/ck/ - Food & Cooking

[Anonymous No.16813007]

i asked /sci/ but they're so slow i'll never get an answer in time.

if you add sodium citrate to cheese it will emulsify it and make a nice smooth cheese which doesn't break.
i'm making cheese dip and the salsa i add is high in vinegar and even if i start with a bechamel it ends up kind of grainy.
i have potassium citrate in a powder.
as well as powdered citric acid, and baking soda, and potassium hydroxide.

will the potassium citrate act as a suitable emulsifier?
alternatively i could react the citric acid with baking soda to yield monosodium citrate, which is not a very good emulsifier.
i don't have any sodium hydroxide so i can't fully neutralize the citric acid.

i was also thinking of perhaps neutralizing some of the acetic acid in the salsa with baking soda or potassium hydroxide, and that would serve a similar purpose.

[Anonymous No.16813011]

have you ever tried a big mac?

[Anonymous No.16813015]

>>16813007
Huh?

[Anonymous No.16813019]

>>16813007
>food
Not science or math.

[Anonymous No.16813024]

>>16813007
What

Just search how to make queso

[Anonymous No.16813028]

>>16813015
queso dip breaks. i'm using monterey jack.
i don't have sodium citrate to act as an emulsifier, but i do have potassium citrate, baking soda, citric acid, potassium hydroxide. and i guess hydrochloric acid but it's for a swimming pool and not good for eating probably.

>>16813019
it is food science

[Anonymous No.16813031]

[Anonymous No.16813036]

>>16813024
i know how to make queso i just don't have any sodium citrate.
there are drawbacks to using a bechamel as a base with real cheese.

[Anonymous No.16813047]

i melt velveta in a crockpot

[Anonymous No.16813056]

>>16813007
Yeah it’s the citrate that helps emulsify not the sodium

[Anonymous No.16813073]

>>16813007
What does the sodium citrate do exactly? Does it help to not break down the fat in the cheese so it separates? If so I think I want to pick some up for the next time I make buffalo chicken dip.
Otherwise just heat it very low and slow.

[Anonymous No.16813091]

>>16813007
>i have potassium citrate in a powder.
> will the potassium citrate act as a suitable emulsifier?
If only there could be some way to know anon.

You have two way to solve this problem
- wait for a anon with high education in biochemistry to crack theoretically the complex problem, and then put the potassium in the cheese to validate theory
- just putting the potassium citrate in the cheese

If you already have it why the fuck are you asking if it could work instead of trying? Are you asking for some kind of permission to mix two substance you already have at home?

[Anonymous No.16813097]

>>16813007
if you have all the materials on hand then you are doing a disservice to your fellow countrymen, this board, and yourself by not doing it and posting the results in this thread

[Anonymous No.16813101]

>>16813007
That creates mustard gas watch out!

[Anonymous No.16813102]

>>16813007
>>16813091
don't do number 2 OP, that mischievous anon is trying to trick you into making a toxic gas. Better safe than sorry, wait for the expert.

[Anonymous No.16813103]

You autistic motherfucker, I'm intrigued by what you're doing, but holy fuck just look up how to make a proper queso dip.

[Anonymous No.16813106]

>will the potassium citrate act as a suitable emulsifier?
Yes. In solution all the ions move freely anyway. There is no difference between potassium citrate + sodium chloride, and sodium citrate + potassium chloride in solution

>can't fully neutralize the acid
That shouldn't even make much of a difference if you don't add lots, it gets buffered out by other things in your sauce, especially if it has vinegar in it, and what kind of (hydrogen)citrate you end up with just depends on the pH of your sauce. I'm not sure if the citrate would even work in very vinegary sauces because of this.

Also if you add potassium, don't add more than is safe to eat

[Anonymous No.16813122]

>>16813007
In English doc

[Anonymous No.16813126]

>>16813007
Fondue is made with wine for acidity and starch as an emulsifier. If this simple shit works your stuff shoul also work.

