Essential

Welcome to Essential Ingredient

Whether you're a budding home cook or one of the nation's top chefs, the Essential Ingredient is one of your favourite destinations. With an uncompromising commitment to quality food, the Essential team scours the globe to bring you the best single source ingredients, a diverse range of books to tell you what to do with them and an array of cookware for any and all tasks in the kitchen. Our business is about inspiring great cooking, it's as simple as that. Stay, look around and come and see us soon.

Essential Facts

• From whence it came.
  
  Coffee is the seed of a berry from the tree genus Coffea.
• That's what it's called.
  
  The tall chef's hat is called a toque.
• An excellent wine glass should be drawn from a single piece of glass.
  
  This ensures that there are no weak points from joining sections of glass together.
• The best capers are small and firm with distinctive flavour.
  
  Capers are the cooked and pickled flower buds of the southern European shrub capparis spinosa.
• The best capers are small and firm with distinctive flavour.
  
  Capers shouldn't be bitter & you can soak them in milk to dilute the salt.
• The best capers are small and firm with distinctive flavour.
  
  Classic uses for capers are in vitello tonnato, salsa verde, smoked salmon puree and anchovy mayonnaise.
• The best capers are small and firm with distinctive flavour.
  
  Although capers are native to the Mediterranean, it is likely they were brought to Provence from Crete by the Phocaeans, Greeks from Asia Minor, who settled near Marseilles in the sixth century B.C.
• Saffron is the stamen of the Crocus flower.
  
  It takes one acre of flowers to yield one kilogram of saffron.
• Most of the world's highly prized saffron is grown in Spain.
  
  It is uniformly red/orange in colour and dry but not brittle.
• Saffron is the stamen of the Crocus flower.
  
  Saffron is classically used in fish soup (bouillabaise), paella, ice cream and pasta.
• Buy a quality knife and it will give a lifetime of satisfaction.
  
  Knife handles should mould the palm and be non-slip
• A 20cm Cooks knife should have perfect balance.
  
  It gives effortless use and along with a pairing knife and serrated knife is an essential blade in every kitchen.
• Stainless knives are better.
  
  High quality stainless steel retains a razor-sharp edge longer.
• The Romans were first with cherry picking.
  
  The Romans are believed to have discovered sweet cherries in Asia Minor in about 70 BC and introduced them to Britain in the first century AD.
• Ever wondered why cherries can taste like medicine?
  
  Cherries were first used during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries for their medicinal properties.
• Al dente is a term used in reference to pasta cooking.
  
  It means "to the teeth," saying that the pasta should have a slight bite to it, still offer a bit of resistance, after cooking.
• The Aztecs and Mayans were first with chocolate.
  
  They were the first to create a drink made from the beans of the cacao tree. They called the beverage cocoatl, now know as chocolate.
• Figs are one of the oldest cultivated fruits in the world.
  
  The fig began life in Asia Minor--between Eastern Turkey and North India.
• Only two places produce "true" balsamic vinegar.
  
  They are Modena and Reggio Emilia. Both designate the different ages of their balsamic vinegar by label colour.
• The tasting of coffee is referred to as "cupping".
  
  It is a process by which coffee brew is slurped by an expert for the purpose of evaluating the brew and determining characteristics.
• To make one kilo of honey bees have to visit 4 million flowers.
  
  They will travel a distance equal to 4 times around the earth to do so.
• Pasta can also be known as Sfoglia.
  
  Tagliatelle, tagliolini, pappardelle, tortellini, and lasagne are some of the pastas made from sfoglia, the "leaves" of egg-and-flour dough.
• Salt plays a substantial role in cheesemaking.
  
  Salting serves a number of functions, it speeds up the drying process, heightens the cheese's flavour, helps the rind to form and slows down the proliferation of micro-organisms.
• Why cook with copper?
  
  Copper pans provide the best conductivity, and therefore the most even heating.
• Vanilla can speak spanish.
  
  Vanilla is a vine and is a flavoring derived from orchids in the genus Vanilla native to Mexico.
• The first known cookbook is the De re coquinaria.
  
  This means "On the subject of cooking" in Latin and was the title given to early printed editions of the Roman cookbook now best known as Apicius.
• Tagliatelle, which simply means 'cut pasta', is a filiform dried pasta.
  
  Tagliatelle, which simply means 'cut pasta', is a filiform dried pasta.