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Tempura Batter Recipe

For many years I have occasionally breaded and fried things the “traditional” way with egg wash and bread crumbs. Lately, I have been experimenting with Tempura recipes to try to get that coating like you get from certain frozen foods. We do not buy that kind of thing usually, so making a batter from scratch that has a similar outcome makes for a nice treat sometimes.

I have learned a thing or two about Japanese tempura batter recipes though. The more complex they are the less well they turn out so far. The best outcome I have had to date has just two ingredients, not counting water and ice (frozen water.)

I have learned some variety of information for getting better results and here is that information first, with the basic recipe which follows.

Cold Tempura slows down the frying and allows the inside of the item to cook longer. If you have something like chicken, which required more time in the fryer, cut it thin and use very cold tempura batter to make sure the inside gets cooked.

Submerge the items in the fryer oil completely. I do not fry things often so do not have a fryer and when I do fry things, I try to do it in a shallow bed of oil. This results in a pancake around the thing you are frying and does not turn out well. Fully covering with hot oil is the only way to produce the desired outcome.

Items you are frying covered with Japanese tempura should be dry. Do not sauce them and then batter them. You can dry season things, but save the sauce for dipping after the dish is ready.

Absolutely do not let different tempura covered items touch in the fryer. They will stick together and then the breading comes off then you try to pull them apart.

Don’t get fancy with the batter. You can season the item before coating it with tempura batter or you can season it after frying, but if you put seasoning in the batter you run the risk of having the consistency be off or burning the spices and having a less pure taste.

Don’t make the Japenese Tempora recipe in advance or store extra for later use. It will not have the same desired consistency.

With all of those Tempora cooking tips in mind, here is the very simple Easy Japanese Tempora Recipe.

Print Recipe

Tempora Batter Recipe

This Japenese Tempora recipe is so basic, you can find references to it all over the web. However, be sure to read the Tempora cooking tips to get a better outcome.

Prep Time15

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: batter, breading, frying

Servings: 4 people

Cost: 50 cents

Equipment

Bowl
Frier or pot for frying

Ingredients

1 cup Flour White, All Purpose
1 Egg
1 cup Water Ice Cold, Chilled

Instructions

Sift flour into bowl to get out clumps
Beat egg slightly
Add water to egg, stir
Add flour to liquid, mix, some clumps OK
Use immediately or refrigerate for up to 15 minutes before using

Use the comments below to let us know what dishes you made with this simple Tempura batter. Enjoy

Why Make Sauces?

One of the things that has been a big change for my cooking in the last couple of years has been making my own sauces.

There are some reasons that initially I always bought jars of sauce and salsa, such as the sauces seeming too difficult, or the taste not being quite the same, or simply ease of having a store-bought jar of sauce.

However, here are some things you might not be aware of about sauces and salsas.

Sauces and salsas do not always taste the same from brand to brand, even when they are called the same thing. Generally, the base sauce items, such as soy sauce or mustard will be similar in taste, but once you get to a more complex sauce such as teriyaki sauce then you will find different companies have different recipes and they can vary greatly in taste, salt level, and thickness.
Jars of sauce are not enough. When I was using jars of sauce, I would dab a little into the dish. In reality, if you are doing a larger helping of a saucy dish, you probably need more than one jar. Once you buy two or three jars, it becomes a log more expensive than making your own.
Sugar and salt control are another issue. Sweet and sour sauces are delicious, but you know why. Lots of sugar or honey. When you make your own you can make them just as good, or you can choose to make them a little bit more healthy by cutting back on the sugars and salts some.
Age and preservatives – while sauces in jars usually stay good for a long time, you also do not know how long they have been waiting to be sold and it could be anything but fresh. Making your own sauce right before you add it to a dish assures your sauce is fresh.
Adding fresh herbs like cilantro or fresh-cut ginger will also boost the taste.
You are also a much smarter cook if you know how to make your own sauces. Sometimes I have to whip something up and being able to make a tasty sauce on the fly with whatever I have in my kitchen is a great skill to have.

The primary two types of “sauces” I make are Mexican salsas and Asian sauces for lo mein, stir fry and chicken. I also sometimes make Indian sauces occasionally.

The real key to making any of these sauces or salsas is not time, but having the right spices and base sauces in your kitchen. For Asian sauces, you might need Fish sauce, Soy Sauce, Siracha, Hosen Sauce, Rice Vinegar, Oyster Sauce, and Sesame Oil. Keep an eye out on which stores have better prices on these kinds of items will help a lot. Some stores treat them like specialty items while others treat them as normal items and offer them at half the price.

