Gratafy

OLD POST:

Today, the amazing app Gratafy has launched in Denver!! What you can do with it is digitally buy food and drinks through the app. So, if you owe someone for helping you move, you’re missing a birthday party, or you’re just feeling friendly, you need to download Gratafy! Also, since I love all of my Drink and Spoon followers – you get 5$ free to spend on it using the code: drinkandspoon 

Wondering where to use it in Denver to buy beer? How about Low Down Brewery and Dry Dock Brewing Company – some of our favorites. Seriously though, how good is Apricot Blonde? Remember when I paired it with the sweet and spicy, tropical shrimp tacos? Yum…

So, if you’re in Denver, Chicago, Houston, LA, San Francisco, or Seattle – check out Gratafy and use the promo code drinkandspoon and your first beer is on me 🙂

Photo Credit: Gratafy

 

Beer Marinade: It’s Science

This post is not really a recipe per se. It is pretty informational and mostly delicious. Last week in the Weekly Growler Fill on PorchDrinking.com, I posted a news article about how marinating beer helps cut down the carcinogens formed during the grilling process. I actually already knew about this, but of course, I needed to try it out.

Cutting a Pineapple 101

Cutting a pineapple – for some it may be easy, for others it may be a mystery. For all you newbies in the kitchen, here’s my preferred way to do it without butchering the whole thing apart.

Cut off the top:

Cut off the butt:

Cut down the sides in small slivers so that you don’t lose too much good stuff:

Skin-less pineapple:

Cut out the core:

After this, slice up the chunks however you want them!

Advice: Softening Butter with Little Time

Don’t you hate when you’re getting ready to bake but you forgot to let the butter get to room temperature? Or if you want to whip up a batch of cookies really quickly but the butter is hard as a rock? You can’t microwave the butter because it will get too hot and cook the eggs in your recipe. Here’s the best way to get it soft quickly:

Natural Way to Clean Your Cutting Board

Let me preface this post: this method may not completely disinfect your cutting board from all microorganisms. With that being said, I did my research. (For those of you who don’t know, I’m in graduate school for a health profession so I have access to millions of scientific articles). I found that lemon will kill many common bacteria and fungi that we find in everyday life. Lemons have a low pH due to the citric acid which many organisms can’t survive in. Also, extremely hot water helps. Salmonella and Campylobacter (common causes of food poisoning) cannot usually survive boiling water. If you have time, boil up a huge pot of water before cleaning and dump it on your cutting board at the end. Cleaning a wood cutting board is difficult. You want to clean out all the grooves but you don’t want a bunch of chemicals getting soaked up by the wood. Chemicals found in everyday house cleaners can irritate skin, eyes, nose, etc. and can also lead to allergies. With that being said, bleach will kill almost anything. So you must weigh the benefits with the risks and decide how afraid you are of germs. Either way, the lemon and salt method is a great way to clean from day to day and helps remove pesky stains from your cutting board. Add boiling water to this and you’ll disinfect against many disease causing organisms.

3 Tips About Cooking with Garlic

– After working with garlic, your hands probably smell. Unless you want to scare off vampires all day, wipe them against any stainless steel surface, like the sink. This will deionized the molecules and make them odorless.

– To make garlic easier to peel, microwave for about 5 seconds. You don’t want it to get hot and cook, but just a bit warm. Cut off the butt end first and the rest of the papery outside should peel off easily.

– When picking out garlic at the grocery store, you wan’t to get the freshest head so that it doesn’t start sprouting as soon as you get home. Grab one and smell it. If it smells like garlic, its no good. It should smell like nothing if its fresh!