andiesenji

I had one of those. It disappeared along with my 16 quart Calphalon stock pot after a potluck party that I contributed a pot of Birria. Mine was made by AmCo Japan - I still have the strainer ladle I bought at the same time.

I did not get to the dairy aisle. Boneless spiral ham 2.99/lb, Butterball turkeys 99¢/lb russet potatoes 1.49/lb, Granny smith apples 2.29/lb (more than Walmart) These prices are comparable to other markets. They do have a few things cheaper but the cheeses I bought were Kerrygold and 3.49 each - they are 3.59 at Walmart. The vine tomatoes were 1.89 for 4 in a bag, medium size. The Pepper maple bacon was 6.99/lb. The Brie cheese mentioned earlier in this thread: 2.99 for 8 ounces. I don't know how that compares to what others paid but I like the one Trader Joes carries the "triple cream brie" which is usually $6.99 a pound but occasionally there will be a special in the Fearless Flyer. The Brats were 3.99/package, I'll have to look to see what the weight is. I don't need eggs, my friend brought me a basket last Saturday and would only take a dollar for two plus dozen. So I didn't even look at them. Eggs are not as expensive as they were last spring but they are not cheap.

About a month or so ago, Winco had grapes BY THE CASE on sale - not by weight. One of the gals in the HOA office got an Excalibur dehydrator a while back (I talked her into it because they have a bunch of fruit trees) and she bought a case of the Red Flame grape. It worked out after she weighed them without the box at - 48¢ a pound. She now has a lot of raisins which she feeds her kids instead of candy. I was in the office yesterday and she said she was ordering another Excalibur because her husband wants one for making jerky and wants to keep it in the garage. (He thought she was nuts for buying the first one.) I can't handle extended shopping because I tire rapidly even when I can use one of the handicap scooters, so I haven't been to Winco lately. It is such a huge store and the things I want seem to be at opposite ends. I have to use my time wisely otherwise I am wiped out and have to spend much of the day with my feet up and resting and do my prep and cooking in small increments, resting in between. A far cry from when I used to work 14-16 hours straight with only brief rests.

I shopped at Aldi yesterday. They have very nice produce. I bought some ENVY apples that have not shown up in other stores yet. This variety was developed in New Zealand bur these were grown in California and are from this year''s crop. If you haven't yet tried them, do so. They have the flavor that apples used to have. I can't tell you how many times I have tried the "big name" apples (honeycrisp, gala, fuji, pink lady etc) and been disappointed because they did not taste anything like a REAL apple. They have bred them to be survivors in long-term storage and bred the flavor out of them. These are also HUGE! I bought some cheese, although they did not have the selection I was expecting, much less variety than Trader Joe's. I bought some bratwurst and some bacon. They offer a wide selection of breads at very reasonable prices and some great specials - large loaves of the white bread were 25¢ - for "stuffing" tho I didn't buy any, I already baked regular bread. I did buy a box of large croissants - 6 for $2.49. And some garlic Naan. I bought some baby potatoes, some sweet potatoes of a different variety that I have seen before. Two huge cucumbers - not the "English" type - I'm going to make braised cucumbers and celery, a side dish from my childhood that I haven't made for years. I didn't get to the dairy aisle or look at the meat because I was tiring and needed to do a few other things yesterday. They are right across the street from a Stater Brothers market which has very good meat and real live butchers that will cut to order, grind the meats you want. And on the opposite corner diagonally is the Walmart Supercenter. Aldi is going to have to offer some really great buys to succeed there. It's too bad they did not select a location where there are ZERO markets because we really need them in some places that have a lot of homes and no market for three miles. I think they must have listened to the wrong people when they selected that site. It is right on the corner of a large undeveloped piece of land that, when I first moved here in 1988, was an onion field and there was a farm stand on the corner where I could buy onions for a dollar for a 10 pound bag.

Here is the link to my post in 2011 about using the wattleseed and the vendor and some other things I ordered. Further down the page is a mention of black garlic, which is now much easier to find than it was then. If you do a search for wattleseed, you will find a page full of posts from various members. I read all of them eagerly when I first began using it. It has a flavor that is like a combination of coffee, chocolate, roasted hazelnuts and even a hint of pepper. I don't think there is anyway to get the exact flavor by combining these things. I have used it in cookies, including a shortbread that I took to a holiday party and was totally consumed, including the crumbs.

I have one of the cylinder shaped "rotissiere" baskets, which I have never used in the appliance it came with. But it is the perfect size in which to stuff a duck, and because it has the stubby rods at each end, can be hung on top of a Dutch oven so the fat all drips out of the bird and it can be (very carefully) turned a couple or three times and to keep it from spinning, I just stick a couple of my old stainless steel dinner forks into each side so they rest on the rim of the pot. I mention this because I was in a thrift store dropping off some cloths that don't fit and saw one on a shelf for $2.00. I have often seen them in thrift shops. So keep it in mind the next time you are out looking, these things are helpful for other than their intended use.

Me too.

