chromedome

Same with dollar stores here. Retail never sleeps... (..and God help you if you need mittens during actual winter, because they'll be setting out the swimsuits and beach toys next...)

Similar scenario here, where we're taking a pair of lively grandkids (girl 4, boy 1 1/2) so the parents can have a date night. Our celebratory meal, after they're in bed, will be fish tacos as GF will be keto-ing again starting tomorrow. Our previous plan was to see Rise of Skywalker today.

Those were the moments I used to really resent when troubleshooting computers.

Well, they kinda look similar... https://www.drugs.com/npp/galangal.html

...and there are some interesting parallels there with hive insects, as well. It's a fascinating field of study, one I'm keeping an eye on sporadically as time permits.

I'd picked up a food mill from a thrift store during apple season, for making my applesauce. With the coarse plate in, it worked very well for the carrot/turnip mash. It had a much more even consistency than when I've used a masher. Presumably I could then have put it through the finer plate had I wished, but I think a relatively coarse and textured effect is more appropriate.

The same argument is made (rightly, IMO) regarding crustaceans, insects, etc on the grounds that their brains are too primitive to feel pain as we understand it. I'm not advocating one way or the other, but vegans *do* make that argument and, I feel, can rightly have it turned back on them. There's another hypothesis that at least some plants have a collective model of intelligence, in which each individual plant (or each part of a large collective plant, which can sometimes span several square miles) acts as a sort of synapse in a collective brain. It's an intriguing notion, though it'll take some inspired experimentation to a) find a way to test this; and b) do so effectively and duplicably.

Freeing up the starch is indeed a big part of what's going on. I'll add that in the course of shredding, rinsing and squeezing the potatoes you're also removing a lot of water from the potatoes, leaving them denser and concentrating their flavor. It's an added step, but not really that much effort. I'll add that I use my potato ricer to squeeze the water out of the shredded potatoes. You can only do a cup or so at a time, but it gives you enough leverage to get them really, really dry.

We had our big meal yesterday. Myself and GF, her parents, her daughter with fiance and their three collective kids (12 to 1 1/2), and GF's aunt with granddaughter and great-granddaughter (2) in tow. It was a rockin' good time, and hearing the little guy (1 1/2) booming out a hearty "HO! HO! HO!" on command in a surprisingly good baritone was the Cutest Thing Ever. That and him singing Jingle Bells to his great-grandma (he only had two of the words down pat, but they were the important ones). Dinner was a small turkey and about 1/3 of a half-ham (I'd cut one into thirds a few months ago and vac-sealed them) along with mashed potatoes and dressing. As always at my house, it was veggie-palooza for sides: cabbage gratin, carrot and turnip mash (very traditional in this part of the world), sweet potato with maple and pecans, a baked buttercup squash, steamed broccoli, the inevitable green bean casserole, Brussels sprouts caramelized with onions and bacon, and parsnips cut into planks and browned gently in butter to bring out their sweetness. The sprouts and parsnips, and all the onions used throughout (except the french-fried kind in the casserole) were from my garden. Desserts were a pumpkin cheesecake on gingersnap-crumb crust, and a big ol' apple pie made with the apples we'd gotten from the U-pick a few months ago (one of the 4-yo granddaughter's favorite weekends of the year). There were also lots of cookies and loaf cake slices just out and about. Friends and family all got baskets of goodies this year: loaf cakes, decorated sugar and gingerbread cookies, regular shortbread cookies and smaller, more-delicate shortbreads made with brown butter and a small portion of oat flour in with the AP, the snowball cookies known to my GF as Russian Tea Cakes (they have many other names), plus Linzer cookies and German-style cinnamon stars. I also made up a gingerbread village, with five little cottages, a church, and a few of those 3-D Christmas tree cookies (two flat trees, one with a notch at top and one with a notch at bottom, which are supposed to fit together...in my experience they don't, so I cut one three in half and just glue it in place with royal icing). There are some pictures of the gingerbread village, which I'll try to remember to post later. They're on my GF's new phone at present. It's not a super-detailed village or anything, because this was my first attempt at doing a gingerbread house, so it's more or less a "proof of concept" and an opportunity to evaluate the process.

Correct, as far as it goes. But celery contains naturally-occurring glutamates (like those in mushrooms, seaweeds and other foods) that are chemically similar and have the same flavor-enhancing properties.

