The 10 Most Useful Food Hacks

I love finding kitchen hacks to make life easier. Unfortunately, some of the hacks I've seen are just not necessary. Here are the 10 of the best hacks and tips that I've found most helpful.

1. Blow into a bag with lettuce or greens in it and seal tightly. The CO2 will keep it from becoming soggy and you will have fresh greens for a long time.

2.  How to determine whether an egg is fresh or not.

3. Dental Floss is Amazing for Cutting Soft Foods

4. Freeze grapes instead of using ice cubes

5. Removing the stem from a strawberry

6. Walnuts to cover up dings? 

7. Shaking a hard-boiled egg to remove shell. Put a cooled hard-boiled egg in a jar filled with water and cover. Shake it for about 10 seconds and the shell will peel off easily. This method works the best even on new eggs! The trick is to let the eggs cool completely or your egg will fall apart.

8.  Choosing the perfect avocado.

Many avocado lovers have experienced, as I have, the disappointment of slicing into it only to find brown streaks or dark, rotten bruising on the inside.

Here’s how to make sure that never happens again. Before you commit to a specific avocado, look for all the external signs of ripe-but-not-rotten. With a Hass avocado (the variety we tend to get on the West coast), the skin should be very dark green-to-black and bumpy. The fruit should feel heavy and firm, with no obvious smooshy parts or flat areas.

Now here’s the trick. Once you’ve got a good candidate, take a sneak-peak at what’s inside. Discreetly flick the dry stem off the fruit.

If you see a brown patch under the stem, put that avocado back. It will be rotten inside.

But, if the fruit right under the stem is bright avocado yellow-green, you have a winner. Your avocado will be great. This technique has never failed me!

9. Hate Peeling Garlic Cloves?

Before you go and spend five times the price for already-peeled cloves, just throw the whole bulb in the microwave on high for about twenty seconds. When you take it out, the peel should come right off.

10. Pre-soak pasta and it will cook in about 60 seconds. 

Sounds weird, but it works! Soak the pasta in water in a sealed bag for a couple hours or overnight. Then you can cook it super super fast in boiling water or just add it straight to a hot sauce in a pan and let it finish cooking there.

I hope you enjoyed reading these useful food hacks. What useful food hacks do you use? Please leave your comments below!


Laurel ♥