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Tips & Tools
Among the things that distinguishes At Home from other cookbooks and websites is its emphasis on teaching you how to improve your cooking techniques and understanding of ingredients, how to freshen up your decor and hone your party style. I can show you how to make affordable crab cakes for 8 guests, how to dress up store-bought desserts, how to refresh dinner rolls and how to come up with your very own house cocktail.
Sample some of my insight, accumulated over decades of catering and cooking experience. Receive more tips and tools through my blog, AtHomebyStevePoses.wordpress.com.
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Entertaining tips
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Serving Edamame with Sea Salt
Edamame, or fresh soybeans, are an easy, healthy addition to your cocktail table. They’re typically sold frozen in their pods and are now widely available in better supermarkets. To prepare them, blanch edamame in salted water for about five minutes. Drain and toss pods well in coarse kosher or sea salt. Serve the beans in their pods, either warm or chilled, and don’t forget to include an empty bowl for discarded pods.
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| Ingredients tips |
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Parmesan Cheese: Good,
Better, Best
If I had to pick only one cheese to eat for the rest of my life—God forbid—it would be aged Parmigiano-Reggiano. Produced only in the Northern Italian region around Emilia-Romagna and the city of Parma (anything else is an imitation), the cheese is made from raw cow’s milk poured into 100-pound wheels and cured to a moist and crumbly, salty and pungent nuttiness. I love a large nugget on its own or grated into soup or pasta, shaved onto a salad or served with fresh figs. Recently, we worked with a chef from Modena, a city within Emilia-Romagna, who made a divine Parmigiano “gelato” by cooking cheese and cream to a thick and scoopable consistency and served it on a nut bread with 30-year old balsamic. Though there are plenty of paler parmesans in your market and the real article is costly, a little goes a long way and I find that this is one ingredient that’s worth the cost. Other excellent grating cheeses include asiago, which is a bit sweeter and pecorino, a sharper hard sheep’s milk cheese. Pre-grated cheese should be skipped unless it’s your last resort. It’s best to pass a hunk of cheese and a hand grater and let your guests shave away salty filings to their heart’s content. They will be—pardon the pun—forever grateful. |
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Hospitality
Hospitality is an intentional and managed act. Hospitality begins by creating comfortable anticipation. It’s about setting a place where people feel welcome, safe and cared for, and from which they can enjoy an unfolding experience that has a beginning, middle and end. This fundamental definition applies equally to a hosted home dinner, a suburban diner and a five-star restaurant. |
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Fresh Corn
Fresh corn is among my favorite foods. In the summer, I might have it for dinner for weeks on end. I love it grilled, boiled or steamed in a wet paper towel in the microwave. To make it using the latter method, shuck the corn, wrap it completely in a paper towel and make the towel very moist, but not dripping wet. Cook each ear for about 1½ minutes. Let the corn sit in the paper towel for another minute or two to finish steaming. My preference when grilling corn is to shuck the corn, brush with a little olive oil, and put it on the grill taking care to nicely toast the kernels without burning them. This is best done with patience and a moderate heat. Finish with a little more olive oil and salt and pepper. (Some people grill corn in the husk. This protects the corn kernels and allows the corn to pick up some of smoky flavor, but in protecting the corn, it also prevents the heat from caramelizing the kernels. And then you have the hassle of shucking hot corn with charred silk.) Fresh corn kernels are a wonderful ingredient in a grain salad, soup or curry. Cook the corn and using a sharp knife, slice the kernels from the cob. Then scrape the corn to release the sweet, residual corn “milk” and remaining nubs of the kernels. Don't stop here. There’s huge flavor in corncobs. Use the cobs to make a sweet stock for vegetable soups, especially vegetable soups with corn. The sweet corn stock is also an excellent base for a curry that needs some sweetness. |
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