The salad spinner is not only for salad
Where we see that the salad spinner can be used for many other purposes.
12 K 4.8/5 (20 reviews)
Keywords for this post:Salad spinnerUseSpinningTrickLast modified on: March 25th 2022
The salad spinner is not only for salad
If you are of a certain age (like me) you may have known the salad basket, from your mother or grandmother, that we used to shake outside with a big swing of the arms, to wring out the salad leaves after washing, and this before using them or adding vinaigrette once poured into a salad bowl.
Even if you still find this kind of basket, hardly modernized, you may have at home a salad spinner, this rather simple utensil: there is a basket inside that turns on an axis, driven by the crank on top. It's the centrifugal force that does all the work, the water is ejected from the leaves that turn very fast inside, and recovered in the bottom.
And a salad spinner can be used for something else than spinning salad, in practice, as soon as you have to dry or more globally to remove water from something, you can also use your spinner.
Here are 2 specific examples:
If you blanch spinach, that is to say that you plunge the leaves into boiling salted water for less than a minute before plunging them into cold water, you will then need to spin them out before you can use them in your recipe.
Traditionally, you drain them in a colander and then put them on a tea towel and press on them to remove as much water as possible that the towel absorbs. Traditional, but not very efficient, and you will stain your towel green.
It is much more effective to pass the spinach leaves out of the cold water in the spin-dryer, by small packets, you will be astonished of all the water which comes out.
Another example, you want to make a broccoli or cauliflower gratin, in principle you will also blanch them, and then drain them before putting them in the gratin dish.
Not the best method, broccoli (like cauliflower) retains water from cooking because of its structure, this water does not go away when draining in the usual way, and it may disturb the creamy side of your gratin.
Here again, a little spin-drying...
These two examples are not exhaustive, of course, you should not hesitate to use the wringer for a lot of food that you need to dry, it is much more efficient than a simple passage in the strainer even followed by a drying with a cloth.
To sum up: Your salad spinner can effectively be used to spin many other foods besides salad, both raw and cooked.
Even if you still find this kind of basket, hardly modernized, you may have at home a salad spinner, this rather simple utensil: there is a basket inside that turns on an axis, driven by the crank on top. It's the centrifugal force that does all the work, the water is ejected from the leaves that turn very fast inside, and recovered in the bottom.
So?
And a salad spinner can be used for something else than spinning salad, in practice, as soon as you have to dry or more globally to remove water from something, you can also use your spinner.
Here are 2 specific examples:
If you blanch spinach, that is to say that you plunge the leaves into boiling salted water for less than a minute before plunging them into cold water, you will then need to spin them out before you can use them in your recipe.
Traditionally, you drain them in a colander and then put them on a tea towel and press on them to remove as much water as possible that the towel absorbs. Traditional, but not very efficient, and you will stain your towel green.
It is much more effective to pass the spinach leaves out of the cold water in the spin-dryer, by small packets, you will be astonished of all the water which comes out.
Another example, you want to make a broccoli or cauliflower gratin, in principle you will also blanch them, and then drain them before putting them in the gratin dish.
Not the best method, broccoli (like cauliflower) retains water from cooking because of its structure, this water does not go away when draining in the usual way, and it may disturb the creamy side of your gratin.
Here again, a little spin-drying...
These two examples are not exhaustive, of course, you should not hesitate to use the wringer for a lot of food that you need to dry, it is much more efficient than a simple passage in the strainer even followed by a drying with a cloth.
To sum up: Your salad spinner can effectively be used to spin many other foods besides salad, both raw and cooked.
Lasts posts
A tablet holder
Perhaps you too cook by consulting your recipe on a tablet or phone, and putting it down on your worktop? It's practical, but not the best solution. Here's a look at how you can make an inexpensive, almost universal stand.March 14th 20266875
Pre-calibrated pastry dough
When making pie dough (shortbread, shortcrust, sweet...), it's always a good idea to make a lot at once, and then divide it into pieces, which you can freeze. I've already pointed out the mistake not to make, which is to form a ball before freezing. It's difficult to roll out afterwards because...March 9th 20269335
Butter vs. grease
We often read in a recipe where a pastry is put into a mould that, just before pouring, the mould should be buttered or greased. But what's the difference between these 2 terms?December 1st 20253,0015
Getting out of the fridge early
Very often when you're cooking, you need to take food or preparations out of the fridge, to use them in the recipe in progress. There's nothing tricky about this: you just take them out of the fridge and use them, usually immediately, in the recipe. But is this really a good method?November 24th 20251,9565
Who's making the croissants?
When you look at a bakery from the outside, you naturally think that in the bakery, the bakers make the bread, and in the laboratory, the pastry chefs make the cakes. It's very often like that, with each of these professions having quite different ways of working, but sometimes there's also one...November 23th 20251,774
Other pages you may also like
Tranché, dissociated, failed, in short... missed!
When preparing a sauce or a cream, there's always a (small) risk that the creamy preparation you're working on will suddenly separate into two parts of different textures: a liquid part, for example, and a more or less solid part, or even become lumpy. It's terribly frustrating, but we'll see...June 19th 202314 K5
The delicious complexity of Jura wines
Do you know the wines of the Jura? Maybe not, it's a small appellation, 2000 hectares, with a production of wines that are both very atypical and very typical, even unique for some of them. Let me tell you a few words about it.May 14th 202214 K4.9
Sugar syrups
In cooking, and especially in pastry, we often use sugar syrups, a simple mixture of water and sugar in varying proportions. Here is a presentation of their differences. .January 17th 202313 K4.8
The 3 secrets of Parisian flan
A flan Parisien, or boulanger, is a simple yet delicious cake. A cream, a mixture of milk, eggs and sugar, is poured into a raw pastry base and baked in the oven until the pastry and cream are cooked. This is the simplest version of the recipe, probably the original one, but nowadays the cream...July 21th 202316 K4.7
The softness of sandwich bread
You're probably familiar with what's known in France as "pain de mie", a very white, molded and rather soft bread, widely used in cooking, particularly for croque-monsieur. Let's find out what it's all about.September 5th 202313 K5
Post a comment or question
Follow this page (as 2 people already do)
If you are interested in this page, you can "follow" it, by entering your email address here. You will then receive a notification immediately each time the page is modified or a new comment is added. Please note that you will need to confirm this following.
Note: We'll never share your e-mail address with anyone else.
Alternatively: you can subscribe to the mailing list of cooling-ez.com , you will receive a e-mail for each new recipe published on the site.