constanela

I made a batch of flourless chocolate cookies for my sweetie today. Because I was working without flour, I splurged on the cocoa and bought Droste. After I mixed up the batter, I tasted it and frowned. It tasted charred or burned to me. A sniff of my box of cocoa confirmed that the it does smell charred....almost like charcoal. I gave her a taste and she said the batter was delicious and that it tasted like cocoa is supposed to taste. (She is not originally from the USA and is used to chocolate brands other than Hershey). I grew up on Hershey's and this is my first time using anything but. Does higher quality cocoa have a burned taste to anybody else or is it just me? By the way, the baked cookies taste good, but do have just a hint of that charred flavor. It is not nearly as intense as the raw batter.

Thanks everyone for your help. I'd post a picture if I weren't so technologically inept.

Chard Girl, could you let me know what Broccoli di Cicco tastes like? Is it bitter like broccoli rabe or more along the lines of regular broccoli? Is it the same thing as "broccolini?" Thanks!

Some of your gorgeous escarole would be great in your soup! This is a great local blog (for me). It's so interesting to see how the people who sell us our vegetables eat. I'll look for your stand at the market this Saturday.

Richard Fagurland (AKA the Bugman) publishes a regular syndicated column and has addressed this problem. He leans toward toxic-free remedies. Here's a link to what I found on his website. http://www.fagerlund.addr.com/stored_product_pests.htm Good luck!

Wow. Thanks everyone. This has been incredibly helpful. Since I am now sufficiently refreshed from the shopping mobs of yesterday, I'll head on back today and invest in a 6 3/4 oval. Er........what color? Just kidding!

Here it is the day after Thanksgiving, I'm close to the Gilroy outlets thanks to a weekend spent with family and I've decided today is the day to finally invest in a Le Creuset oven for brasing. I headed over to the Le Creuset outlet and quickly became confused over all the various sizes, shapes and styles. Things that sounded huge (like the 6 quart ovens) look tiny in the store, but the 9 quart ovens seem like they might be too big. What's the best size for a family of 2 adults that like to have leftovers for lunch? Anybody have some advice?

Abra, I wanted to thank you for a FANTASTIC blog and to let you know that my elderly Sheltie has been delicately crossing his paws his entire life.

Potatoes boiled with skins on and then peeled before mashing have more flavor than those that are peeled first. I didn't believe it until I tried it, but it's true. I don't think it takes more time at all! Maybe less, because as mentioned above, they just slip off.....much easier than peeling! And I too think that you got a bad batch. My yukon golds from the farm box have never had spots.

That just screams against everything $40 a day stands for!

I was looking at a batch of defrosted chicken thighs this weekend and wondering how to cook them for dinner. Chicken..........again. As I reached for one of my cookbooks, I saw Molly's book on the shelf. I haven't touched it since spring. I opened the pages and found that I had nearly all the ingredients for Chicken Do-Piaza. I substituted cumin for the coriander seeds and tumeric because that was all I had on hand. To compensate for my lack of coriander seeds, I added a big handful of chopped cilantro at the end along with the yogurt. It was outstanding. I will make this dish again and again. I took pictures and tried to post them here, but it seems to be technologically beyond me (any hints are appreciated). I did blog about it though, if you'd like to check it out. Every recipe in this book has been good, but this one was great. The sauce/braising liquid becomes something more.....much more....than the sum of it's parts.

Guinea pig, or cuy, is a traditional Peruvian dish. It is not a myth at all. I've seen it at very fancy restaurants as well as less expensive holes in the wall. I was in Cusco in April and tried it at a very upper class restaurant. I didn't particularly care for it....I think it's an acquired taste. But I wanted to try it.....my philosophy about food is that if lots of people like it, there must be something good about it. (That's how I discovered sushi ) If you're interested, I blogged about it in my first blog entry.....here's the link http://www.mylastsupper.typepad.com You'll also find there a picture I took of a guinea pig "corral" where many cuys we being raised and fattened for future consumption.

After reading this, I think that Ton Kiang actually does make their dim sum from scratch. If you are there on a busy Saturday or Sunday and order something that's not coming around on the carts, it generally takes 20 or 30 minutes for your order to appear. I would urge you to give Ton Kiang a try. They are my favorite dim sum place, hands down. The menu you see online is just what's available at anytime of day. In the morning and on weekends, most of the items circulating on the carts are not off that menu. As for Thai, one of my favorites that I don't see listed here much is Neecha Thai on Sutter and Steiner.

