Ben Starr

The Ultimate Food Geek

Tag: Alton Brown

  • Perfect Homemade Fortune Cookies

    Makes 12-18 fortune cookies depending on size and thickness. Fortune cookies are remarkably easy to make…IF…you have the right recipe.  Many of the recipes on the net call for fat in the form of butter or oil.  The problem there is that you end up with greasy fortunes.  The remaining recipes, at least the ones…

  • FINALLY! An All-Stainless Steel Meat Grinder Attachment for Kitchenaid! (Smokehouse Chef)

    **This is an objective product review of a meat grinder I recently purchased.  I have no affiliation with either Kitchenaid or Smokehouse Chef, I do not receive any benefits or “kickbacks” from them, and the links in this ad are to the product pages on Amazon if you want to purchase them.  I do not…

  • Ben’s Secret to Stock

    Homemade stocks make ALL the difference in recipes, particularly in soups, sauces, and gravies.  But who’s got room in their freezer for gallons and gallons of homemade stock?  Lots of TV chefs will tell you to reduce the stock a bit and then freeze it in ice cube trays, but then you have to maintain…

  • How to Make Aged Cheese: “Black and Bleu” Ricotta Salata

    I’ve been making cheese at home for about 3 years now, and SO many fans have begged me for instructions on how to make cheese after I’ve posted photos of exquisite homemade cheeses. Cheesemaking is a specific hobby with it’s own set of necessary equipment and supplies.  It’s sort of like wine making or beer…

  • How to Make the BEST Loaf of Bread on Planet Earth

    Tough title to live up to, right?  But I was literally stunned out of my mind when I tasted this bread the first time, and each time I’ve baked it since, it seems to get better.  This bread makes people scream.  Literally. What you are about to read is very, very long.  After all, if…

  • The 5 Cookbooks I Can’t Live Without

    I often get asked which cookbooks are my favorite, so I figured some of you would enjoy a blog about it.  I have a LOT of cookbooks.  Most of them are specific to making a particular type of product.  I have lots of books on making cheese.  Making wine.  Curing meats.  Canning and preserving.  The…

  • Crispy Fish Tacos

    I’ve had quite a number of requests for the recipe for fish tacos that I served as my “signature dish” on MasterChef.  It’s certainly not my signature dish, but it’s one of the only things I make that could be made in an hour, so that’s what I made!  Fish tacos are one of the…

  • 3-minute Microwave Oatmeal Cinnamon Breakfast Cake

    I make breakfast almost every single day.  During the week, when it’s nothing special, I usually make biscuits or pancakes.  Biscuits take about 15 minutes, start to finish, pancakes take a little less.  That’s not a lot of time, to be honest.  Way less than most people might think. But even 15 minutes is too…

  • Venison Meatballs

    Venison is one of my favorite meats.  The last meal I cooked before leaving to film MasterChef was venison tenderloin.  (Ironically, the dish that sent me home in 5th place from MasterChef was venison tenderloin…I was trying to cook it the way Ramsay cooks it, rather than my own special way.)  Venison is the most…

  • 1-Hour Hazelnut Cranberry Sticky/Sweet Rolls

    When I’m making a very special breakfast, I often choose my Overnight Cinnamon Rolls because they get rave reviews.  Any kind of yeast-risen roll for breakfast is a winner…but sometimes you can’t prep the night before, or don’t have HOURS to prep that morning.  So I’ve been developing a series of 1-Hour yeast risen recipes…