We now have an ALDI here in Lancaster! The Grand Opening is tomorrow, Thursday, November 16 2014 E. Avenue J, I received a large card in the mail with a $5.00 off coupon with a $25.00 minimum purchase good from November 16 to December 31, 2017. It says, "Switch to Aldi Exclusive Brands and save up to 50% on groceries." They included a notice that one will have to deposit a quarter to use a shopping cart and a quarter will be returned with the cart is returned. There are a lot of goodies for the FIRST 100 customers but I won't be included in that bunch. I have been to grand openings before and will wait a few days before I venture into the store. One has to pack one's own groceries. "That keeps lines moving and saves you money." Perhaps they are unfamiliar with disabled people and the difficulty of lifting and moving things quickly. Frankly, I have seen Trader Joe's checkers take things from carts, scan and bag them far more rapidly than at any other store. I have shopped at Winco, where one bags their own groceries and I can attest to the fact that it is a hell of a lot slower than at other stores where the checkers bag everything with customer's bags.

I alway use strips of parchment on all sides and the top for angel food cakes or other sponge cakes. When I began back in the '60s, I used waxed paper with the lengthwise strips sticking out of the ends. They would sometimes char a bit but the "crust" of the cakes was barely tan.

Fantastic haul. I love my Viancin lids.

Until you get the "system" working correctly, check on the dough several times during the final rise before it starts the baking segment. Push on the dough with a finger, if it indents and doesn't spring back rapidly, it is becoming overproofed. End the cycle, reset it to bake only, and start that. The machine should heat up faster, give a bit of "oven spring" but not as much as in a regular oven but it will stop the action of the yeast so it won't blow out. I often have to do that with the doughs that contain a bit of sugar or eggs - challah or brioche doughs often exhibit accelerated yeast action and if I miss the signs, before the baking begins, I stop the cycle, yank the dough out of the pan, knead it vigorously with a bit more flour, shape it and drop it back into the pan and set for Bake Only. It can be tricky. I have convinced a lot of people to get bread machines and I always tell them to start out with one of the boxed mixes, which are foolproof or nearly so. I have given several as gifts and I always include a couple of boxes so they can have a success before going off into the weeds of the various recipes that often sound interesting but are not always the easiest for a novice. I have been baking for most of my life so I have a knowledge of what dough is supposed to look and feel like at all the various stages. I have had my share of disasters, not compensating for certain odd habits of some flours - that naturally have a high sugar content and may run wild with a "normal" amount of yeast. It can be frustrating but fun.

What kind and how much yeast? It's possible the dough was a bit too "wet" which is difficult to tell sometimes, which is why I check on it. Touch it and if it is a bit too 'tacky" at the end of the second knead, (with a recipe with which I am unfamiliar) I add a bit more flour. I have gotten results like this when I used too much yeast when re-working a dough I had left in the fridge too long and got a bit over eager.

Just out of the oven. Two pastries. (puff pastry sheets) I found the box in the freezer, 3 months past its use-by date. One is filled only with the very sweet Dried Amarena cherries in syrup. $9.61 for this tub. And the other filled with cream cheese, finely chopped pecans and King Arthur Flour's cinnamon baking mix. And how they look cut.

I think it over-proofed. The yeast blew its top and deflated. The Zo should have a troubleshooting section. You can saw off the top, lengthwise and slice the bottom section.

I've had the same experience. I can't stand things that are too sweet. I get an odd sensation like puckering inside my cheeks and then copious saliva. It can be embarrassing at times and I have to use a napkin quickly so I don't drool like a village idiot. I have had to make believe I was eating, using my fork around the edges - one such was a pecan pie that the hostess was so proud off. I gave the excuse of my diabetes being out of control to sooth her feelings. I can handle sour and bitter flavors, if I have warning but some things are just beyond me. Gooseberries, for instance. The flavor makes my skin crawl and I actually feel faint, the reaction is rapid and scary. There are a couple of other fruits, wild and not widely available that have the same effect. They grow wild in Kentucky and as a child, my cousins would devour them but I couldn't stand the taste.

I read my previous post and think it suffered from being in the middle of the morning when I was juggling several tasks and moved back an forth between the computer and the bread machine, the Thermomix and the oven. What I did was something of a "party trick" - catching bottled water was easy and so was distilled water, even when oxygenated - but I could tell the difference between the two water cooler/dispenser waters we had in the office, Arrowhead and Sparkletts even when they put them in ceramic cups or glasses, instead of the paper cups. No one could figure out how I did it but I was correct every time. That is when the neurologist mentioned my "talent" to his colleague. I thought it was something to do with the coolers themselves, both were electric but they were sightly different and one had been in the other doctor's office before he moved to our suite. We had gotten the Arrowhead when we moved into the new suite in November 1985. There may have been something residual in it from the manufacturing process. In any event, It was something fun to do when things were slow in the office. My boss used to bring in other doctors who thought I was pulling a fast one. One said, water has no taste so I think he was one of the non tasters because the tap water in that building was ghastly. Had a horrible metallic taste which made my teeth cringe.

