Shalmanese

huh? Whenever I boil potatos, I salt the water until it tastes like the sea and my potatos come out perfectly seasoned with no need for salt afterwards.

man, you guys all have much cleaner kitchens than I do.

I generally prefer steaming potatos to boiling them because they're easier to cook, more tolerant to overcooking, don't become waterlogged and dont require a colander. However, I can't salt steamed potatos as they are cooking but I can with boiled ones. I just had a random thought that I could brine them overnight the day before and that way, I would have perfectly salted steamed potatos. Has anyone tried this? For every day, it might be a bit involved but I was thinking for, say a dinner party, that extra step might just make my life a bit easier.

Riesling has always been my go-to cooking wine but I've been drinking a lot of it lately as well. I've been going through some Cookathama Riesling atm. Not fabulous but great for the price. It was really battery acid dry and I was really struggling to pair it with foods until I discovered that it works fabulously with spicy asian foods. Apart from that, I'm having a mini-love affair with NZ Sav Blancs. They just seem to have a much crisper, more defined flavour that I love. I've been trying to track down a bottle of "Omaka Springs" (2004 Sav Blanc) in Australia but I've had no luck, you wouldn't be able to help me would you?

You can grill it just fine I think.

Desperate Meals? Once upon a midnight dreary, working till my eyes were bleary, I stumbled through the kitchen door. While I rustled, stomach rumbling, muttering, cursing, swearing grumbling, the goal, to sate my inner carnivore. Here is something, something in my freezer door, only this and nothing more. Ah discovered meat of porcine, ground to a convenient portion, a scant half block upon my door. Eagerly I searched the tomes of wisdom, sages from the cooking canon, but from my books was only sorrow, sorrow that I must endure. For perfect partner to my porcine, was not in my pantry anymore. The tomes all said "pork with mango", the taste will make you want to tango, alas no mango hanging from my pantry door. I spied my eyes on fruit of kiwi, the goal is pork that's sweet and chewy, surely this works even more. The dinner shall be Pork and Kiwi, twill be this and nothing more. Presently my soul grew stronger, hesitating then no longer, in the bowl the both were poured. Middle stem was tough fibrous, pick it out and in the rubbish, and do make sure the meat is thawed. Unappetizing in appearance, it looked like that and nothing more. Deep into the darkness peering, I feared the meal as unappealing, while looking at refrigerator door. Sauce of chilli, salt and pepper, add you this and nothing more. "But more?", This I whispered and an echo murmured back the word, "No more!" Merely this and nothing more. Back into the bowl a mixing, now I have all of my fixings, "please taste good" I did implore. Mould it so you have a patty, heat the pan with something fatty, it makes sure sticking is no more. Let my heart be still a moment, this food indeed I must explore. Once the pan is hot and smoking, the windows open or you'll be choking, add the patty, do nothing more. 60 seconds wait no touching, the surface of the meat is crusting, wait this long and not a second more. Flip the meat and season carefully, flipped and seasoned, nothing more. Once the middle pink not showing, on the plate, it will be going, a side of salad, nothing more. Peering with some trepidation, a prayer of mindless recitation, "please god let this dish taste better than those before!" The memories of past abominations, all chanting to me "Make no more!" The meal quickly I did devour, I watched my tastebuds begin to flower, the taste I simply did adore. The sweet and meaty flavours contrasted, to make a meal I wish had lasted, all the night and forevermore. For Pork and Kiwi is divine in flavour, here and now and forever more. Fortune smiled upon my combo, as unlikely as it was to conjure, something my fevered imagination drifted ashore. The contrast made the dish compelling, each flavour note was telling, both fruit and meat yet not as before. The fortune of an unlikely combo, twas good fate and nothing more. So now my eyelids are all bleary, writing poems doth make me weary, as I fumble, stumble to the door. Silently, I curse my project, so hard to make it perfect, there's only so many words that end in "oor". I bid adieu to all you readers, read this far and nothing more. --Shalmanese

Oh great, I now have an incredible craving for lobsters and eggs.

12lb is very easy to cook as long as you add them in batches. Fill the pot 3/4 full first and let it cook for 20 minutes and it should have shrunk to only 1/4 of the pot, then continue adding until it's all in there. In the end, it should only be 1/4 of the original volume.

I think that you should focus on first doing one thing really really well and the rest just okay to start off with. The key is to have a hook so people can go "Hey, have you checked out the No 9? They have awesome X". Having GREAT burgers and ok fries will get you say, 100 customers a day, having great burgers AND great fries might get you 140 customers and having great burgers AND great fries AND great milkshakes might get you 160 customers. From what I understand, the competition there is rather sparse and amatuer so as long as it's not offensively bad, nobodys going to avoid your place merely because you have merely adequate fries. The other thing is that you should be afraid of overextending yourself to start off with. If your forced to cut back on the quality of your food, due to time or labour constraints, then it's worse than if you just started off worse. I know I would get pretty pissed off if I went around for a week telling people how awesome the fries are at No 9 and then go the next time with friends and find out they replaced them with Sysco chips or to find out theyre now twice as expensive since you underestimated the labour costs. OTOH, going for a great burger and then suddenly finding phenomenal fries for the same price as the previously okay fries would be something that would make my day. It sounds like your on a good thing with your burger. My vote is to start off with the burgers, and then gradually build up everything else from there.

