cakewalk

I don't know that there really has to be a reason, but I'm finding this thread to be more interesting than I thought possible.

They're crunchy and crisp, which is what I like. That's why they're best the same day, they lose some of the crispness as they sit with the fillings in them, but they're still good the second day. They are not hard, just nice and crisp.

That's a great thread, very helpful. Thank you.

You've made these! Tell us all about it. Did you add the optional sweet wine? It seems that it's meant to balance the tamarind, but if fresh is less pungent than ready-made, I'm wondering how much might be needed. I will have to play around with amounts, but tips about what you did would be appreciated!

Very interesting about the tamarind paste. She does have a recipe for it in Aromas of Aleppo, but since I know nothing about it I thought it would be safer to just buy some ready-made. But from what you're both saying, maybe not. Of course I'm not even sure what tamarind is, but I suppose that's easily resolved. Thanks for the ideas.

Hamantaschen season is starting. Just a head's up. My go-to recipe for the dough (I've never made her fillings): http://www.ruths-kitchen.com/recipes/desserts/hamantaschen.html For me it's all about the dough. I fill with good jam or with Nutella. If the cookie part isn't good, I don't care how good the filling is, I just lose interest. I used this dough recipe for the first time several years ago, and everyone commented on it. They're best on the day they're baked, but still good the next day. In truth, they've always been good, but never quite as good as they were that first time. Just one of those indefinable mysteries of baking. Maybe I baked them for 30 seconds more, or 30 seconds less, who knows? But this is still my go-to recipe.

Ah, pungent and sour. That sheds some understanding on the addition of sweet wine or grape juice, which I had been planning to omit. I'll use both the tamarind paste and the sweet wine judiciously.

Everything looks so great. I think I'm going to put baking aside (for a while, anyway) and try my hand at some meatballs. I have a few restrictions, which should make things interesting. I keep kosher, which means: no pork (alas) or seafood; no mixing meat and milk; no mixing meat and fish (ergo, no fish sauce, not even in turkey meatballs). The price of kosher veal puts me into a dead faint, so that's probably out as well. I have, of course, made meatballs and meatloaf many times, and they were very good, but it has been quite a while since the last time, which was a recipe for Thai style turkey meatballs and I just left the fish sauce out. They were very good, although I'm sure they would have been better with it. I don't remember which recipe I used. I thought this might be a good time to look through "Aromas of Aleppo," a beautiful book I've had for quite a while and have enjoyed looking through, but used only once. (To make ka'ak.) One recipe has caught my eye: Sweet Cherry-Stewed Meatballs. (Kebab Garaz; if any of our Middle Eastern experts know anything about this, please chime in.) This is from "Aromas of Aleppo, The Legendary Cuisine of Syrian Jews" by Poopa Dweck. A small, bitter, crimson-colored cherry found near Aleppo, called the St. Lucie's cherry (Prunus mahaleb L.), is the featured flavor of two Aleppian Jewish dishes, this one and kibbeh b'garaz (Sweet Cherry-Stuffed Beef Slices). You can use either fresh pitted sour cherries or canned sweet cherries (though not the garish, syrupy sort used for pie filling). . . The dish, kebab garaz, is a stewlike preparation. It was traditionally served over open-faced Syrian flatbread and topped with chopped parsley and scallions. Today, many Allepian Jews enjoy it over rice because it is often served alongside other dishes that are complemented by rice. - I have a jar of Trader Joe's Dark Morello Cherries, which I think will work well here. I may just sprinkle in a bit of mahleb, since I have it. It seems to me that whichever cherries are used would turn it into a completely different dish, but it's not cherry season, so my choices are few. So: Meatballs: 1 lb ground beef, 1/2 c. pine nuts, 1/2 tsp ground allspice, 3 Tbs oil Sauce: 3 onions chopped (1 1/2 c.); two 15 oz cans dark sweet pitted cherries, including liquid, or 1 lb fresh cherries, pitted; 1 Tbs tamarind concentrate; 3 Tbs lemon juice; 1 Tbs sugar, 1 tsp allspice; 1 c. sweet red wine or Concord grape juice (optional) Meatballs: combine everything but the oil, knead thoroughly by hand, form 2-inch long torpedo shapes. Saute in 2 Tbs oil on med. heat for 3 minutes or until lightly browned, turning to brown both sides. Remove and set aside. Use same pan to make the sauce. Sauce: sauté onions in 1 Tbs oil 4-6 min or until translucent. Add liquid from canned cherries, along with tamarind paste, lemon juice, sugar, allspice, and 1/2 cup water (or 1 cup if using fresh cherries), and wine or juice if using. Stir, bring to a boil. Add meatballs and cherries. Cover, reduce heat to low, simmer one hour or until sauce has thickened. I've never used tamarind paste, so will have to get some. But I think I will give this one a try.

KAF used to make a bleached cake flour that was this side of heaven. A few years ago they decided not to bleach anything any more. I still mourn the loss if that cake flour. It made cakes ethereal. The cakes are still light and nice, but they've lost that lovin' feeling, it's gone, gone, gone. I don't understand why you'd use cake flour in shortbread. I don't think it would mimic the texture that rice flour or corn flour adds.

Cut in half, sprinkle with salt and some lemon or lime juice, and eat with a spoon. They come in these really convenient cups.

A wodge of stodge. That is lovely.

Some stuff from the past week. At bottom are Dan Leopard's semolina buns. I love anything with semolina in it. This recipe calls for mixing the semolina flour with some boiling water before incorporating it into the dough. It makes for a wonderful texture. Last time I made it I had trouble rolling it out and cutting the dough into squares, which is what he suggests, so I ended up weighing out pieces of dough and rolling each piece individually. This time I patted the dough out into a rectangle and cut it into squares. I liked the results better the first time. The other loaf us from Keller's Bouchon Bakery cookbook, it's the multigrain loaf. It's a very nice, very straightforward recipe. He calls for 2 loaves, but I prefer one larger loaf.

