Smithy

I'm going to enjoy reading about these places as tasted by an educated newcomer. Thanks for bringing us along, Rob.

After a private conversation with Andiesenji, I've found the link to which she referred: Making Cheese. The discussion about making quark is on page 10.

I'm not sure the wine contributed any salt or perception of salt, but I've certainly learned the same thing about parmesan cheese: it adds plenty of salt on its own! The cottage cheese may have added some also. I too have been unimpressed by ricotta so far, but I have some sitting in my fridge right now. Hope springs eternal. :-)

That bowl is exquisite, Kerry!

I had missed that note. What a great idea for the book sale! Thanks, Heidi. liamsaunt, I spy a copy of The Black Dog Summer at the Vineyard Cookbook on your shelf. Nice to see that someone else owns that book too! I've only made a few things from it, over all these years, but I enjoy browsing through it and daydreaming about Martha's Vineyard anyway.

That looks like it would save on a lot of parchment paper. Thanks for the recommendation.

Like a metal window screen, or like one of those perforated-metal pizza pans?

Interesting that you call it 'albedo' (which to me is an astronomical term); we call it 'pith'. And yes, it's typically more bitter than the colored zest. It makes sense that it would affect the quality of the candied citron.

That looks like a good way to get more squash into our diet, now that the season is here. Thanks for posting the photo and recipe.

There are many kinds of grouper, from what I've seen out there. Could you elaborate, please, on which you purchased? It looks like this was from a pretty good-sized fish. I struggle with the decisions when I have the option to buy grouper - and yes, when I've had it in restaurants it's been delicious.

Ooh, that looks good! How do you get the urchin meat out?

In the interests of balance, let it be known that I have cooked and enjoyed Jerusalem artichokes and lived to tell the tale. Whether they weren't fresh enough or the method of cooking was the ticket I'm not sure, but we didn't suffer any ill effects. The recipe came from Fine Cooking, here: Pan=Roasted Sunchokes and Artichoke Hearts with Lemon-Herb Butter. I hadn't heard of any gut problems before cooking them, and I'm rather glad of it since we had no fears of the food. We liked it.

I suspect that, as Lisa notes, you will end up with a more rubbery product as you add more gelatin; the water may evaporate out of the gelatin but the gelatin proteins will still be present. However, I've never tried it - never even thought of it. I admire your creativity. I hope you'll test this idea more and post the results.

I'm with you on the parchment. The burnt cornmeal was messy and smelly, and required far too frequent cleanup. However, I generally just leave the bread on the parchment for the entire bake. Do you get a crisper crust if you remove the parchment after the oven spring has set?

Is there any chance it's a Jonamac? As the name implies, it's a Macintosh x Jonathan hybrid, trees very winter hardy, although the variety only dates back to 1944. If the grove is as old as the original buildings you'll have to keep looking. I found that variety on a good website with information from several groups (Canada, UK, US). It has a good section with oodles of identification criteria to help narrow the varieties; since you're holding the apples and have seen the trees you may be able to find your apple. Unfortunately they don't define all their terms, so a bit of googling may also be necessary. Click here for the home page: Apple Name.

Oh, those chocolate-dipped goodies, and the bark! I adore dark chocolate...and welcome the convenient info that it's rich in antioxidants. What will you do, if anything, to compensate for cloudy rum? Disguise it with a cream liqueur? Ignore it? Invent a new drink that celebrates the cloudiness? 'Island storm' or 'tropical fog', perhaps?

I grew up with a nut chopper like that, and we liked the way it cut nuts to a nearly-uniform size. At some point Mom gave it away in favor of a very large slap-chop-type chopper that made much shorter work of the nuts. They were contained on the cutting board by the rim of the chopper; the plunger rotated with each push, so everything was chopped in short order. It was neat and quick. I let it go when they downsized, but own an older version of this Zyliss chopper. It disassembles easily for cleaning and does a nice job, although its capacity is smaller than you might need. Because the blade rotates and hits some nuts more than once, the chopping isn't as uniform as in Kerry's linked chopper. But it's quick!

I agree that there's a problem. For additional discussion about this, check out this topic: Botulism concerns re infused oils and confit

I have that one; I refer to it as my Ace of Wands. It was my Very Cool Christmas Present last year. We got it because it's cordless, comes with a number of blades and accessories, has 2 different wand attachments and 5 speeds. I don't think its food processor function is quite as effective as that of a true food processor, but for our purposes it works well and has replaced the food processor for trailer use. So far the battery has never let me down. I use it for the typical immersion blender applications (soups, mayonnaise, salad dressing, cream whipping) but I've also used it for chopping vegetables when I didn't feel like doing all the knife work. One of its beauties is that it can stand up by itself. I wouldn't take it down the road that way, and it might tip over in an earthquake, but otherwise I never worry about it falling over. Awkward? Maybe, but I haven't had a problem with it. My only complaint, and it's a small one, is that the 'go' button that must be depressed is stiff enough to be tiring to hold after several minutes.

ElainaA, I wish I could have joined your group; it sounds wonderful! Please tell us more about pear paste. At last night's dinner party we (the guests) enjoyed quince paste (membrillo) as part of dessert and I began thinking about how to make it. Now here you are, posting about quince paste's close cousin. Want to post a link to the recipe you used, or post about what you did?

Very pretty! Cabbages are difficult to show off, aren't they? They dwarf everything else, and unless they're but or still have the outer leaves flourishing outward they aren't especially photogenic. I'm sure some creative photographer will come along now and show me how mistaken that statement is. :-)

"Beautiful people pepper" is a great name, and those are pretty! We have a few wild-card chiles in the U.S. but I don't think I've seen any with that particular shape and color.

Stuffing with olives! Sounds like my kind of group. What kind of olives, and what was the stuffing base? What, if anything, did folks make of the foodblogging idea?

AND she manages to photograph and post about it! I too am impressed.

Lucky you! I would love to have access to ripe quince again. Years ago I was given ripe quince and ripe loquats by neighbors. Both were wonderful, and I've never been able to find either (worth buying) in a grocery store. Out here in Minnesota I think the quince must be picked well before they're ready, because they never cook up to anything worthwhile.