andiesenji

It is a round peice of metal that you place over your burner. It absorbs and distributes the heat so you can obtain a perfect simmer. This is the one I have Flame Tamer Thanks! This could eliminate some of the cursing that goes on in the kitchen. Of course the downside of this is that there will be less reason to replace that nasty, horrible, unpredictable piece of garbage stove that I have now.... did I mention that I really hate this stove???? Wow, thirty bucks for a slab of aluminum. These things used to be much less. I wonder why the price has increased so much. I have one that I "made" , sort of..... One of the department stores had a table of "clearance" items, much of it damaged merchandise, including a large all clad skillet with the copper/aluminum layers in the bottom and a big V-shaped dent in one side and one of the handle rivets was loose. I took the thing to one my my neighbors, who is a welder and he cut the sides off then ground the rough edges down and now I have an 11 inch almost round (a slightly flattened spot on one side) heat distributor. I can put three of the little butter warmer pans on it with the flame on very low. Oh yeah, the pan cost me $2.00. I told the sales lady I was going to make a planter out of it......

I have made the goat stew from the recipe on this site Goat stew and it is indeed remarkable. If you brine the goat meat prior to cutting it up for the stew with this brine recipe it will be tender and not at all gamey. Far better than lamb, in my opinion.

The best way to roast goat is to lard it, that is get some pork fat, cut into thin strips and insert into the meat. If some of your guests do not eat pork, you can get some beef suet and do the same thing. A larding needle is hard to find nowadays, but a very thin bladed knife and a chopstick can work just fine. The fat completely disappears during cooking and makes the meat very tender. Brining helps also. Goat is actually less strong a meat than mutton. Ned is correct that slow and low is the best way. I wrap seasoned roasts in aluminum foil and cook in the oven at a very low temperature for quite a long time. Even well done, the meat is moist and tender. If you have time, do a practice run with one roast first. You can always reheat it, shred it for something like tacos (or fill pita pockets). It is always a chancy thing to cook something for the first time for a large party of guests. You are a brave person.

It is true that the first cheese seem to have been accidentally produced by nomads who carried milk (mare's milk) in skins and then some enterprising nomad made bladders from a stomach, probably from a sheep or goat and slung it behind his saddle and at the end of the trek he didn't have milk but a thin liquid with clumps of solid stuff that, when tasted, turned out to be pretty good. This budding Einstein probably figured out that since this only happened when a stomach was the container so it was something in the stomach that made it happen. Rather than use just one stomach to one batch of milk he began scraping the lining of one stomach and adding it to several batches of milk in other containers and got the same results. Cheese! And it probably stank to high Heaven but the nomad was probably so stinky he didn't notice any additional aroma. (I have been on a backpacking trip to the High Sierras when it wasn't feasable to bathe a whole lot because the water available was right off the snow and was darn cold. After a few days Limburger would have smelled like perfume when compared to some of us. On the way home we had all the windows in the station wagon wide open in spite of the near freezing temperatures outside. Finally we stopped in Bishop, rented a motel room and took turns showering. The only way we could handle the 4 hour trip home. .......

Actually "brick" cheese always seemed a rather odd name. During the few years I lived in Wisconsin, in my mid teens, I thought it was because it was generally shaped like a brick when you saw it in stores. However the story now is that it had to be pressed between bricks for the right texture to develop. and what is this Virgin Pine Native Blue? Does this sound like a cheese? Well it is, and a very nice one too. Not a typical blue cheese but actually a blue veined cheddar. And then there is Cojack, obviously a combinaton of Colby and Jack. Why don't they call it JackCo instead. And the Finnish cheese Juustoleipa (hoo-stah-lee-pah) which means bread cheese. Not because you put it on bread but because it is baked like bread and has an edible crust that looks like bread. Someone gifted me with a carton of "Neil's Squeeky Cheese" last Christmas. For some reason I thought of mice (squeeky) when I saw the name. However it is actually fresh, slightly dry, cheese curds that squeek when you bite into them. Not a lot of flavor but okay for something different. The low carb people should love them.

