Easy cooking hacks that you should know to save time

We all love a hearty meal, but with our busy schedules, cooking can be tedious. Whether you want to make speedy lunch or a quick family dinner, here are some foolproof tips to get your cooking done faster. Applying these tips will reduce your cooking time and enhance your cooking ability. 

Prepping Your Veggies

Your meals every day must include vegetables. However, it should not be surprising that chopping veggies take up half of your cooking time. Without colourful vegetables that increase the nutritional content of your meal, tasty recipes would be incomplete. Here are some Indian kitchen tips to rapidly chop your vegetables so that cooking is easier for you.

• Egg Slicer For Even Portion Of Fruits And Vegetables: Egg slicer is not only meant for cutting hard-boiled eggs. For even thickness, you can slice strawberries, mushrooms, kiwis, apples, or any fruits and vegetables, and it saves you a lot of time that goes into perfect chopping of vegetables or fruit.
•  Peel Ginger With Spoon: The peel of ginger is pretty thin, and it becomes difficult to peel, and it takes a lot of time to peel it. No need for a unique tool to peel ginger. To make the process simple scrape it with a metal spoon. This will save a lot of time and energy. 
• Before putting avocado on your toast, check it before peeling. You should expect creamy, green flesh within if it pulls away easily and you can see green, and if it resists then allow to ripe longer. If it seems brown, it has got rotten. 
• Separate the garlic cloves, place them in the mason jar, then cover the lid to reduce the mess and speed the peeling process. The skins should come off easily with a good shake of the jar, leaving the pods ready for chopping.
• To speed up the boiling process for potatoes, poke them with the help of a knife. The holes will help the heat seep into the potatoes and soften them in no time. 

Save Your Fruits

• If you want to keep your bananas fresh for more time, pull them apart and cove each stem in plastic wrap or foil. This will help produce the ethylene gas in the stem; otherwise, it would spread to the whole banana and accelerate the ripening. 
• If you want to ripe your fruits faster, place them tightly in brown paper bags. This will trap ethylene gas inside the bag (while allowing a slight amount of breathing) so that fruit sugars mature and acids break down. 
• Here is a very easy trick to remove the stem of strawberries. Push the leaves out of the strawberry by inserting a straw into the pointed bottom of the fruit.
• Peeling pomegranates is a tedious task. To peel it easily and mess-free, score the skin with a knife around the centre, peel the halves apart, cut them in half again, and then place the pomegranate seeds under water. To free the arils from the white membrane, gently rub them.
• The secret to fresh apple slices is its core. Slice an apple into wedges with a slicer, then press the fruit back together.  Hold it in one place with an elastic band or plastic wrap. Before reassembling and wrapping, squeeze a lemon over the meat for further oxidation protection.
• Turn Your Fruit Into Popsicle If your fruit is about to be overripe, just blend it and add it to your popsicle mould.

Life Changing Cooking Hacks

• Make Scrambled Eggs In Microwave: Grab a mug and spray it with some oil, crack a few eggs and top it with milk/water and sprinkle with some salt and pepper, then stir with a fork to combine. Microwave at a 30-second interval, stirring every time, for 90 seconds.
• Poach a Dozen Eggs At a Time: For those who prefer their yolk to be runny, try this speedy option. Fill a muffin tray with a tablespoon of water, then crack an egg in each cup. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 to 15 minutes for set whites and oozy yolks, perfect for adding to a family-size batch of eggs. 
• Freeze Your Coffee: Instead of diluting your strong coffee with regular ice, try the coffee cubes. Just blend your favourite coffee, cool it down, and freeze it in an ice tray. Now, whenever you have your favourite iced coffee, just drop the coffee cube for the rich taste. 
•  Use Frozen Dishware For Cold Food And Drink: If you want to serve any cold beverage, put your glass into a freezer; this will keep your drink cool. You can try the same with your ice creams; just freeze your bowl before serving to keep it cool for a long time.  
• Preheat The Pan: Preheat your pan before adding the ingredients to decrease the cooking time and for the crispy vegetables. If you are cooking in a microwave, then make sure to preheat it. 
• Use Slow Cooker: It is the best friend for all cooking enthusiasts. You can toss all the ingredients in your slow cooker and go about your day until it’s time to eat. It’s even faster when you prep your ingredients beforehand. 
• Toast-Bread For Whole Family: Avoid standing for long hours to toast multiple slices of bread. Instead, place a sheet pan on the bottom one and lay slices perpendicularly between the rack grates of two neighbouring oven racks. Bake at 450 degrees or until golden brown, and in about 5 minutes, you will have a whole loaf of toast. 
• Slice Greens With Pizza Cutter: Slicing greens can be very time-consuming. Roll the pizza cutter over your greens to make your work easy. You can keep it handy for DIY chopped salads. Add your ingredients to a sturdy glass or stainless steel bowl and roll the cutter back and forth until you form bite-sized pieces.  
• Roll Out Lemons: Sometimes, lemons can feel hard when you try to squeeze them. The best hack to soften them and get the maximum juice out of them is to roll lemons firmly on the counter with your hand’s palm. This will make the lemons soft and juicer. 
• Crisp Up Crunchy Taco Shell: Place tortillas between two grates that are separated by one space. For about 10 minutes, or until golden, bake at 350 degrees. Not only will they crisp up, but the crunchy shells will also sit upright on their flat bottom, making them easy to put down between bites without the fillings spilling out.