Smithy
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Hey, can you larb venison sausage?
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Venison jerky. I love it, but all I have left is smoked and in casings. I'm thinking that I should be thinking about using some of them in soups. I recall seeing a photo (on the Dinner thread, if memory serves me right) of someone posting about using them with beans. I think the beans were white. Sounds like I'll need to do some experimenting. Anyone have any other ideas?
Lessee, ideas for underwhelming but edible sausage, from someone whose deer was hijacked by the rest of the party with that precise result:
* slice some into little coins and throw them into spaghetti sauce and serve with noodles
* slice some more and cook them up with tomatoes, red peppers, mushrooms, olives, whatever, and mix with little pasta butterflies and turn it into a creamy tomatoey pasta skillet dish
* slice up yet more, scramble with eggs and some good spicy salsa
* try white beans and venison sausage, maybe with a touch of sage?
* chop up yet more and throw it into a kale soup or stew, or some other leafy green stew, maybe with some garbanzos thrown in
* throw it into the grinder or food processor, regrind, and use in place of fresh ground meat in, oh, moussaka
I admire your restraint at the farmer's market! I always come away with bags and bushels of stuff and having to do something with it!
Nancy
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ARGGGG! It is the sulfites, is it not, that might trigger a migrane? There is not, am I correct, caffeine in wine?????
Uhmm, if I've been reading this thread correctly, sulfites are very likely not the culprit. As noted above, and in the "Copper Headaches" thread, more likely culprits for migraine headaches are tannins in the red wines and coppers (particularly in some white wines).
As to caffeine in wine: I've sure never gotten a caffeine jag from it, and it sure seems more likely to put me to sleep than wake me up. However, I like the excuse for a good cuppa wine in the morning!
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I enjoy a few sips, and then since I'm usually cooking, I just desert my glass in hopes it will get kidnapped. "Oh my goodness, where did my glass go? And look, the bottle's empty."
What a great strategy! It beats heck out of knocking the glass over! -
My guess is copper, but it could be a number of things. There's a more complete reply on the Wine 101: Sulfites thread.
And don't worry about gullet gaffes . . . a forum host will guide you if you stray off the path. And after all, wine reviews here do include positive and negative notes!
I think it would be relatively easy to test for copper. Hmm. Something to talk about with the lab!
Thanks for the reassurance about the gullet gaffes, too - every community is a bit different and I'm still trying to get a feel for when a forum host will say, quietly, "not here" vs. shouting "Outta the pool!" Not that I've seen any evidence of Trumpesque ogreism so far...
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This is very, very interesting. Do you suppose copper compounds are the source of my headache? I just finished posting this question on the sulfites thread. If it's copper, how could I find out (before drinking) who was using it and in which wines? And by the way - if I done bad naming names in the other post, I hope someone will let me know.
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Since we're on the topic of allergic reactions to wine, I'll ask my question here. I've been trying to pin down the substance in certain wines that gives me a headache, partly out of chemical curiosity but mostly so I can predict which wines to avoid. I don't mean the predictable headache that comes with overindulgence; I mean a real
back-of-the-eyeballs head-banger that lasts the entire next day after only one glass of wine at dinner, with no other alcohol in the evening. Rosemount Shiraz (the black diamond label) is one of them, and unfortunately I learned it after my husband and I had bought a bunch because we liked its taste for the price. I haven't found a rule. Some reds do it, some whites do it. The reds seem most likely to be shiraz (most notably Australian), but I can drink many other shiraz/syrah with impunity and I've gotten the same reaction from some other reds - cabernet sauvignon, zinfandel. Some cheap sauvignon blancs give me the same reaction. Any ideas? I know it isn't sulfites. I'm tempted to have a lab run a series of tests to see if the demon compound can be isolated, but it would be an expensive proposition because I wouldn't know what to tell them to look for. Besides that, I don't know of any wine purveyor who lists, say, the level of ethylhexylketomethylheadbanger on their labels, so I'm not sure how helpful the analyses would be.
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I'm not so sure the motivations of the wineries that are "double oaking" with wood chips, suspended staves or sawdust are as noble as might be implied previously. They do it because they're overcropping and growing far too many grapes per acre (NOT dropping fruit as Carolyn mentioned earlier) and getting shitty quality juice from thin and weedy tasting grapes, more often than not in areas that aren't as ideal in terms of the growing conditions for the grape varietal in question. By giving it the "oak treatment" they can pass it off as having seen a real barrel and hopefully by conforming to the prevailing flavor profile that the less educated customer has come to expect, can get more money for their crappy manipulated wine.