I can't hear "Quark" without thinking of the Star Trek DS9 bar-keep... (he was a Ferengi named Quark). I remember Quark. He did always look a little cheesey to me.

I want to make a couple of comments. I do not drink alcohol but I have many friends that do and I make many of my own flavorings. If you are in a state where Everclear is legal, try using it. It is straight grain alcohol and extracts much more flavor from whatever you put in it than 100 proof vodka. It is available online but they do not ship to certain states, including California. The other thing is, even with the microplaners, it takes a fair amount of time to grate a lot of zest. I make a lot of citrus syrup with zest and keep it in the fridge with the zest still in for up to 6 weeks, then strain the zest out and the syrup can then be heated and canned in jars and stored at room temperature. during that 6 weeks, the zest can be dipped out of the syrup and used in pastry, (scones especially) in dressings, chutneys, and so on. I need cups full of the stuff and there is no way I am going to spend all that time with a microplane. I do 4 or 5 pounds of lemons or oranges at a time, scrub them well with a nail brush which I keep just for this use. Then dry them with a towel. Using a vegetable peeler (and the serrated one is perfect for taking off just enough) I peel off the colored part of the rind, let them sit for half an hour or so, so it drys just a bit, then I put several pieces into one of my spice grinders and turn it on, shaking to make sure it is all finely shredded, then dump that out and do another batch. I use one of the brushes especially made for cleaning the grinders, available at most coffee specialty stores, to sweep out the zest. If you have only one grinder and need to use it for various things this is the best way to clean it between batches of strongly flavored things. Put two heaping tablespoons of baking soda and 4 saltines, broken, into the grinder and turn it on and run it for 15 seconds, shaking and turning it upside down while it is running (hold the top on). This will remove oils, caked on coffee, cinnamon, cloves, and etc. Occasionally you might have to reapeat it a second time if it is really gunky but usually one pass is all you need. Wipe it out with a paper towel and it is ready to use on something else. It also polishes the bowl and the blade. I have a Krups that is 10 years old and still looks new and it has been used on everything. Whenever I see them on sale for some ridiculous low price (like the KitchenAid I got for $8.00) I buy it and stick it away because eventually I know I will find a use for it, drop one and break the body, or leave one at a place where I have gone to cook, etc.

For flavoring ice cream, sorbet, ices. As a base for drinks with plain water, seltzer or club soda (a soda siphon works really well). Some are used in making dressings or condiments. Also in baking. If you wish you can process the bottles in a water bath, you just have to start them in tepid water then bring it up to a boil, process for the correct time then allow to cool in the water, capping the bottles at teh end of the process time but not fastening the bail until they are cool. However the acid/sugar level in most syrups is so high that you don't have to worry about anything infecting the syrup as long as it is bottled while it is still hot.

As long as you have a way of keeping it well sealed. I bottle citrus syrup in the glass bottles with the glass top that has a rubber gasket and a wire bail to hold the top on. I sterilize the bottles, funnel and everything that will touch the syrup fill to within an inch of the top of the bottle and (wearing sterile gloves) cap the bottle. I keep these on a shelf in my pantry. I have a large bottle of vanilla syrup from a batch that I made 2 or 3 years ago (I use it for making marrons glacé) and it is still just fine. I buy the bottles at Cost Plus World Market. Every store has a different policy, but the store at which I shop will give me a good discount if I buy a case of the bottles. They are not all that expensive at the regular price. I have several bottles of mixed flavor syrups, ginger/orange, cinnamon/orange, ginger/lime and mixed berry, all are bottled this way and stored in the pantry. My pantry does stay fairly cool, even in the middle of summer.

Sorry the gloves did not work as well for you as they have for me. I don't steam the nuts and the skins are very dry and crisp. Of course there can also be different varieties of nuts which may have different characteristics. I have blanched some almonds that pop out of their skins all by themselves while in the boiling water. Others cling to the skins as if they were glued on.

