Cool Info Lounge

Culinary arts is about knowing how to blend different ingredients and use a variety of cooking methods. It’s simply more than just preparing meals. Almost anyone can prepare meals using simple recipes, and that’s what I used to do for many years. One day I realized it would be far more interesting to learn the art of cooking. Learning by trial and error is a great teacher. You will make mistakes but most important is you learn from them.

I still have my collection of recipes but I do a lot of my own experimenting. If certain ingredients are not available, I’m able to adapt using substitutes. Nevertheless, there are a number of ingredients that you always need to have. These essential ingredients form the basis of your favorite culinary arts, whether they be cuisine from France, China, Italy, Mexico or wherever. For instance, if you love cooking Indian food, you should never run out of “garam masala”, the blend of spices we all know as curry.

If you prefer a more structured approach to the culinary arts, there are cookery classes available, and even culinary arts colleges and schools. It’s my dream to go on one of those cookery vacations, especially to Europe and visit different countries such as France and Spain. What could be more fun than combining a sightseeing vacation with learning cooking skills?

There’s really no excuse for not learning how to cook these days. Just go to a bookstore and you’ll see plenty of cooking books as well as cookery articles in magazines. With an entire TV channel such as The Food Network dedicated to the subject of food and cooking, not to mention individual cooking programs on various channels, chefs are becoming celebrities today. Despite all of that however, the culinary arts are actually being neglected as more people opt for instant meals and processed food rather than making use of their gourmet kitchens and utensils. The reason being, everyone is too busy with work and other activities, and have no time to make meals from scratch.

However, think about this, folks! A home cooked meal is much healthier than processed food high in fat, salt, and preservatives, and is much cheaper than eating at restaurants. When you prepare your own meals you can select the freshest and healthiest ingredients, and you can show off your culinary skills. If you don’t think you have good enough skills, you may want to consider attending a culinary arts school. Who knows, you may end up choosing a career in culinary arts!

Posted by Susie

Belgian chocolate is known among the best in the world, which is well deserved since great ingredients make great chocolate, and chocoholics around the world appreciate quality.

The Swiss also make good chocolate but the Belgians were able to top them. It comes as no surprise since there’s a long tradition of chocolate making in Belgium, and a strong marketing campaign was able to get the world’s attention. If you’re traveling to Belgium you should visit a chocolate museum or two and learn more about Belgian chocolate history.

The selection of the best cocoa seeds and other ingredients is key to the high standard of Belgian chocolate. You can tell when a low quality cocoa is used in any chocolate, since it leaves a bad after taste. A superior chocolate gives a lingering rich, full flavor which you can savor even after the chocolate leaves your mouth Another great thing about Belgian chocolate is that it’s processed mainly by hand, including the final decoration.

By the way, did you know that praline was invented in Belgium in 1912? Folks there have always enjoyed exchanging chocolates as presents, and they take pride of their quality export which is popular around the world.

Belgian chocolate has a wide range of products with different center fillings in plain, milk and white chocolate. Fruit, butter cream, mocha caramel, and ganache are some of the fillings that you can savor. In addition, you can also try almonds, nougat, whipped cream, cinnamon, ginger, coffee, rum, and spice. Belgian chocolate liqueur cups taste out of this world If you enjoy something a little out of the ordinary, you might find lime, coriander, or jasmine tea appealing.

You can enjoy chocolate in many delicious forms such as truffles, chocolate mousse, and cake. If you use Belgian chocolate in cooking, everything will taste even better. Chocolate fountains are all the rage for parties and receptions.

The rivers of warm, liquid chocolate are a chocolate lover’s delight. You can dip stuff like fruits such as bananas and strawberries, or even cookies into the chocolate goo. Belgian chocolate dipped marshmallows are simply heavenly! Belgian chocolate fountain refills are available, so you will never run out.

Since the high quality also applies to the packaging, Belgian chocolate makes the ideal gift, all tied up in a ribbon.

Buy our World Champion Box, made by Pacal Caffet, World Champion Chocolatier. An exclusivity zChocolat.com.