I know I am a supertaster or maybe a super-supertaster, although the latter classification was not used in the late '80s when I was part of a study at UCLA. I can taste the difference between filtered tap water and bottled waters in a blind tasting. The bottled waters ALL have a faint taste that to me is like silicone smells, or hot plastic. I have had people try to fool me and I can catch it every time. I don't drink alcohol because I have a severe allergy to it but I do cook with it. I make a meat pie made with Guinness which had, when cooked long enough and with the right ingredients, a hint of bitterness that is good. Raw or not cooked enough, it is like touching my tongue to the base metal on a spoon where the silver plating has worn off. It makes me shudder.

You can salvage all of it. As long as the dough has not been baked or dried out, just fix the paddles, add a bit more water, and half to one teaspoon of yeast to kickstart it. Start the cycle again and leave it to finish. I have forgotten to add some ingredients from time to time and just zero out the cycle, add what is needed and restart from the beginning. Yeast dough is very forgiving. I learned this when working in my mom's bakery in the '50s. We re-vitalized dough that had been left in one of the dough troughs (for the first rise after mixing) and had risen and deflated. It was cut into manageable pieces, tossed back in the big horizontal mixer, had some liquid and flour added, some yeast (we used fresh) and remixed. Turned out fine. I can't tell you how many times I started something on the dough cycle and then got involved with other tasks and totally forgot about it. Sometimes I would take it out of the pan, stick it in a plastic bag in the fridge and then rework it the next day or the day after, adding more yeast and whatever else was required to get it back to what i wanted. I have also taken a small piece of the dough, when I was experimenting with "flavors" and baked the little "roll" to see if it was the flavor I wanted.

I still have the DLX 2000, also known as the Electrolux, AEG, Ankasarum, mixer, which has more capacity - I think it is 10 quarts. It works on a different principle than the "orbital" mixers but it does a bang-up job on breads and I have mixed large batches of cake batter, cookie dough, etc. I got it after I burned out the motors on TWO 5-quart KAs (not the ones made by Hobart) making Peter Reinhart's Struan bread which is heavy, dense, stiff dough. It handled the stiff dough just fine and I love it. It has a timer so I can turn it on, set the timer and leave it to do the work. There are a lot of YouTube videos of the mixer working. A couple of eG members bought the machine after I recommended it, years ago and at least two have posted that they are still happy with it. Pleasant Hill Grain has the best deal for it as they include things that other vendors don't.

No. You do not need to add sugar. I think some recipes add it to give a boost to the yeast but if your yeast is fresh and active it is not needed. I leave it out of most recipes unless it is a sweet dough. Your machine should have a "bake only" cycle - usually the last one on the menu. You can select that and push start and set your timer for 15 minutes, which is usually enough to brown the top. With some breads that are quite dense, the regular cycles do not bake them long enough. I use my Thermapen to check the interior temp. It has to be at least 200°F and for some, heavy breads with a lot of whole seeds and grains, I make sure the interior temp reaches 210°F. before I push the off button.

I had the 10 quart Hobart but it was too tall for a regular kitchen counter. I had it bolted to a heavy wood "dolly" or cart that was about 18" high and had 4" locking wheels. Under the platform to which the mixer was bolted, there was room for the beaters and a couple of extra bowls. It was very heavy.

The local Middle Eastern store sells frozen barberries. Some states do not allow them to be sold because they are considered an "invasive non-native plant" even though it is actually the Japanese barberry that is the nasty species. The Zereshk barberries are available from Amazon. You have to search for "zereshk barberries" I stumbled on them by accident.

Single woman's pizza "oven" might be satisfied with THIS. KALORIK HOT STONE PIZZA OVEN. It's not exactly an oven per se. but it certainly gets hot. My friends, Erik and Charles got one of these for Christmas last year from a doting aunt. They thought it was a gimmick but found it worked fairly well. One of their dogs managed to pull it off the counter (it was cold and unplugged) and broke the stone. Rather than replace it, they upgraded to the Breville, which they use frequently for parties - setting out the "fixings" and prepared pizza dough rounds and letting their guests "customize" their pizzas. They have urged me to get one but sadly, I can no longer consume pizza. The heartburn that follows is excruciating

The Zojirushi I have, from about 15 years ago had "racks" that went into the pan for baking rolls. I never used them, I just take the dough out, divide and shape it. Put the rolls on a sheet pan and bake them off in the regular oven. I have the method for cinnamon raisin rolls with the dough being mixed and kneaded, rise and kneaded through the entire dough cycle on my blog. The machine does all the routine work and you get to do the fun part. The link to my blog is at the bottom of every one of my posts.

This is at the 155 mark, just before the final "punch-down" knead. Photo #1 As you can see, it is too high to bake like this, the oven "spring" will cause it to hit the top. This is after I have divided the dough, removing about 1/3 or so and returning it to the pan, with the paddle removed. The time shows 1:50 remaining to finish. And the last photo is the oiled plastic bag with the remaining dough. I will keep it in the fridge for a day or so and then make rolls from it.