Mangalorean Recipes

  • Increase font size
  • Default font size
  • Decrease font size
Home Food Information Kitchen Tips Icing and Frosting

Icing and Frosting

E-mail Print PDF
 Cream of tartar is is the common name for potassium hydrogen tartrate, an acid salt that has a number of uses in cooking. Now, before you get all jittery about the thought of cooking with an acid, it's worth noting that milk, brown sugar, steak, plums, and just about every other food we eat is acidic. In fact, egg whites and baking soda are the only non-acidic (alkaline) foods we have.

Cream of tartar is obtained when tartaric acid is half neutralized with potassium hydroxide, transforming it into a salt. Grapes are the only significant natural source of tartaric acid, and cream of tartar is a obtained from sediment produced in the process of making wine. (The journal Nature reported some years ago that traces of calcium tartrate found in a pottery jar in the ruins of a village in northern Iran are evidence that wine was being made more than 7,000 years ago.)

Cream of tartar is best known in our kitchens for helping stabilize and give more volume to beaten egg whites. It is the acidic ingredient in some brands of baking powder. It is also used to produce a creamier texture in sugary desserts such as candy and frosting. It is used commercially in some soft drinks, candies, bakery products, gelatin desserts, and photography products. Cream of tartar can also be used to clean brass and copper cookware.

If you are beating eggs whites and don't have cream of tartar, you can substitute white vinegar (in the same ratio as cream of tartar, generally 1/8 teaspoon per egg white). It is a little more problematic to find a substitute for cream of tartar in baking projects. White vinegar or lemon juice, in the ratio of 3 times the amount of cream of tartar called for, will provide the right amount of acid for most recipes. But that amount of liquid may cause other problems in the recipe, and bakers have found that cakes made with vinegar or lemon juice have a coarser grain and are more prone to shrinking than those made with cream of tartar.

Now, if they were making cream of tarter 7,000 years ago in Iran (or at least if cream of tartar was making itself), don't you think you can find the small plastic or glass bottles it comes in among the hundreds of other small jars and bottles in the spice section of your grocery store? Or you can get modest or huge quantities of it online.

http://www.recipegoldmine.com/cakefrost/cakefrost.html

Bookmark with:

Deli.cio.us Deli.cio.us    Digg Digg    reddit reddit    Facebook Facebook    StumbleUpon StumbleUpon    Newsvine Newsvine
 


OFFSEASON GOA

WOWMOM

WOW MOM - Please send this link to your friends in Mumbai.

Hair Accessories, Snap Clips, Bobby Pins, and creative stuff. Visit my page - Click on the Pic - -------------------------------------

Artwork For SALE

Artwork By Ruchi - Please send this link to your friends in Mumbai.

Art by Ruchi Pais - Contact: 9821611343 Mumbai Click on the Picture ------------------------------

Face Book Badge

CLICK THE PIC

FACEBOOK PAGE OF : Walter J. Pais

Walter J. Pais

Mangalorean Recipes Facebook Page

Banner

Who's Online

We have 333 guests online

Google Ad 3 CLICK

Google Ad: Click

Mangalorean Recipes Facebook Group

I invite you to join our group on Face Book. Click the picture

Ranjit and Ruchi Pais, Hair Stylists

Mumbai's Trendiest Cuts Ranjit and Ruchi now operate from Goa. Call them for appointments. Timings: 9:30am - 9:30pm Call +919821611343 for appointments Click on the picture below:

Google AD 2: Click

Web Links

Links: Find other websites of interest here. Create your account and post a Web Link of your own. Click on the link below

HTML Module Ad 4


mangrecsheader