Lastly, remember your sauce might not be as good as the restaurant. That is usually because it is healthier and not full of fat, oil, and salt. You can always make it more delicious but the key is to find your happy place between flavor and health benefits.

Can You Prevent a Virus with Zinc?

There is a lot of bad information going around about virus cures. One meme going around is that zinc will prevent Coronavirus. This has led to a run on Cold-EEZE lozenges. The idea behind these lozenges is that if you eat them regularly right at the beginning of a cold, the zinc in them will reduce the time and severity of a cold. There is science to back it up, although it is not a magical cure and it does not prevent you from getting sick in the first place.

The rumor that zinc can prevent Coronavirus (COVID-19) started because someone shared an email that a doctor sent to his family and close friends. He gave all the good advice you hear about avoiding crowds and washing your hands, and one point in his letter suggested that zinc could help.

This is probably good doctorial advice, but not specific to lozenges and it is not advice from the leading expert on coronavirus. Just decent general advice to fight any cold or flu.

I am not a doctor. But I like to write about (and cook) (and eat) food and it seems like a better strategy might be to have healthy amounts of zinc in your diet at all times to ward off any type of illness. The last thing you would want to do is buy those lozenges and be sucking on them every day. Instead, getting more zinc in your diet from your daily food would be a great way to improve your defenses.

Which Foods Have High Zinc?

The highest levels of zinc in foods are red meats and shellfish. The problem with this is that eating them every day would not be good for you. During any cold and flu season though, maybe a few more meals with those things could help.

However, I want to be at a good, even level of zinc in my body all the time and I cannot do it with shrimp and burgers. (wish I could) Instead, there are a number of things that are easy to eat every day and when done regularly will sustain your zinc levels at a higher level.

Beans, Lentils, And Chick Peas Are High In Zinc

Black Beans, Chick Peas and Lentils are the 3rd highest common foods that contain zinc. You need several helpings a day, but it is fairly easy to eat beans with your breakfast, a cup of lentil soup with your lunch and beans as a side dish at dinner. We always have 2-3 helpings a day in our family. It is important to soak the beans before cooking to improve the digestibility and absorption of the zinc. See our easy black bean recipe here.

Seeds Are High In Zinc

Next is seeds. The funny thing about seeds is you can toss them into many dishes to add a health boost. That recipe I just mentioned for healthy black beans has flaxseeds added to them. Talk about packing a zinc punch. Black beans and flaxseed are full of zinc. Other seeds that can be even better are help seeds, squash and pumpkin seeds. These are a bit harder to eat but high in zinc. Sesame seeds are also high in zinc and they can be sprinkled on top of a lot of dishes to make them look great and add benefits.

Nuts Are High In Zinc

Nuts are also a great option for zinc. Peanuts, pine nuts, cashews, and almonds are all good sources of zinc and they can be eaten as a snack between meals or added to salads or sauces. Another option is a serving of peanut butter, which has 0.85 mg of zinc. That is 7.7 % of the recommended daily intake for men and 10.6 % for women.

Beyond that, zinc levels go down but you do get some from dairy and eggs. Some vegetables, like potatoes and sweet potatoes, are high in zinc.

Lastly, it might be time to indulge in some sweets. Dark chocolate which is less sweetened can contain a high amount of zinc, but also has a lot of calories that make it something you do not want to try to use as your exclusive source of zinc to fight off the coronavirus or other illnesses.

Viruses going to be a major concern to people, but the advice in this article is good for getting better levels of zinc from natural sources which has been proven to improve health and fight off viruses or at least reduce their severity. And most of the food listed here is great for you anyway.

The Best Flooring Options for a Finished Basement

Most basements in the Northeast have a concrete finished basement floor that is flat, durable, and can stay like that for many families finishing the basement on a shoestring budget. Depending on the project you are trying to accomplish, finishing a basement does not have to be an expensive project. But, if you have an old house and are ready to finish the basement of your home, there are 6 important items you need to do before thinking about the ceiling, flooring, and walls.

Waterproofing the basement of the home
Fixing water leaks or replacing old pipes that can cause trouble when you have a finished basement
Getting rid of mold or mildew that have accumulated on the walls and ceiling
Decluttering the basement of the home and getting rid of unwanted items you don’t need
Checking the electric layout and fixing and adding fixtures that match the new basement
Check to make sure the sump pump is in working order

After making sure everything is done properly and there is a drainage system in place, you are ready to start choosing the way you want the basement to look.

Walls: Choose warm colors that will brighten the room. Keep it uniform. If you have a section or a room for children to play, decorate that section or room with pictures but keep the walls the same color as the rest of the basement. There is less light coming through the windows in the basement, so the bright walls can help add some brightness to it.