[Anonymous No.16813147]

>>16813007
Try adding raw egg yolk
It's a great emulsifier

[Anonymous No.16813234]

yeah so it turns out potassium citrate does work as an emulsifier.

i started with a 2tbsp:2tbsp butter:flour roux, then added 1c milk to make a bechamel. cooked until it began to coat the spoon but stopped before it thickened.
added 1 pound monterrey jack.
very stringy smooth consistency, i could pull ropes as long as my arm out of it.
i then added enough vinegary salsa until the cheese broke. gritty mouthfeel, no ropes.

i then added potassium citrate by the half teaspoon, stirred in, and waited 5 minutes.
i ended up adding 2 tsp potassium citrate.

the cheese gradually smoothed and oil was no longer separate from the protein. i didn't manage to get it ropey and stringy, but i imagine if i had not broken it, that could have happened? the emulsion it is now is different. i'm at a struggle for how to describe it. it's good, it's smooth. but it lacks cheese adhesion. it doesn't have any pull.
but there is no grittiness in the mouth. the fat is smooth and sort of melts on the tongue in a way that ice cream does.
when i lift it and let it fall, it forms sheets.

if you look on the back wall of the pot you can see the sort of gritty unmixed cheese, contrasted with the smooth flow from the spoon.
the surface appears like a once-broken cheese, somehow fixed. but there isn't a greasy feel on the tongue like you would expect. it tastes very good and feels good in the mouth.

[Anonymous No.16813268]

>>16813234
in closeup you can see the surface texture is not quite right. like there are very small irregularities on the surface, which makes sense considering i broke the cheese.

yet it's not broken. and if you ate it without observing it, you wouldn't know. it's incredibly smooth in the mouth. it doesn't form a skin on the surface, and i even took a bit in a bowl and heated it up really hot in the microwave and the oil didn't separate out.

next time ill try adding the potassium citrate to the bechamel before adding the cheese, and see what the result is like without forcing the cheese to break. i really just wanted to see if there was a way to undo a broken cheese sauce.

i was also concerned there would be a metallic aftertaste, as that can be the case with potassium chloride "salt alternatives". but there is no perceptible aftertaste.

all in all, great success. although sodium citrate is probably better to use, and i imagine that's why it's used in industry, if you have potassium citrate it will work.

[Anonymous No.16813291]

fuck i want nachos right now

[Anonymous No.16813297]

>>16813234
>>16813268
Based op, thanks for delivering

[Anonymous No.16813317]

>>16813007
Even the richest cheese doesn't break if you stir it while melting on a double broiler. It will, however, eventually form a skin, and eventually break if not stirred. You can do many things to achieve more stability. For the best possible stability I have found, begin an emulsification of melted cheese and cream via stirring over a double broiler, put it in a blender and add egg yolk and slowly pour in warmed oil while blending, bonus with a small amount of dry mustard. Continue adding oil until it is a smooth consistency. Adjust salt to taste. All the shit you're talking about doesn't make sense to me because I've never worked with those ingredients, and no reasonable cook would.

[Anonymous No.16813321]

Can't you overdose on potassium?
Be careful anon

[Anonymous No.16813325]

>>16813317
double boiler*

[Anonymous No.16813328]

>>16813317
>Even the richest cheese doesn't break if you stir it while melting on a double broiler.
it's because i add salsa, to make salsa con queso.
and the salsa has a lot of vinegar in it. and that acid acts to denature the proteins and "break" the cheese. rather than thermally denaturing the casein, i'm doing it chemically with vinegar.
if i were to neutralize the acid in the salsa, that would also work, but i haven't tried that.

[Anonymous No.16813331]

>>16813328
>salsa con queso
or chile con queso i guess. it's queso dip. mexican queso dip. cheese and peppers.

[Anonymous No.16813332]

>>16813007
just use an egg yolk retard.

[Anonymous No.16813334]

>>16813328
So make a salsa without the vinegar, or stabilize your emulsion better to begin with without using ridiculous ingredients.

[Anonymous No.16813338]

>>16813234
You should've made sodium citrate from bicarbonate of soda+citric acid (not baking soda+citric acid). I use it to make my own melting cheese all the time, has never failed me.

[Anonymous No.16813339]

>>16813334
no. the salsa is good. i don't know why you're fighting me on this. sodium citrate is what is used industrially in making american cheese, it is an emulsifier.
you can even skip the bechamel and just melt the cheese with water and sodium citrate and have a texture that is very different from the "cheese sauce" texture of a mornay sauce.
i stabilized my emulsion with the addition of potassium citrate. and it worked.

[Anonymous No.16813346]

what the fuck is broken cheese

[Anonymous No.16813355]

>>16813339
I never use bechamel when making a cheese sauce that doesn't specifically call for it, like mornay. It is completely unnecessary and makes an inferior sauce in most cases. I'm not intending to fight with you, just pointing out that you're a fucking idiot for resorting to extreme measures when none are required. By all means, have fun shopping for sodium citrate and whatever the fuck else you want to cook with, though.