Wow! That sounds and looks fantastic! I think I will try it this weekend for a change of pace from regular scrambled eggs. Great blog, Percyn (I have also been referring to you in my head as "person")

Northern California checking in again: The first of the tomatoes (said by the farmer to be substandard but WAY better than anything from a supermarket at ANY time of the year Strawberries Green Beans Peaches Summer squash Sweet Corn - another first Basil Garlic Yellow Watermelon -another first showing for melons. Whee!!!! Summer is here

Wow. I just got this book a few days ago and have done just 2 recipes, but both have turned out great. Last night I did the spring vegetable braise. I had fava beans, peas, spring onions and carrots thanks to my farm box. I substituted the first of the zucchini crop for the artichokes. I didn't have creme fraiche, so I substituted a quarter cup of full fat Greek yogurt. I think this is my new favorite way to cook fava beans now. I ended up putting too much stock in the pan and I was afraid that if I let it boil down, my vegetables would overcook, so I did not end up with the "tawny glaze" mentioned in the book. Any ideas how to over come this? I added more because when I added the second batch of vegetables, there was almost no liquid.

Status post dinner report: Despite my modifications, the ribs turned out great. They were very tender. Yes, Snowangel, I do believe that papaya has that tenderizing enzyme which was one of the reasons I chose it. However, I wasn't a big fan of eating the actual chunks that had cooking away for hours. I might puree the sauce (I've got tons because of my liquid additions) with my blender tomorrow. The pineapple was another story. It was delicious and the whole thing reminded me of a dish I loved in Peru....pineapple chicken....that I never thought I'd be able to reproduce here. Next time I try this, it's going to be with all pineapple and chicken for meat.

Thanks for the tip. It's not simmering. Does this mean the heat is too low?

I'm a little late to the game. I found some nice looking country ribs and turned to the internet for ways to cook them. After finding references to Molly Steven's mango/lime/etc.....country ribs right here on egullet, I headed to the bookstore for a copy and the lovely clerk behind the desk told me that the deli next door had 2 copies in stock... and they were on sale! I headed next door and got it for 45% off. Next stop was the grocery store, another market and then yet another grocery store. The reason? Not a mango to be had. I grabbed a nice looking Mexican papaya and some pineapple, figuring the tropicality and texture might yield similar results. Once home, I realized I had to make further modifications. I don't have a large enough skillet to cook these ribs on the stove top. So I browned them off and made the sauce, adding chicken stock, the entire can of coconut milk and more lime juice to almost cover the ribs once they were in my dutch oven. They are now in the oven at 300 degrees, cooking away. I plan on checking on them every 30 minutes to rotate them a little and check their doneness. This is my first time braising......I'll let everyone know how my modifications turned out. For now, I'll wait until they're done, fingers stinging with serrano chile residue (should have grabbed some gloves from work).

My partner teaches in an elementary school. On staff is one particularly dreaded teacher, sort of a neo-hippie, who is vegetarian and refuses to use deodorant. A few months ago, the school secretary decided to clean out the fridge and found some curious bundles wrapped in foil. She opened one and was shocked to find a dead rat. Turns out the rats belonged to the teacher no one liked. She was using them to feed a snake she had in her room as a science project. When she and the other teachers confronted this woman, she got very defensive and told them that when they brought their lunches of hamburger and chicken and put it in the fridge, she found it to be just as offensive and disgusting as they were finding her rats! Long story short......after much heated debate, rodents were banned from the food refrigerator.

The last time I was in Scotland I stayed at a Bed & Breakfast in Inverness. They had a carafe of home-made elderberry wine available in the living room at all times. It was YUMMY! Have you ever made wine from your elderberries?

It occurs to me that many people are relating stories of things they had as children, hated and then tried again as an adult only to discover they liked them. I myself have many taste memories of things that tasted absolutely horrible as a child. For me, these tastes included apricots, fresh tomatoes, beans, peas and many other things that I absolutely love as an adult. I have often wondered if our taste buds are more senstive when we are children and we are able to taste things then that our adult taste buds can't detect. I remember some absolutely horrible flavors in these foods that I don't find now. Anybody have thoughts on this theory? By the way, the two things that I still hate today are lima beans and peanuts. I still remember my mother refusing to allow me to leave the table until I swallowed those lima beans I had been avoiding in my Alphabet Soup.

Ditto on Kabuto.

Thanks everyone! I have lots of ideas. I'll pick one and try then report back this weekend.

A16 (a Naples-style restaurant here in SF...they posted their recipe in the local newspaper) Meatballs baked and served in a tomato-based brasing liquid, cous-cous, steamed asparagus and a green salad.