quiet1

As I mentioned in the books thread, I'm getting a friend some home bar start up supplies for a gift, and someone is going in with me now so I can get a little more stuff. However I don't want to get him junk he doesn't need, and I don't want to overlook anything that would be useful that isn't normally on the 'how to set up your home cocktail cart' kind of lists. (Which I have read. A lot.) So is there anything you find yourself using a lot that may not be what someone would consider standard for a home bar? (I'm thinking along the lines of using a garlic press for something clever other than garlic, not fancy expensive stuff like a home centrifuge. ) My basic plan is a couple books, basic tools (mixing container, bar spoon, some kind of shaker although I haven't decided which yet, etc.) and then with whatever is leftover in the budget buy minis at the state store so he can experiment a little with stuff. I know minis aren't often the best of the best, but they're also usually not all awful and I think he'd get more out of trying the same drink with 2-3 brands of whiskey to see how it changes things than he would appreciate a single bottle of something nice, at this point. (I'm in PA so a lot of the interesting looking stuff is hard to get anyway. Though my state store does have a little 'travel' set of The Bitter Truth bitters that I was planning to get.) Is there anything homemade that would be a good addition? Is it worth trying something like one of the homemade bitters recipes kicking around to add something particularly interesting to the gift? Now that I am planning it from more than just me, I feel more pressure to make sure it is good because I am spending other people's money too.

I swear by bacon for getting seasoning started, too. I don't really rub it with bacon fat, though, so much as I use the pan exclusively to cook bacon and look for excuses to use bacon (breakfast, blts, carbonara sauce, etc.) often. Which is obviously a real hardship. When I'm done cooking the bacon I wipe the pan out and make sure there is no stuck food, then coat with a thin thin layer of vegetable oil. So it's sort of a bacon fat-vegetable oil combo treatment?

I've skimmed this thread (there is a lot of it) and it seems like a lot of books have been coming out so I figured I'd be best just asking - what is a good recipe book for a geek type new to cocktails? My friend is a bit of a foodie and now getting into cocktails also and I want to get him some supplies as a Christmas gift. I have Morganthaler's book on my list to look at in a store because it seems his style of geekery in the subject, but I thought some kind of reasonable reference recipe book would be helpful to have too. (I swear I had one bookmarked that I'd seen recommended, but now I can't find it.) Bonus points if the book has enough recipes for syrups and things that can be used to experiment with making my friend's son (11 and also a bit of a foodie) fun non-alcoholic drinks too. (I thought about the Canon book but that seems far too involved and I'd really just be giving it to him so I could borrow it. )

I am quite intrigued by the salad rolls. What kind of wrapper is that? And any tips or suggestions on what does and doesn't work as a filling? Unrelated, as far as bread with pasta (from an earlier conversation) I often want a relatively plain bread if the pasta sauce is exceptionally good, to get every last drop. Herb butter sauces are particularly likely to get this treatment if they are well made, but any sauce is fair game if I think it will be tasty on bread. Also sometimes I just want the bread to taste someone else's sauce (if we are out at a restaurant) as a small piece of bread can be passed over for dipping and then passed back without a big fuss. At home I rarely serve bread with a meal if it isn't something that explicitly expects it (like naan or similar with Indian.)

They now say they can't do delivery to PA.

In The Cake Bible there are a couple different methods - the one I've used has a bit of corn starch involved (if I remember right you cook it a little with a small amount of cream, then cool and add that paste to the rest of the normal ingredients) but there was also one with gelatin primarily for piping decorations that don't wilt quickly. One of those might do the job - I'd start with the corn starch version though.

My understanding is that part of the point of regular cleaning with a sanitizing solution isn't so much to remove the chance of one or two stray germs as it is to prevent the germs from setting up shop and reproducing to problem levels. However the easily wiped surfaces are usually less risk for that anyway than all the nooks and crannies where things meet, so if you're really trying to be careful you need to pay attention to detail - get into any seams that might be present and so on. I do like the idea of alcohol wipes - though I think what I will do is get one of those bottles like they use in nail salons where you push down and a small amount is dispensed up? Fill it with cheap vodka and then I can have a wipe as big or as small as I want depending how much paper towel I use with it. Plus the wipes are wasteful and all the little packets drive me nuts. (We have a bunch of them around anyway because someone in the house needs an injected medication, and the things somehow end up EVERYWHERE no matter how careful you are to throw them away. Usually parts of the packaging, like the little bit you rip to open it if it's ripped off? Argh.) Anyway, it is probably overkill for most folks, but we have two people with compromised immune systems and it isn't worth the risk of getting sick.

