Frequently Used Cooking Terms

A-La King - Food served in cream sauce to which green peppers, mushrooms and pimentos often are added. Sometimes it is flavored with sherry.
A-La Mode - Literally means "in the manner of". In common use it refers to a dessert served with ice cream on top.
Antipasto - Italian for assorted appetizers of cold cuts, vegetables, fish, etc.
Aspic - A dish (except desert) which has been thickened or coated with gelatin.
Au Jus - Meat served in its natural juice.
Bake - TO cook by dry heat, usually in an oven.
Baking - Cookin in the oven. The temperature at which foods are baked varies considerably and is usually stated in the recipe. Where no temperature is stated, the common temperatures used are: a slow oven - 300 degrees F, a moderate oven - should be at 350 degrees F, a hot oven is about 425 degrees F, and a very hot oven is about 500 degrees F.
Barbecue - Meat roasted on a rack or spit, over coals. The meat is usually basted with a highly seasoned sauce.
Bard - To cover a bird or roast with strips of fat inorder to automatically baste meat or to protect delicate parts.
Baste - To moisten food while cooking, to add flavor and prevent dryness. Generally used in connection with meat that is being roasted.
Batter - A mixture including flour and liquid to wich heat is to be applied.
Beat - To incorporate air through a mixture by using a brisk, regular motion or to smooth lumps out of a mixture.
Beat Eggs Slightly - TO mix with a fork until yolk is broken and partly mixed with whites.
Beat Eggs Until Thick - TO beat, usually with a rotary beater or electirc mixer, until eggs thicken and c olor becomes light yellow.
Beat Egg Whites Until Stiff - To beat, usually with a rotary beater, or electric mixer, until egg whites are stiff and very white.
Bind - TO use egg yolk, flour, cornstarch, etc., to thicken or smooth a liquid.
Bisque - A rich cream soup (often of vegetable or shell fish) or a frozen dessert, usually ice cream containing nuts.
Blanch - TO pour boiling water over a food, then rinse with cold water. Used to shrink vegetables for canning and freeing, to remove skins from almonds, peaches and tomatoes.
Blend _ TO mix two or more ingredients thoroughly.
Boiling - Cooking in water at a tempreature of 212 degrees F. At very high altitudes water boils at a temperature below this and it is necessary to increase the cookign time. WHen water is at the boiling temperature, it will bubble vigorously and steam will rise from the surface.
Bread - To coat with flour or bread crumbs before cooking.
Broiling - Cooking over, under, or in front of a fire of live coals or a gas or electric burner. As the term is now commonly used, it refers to cooking under a gas or electric burner with notheing between the source of the heat and the food.
Broth - Thin soup, usually the liquid in which meat or poultry has been boiled.
Caramelize - To heat sugar until it melts and becomes brown. Used as a flavoring in many dishes.
Chantilly - A dish in which one of the ingredients is whipped cream.
Chill - TO allow to become thoroughly cool, but not frozen.
Chop - TO cut into coarse pieces with a sharp knife or chopper.
Chowder - A soup made of fish, clams or vegetables.
Chutney - A spicy relish made from several fruts and vegetables.
Cobbler - A deep frut pie with or without a bottom crust.
Coddle - To cook slowly just under the boiling point.
Combine - TO blen two or more ingredients together.
Compote - A serving dish with a stem or a mixture of foods served in a stemmed dish.
Condiment - A substance with a pungent flavor, such as catsup, chutney, etc. that is used to give relish to food.
Confectiners Sugar - Sugar ground to a very fine consistency. Powdered sugar.
Consomme - A clear soup usually of meat or chicken.
Cool - TO allow to stand at room temperature until heat is reduced so that food does not feel hot to the touch.
Cream - To soften by rubbing against the bowl with a spoon or beating with an electric mixer until a food (usually a fat) is light and creamy.
Crealot - Any highly seasoned food such as that prepared by the Creoles who are descendents of the early French and ASpanish settlers of Louisiana.
Crepes - Thin desert pancakes.
Croquettes - FInely chopped food held together in shape of balls, cones or cubes and cooked in hot fat.
Croutons - Cubes of bread which have been toated or fried.
Cube - TO cut into solid pieces of six equal square sides.
Curry - A dish cooked or flavored with curry powder.
Cut in - To use knives or a pastry blender to distribute solid fat in dry ingredients.
Deep Fry - TO cover food with hot oil and cook.
Demitasse - The small cup of after dinner coffee.
