Posts Tagged ‘cooking tips’

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Flavorful Solutions for a Gluten-Free Vegetarian Diet

Monday, May 13th, 2013

A gluten-free and vegetarian diet may sound restricting, but for many who need to follow this dietary lifestyle or have chosen to do so, cooking without meat and without ingredients containing gluten inspires creativity in the kitchen and a real appreciation of plant-based cuisine.  A gluten-free vegetarian diet celebrates the fresh flavors of fruit, vegetables, whole grains, and lentils. Great tasting dishes, including risottos, curries, hearty stews and gratins, delicate soups, and sturdy casseroles, are all part of gluten-free vegetarian cooking.

Cooks who embrace this diet don’t rely on heavily processed foods with artificial ingredients.  There’s no need to when you’re cooking with fresh, naturally flavorful ingredients.  More Than Gourmet’s gluten-free vegetarian products are much the same.  Our vegetarian stocks and sauces are gluten-free because our time-honored recipes simply don’t call for anything that contains gluten.  There’s no need.  Our vegetable-based products are also certified vegan by the prestigious American Vegetarian Association because they are made carefully with only the best natural ingredients.

MTG’s versatile gluten-free vegetarian stocks and sauces can serve as the foundation for delicious soups like Wild Mushroom Bisque and Pea Soup with Mint and satisfying stews like Spicy Vegetarian Black Bean Chili and Vegetable Stew Dijonnaise.  Our vegetable and mushroom stocks add rich flavor to rice and whole grain dishes, from simple pilafs to whole-grain salads and risottos, as well as to braised fresh greens and vegetables.  These stocks can be used to enhance potato dishes like Fingerling Potato Salad and Yukon Gold Garlic Smashed Potatoes.  Need a sauce for roasted or grilled veggies or for grains or potatoes?  Use our Roasted Vegetable Demi-Glace to make Lemon Dill Sauce, Spicy Ginger Garlic Sauce, or Mediterranean Mushroom Olive Sauce.

A gluten-free vegetarian diet can be delicious and satisfying with MTG’s stocks and sauces to use from your pantry.  You’ll find no chemicals, no MSG, no fillers or preservatives, no artificial anything on our labels: only flavorful, fresh ingredients, just like the foods you rely on for a health-conscious lifestyle.

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Posted in The Sauce Guys, Tips and Techniques

Fish Fumet Gives Your Dish a Kick of Flavor!

Thursday, May 9th, 2013

To create our fish fumet, we gently simmer the bones and trimmings of various white fish with white wine and aromatic vegetables to produce the highest quality fish stock, and we call it Fumet de Poisson Gold.  Its clear yellow color and lovely aroma make it outstanding as a braising or poaching liquid, in addition to its primary use in sauces.  Our fish fumet is the perfect flavor base for your fish and seafood dishes.

Check out our trusted recipe pages for a few ideas on how to use Fumet de Poisson Gold! Braise fish of your choice in our fish fumet, then add flavorful Asian ingredients to make Braised Fish with Thai Curry Sauce.  Or top some fish filets with sun-dried-tomato pesto, braise them in fish fumet, flake the fish into the braising liquid, and serve over pasta to make Sicilian Tomato Pesto Fish Sauce with Spaghetti.  You can also simply poach or braise fish in our fish fumet with some minced onion and fresh herbs and serve it with a little of the delicious braising liquid spooned over the top.

Fish stock is most commonly used in sauces.  For just the right complement to baked, grilled, or steamed fish, use our fish fumet to make a classic Velouté Sauce, or try building on that sauce to make nearly endless variations.  Sauce Aurore is Velouté flavored with tomato and finished with butter.  It’s terrific with salmon.  Sauce Chivry is Velouté flavored with fresh herbs and white wine, and It goes beautifully with delicate fish like sole or flounder.  You can find more sauce ideas for fish in in our recipe pages.

Fumet de Poisson works so well in seafood dishes because it has a balanced fish flavor.  It’s not overly strong and has a fraction of the salt found in commercial fish bases and clam juice.  Give our fish fumet a try and discover a secret ingredient sure to become a pantry staple!

