The First Alexa Skills to Enable on Your New Amazon Echo. So, you bought an Amazon Echo during Prime Day, but you’re not sure what to do with it other than ask it silly questions, set timers, and roll a dice. Before you return it, know there’s a whole bunch else you can do with that smart speaker. The Echo currently has more than 3,0. Amazon. But since writing a guide for all its talents would probably be longer than a Nicholas Sparks novel, here is a quick list of the best, practical skills you should start using right away. Amazon’s trying to kill your controller with a new Alexa skill designed to make watching TV super…Read more Read.

Get your daily morning news briefing. One of my favorite Alexa skills is the morning news briefing, since I get to lie in bed or prepare breakfast while getting the news read to me.

Just ask, “Alexa, read me the news” and Alexa will let you know what’s going on in this crazy world, courtesy of NPR. She’ll even finish the briefing with a weather update. Turtle Cheesecake there. You can customize your flash briefing in the Alexa mobile app.

Or, install the Guardian skill and ask Alexa to read you headlines and even full articles. Work out with Alexa. Sometimes it’s hard to go to the gym when you have such a busy schedule, but Alexa can help you fit in a quick workout in the morning.

Barbecue beef brisket is the national dish of the Republic of Texas. Here's the recipe for how to cook it the way the BBQ champions abd BBQ restaurants cook it.

Just say, “Alexa, start 7- minute workout,” and the AI will guide you through a series of workout repetitions that will surely make you sweat. If you don’t know what the workout looks like, you can just look them up on your phone and follow along. Amazon’s beefing up some basic features in Alexa, its voice- controlled assistant. Your favorite…Read more Read. Control your lights.

This skill is one of the most basic and known, but also one of the most convenient—or maybe I’m just lazy. But if own Philips Hue Lights, you can ask Alexa to turn them on/off without having to get up from your bed or couch. It’s ideal for when you’re going to bed, or already sat down at your couch with the popcorn and about to watch a movie. Change the wake word.

If having “Alexa” as the wake word—the word that triggers the voice assistant—is causing to much trouble because someone in the house is named Alex or Alexis, you can change it to something less common. Green Beans And Tomatoes. You can change the wake word to Amazon, Echo, or Computer.

Sure, the options are limited right now, but hopefully Amazon lets us change it to whatever we want in a near future. I would love to call mine Jarvis, like Iron Man. The future you’ve been waiting for has arrived. Amazon has added a new accepted wake word to…Read more Read. Find your smartphone. Are you the type of person who constantly loses their phone around the house?

Well, Alexa has a neat skill to help you find it. If you sign up for a Track. R account, you can just ask, “Alexa, find my phone,” and the smart speaker will make sure your smartphone rings at full volume—and guess what? It was probably under the couch cushion again.

Check airport security wait times before you leave the house. Plan better and avoid long lines the day you travel. Just say, “Alexa, ask airport security for the wait time at La Guardia (or whichever airport),” and the AI will check the TSA’s public API for the last reported wait times at the airport checkpoint.

If you’re a last minute planner when traveling, this trick will help you a lot while your packing in a rush the morning of your flight. We’ve previously covered how cool automatic blinds are. And we know the Amazon Echo is pretty…Read more Read. Set Spotify as the default music streaming service.

Amazon announced last year that it would add a Spotify skill to Alexa’s catalog, but in order to have it work properly consumer has to say, “Alexa, play Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen On Spotify.” If you didn’t specify Spotify, Alexa would try and find the song on Amazon Music, which has a very limited song catalog. However, there’s a way to make Spotify the default so when you ask to play a song, it’ll automatically fetch the media from the select streaming service. Open the Alexa App and under Settings go into Music & Media. Once there, just select Spotify as the default music service and save your changes. For whatever reason, controlling blinds in a smart home has always been a bit of a holy grail for…Read more Read.

Get exclusive deals through Alexa. If you’re looking for a new way of shopping, all you have to do is ask, “Alexa, what are your deals?” and the smart speaker will recite a list of Prime- member- exclusive deals. If you have Alexa synced with your Prime membership and your payment method of choice, you can just Alexa to place an order for you.

