These viral food hacks will save you time.

Viral food hacks that will save you time in the kitchen

1) Pour oil without spilling

When you wish to pour oil from a packet ( when you buy a packet of oil- say 500 ml , you get more than when you buy a bottle stating the same ml ! ) I've tried. I am a person who believes in repurpose or reusing whatever is there at home. I used an old glass bottle which had ketchup, which was washed, dried. When I bought a packet of sesame oil 500 ml, it came more than the bottle can hold ! 

How to pour in the bottle without dripping out, is cut a small bit from one corner of the packet, either put a spoon in the bottle, when you pour, the spoon will make sure that it doesn't spill out. The spoon/ ladle should be longer than the bottle. 

2) To roll out rotis one by one is a tedious job. Normally when you roll out a roti, we take enough dough roll it round that flatten with your hand and dust flower on both sides to roll, right !

Now take 4/5 roti dough, dust each one with enough flour, stack them on top of each other, than roll it, at one stroke, you've rolled out 5 rotis ! It may take a little practice, once you finished rolling the rotis, carefully lift one by one and spread it on a plate. 

To make phulkas, I used to put one roti on the tawa, once the bottom side is lightly cooked, I put another roti on top and flip it down, for it to get cooked, then turn it, turn the top roti, cooked side down and once the down roti is cooked, flip the top one, as the tawa will be hot, you can remove the tawa from the gas and cook the top roti on fire till it puffs up on both sides, then beat it to remove excess flour, cook the other roti on the tawa over the fire till it puffs up, remove the extra flour, smear some ghee on one roti, put the other roti on top on press it well, so the ghee spreads on both rotis. I put a cloth then put cooked rotis on top, so that they don't sweat and get wet by the time you start eating. Once all the rotis are cooked, I cover it well with the cloth. On the top roti, I don't put ghee, as I'm going to cover it with a cloth.

3) It is easier to keep near you all the ingredients that you need for the dish, vegetables, masalas, oil, tamarind water, salt etc. If I'm using onion for a vegetable, as I chop the onion fine, I light the gas and keep my kadai/ pan with oil and put cumin / mustard seeds on it. Before it splutters, onion will be cut, also if I need garlic, ginger, green chilies, as I keep the gas small.

While the onion is getting fried ( add little salt), I start cutting the vegetable that I need next to go into the kadai, so less time standing near the gas, as I keep turning the onion and cut the veges too at the same time.

I cover and cook almost all veges, including lady finger, brinjal till they're tender, then remove the lid for ladyfinger and brinjal to add salt and spices.

4) You want greens not to get dark, add a big pinch of baking soda to the vegetable and mix well once it starts to cook.

While we're in Delhi, I used to plan the menu and use the kadai first for doing tadka for sambar, rasam and use the same kadai for cooking veges later, so less vessels to clean.

5) When I use the pressure cooker, I stack, rice in one, dal in another and if there are root veges like yam or colacassia/ arbi , I put it on top, or at times if no vege, I put potatoes whole to cook, once cool, I store it in the fridge without peeling the skin. It comes handy when you're making upma- avil, or wish to make quickly any vege or alu parantha ! 

Hope these tips are useful to all to help you save time in the kitchen.

 

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