prasantrin

That's what I thought, too! I was tempted to try the sour cream ones, though. I'm a sucker for anything with sour cream, but since I'm trying to be frugal these days, I had to pass. Here are the "Adult" Doritos The black comes from takesumi, as you can read from the bag. (bamboo ash/coal for those who don't read kanji). Haven't gotten a chance to see if Lawson's still had them. I really liked them. They were the perfect blend of pepper and salt.

If one were to use bean sauce instead of black beans, how much would one use? I have more sauce than beans, so I figure I should use that, instead. As soon as I saw this cooking pictorial, I knew I had to make this! I could just taste it as I looked at the pictures!

At Daiei today I found "Cooking Doritos". They come in two flavours--plain salt, and sour creaam. Judging by the bag, they're not supposed to be eaten, straight, but used as garnishes in dishes, or for dipping. They're more than Y200 for a regular Japanese-sized bag, so it would actually be cheaper to buy the big bag of imported Doritoes...

Don't you mean Old Dutch Rip-L chips? Way better than Ruffles (which I think didn't exist in Manitoba till the early/mid '90). I think my mother mentioned using Onion soup mix and cream of mushroom soup for pot roast. Apparently it gets raves in the Philippines...

I don't know if they're over, yet. I just bought mine last week, but i was gone all summer so I don't know how long they were around before that. I bought them at Lawson's, I think. If it's not raining tomorrow morning, I'll see if they still have them, and I'll download the pics tomorrow so you can see what the bag looks like. The tortilla chips are black, by the way, and the bag is white with pink, with a woman on a mama-chari and a man on it.

The texture is quite different from what I think of as ganache. It's gooey-ish. I've always thought there was quite a bit of corn syrup in it, but I'm not sure. I'll give your recipe a try next time I make chocolate cake. Now where to find green bean flour in Japan...

Does the frosting you're looking for look like this.... I've been looking for the same kind of frosting. These pictures were of a cake in the Philippines, but I don't think they use green bean flour there. If I find something, I'll post it, but if anyone out there has a recipe for a frosting that looks like this, please post it! I'd be forever grateful!

Do you have a scale? One large egg is about 52 grams (without the shell), so 1 1/2 eggs would weight 78 grams. That's what I learned in my current cooking class. In junior high school, we learned that 1 egg was about 3 tablespoons, so you could also use about 4 1/2 tablespoons.

I will never again put my favourite silicone spatula in my crappy Japanese blender. Because even if the blender is crappy and can't blend the crap out of my a**, its rotating blades are still sharp enough to take a chunk out of my spatula. My poor spatula....I really loved it!

I do have an air conditioner that has a dehumidifier setting. The only problem is, as with many Japanese appliances made for the Japanese market, it doesn't work very well. It's also typhoon season here. But I'm going to purchase a humidty gauge and as soon as it hits below 60, I'm making the good stuff!! Soft buttery caramels...mmmmmmmm

Question about humidity and caramel (and nougat, too!). What is the ideal humidity of a room for making confections? I'd like to try making caramels and nougat, but it's about 75% humidity where I am right now. Would it be a bad move to try it now? Or should I wait for a bit. Would 50% humidity be OK? 25%?

Don't know if this has come up already, but has anyone tried the new "Adult" Doritos? Black pepper and salt, and black in colour. I like them! I'd post a pic, but I seem to have forgotten my cell phone at home. Oops!

It sounds to me like this is the perfect opportunity for you to visit Ikea!!! I'm sure they'll have tons of ideas for storage for small areas, and it's reasonably priced usually, don't know about Japanese prices, yet). Take pictures!

I got turned on to Gjetost when I was in grad school. I love the stuff! I have a recipe from the NYT for Gjetost Dessert Tartlets. I don't want to post it, but if anyone wants it, just pm me and I'll get it out as soon as I can. It's a little odd--uses whole wheat bread for the tart shells, but the filling is gjetost, cream, brown sugar, and cognac. I imagine it would be a) very tasty, and b) usable in other crusts (I'm thinking it would be nice in some kind of nut crust).

Have you considered investing in a Tilia FoodSaver? Vacuum-seal bags would be easier to carry than vacuum-seal boxes, and easier to store, I would think. I sometimes vacuum-seal flour with my Tilia. I keep the flour in its original bag to avoid getting flour in the machine.

