Cooking With Wine (Daily Dish)

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Registered: 04-01-2004
Cooking With Wine (Daily Dish)
Sun, 10-03-2004 - 11:22am
Cooking With Wine


Wine is not only a great accompaniment to a meal—it's also an ideal ingredient for cooking if you're in Phase 2 or 3. It can be used either as a meat marinade to tenderize and enhance flavor or to create sauces from pan drippings and juices.

How do you choose a good cooking wine? As a general rule, you should only cook with a wine you would drink. It doesn't have to be expensive, but it should taste good. When you use wine to make a sauce, you concentrate its flavor, so a bad wine will almost always turn into a bad sauce. A good table wine is always a safe bet, but since every wine has its own distinct flavor, you may have to experiment according to the type of food you're cooking. Always avoid wines labeled "cooking wine," since these are often of poor quality and contain large amounts of added salt. These will not only impart a bad flavor to your food, but they may also make it salty.

Making a wine-based sauce is simpler than it sounds. First, "deglaze" the pan that's been used to sauté or roast meat. To do this, add wine to the pan and allow it to mix with the meat drippings and seasonings. Then, allow the wine to "reduce" by bringing it to a boil and cooking it until it's half the volume as when you started. Once it's reduced, you can add a little stock, fat-free half-and-half, or bouillon (depending on the meat), and continue to cook until it has reached the desired consistency. Enjoy!

                         

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