Some kind of mushroom?

I am reminded of a place I went with my dad and some friends in England, which clearly catered somewhat to the post-pub crowd and had a variety of sauces ranging from 'mild' to ones labeled 'blow your head off' which everyone was daring the others to try but no one was brave enough except my dad, who along with my mom is something of a chili-head. He put some of the 'blow your head off' on his food and tasted it. Then added more. Ate while everyone stared. Then he lined up all the sauces and tried a bit of each one - turned out the hottest sauce was actually labeled 'medium' and the ones above that in labeling were spicy, but less so. The 'blow your head off' was actually pretty mild as hot sauces go. We confirmed they were labeled the right way, yup. i can only conclude this was a ruse adopted to deal with drunk idiots ribbing each other to consume ridiculous amounts of hot sauce, so as to avoid unpleasantness like people getting sick or causing trouble because their food was too hot. Seemed pretty clever to me. (The 'blow your head off' was a bit more spicy than I like, because I am a wimp, but it did have a nice flavor. Better than the 'medium' which was just kind of blandly hot.)

I was quite intrigued by the freedom models until I saw the limit on number of pans. I understand why it can't be a huge number, but for the size of surface I always feel like I want at least 6 pans as a possibility. When I cook I often do more than one meal at a time, or components of another meal while working in the first, so I often run out of pan space on a standard 4 burner gas. Even if I was limited in how much power and a few had to be basically warming only, that would make a difference for me. Oh well. Maybe there will be something appealing when we are ready to redo the kitchen.

I was thinking along those lines. I don't tend to like a thick layer of breadiness in a rolled meat so I was pondering breaking the stuffing down a bit - maybe a vegetable and herb very finely diced sauté and then a sprinkling of breadcrumbs, more to suggest the flavors than to actually replace a serving of stuffing on the plate. (We always do ours outside of the turkey anyway.) I'm wondering about including some cranberries also in the roll, for the color as much as the flavor? But they'd need some sweetening. Maybe gently heat in some simple syrup with a bit of orange peel, then strain so the berries don't burst into mush? I may have to experiment. The other route I was pondering would be a riff on more of a traditional British Christmas dinner, with sausage meat and bacon rolled with the turkey. But that may have to wait for Christmas since I suspect everyone in the family spent enough time visiting me in England to spot it as a British Christmas thing, not Thanksgiving. Thoigh my mom is now talking about going out on Thanksgiving if it isn't going to end up being a large group at home - sometimes it isn't worth the stress for her of a big meal even if someone else is doing the cooking. (My mother has never been one of those people who enjoys all the cooking and prep leading up to an event, so just the prospect tends to stress her out. She enjoys entertaining, and she enjoys cooking, just not together so much. If she could afford it she would just have all of her social gatherings professionally catered and order enough for an army.) (I have no idea where I got it from - I like preparing challenging meals. I make charts and lists and timelines, it is all very organized to start with. A couple of years ago I last minute decided to make beef Wellington for Christmas dinner. First time cooking it, turned out fine, no worries. My mom nearly had a heart attack. )

Interesting idea, but I definitely have to stick to traditional flavors. Taking the turkey apart definitely seems like the way to go. I'm intrigued by the idea of rolling it with something but I'm not sure what would work but still have the right traditional flavors. Hm. (My mom is picky enough that she will complain if there is too much carrot in the stuffing, so spinach and mushrooms in the turkey would be right out if I was trying to pass it off as Thanksgiving dinner. )

What does celery grown next to Chernobyl look like?