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Posted in The Sauce Guys, Tips and Techniques

Gourmet Gluten-Free Stock Is a Flavorful Foundation

Saturday, May 4th, 2013

Gluten sensitivity and celiac disease aren’t passing diagnosis fads. These are real conditions that affect the dietary habits of professional and home cooks alike. Some people experience mild discomfort from eating gluten, and others need to avoid it at altogether. Finding a restaurant that offers a good selection of gluten-free items can be difficult at best and impossible in some places. Often, the best place to find a truly gluten-free meal is in the home kitchen. Gluten-free stock helps new cooks and old hands alike by providing a trusted foundation. Fortunately, More Than Gourmet follows traditional French recipes to produce naturally gluten-free stocks for cooks of all skill sets and dietary lifestyles.

Cooking gluten-free doesn’t mean cooking without flavor or substance.  Natural stock made with fresh ingredients doesn’t even have any components that contain gluten.  A quality stock provides depth without overpowering a recipe with over-the-top flavors or excess ingredients. In a perfect world, all stock would be gluten-free stock.  However, this isn’t the case, and careful reading of labels on purchased stocks is a necessity.  In More Than Gourmet’s pantry, you’ll find a large selection of gluten-free stocks you can trust.

A quality foundation like a stock is a key component of a good meal. Some cooks prepare their own stocks, but, in reality, most just don’t have the time. Making stock requires a good chunk of time, effort, and several ingredients.  More Than Gourmet stocks keep the spirit of this  cooking tradition while allowing busier households to carry on with their days. Our cooks do the labor-intensive part, and you take home the results to create inspired meals of your own.

A flavorful starting point allows newer cooks a bit of leeway while learning what starches, veggies, and meats go well together for a filling gluten-free meal. Our family recipes offer more than a few suggestions to help cooks of all skill sets become accustomed to a healthy, gluten-free, yet delicious diet. If you struggle finding a recipe for dinner, just remember that the majority of natural ingredients have nothing to do with gluten. Our stocks, sauces, and large collection of recipes will help you create gluten-free meals without awkward substitutions.

Cooking without gluten isn’t as difficult as it seems at first. For example, filling starches don’t need to contain gluten to be flavorful. Root vegetables, including the beloved potato, are still gluten-free. Rice is safe, as well, so long as the company you purchase from hasn’t coated it in flour (check the ingredients label to be sure). Many grocery stores and markets have started stocking gluten-free pasta as public awareness about celiac disease has grown.  These starches will taste even better when cooked with a flavorful gluten-free stock.

It’s good to remember, too, that gluten-free stock isn’t only for those with sensitivities or allergies to a specific protein. Gluten-based ingredients, including flour, normally function as filler in pre-made stocks and sauces. This serves to “bulk up” the end product without adding or subtracting from elements of flavor. While these types of stocks aren’t unhealthy for everyone, they tend to lean toward the over-salted side of the flavor spectrum.

Gluten-free stock from More Than Gourmet doesn’t need filler. Our choice of vegetables, meats, and spices produces deeper flavors that work with the cook in creating tasty and filling dishes. Really, that’s the way stock should be. Our gluten-free stocks allow families with or without gluten sensitivities to experience gourmet flavors in their everyday meals.

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Posted in The Sauce Guys, What's News Now

Matching a Cooking Stock to Your Dish

Friday, May 3rd, 2013

Matching a cooking stock to your dish might seem simple at first glance: chicken stock for poultry (or fish), vegetable stock for vegetables, and beef stock for meat and game. However, choosing a cooking stock is all about highlighting and enhancing the flavors in a dish.  To achieve the best taste, selecting the right stock goes beyond those three simple categories.

More Than Gourmet expands your ability to match a stock to the main ingredient in your dish or to the ingredient you want to highlight in your dish.  We offer much more than chicken, beef, and vegetable stock.  Cooking fish?  We have fish stock.  Lamb?  We have roasted lamb stock. Turkey?  We have roasted turkey stock. You can also find shellfish stock, veal stock, roasted duck and chicken stock, venison stock, and even mushroom stock in our pantry. Using a stock that’s a closer match to your main ingredient brings out the naturally delicious flavor of that ingredient.

In addition, stocks are made in different styles, some hearty, some delicate, and selecting the right style of stock is just as important as matching your cooking stock to a main ingredient.  There are two primary styles of stocks: white and brown.  White stocks are light in color and made with poultry, meat, fish or vegetables simmered with aromatics (usually carrot, onion, and celery) in water.  Brown stocks are usually amber colored and are made with browned (roasted) meat, vegetables, or poultry and browned aromatics.