• Meanwhile, though Google Assistant runs on iOS, it’s very limited and can’t be activated without opening an app. Siri won’t run at all on Android.
• So, you bought an Amazon Echo during Prime Day, but you’re not sure what to do with it other than ask it silly questions, set timers, and roll a dice. Before you.
• Scones are best when freshly baked and warm -- served with butter or jam. If you make a large batch, refrigerate or freeze them for later eating. When you want to.
• How to Shop for Lamb Rack. A rack of lamb is a bone-in cut that typically includes around eight rib bones, along with a single small eye of meat.
• How to Reheat Prime Rib. Prime rib can be difficult to reheat, as you don't want to overcook the meat. You also want to maintain its original juiciness. The methods.

Add a code to avoid accidental purchases. Since Alexa is very easy to trigger with language that resembles her name, you might sometimes end up accidentally making an unwanted purchase. However, there is a way to prevent an unintended purchase from Alexa by setting up a 4- digit voice shopping code through the corresponding app. To input a code go to the Alexa app’s Settings and choose Voice Purchasing, then just input your code and select Save Changes. Learn more skills. You can also discover more Alexa skills by using the Skill Finder. All you have to say is, “Alexa, tell Skill Finder to give me the skill of the day” and you will unearth new, cool skills.

You can also learn about new talents by category by asking, “Alexa, tell Skill Finder to list the top skills in the games category.”.

Step by step recipe instructions for prime rib or standing rib roast complete with photographs and reader comments and discussion. Bone-in leg of lamb like the one above comes in two forms: shank end, and sirloin end (occasionally, you'll find a massive one for sale with both the shank and the.

The Food Lab's Complete Guide to Sous Vide Rack of Lamb[Photographs: J. Kenji López- Alt]Disclaimer: This guide was produced for Serious Eats and licensed to Anova Culinary, makers of the Anova Precision Cooker, for use on their app. Download the Anova app for built- in temperature and timing guides, along with full Bluetooth control over the Anova Precision Cooker.

Serious Eats receives no revenue from sales of the device nor from downloads of the app. Rack of lamb isn't cheap, so it's understandable that cooking it can be even more nerve- wracking than cooking a pricey steak. What's more, lamb tends to be leaner and smaller than a steak, which means that it's even more susceptible to accidental overcooking. All of this makes it an ideal candidate for cooking sous vide, which makes overcooking nearly impossible and perfectly edge- to- edge medium- rare results the norm.

Because rack of lamb is a fast- cooking cut, the good news is that you don't even need a dedicated sous vide device. A plain old beer cooler will help you achieve better- than- restaurant- quality results. How to Shop for Lamb Rack[top]A rack of lamb is a bone- in cut that typically includes around eight rib bones, along with a single small eye of meat. If you're familiar with a prime rib of beef, rack of lamb is the equivalent cut on the lamb. If you're buying your lamb in the US, your main choices come down to the origin of the lamb (American versus New Zealand or Australian) and the way it is butchered.

American lamb tends to be larger, fattier, and more strongly flavored than lamb imported from New Zealand or Australia, though that doesn't necessarily mean better or worse. It largely comes down to personal taste. If you typically find lamb to be a little too gamy for your palate, stick to imported lamb. If you like a fuller flavor, pick American. The basic cooking process is identical for both.

Most lamb racks come already frenched, which means that the meat and connective tissue have been pulled away from the ends of the rib bones to expose them. Occasionally you'll find an untrimmed rack of lamb; whether you want your butcher to french it for you or not is, again, entirely personal. Some people like the clean appearance of frenched bones. Others like the bits of crispy fat and connective tissue that you find on untrimmed bones. How to Select the Right Temperature[top]The doneness of a lamb rack is by and large determined by the maximum internal temperature it reaches during cooking. For instance, so long as the interior does not rise above 1.

F (5. 4°C), it will never cook beyond medium- rare. With traditional cooking methods, there is a very short window of time during which your meat is perfectly cooked. A minute too long will mean overcooked meat. With sous vide cooking, on the other hand, that window of time is stretched into hours, which means your lamb will be hot and ready to go whenever you're ready to sear and serve it. As with a steak, the muscle structure of a lamb rack resembles a series of long tubes that are filled with juices.

The higher the temperature you cook them to, the more juices they squeeze out, and the firmer and drier your lamb will be. Here's a rough breakdown of how lamb feels at different degrees of doneness. Rare (1. 15°F to 1. F)Your meat is still nearly raw. Muscle proteins have not started to contract much and have a slippery, wet texture. Fat has not yet started to render, so it can be a little tough or waxy.

