1001 Kitchen tips #58 - Help! My loaf of bread is burning on the top but not cooked underneath what do i do?

Call it schwarzbrot?
You could, but this however, is a much better solution. Sometimes when you've had the oven turned up high for ages before turning it down to 210 oC to cook the bread, or if you're using an aga (can be unpredictable what oven temperatures are) the bread will be cooked on top while the base is still pale & middle not cooked. Answer like the burning edges of a pastry case is to wrap it in foil. That way the loaf keeps cooking from below but stops colouring on the top.

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1001 Kitchen Tips #53 - How do I stop the ends of my parsnips burning?

Wrap the ends in foil. Just like wrapping the edges of the pastry of your pie, it stops the ends burning, so the more chunky tops can be cooked through.







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1001 Kitchen Tips #45 - How do I stop mince burning to the bottom of the pan?

I was asked this today (Saturday's cooking day in Blogsville), so here's an answer......

Mince, onions, peppers - you name it, you turn your back for a moment and there it is burning to the bottom of the pan. Add a ladle of stock, water or wine. This cools it down immediately, and the liquid then boils so stops it burning. This is useful when sweating onions for risotto for example and they start to brown slightly - add a drop of white wine to stop them colouring and let it reduce before adding your risotto rice.

If it's a bad, thick encrusted burning however, if you do this you will incorporate the burnt flavour all through your food, and that's the last thing you want. So the answer is to cut your losses and swap pans - lift out what mince/ onions etc you can save and put it in a new pan and start again.

Another good tip, as I mention on the lamb and apricot post is not to thicken anything that is going to sit in the pan, or go into the oven for a couple of hours, like minced lamb for shepherds pie, or shin of beef for beef and ale pie. Thicken it after cooking and it doesn't burn on to your pan/ dish for 3 or 4 hours - much easier to clean. When the meat is cooked, drain the sauce through a colander into a saucepan, and put the meat to one side. Then thicken the sauce with beurre manie or cornflour, and drop the meat back in.

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P.S. Kitchen tip #44 - how to make the best roast parsnips - is in draft form at the moment - keep a lookout.......

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