Most people who have been cooking for a long time generally feel that they know all there is to know about cooking, which is generally a wrong assumption. There is always something new to learn in the kitchen, either about cooking, or about the ingredients you use. Here are some simple cooking tips for you to use.

Eggs

• Sometimes you forget if an egg is fresh or boiled, which is a problem, because you don’t want to crack the egg and find out that it is raw. An easy solution to the problem is to spin the egg. If the egg wobbles, it is a raw egg, and if it spins for a while, it is boiled.
• Sometimes when boiling eggs, the eggs crack, which allows water to get in and loses some of its flavor. You can avoid a situation like that by adding a little vinegar to the water, because it seals the eggs.
• If you are trying to determine the freshness of your eggs, put the eggs in water. The fresh egg will sink to the bottom of the water, while the stale egg will float.
• It is easier to beat an egg white at room temperature, so take your egg out of the fridge at least 30 minutes before you use it.
• If you are trying to make light and fluffy scrambled eggs, it is a good idea to add some water to the egg while beating it.

Soup/Stew

• One of the big problems people have with their stew/soup, is that they are too salty. To reduce the level of salt in your soup/stew, you should add raw cut potatoes to it, because they absorb the salt, and discard them when the soup is done.
• If your soup/stew is too sweet, add some salt to it, and if your vegetables are too sweet, add some cider vinegar.

Fruits and Vegetables

• To avoid tearing up when peeling an onion, you should peel it under cold water, or refrigerate it before cutting it.
• When you’re cooking corn, peas, beets, or carrots, you should add some sugar to the water, to help them retain their flavor.
• Lemon juice can be used to keep your sweet corn yellow, and to perk up wilting lettuce.
• You should keep lettuce and celery in paper bags instead of plastic bags, and leave the stalks alone until you are ready to use them.
• You can keep your tomatoes fresh for a longer period of time by storing them with their stems pointing down.
• You should keep green fruits in perforated bags, because the holes allow the air to circulate, while the bag retains the gas that fruits produce while they are ripening.

Food

• Putting a slice of bacon at the bottom of the pan used for meatloaf, will prevent it from sticking.
• Poking a hole in the middles of hamburger patties while shaping them allows the burgers to cook faster, and the hole will close up by the time the burgers are done.
• If you want to make fluffier white rice, you should add one teaspoon of lemon juice for every liter of water, and if you want to add more flavor to the rice, you should cook it in liquids that were used for cooking vegetables.