What health risks? Unless you happen to be wiping the stove while it's on and your wearing a metal bracelet, I haven't heard any credible evidence that these things are dangerous. But if these things are absolutely even heating, then you need to ask why do you even need or want to use copper pans on them? You don't need the superior heat conducting properties of copper. Anyway, what I would like to see is a 5 burner stove, 4 of which are seriously grunty gas burners an one induction hob in the middle. Seems to me that would be my dream stove.

Welcome to the boards Star! hope you enjoy your stay. I remember reading the profile of your company in the SMH and was very impressed by your dedication. What are you drinking at the moment?

One italian restaurant I go to has a nice practise where the specials are written on 3 or 4 blackboards at the start of the night. When your seated, they prop the specials board right next to your table and then take it away again once you've ordered. It's a nice touch.

Ugh, sorry PCL, I don't own a copy of the dining guide (or any dining guide for that matter). I only eat out maybe 1/2 a dozen times a year. I generally find when I go out that I either end up extremely disappointed with my meal or extremely poor, often both .

Wouldn't it be easier to first mix the ink with the eggs and then knead it into the dough? That way, you don't have to worry about staining.

For me, milkshakes just taste better in styrofoam. Of course, they taste best in a thick glass cup but the scratching of the straw on the styrofoam surface and the chewing off the lip of the cup after your done. I just can't imagine a milkshake in plastic, it seems wrong.

Welcome to Sydney loiosh! The North Shore of Sydney is freakishly expensive as I'm sure you know. Probably best to go up further north on the train line, somewhere around pymble or so. But then the culinary scene isn't as good. In fact, almost anywhere in sydney is going to be freakishly expensive compared to Canberra.

I'm actually more of a fast person. Theres something fun about the controlled chaos where you know everything is just teetering on the edge of of getting out of control and you have to take care of 5 things at once. But every move you make is controlled and perfect and you manage to bang something out that tastes incredible. It's a huge adrenaline rush. Then again, theres also something soothing about making a huge batch of chicken stock and taking the time to slow down and get everything right.

Sambuca is different because it's such a high proof liquor that your actually cold flambeing it. This means your burning off liquid ethanol which would obviously reduce the alcohol content compared to the unflamed sambucca. Additionally, you would also slightly heat up the drink and possibly also introduce new flavour combos (plus it looks cool to throw a flaming shot into your mouth). However, with lower proof alcohols, it is impossible to flambe them cold. You need to heat them and vaporise the alcohol before it will flame. In this case, since it is already vapour, it's essentially out of the dish anyway and flambe does nothing to remove further alcohol from the dish.

I tried looking on the internet until I found this. Then I just curled up in the corner wishing for the bad, bad man to go away.

I think Australia stores have a policy that if theres a mistake on your bill, you get that entire item free. I think it's a good one and encourages more faith in the supermarkets.

Inspired by the Jello Shots thread, it seems to me that many classic cocktails would work well in sorbet form. A Mojito as a lime-mint-rum sorbet, a pina colada, a margarita etc. However, sorbets are finicky things when sugar and alcohol come together so I was hoping that people had recipes that had the right consistancy. Is it possible? Is it tasty?

I don't actually get how this works. If the alcohol is on fire, then it's above the pan which means it's already out of the dish. Unless the flambe is heating the top layer of the pan to a microscopic degree or a significant amount of ethanol ends up recondensing into the dish, then flambeing should have no effect on the level of alcohol. My guess is that it's done for: a) Cheap Theatrical Effect b) In order to form a whole host of new flavour chemicals via maillard on the surface due to the high heat.

Yes, the rice will absorb the salt, thats established. What isn't established is will it not absorb all the other flavours of the soup? If it does, then it's no better than just diluting the soup.

I was so intrigued by this I had to test it. So I brought 1L (1.05 quarts) of water up to a boil: Added 20gm of iodized table salt which made it a 2% salt solution. This was just barely offensively oversalted to my tastes: I got 1/2 a cup of rice and a clean, porous cloth (I don't have any muslin): Wrapped it up: And let it simmer in the water for 30 minutes. This is the end result: The one on the left is the simmered one, the one on the right is the pre-simmer. To make sure temperature was not a factor, both were put in the microwave until boiling, then allowed to cool for about 3 mins. I enlisted the help of my brother for a single blind tasting. And the results... Unfortunately, the rice seemed to have no effect whatsoever. If anything, the riced one was slightly saltier that the pre-rice one and there was a bit of a ricey flavour as well. One possible explanation is that some water boiled off the riced one which would make the salt more concentrated. Another is that the rice actually does the reverse an absorbs more water than salt. Since I neglected to weigh the rice bundle beforehand, it was impossible for me to determine how much water it had absorbed so I cannot tell which theory is correct but I did note that, when tasting the rice, it seemed a bit less salty than the water. Of course, if I read andie right, it seems as if he's saying that it's not that the rice absorbs LOTS of salt, it's that it absorbs not much of anything else. In that case, it is still plausible that this might work but I'm not prepared to waste 1L of chicken stock finding out. I'm just going to note, however, that rice dishes that involve cooking the rice in a flavourful liquid usually does have the rice become fairly flavourful in it's own right. Incientally, this is an EXCELLENT way to cook rice. The grains came out delightfully fluffy and with an excellent chew and no chance whatsoever of burning it.

I was served brocollini at a restaurant a month ago and can't believe I overlooked a vegtable as delicious as this for so long. Just rapily fried in some garlic oil with some salt and pepper and hot sauce and it' fantastic. I've been using it in everything now.