Wholemeal Crank

Recipes that I have come up with first wander around on random scraps of paper and e-mails to myself, and get either handwritten in my recipe book, or now, more often, go straight to my web site--if they're good enough. Recipes in books, I mostly remember which book they came from, if I still own the book. And I have a couple of 3-ring binders with recipes copied from various sources--borrowed books, newspaper clippings, books I decided not to keep but that had one or two special recipes I did keep, recipes shared from friends or family. They're stored in sheet-protectors, organized roughly by category. I take a sheet with the recipe I need out, use it, and return it (ok, there is a 'to be refiled' folder too).

First head to head done, will wait to post until everyone has had a chance for a first round. Did a mini-sized tasting with the tiniest gaiwans and just over a gram of tea apiece, so can do several more including regular-scale infusions. Nice how they last.

That Sasaki Basic set looks GREAT. Too bad it's out of stock. I'm going to write down the name so I can look it up again later, however, because while I could wish the fork tines were a bit longer, it's really about as nice as I've seen. I actually have a quite adequate flatware set, but it was a closeout special and I've never seen it since, and can't replace the occasional lost or mangled piece.

Coffee or coffee-flavored anything. Just not my thing, thank you very much.

Shengs are here! Shengs are here! Heh. Almost as though I was expecting them, I've been drinking white and green teas a lot the past few days. I'm ready for some puerhs this evening.

You're not. We used to use waxed paper to spread shortening on the baking dishes, but now I do not keep shortening in my kitchen any more, and I use clean fingers to spread softened butter instead. I still use waxed paper for rolls of icebox cookie dough, and layering between baked goods that I want to freeze without sticking to each other (e.g., glazed or sugared rolls), and waxed paper bags for bringing things to work to microwave for my lunch. You can get waxed paper bags more easily now in health food stores than in regular supermarkets.

A friend of mine has the best spoons ever in his flatware set, deep lovely round soup spoons with a heavy, curvaceous handle, marvelously comfortable to use. But that same set has horrid short-tined forks that are more spork than fork. I have been looking for years for a nice set that includes lovely spoons like those and a nice long straight-tined fork. It seems apparently too much to ask.

My grain mill that makes whole grains into such lovely flours for all my baking. Right after that, the chocolate-breaking fork.

Today I tried the intriguing tea that has been sitting on my cabinet for a week, awaiting its debut. Today was the right time, as I could properly prepare some with the tea-friend who brought me a packet as a gift. Quite astonishingly, it's a LOCAL tea, from Forbidden Fruit Orchards near Santa Barbara. We used cups holding about 5-6 oz of water, water at 160 degrees, and one teabag per cup, steeping about 1 minute, 2 minutes, 3 or 4 minutes, and one last one might have been closer to 10 minutes. This is a quite splendid delicate and floral white tea, with a hint of blueberry tartness. I am not typically a fan of flavored teas, but this one was quite impressive. I was expecting an expensive novelty: locally grown! from California! but was quite impressed by this neat little tea. Also had some lovely Lao Mansa '09 sheng puerh from Norbu, which made me fall in love with it all over again, and a nice bit of his Diamond TGY, which is so reliably a favorite oolong.

Hot chocolate should be made with chocolate, hot cocoa with cocoa. Hot chocolate has the cocoa butter and is richer stuff.

I did a double-take on reading that last post, and the a quick google search revealed that yes, tea is being grown in Australia. Cool. No tea yet today. Yesterday, a new combination tisane that was quite nice, some simple to kuan yin, and some Sichuan yellow tea from norbu. Ba simple and nice teaDay.

A related topic with some possibly useful info Hot Cocoa Mix for Gifts

A very nice tea the last 2 days, soothing to my irritated throat during a cold: korean hydrangea leaf (gamro), chamomile, tulsi, hibiscus, lemongrass--the chamomile gives a nice base, hydrangea adds sweetness, tulsi (holy basil) adds spice, and the hibiscus and lemongrass give it a nice fruitiness. Yum.

Today, started with Lemon Myrtle Rooibos from the Cultured Cup, then on to some Tie Guan Yin from Norbu. I have a cold playing havoc with my sense of smell & taste again, so will next try something a little less precious, as the lovely floral & spicy highlights of this tea are lost on me at present. Maybe something smoky would do....

