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Most business and government offices etc resume on the 24th, but schools and colleges not until March 4th.

Things in a bowl #35. I made a broth with charred onion, ginger and garlic in chicken stock with a bit of soy sauce, sesame oil and miso paste. Briefly marinated chicken thighs with gochujang, ginger and garlic then pan fried, added baby bok choy to wilt, and served the lot over garlic rice. Nice. Topped with coriander, onion slices and chilli crisp.

When do the hordes of tourists gallop home?

I agree about having a foot on top. The only time I find it necessary is when the filling remains soft; then it's almost essential to add something firm to the top, as otherwise the soft filling can melt into the dipping chocolate. I do realize that the filling should not be that soft, but many ganache recipes (from reputable authors) turn out rather soft. About trimming the bottom edges: I always do this. With hand dipping, it is virtually impossible not to have the chocolate at the bottom of the piece spread out. I have had to accept the procedure as part of not having an enrobing machine. I should add that after watching Kalle Jungstedt hand-enrobe fillings in his videos, I now run a metal skewer across the bottom of each enrobed cube (while it is still on the dipping fork) to scrape off excess chocolate; the result has been few fewer spreading bottoms. I realize others have been doing this for years, but I have never figured out a way to attach a scraping wire to my tempering machine, so eventually thought of running the scraper under the cube.

Tacos

Not a restaurant, but if you happened to be in Santa Monica on a Wednesday or Saturday, a walk through the downtown farmers markets might be interesting. Wednesday is bigger but both have quite a wide range of produce all year and the farmers are usually happy to answer questions. Both run from 8 AM - 1 PM on Arizona between 2nd & 4th Streets. There are a number of public parking structures in the area at reasonable cost.

I was waiting for it, and was not disappointed. About the second social media post I saw when I got up this morning was "Pancake Tuesday already? That really creped up on us..."

Very nice 🤗

The Year of the Rabbit ran from 22 January, 2023 to 9 February, 2024 so your hoisin could be anywhere between two and three years old or longer, depending on whether that's a production date or a best by date. Does it give a specific date? Surely it doesn't give a Chinese zodiac date. That would be like saying your yoghurt expires in Capricorn! Why you're researching soy sauce shelf life won't help you with hoisin sauce. They're completely different products. Opened, I wouldn't use the sauces you mention. Unopened maybe. I'd need more information to give a better answer. Brand? How stored? An image?

Footing at the top isn't something I prefer because it disrupts a smooth, flat top surface. I thought ... lightly trimmimg the edges with a knife would be a solution, but immediately proven that it is not a labor efficient way. It seems to be related to the cocoa butter content. I increased the cocoa butter ratio to 20%, wrong direction clearly, and the effects Jim described in (1) became apparent, but these are not my cracks ... I'll try reducing the amount of cocoa butter now. If that doesn't work, I think applying two thin layers of coating might solve my problem. Thank you so much for your suggestions.

Chicken sate (sate ayam): Marinated the chicken with ground coriander and fennel seeds, lemongrass, shallots, garlic, galangal, ginger, turmeric, and palm sugar before grilling over charcoal. More like kebabs than sate because we loaded up the skewers for company. Javanese peanut sauce (saus kacang tanah): Roastedd peanuts, toasted shrimp paste, red Holland chile, garlic, and palm sugar, all blended up and simmered with coconut milk. Finished with rice vinegar and diluted to taste. Sri Lankan mustard greens: Sliced onion and a halved jalapeno chile sauteed with sliced mustard greens, Thai basil, and turmeric, and finished with dried unsweetened coconut. Served with leftover bulgur pilaf with peas and carrots.

We've been a little pork centric in the menu department the past week. @Duvel suggested a recipe using pork steaks and I settled on a recipe for Thüringer Bierfleisch. Todays lunch were dinner leftovers including fried potato dumplings and cucumber salad. This was the dinner version including prep. I cut the pork steaks from a boston butt roast and used the remainder for ground pork. A portion of the meat became a nice pork patty sandwich. a And the remaining ground pork was used for Mexican chorizo. A portion which became chorizo and lentil stew.

The two ice creams I had left I spun today. Both had at least 1/4" ice on the bottom and some on the sides as well. I have decided to return it to Costco as I'm not excited enough about it to keep it. I'll stick with the Creami and for bigger batches,my Breville Smart Scoop.

I was sick for a few days. Had to cancel and had already bought the shrimp to make shrimp cocktail for the party I was going to. Did not want to risk getting sick all over again by freezing the defrosted shrimp, so told my neighbor to come over and get the shrimp for their V-Day dinner. When she came over, she brought ne French onion soup she had just mad with bread and cheese to top it. I really didn't feel like eating it until tonight. It was delicious! Did not take pix. She also brought me some of her pastry daughter's macarons which I put in the downstairs fridge and forgot about until just now. I'll try to remember to eat one tomorrow. Don't want to over-do it on my recovering stomach.

Exactly. So nice.

Potato and onion varenyky (from a local small business), garlic and herb labne, roasted and marinated beets and pickled onions all on a bed of arugula.

@blue_dolphin very high drool factor to that!

A belated Valentine’s post. Cheese thumbprints (from Deep Run Roots) filled with pomegranate and jalapeño jelly.

Can you provide a photo? I can't visualize where the crack forms and how pronounced it is. Initial suggestions would include: (1) The added 10% cocoa butter may be thinning out the chocolate too much, so that it flows off the filling and leaves what appears as a crack. (2) What technique do you use when dipping? Do you make sure that all six sides get covered adequately? I bring this up because my technique is to create a foot/chablon for the entire slab (I don't ordinarily add one on top). That means the bottom of each piece will have an adequate covering. But it is crucial to have the top covered as well in the dipping process.

We have reached the final chapter of this (not so) epic trilogy. Time to put this one to bed and get on with our lives... Managed to time it so the topping slowly crept down the cake after a slice. That's about it. I preferred version 2.0 with the firmer set, but I don't see any reason to make it again.

Pollo en ajillo (chicken in garlic: Toasted ancho chile sauce with 14 cloves of roasted garlic, fried chile guajillo rings, and stock from simmering the chicken. Tasted like the world's simplest mole. This was leftover from having friends visit for dinner last night. Bulgur pilaf with peas and carrots, cumin seed, ginger, jalapeno, and a little cayenne. Sadly, no leftovers and no pictures for the rest of last night's dinner: Asiya's eggplant curry and Sri Lankan sweet potatoes with cardamom and chiles. You will have to take my word that they were both pretty and tasty.

And what's your point? This was never intended to be a classic stock, and stocks made with salt or other seasonings serve a purpose just as real as unseasoned stocks.

I haven’t tried these but I quite like the Trader Joe’s version. The flavor is a little like a cross between salt-preserved lemon and olive! My Walmart neighborhood market has surprised me with black garlic and a wide range of ingredients I didn’t expect to find there.

Hmmmm - I wonder if a top and bottom foot might help?

As I said, the technique for making a classic stock is basically no salt.