oraklet

a kitchen is such an awful place for storing wine. ever changing temperature, humidity, light. better in a well isolated cupboard in the bedroom or the hall.

funny coincidence: i've got some old unglazed second hand cast iron (danish) copco, and i've been wondering what made them look as if they had, after all, chips. then, a few days ago, i read in a book about how enamelled pans are made, and it explains that at least two layers are added to the raw iron: one of a different sort of iron (for reasons that have to do with the enamel not sticking well to the basic material) and then one or several layers of enamel. the additional layer of iron does rust - though not as fast, it seems, as the normal raw cast iron. and the reason i find it on the black copco pans may be that they also made enameled pans in several colors, so they may have used a standard form plus a layer of iron to keep up the weight of the unglazed pans. and that may be the case with the le creuset grill pan, too. i hope this made some sense...

i think there are many similarities in danish /scandinavian and british approaches to cooking. most important that both are to a large extent formed by a long regime of margerine and other ersatz products, in combination with the propaganda telling that it's good for you... now in denmark, for c. 30 years good men and women have fought for a return to basics. not the cuisine of our great-grandmothers, but to using seasonal produce, and to recognizing the value of local produce. i imagine that the same development has been seen seen in britain. so, it's not a fad. on the other hand, it's very slow going, and is constantly being sabotaged by supermarket chains trying to sell us strawberries in january, or terribly sour pineapples, or hard peaches, or hard pears, or lousy french apples. what for would we want french apples, dammit? we can get perfectly good danish apples with decent to absolutely excellent taste from august till march. do we really need poor french /chilean/new zealand apples? no way. same with diluted concepts of tapas or thai cooking or...- sure, it is slow going, and perhaps a losing battle. reminds me, i haven't had a really good pear for nigh on 20 years. nor really good strawberries. but of course, the pears and strawberries i can get now are much cheaper than 20 years ago, and accessible at all seasons.

oh thanks. i did have the impression - from reading slater - that it was a little like what forms when chicken or pork caramelizes, or when you make a concentrated stock, all of which can be, as you say, intensely umami.

by the way: what is marmite?

i can recognize that picture from denmark, and from the rest of what i know of scandinavia. crap for the unthinking masses, luxury for the rich gourmets, and almost nothing in between. ham for instance, is either soggy stuff in supermarket plastic, or it's cut for you by a butcher who knew the pig's grandmother's name

i don't personally drink cappu's (i prefer espresso), but i make them for my wife and sometimes guests. even with our small krups machine (which actually makes a quite decent espresso), the technique described in this thread makes much more delicious results, they tell me. thanks a lot. of course, we don't ever have skim or semi skim milk in the house!

well, that's what my mother does, too, and so does my sister. or they used to. untill last christmas, when some of us thought the wine was corked, only it wasn't: some of wine glasses had picked up a bad fungus smell from sister's cupboard (not all of them, because she had not stored them all upside-down), or perhaps she hadn't dried them well enough. we had to pour out the wine in those glasses, and rinse them. a bad waste of a quite decent amarone. several lessons learned. i don't know if this is actually so silly, but it makes me furious when i can't find my tools because someone misplaced them when emptying the dishwasher. i'm not a very good searcher.

ok, here i go again... inspired by the le creuset thread, i took a closer look at my raw cast iron copco pans. and to my surprise, i noticed that in the few places where they had dents, they actually look as if some enamel had chipped off. this is weird, as they otherwise do react to seasoning like normal cast iron, and they're as heavy as one would expect. under the outer, black layer is a dark silver grey material. what the devil is it i've gotten hold of?

if you want enameled cast iron and don't want to pay for lc, then perhaps this might do: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...11&category=976

This is what I do, too. Bruce me too. and it's funny, really, to notice how the skin seems almost glued to the onion right up to the moment you've gently scored it. then suddenly it comes loose very easily. i think the reason must be that the scoring de-stresses the skin.

ah, yes. of course.

if you're talking uht-pasteurized, then oh no, it isn't. try as a contrast, the fresh milk in haute savoie. or swedish "old fashioned" milk. but we'd better not go any further off topic!