Cleaning out the fridge day, leek sautéed in butter with salt, pepper, and a tiny dash of soy sauce, leftover chicken tenders sliced and tossed in with the leeks to warm, some rice nabbed from the batch of rice I made in the rice cooker to use for the dog's food. Not the most visually appealing but surprisingly tasty. I was expecting it to be "well, I can choke this down" and it was actually "would make again if I have leftovers to use up." Far better than trying to reheat chicken tenders as chicken tenders, since I have never figured out how to reheat them so they crisp up without horrifically over cooking chicken, which is often overlooked to start with if they are purchased tenders from a restaurant or fast food. Maybe next time I'll try a sort of chicken tender fried rice... Not pictured is the dog's food, which got more time and attention and was ground turkey browned and mixed with a couple cubes of homemade chicken stock, salt, pepper, a dash of soy sauce and a tiny sprinkle of onion powder for flavor, then combined with equal amounts of rice. (She won't eat it if it isn't nicely seasoned, this is what happens when you raise a dog getting bits of tasty people food all the time. She expects FLAVOR.) Foxy is going to be 14 on Halloween and has cancer, so if homemade food keeps her stomach happy with the chemo, she gets homemade food. (She's doing quite well, I should add. The only issue is the chemo upsets her stomach much as it does with people. Otherwise she bops around like any other older dog, not as bouncy as a puppy but quite happy with life.)

Oh, I like the idea of braising the legs - did you do it with the standard turkey aromatics? What did you use for braising liquid? This sounds like it has distinct potential for my low-sodium-but-tasty requirements.

I love this approach.

I have to come up with something other than my normal method of roasting a turkey because my mom is on a low sodium diet and typically I'd brine. Someone in another thread mentioned SV working well for turkey so I'm considering that, but that misses the dramatic presentation of a whole bird so I have to think of something else with the wow factor.

Will they keep long enough, though? They've never lasted much past a week before being entirely eaten and that's only when I had some hidden away. (I did have a batch last for months but that was the batch I made with fruit sugar for someone diabetic on request, and I intentionally only baked a few and froze the rest as pre-sliced rounds in a tin so he wouldn't be tempted to eat too many at once. With them frozen he could just cook a couple for dessert while he was making his dinner and not be tempted to over eat. Very successful.) Yup, I was already thinking of how to package. I believe we have a package of small silica gel packets from a previous project that will work, if not I know you can get them online and they will get used. (Biggest problem is making sure my housemate doesn't steal them all for packaging electronics before I'm done with them.) Good reminder, though. I also need to find a new source for boxes. My go-to local baking supply shop closed.

These will go along with some tea or coffee so I'm figuring that will make up for needing some more robust cookies so they have the necessary shelf life? I was thinking to do fewer anise though because it is not something everyone loves. I'd forgotten about Beranbaum even though I love the Cake Bible. It slipped my mind that she has a cookie book.

I see what you mean. Do I absolutely need a mold or will they look nice enough if I wing it? (I'm thinking maybe lightly press a cookie cutter on to make a design or something along those lines.) Will it stick horribly to the bottom of a glass that has a nice pattern? Also, favorite recipe or recipe source?

For a gift I want to do cookies, but for various reasons they need to be able to hang around for a month or more without getting gross or unsafe to eat. All the recipes I'm finding are saying max 2-3 weeks. This is just a home baking project so I don't have any unusual ingredients or test equipment handy, though I suppose I could buy something as long as it isn't too expensive. My first thought was something quite simple like a shortbread or maybe a gingerbread/spice cookie?

Old but just came across this - if you are selling decently expensive tea, I want to be able to buy nicely packaged samples. I do not want to have to spend $$$ on a new to me tea only to find out it isn't to my taste at all and then I have the hassle of returning it or getting a refund, or I'm stuck with tea I don't like. I'd far rather pay a small premium for the extra work of packaging nice easy to use samples so I can try a tea for a few cups and decide if I like it or not. And packaging the samples well helps too - not only are they less annoying to use, but honestly if they are attractive enough I will buy samples to give as gifts to other people I know who enjoy tea, and as add-ons to other gifts (if I give someone a mug, perhaps) which not only gets you money from me, but potentially nets you a new customer if they like the tea and want more.

Okay, this I must investigate. I always brine my turkey for roasting but my mom is low sodium so she can't have brined turkey this year, so I was wondering what to do so we have turkey but not all dried out and gross. SV may be the way forward, although presentation would have to be different. Hm. I love this site.

Except in PA.

My mom did it years ago for a quarter of a cow, and then realized we really wouldn't use it all. My housemate also bought some portion of a cow when he lived in the Bay Area a few years back - it is definitely not a new thing. I don't recall what my mom got, but my housemate got a LOT of ground beef. He is a recovering vegetarian and so would send me photos of various vacuum packed frozen beef parts to ask how to cook it. Lots and lots and lots of ground beef.