Flooring

The flooring of the basement floor is very important for many reasons. It needs to have waterproof qualities, ease of use, and it needs to look good for many years. Many homes have a concrete floor already in place. If the floor is in good condition, there is only cleaning to be done before you lay the sub-flooring. If the concrete floor has cracks, holes, or is coming undone where the wall meets the floor, you need to fix those issues before continuing.

Choosing the best flooring for your basement depends on the usability of the room. Here are some options for you:

Tile-If you are finishing the basement and want to lay tile on the floor, you can apply the tile right over the concrete flooring you have if it’s in good condition. The choices for tile flooring are numerous. It really depends on your preferences.

Carpet-Many homeowners like to have carpet on the basement floor. It is warmer than other flooring and makes sense to install carpet if you have small children and a playroom for them. Air circulation plays an important role and needs to be monitored when the basement has carpet on it though. Mustiness and odors tend to stay longer and over the years, that mustiness seems to cling to the basement and of course the carpet as well. If you waterproof the basement well before finishing it, the dampness and any leaks you had are hopefully a thing of the past. And, if you are still set on having some sort of carpet installed, having area rugs that can be aired out in the summer are a great alternative for carpet.

Vinyl-Another option for basement flooring that is affordable and easy to care for is vinyl. A homeowner can buy vinyl in a sheet, individual squares, or vinyl plank flooring to lay easily on the basement floor. The look of vinyl plank flooring with attached underlayment can save a lot of work for the homeowner while providing the look and feel of real hardwood flooring. And while we recommend a sub-flooring for the basement floor because vinyl flooring can be very cold in the winter months, the attached underlayment of some of these options save you the extra work of putting a subfloor. There are many designs and good quality vinyl options that the homeowner can choose from that are easy to care for and will look great for many years.

Painting the floor in a workroom or a home gym can be a cheap viable option for you, especially if you are finishing the basement on a shoestring budget. The good news is that you can always finish these rooms with tile, carpet, or other types of flooring the year after with little trouble. If you want to keep the painted basement floor as is, applying a new coat should be relatively easy and cheap while maintaining a brand-new look.

The wrong kind of flooring can make a room seem dreary, or even ugly. Thankfully, the variety and quality of flooring choices in the market are vast. You need to pick the right kind of flooring for you and your family and enjoy a finished basement for many years.

Spring Cleaning in February

Looking out the window during these cold, snow-covered days, for many northeast Ohio owners, spring might seem like a distant season that won’t come soon enough. But, like every year, spring comes perhaps too quickly for some of us, and the chores that accompany the warmer weather come along with it.

This year has been unprecedented, to say the least. For many people, the financial strain has been difficult to weather, and the health concerns for many of us are too serious to shrug off carelessly.

Fortunately for some, the daily chores are still present, and we can fight our boredom with chores we can do at home daily if we want.

Spring is almost here-believe it or not- and the yard work and flower planting are going to keep us occupied for many weeks.

So, what chores can you do now to have a nice summer without having to do them during those beautiful summer days? Begin the chores that can be done inside right now, and save the outside chores for the spring.

Spring cleaning can be done now without waiting for spring to come. We are inside the home; we do not need to have nice weather to start spring cleaning.
Declutter the basement and get rid of unwanted items that have been saved for years. If you have items that are serviceable, you can donate them. You can call a donation center to find out if they can pick them up. They ask those items to be 5 years old or newer.
Kitchen items that you haven’t used in years can be donated as well. You will be happy with the extra space you will have after doing a kitchen declutter.
Choose a room and critically assess whether it can be improved with a new coat of paint.
Redecorate a room to improve it. Plants, candles, and even different light fixtures can give your room a new look. Redecorating a room should not be an expensive chore, but it can give it a different feel for the family.
Mats, rugs, or paintings can transform a room. They do not have to be expensive for you to have a warm room you can enjoy.
If you don’t want to paint the room, even a good scrubbing can make a difference. The walls of the house do get a thin layer of dust particles during the winter months. Scrubbing them can be done easily and quickly.
Changing the curtains or dry cleaning them can add brightness to any room. Do you need to add new ones to a room? Try making them yourself. They can be easy to accomplish. Roman curtains for the kitchen or a bedroom are easy and pretty to make. You can even use tape and an iron to make them. No sewing needed.