I make all kinds of fruit syrups and freeze them in large airtight containers for later use either as a syrup or for making jellies in combination with other things. It can be kept much longer when frozen in larger amounts. I only freeze juices or diluted syrups in ice cube trays shortly before use because they have to be tightly sealed to keep from being altered by the freezer and even a month is too long. I use the Cambro containers because they are just flared enough from bottom to top so that anything frozen in them can be decanted into a bowl or another container without waiting for the entire thing to melt. You can also freeze juices and syrups in orange juice cartons (that have been scrupulously cleaned) then clamp the top closed and place the carton in a freezer bag. When ready to use it, simply cut the top off, dip briefly in hot water and the frozen mass will come out easily.

I have ordered from Adagio many times. I get their email newsletter about new and interesting things or special deals. They have always been fast and accurate and their little sample tins are really great for holding odd little things when you have used the tea. Their regular tins seal tightly and keep the tea perfectly. I use a lot of tea and have ordered from most of the tea vendors on the 'net during the past several years. I have had only one bad experience and that vendor is no longer in business.

Food is a universal language, talk about food can cross all barriers, sharing of food can make friends of enemies and can open doors that would be otherwise closed. One need not speak the language to enjoy the food of another country. A smile and gestures can convey delight. People are generous with their knowledge about food when you show interest. There have been times I have been moved to tears when I have tasted perfection in a dish. I have tried to do as well myself and continually fall short but the striving is the important thing.

this is an addendum to my prior post re: Cambro. The taller containers hold bottles nicely and are great for traveling because if a bottle should break the liquid is confined to the container and does not ruin the carpeting in your van (something which happened to me with a bottle of roated-garlic olive oil).

Cambro makes many sizes of containers and some have the same size covers, (6 qt and 8 qt use the same size lid) (12,18 & 22 quart have one size lid) but are of different depths. I use these because they nest well and I keep the up to 8 qt. lids in the Jumbo sized Hefty slide-lock bags hanging next to where I store the containers (upside down, of course). I keep the larger lids in one of the drawstring type kitchen bags, also hanging up. Most of mine are the round containers from 1 quart to 22 quarts. I have several of the largest ones in which I store flour, etc. They also make a line of CLEAR round and square containers - Alton Brown has used these on his show - I have a few but prefer the round Natural White ones except for a few things (such as pickles). They all are dishwasher safe and resist coloring from the foods that often discolor ordinary plastics. Out here I buy Cambro containers at Smart & Final but they are carried at other stores that cater to the food service industry. The "Natural White" ones are very reasonably priced. Cambro at Smart & Final The following is a post I made to the Bread-Bakers list in Feb '03. --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v103.n009.15 --------------- From: Andie Paysinger <asenji@earthlink.net> Subject: Dough bucket/food grade storage containers Date: Sat, 08 Feb 2003 18:38:03 -0800 There was a request for a dough bucket. I have used the Cambro containers which are superior food grade containers for many years. They are available from Smart & Final at very good prices. Check them out at the web site. http://sdc2.sdccorp.com/smartstore/browse.asp?id=1 Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on Food Containers. The round Cambro containers which are the most suitable for al your needs are on pages 2 and 3 (containers and lids sold separately). The sizes range from 1 quart # 106060 to 22 quarts # 106240. The price of the 1 qt. is $1.87. The price of the 22 quart is $9.78 The lid (fits the 12 qt., the 18 qt. and 22 qt.) is $0.72 The I have many of these in every size. I use them for storing flour, grains, nuts, dried fruit, kitchen utensils when I travel, bottles of liquids (If something breaks, it is confined to the bucket. In my freezer instead of many small packages of veggies, fruits, etc. I have the large containers, one with veggies, one with fruits, one with poultry, one with fish, one with pork, beef, etc., etc. They seal so well that there is very little frost formation in the packages and therefore less waste. I do vacuum seal meats and fish and home grown fruit and veg before putting them into the containers. When getting ready for a party I dump ice from my ice maker into one of the buckets and keep adding to it every time the icemaker fills. The lids really seal tightly. Last week I put a batch of dough in one, snapped on the lid and it rose more than I expected, the lid had bulged up considerably but had remained tightly sealed. The containers also can be put in the microwave directly from the freezer to defrost stored foods. Try that with some other containers and you will have a disaster.

