deltadoc

Being the "bad seed" too, I tried making Julia Child's chicken pate with the drawstring cognac'd chicken skin, and the tarragon, heavy cream chicken pate with the whole peeled pistachios marinated in cognac with shallots, cubed ham, more tarrgon, etc folded in. When "diapered" with cheese cloth and tied with strings, after roasting and removing the cheesecloth, you have what looks like a Melon. Took 4 1/2 hours to make. mom ate one teensy weensy bite, and I asked her what she thought. She said she'd never had anything like it before to compare. Wouldn't eat anymore of it, and went and buttered some toast, opened a can of MuscleMan's apple sauce, and that was our Mother's day dinner. If were me, I'd research some endangered species, like they did in the movie that starred Marlon Brando which was a spoof on the Godfather, where they made people pay exorbitant prices to eat the last remaining "whatever" and served 'em chicken instead. That's what I'd do. Say it's one of the last two remaining Galapagos Lizardo Corleone's, and serve her chicken. doc

Last summer, a co-worker gave me some really fresh garlic from their garden. It was almost translucent, and was the best garlic I ever had. I use it in Caesar Salad dressing, or rub it on French baquettes sliced crosswise or lengthwise, add butter, and then heat under a broiler. I also make a wonderful Triple garlic pate. I mix squished fresh garlic with squished fried garlic and mix in with cream cheese. Then I top each baquette that I spread this on with some wine-braised fresh garlic. Yum! doc

We do Brussels sprouts alot. We cross a deep "X" in the stem end. We use a pot and steamer basket. But 15 minutes seems like an awful long time. We usually steam them about 9 minutes testing with a fork so they're pierceable but not mushy. We drain the pot dump the brussels sprouts back in with some butter, S&P, grated nutmeg, a little parmesan cheese and some fresh lemon juice. We never get tired of them. ALTERNATIVES: Steam some snap bean (Green beans) for about 10 minutes, and shock them in cold water. Slice some fresh mushrooms, and saute in butter. Add some fresh lemon juice and lemon zest, S&P and then dump the drained shocked green beans back in until just heated up. Yum! Also steam carrots and fresh peas. We cut the carrots to be just about the size of the peas. An old favorite Peas & Carrots, but still as good as ever. doc (Gotta go to a meeting!)

1. Rhubarb Pie - great great grandmother's recipe uses rhubarb, lemon juice, and lemon rind. Surprises a lot of people but the tang of the lemon offsets the tang of the rhubarb 2. Anything Escoffier 3. French Onion Soup - Got it from an old newspaper column that people used to send in their "rich" recipes and ask to have them lightened up. I always went for the rich ones, and this one was really a winner. 4. Whole wheat bread made from wheat berries in my 42 year-old metal Vita-Mix. Their recipe, and I don't deviate one iota. Its a wonderful throwback to the days of yesteryear. That's about it. Everything else is up for grabs, although I do can catsup made ala Joy of Cooking (~1960's version). doc

I plan on taking a personal holiday on Good Friday, because they don't give us religious holidays anymore (even Xmas is Holiday Season). I plan on "drinking Christ's blood" straight through till Easter and see if I can actually arise out of my hangover on Sunday! :0) doc

What you all are experiencing applies to almost anything. I can play a certain piano, but not all of them work the same. My dad the carpenter always said "The right tools for the right job". I tried cooking at a friends house with an electric stove, and the results were mediocre at best. The same meal for the same people at my house was the raving suggestion by them to make the meal for them when we were at their house visiting. I can play my guitar, but it takes time to adjust to someone else's. A new cooking utensil, even in my own home, takes a bit of time to get to "know". And then there are the environmental considerations. General outdoor humidity. Bread just doesn't rise when it rains. Bread made in a house with a humidifier just isn't the same as bread made in my non-humidified house. Flour, as an ingredient, just isn't the same from one batch to another. I could go on and on, but since its almost Easter, I wouldn't want anyone to confuse me with a bunny! doc

We just made a huge batch of skinless boneless chicken breasts. They were big teardrop shape, so I butterflied them in half. Dragged them through some flour with S&P and parmesan cheese all mixed up in it. Then dragged them through a egg wash, then dipped into Italian fine bread crumbs. Fried them golden brown and stacked them on a cookie sheet (there were probably 24 breasts all together). Then I cleaned the hot frying pan under cold water, added more EVOO and butter, then some chopped onion, and then a bunch of chopped portabellas. Deglazed with Dry Sack white wine, added some flour to make a roux. Added some turkey stock, and 2 cups of heavy cream. S&P to taste, juice of one lemon, and a bunch of chopped chives. Topped it off with some Hennesey Cognac. In the rice cooker, white basmati rice with sliced carrots, leeks, and celery. Makes lots of lunches for next week as well as a fine dinner tonight! doc

You wouldn't happen to know one that could reproduce Jean-Claude Tindillier's Artichoke Bottom Medallion with Crab Meat Sauce? Jean-Claude retired to France before he ever could teach me. Used to be served at Chouette Restaurant in Wayzata MN. I will invite you to dinner if you can come up with that reproduction for me!! Seriously! doc

