Kitchen Deals -> Cook's Tools

Convection ovens allow you to bake more foods (cookies, muffins, etc.) at once with even browning, but without the need to shift and rotate pans. A convection oven is the same as a conventional oven except a fan is installed in the back interior of the oven. The fan is used to blow and force the heat to circulate in the oven and around the food, thus eliminating the need to rotate and shift pans. In reality, though, even with the most expensive convection ovens, you will still need to rotate your foods, because there will always exist still hot spots in the cavity, because the cavity is small. Don't compare home convection ovens with most commercial convection ovens used by bakers and small food manufacturers, because their commercial ovens are much larger than home ovens and commercial ovens don't have any hot spots and therefore, there's no need to shift and rotate pans.

Keen cooks may want to take advantage of multi-function ovens - usually aimed at the top end of the market. As well as traditional cooking, fan or fan-assisted cooking and grilling, these ovens offer up to nine further functions. These include: Top element only (browning), bottom element (final cooking of pastry dishes or pizzas), fan and bottom element (delicate cooking), fan only (thawing).

To remove fat from soup or stock, use one of these techniques:

• Remove fat from soups by allowing a lettuce leaf to float on top of the soup. The lettuce will attract the fat and then the fat and lettuce leaf can be removed.
• Add ice cubes to the soup, stir to allow fat to collect on the ice cubes, and then remove before they have melted.
• Crumple up a piece of plastic wrap and skim the surface of the soup with it. The plastic wrap will attract fat from the surface.
• Allow the soup to cool, place it in the refrigerator for a couple of hours and when it is removed, the fat will have solidified on top and can then be easily scraped off.