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Aluminum Reactivity and Tomatoes

You don’t want to use aluminum (or copper) pots, pans or even utensils when cooking tomatoes. Aluminum is a reactive metal, so will react with the acid in tomatoes resulting in bitter flavors and duller colors for the tomatoes, and possibly damages and discoloration for your cookware.

Aluminum is a good choice for some types of cooking, because it is inexpensive, easy to clean, lightweight and highly conductive (second only to copper). Plus, it’s sourced from a fairly abundant material. But it’s just no good for cooking acidic foods (wine, citrus, tomatoes, chili, barbecue sauce, chutney, etc.). It’s also rubbish for cheese making, home brewing, and other kitchen adventures in which you are deliberately trying to control a reaction and just don’t want any uninvited guests at your party.

As for the health concerns, the research is inconclusive on whether aluminum particles that enter our bodies via cookware are particularly toxic. However, there’s no doubt that acidic compounds do break down aluminum. I definitely wouldn’t want any random bits of cookware or errant unwanted compounds in my marinara. And of course, I don’t want my marinara to taste bitter or look dull, so steering clear of aluminum is a good idea all-around.

Stainless steel is a good choice because it is chemically inert, but it is more expensive and is a poorer conductor of heat than aluminum. To compensate for this drawback, cookware manufacturers often coat the underside of stainless steel pans with copper, or insert a layer of copper or aluminum just beneath the stainless steel surface. According to food science expert Harold McGee, these “hybrid pans are the closest thing we have to the ideal chemically inert but thermally responsive pan.”

Note: To see an excellent review of cookware sets, ranging in price from affordable to astronomical, see Cook’s Illustrated. The Cook’s Illustrated website requires a paid subscription, and it is well worth the $25 annual fee if you cook regularly. But if you can’t access the article, I’ll help you out with this shortcut: The Tramontina 18/10 Stainless Steel TriPly-Clad line is apparently the best quality you can get at an affordable price. I have a few Tramontina pans myself, and I love love love them.

How to Tell the Difference Between Stainless Steel and Aluminum

But now to your question about how to tell the difference ... Here a few helpful indicators (all of which would be even more helpful if you happen to have a known aluminum or stainless steel pan around for comparison):

• Aluminum sounds duller and has less of a ring than stainless steel. Rap your knuckles on the edge of the pot or bang it with a wooden spoon.
• Aluminum feels slightly warmer than stainless steel at room temperature.
• After being washed, aluminum tends to dull slightly, while stainless steel usually stays bright.
• Because aluminum is softer than stainless steel, a key will scratch aluminum much more readily than stainless steel.
• If a magnet sticks to the side of the pot (even weakly), it is definitely stainless steel and not aluminum. (Note: If a magnet does not stick, you still can’t tell which metal it is, but you can be sure it’s stainless steel if the magnet does stick!)

If you’re a science nerd and like to do silly kitchen experiments, you might try this wacky method of determining the difference. But beware that your weight measurements could be totally thrown off if the pan has plastic handles or a copper insert in the bottom, etc.

You might also try taking the pan to your closest kitchen store or cooking school to ask someone more familiar with different kinds of cookware; They probably can spot it right away. Good luck!

The traditional thing to do with (slightly) sour milk is to make pudding. I made this butterscotch pudding recipe recently, and it was really good, but super-duper-rich, and maybe too sweet. (But it calls for real Scotch — fun!)

You can also bake numerous things with milk. Make enchiladas in a creamy cheesy sauce or bake a chicken breast or fish filet with milk and herbs poured over it.

But beware. Sour milk is not the same as buttermilk. Buttermilk is either purposefully cultured to get a sour ta…

Cook ’em! Greens are actually pretty versatile, so there’s practically no end to the many ways you can enjoy them. If you enter “greens” into one of the many recipe databases online (Epicurious is my favorite), you’ll find tons of great ideas. But here’s a good place to start: Cooking Greens for Greens Haters. So eat ’em up this spring, and get ready to eat some more come fall!

My favorite sweet potato is ‘Red Wine Velvet’ of the orange varieties, ‘Brazil White’ of the white-fleshed varieties, and ‘Camote Morada’ (a Nicaraguan variety) of the purple-fleshed sweet potatoes. I grow 53 varieties of potatoes, all are favorites or I would not grow them, but I think ‘La Ratte d'Ardeche’ is one of the best and it is favored by the chefs in Paris, as well. My favorite way to cook ‘La Ratte’ potatoes it is to boil or steam them until “al dente” (maybe 12 minutes), so that it is…

There are several ways to make soup stock, depending on what kind of soup you’re making. The important thing is that you do actually make a stock—instead of starting with water—because that’s what makes soups wonderful and complex.

The basic method is to add flavorful ingredients to cold water and bring it to a boil. You can use a wide variety of ingredients, such as veggies (roughly chopped, peels and all), herbs, spices, meat (with or without skin), bones and seafood shells. If you’re a vegetar…

The American craft beer industry is currently experiencing a renaissance, and microbreweries are popping up all over the country. Some even specialize in organic beer. To find a brewery near you, simply search your state at beertown.org. (Good news—looks like Pennsylvania has several!)

You might also be interested in checking out local wineries, and you can find those by state here. (Pennsylvania has lots of those, too!)

If you’re interested in finding out about your eco-friendly options for wine …

Your eggs are fine. Fresh eggs actually take a long time to spoil. They would be all right under those conditions even for a couple of weeks. There’s no need to rinse the eggs until it’s time to use them, and that can actually keep them fresh longer. Enjoy your farm-fresh eggs!

It’s actually very easy to pasteurize your own milk on the stovetop. An added bonus is that your milk won’t need to stand up to long distance shipping and prolonged storage, so you can pasteurize it safely using lower heat and less time than many industrial milk producers use. All you need is a stainless steel pot and a simple kitchen thermometer. Just follow these simple steps for home pasteurization:

1. Pour the raw milk into the stainless steel pot. If you have a double boiler, that will work eve…

Baking soda and baking powder both help create a reaction that causes doughs to rise. This chemical reaction is dependent on the interaction of a base and an acid.

Baking soda is the common name for sodium bicarbonate, which is a base. When combined with an acid plus some moisture, such as buttermilk, the reaction releases carbon dioxide bubbles, causing dough to expand.

Baking powder contains sodium bicarbonate, but it also contains the acid necessary to produce the chemical reaction, usually in …