Smithy

I'll post photos later this morning to show you, but the little white "pot holders" in my photo above are designed to wedge in at the sides of the insert so you can get it out. The footprint is larger than I expected: very close to the footprint of my Cuisinart griddler, but without the handles.

The grain on those is beautiful! I'll bet the finish is quite smooth, too. Nice find!

I bought a bag of brioche-style hamburger buns yesterday and just now had a pressed sandwich made with one of those fresh buns. I can't report on the Cubano yet because I haven't cooked the pork, but I can now say that I really do prefer the more porous exterior of sliced bread to the finished outside of the brioche bun, even when that bun is fresh. ElsieD, it did squish but not hugely. But it squished and toughened, without the added benefit of the lovely butter (or mayo) dripping into the pores of the grilled bread, and without the extra crispness of said grilled and browned bread. For my tastes, the Maillard reaction is critical and this bread didn't get it. I'll use the rest of this bread -- hopefully on at least one Cubano in the next few days -- but I don't recommend burger buns for this kind of grilled sandwich.

My pan looks a lot like yours. Here's one of the recipes, with instructions: I'm glad I found the booklet. I had forgotten the spray. I think that the shortbread wouldn't hold its shape unless it's baked in the pan. Firmer cookies, like springerle, can be molded (like in my cute little angel mold) and then baked outside the mold. Incidentally, here's the cover of the booklet that came with my mold: I haven't made shortbread in ages! Thanks for the reminder.

As documented here, when I made the purchase; and here, when I opened the box and began playing with it, I bought myself an A4 Box. Last night I grilled a sandwich on it and was pleased. Today, for lunch, I heated a mess of chopped spinach until it began to wilt, added feta cheese and some oven-dried tomatoes, and tossed all until I thought it was done. I very much like the broad, flat, rather shallow pan for doing this sort of work. It allowed water to evaporate from the spinach quickly, and allowed me to stir the greens easily because the pan is so broad and shallow. When the food was done, it was easy to pick the pan up out of the cooker, using the little silicone pot holders they provide. It will be easy to wash the pan, too. Given the pan's size, it will be easier to wash than the skillet I might otherwise have used. As for the lunch itself, well... ...it looks better than it tastes. The tomatoes are too sour to compliment the spinach, and I didn't chop the spinach finely enough. Or maybe I overcooked it. I like spinach, both raw and cooked, but this seems to be a bit too much in the middle ground. So: score 1 for the A4! Proof of concept, and I got that spinach out of the refrigerator before it went off! But I won't try repeating this lunch.

Beyond this I think I'll need to post in the A4 Induction Box Cooker topic, but I'll post this little teaser. I was planning to have a ham and cheese grilled sandwich tonight. Normally I'd have done it in my $8 panini press. But the newly-arrived A4 Box was looking at me, so I had to try it instead. 1. I do think this gets hotter than my panini press. That might have to do with this A4 Box being new out of the box vs. my Cuisinart being used (for $8!) but I really don't know. 2. Similarly, this heated really quickly compared to the panini press. See above comment. 3. Obviously, the panini press wouldn't have required the sandwich to be flipped. This did. 4. Still, this did an admirable job on my sandwich. I'm happy. Oh, and incidentally: the inductive surface, which gets hot, is built into the base plate. Maybe an induction stove or induction plate doesn't get hot to the touch, but this does.

Mine arrived today too! It's a little more blue than this photo suggests, but not quite the light of a silvery blue moon that I was expecting. Would I have liked sage green better after all? Don't know. Don't really care. I am pleased at the packaging. Someone had fun with their marketing. This greeted me on the second box flap as I opened the box: The slogan is repeated on the package tray holding accessories, which I hadn't expected: Two trays are included: one with a grill, one flatter. The inductive surface is in the middle of the A4 box itself, at the right of this photo: It's going to be fun playing with this. Even if the color isn't as pretty as I'd expected. 🙂

That's reminiscent of, but simpler than, Ina Garten's French Potato Salad, a favorite of mine that I tend to forget about. Thanks for your version!

I haven't had roast pork in months and months. I may have to rectify that. The sandwich looks so good! And I still haven't cooked a Cubano!

Those are very pretty! I'd guess the artwork would encourage people to keep reusing them.

I don't remember: can you (they) shoot bucks or does there? Or is there a special permit required for one or the other? Here in Minnesota there's a special permit required for does and young bucks. I've been told that in Kentucky, where friends hunt, it's the other way around.