I think perhaps you're being a bit too literal. The "best of" threads are wonderful for sure, but I find that it's the different opinions that make them so great, not a consensus of any sort. Everyone shares his own "best of," and that's why they're such great learning threads. Good luck in your search.

I think looking for a "best" recipe of any sort is always going to be problematic. You have to try some and then decide what you like best. Maybe you could make a few half-recipes. Also, shortbread is made in many different flavors these days. I'd say you had vanilla shortbread, not a vanilla cookie. I've made ginger shortbread, lavender shortbread (tasted like soap), and others over the years. I'd say it's still shortbread if it uses more butter than a "regular" cookie and also no leavening. Also a larger proportion of flour than most other cookies would take. (Obviously I'm not thinking so scientifically.) BTW, I think the joepastry.com site also has something about the tang mian method, although not shortbread.

I guess it all depends on how you like your shortbread. (Or anything else.) Even for home-sized recipes, some people prefer to bake and cook things to their own taste and can tell the difference between different levels of salt in different brands of butter. Others prefer to laugh at recipes that do things differently than they do. To each his own. In any case, I've used this recipe for shortbread, which I like very much: http://joepastry.com/?s=shortbread He uses unsalted butter and adds his own salt. I always add rice flour to my shortbread, I like the texture it creates. I think "true" Scottish shortbread (if there is such a thing) does not include salt. It is flour, butter, sugar and that's it. I always add salt because I don't like it without. While I like the recipe linked above, I haven't yet found "my" shortbread recipe. I make different recipes all the time. I like them all, but so far haven't found one that will make me stop searching.

And customers, by and large, do an excellent job of eating that food, no matter whether the cooks care about them or not. I guess unless we're talking about regular customers, there's not a lot of "caring" on either end of the spectrum. But I do expect the employer/employee relationship to be a bit different.

But you seem to be avoiding the issue, or perhaps you don't understand the issue I'm raising. Blowing off steam is necessary at times, we've all been there whether we work in a kitchen or not; it's not limited to restaurant work. What I don't get in that story is the hatred felt toward the customers. I understand (and admire) the professionalism in executing and serving the meal. I fully understand animosity toward the boss, who sounds like a real piece of work, to say the least. But hating the customers? And I know there are plenty of customers who deserve that reaction. But I'm not referring to all the stories that everyone has about people who feel entitled to do whatever they want. I was responding to the above story only. The customers were invited by the owner. They had no idea what did or didn't happen between the owner and his workers. For all they knew, the owner could have told his staff that anyone who stays would get double pay plus a bonus, and they could either stay or leave, it was their choice. The point is, the customers had no part in this. (The owner, on the other hand, should have been shot.)

I agree that the story is great. Very entertaining. Not sure I'd say the same thing about the attitude that accompanies it, which I'm just finding to be sad. I do wonder if it is typical. Perhaps others can weigh in on that.

Boy, sure sounds like you hated and complained about the wrong people. Doesn't seem to be the way to change anything.

I never thought that five spice powder was supposed to contain exactly five ingredients, and just about anything that I have ever read on the spice stressed that the name is not to be taken literally, nor are the number and/or the precise ingredients to be viewed as "fixed." It's kind of like assuming that thousand-year-old eggs have really aged for a thousand years. Most people do not think this. And if anyone wants to put Chinese five spice powder (because that is what it is called here, like it or not) in their tomato sauce and call it Chinese style tomato sauce, then that is their decision to make. Your posts are informative, but they're also very condescending. I appreciate the one, but not the other.

Do you think you'd prefer a "vegetable butcher" rather than buy a package of pre-sliced vegetables, whether it's onions or anything else? Do you think freshness is an issue? Plenty of veggies in the market (not pre-sliced) are not so fresh or nice looking, in which case I just don't buy them. I'm just trying to see the reasoning behind a vegetable butcher as opposed to packages of pre-sliced vegetables.

I duuno, this whole thing seems made for people who have more money than brains. I suppose there's no shortage. Pre-cut veggies can be a worthwhile thing for many reasons, as time savers and for people who have difficulty chopping, to name only two. But the pretentiousness of the title (Vegetable Butcher? Puh-leeze. Butchering an animal is a serious craft, some might say an art.) plus the "butchered to order" aspect of this make me wonder who this is geared to. I just can't imagine people standing on line waiting for the "butcher" to cut up their carrots and parsnips so they can go home and make soup.

Humble Pie.

Goodness, never realized there were so many! I think it's the plain old Crumb Cake, second row all the way to the left, that I remember. I also remember that all butter French Crumb Cake, but that's from much later. (College, actually.) I am currently resisting the impulse to put on my jacket and walk up to the supermarket to buy one.

Very surprised by the nuts, and I don't remember a cinnamon flavor to it either. Actually the molasses is also a bit of a surprise. This was a standard cake in just about everyone's home when I was growing up (sixties/seventies), but I can't remember the last time I ate it. Not sure if the current list of ingredients is the same as the original list of ingredients. But I assume you've eaten this cake much more recently than I have, and you're aiming for its current, rather than its past, taste and texture. I do remember seeing a vegan recipe for a "NY Crumb Cake." (The name always takes me by surprise, I never thought of it as a NY thing.) I can't say anything about the vegan recipe except that it certainly would not have used butter. Here is one, it's not the Entenmann's recipe but maybe it has something to offer in your search: http://vegangretchen.com/vegan-coffee-cake/