Dry cured pork is treated with salt and sodium nitrate. The action of the nitrate on the meat is what causes the pink color. Brine cured pork is lighter in color, more of a tan or beige with just a hint of pink. Nitrates have this effect on other meats, sausages, turkey, etc., but it is most pronounced in pork products.

I think "Quark" is a very odd name for cheese. However in German it means "curd" so that makes sense.

Any dried fruits are great in bread pudding. I like minced dried apricots and dried mango. If they are too dry and hard, a few minutes in a steamer will soften them without them getting soggy. Here is my original recipe for a very fancy "bread" pudding, in case you ever want to do something quite different. Marzipan filled brioche bread pudding. an original recipe by Andie Read all directions first. This recipe takes 2 days to do it correctly Easy Brioche Rolls Must start day before serving this dessert. 1/2 cup milk 1/2 cup butter or margarine 1/3 cup sugar 1 tsp. salt 1 pkg. dry yeast 1/4 cup lukewarm water 1 egg, separated 3 whole eggs, beaten 3 1/4 cup flour Scald milk and while hot add butter (margarine), sugar, and salt. COOL TO LUKEWARM. Soften yeast in the water. Add to LUKEWARM milk mixture. Add egg yolk and beaten eggs and stir. Add flour and beat with wooden spoon for 2 minutes. Cover and let rise in a warm place (80-85 degrees) until more than double in bulk, about 2 hours or less. Stir down and beat (stir) thoroughly. Cover tightly with foil and refrigerate overnight. Remove from fridge and allow to come to room temp. Take plain brioche dough and form into small buns (golf ball size works nicely), cover and let them rest for 10 minutes. Filling You can use store bought marzipan or make your own. Make a rope of marzipan about the size of a tootsie roll and cut into pieces about the same width. (You don't have to shape them.) Put one of the marzipan pieces on each bun, draw the dough up around it and pinch and twist to seal. Place in a buttered pan with seam side down. Cover and allow to rise about 30 minutes or until nearly doubled in size. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Brush tops of rolls with melted butter. Place pan in center of oven. Bake till nicely browned. Remove from oven and place on a wire grid. When cool cover loosely with a cloth and let them set out several hours. We want them to be just a little stale. The next step which takes this into an entire new category Egg custard 4 eggs + 2 egg yolks, beaten till creamy 1 1/2 cups milk 1/2 cup cream 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/4 cup sugar 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg 1/4 cup sweet sherry (optional) Mix all these ingredients and beat until completely blended Preheat oven to 325 degrees Place the marzipan filled buns in a buttered baking dish sides touching. Pour the custard in and around the buns but do not cover the tops of the buns. Let this stand for a few minutes then add more of the custard mix as the rolls will have soaked up some. Place the pan in a bain marie and bake until the custard is set. (Time varies with the size of the baking dish and the amount of custard) For a 9 x 11 pan it should be done in about 25 minutes. Test with a thin knife blade BETWEEN THE ROLLS at about 20 minutes, then at 25 minutes. Test every 2 minutes after that until blade comes out clean.

Go figure -- I couldn't see it before but can now! I'm like Balmagowry -- buy 'em all! I can't get enough Historical Cuisine books and continually fight the urge in buying more and more. While I am concentrating on researching and writing about Victorian cuisine, I can't say I really have a preference. I started out doing culinary historical recreation for the Renaissance Faire. Then some Freemasons hired me to create a feast honoring the supposed meeting between Richard the Lionhearted and Saladin (a la The Crusades). Then a group wanted to do ancient Greek and Roman feasts. It has been downhill from there! I trust you have visited Acanthus Books? Acanthus Books

I would like to prepare a meal for two people, Jane Austin and Dr. Johnson. Can't you just imagine the conversation? Splendid. I would prepare a diverse meal from multiple ethnic cuisines with each one a separate course. I have to think about the individual dishes.

Here is a little secret thing that has been passed along to me by my daughter, an ebay fanatic! I am also an ebay enthusiast and am a collector of various things. I have passed it on to others, now it is your turn. I have used it with fantastic results. They allow you three FREE transactions so you can see how well they work. They bid for you in the last 5 seconds of an auction. You have to set the price you are willing to pay and be firm about it. They will notify you if you are outbid but I have that checked off because I am only going to pay so much and no more. Auction Sniper Enjoy!