I've used my IP more for dry beans than anything else, I think. Is it as good as slow-cooking them for hours? My inclination is to say no, in situations (ie, classic baked beans) where the sauce reduces and thickens as the beans cook. I'm sure it's perfectly possible to make adjustments so the IP version comes out more or less the same, and I'm sure someone else has done the work to figure it out, but I don't care that much...if those are the beans and the result I'm looking for, I do it the old-fashioned way and slow-cook them. To me the real value of the IP is just that I can decide I want beans at 4 or 5 PM, and have them table-ready for dinner. Sometimes I *do* think far enough ahead to pull some out and soak them, but usually not, so this is a Really Big Deal for me. I also have a big-ass bag of dry chickpeas in my cupboard, and thanks to the IP can turn them into hummus pretty quickly. I also use it a lot for cooking pork. Pork shoulder often comes on sale for dirt cheap where I live, and I also can buy the pork breast bone pieces one of my local supermarkets trims from its racks of side ribs. The thing about this is that when the pork is done, there will be a varying quantity of intensely porky juices beneath. I'll add my dry beans to this, along with some aromatics and as much extra water as needed, and the end result is some really porky-tasting beans. Those are my current favorite, and I have a couple of containers of the finished beans in my freezer now at all times. They're great for refried, or for adding to a soup or a grain dish.

Indeed. Douglas Adams is looking more prophetic all the time. I will cheerfully concede the environmental and health (when done correctly) benefits of the vegan diet, but I don't give much credence to the notion of veganism as "cruelty-free" eating. Between the growing evidence that plants are more complicated creatures than we'd always assumed, and the brute fact that growing grains and produce necessarily kills untold numbers of insects, rodents, etc (there have been good studies on this, as well), it simply doesn't hold water.

The reflection in this image fooled my eyes briefly, and made it look like a deep cauldron. I thought "Gee, that's a really impractical pan for lasagna..."

There was something similar on tap from one of my local microbreweries when I was last at the liquor store. It was interesting, but not something I wanted to fill a whole growler with, so I walked out with a non-holiday themed double IPA instead.

I'm on the homestretch now, with a last two trays of brown-butter shortbread cookies in the oven. I have several dozen mini-loaves made ahead and frozen, and I don't even know anymore how many dozens of cookies. Today I begin assembling baskets for the neighbours here in our building, and then over the weekend I'll make up the ones for friends and immediate family. Each basket will contain a few mini-loaves and a selection of cookies. The ones for friends and family will get the "fancier" cookies, larger loaves made in 6-inch paper tube pans, and also some rum balls and chocolates if I can find the time. I know nobody in our immediate circle has a drinking problem...I wouldn't give rum balls to anyone I didn't know just in case. Last night my GF and I treated the kids from our building and the next building to a holiday cookie-decorating spree. There were sugar cookies and gingerbread cookies, homemade icing in bowls with spreaders, store-bought icing in squeeze tubes for details, all manner of sprinkles and decorations, plus crushed hard candy in various colors and Skittles and Smarties (like M&Ms but flatter). At peak I think we had 18 kids, most of them 8 and younger. It was a lot of fun for everyone, except perhaps the parents who had to put them to bed for school afterwards.

In similar circumstances, I've made soup. The salt mostly goes into the broth, where you can compensate for it. It's a frugality thing on my part, of course. Tossing it is also a perfectly valid option.

Toast some pine nuts in a pan, then tip them out. Caramelize some onions, than add a generous double handful of green seedless grapes. Stir until the grapes are heated through and acquire a beautiful, milky jade color. Add back the pine nuts, and some chiffonaded fresh basil. Serve with grilled or broiled chicken breasts. It's one of my favorite things to do with pine nuts, other than the inevitable pesto.

Then there's this... https://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/weather/2019/12/17/australian-man-slow-roasts-pork-his-hot-car/2673073001/

I like the foam dispensers too, because they appeal to my frugal streak (and when you wash your hands a LOT, using less soap helps keep them from drying out). Diluting your own hand soap of choice to make it work in the dispenser is actually pretty trivial. Depending on the soap, you'll need to dilute it 3X to 5X to make it foam properly. Start at 3:1, swirl to mix well, then try pumping. If it's not giving you a smooth supply of foam, add water a bit at a time until you get the right mixture. Once you know the right proportion for your own soap and dispenser, you can (ahem) "dispense with" the trial and error in future.

If you like 'em with balsamic, try pomegranate molasses sometime. A similar balance of sweet and tart, but with some nice fruity notes. And the color is much more complementary.

Quebec only, Coaticook brand cheddar, for potential listeria: https://www.inspection.gc.ca/food-recall-warnings-and-allergy-alerts/2019-12-16/eng/1576561478528/1576561485300?utm_source=r_listserv

To me it feels like an induction version of my large electric skillet. I'm not in the market for such a thing, but I can certainly see the utility of it.

On a somewhat related note: https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/12/judge-serves-up-sizzling-rebuke-of-arkansas-anti-veggie-meat-labeling-law/

An update/expansion of the Sunflower Crisp salad mix recall: https://www.inspection.gc.ca/about-the-cfia/newsroom/food-recall-warnings/complete-listing/2019-12-12/eng/1576180047004/1576180047316

https://ny.eater.com/2019/12/5/20978234/tripadvisor-best-nyc-restaurant-rankings-scam