White stocks tend to be light and delicate and are good for poaching, light braises, and light sauces and soups.  Brown stocks are rich and flavorful and add depth to sturdier dishes like hearty soups and stews and concentrated reduction sauces.  More Than Gourmet makes both white and brown stocks, so you have options for any type of dish you wish to make.  Among our white stocks are chicken stock, fish fumet, and vegetable stock.  Our brown stocks include roasted chicken stock, beef and veal stock, and roasted lamb stock.

When you select a cooking stock, keep in mind what flavors you want to highlight and the style of the dish you’re making.  If you wanted to highlight the delicate vegetables flavors in a light chicken and vegetable soup, you might use our vegetable stock.  If you wanted to highlight the chicken flavors in that soup, you might use our chicken stock. If you wanted to make a hearty chicken and roasted root vegetable stew, our roasted chicken stock would be the perfect choice.

In the end, consult your palate to choose the right cooking stock. More Than Gourmet’s pantry provides the cooking stock you need for the best flavor in all your lovingly prepared dishes.

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Posted in Tips and Techniques

Planning Gluten-Free Dinners

Friday, April 26th, 2013

Switching to a gluten-free diet can be a big change and may take some getting used to, as can cooking gluten-free meals, whether for yourself or for a family member or friend.  The good news is that many foods you are already eating are naturally gluten-free, and the selection of good substitutes for gluten-containing foods like pasta and bread is getting better all the time.  More Than Gourmet offers a broad range of gluten-free stocks and sauces to help you create flavorful and satisfying gluten-free dinners.

One of our sauces can take a dish from boring to delicious in no time flat.  Top a grilled steak with our Bearnaise Sauce, or drizzle some Dijon Mustard Wine Sauce over roasted asparagus.   Toss some gluten-free pasta with shrimp and our Lemon Dill Sauce, or complete a roast chicken dinner with Rosemary Peppercorn Sauce quickly made with our gluten-free Roasted Chicken Demi-Glace.

Cooking with our gluten-free stocks opens up a whole range of terrific dinner options: savory soups and stews; braised meat, poultry, fish, or veggies; risottos and rice dishes; potato, bean and whole grain dishes, including hearty salads; just to name a few.  For great recipes and ideas, take a look at our gluten-free recipe collection!

If you are sensitive to gluten and vegetarian, we have great gluten-free dinner solutions for you. Our vegetable-based stocks and sauces are certified vegan by the AVA, and gluten-free, as well. Our vegan products allow you to create full vegetarian meals easily. Try braising a selection of fresh vegetables in Vegetable Stock and serving them over quinoa or rice for a scrumptious main course. Use our Mushroom Essence to make a rich, elegant mushroom bisque, or our Roasted Vegetable Demi-Glace to create a succulent sauce for roasted veggies and potatoes.

Any meal prepared with loving attention will allow you and your gluten-sensitive loved ones to enjoy gluten-free dinners without sacrificing taste.  MTG is here to help with plenty of gluten-free stocks and sauces for your pantry and recipes to guide and inspire you.

P.S. We have a great promotion on all our gluten-free products coming up soon.  Go to our Sauce Deals page May 1 and after for details!

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Posted in Tips and Techniques, What's News Now

Why Use Beef Demi-Glace?

Wednesday, April 24th, 2013

Beef demi-glace is a rich, meaty, concentrated sauce that is an irreplaceable ingredient for making gourmet meals in your home kitchen.   Demi-glace can be swirled into sauces, stews, and soups to add a deep, complex flavor.  You can add a little port wine or some sautéed mushrooms to demi-glace and almost instantly have a deliciously nuanced sauce. Or just brush it on grilled steaks or chops as-is for a hit of savory flavor.  Why use beef demi-glace? Use it to impress everyone at your dining table.

“Demi-glace,” literally translated from French, means “half glaze.”  It is a mixture of brown stock (veal and beef stock) and Espagnole Sauce, which is a brown sauce made with reduced brown stock, herbs, tomato, and caramelized aromatic vegetables and thickened with a browned roux. This mixture is slowly simmered over a long period of time until it is reduced by half, which is where demi-glace gets its name. More Than Gourmet takes the classic reduction even further to create a concentrate that brings you the culinary luxury of demi-glace in an easy-to-use package.