Related article: World’s Finest Chocolate

Posted by Susie

Cookie gift baskets make wonderful gifts for all occasion. Who doesn’t love cookies? They’re a great way to celebrate holidays such as Christmas and Valentine’s Day as well as birthdays, anniversaries, baby showers, and other special occasion.

You can slso use cookie gift baskets as a way to say thank you, congratulations, good luck, get well soon, and convey other expressions when words alone may not be enough.

One good thing about cookie gift baskets is that they don’t have to contain exclusively cookies. You are free to add in other goodies like candies, chocolate bars, or brownies and fudge and create mixed cookie gift baskets.

Need more ideas to fill your cookie gift baskets? How about oatmeal raisin cookies, sugar cookies, and jam filled cookies? Oh, and don’t forget everyone’s favorite: chocolate chip cookies!

If Christmas is the occasion, you may also want to include lemon bars and cinnamon cookies along with some gingerbread men and candy canes. You can decorate your cookie gift baskets with gold tissue paper, red or green cellophane and gold or silver confetti, and throw in a couple of pine cones to reflect the season.

If you’re a cookie lover like me, you probably have no shortage of recipes at hand, and including the recipes for your cookies in the gift baskets as an extra treat for your recipients would be a great idea.

One thing to remember about cookie recipes and gift baskets is that you should tailor them to your recipients’ tastes and needs without compromising the quality of the cookies. For instance, substituting shortening for butter or margarine may result in disappointment.

If you have a friend who is crazy for chocolate chip cookies, you may want to make a cookie gift basket based on chocolate chips that contain a mixed variation such as raisins, peanuts, macadamia nuts, and cinnamon.

A health conscious business associate of yours will appreciate a cookie gift basket filled with healthy fruit based cookies. Including your recipes for each selection will assure them that your delicious cookies won’t compromise their food ethics.

There are also sugar-free cookies and other foods you can put together to create special cookie gift baskets for diabetics. Spices like cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves make for a really tasty cookie and usually are less caloric. The sweetness comes from the spices, and tends to be healthier.

On the other hand, if the consumer has no dietary restrictions, you can present them a gourmet cookie gift basket filled with decadent and calorie-rich goodies like butter cookies and fudge.

As you can see, you can make excellent cookie gift baskets to suit the pickiest eater with just a little creativity. In case you need more ideas for cookie gift baskets and recipes, check out some cooking magazines or recipe books. You can slso find some free, great tasting cookie recipes online. Just do a search!

Posted by Susie 

German food recipes get pretty popular this time of the year because it’s Oktoberfest! Yes, we even celebrated Oktoberfest at church last Sunday but without any beer But that didn’t take away the enjoyment since there was plenty of delicious food such as bratwurst and sauerkraut, goulash, Spatzle, and roast pork leg just to name a few, not to mention the mouth-watering desserts.

Speaking of desserts, I’m planning to serve German desserts at our Christmas party this year. I know, it’s only September but it will be here before you know it. Besides, I need to try out some of the recipes first to make sure they will indeed be a special treat.

Want to know what they are? Read my article on German Food Recipes, and perhaps you can try some of your own to celebrate Oktoberfest or make your holiday season extra special!

Posted by Susie

P.S. - Note to Tanya, my associate…

I think you would be perfect as a jungle woman. I saw a picture of a very sexy Cat Woman costume the other day and I thought about you, but then I thought Cat Woman doesn’t go barefoot So jungle woman is the way to go girl! Don’t worry too much about your dad, I’m sure you can handle him Be sure to share with us how it all went!

I love cheese pizza. I mean just plain cheese pizza with nothing else on it. Mmm, yummy! It’s always been my favorite food since I was a kid growing up in a small town with no pizza parlor around. We didn’t have frozen pizza or cheese pizza pie either. So the best cheese pizza I’ve ever had is that my grandma used to make for us kids when we stayed over on Saturday nights.

Instead of recommending the best, richest, doughiest, cheesiest, or other superlative pizza made in family-owned local pizzerias (where you’ll most likely find the best cheese pizza), since that wouldn’t be very helpful considering many of my readers live in different parts of the world, I decided to share with you some interesting facts about cheese pizza, our favorite food. Bon apetite!

Posted by Susie