Conference turris::cooks

    
    	I found out about the fructose. I stopped by GNC to get some
    	vites, and what do I walk by - fructose. It looks like table
    	sugar, but it's more expensive. It was $2.79/14ozs there. Why
    	would that be preferred over table sugar? Does it taste a lot
    	different, or is it in the catagory of "health food hype?"
    
    								 Mike
    

    I use large eggs for everything.  Sometimes a recipe gets finicky
    and says how much the eggs should measure, but otherwise, I don't
    think it makes much difference.
    

    Remembering things from chem 101 - Fructose is a complex sugar found
    in fruit.  It's made up of two simpler sugars.  Other sugars
    are Glucose (the most simple one), sucrose (the usual table sugar),
    dextrose, maltose, lactose (found in milk).
    
    When your body metabolizes any sugar, it breaks it down into
    glucose.  Glucose is the basic energy source used by your body.
    
    The simpler a sugar is, the quicker it breaks down into glucose.
    The more complex sugars have to be broken up and massaged more
    to get them down into glucose.
    
    Some folks who are unable to tolerate simple sugars, can more
    easily tolerate complex sugars like fructose.  Fructose breaks
    down a bit at a time and thus does not hit your system with a
    wumph of glucose all at once, but just dribs and drabs over
    a period of time.
    
    Pure fructose, as found in the health food store, breaks down
    faster than the fructose sitting in apples and bananas.  This is
    why an apple will keep you for many hours, while a cookie will
    need friends in about 3 seconds.  Another interesting bit of
    info is that whole flour products will break down more slowly
    than white flour products.  Don't know why, but they're generally
    lower on the glycemic index.  Another fun fact is that carrots
    are pretty high on the glycemic index.  The index has glucose
    at 100, apples are around 40, carrots are in the 70's somewhere,
    maybe 80's.
    
    The calories in all the sorts of sugars are, by the way, pretty
    close to the same.  So, you're not dieting by subbing fructose for
    sucrose.
    
    --Louise
    
    

    I buy both fructose and the basic Domino Sugar.  I find that the
    fructose is sweeter than the sugar, thus you do not have to use
    as much of it.  I basically use the Domino when cooking, since I
    don't know the ratio of how fructose to use for how much sugar to
    retain the same sweetness.
    
    I was also under the impression that since fructose was better for
    you because of how it beaks down (as explained in .3), even though
    the caloric count doesn't differ that much.
    
    

When a simple sugar such as glucose hits the blood stream it causes an 
enormous rush of insulin to counteract it.  Since the glucose is 
burned up very quickly, the body now has very low blood sugar, an 
excess of insulin in the blood.  This is why you will feel a 'sugar 
buzz' and soon afterward very sluggish.

Fructose and other complex sugars take much longer to metabolize and 
are much better for keeping the blood sugar at an even level.  All the 
up and down in blood sugar levels causes havoc in the body.

The reason that whole grain flours take longer to metabolize is that
they contain the germ and bran of the grain as well.  Since there is
more substance to break down, it takes longer.  You also will need
less of a whole grain flour in a recipe than white flour, because of 
the added bulk.  Personally I prefer whole wheat pastry flour in
baking to white all-purpose flour; it tastes better. 

Fructose is the sugar from fruit - it has some special properties in that
it "hits" the system differently from cane or beet sugar - it is digested
more slowly into the blood stream and therefore can be used by some diabetics.
It is also the sugar of choice for hypoglycemics.  I understand it is 
sweeter than cane or beet sugar - you generally use less than the equivalent
cane or beet sugar.  If a recipe is for a special diet, you will often
see fructose instead of sugar.

Recipe standards concerning egg sizes - all eggs are assumed to be extra
large or greater.  Minimum size is large.  If you have smaller eggs, use
an extra one.

    Julia Child said one day that if the recipe calls for one egg (I
    assume she means HER recipes), it means one US Grade A Large egg.
    If you have a recipe that requires a certain weight of egg, use
    another recipe :) !
    