Dice - To cut into very small cubes.
Dissolve - TO melt. To liquefy a solid food.
Dot - To scatter small bits (such as butter) on the top of a recipe.
Dredge - To cover with flour, sugar or some other fine substance. Used to coat fruit to prevent it from sinking to the bottom of cake.
Drippings - Fat and juice which has dropped from roasting meat or poultry.
Drizzle - To spinkle with small drops of a liquid.
Dust - To sprinkle or coat lightly with flour or sugar.
Enrich - To add eggs, cream or butter.
Entree - with an inormal meal the entree is the chief dish of the main course, often meat, poultry or fish.
Entremet - Vegetables served with the entree or a dish served between main courses at a meal.
Fat - Butter, margarine, cooking and salad oils, the fat from meat and poultry, or shortening.
Fillet - A piece of meat or fish containing no bones.
Flake - To break into small pieces.
Flambe - To flavor food with an alcoholic liquid which is lit an dburned away, leaving its flavor.
Fold In = TO blend a mixture, such as egg whites into cake batter, or vice versa, so that air already beaten into whites is not lost. This is done by cutting down with a mixing spoon or spatual, then bringing up the lower part of mixture and folding it over the uppper part, repeating until blended.
Frosting - A mixture similar to an icing, but thicker and mroe opaque. Used for cakes.
Fricassee - To cook meat, game or poultry cut up in small pieces in liquid or fat.
Frying - Cooking in hot fat at a temperature or around 375 degrees F. Te article to be cooked is immersed in the fat.
Garnish - TO add decorative color to a dish with other food or greens.
Glace - To coat fruits or pies with a sugar syrup that has been cooked to the cra ck stage. The fruits used for fruitcake are glaced or candied.
Goulash - A thick meat stew.
Grate - To tear food into bits or shreds of varying size by rubbing against a course surface. (a grater)
Gravy - Sauce made with juice of meat, poultry or fish as a base.
Grease - To apply a thin layer of butter or oil on food or utensils.
Grill - Cooking over, under or in front of a fire of live coals or a gas or electric burner.
Icing - A mixture of confectioner's sugar and liquid, thin enough to be spread with a pastry bursh.
Julienne - Cut into long narrow strips.
Knead - To work dough by pressing, folding, and stretching. Biscuits and yeast leavened products are handled in this manner.
Liquor - The liquid in which food is packed or that in which it has been boiled.
Marinate - To soak in an oil and acid mixture.
Melt - To heat (usually a fat) until the material becomes liquid. A recipe might suggest melting to effect better mixing.
Mince - To cut with scissors or a knife into very fine pieces.
Mix - To stir ingredients itno a uniform mass.
Mocha - A mixture of coffee and chocolate flavors.
Pan Broiling - Cooking ona hot griddle or pan greased only enough to protect the food from sticking.
Pan Fry - Cooking in a small quantity of fat, turning from time to time so that all comes in contact with the hot fat.
Parboil - To cook to near tenderness in boiling water. Cooking is then usually finished in some other way, such as cooked on a barbecue.
Pare - To cut off the outside covering with a knife, as from a potato or apple.
Peel - To remove the outside covering by stripping off, as from a tomato, peach or banana.
Petit Fours - Small iced cakes.
Pilaf - Dishes originally from the Orient, combining meat, vegetables and rice.
Pit - To remove the pit or pits from fruits.
Poach - To cook under water which si just below the boiling point.
Steaming - Cooking in the steam generated by boiling water withthe food in a container above the water, only the steam able to reach the food.
Steep - To soak in a liquid at a temperature below the boiling point.
Stew - To cook slowly in a small amount of liquid.
Stewing - Cooking in a small amount of liquid which may either boil or simmer, as per recipes instructions.
Stock - Liquid resulting from cooking meat, fish or vegetables.
Stir - TO mix with a rotary motion, using a for, spoon or spatula. Stirring does not serve as a mthod of aeration as beating does.
Toss - To mix with light strokes, usualy by lifting with a fork or spoon.
Truss - TO bind the wings or legs of fowl before cooking.
Until Set - Until a liquid (usually a gelatin) becomes firm.
Whip - To beat very rapidly to incorporate air into the mixture,
Yeast _ A substance composed of many living cells. When mixed into suitable foods they produce a gas which causes doughs to rise. Brewers yeast is composed of cells no longer able to cause this action and it is used as a food supplement, rich in some of the B-Vitamins.