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Smoked oysters remind my of a night with my Dad when I was about 9 or 10. My mom was out and he came into the room where I slept with my younger sister and waved his cigarette in a circle, which was our code for "your sister is sleeping, you can get up." I did and we had smoked oysters with saltines and my first tiny sip of beer. "Don't tell your Mom about the beer." Fast forward about 55 years and my dad was in long term care. I brought smoked oysters and saltines and a bottle of beer. "Don't tell the nurses about the beer." Full circle.

I'm sorry for your recurrence of Crohn's. It's a b**ch of a disease. My younger sister suffered from it from the time she was 14. She spent her teenage years in hospital, often on TPN. She had a couple of resections and did okay for a while, then relapsed. They said she could have one more resection but it would likely end up with her having a permanentt colostomy. She said she didn't care -she just wanted to be out hospital and live a semi normal life. They did the resection and she didn't end up with a colostomy and went on to graduate from college, have a career, get married and have two boys. From the time she got pregnant, all her Crohn's symptoms went away and she became part of a UBC study of women who suffered from Crohn's or colitis or ileitis colitis who seemed to be symptom free after pregnancy. I wish you the verey bet outcome.

盐焗鸡 (yán jú jī), salt baked chicken. A Hakka dish. The chicken is brushed with Shaoxing wine, covered inside and out in a mix of ground 沙姜 (shā jiāng), sand ginger aka lesser galangal, kencur, Kaempferia galanga; salt and ground white pepper then buried in its own weight of coarse sea salt and ‘baked’ in a clay pot or wok. Usually served hand torn. Here I used half an organic chicken and I’ll get at least two meals out of it. The salt is reusable.

Breakfast outside at my son’s place. Scrambled eggs on toast with tomatoes and baby bocconcini. An almond cream croissant to share as a finishing sweet. Takeaway coffee from the cafe nearby

Good points . temperature differences aside we both get a superb amount of gelatin. granted , I concentrate it on purpose .

Mapo tofu tonight (and lunches for a couple of days). My first attempt. Next time a little more sauce and medium tofu. I could only find firm or extra firm.

TJ's lemon torchietti pasta, snap peas, yellow zucchini and red peppers, dressed with TJ's lemon pesto and crumbled feta. I often photograph my plate next to a window in the living room and must ask my assistant to step aside… Today, he was puzzled, but obliged. Sometimes I have to haul him away and shut him up in my bedroom.

Leftover Shoyu Chicken and Rice: 1½ thighs were left over from dinner last night. Heated them in the sauce, used the sauce to refresh the rice, had a glass of tea with the meal.

I do mine in large pot at a bare simmer (the old fashioned way). At 2 hours I strain the stock, trash the veg then add the bones back to the pot and cover with cold water and bring up to a simmer again. I was super impressed how much gelatin I got considering I didn't add any chicken feet and the broth had more flavor than I expected as well. Oh and when I go over night I just put it as low as possible and put the pot to one side of the flame

@AAQuesada thank you for those ideas . Ive found that chopping the bottom of the leg for marrow , probably adds little marrow to the stock . this in an iPot HP 1 hour. Im pleased with that , as i did not care very much for the flavor of the cooked marrow. when you say you pull yours @ 2 Hrs : how are you cooking for those 2 hrs ? @ 2 hrs , you pull the chicken out of your cooking method ? then , you continue over night w the stock ? what heat method are you using then ? I think its fine to chop the bones making your ' personal ' stock . I will chop off the bottom of ChDrums , as I pull off the skin , as its easy to do . next time . but not for the marrow . for easy of getting the PITA skin off .

I do this when I make chicken stock and have been very happy with the results. Legs make great stock! I pull mine at 2 hours because I feel the flavor is best at that point then add more water and let it go overnight to really get all the gelatin

It's a great ingredient I love making Negishio condiment for grilled meats. It's basically diced Negi with salt, black pepper, sesame oil some ajinomoto/chicken powder for that msg hit if you want.

Singapore style headless fish head curry (mahi mahi) with masala potatoes.

I’m so sorry you’re dealing with this, @Tempest63 and hoping, along with everyone here, for the best possible outcome!

Grilled chicken thighs with lime basil butter and corn, plus tomato salad and some grilled bread

Good wishes @Tempest63.

Ive been working w Stop&Shop chicken drumsticks decided to SV a batch , freeze , for later use as dark meat Ck for other dishes . I dont like CkFat, so skinned the lot : 5 lbs . nice and plump these are. bagged SV later tonight , chill and freeze . just Thyme and Rosemary . I thought it was going to be easy to skin these . Grab the skin , blunt dissection down to the small end , rip off the skin. its a bit of a PITA , that end bit . but I think it will be worth it in the end. next time Ill just pull the skin down to the end , then chop the end off . just tendon down there on another thread , I looked into CkMarrow . fount it not interesting at all. but iPot'ed nothing much seemed to happen to it , so I doubt much would happen to it SV 150 F a much lower temp than HP iPot. Im thinking 145 or maybe 150 F , 8 hours or so. rapid chill . freeze . next time , Ill do all bags 2 CkDrums // bag.

I make naan-ish AF pizzas from time to time , remarkably easy Campari tomato , thyme , fontina cheese AF'd . about 4 - 5 minutes plated . w EVOO quite nice . added Chipotle tabasco to live it up .

Over on the IDS thrad https://forums.egullet.org/topic/167917-cooking-with-a-countertop-indoor-smoker/page/12/#comment-2458890 I smoked two trays of CkDrums, for the purposes of making CkJell Stock : 6 legs , in the 6 qt iPot water to allmost cover ( 6 cups ) after 1 HR HP . I immediately release . it save time as this will be a 3 X stock . Ive discovered w past sessions , using quick release the steam lost equals about 1 cup of water from the iPot. this concentrates the stock , ' seamlessly ' w no extra work I hand mash the legs , getting to a state of muscle strands . I iPot 30 min more , HP . the solids are removed and jus pressed out via a hand potato ricer . this was done three times ( 3 X ) . the last session , above. the stock was strained to remove any remaining strand , cooled in the sink then added to my Brick-Maker containers a little over 4 cups 3 X stock. I refrigerated the three containers over night . later today Ill place them in the freezer for 15 minutes or so facilitating the removal of the fat , then overnight again in the freezer , then vac the bricks and keep in the freezer for future use. I open the Vac'd bag , quickly remove the CkJell I plan to use , and re-seal in the chamber vac the same bag. works quite well.

That package was puchased at Yaoya-San, a Japanese market in El Cerrito. I purchased the replacement kombu at Tokyo. Didn't think to save the kombu and have the folks at Tokyo look at it. The folks at Yaoya-San cheerfully refunded my $$$, though.

I'll echo this one, @Tempest63. Sending more positive and healing vibes!

@Shel_B Did you get it at Tokyo Market? I'm sure they won't have a problem with the return. And someone there might know what kind of mold it is.

So sorry to hear this, @Tempest63. It's a lot, for sure. All the best.

@Tempest63 I'm sorry to hear this. I hope your operation is a success. Please let us know how it goes.

A favorite of mine , Jamie Oliver , seems to still be going strong. ' Eat yourself Health ' is current . Ive learned a great deal from him , over many years. Tom Kerridge also has ( fairly ) current show , ' Pub ' and a travel show to Spain. he points out clearly and early , the Spain show is sponsored by M&S. but there is 50 % cooking along w travel. in terms of competition shows Great British Menu , an exceptional show early on for several seasons , now seems to be pretty much about props , not food so much. Ive given up on them several years ago