I have a pair of Merrills that I wear in the winter, alternating with a pair of Blundstone "Tug" shoes that are also extremely comfortable. Tug shoes Occasionally I go through an episode of ankle swelling and I have a pair of Caterpillar high tops, style Mystifi, (I think) that are very comfortable and keep my ankles from ballooning. They are made to look sort of like wrestling boots and the soles are not as thick as the others so they are not good for extended standing, but for a change-off from my regular shoes, they are great. Mystify by Caterpillar (I can't stand to wear the stockings, I invariably end up tearing them off after an hour or so because they make my legs itch.) And for those looking for extra wide shoes the Skidbusters come in extra wide and sizes up to 14. One of the guys in my diabetes support group is a Samoan (very large) who wears a 13 xtra wide in the oxford style. His doctor approved of these. skidbuster shoes

Trichinosis has NOT been totally eliminated. In our office we have seen 5 cases during the past four years of 3 patients with brain lesions from trichina, one also had a bovine tapeworm larva in the brain. All three had had back or neck injuries on the job and were seen for med/legal evaluations for the defendant insurance companies. All had also had surgeries to the neck or back or both. All had developed weakness, trembling, difficulty ambulating, numbness and tingling in one of more extremities. This was thought to be due to pressure on the nerves pre-op but was not relieved by surgery and continued to worsen. The problem was that these people had all been under the care of a chiropractor, farmed out for surgery and all the postop care was back to the chiropractor who did not recognize that this was not a nerve root problem. My boss, an orthopedic surgeon, did the exam and he felt that the symptoms were central nervous system or brain and recommended immediate referral to a neurosurgeon for evaluation. Scans of the brains showed the lesions and treatment arrested the problem but the damage already done cannot be reversed. Only one of these cases was accountable to home-butchered meats, resident of Bakersfield. The other two were from commercial sources, one patient lived in Whittier, the other in Valencia, California. The other two cases had trichina cysts in certain muscles with resultant weakness localized to that muscle only, plus a palpable lump. I only recall the one man who happened to live in Lacaster, my home city, and he was a teacher at one of the high schools. I believe the other man was a farm worker from the San Joaquin Valley. I personally will not eat pork that is less well done than medium. I know that in England they prefer pork pink but I don't think they have as high an incidence of trichina there. In one of the journals it was estimated that many such brain lesions go undetected or the symptoms are attributed to other causes, senile dementia, Alzheimers, Parkinson's, etc., because the patients are not completely worked up because of inadequate testing in some HMOs. Brain scans are expensive and many HMOs simply will not approve them and most people do not know how to force the issue or even that it is necessary.

Two things I have, which make life much easier is a new sink faucet I got just last year. It has a very high arch and the on/off control valve at the end. and the second is a pot-filler faucet over the cooktop that I had installed with the remodel. I have a big sink, but there are two sections, one is large and square and 10 inches deep. The other is smaller (where the garbage disposal is located), and not as deep. It is a cultured stone sink, very tough.

I do not like the bottom mount freezers at all. Now with my injured back it would be impossible for me to get anything out of one. I have two refer drawers, one on one side of the kitchen at the vegetable prep area and the other at one end by the baking station. And I also have a Maytag Wide by Side which has the wider part of the refrigerator at the top and that level of the freezer is narrow and contains the ice maker. Then I have a 10 cf small refrigerator just for cheese and some produce. They just don't make most side-by-sides as big as they used to. In 1972 I bought a 32cf Kelvinator side-by which worked like a horse for many years. The refrigerator alone was as big as most are now, total. It was huge but it worked. It is still working, I gave it to a women's shelter here in town and they have told me that it may use more electricity than the newer ones but the compressor doesn't run as much as the other one they have. Freezers are smaller now also. I have an upright 30 cf freezer that has an interior "quick freeze" compartment at the bottom. I bought it perhaps 10 or 12 years ago and I don't think they make them this size any longer.