I'm almost set to leave the 'Peg again. I didn't eat nearly as much as I did when I came home last year, but I'm a bit pre-occupied with finishing my grad. degree writing. Such is my punishment for procrastinating. The highlight of my trip home was lunch yesterday at Bistro 7 1/4. It was a nice space, reminding me somewhat of an open kitchen in a home. The main cooking space is in the middle of the room with a counter (which has 6 or so stools) separating it from the rest of the space. They also have a small counter near the back of the space which is the bar, and a small room at the back as the prep area. My mother had chicken livers with a poached egg. We asked for a runny egg, because that's the way poached eggs should be. It was runny in the middle, but the rim of the yolk was a touch too done for my tastes. The livers were served with bacon and onions over thick slices of baguette, with a lot of sauce. The sauce was delicious, but I didn't get much of it because my mother sopped most of it up with her bread. The liver was very tasty, according to my mother. I thought it tasted like liver (go figure!). I had the moules et frites. I thought the serving was quite generous for the price. I think it was 7.50 for about 3 dozen mussels, and plenty of frites served with homemade mayonnaise. You could select the sauce you wanted for your mussels. I chose the traditional route, and had tomatoes, garlic, with white wine. I can't remember the other options, but one had gorgonzola, and another had Pernod. There was a fourth, but I wasn't really paying attention. The mussels were cooked perfectly, and the sauce was light and flavourful. There was just enough lemon in it to make it fresh, but not overwhelmingly acidic. It would have been nice to have more bread with which to sop up the sauce (there were two slices), but the amount of food in its entirety was more than enough. I only ate 14 mussels (we were counting), most of the frites, and one slice of bread and I was stuffed. I'd have been willing to sacrifice some frites for more bread, though. That sauce was really good! I loved the frites. They were probably supposed to be like shoestring or very long matchstick fries, but some didn't separate from each other so they were like wide ribbons. Crispy, just the way I like them. The mayonnaise was fine, but I would have liked something a little more flavourful or original. I'd even have settled for aioli. We each had half servings of dessert--me the lemon tart, my mother the very berry pie. The lemon pie filling was perfect. It was not quite what I expected (I expected something like lemon curd). Their filling was baked, and reminded me of a lemon cheesecake. It wasn't too sweet or too tart, It's only downfall was the crust. Boooooring! The very berry pie was very verry tart. Neither of us really cared for it, but I'm sure people who like tart berries would have enjoyed it more. The crust, again, was boooooooring. I think their baker needs to experiment a little more with pie crust making. I believe pie crusts can be flavourful, but theirs was flavourless. I would dine there again, but not for an elegant or romantic dinner. It's just not that kind of space (it could be, but it is a Bistro, afterall). If you're looking for a quiet dinner, stay away, because it gets rather noisy in there. But the food is tasty, the atmosphere is casual, and the prices are reasonable. I'd give it 3 out of 4 stars based on my first visit. Or maybe 2 3/4. Added to their name, it would give them a perfect 10!

Are all the goods supposed to be packaged? Loaf cakes tend to freeze very well--pound cakes, banana cakes...stuff like that. They're also very easy to make, so it would help take the stress off prep. One mini-loaf could be one package, so you could easily get 6 or so mini loaves out of one recipe. Or use muffin tins, instead. If you're good with pastry, you could make mini tart shells (or buy them if available) and freeze them, and some kind of filling that's easy to freeze (lemon curd?). The defrost and fill at the list minute. If you use a pastry bag the filling will be quite quick. Scones also freeze very well and are easy to make. You could do a variety of sweet and savoury flavours. Yeasted coffee cakes or cinnamon rolls--frost after defrosting. All of the above could be made now and frozen without much harm, I think (except maybe for the lemon curd?). I don't know all the details, but it seems like your friend is being a little pushy about what she expects from you. You're volunteering your time and effort, after all. Perhaps you could guarantee your original offering, and let her know that you'll try to do more but you might not be able to do as much as she'd like. Or request her maid's service for more than just two days. I'd ask for a week, personally, and maybe at least one more helping hand.

This topic might end up being Tokyo/Kanto-centric, but I'll add some info for the Kansai folks. Ikari supermarket often sells chilled lamb chops. I also found oxtail there, once. At least I think it was oxtail...

Question about the sweet and sour pork. It was my understanding that Chinese-style sweet and sour sauce was usually just some rice vinegar (the black stuff) and sugar. The S&S in your picture looks just like North American style S&S. Did your dining companions comment on it at all? I'm wondering if that style has always been present in China, or if it's something adapted for Western tastes.

I live in Japan, so I don't even get to do that! I've been thinking of bringing them some of my baked goods. What's the protocol of giving food gifts (homemade or otherwise) to restaurant staff? This is a very small restaurant (2 4-tops, 6 counter seats) with only the owner and 3 staff working at the place. I doubt they have an official policy on the matter--should I just bring them some goodies and see what happens?

This might seem an odd question to some, but what do you do when a place wants to comp part of your meal or give you something you didn't order, but you don't want them to? Here's an example--my favourite Italian place closed suddenly for about 4 months due to severe staff shortages. When they reopened, I returned as a regular (I eat there or get take out once or twice a week). I knew their business was nowhere near where it was pre-closure, and they were struggling somewhat. But they would still offer me free drinks, or to upgrade one of the dishes I ordered, etc. I felt really bad, because I knew they weren't doing well financially, so I didn't want to accept their offers but they always insisted. Now I know if they really want to give me something, I shouldn't refuse, but would there be a polite way to refuse a comp and not seem ungrateful?

I'm not a tupperware rep, but here's the website. Cheers. Ellen ← and if the link doesn't work, they're called Classic Sheer Midgets Set (they're about 60mL, twice the size of a shot glass, I think).

Hmmm....if it's your first job (contract?) and you're not really licensed to do baking out of your home for profit, I probably wouldn't even charge that much, especially if you're doing it as a favour. I might charge what it costs to make the cupcakes, plus a little per cupcake (maybe 25-50 cents, depending on how complicated the decorating is) for this specific job, or let her buy the ingredients, and charge a flat fee for the baking and decorating (maybe $5-7 per dozen?). But I'd also let it be known that it's a one-time deal, and if you were to continue baking for her, you'd be charging more (maybe print out a price list for her for future reference?).

She still has it. I was thinking of using it to sprinkle on caramel or something like that. Only problem is that it's ordinary iodized table salt, which (in my opinion) doesn't have a great flavour straight. I think my mom might just continue using it as regular salt. It does smell rather nicely of vanilla, though.

The best!!!!!!!!! ← It was my mother...she has a closet full of mistakes like that. I could write a book if I could remember them all... She still feels really bad about having to throw out all that leche flan--she uses a lot of eggs and cream in hers.