If you enjoy the texture of lamb that's barely been touched by heat, you'll enjoy this. Medium- Rare (1. 25°F to 1.

F)Your lamb is still nice and red, but muscle proteins have begun to tighten and firm up. You lose a bit of juice due to this tightening, but what you lose in juice, you gain in tenderness. Medium- rare lamb has a cleaner bite to it: Instead of muscle fibrils mushing and slipping past each other, as they do in very rare lamb, they're cut more easily between your teeth.

This is my favorite temperature range for lamb. Medium (1. 35°F to 1. F)Your lamb is a rosy pink throughout and has lost about four times more juices than a very rare lamb rack. If you have a very fatty piece of American lamb, I would recommend the lower end of this temperature range; it will help the fat render more fully, which should keep your lamb nice and juicy. Medium- Well (1. 45°F to 1. F)Your lamb is well on its way to dryness. At this point, it's lost nearly six times as much juice as a rare lamb rack, and the meat has a distinctly cottony, grainy texture that no amount of extra lubricating fat can disguise.

If you must have your meat cooked medium- well, make sure to look for a really well- marbled piece of American lamb to ensure juiciness. Well- Done (1. 55°F+)I get it: Some people like their meat well- done. However, there's no real reason to use a sous vide precision technique if you like your lamb cooked this way. Just grill or pan- roast until it's as done as you like it. Does Timing Matter?[top]I've seen some folks say that with sous vide cooking, once you set your temperature and add your meat, you can let it sit there indefinitely and see no change in quality.

I even believed that myself a few years back. Since then, I've come to realize that's not quite the case. Even at low temperatures, things are going on.

Enzymes are breaking down proteins. Chemical reactions are slowly taking place. I cooked identical lamb racks at 1.

F for intervals ranging from one hour all the way up to 4. As I had experienced with steak in the past, I found that the most important differences typically appeared between the four- and 2. As you can see, the lamb cooked for four hours stretches and pulls when you tear it.

This gives it a pleasant amount of chew even as it's still quite tender. Double that time to eight hours and you have a completely different texture: Rather than pulling and tearing, the meat shreds easily, with a much softer texture that offers little resistance. Increase that time to 2. For the best results, I strongly suggest cooking for no more than four hours total. Temperature and Timing Chart for Sous Vide Lamb Rack[top]At a minimum, smaller New Zealand or Australian lamb needs only around 4. Larger American lamb should be cooked for a minimum of one hour. Lamb rack cooked under 1.

F (5. 4°C) should not be cooked for longer than two and a half hours at a time for food safety reasons. Sous Vide Rack of Lamb Temperatures and Timing[top]Doneness. Temperature Range. Timing Range. Very rare to rare. F (4. 6°C) to 1. 24°F (5. C)1 to 2 1/2 hours.

Medium- rare. 12. F (5. 2°C) to 1. 34°F (5.

C)1 to 4 hours (2 1/2 hours max if under 1. F/5. 4°C)Medium. 13. F (5. 7°C) to 1. 44°F (6.

C)1 to 4 hours. Medium- well. F (6. 3°C) to 1. 54°F (6. C)1 to 4 hours. Well- done. F (6. 8°C) and up.

How to Cook a Lamb Rack Sous Vide, Step by Step[top]Step 1: Preheat Precision Cooker. Preheat your sous vide cooker to the desired final temperature according to the chart above. Allow the water bath to come to temperature before adding your lamb.

Alternatively, use the beer cooler technique to cook sous vide without a device. Step 2: Season. Season the lamb rack generously on all sides with salt and pepper. Step 3: Bag and Seal. Seal the bag by using either a vacuum sealer or, if using a zipper- lock bag, the water displacement method demonstrated in the video below. To do it, seal the zipper almost all the way, leaving about an inch open. Slowly lower your bagged lamb into a tub of water, letting the pressure of the water force air out through the top of the bag, using your fingers to help the air out. Once most of the air is out of the bag, carefully seal the bag just above the waterline.[Video: J.

Kenji López- Alt]Step 4: Cook the Lamb. Drop the bag in the water bath and cook. If properly sealed, the lamb should sink. Cook according to the timing chart above. Step 5: Remove Lamb and Dry Carefully. Remove the lamb from the bag and place it on a paper towel–lined plate. Pat it dry very carefully on both sides.