A real winemaker with some skill and viticultural knowhow doesn't have to resort to these sorts of cheap tactics.
Katie, thank you for solving a mystery! My husband and I have been carping for years about the over-oaked flavor of so many inexpensive wines and wondering why that practice caught on. We've been thinking it was some inexplicable flavor fad. I hadn't realized the strong oak (he calls it pine tar) flavor was supposed to mask a crappy wine; I just thought it made for a crappy wine.
Edited to add: I really, really love this blog!
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Welcome, Rob! C'mon in and stay awhile!
I too am glad for this topic. I've had more than one person assert that my occasional wine headaches were from sulfites - where did this idea get started, anyway? - and I've had to point to the labels of all the wines I can drink. The sulfites aren't the culprit.
I never knew the whitish coat on our grapes was sulfite compounds! How interesting!
The steroids bit reminds me of a student project some years back, in which the student(s) tried to collect signatures on a petition to ban a dangerous chemical called dihydrogen monoxide. The petition listed a number of deadly hazards: in sufficient quantity, DHMO can kill you; given enough time, it can dissolve almost anything, and so on, and yet the government has done nothing about it! By the end of the day, the number of adults who had signed the petition heavily outweighed the number who realized they were reading about water.
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This is truely the summer that never happened. We have kept sweatshirts at hand, which is not typical. Most disappointing. I had so hoped for a tomato from our "new estate" this year.
...summer. Wish we'd had one.
Boy, howdy. This was the year I planted nearly a dozen tomato plants of varying varieties. I think two tomatoes of the whole lot have ripened. At least the basil, sorrel and other herbs are flourishing.
At least you *got* summer, and up north at that! I got a few days of summer here near Duluth, but then I trotted off to California for a visit and missed the rest of the heat. *Sigh*
Fried green tomatoes, anyone?
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I think its highly appropriate and important that much of the key discussion on the Internet regarding Julia's passing is taking place on eGullet -- and that her death occurred not long after eGullet's 3rd birthday and our announcement to become a not for profit venture and a culinary educational entity rivalling the American Institute for Wine and Food, which was founded by Julia Child. In many ways, I see this as the passing of the torch. Julia Child enlightened the American culinary consciousness of the 1960's and 1970's and fueled the culinary revolution of the 1980's and 90's -- we hope and will endeavor that eGullet, assisted and guided by some of the brightest and best in the culinary profession will strive to do the same for the opening decades of the 21st century.
Well said!
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Some of my colleagues insist that I need to tell this story in honor of Julia since we still talk about it to this day. And we credit Julia for the original thought.
It was some time after the '89 freeze and I had assembled a report on our shortcomings in preparation for such an event on the Gulf Coast. The report was about 30 pages and was assembled in little 3-ring binders for the audience of about 20 high muck-a-mucks. The leader of this meeting was a Senior VP that I knew pretty well. He was a great guy and had heard about my previous attempts at this trick. I agreed with him that I would include something appropriate for my report out.
Well, I was reporting to this august body in the big board room, every one with a copy of the bound report in front of them. On page 15 was a paragraph giving instructions on removing page 15 and how to fold into a paper airplane. Then there were instructions to launch that airplane at an "appropriate target". I proceeded with my report with the attendant viewgraphs then opened the floor for questions. There was this one recalcitrant old fart that was blustering about how this could not be true and that his location was well prepared... blah blah blah. Then there was this young pompous ass that started trying to deconstruct the statistics. As I was fielding the questions, really more like attacks, I heard numerous snaps of the three ring binders. Some time passed as I continued to defend the report to these two dorks. Then, all of a sudden, there was this flurry of paper airplanes hurled towards these two idiots.
My final viewgraph:
This demonstration brought to you by Julia Child, OSS and French Chef
Our SrVP was a great fan of Julia and had known her during the war.
Julia would have been proud!
No wonder the muck-a-mucks fear your writings!
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Andie, that is a terrific story and a very interesting recipe! Thanks for posting both!
I'm going to have to try that recipe, now while it's still (what passes for) warm here.
Isn't it cool to have colorful family and good stories from them?
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I loved Julia's sense of play. In an interview once (on public radio?) I heard her talk about her years working for the OSS. She began to wonder whether anyone ever bothered reading the memos and reports she typed up, so she decided to find out. In one report, she embedded instructions for folding the report paper to make a paper drinking cup. Nobody commented. On another occasion, she submitted a proposal to change the filing system in the name of efficiency. Under the new system, every document would be filed alphabetically, according to the first letter of the last word of the document.
