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A picnic spread need not be a complicated affair. Offering cold food items makes the menu easier to control. There will be less things to bring and fewer cleanups afterwards.

A favorite picnic item is sandwiches. In the not so distant past a sandwich consisted of two slices of bread with a slice of lunch meat sandwiched between them. Sandwiches have been given a facelift in recent years.

To add variety to ordinary sandwiches, choose from different breads. Sandwiches are being made from pitas, flatbreads, and tortilla wraps. Cut the bread the night before and store in an airtight container.

Select meats from the deli counter at the grocery store. Fresh turkey breast, ham, chicken breast, and salamis are available. Store the sliced deli meats in the freezer. The morning of the picnic, take them out so they can slowly thaw and stay cold until they are ready to be devoured.

Condiments can spell trouble for picnic-goers Refrigerate mayonnaise derived foods and dips until ready to pack the cooler for the picnic. To eliminate having condiments containers sitting out without refrigeration, use condiment packets like the ones they give out at fast food restaurants.

Salads of all types are great cold picnic options. Macaroni or potato salad is best when served cold. If your gathering is large, investing in single serving plastic cups with lids will avoid bringing too much to the picnic. When mayonnaise based salads come to room temperature they begin to get soupy and could spoil.
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MSG or monosodium glutamate is a extremely contestable food additive whether it is beneficial or badly o our health monosodium glutamate. Almost frequently I discover people ordering that MSG can effort assorted diseases in our body admitting cancer. Approximately say that it may damage vital organs in our body although any tell this matter acquires free radicals which in turn crusade cancer.

The amusing affair is that our environment is entire of carcinogens; pollutions got along smoke, waste and early harmful contents that are damaging to our health. We cannot charge MSG exclusively for completely the illnesses that are bechancing away there. In my opinion, there are two better matters that we had better come to ourselves in having MSG.

MSG creates our food taste better. It is a familiar nutrient addictive and this will emphatically create our appetite addition whenever this substance is applied with our popular dish. Obesity is one recognized campaign of cardiovascular jobs and other troubles caused along being overweight. And this is one beneficial reason how come you had better be avoiding expenditure of MSG whenever you have a big appetite for appetizing foods.

But then once again, we should not be charging this substance in creating an individual overweight. It is calm the individual’s consuming uses that had better be chastened rather than blaming to a essence that exclusively behave its job in making the food tastier.

“What is the last thing that your patrons taste/drink before leaving a restaurant ?” And if you do not believe me go out there and watch. Nearly everybody will toss back that last cold cup of coffee before leaving their table, therefore it is vitally important that your coffee tastes wonderful hot, warm or cold.

Now how can you be sure that your coffee tastes good.

STEP ONE : CLEAN the EQUIPMENT

Cleanliness is more important than godliness, therefore ensure that you not only clean your bowls every night (there must be a joke in that line somewhere), and your coffee supplier can give you urn cleaner to really clean them occasionally, or run them through the dishwasher. DO NOT FORGET THE BREW BASKET. This will be dirtier than everything else, so once again ensure that there is no oily residue, plus clean the showerhead, and the area around it. If you have an urn or dual system, ask your coffee supplier to come in and train/educate your staff on how to properly clean the equipment.

STEP TWO: CALIBRATE the EQUIPMENT

Many times I go into a restaurant to find the brewer is short-potting (no this is not a gardening term), and the remedy can be very simple. Adjust the timer or float mechanism. BUT, maybe the equipment is short potting because the water line (including the filter/strainer) or machine or showerhead is clogged with lime, or some other gunk. Cleaning and maybe de-liming is necessary. Remember that if your brew time is too long, your resulting (revolting) coffee will be bitter, with a burnt after-taste. It’s rather like drinking coal tar – although I must admit I cannot remember the last time I knocked back a shot of coal tar.

Also, ensure that the water coming out of the showerhead is at the correct temperature, too cold and you will underextract, too hot and we start going down the coal-tar path again. A simple thing to check (use an oral thermometer, not a r…… one), and then adjust the temperature on the thermostat as necessary.

STEP THREE : WATER

A cup of coffee is 98% (approx) water, so if your water tastes lousy, your coffee will taste lousy. So test your faucet water by comparing it to the taste of a bottle of filtered water. And if necessary, put in a proper water filtration system. Remember your ice, soda, and cooking will all taste better.

STEP FOUR : YOUR COFFEE/COFFEE SUPPLIER

The people responsible at your coffee roaster will cup (taste) coffees through the temperature range, right down to room temperature – specifically to address the question at the top of this page, and to ensure that the coffee tastes good even when its been sitting for a while in your coffee cup. The coffee cupper (and by the way the best tea tasters, coffee cuppers, and wine sommeliers are all women, this is because physiologically God built a woman’s mouth differently to a man, and women have much better taste buds than men ) will cup and blend the coffee so that the taste profile always remains the same. People do not want surprises when they first wake up, least of all in their coffee cup at 7am, therefore the job of cupping and blending is one of the most difficult in the world. Mind you, most people don’t want a surprise in their martinis about 12 hours later, so once again tasting and blending is vital.

Having determined that your coffee supplier/roaster (hopefully one and the same company) can roast and blend coffee well, lets look at packaging, and the whole bean versus fractional pack/ground coffee debate.
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I always cringe when that is the first question from a restaurateur, and my response is always the same – “Is price more important than taste”?

Consider the following – restaurants usually sell a cup of coffee for about one dollar. And when they pay $6.00 per pound for coffee, their cost per cup is about ten cents, (which means their profit is ninety cents). So the difference in their profit between $6.00 per pound and $3.00 per pound is the incredible sum of five cents per cup. However, the real difference will be in the taste of the coffee.

The taste difference is even greater with coffee brewed in an espresso machine since an espresso machine is an amplifier. It will highlight a really good coffee, but conversely, it will also amplify any faults with that coffee.

Remember, espresso is not a type of bean, but is a method of brewing coffee. Espresso coffee is tightly packed (7 grams), through which hot water (198 degrees F) is forced at high mechanical pressure (132 psi). The resultant one and a half fluid ounces is the elixir known as espresso, and many countries could be conquered before 9:00 am if their population were to be deprived of this magic “elixir”!

A commonly mistaken thought is that coffee used in espresso machines should be dark roasted – WRONG! When beans are darkly over-roasted, all the oils come to the surface giving the impression that the roasted coffee has been coated with grease. These oils contain much of the flavor of the coffee and when brought to the surface by over-roasting, they will be lost when handled, stored, and of course, when they are ground. Since coffee is really “cooked” three times, (the first during roasting; second when ground since the grinder creates heat; and thirdly when brewed), over-roasting will produce a bitter/burnt taste when brewed as an espresso.

Let me return to my original point as to why better coffee beans cost more. Coffee beans are an agrarian product, and like all crops they are subject to climate, soil, and growing and harvesting methods. Coffee plants that are treated better will produce a better crop.

Coffee harvested by hand will produce a higher quality product. A mechanical harvester only goes through once plucking ripe and unripe berries simultaneously. Manual harvesting takes place over a period of time and the pickers only pluck the ripe fruit, avoiding the unripe berries.
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