigerator tests we crank up the heat in our test lab, but those aren’t the ideal conditions for a fridge. To keep your refrigerator humming but not running overtime, make sure the front grille is free of dirt—keeping it clean will improve airflow to the condenser. Likewise, clean the condenser coil with a brush or vacuum, and make sure the door closes tightly by washing the door gasket
Fourth of July barbecue food safety tips: how to keep foodborne bacteria at bay
Fourth of July celebrations may be back to normal for Americans as U.S. coronavirus cases drop and more than half (57%) of American adults are fully vaccinated. With typical holiday celebrations comes fireworks, barbecues and lots of food.
Several food experts are warning Americans not to let the holiday excitement distract them from food safety protocols. Bacteria, food poisoning and poorly cooked meals can easily ruin a celebration.
“Rates of foodborne illness tend to increase during the summer months because germs grow faster in warmer, more humid weather. People also cook and eat outside, making shortcuts to food safety tempting because they are away from the convenience of soap and running water at the kitchen sink,” Sandra Eskin, USDA’s Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety, said in a news release.
More than half of Americans (57%) plan to grill or barbecue over the holiday weekend — that’s more
Top cooking tips from the Barefoot Contessa
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