will it be no good if it isnt straight gauge? or have i misunderstood what this is about? i've actually been thinking of buying (a rather cheap) one, as i often reduce my stocks very much due to lack of space in fridge/freezer.

the only scandinavian crowned cursive "r" i can think of would be rörstrand - but that is faïence and porcellaine. on the other hand, if you're looking for scandinavian enamelled cast iron, try searching for "copco" on ebay.

size matters. i've got a big, single blade, carbon steel old flea market find. not as versatile as a knife, of course, but fine for heaps of herbs. a bit more difficult to hone or sharpen than a knife, though.

depends. if they're wood, they're allright imo. the plastic handles are bigger, and leave less room for your knuckles. probably the best stamped knives out there. after all, victorinox has a reputation to live up to.

basically, granite is fine for pastry, or next to your stove. apart from that, wood, preferably end grain, is a lot more gentle on your tools or china, which won't be ruined if you drop them. and you may not think that you often drop things on your counter, but you'll live to change your idea about that, once you've got your granite counters. if you don't mistreat it, good quality wood will last for centuries.

if the handle is sufficiently long, you can grip it close to the pan and let the end of the handle rest on the under side of your arm. at first it may feel a little awkward, but it's much better than just using your hand. that's about the only advantage of long handles!

is it really that much of a problem? most times, a tomato sauce will be darkish, so discolouring won't show, and a little iron can't be harmful, anyway. only thing i can think of is that the casserolle might slowly rust away...

i know what you mean. still, friends allways seem to want me to make my pizza, which is very good (mostly because of the crust), and my standard rogan josh, which is nowhere near the real thing. pies (again, because of the crust) are in demand, too. when we visit others, strangely they allways want my advice on sauce (and then "oh, by the way, could you sharpen my rather dull knives?").

Under cooked as in how? Do you mean that the water was not all absorbed in the amount of time you expected, or was it the case that the water was absorbed but the rice was crunchy? What is the technique you use? I always cook rice in a Le Creuset pot, and have never experienced any problems -- but mayube I have adjusted my technique to work with the pot. If the problem you're having is that the rice is too wet after the usual amount of time, I'd recommend using less water. If you use the same technique I use (bring the rice to a boil uncovered, then reduce to minimum heat and cover for 20 minutes) you might boil the rice uncovered a little while longer than usual to reduce the liquid. The lids on enameled cast iron are much heavier than "regular" lids, and as a result I find that there is less evaporation when maintaining a low simmer with the pan covered. This means that one has to adjust by starting with less water, or anyway making sure there is less water in the pan when you cover it. If the opposite is true, and your rice is crunchy at the end, I'd recommend a little more water, covering the pot a little earlier and using a lower heat setting when the pot is covered. The point of all this is that different cookware really can change the way a certain dish turns out. When using cookware with unusual and particular properties, often times one must adjust the cooking technique slightly. undercooked: crunchy. technique (basmati rice): 10 min. low boil, 12 min. resting. normally leaves me with perfect rice. i would have thought that this casserolle would save (a little) energy, but it seems to demand more water and longer boiling. strange.

no touch. rules out a lot of 8" knives for most of us.

i fail to see that it has been the case on this thread. to me, it seems that most posters are concerned with the lack of taste in the once seasonal but now year round produce like apples, tomatoes, strawberries etc. also, by the tendency to import cheap fruit and vegetables even when better local produce can be had, or the introduction of standardized gmo versions of divers crops that will slowly but surely supplant diversity. what is your agenda here? that we should just say "well, that's how it is, that's development, and there's nothing we can or should do about it"? well, you're on egullet, so supposedly you're interested in food as a sensual experience. gmo and other industrialization is not favourable to that.

sam, yet another question: i've aquired this smallish enamelled cast iron casserolle (used but in fine condition) that i thought would be good for, say, cooking rice. problem is, now is the second time the rice has been undercooked when timing as i do when cooking it in a stainless pan. i wonder why?