It's Science!

Epi-log, which is a blog from Epicurious, the publishers of Gourmet and Epicurious, listed some interesting tips today:

• The first was keeping avocados fresh.  After cutting an avocado in half, the author sprayed the unused half of the avocado with cooking spray and put it in the fridge.  The next day, the avocado had not turned brown.  This makes sense because avocados turn brown because of oxidation, exposure to air.  If you cover the surface with oil, air cannot get to it, thus no oxidation.  The author said that he then just wiped off the cooking spray and the avocado was ready to eat.  Pretty nifty solution.  My only question is how long before the oil seeps into the avocado, but that question is for another day.
• The second was making a roux in a microwave.  I've done this before and it's pretty easy.  You just melt a little butter or put some oil in a ramekin or other microwave container together with a nearly equal amount of flour and zap it for 20 to 30 seconds and it will turn a straw color.  I have experimented a bit with this, but I don't know if you can get a really dark roux this way.  I am interested in why the roux colors at all.  That would indicate to me that the flour is caramelizing or browning in the microwave and I would like to know how or why that is happening.
• The last tip was rinsing your hands with milk after handling chili peppers like jalapeños.  I've done this before and it works because the milk neutralizes the capsaicin in the peppers.  One tip that was on there that I hadn't heard of was rubbing your hands on a stainless steel knife after chopping garlic to get rid of the garlic smell.  I suppose, but I  am not sure, that that solution has to do with an ionic reaction between the steel and the garlic-smell compound. On the other hand, there's no good evidence that it actually works.