Immersion blender is the key. Never made good mayonnaise in a blender or by hand in a bowl or a food processor. I like using EVOO, even though some say its too heavy in taste, and a mixture of vinegar and fresh lemon juice, along with the yolks and dijon, and S&P. doc

Im a big fan (literally and figureatively) of making duplicates of my favorite restaurant offerings. After eating Maid-Rites for 52+ years, just recently, I discovered how to make them and they actually do taste like the best ones I ever ate. And I've tried dozens of the recipes you find on the net over the years, and none ever came close! Took me 8 years to finally figure out how to make "China Taste"s Kung Pao Beef. They retired in about 1996, and the meal, while popularly named on many Chinese menus, never came close to tasting like China Taste's did. Now I've got that one down! I had a craving for Red Robin's A-1 Peppercorn Burger. Now I already have a special blend of meat that I grind for hamburgers, but it wasn't hard to figure out the sauce to duplicate their's. The friendly waitress brought a list of ingredients to my table (for which I left an outstanding tip). Took a couple of tries to figure out if the measurements were oz's in weight or volume, but the secret is Meyer's Green Peppercorn Concentrate available from Amazon. And most things "Escoffier" aren't too hard if you take the time to make the Mother sauces and can them for ready use (and have his cookbook handy too!) doc

I absolutely positively agree with you! Ever since I inherited some 100 year-old thick castiron skillets, heating them dry on a gas stove top, dropping the lightly olive-oiled steak, wait 3 minutes, shake the pan to see if the steak breaks free on its own, then flipping it over for 3 more minutes and then pan and steak both into a pre-heated 425-450 oven to finish it off, has consistently given me the best tasting best cooked steaks regardless of type of steak! doc

While I use the rectangular pizza stone now in a pre-heated 550 F oven for pizza, back in college i had this heavy duty electric frying pan with metal cover. Grease up the pan a bit, plop in your dough, sauce, etc. put the cover on, set at 375, and out came a perfect pizza with uniformly brown crispy crust and I was the hit of the dorm floor! doc

Minor's Green Peppercorn Concentrate. doc

So, what's your recipe for hummous? Is it hummous or hummous bi tahini?And what is Tarator? doc ← I don't roast lamb heads, but I think I might be able to answer this correctly:1) Look at photographs. ChefCrash was most likely referring to chickpeas since the larger amount of round, dried peas are mixed in with the dried fava beans. 2) Use google and you're bound to find recipes. It's a thinned tahini sauce, delicious, made by vigorously beating a combination of cold water and lemon juice with the tahini paste and adding salt and garlic to taste. ← I just love it when someone other than the person to whom I was addressing the question answers (or rather speculates) for the original poster what the original poster meant. If indeed the orignal poster was referring to garbanzo beans as hummous, that would be the first time I'd ever heard that reference made. But it was a legitimate question what ChefCrash meant by hummous, because it is an endless argument whether "hummous" and "hummous bi tahini", which are erroneously used interchangeably, consisted of. As far as "googling" hummous recipes, they're as assorted as almost any recipe you'd care to google. I learned how to make hummous bi tahini from a Palestinian master chef 20 years ago. But would that hummous bi tahini be as ideal for ChefCrash's falafel recipe? Don't know, so that is why I questioned ChefCrash. I was interested in ChefCrash's recipe, since the hummous he uses results in the falafel in the pictures. His pictorial and written descriptions of the falafel made me want to try "his" process. But thanks to the other poster who told us what Tarator sauce is. That is the first time I'd heard that name, and also, it is the first time I've heard that "garlic sauce" is synonymous with Tahini sauce. doc

[quoteDoes anyone know how tomato paste is made? Is it cooked down, or is it a product of a vacuum evaporation process like concentrated orange juice? ←

I've tried several times to make good falafel. Even bought a falafel ejector tool from the Holyland Deli. Tried making them from the following: 1. Canned Garbanzos - fell apart in deep fryer 2. Canned Garbanzos and Canned Fava beans - fell apart in the deep fryer 3. Middle Eastern mixes (2 different ones) - dry, didn' t fall apart but didn't taste very good either 4. Dried ones that I ground in a Vita-mix, then soaked. They were passing fair. 5. Dried whole ones that I soaked - didn't soak them long enough! One would have thought 12 hours would have been long enough! 6. Dried whole ones with boiling water poured over them, soaked overnight. Added a little baking soda like my Lebanese cook friend suggested. Had lots of garbanzo skins rise to the top. Just haven't ever been able to get the kind of taste from those served at the Holyland in Minneapolis. Crunchy on the outside, greenish in the middle, moist but not soggy. Taste outstanding! doc

Back in the late 60's at college, I found that one could make a fairly decent pie using an oldtime electric skillet with cover. Crust was nice and brown on the bottom, the toppings were cooked properly, and the sauce didn't dry out. I don't even know if they make electric temperature controlled skillets anymore! doc

google "encyclopizza" and that is an interesting commercial pizzaria information website. Very involved, and detailed. 8 sauce recipes depending on the type of pizza. Several dough recipes as I recall. Very interesting dissertation on the benefits of canned tomato products over fresh. doc

