Pat W

Ahhhh thank you for posting such delightful news! I shall definitely give it a try. pat w Thank you also, divalasvegas..... That sounds yummy. Sigh, must stop reading this forum when I'm hungry. Tummy is rumbling out of control. pat w

Thank you all for the great ideas & recipes. I mean to try them all, although the vegetables in olive bread seems a bit daunting. It looks like a lot of vegetables are going to be roasted around here. I combined a couple of your suggestions for lunch. We happened to have half a baguette & some feta cheese. I split the baguette, brushed on a little olive oil & toasted under the broiler. Then tossed the half cup or so of vegetables left over with the feta, piled them on the baguette & put them back in the oven for awhile. It was yummy but I think if we had had some pesto lying around, it would have been a spiritual experience. Sooo, I'm off to buy some pine nuts, there is a bunch a basil in the back yard calling my name. You people are so nice. Pat w.

First of all, I apologize if this has been done to death. I did a forum search but it didn't really work out We bought a share in a CSA this year & at the moment have a refrigerator full wonderful, organic vegetables. Tonight, while my husband was out fishing, I roasted several new potatoes along with some onions, red & green peppers, summer squash, celery & a handful of garlic cloves, all of which had been tossed with a little olive oil & balsamic vinegar & dusted with freshly ground pepper & sea salt. (The sea salt was Maldon thanks to advice received in an earlier thread.) The end result was scrumptious. We (the husband having returned sans fish) devoured the whole pan. It was almost as good as ravishing a box of chocolates. My question is.... having even more vegetables available, if I roast another bunch, what else can I do with them? In the late sixties there was a wonderful small restaurant here that did something similar with brown rice beneath & melted cheese above. It seems that these delectable morsels would lend themselves to some kind of pasta treatment. This is new territory for me & any suggestions would be much appreciated. pat w.

Just wanted to add an unsolicited testimonial. Those of us in Nebraska have been able to get Smart Chicken for a couple of years now. (Finally! A reason to live in Nebraska) Everyone I know says the same thing. If our local grocer is out of it, we eat something else. It's Smart Chicken or no chicken. pat w.

vitamin C powder - from your local natural foods store, or drugstore ← Duh! I didn't realize she meant that citric acid. I was expecting something complicated & mysterious that had to be shipped in from afar. Thank you for clearing that up. Slinking away in embarrassment, pat

Many thanks Wendy. I'm pumped about trying this. At the risk of wearing out my welcome.... citric acid... How do I find it? A Google search didn't help me much. All the other variables are in place. pat

This thread now has me dreaming about ricotta. Unfortunately (actually it's more tragic than unfortunate) there is no good ricotta available where I live. We used to be able to at least get Frigo, but the stores here no longer carry it. So please forgive the dumb question, but how do you make your own? pat with tummy rumbling & eyes filled with tears of longing....

My first thought would be to add sugar, which would help combat the acidity of the tomatoes which is what you're tasting. Don't overdo it though. Of course the first response is "make your own sauce" but it's not always tomato season. You can go halfway and use the whole peeled stuff (run it through a food mill or the like to get the seeds out and mash it up a bit) and make your own -- it really doesn't need to cook for all that long. ← Giada De Laurentiis (Everyday Italian on the Food Network) has a simple tomato sauce based on crushed tomatoes that I've made a few times and really liked. At the end of the cooking time if the sauce seems too acidic, she suggests adding a tablespoon or two of unsalted butter to mellow it out. It actually works. I think it might do the trick with bottled sauce as well. pat w.

Sigh.... eyes are filled with tears of longing. They are a thing of beauty indeed.

I got side tracked for a few days with a health glitch but all is well now. I just wanted to thank everyone for the encouragement and ideas. I am a convert, no cake mix shall darken my door. And to those of you who suggested lemon curd, I can only say - brilliant! I suspect we will soon be knee deep in lemon curd around here, at least until I can find the packaged egg whites. Is it true that one should avoid baking angel food cakes on rainy days or when the air is very humid?

Oops! My cream cheese frosted Wendy's banana cake just went into the refrigerator. Thank you. Pat w.