    Sarah
    

    Somewhere early on, Joy of Cooking states "In all recipe assume the
    use of Large eggs." 
    					
    					andrew

    I quit buying eggs larger than "large".  Apparently eggs are graded by
    weight rather than size, and, when I used to buy "jumbo" eggs, I got a
    lot of eggs with two yolks.  That is a big nuisance if you need to
    separate the eggs for the recipe you are making - not only is there not
    enough eggwhite, but it is real easy to break one of the double yolks,
    and then you get to try it with another egg (you can often tell which
    eggs are going to be the double-yolked ones because they are smaller
    than the other ones in the carton).  So, I assume recipes mean "large"
    eggs.  If a recipe specifies a quantity of total egg by volume, I
    either ignore it or use a different recipe (if I think the volume is
    all that critical - usually doesn't seem to be).
    
    /Charlotte
    
    PS - Separating a double-tolked egg may be easier if you use one of
    those plastic gadgets for that purpose - I use the half-eggshell method
    - but you still would have a lot of egg ylk and not a lot of egg white.

    Separating eggs -- I learned this trick from my brother, who worked
    as a sous chef for a while...
    
    Crack the egg over a bowl -- some of the white will flow out, and the
    yolk should remain in one half of the shell.  Put down the other half
    of the shell, and empty the rest of the egg into your hand.  Let the
    white of the egg flow through your fingers; you'll be left holding the
    yolk, which you can place into a different container. 
    
    Using your fingers rather than the shell or any other contraption
    minimizes the chances of breaking the yolk;  regardless, don't separate
    the eggs over the bowl where you're keeping the whites.  If you
    mess up on the tenth egg, you will spoil all the whites.  Therefore,
    do the separation over a different bowl...
    
    
					andrew    

    Boy, that's even messier than the way I do it!  What I do is carefully
    crack the eggshell all the way around, and then pull it apart.  I pour
    the yolk into the other half of the shell rather than into my hand,
    though.  I haven't lost an eggyolk in years, but sometimes I have to
    fish little bits of shell out of the whites.  This method works better
    with fresh eggs; as they get old the whites get thicker.
    
    Definitely use a separate small bowl to catch the white, in case you do
    break the yolk; also, it is easier to catch escaped eggshell in a small
    bowl.

     re: .11

>                                     This method works better
>      with fresh eggs; as they get old the whites get thicker.

     
   Actually, the whites get thinner as the egg ages.  A fresh egg will
   have a white that this thick and clings to the yolk.  As the egg
   ages, the yolk thins and becomes more 'watery'.   Hence, a fresh egg
   is best for frying (spreads less) and an older egg is best for
   separating.  I have also been told that older eggs are prefered for
   souffle's, angelfood cakes, etc. as they beat up to a greater volume
   than fresh eggs.
                                                                                
                                                                                
     
               
    

    I read somewhere that eggs are graded by freshness and that AA are
    freshest.  Because they have to be sold within a certain time period,
    they are harder to find at retail groceries than Grade A.  Kinda like
    certain grades of meat!

    My brother can break four eggs at once (two in each hand) to fry
    for breakfast without breaking any - says he learned in the Navy!
    I'll have to ask him about separating them sometime!
    
    TW

RE: .3 (fructose)

Not quite right.

According to my handy copy of Lehninger's BIOCHEMISTRY (no cook should be
without one :-) --there is some use to having been a Bio major after all):

sucrose, the usual table sugar, is composed of one molecule each of the two
	simple sugars, glucose and fructose, linked together

maltose, found in malt extract and also called barley sugar, is the same thing,
	but with two molecules of glucose rather than one each of glucose and
	fructose

lactose (milk sugar) is a complex sugar composed of one molecule each of glucose
	and galactose, linked together

glucose, also known as dextrose, is the key six-carbon sugar in the body's
	metabolism.  All of the others have to be converted into glucose before
	they can be used.

fructose is also known as levulose or invert sugar.  It is a simple sugar found
	in fruit.  It tastes a lot sweeter than glucose or sucrose, so you
	need less of it in a recipe to produce the same sweetening effect.

Lactose is interesting because it is only found in milk and most non-Caucasians
lose the proper enzyme to digest it (split it up into its components glucose
and galactose) as adults.  Inability to digest lactose leads to a very 
unpleasant form of indigestion called lactose intolerance that prevents affected
people from enjoying dishes made with dairy products.  This is why you only
rarely see Chinese recipes made with milk.

A lot of health-conscious people prefer fructose to normal table sugar.  First
of all, you need less of it to get the same sweetening effect, and secondly,
since it has to be converted to glucose before the body can use it, it takes
longer to enter the bloodstream as glucose and produce the "sugar high" effects
than regular sucrose does.

--PSW