Smithy

Boy howdy. How have I missed the recipe before now? Time to break that book out again, and see what else I've been missing.

Righto...I've never tried this but I'm curious about it, and it seems to be very regional: Injera

Rhubarb and dates is a new and intriguing combination for me. Do you precook the rhubarb, or just chop it finely?

When the stepstool is almost, but not quite, fully opened there is a strong temptation to push down on the 'step' (top) part to flatten it the rest of the way quickly. Our first stepstool was kind, with enough gaps in the hinge to allow skin to escape. Our current folding stepstool has such tight tolerances that it must be opened All. The. Way. before someone steps on it. Do not try to push that bad boy flat with your hand, or you'll have blood blisters. Ours lives in the trailer and has many opportunities to fold and unfold, but has not loosened one whit. Boy, this is teasing at some memories of stores with some automotive name (like Canadian Tire) that had a wild hodgepodge of stuff not restricted to automotive material. I wasn't into cookery then but was fascinated with all the random stuff they carried - including cooking gear - more diversified than the Pep Boys now. Could that have been Canadian Tire? In California? A few decades ago?

Bacon, lettuce, tomato and dill pickle. You were missing two elements!

I have no immediate (more's the pity) plans to return to Ireland but I'd love to read about what's happening with food around Sligo these days.

What fun! Thanks for posting these photos. Can you describe the limes? Are they like the Persian limes that we routinely see here in the States? I'm craving satay now. Thanks for the observation that their meat chunks are usually smaller for a better surface to volume ratio. Makes sense. I'm going to adopt that trick.

Oh, by the way: http://forums.egullet.org/uploads/monthly_07_2015/post-34671-0-13701100-1437264008.jpg Those folding stepstools are wonderful, but beware of their pinch points when you're unfolding and folding them. They can be especially vicious when you're unfolding them; we've both been bitten from pushing down on the top of ours to flatten it quickly.

It looks like you had grand fun shopping! I'm glad you looked into the book and told us about it. I was wondering about an entire coffee-table cookbook dedicated to one form of bread alone. :-D

My first thought was chicken feet on the grill, and that sounded messy. I'm guessing now that the chickeny bits will go to making a nicely gelled base for the relish. There, I've stuck my foot neck out in public.

That discussion started about a year ago: Blondies. Are they nice?

Beautiful! I also thank you.

Very impressive crust and crumb, both! Was this the no-knead bread in the heavy stainless to which you referred on the previous page? Is this a Forkish, Lahey, or Anna N (or all of the above) approach?

In addition to or instead of the cayenne?

That's interesting reading. It should be noted that your excerpt is from a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking regarding the test methods, but as I read this it still looks as though the efficiencies of coil, smooth electric and induction are roughly equivalent using the hybrid-block method. The claims of higher efficiency for induction are from a 2009 study by a non-government group. The other thing I took away from this is that the biggest efficiency bang for the buck is matching burner size to pot size. The efficiency was way down for a small pot on a big burner. No surprise, perhaps, except for the magnitude. This table is excerpted from Page 34 of the same document : Edited to add link and this followup information: the NOPR is for what's called a hybrid-block measurement method using a steel-and-aluminum block as opposed to measuring efficiency for boiling water. They show that the boiling-water method is less repeatable than the hybrid-block method. It's clear that certain commenters are not happy with the proposal or its implications.

I'm fascinated as well. I can see the two halves of the mold in the background of that photo, but have no idea how you'd fill the halves and mate them without making a mess. That's a very cool pate.

I love Cooking at the Kasbah; it's one of my first Moroccan cookbooks. It's fairly small, but I'm not sure it has enough variety to meet your indoor / outdoor requirements. Two other cookbooks for you to consider, if you don't find something new, are: Alice's Kitchen: Traditional Lebanese Cooking, by Linda Dala Sawaya. Linda is an artist who includes charming drawings and family photos in this collection of their family's recipes. There are notes about family history. There are careful notes about how to do certain items. I have yet to have a recipe fail from this small book, and consider it an excellent introduction to Lebanese cookery. The Sultan's Kitchen: A Turkish Cookbook, by Ozcan Ozan. This book is from the restaurant of the same name in Boston, and it carries a good seasonal variety of foods. Neither of these books meets your 'relatively new' requirements, and I'm not sure about their meeting the 'most dishes can be done in under an hour' requirement. They are relatively small and varied enough for different weather conditions and types of dishes (soups, salads, vegetarian and so on).

That looks like perfect summer fare. My basil is also reaching the point where I can harvest it - pesto in the next few days! As for the lamb - I've been hankering for lamb, but I can't buy any more meat until I've worked down through the freezer. No lamb in there. :-(The only thing that seems to be missing from your meals is your lovely bread.

Is Farquhar's a particularly good butter, or just what thy happened to have? Is that a pork roast of some sort at the lower left?

Thanks for the reminder of those recipes, Toliver. I'd forgotten about them, and they really do sound like a good summer treat. I wonder how those creamsicle cookies would go with rhubarb ice cream?

That storm system was here yesterday, and it was indeed a good day for long, slow cooking. I'm looking forward to seeing how that cake turns out.

Nope, that clarified it perfectly. Thanks!

So much for my suggestion of something they can't see well. Thanks for that information about an unintended consequence.

Remember to disable them before you go out to weed or harvest. :-D

A dog does wonders for that problem. Failing that, I wonder whether bird netting would help? Something difficult to see that's too floppy for deer to be able to jump? It might spook the deer enough to discourage them. I've heard mixed reviews (mostly negative) about the various chemical scents that are supposed to scare deer away, and I've seen adult deer clear 10' chainlink fences with ease.