Foodie Book Review: Christine France Cooking Hints and Tips

As someone who worked hard to learn properly how to cook, I highly appreciate the value of books who are teaching you not only how to properly mix the ingredients, but also how to organize your kitchen and your working space in general. This book by Christine France brought rapidly light into long years of darkness when it comes to coping with the usual kitchen challenges. 

The information is very well organized and suits someone without too much time, but a lot of curiosities about the hints and tips of cooking. It goes from the very simple time and space management details, till guidance about how you should design your kitchen as to have enough movement space and enjoy your cooking experience not only through tasting. It also outlines the ways in which one can chose the perfect electronic items helping to avoid energy consumption, and good cleaning tips. Last but not least, there are also interesting ideas for table settings and as we have at least once the week the Shabbes table there is never enough inspiration for surprising your guests.

At the beginning - it sounds like long time ago, but it is not that far away in time to be honest - I struggled with the mixture of different smells in the fridge. If I knew that a simple plastic coverage can avoid this, I would have avoid a lot of unpleasant minutes spent with the door of the fridge open - yes, I know it is wasting energy too...- trying to figure out the best solution. Another idea is to always have half apple in the kitchen and change it every week. 

Another practical tip is to clean copper with lemon juice or with a pasta made out of vinegar and flour.  

Once I attended a cooking class and some of the participants were using their own special knives carefully looked after. Such a high attention is due to the fact that the good ones are usually very expensive and hard to find. Thus, be careful not to use them for cutting paper or plastic - there is not only an idea children have, believe me. If you don't have a wooden support to keep them, you can protect the knife blade with a cork. For sharpening, a piece of ceramics can be helpful for keeping the blade at proper standards. 

The conservation of some fresh herbs might be problematic, especially in warmer climate. Dry them in the oven or the microwave and you can have them for long. Also, from the kosher point of view, this is a very good idea. My dear garlic can be kept for a longer time fresh if it's hidden in the dark and out of sources of heat. Fruits like lemons or oranges can be kept fresh for a longer time if covered in several layers of paper and in a dry place. 

Many utensils used in the kitchen can have various chemical interactions with the food, especially those made of metal. Thus, if you want to have a good and chemicals free purée, you better use wooden utensils - as I am doing as well. 

The book can be read easily and is strongly recommended to both beginner and advancer cooker.