If I knew what I know now when I was younger (Home Cooking - Helpful Hints and Tips)

Member Name: CAFCGirl

Product:	Home Cooking - Helpful Hints and Tips
Date:	04/12/08 (115 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Yum.

Disadvantages: You have to go through the disasters first

My helpful hints and tips in the 6 years since I've been cooking after leaving home are as follows:

Cook rice in a deep frying pan - For some reasons (possibly because its got a greater surface area) my rice has always been perfectly cooked and fluffy when I've cook it in a frying pan as opposed to a saucepan.
I rinse my rice in cold running water, in a sieve before adding to the saucepan. This seems to get rid of some of the starch content which stops it clinging together.
Stir it once or twice with a wooden spoon, cover and cook. Too much stirring and lid lifting seems to upset the process. Keep the heat steady, and leave it alone.
Cooking rice this way I've never needed to rinse it after cooking, but just sieved it off, and then fluffed slightly in the sieve with a fork, and serve.

Onions - I dont generally suffer with streaming eyes, as I try to avoid cutting through the roots as much as possible. My one tip with onions however is more to do with the smell. If you can get hold of it a soap stone comes in really handy. It looks like a metal egg, and you essentially wash your hands with it under running water. If you cant get one, then rub your fingers and hands over your taps. The metal takes the smell of onions off your skin! Who'd have known!?

Third top tip is with sweet potatoes for roasting.
These take about 25 minutes, I simply rinse and cut. There's no need to peel them. If peeled they have a habit of breaking down (seem to have much more water content than regular potatoes), and turning to mush. Leave the skin complete, slice, and roast. There's no need to boil them off like carrots and potatoes.
Light drizzle of oil is all they need, and they taste gorgeous!

Editted:
Forgot to mention about eggs.
I never keep these stored in the fridge, especially if they are being used for cake baking.
When too cold, I find it takes a lot more stirring to get the egg to break down and mix with the dry ingredients. I keep mine in a little egg basket on the side, out od direct sunlight, and have to try and remember when I bought them...

When cracking eggs for baking or frying, I use the back edge of a knife. I think this strikes the shell with more pin point pressing than on the side of the bowl, and means less pieces of shell falling off.
Im yet to master the art of cracking an egg with one hand!

Summary: Learn from other peoples mistakes