[Anonymous No.16813357]

>>16813338
baking soda is sodium bicarbonate. which is distinct from baking powder. and also washing powder.
the problem is baking soda is not a very strong base and when you mix it with citric acid, you get monosodium citrate rather than the trisodium citrate (sold as "sodium citrate).

it's not as good of an emulsifier. the trisodium form buffers a higher pH than the mono- or di- sodium form.
(violet for trisodium, green for disodium, pink for monosodium, red is citric acid).
this higher pH from trisodium citrate means that it keeps the milk at the pH it is more stable at, around ~6.4 pH compared to mono-sodium citrate's ~3.1 pH.

i don't know if this means anything to you. tl;dr making it with baking soda and citric acid is not very good if you want to use it as an emulsifier because it will try to keep the milk more acidic than you want it to be.

[Anonymous No.16813363]

>>16813357
Fuck, my bad - I always mix up the names for the products in English (it's not my native language).

[Anonymous No.16813368]

>>16813355
i've made more queso than you've had hot meals. i'm always about learning new ways to do things. by all means, stick to the well-trodden path.

>>16813346
in milk, casein and whey are the proteins. these form structures with fat and keep the whole thing "uniform" in your mouth. the fat stays dissolved, trapped by the proteins.

when you heat milk, or add an acid, the proteins straighten out and separates from the water and you get cheese or yogurt.

however in a cheese sauce, if you heat it too much or add too much acid, you really deform the proteins and the fat comes out of the protein complexes and you have oil sitting on top, and thick gritty cheese on the bottom.
you can't force that back together normally.
that is what is known as "broken cheese".

pic related is what it looks like.

[Anonymous No.16813379]

>>16813368
I've made more hot meals than you've taken breaths. The well-trodden path works until ignorant people like you try your hand at it.

[Anonymous No.16813381]

>>16813368
Oh, is that what it's called or is that what you call it? I know that it does that, but I've never heard anyone call it that before.

[Anonymous No.16813384]

>>16813381
i don't know any other name for it. you'd say "the sauce has broken" or "this is a broken sauce".
because it's usually unfixable and you throw it out and start over.

[Anonymous No.16813394]

A few slices of "American Cheese" improves a mornay sauce a lot as it has way more sodium citrate and sodium hexametaphosphate than needed.

[Anonymous No.16813402]

>>16813007
just use a whisk

[Anonymous No.16813976]

>>16813234
>Flour in queso
Disgusting

[Anonymous No.16813981]

>>16813321
>Can't you overdose on potassium
I hope he shits his pants

[Anonymous No.16813987]

>>16813234
>>16813268
based and sciencepilled

[Anonymous No.16813997]

>>16813321
>>16813981
you can put a potassium suppository in your asshole and die from it. they assassinated (haha) people in iran that way

[Anonymous No.16814096]

>>16813381
that’s what it’s called. “broken” is the common term for a separated emulsification

[Anonymous No.16814099]

>>16813234
>>16813268
based OP

[Anonymous No.16814140]

how fat and retarded are you that you're just eating a fucking bowl of melted cheese like a dumbass

[Anonymous No.16814194]

>>16814140
it's not just a bowl of melted cheese, you eat it with tortilla chips too

[Anonymous No.16814205]

>>16813321
Yes, very easily actually depending on what you’re dealing with. Good advice.
>inb4 nerve gas

[Anonymous No.16814231]

>>16813073
proteins don't curdle
fat doesn't separate

i.e. it turns cheese into velveeta

[Anonymous No.16814235]

>>16813007
based /sci/ck/, I have no idea sorry :^)

[Anonymous No.16814359]

>getting this serious about nachos
/ck/ - Food and Autism

[Anonymous No.16814366]

>>16813234
>>16813268
you don't even need the roux if you're using an emulsifier, just cut that stuff out. when I make beer cheese the base is just beer, cheese, and sodium citrate. no need for anything else.

[Anonymous No.16814373]

>>16813007
shit never fucking works
just go buy a gallon of nacho cheese for 3 dollars a can

[Anonymous No.16814381]

>>16814373
they always put a ton of Crisco in premade nacho cheese to make it stay semi-liquid
get velveeta at least

[Anonymous No.16814387]

>>16814381
This is all you need