There are many enjoyable pass times anyone can do that do not include cleaning, sewing, or painting. But, as homeowners, we have chores we must do every year to keep a decent home for our families and those chores are unavoidable. Keeping a decluttered home is enjoyable for everyone, and can give you the extra space you might need right now. We can begin doing a chore for fifteen minutes every day to create the habit and continue till that chore is done. Eventually, we can have a cleaned, decluttered home we can all enjoy.

Healthy Breakfast Options

Scientific studies have found that people start the day with a certain amount of will power and throughout the day that reserve of strength wanes as people become tired, hungry and distracted.

For that reason, regardless of how well or poorly you eat throughout the day, you have no excuse not to eat a healthy breakfast. This healthy breakfast recipe is the perfect example of how you can have great taste while having good protein, lots of vitamins from different colored vegetables and slow-burn energy with healthy carbs like black beans.

black beans — Black beans have protein and provide a steady energy source, reducing your hunger.

The good thing about that recipe is you can substitute most of the ingredients for other options depending on seasonal availability, taste, and your personal eating choices. For example, the spinach can be kale or cabbage, and the sausage can be vegetarian.

Other healthy breakfasts can include the following:

Steel Cut Oatmeal with Flaxseed and Berries
Egg White Vegetable Omelet
Protein Powder & Oatmeal Pancakes

The simple fact is that in the mornings, you can build habits that are very regular and easy to follow. Dinner will probably be hit or miss for most people as they are more tired, more hungry and have more options when they are out and about. Whether you are trying to lose weight, maintain your current weight or be super fit and healthy, it does not matter. The morning is the best time to stick to a healthy plan with a tried and true healthy breakfast recipe and just eat it every day.

If you have a cheat day where you let yourself go, you can cheat with the same recipe. Add cheese, add more meat if you like that and add toast or tortillas. All of these things make the breakfast have more calories and carbs, but also makes it tastier while still getting the benefit of all of the vegetables and proteins.

Lasanga with Pasta Alternative

I love lasagna but we have a rule. Christmas day only. We call it Christmas Lasagna. However, I thought if I could replace some pasta with vegetables, we could eat it more frequently. Substituting layers of lasagna pasta are actually easier than you think. The trick I found, is to use the actual pasta on the top and bottom layer, but the middle layers can be lasagna noodle substitutes, and people will really not notice.

So the first thing I did before creating this vegetarian lasagna recipe with pasta substitutions was to look around at what was already out there. What I found when I searched for sweet potato lasagna recipes seemed more like a sweet potato casserole and less like lasagna. So I just read over a couple of options and then came up with my own pasta alternative, while still using some pasta for the top and bottom so that the lasagna really feels like it is real.

This was risky because it was for my daughter’s birthday, and I was winging a recipe I’d never made before. Her requirements are rather odd because she is 90% a vegetarian (prefers it, but sometimes eats meat for protein) and she tries to eat very healthily, which means low quantities of refined pasta.

What we ended up with is lasagna with top and bottom real pasta, and two layers in the middle where sweet potatoes are the pasta replacement. By lightly salting the sweet potatoes at each layer with a light amount of coarse salt, the layers ended up being sweet and salty, instead of just sweet.

If you do not want sweet potatoes, I am sure you can think of many other lasagna pasta substitutes. For example, zucchini would work, squash would work, eggplant, thinly sliced shiitake mushrooms, corn tortillas, and even regular potatoes (although more healthy???) are all possibilities as a lasagna noodle substitute.

Whichever pasta alternative you choose for your lasagna, the key is making every layer tasty and stacking it well. It will all bake together beautifully. And since we use real lasagna pasta on the top and bottom, there is a chance no one will even notice that the center is actually layers of vegetables.

The good news is, this being my daughter’s birthday dinner turned out great. She said it was the best lasagna she has ever had. I would not go that far, but I am more partial to it billed with meat sauce and mushrooms. However, for a more healthy lasagna with vegetable substitutes for more than half the pasta, it was surprisingly good and having a second piece was guilt-free.

Just a warning on the pictures, I am using stock photos because I did not take any during the first round of making this dish. Trust me, the layers looked great and the only time you really noticed the sweet potatoes is when you would eat one layer and they would be exposed below it. When you actually look from the side at a cut slice, it looks identical to lasagna full of pasta, and not some special pasta alternatives.

Print Recipe

Lasagne with Pasta Alternative

This lasagne recipe is health conscious but only 50% – by using lasagne pasta on the top and bottom of the dish, but having pasta substitutes in the middle, you can have the best of both worlds while reducing calories and carbs.

Prep Time30

Cook Time1

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: Italian

Keyword: healthy lasagne, pasta alternative, vegetarian

Servings: 6 people

Calories: 450kcal

Cost: $12