...
The proposal was approved.
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I'll add my vote for favorites to Fine Cooking and Saveur. At present I'm also subscribed to Gourmet, Cook's Illustrated, Bon Apetit, Cuisine@Home, and Cooking Pleasures. (Can you tell I've made the idiot list of the magazine subscription "special trial offer" folks?) I'm going to let the overload die down as the trial subscriptions expire. Here's what I'm keeping and what I'm letting go, and why:
Saveur and Fine Cooking I'm keeping, for all the reasons named above in this thread. I love those magazines.
I love Cooking Pleasures just as much as the two listed above. It's slightly more basic but along the same lines as Fine Cooking, and I've learned tons from it. Every recipe I've tried from it (admittedly fewer than half) has been a winner. For folks who like basic "how-to" type recipes along with reviews of equipment and the possibility of getting to review that equipment (and keep it) themselves, joining the Cooking Club of America can be a good thing. I think the professional and well-advanced eGulleteers would find it too basic. It's similar to Fine Cooking in style but somewhat thinner. I think the subscription costs are about the same.
Cuisine@Home is a well-written, clearly laid out how-to cooking mag that I think is a good value for the money, more basic than Cooking Pleasures. I'm going to let it lapse anyway because it has the world's most annoying circulation department: barely a month into a new subscription, they start bugging me to renew yet again. The last straw was this year when I gave my sister a gift subscription for Christmas, and they started bugging her to renew before she'd seen her first issue. Shame on them, no more money - after several years of subscriptions.
Gourmet - well, oddly enough after seeing the complaints from Down Under that they show too many farms, my sense is that it's too NYC oriented- at least, too flashy, too much about city night life. It goes.
I haven't decided yet about CI, but it's already been discussed ad nauseum. I really like the scientific approach, but I haven't generally liked the recipe results. Kimball's a bit too precious for me, but I can get past that - and I confess, sometimes I like his homey little essays in the front.
Bon Apetit - maybe, maybe not. I like it, but does it do anything the other combo of mags doesn't? I need time to read the flying magazines too!
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"Dew-wayne Post, if you don' stop flapping your gums and get into that kitchen to make sure that roux don' burn, there is gon' be a precious lot of loud singin' and slow marchin' round chere."
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Ye cats, man! You sure do know to come back from a vacation!
I live almost as far up into the frozen north as you recently vacated, so I don't know about separate ice makers; Rachel's points about the bottom freezer if you have a separate ice maker all make sense. Certainly it makes physical sense to put the freezer underneath everything else. However, my friends who invested in a bottom drawer freezer were disappointed with it. It was a big pull-out bin with multiple compartments (as Rachel recommends), but they were still forever bending down and trying to unearth the wanted thing from the very bottom of its compartment. As I watch dear friends age (but not me!
) I'm finding that the last thing they want to do is have to squat down to a bottom drawer, not even to get something like the frozen chicken for tonight's dinner.Good luck, have fun, and hang onto your sense of humor! I love the image of the neighborhood boys standing around goggle-eyed at your last renovation project.
Nancy
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Yes a mix of small cut up pieces. Don't remember seeing the seeds.
I guess a return visit is mandated 
With a camera, please! We need pictures!
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Broth and a touch of dry white wine (sauvignon blanc is my standby) or dry vermouth. Bacon. Fry up the bacon (or use other pork fat), pull out the bacon bits, soften the leeks in the fat, brown the potato chunks slightly, stir in the alcohol, stir in the broth, let it all simmer until potatoes are done and the soup is starting to thicken. Smooth in some half-and-half, but don't let it boil. Add the bacon bits back in, or use as garnish once the soup is in the bowls. Salt, pepper to taste. A bit of chopped parsley never hurts.
Good luck! Let us know what you do, and how it turns out!
Nancy
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It was not a stewed dish but rather slices of eggplant with garlic and pomegranates, all though on the latter you just saw very small pieces of Pomegranate. The Syrian dish sounds closest.
By "small pieces of pomegranate" do you mean they had sprinkled pomegranate seeds over the garlic and eggplant slices? That would look lovely.
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Am I the only person on the face of the earth who truly dislikes raspberries? Blackberries are fine, but raspberries ruin the whole thing. I've seen the lovliest chocolate pastries and cakes, and look forward to dispaching them at the first opportunity... then I smell them.