Doctortim, Chicago style deep dish (the only pizza worth gracing your palate ) is prepared thusly. Hand form you dough in a deep-dish pan. Brush with olive oil. Layer the mozzarella cheese on the dough, then add other fillings in layers. Sausage, mushrooms, etc. Next, smooth the sauce on top and bake. You do not need a 500 deg. oven. 350-375 will do. You are baking too hot. Its a no-no to put the sauce on the bottom as everything else will slide on it and the sauce will not cook evenly, which seems to be the problem you are having. ← Oldtimer, lest there is confusion here, doctortim and doc (aka deltadoc) are not one and the same. With that said, I would never ever cook a pizza at 350-375. Jean-Claude Tindillier, arguably one of the greatest living French chefs in the world, told me once 20+ years ago, that pizza can only be done right in an oven at least 550F. What he told me and what my taste buds confirm is that he was right. I am limited only by my oven or I'd experiment with the temp ranges that professional pizzarias have available. Oh, to have a wood fired stone brick oven to work with! deltadoc

I make pizza a lot, using a 1/2" rectangular pizza stone, preheated for at least 30 minutes in a 550F oven, middle rack. The dough is made thusly and split into thirds using an electronic balance: 12 oz water 1lb 4 oz bread flour 2 TBSP EVOO 2 tsp Sea Salt 1 TBSP Honey 1 capful of yeast from the little brown yeast bottle ~ 2 TBSP I use a bread machine to make the dough, and it preheats the water before it starts to mix and knead. When it starts up, I check the dough and add more water or more flour to get what, from experience, I see is needed to get the right consistency of dough that will rise nicely in the machine. When the machine is done, I flour my Corian countertop, and after dividing the dough into three equal ~ 12 oz balls, I roll them out with a rolling pin to just about the same size as the pizza stone. I usually add light sprinklings of more flour to make sure the dough doesn't stick to the rolling pin or my hands or the countertop. At that point, I sprinkle corn meal on my wooden pizza peel and put the dough on. I then use a boar bristle paint brush to brush on EVOO the dough. I continually pick up the peel and make sure the dough easily moves without sticking. The brushing of EVOO makes the dough water proof from the sauce that goes on next. Then my meat and veggies, basil leaves, some fennel seed and/or anise seed, parmesan and then food processor processed chunk of mozzarella. Each time I add something I make sure it still moves freely on the peel. Stick it onto the stone, wait about 9 minutes and the pizza is perfect. Cooked all the way through, nice browned bottom, no doughy spots in the middle of the crust, cheese just starting to get carmelized a bit. The other two dough balls get the same treatment, only I put them on round metal pizza pans, and stick them in the freezer with all the same ingredients as the one I am baking. Some time later, I take one of them out of the freezer and easily extract the frozen pizza from off the pan, let it sit on a corn meal dusted peel while the oven is preheating the stone and itself, and by the time the oven is ready the pizza has thawed, and moves freely on the peel, and I repeat the baking process. doc

Whoops. I listed a bunch of commercial foods. So I edited them out. doc

Make some Maid-Rites. The following is my recipe from eating them for 52 years and just recently hit upon the exact right combination: 3 lbs 95% Ground Beef 1 C diced yellow onion 3 TBSP L&P Worcestershire Sauce 3 TBSP Kikkoman Reg. Soy Sauce 2 TBSP Dark Brown Sugar 1/4 C Apple Cidar Vinegar 1 C Swanson Chicken Broth 6 oz. Coca-Cola (Regular) 1 tsp Paprika California Sweet (from Penzey's Spices) 1/2 tsp Salt 1/4 tsp Black Pepper Put in crock pot on low overnight with vent open. Next day, use a slotted spoon to put on hamburger bun, serve with dill pickle slices, diced onion, yellow mustard, ketchup optional. The meat will be tender and moist, and it is ok to dump it all into a sieve and discard any remaining liquid. The idea during cooking is to keep the meat moist and slow cook it (if you don't have a crock pot). doc

Deglaze your frying pan with dry white wine, add some butter and chopped shallots. When they're soft, add about 1 C demi-glace. Crumble about 2 TBSP of Maytag Iowa Blue Cheese into the demi-glace pan sauce, S&P to taste. When fully incorporated, serve on steaks. This goes especially well with garlic Rosemary mashed potatoes to sop up the extra sauce. doc

One important thing to look for on the label of any Olive Oil is "Cold Pressed". If that is missing on the label then you can be pretty sure that it used solvents to extract the last of the remaining oil from the mash. And I'm pretty sure that Olive Oil labeled as "Light" doesn't have "Cold Pressed" on the label. I buy my Olive Oil at Sam's Club in 1/2 gallon plastic containers. The prices have ranged from $6 - $13 over the years. Wife has standing orders that when it's at $6, buy a LOT. We have probably 40 bottles of it in the garage right now, most of it bought between $6-8. The brands change from time to time, Berio's, Bertolli's. In fact, I just went over and read carefully the whole label on my Bertolli's, and I started to panic, but finally saw in the fine print, "First Cold Pressing", and we never get anything but the Extra Virgin. doc