When reconstituted, our beef demi-glace is highly flavored, glossy, full-bodied, and deeply colored. Use it for a stunning glaze on your next roast, or drizzle it over a sauté of your favorite vegetables. Beef demi-glace may also be stirred into braising liquid with a little wine for an impressive yet simply prepared meal. Add it to rice for a spectacular side dish made on the fly.

More Than Gourmet’s beef demi-glace allows you to create truly gourmet sauces in no time in the comfort of your own home kitchen. Add Madeira wine to demi-glace to make classic Madeira Sauce, try it as the perfect addition to a killer barbecue sauce or an Italian meat sauce for pasta.  Check out our recipes for more ideas on how to cook with this delicious French classic to impress your friends and family.

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Posted in Market to Table, Tips and Techniques

Lamb Stock: Let’s Talk Turkey

Friday, April 12th, 2013

The rich flavor of lamb is as tender as slow-roasted chicken and as sweet as pork, but it has a robust quality all its own.  Lamb can be a welcome change from everyday meats and poultry, and it’s now available year round in most markets. More Than Gourmet’s roasted lamb stock is the perfect complement to delicious lamb dishes from a humble stew to a spectacular roast, and it brings the savory-sweet flavor of lamb to other dishes, as well. Think of the possibilities a good lamb stock could provide as a key ingredient for meals ranging from the simple to the complex.

The primary use of lamb stock is definitely lamb-centered dishes. It’s the ideal braising liquid for lamb shanks or shoulder.  It enhances the flavor of a pan sauce for a roast leg of lamb or seared lamb chops.  It makes the perfect sauce base for a lamb curry or shepherd’s pie.  More Than Gourmet’s lamb stock is as versatile as lamb itself in cuisines from Irish to Moroccan and Spanish to Greek.

Lamb stock can bring the robust flavor of lamb to side dishes and vegetables, too.  It can serve as a flavorful cooking liquid for couscous or rice, as well as white beans and lentils.  Hearty root vegetables and sweet potatoes take on delicious savory notes when braised in lamb stock, as do more delicate spring vegetables like asparagus, artichokes, and wild mushrooms.

Bring the welcome change of lamb to your kitchen with More Than Gourmet’s convenient roasted lamb stock. More Than Gourmet strives to make it easier for cooks of all types to use lamb stock and other delicious stocks in their day-to-day or gourmet cooking.  Stop by our website and browse our wide selection of stocks and sauces for fine home cooking!

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Posted in Tips and Techniques

Don’t Be Too Chicken to Experiment with Your Chicken Stock

Wednesday, April 10th, 2013

Whether you’re a new cook in the process of learning how to blend flavors or an experienced cook just looking for a way to liven up an old standard, chicken stock can be one of your best tools. Don’t be afraid to experiment with new recipes or those that you hold most dear. With its delicate and rich flavor, chicken stock can help you make a good dish even better.

The choice of chicken stock is key.  Your local grocer probably has any number of different stocks on the shelf – most of which are loaded with MSG, sugar, and sodium. These ingredients have the potential to overpower your dish with harsh flavors, and a tendency to make every dish taste the same. Ideally, stock should enhance the taste of your chosen ingredients and add some depth to the dish with its subtle but recognizable flavor.

More Than Gourmet’s stock is made from a time-tested recipe penned by master chef Auguste Escoffier. We don’t overload our stocks with salt, sugar, or chemicals.  We strive for a good balance. Our natural ingredients ensure that you have only the best on hand for your more creative endeavors, and we offer both ready-to-use chicken stock and a reduced chicken stock, our Fond de Poulet Gold.

Our chicken stock is perfect for traditional stock-based dishes: hot and chilled soups, risotto, braised poultry, and sauces from rich velouté to contemporary purées to light broths.  However, our chicken stock also works beautifully in unexpected ways: braising vegetables; cooking whole grains from wild rice to barley to wheat berries to grits; simmering dried beans or legumes, as in our recipe for Tuscan Baked Beans; or adding flavor to pasta dishes like Lemon Herb Couscous.  You can also use our chicken stock to moisten roasted or grilled vegetables or add a savory note to salad dressings.