<snip>
Once I know that rasperries are in it, I just cannot stomach it. And it seems that every recipe containing chocolate also has raspberry as an ingredient. Drives me bonkers.
Heresy!
You'd have been disappointed with our wedding cake, then: one layer of chocolate chip cake, one layer of chocolate (or was it white? it's been 7 years), married by a wild raspberry filling, covered with some luscious white (chocolate? I forget) frosting. Even people who don't normally like cake raved about it, and sometimes I dream of asking the baker to make another for us.I know how you feel, though: I am revolted, and feel cheated, when I bite into a lovely piece of cake with chocolate frosting and discover it has *peanut butter* in it.
Now, I like peanut butter. I like chocolate. But not together, except for the occasional Reese's cup. I think the cake baker's sister was truly offended when she asked what kind of cake I wanted for an office party and I specified chocolate frosting *without* the peanut butter. -
Here's a link to the KitchenAid site for this product.
I had not heard of this before and would be curious as to why a $99 attachment might be better than this Krups $60.00 model or this Cuisinart $80 model. or even this Cuisinart $50 model.
I've been wanting an ice cream maker for some time. I know I can't afford the Delonghi $250 model or any in that bracket - but would love to hear what people have to say about theirs'!
I have a cheapo $20 model from Wal-Mart (don't remember the manufacturer - Waring, maybe?) that works pretty well for me. We picked it because it was large enough to satisfy me and inexpensive enough to satisfy my husband.
It makes good ice cream, and I only have two complaints about it. First, the way the canister sits in the ice and the motor mount sits down over the canister means that once it's together, it's together until the ice cream is done. You can't take the lid off partly through the freezing process to add nuts without knocking everything out of alignment and having to empty the ice and start all over. The second thing is the requirement for ice and salt. Not a big deal, but if you get the wrong kind of salt there will be icky insoluble chunks of dark mineral that are a messy disposal problem. (Do use ice cream salt, not rock salt!) Since I generally make ice cream only when the summer fruit is at its best, the choice has been satisfactory.My mother has the $50 Cuisinart (ICE-20). It makes terrific ice cream and does not have either of the inconveniences I noted above. When I replace my machine, that's what I'm getting. The extra bowls come in useful for making multiple batches quickly. Why spend more?
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I pick the local wild raspberries and make wonderful sauces of them, those that I don't eat out of hand, and those sauces go on desserts whenever I can find someone to eat them. The wild raspberries are better-tasting than any domestic raspberries of my experience, but they're also a bit too seedy to make comfortable eating for most people. I freeze some blueberries for use later in pies, but a lot of them are eaten with breakfast cereal, too. I'm living on fruit right now, unfortunately a good deal of it store-bought but good anyway. But the berries! A couple of years ago I made a compote from raspberries and tart cherries, with a bit of kirsch, from a recipe in a cookbook. The result was a very fruity ruby-colored cherry-raspberry sauce with a small touch of alcohol, perfect for ice cream or dark chocolate cake. I loved it, my best friend and her family loved it. I shared jars with my family and other friends. Not a peep from any of 'em! When my best friend and I get together in a couple of weeks I'm taking her the rest of the jars. I won't bother trying to make it again, since my husband won't eat it and nobody else seemed to think it was as wonderful as Susan and I had. What a disappointment!
Fruit salad hardly seems worth mentioning - I assume everyone does that regularly - except that people around here seem to think it's exotic!
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I've never tried those handheld juicers! They must be better than I'd expected.
Just to be clear about it, though, I'm posting a picture of what I'm talking about. (It's about time I tried posting a photo!) My "garlic press" analogy must not be as good as I thought.
My Wearever juicer is like this. The top handle is attached to a flat plate that presses the lemon half against the flat edge of the bowl. There's a strainer inside. There are other juicers that sit higher and must have a bowl or glass beneath them to catch the juice, but they're larger and not as convenient.
Now that I've set the record straight, I'll agree that an electric juicer might be easier in the long run - but no, these won't give you carpal tunnel, and they'll tire your arms sooner than your hands!
Edited in a perhaps-vain attempt to spleak more painly.
eG Foodblog: snowangel - Freedom!
in Food Traditions & Culture
Posted
That stuff is sooo good. Last winter my friends from the Twin Cities came up for the usual winter camping/river skiing/see how much you can damage your liver weekend, and one of them brought a bottle of Shakers. I don't think it lasted the first night. There's something about being out under the northern lights, in the hot tub, long past midnight, that just...well...dried us out. Had to rehydrate, ya know.