Thanks for those listings, @dtremit. I bit on a couple of them. For anyone considering the Joshua McFadden book, I recommend reading this topic that @blue_dolphin began back in 2018:

I probably won't bother this year, what with one thing and three others, but I have happy memories of past years' cookie collections. Strut your stuff, folks!

Amen! I was hoping for a 2-week visit and blog!

I've never had, nor made, panettone. From what I've been reading it sounds reminiscent of Christmas Stollen, which used to be a family favorite luxury from an almost-local bakery. Well. The bakery is still in business but those family gatherings are a thing of the past. I suppose I could have ordered a stollen for my sister and me, but in a fit of self-pity and desire to experiment, not to mention @Pete Fred's fabulous review... ...I ordered one for myself and one for my sister! Merry Christmas to us! Shopping for a panettone at a local store, as @Tropicalsenior did above, might have been more sensible. But no, I'm shooting for the stars. Planning to share it with special friends!

Judging by the photo, you sweated for your art! And it paid off! It looks delicious! 😀

Thanks for the reminder! Maybe it's time to revive the Larb Laab Larp topic? At any rate, it might time for me soon to try making it again. 🙂

Another "get it out of the way" dinner. I thought it would be headed for the Gallery of Regrettable Foods, and surprised myself. Last night I broke into this package of dried tortellini from World Market, and boiled and ate roughly half. It was okay. Had a decided "pizza" flavor to it, as the package suggested, when tossed with butter and grated parmesan last night. Tonight I boiled the rest. Lurking in the freezer was an unlabeled package of...something homemade. It looked tomatoey. It looked like it had sausage in it. Could it have been one of my disastrous and perverse attempts to make puttanesca sauce ahead of time and freeze it? (I won't try it again. But the tomatoes were exceptional that summer.) In fact I think it wasn't intended as puttanesca, given the presence of sausage and the lack of capers. But I digress. Here it is, refusing to divulge its identity. I sampled one of the sausage bits. Hot! And maybe a bit past its prime? Still...once the tortellini were cooked and drained, I threw the mystery tomato sauce into the pan with the tortellini and began to stir. I added the last of the heavy cream from Thanksgiving dinner. I thought of the aforementioned Gallery of Regrettable Foods. Well, comic relief is still a form of relief. Then I dished it up. Because I needed some greens, I piled some atop a bed of baby bitter greens. You know what? It's actually pretty good! I added shredded cheese at the table but forgot to take a picture of that. Sour cream was also present but didn't really help the product. The mystery meat and tomato, and the pizza-ish tortellini filling, actually played well off each other. Sometimes, it's better to be lucky than good.

I miss being able to go pick satsumas and other ripe citrus fruits at this time of year. It's a bit early yet for the navel oranges, but sometimes the crop is getting ready to pick by now.

It might help to tell us your current food processor: make, model, size? I've liked my Cuisinart DLC-8 and never had a lick of trouble with it, once I made the necessary modifications to be able to take the top apart for cleaning. However, I don't use it every day (or even every week) and I know a lot of people have had trouble with Cuisinarts. I have a Hamilton Beach 4-cup cheapie purchased for travel and currently put away since the trailer is gone. It's okay for "camping". This topic has quite a bit of discussion about food processor models, as recently as 2022, but there may be more current opinions out there.

"Kapow" is what happened the first time my father tried to microwave eggs! Anyway, what are the seasonings in this chicken grapao / kapow?

No visible change to the kraut this morning, nor would I expect it. But I did finally remember that the word I wanted yesterday to describe what happened overnight to the brine is "diffusion"! Edited to add: actually, I can see some surface bubbles and I'm gettting a bit of tart kraut smell out of the pickle pipe. I think we have ignition!

Lovely, as always. Where did you get those tomatoes, and how good are they? By now, the northern Minnesota farms are shut down for the winter. Grocery store tomatoes are hit and miss on quality.

I know what you mean! It seriously looks like a fun toy to me, and at $40 I can afford that fun. It looks like a good Gizmo for traveling, too. I don't know what my next Princessmobile will be, and maybe I'll relegate the toy to that purpose... but maybe not. Right now my cooking is so minimalist that small appliances make more sense than the large oven. If I were still working I'm pretty sure it would have a home in my office.

I just got an email from A4 Box. The sale is still going!