More Than Gourmet’s traditional chicken stock is made to work with your chosen ingredients to bring out the savory flavors of your dish. Go ahead and get a little adventurous with your recipes – after all, it’s your kitchen. Let our kitchen help your kitchen become a place of creativity and experimentation. Our versatile chicken stock may very well become your secret go-to ingredient.

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Posted in Tips and Techniques

Essential Flavors for Gourmet Home Cooking

Thursday, April 4th, 2013

Dining in can prove just as special as going out. Whether you are cooking for yourself or for someone special to you, the effort of cooking lends its own flavor to the meal. From a quick weeknight meal to the special occasion dinner, gourmet home cooking means adding flavor, enhancing flavor, or just bringing out the naturally great flavor of good food.  And it’s not that hard to do.  A simple step or two during, before, or after cooking can take a dish from OK to amazing. Here’s a little information on essential flavors that will make your home-cooked meals stand out!

Perhaps the most important thing good cooks know is how to season food.  It’s a small thing with big results: the difference between a bland, unsatisfying dish that you eat out of necessity and a delicious, wonderfully nuanced experience is often just salt and pepper. Seasoning is a key way to build flavor.  Whether you’re making chicken soup, mashed potatoes, a roasted beef tenderloin, or sautéed snap peas, a sprinkle of salt and pepper early in the cooking process, and then again near the end will make the flavors dance in your mouth.

In addition to salt and pepper, traditional French cooking includes grated nutmeg and cayenne on the list of standard seasonings. The nutmeg and cayenne are added in small quantities, and they give a subtle, tasty complexity to soups, sauces, and vegetable and meat dishes. (Ground allspice is substituted for the nutmeg with beef and lamb.) Try adding a little nutmeg and cayenne to your next batch of mashed potatoes and see what you think.

After cooking, you can ramp up the flavor of your food by adding a sauce, and More Than Gourmet has you covered there.  We offer a line of superb ready-to-use sauces imported from France, our delicious red and white wine sauces, plus four classic demi-glaces.  All are excellent on their own and easy to prepare—or you can embellish them as you like.  Gourmet home cooking has never been so simple. Seasoning, a little fat, and a great sauce are the flavor essentials that will enhance almost any dish you prepare. Shop our pantry for more inspiration!

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Posted in Tips and Techniques

Pig Out with Your Roasted Chicken Stock

Monday, March 25th, 2013

Roasted chicken stock is a time-tested ingredient for pork dishes. From northern Mexican cooking to Tex-Mex to soul food, roasted chicken stock is the liquid of choice for many dishes that focus more on pork than poultry. Roasted chicken stock blends beautifully with the spices these cuisines call for. More Than Gourmet’s easy-to-use roasted chicken stock adds a touch of roasted flavor to braised or slow-cooked pork dishes without interfering with herbs, spices, and other flavorings. Our stock is made to exacting standards that allow every type of cook to “pig out” while highlighting the robust flavors in pork dishes.

On its own, pork is tasty and versatile. It takes readily to a variety of seasonings and nearly any method of cooking. Several cuts of pork can play a featured role in summer cookouts and barbecues, and a dish like hearty bean stew with pork makes a warming supper for a chilly day. Since the meat itself possesses a mild flavor, marinades and braising liquid make all the difference. A true pork stock often comes out too sweet or too watery to use as a primary ingredient. Ham broth, while great for ham, can have a salty or smoky quality that doesn’t quite work with more many pork dishes.

Roasted chicken stock, on the other hand, gives pork a slow-roasted flavor unachievable by other means. Add some aromatics, herbs, and orange to this stock, and you have a braising liquid for Mexican pulled pork for tacos; if you want to cook some smoked pork chops in sauerkraut, moisten it with a little roasted chicken stock for great savory flavor.  Add some ginger, spices, dark brown sugar, and a fiery chili to this stock to make a Jamaican jerk barbecue sauce that will transport you to the Caribbean. Roasted chicken stock’s adjustable flavor makes it ideal for many types of pork dishes, because More Than Gourmet believes that your stock should work with your recipe to boost flavor in place of overpowering it. Our roasted chicken stock is only the starting point! Pick some up today, and experience what’s likely to become your new favorite stock for authentic pork dishes.

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Posted in Tips and Techniques

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