Melons.....what a great idea! Will have to try that, may even break down and buy an out-of-season mellon to check it out. Forgot one other favorite use: Hot chocolate with Thai Lime and Long Pepper

I like to use long pepper in sweets, because it adds a fruitiness that is distinct from and in addition to the standard black pepper, although I think you could get a similar effect in a lot of cases with regular peppercorns plus cardamom: Ginger icebox cookies with long pepper Spice cookies with rice flour and coconut Chocolate Ginger Pear Bread I've also used it in some soups and sauces, curries. Haven't got any particular recipes to link to, however.

More days with a variety of good teas. Today, drinking some 2007 Menghai Golden Needles & White Lotus ripe/shu puerh: it's about as good as shu gets, not as complex or rich as, say, the 2008 Yi Wu bamboo puerh from Norbu, but also easier to brew when in a hurry, because you have to work very hard to get anything unpleasant from it. I've achieved that, once, but only once, and I really had to overdo on the tea to water ratio and brew it badly to boot. Last few days, more Yamakai sencha from Norbu (doing well with the campaign to keep only one sencha open at a time), not much puerh, several different greener oolongs (Zhanshu lake and Diamond TGY); some of Hankook's Korean oolong, some Bai Yun 'oriental beauty' style Yunnan oolong; a bit of Dan Cong, some Bi Lo Chun, and now craving some Lemon Myrtle Rooibos to finish the evening. Very interested ina special sample a friend gave me today: it's locally grown, here in southern California! From 'Forbidden Fruit Orchards'. For the price, it better be good, but I have to wait until next week when we get together to try it, because there's not enough to practice on my own beforehand.

I think of galangal as more delicate and fruity, without the peppery bite of ginger.

Recently, I bought a rather pumpkin at my farmers' market, and decided to make a soup. I baked it, and ended up with so much pulp that I used the pureed pulp as the base for the soup--not using it as an ingredient, but as the bulk of the soup, flavored with leeks, peppers, cheese and sage. It was incredibly rich and delicious. The recipe is on my website: Squash Soup with Leeks and Peppers

This is the first time I've seen this topic. I put together my notes on seasoning cast iron here, but will just share the highlights: ten coats in the oven to go from this to this Not hard, just takes a while and be sure you turn off the smoke alarm first!

Several days, no posting. Teas have ranged all over the tea-map: senchas, gyokuro, green oolongs, toasty oolongs, puerhs, white teas, herbal teas. Only one that was 'new and different' was the Yamakai sencha from Norbu, reviewed now in the Japanese green tea topic. Had an exceptionally nice session with the Norbu 2008 Yi Wu bamboo-aged sheng puerh a couple of days ago, and always enjoy the slightly fruity touch of the Jade Pole yunnan green tea from Yunnan Sourcing--that was quite a hit with one of my work colleagues, and yesterday while busy with spring cleaning--not spring yet, but the weather here feels like it--I prepared and enjoyed a thermos full of the SeaDyke red label Ti Kuan Yin. Now pleased to be contemplating an afternoon with puerh or oolong. It will be another thermos/bulk session, don't have the time to sit for gongfu cha, so can't go with a Dan Cong as I've been itching to do. Probably a Wuyi of some kind.....or Dong Ding dark roast.....mmmm....even thinking about the next cuppa is so nice.

Finished off the Zairai sencha last week, so now starting a new one from Norbu: Yamakai Sencha - 2010 1st Harvest Shizuoka Sencha One sniff and I'm already in love: the scent is sweet and rich. 5 grams of tea to my 150mL kyusu, prewarmed, water to 140 degrees per Greg's brewing recommendation. Brewing 2 minutes first steep, throwing caution to the wind…and it is sweet and rich. 30 second 2nd steep, delicious and sweet, a bit astringent and nutty too. For 3 steep, heating the water to 150, just to play a little more, and steeping 1 minute--similar to previous infusion, but a bit lighter in body and richness--really think it's done at 3. I may play with it a bit more next time, because I am concerned that the very long first steep took a bit more of the punch that should have been left for the later steeps. Overall, this is a lovely sencha. Without a head-to-head comparison, it's hard to rank it other than saying it's right up there with my top-tier senchas. Lovely for breakfast this morning with toast with honey-butter.

For nearly all onion-work: first halve it vertically, then horizontal into half-rings, holding the half together, then slice vertically across the rings, into dice.

I usually head for chamomile and hibiscus when I feel really punky, but almost any tea is welcome with milder illness, because it's hot and wet.

I just left a batch of leaves in my gaiwan overnight, but that turned into four days before I returned to the office to get back to them. It was a lovely Korean 'oolong' that has very good stamina for many many infusions. The gaiwan was covered, the leaves still damp, but smelled ok. I rinsed quickly once with water at full boil, then infused the leaves a few times until I was getting sweet water. Quite amazing.