Ok, it should be easy, but I haven't found it yet. Will try tomorrow when hopefully I'm slightly more lucid (very long day, but by golly we got our taxes mailed). Edited to say: Not noticibly more lucid but managed to find the recipe this morning. Coincidently Wendy, I made your banana cake tonight & we just had our first piece. I baked it in a 9X9 spring form pan & topped it with a cream cheese frosting dusted with chopped walnuts. That was of course gilding the lily, it would have been fine with a smidgen of powdered sugar. None the less, describing it as a spiritual experience would not be overstating the point. Thanks so much for sharing your recipe. It was stellar. (Just sneaked back into the kitchen for another piece.) Pat w.

That was exactly the kind of advice I needed. Thank you for saving me from myself. Pat w.

Yes, that actually is part of the problem. The yolks would almost certainly be thrown away. Are you talking about powdered egg whites? Swirled chocolate & white sounds amazing. I think you just planned out my Sunday for me. Pat w.

If this topic has already been addressed, I apologize. I've been searching the forum without luck. I am the happy owner of a new angel food cake pan. I love angel food cake & am anxious to try it out. Not being a professional, I find the recipes somewhat daunting. So are the mixes any good? Is "from scratch" noticeably better? Should I start separating a dozen eggs or can I take the slackers way out? Eagerly awaiting your advice, Pat w.

I agree with Cala Massey. I bought my Vita Mix before mini-processors came on the scene. Now that I have one, I use my mini-processor for just about everything I used to use the VM at low speeds for. These days I mostly use the Vita Mix for things like smoothies, ice creams & soups (which it does splendidly). The variable speed is handy for making a slower transition from low to high, which keeps liquids from crashing against the lid, but hardly necessary. The lid has a nice tight fit. Enjoy your 4500. (Wow, what a fantastic gift to have received!) Pat w.

Thank you Dorie & Seth. And thank you Seth, for reposting your photos. I remembered seeing them but it was beyond me to work my way back through the thread. My goodness! You should be proud. Those are gorgeous. Thank you for the KA tutorial link. It couldn't be clearer. Sigh, yet another thing to add to my "to do" list. pat w

I'm also one of the people who after a hard day, pours a glass of wine and starts slicing & dicing. I don't know why it's so therapeutic, but it is. Oh yeah, I try to get the most serious slicing over with before the second glass of wine. Sigh, learned this the hard way. pat w

Oh dear, I finally made eye contact with this thread & the morning has flown by. I've just ordered the Cooking With Julia from Amazon and hope to be joining you soon. But first I have a dumb question. What exactly is an epi? There was a link much earlier in this thread to a King Arthur page which regrettably no longer works. I've searched through the King Arthur web site without luck. Can anyone help? Must go to work now. Will no doubt spend rest of day with tummy rumbling and sugar plums in my head. Pat w.

Would a little Meyer lemon olive oil be a good idea here or would 400° be to much for it? Pat w.

Thank you Michael. And thanks again for your original post. This has become my new favorite fast food. It works especially well with the Enchilado anejo because the warm tortilla melts only the outside of the cheese bringing out the flavor but a nice texture remains. In a word... yummy. Pat w

Aha! That clears up yet another mystery. I've tried the tasting on the tip of the tongue method with limited success. The bread & butter method never occurred to me. Thanks very much for the suggestion. It wil be fun to try this. Pat W.

Thanks everyone for the answers. This brings me to another question. Why do you many or most of you cook with kosher salt? Why is it better? And another, perhaps even more naïve question, are there any circumstances in which the old Morton's Iodized would be appropriate? (Other than salting the sidewalk after an ice storm) Pat W. Oops! I just found the kosher salt thread on another forum. Does anyone here have a favorite brand? It seems like there is quite a bit of difference between Morton & Diamond.

This is an absurdly stupidly simple sea salt question. I accidentally bought a container of coarse La Baleine sea salt. I'm not sure what to do with it. Do I go out and buy a salt grinder & use it for table salt? Do I use it as Kosher salt? Can I toss it in a pot of water when I cook pasta? Any guidance would be much appreciated. Pat W.

I just happened to have all these ingredients on hand tonight.... OK, I didn't have the radishes... I never have radishes on hand.... So... after picking up the radishes I followed TongoRad's directions. The only thing I did differently was spoon a little of the red chile sauce on the plate under the enchiladas. I've never made enchiladas this way before & I have no idea if I did it correctly, but they were delicious. The hot tortilla wrapped around the crumbled enchilado cheese & chopped onions.... ¡Que delicioso! Half way through the munching part of this I went back for more red chile sauce and more radishes. I completely forgot to slice the lime. Thank you TongoRad for a very tasty dinner. Pat