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I know I'm only looking through a tiny lens on the internet, but by my book, you and Moe are truly living the dream. So many of us are stuck in these boxes of 'that's not breakfast food,' and thus we don't eat what we really want, and you two are eating what you want, when you want it. And to top it all off, everything you make looks absolutely fantastic. Yes, I'm a little bit jealous.

What is a "blast freezer?" And, I hope you don't mind my asking, why do you have freezers in your dining and living rooms?

Unfortunately the link goes to a page reading "Private Site - This site is currently private. If you’re the owner or contributor, log in." I never liked tripe (despite my mother's many attempts to convert me) until I ate it in China. I've since eaten it in Japan and Vietnam; maybe Thailand. I don't know how or why, but East Asia seems to do something else entirely with it.

Pasta with Roasted Garlic, Cauliflower and Walnuts - First you roast two whole garlic heads with olive oil in an aluminum foil poach in the oven at 500F and mix the roasted garlic with olive oil, lemon juice and red pepper flakes. Afterwards you roast the cauliflower in larger pieces in the oven before chopping it. Both get mixed with pasta (casarecce), pasta water, parsley, parmesan, lemon juice and toasted walnuts.

Almost every day I get fun stuff to evaluate, although some of the fun stuff is more fun than others. I just finished a review of a new West Bend 5 cubic foot chest freezer: (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) What a joy. I'd never had a chest freezer before. Amazing, when you lift the lid of a chest freezer the contents don't go spilling out onto the floor. I relocated my blast freezer to the dining room, and set up the West Bend in the living room where the blast freezer used to be. The West Bend easily held all the food from my ice bound freezer in the kitchen with oodles of space to spare. I've now been able to defrost both the kitchen freezer and the blast freezer. The blast freezer is not recommended to be run continuously, though I confess I had been using the blast freezer as an overflow freezer from the kitchen. If there is a power interruption the blast freezer does not automatically restart. The West Bend will. Meanwhile I have high hopes for a new nugget ice maker that's on the way. Considering the current Excessive Heat Watch the ice maker can't get here soon enough!

This is quite good, although it's not the higher quality gelato one would find in a dedicated gelato shop. I love the combination of vanilla and chocolate - always a favorite - and the fudgy swirl is not at all overpowering. The dessert maintains an easy-to-scoop texture right from the freezer, and it's not overly sweet ... this, I think, will be my go-to ice cream for a while. Try it ... nice for the summer months. .

No. They sit where you see them sitting. Wait staff bring them bowls of noodles in broth* and then they add ingredients of their choice from the dishes in the centre of the long table. These are repeated along the length of the table and are replenished as required. More broth is available on request. * The women in the striped apron top right of the image is bringing some one a bowl of noodles.

I have two: one for the house, and one for the Princessmobile. Whereas I leaned toward hand-slicing and dicing, my darling preferred the security of having the diced product contained, even though it meant cutting things into smaller bits first. He didn't think he had the knife skills for dicing. Elaboration: Our alligator chopper, an original Vidalia chopping wizard, has too small a chopping area to allow an entire onion at once. I usually cut onions into quarters or eighths, depending on onion size, before proceeding. The potatoes require slicing before being pushed through the grid, but (a) an entire potato slice, if done latitudinally, will fit the grid area. Furthermore -- and this was a surprise when we tested -- the potatoes cleaned the onion fibers from the chopping grid. The procedure became: chop onions first, and make more than needed for the night's recipe. Then chop the potatoes. Cleanup was much easier.

I sliced a little fish off husbands dinner of flake and used it to make a very simple kedgeree for breakfast which I enjoyed.

Chicken broth with a few vegetables including mushrooms and pork dumplings.

Looks perfect!

I have three refractometers but for the grapefruit soda I used DiFluid brand... (eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

Thanks, I think that's what happened.

People are dining at the buffet? Do they move from dish to dish? Or do they "fill their plate" then stop wherever is handy?

@RWood, Mozz takes practice in my experience. I used to live about a mile from an Amishish raw milk dairy and made mozz semi-regularly. At first I kneaded it too much and got a tougher, almost store-bought skim-milk mozz result. Then I learned to knead it as little a possible to get it to cohere and got a much moister, softer, more pleasing result.

Once upon a time, I would have fed it to the chickens! Reuse, Recycle!

Tamarind mojito adapted from a recipe by Pierre Thiam. The tamarind which is naturally tart added interesting flavors to the classic mojito recipe (spice and burnt sugar notes). First you make a tamarind simple syrup with 1/2 cup of tamarind pulp or paste (I used a tamarind puree which has the consistency of honey), 1 cup of sugar, and 1.5 cups of water (heat everything together, then let it cool). To make the cocktail, you muddle 1 mint sprig with 1-2 lime wedges, add 2 ounces of white rum, 3/4 oz of tamarind syrup, 1/2 oz lime juice, shake with ice, and strain into an ice-filled glass. Then you top with club soda and garnish with a mint bouquet.

Gravity Heights in Mission Valley. This is their new / second location (the other location is in Sorrento Valley). They make their own beer, and have a diverse menu that pairs great with the beer. I started with the Moonlight American IPA. My notes read: acidic, resin, piney, lemon, gravel, tropical notes. 3.75/5 The pierogies are a must-order - crispy browned exterior, creamy center. I also liked the dill sour cream on the side. I had the crab-crusted halibut for my main. I love the local halibut, it's one of my favorite fish. This one was well prepared, maybe just a touch overcooked. The Caesar salad was fine (there are superior versions out there at the Fishery or Paradisea). The Demi More burger with gruyere and caramelized onions that my husband ordered was good, very rich. A small pour of the Daybreak IPA to round things off. Piney, pineapple, coconut, grass, floral. 3.75/5 At the other location I previously enjoyed the mezze platter, the oven-roasted mussels, and the pork bolognese. Their woodfired pizzas are also quite good.

Not something that interests me but I'm always impressed with Breville engineering. Price is relative. I mean there are people who will spend as much money on a chef's knife that I'm sure will do as good a job. Probably slower but easier to clean.

I made chef Ludo's boursin omelette the other day. It was pretty rich, and I would use smaller dollops of boursin next time. Regrettably I was out of chives, so you will have to picture this with finely sliced chives on top. The center was custardy-creamy.

Is it a pet hedgehog? If so - then I might not put it there.

After a little more investigating the Dicing and Peeling kit does have the ability to do a 12mm dice, the dicing kit ($180) adds 8mm and 16mm capability. p

I made the baked shells from the newsletter. I had homemade tomato sauce on hand so it was quite easy to make the recipe (I also do not have the energy to stuff an individual shell ). I made a half batch. It turned out pretty good, slightly on the dry side so I would use a bit more tomato sauce next time. I used these as well as the surprisingly excellent fresh ricotta from Trader Joe's, TJ's mozzarella, and TJ's parmesan. Assembly The finished product. I served it with a sprinkle of parmesan on top and a rioja on the side (also TJ's).

Here is my low tech solution for juicing grapefruit: I cut it in eighths, and I press each eighth using my Hamilton citrus press. It's a bit messy but it works. Out of curiosity, what instrument do you use to measure the brix of your juice @JoNorvelleWalker?