miladyinsanity

I may give breadmaking a try one fine weekend. Great demo Jack!

I got flat ones, like the pistachio ones somebody posted earlier in the thread. I think I undermixed the batter. But it was shiny, and rather thick. And flat too. Now here's the thing: I like the flavor, but it's waaaaaaaay too sweet for me. Does anybody know what cutting down the sugar will do to a macaron?

I always assumed what some people call taro was yam?

If you're leery of the 'typical fish taste,' I'd suggest staying away from freshwater fish, at least at first. If you buy prawns, don't eat the head (that's where the cholesterol is). With crabs, don't eat the roe inside the carapace--again, cholesterol. If you go the poaching route, use stock seasoned with miso paste, spring onions and ginger. Yummy!

Indeed it has, Andrea. I've taken to measuring liquids in weight as well, simply because I don't like using cups--I have to wash them too!! Plus my digital scale allows you to start from zero even when you have something on it (IOW, weigh a hundred grams of sugar, hit the button, and you start from zero again.).

I don't know about the oven temperature. I think it's fine, and it seems to work fine when my mom bakes her cakes. Plus the last time I made cupcakes, they had that perfect, store-bought, domed top. And Whisks might be right, that too much sugar was the problem, because I cut down on the sugar as it was too sweet the first time I made it.

Can you clarify "one wooden chopstick?" Don't you mean one pair of chopsticks? I do know people who prefer not to use the Chinese porcelain spoon and use a regular metal Western-style spoon instead, even when eating with chopsticks. Not brass though. And I've lived here all my rather short life, and never met a person who was like that. ← Thanks for the reply - I did mean a lone chopstick but I guess that would be pretty dumb, unless you stuck it in a pencil sharpener. I am sure of the brass spoon part though, and I have seen them set on tables in a restaurant, though I cannot recall where. ← Brass spoons, yeah, I've seen those. And I can tell you I've never ever seen anybody eat with just one chopstick. Well, I have, but those were kids playing with their food.

Peach gelato. Sort of. It had egg yolk, milk, and pureed canned peaches (that is, I pureed the canned peaches) and was cooked. So it counts, right? Right? I'll take a pic if it turns out well after it's frozen after a round in the ice cream maker. It was kinda too sweet and soft after just being in the ice cream maker. Maybe the pretty color will show up in my photographs for a change.

I suppose you could always use a dish that shares homonyms with the animal. Or there are always jelly molds.

Please include all other kinds of animal organs while you're at it. Mom keeps trying to make me eat the stuff because it's high in iron, and she's been anemic enough to land in hospitale before, so she worries a lot about it. Her sister too.

I really think I'd rather starve than eat that.

Rub with turmeric and salt, then shallow fry the fish. Keep in mind you won't be able to use the oil after that, unless you want to make something that's good with turmeric, like sambal etc.

Helen, it's because you were tourists. I've not been to Bali, but I've heard similar horror stories from relatives and friends who have.

Can you clarify "one wooden chopstick?" Don't you mean one pair of chopsticks? I do know people who prefer not to use the Chinese porcelain spoon and use a regular metal Western-style spoon instead, even when eating with chopsticks. Not brass though. And I've lived here all my rather short life, and never met a person who was like that.

Adam, I can try, but can't make any promises. My mom belongs to the cooks without recipe book gang.

You could substitute nut flours and oils for flour and oil. I don't know about eggs though. Never had an eggless cake before--or even seen such a recipe.

Chopsticks for all noodles, including pasta. I use a Chinese porcelain spoon for soup and noodle soup. I have to eat cake with a small fork. I won't use a spoon.

There you go. This is rice vermicelli in pig's stomach soup with a chicken drumstick. Not a very appetizing picture, I know, but the soup is good! I'll endeavour to get better pictures when I talk my mom into making Penang-style prawn noodles.

Ooh I love that orange peel. Hmm, I need to get aunty number 3 to bring some down from my uncle's shop if they come down this week.

Can I do this with agar-agar? I have rum to use up, and I've got cousins coming over next weekend. And lots of agar-agar powder too.

It occurs to me that you are probably right about that, Wendy. Because I know that too much leavening can cause a coarse crumb, and the cratered cupcakes were on the coarse side.

I don't know what I did, but I got perfect looking cupcakes and not so perfect tasting ones. They are good--I used Snowangel's recipe. Just not great, not like the first time I made them. In fact, if you saw them side by side, you'd not believe that they are the same ones. Sorry, I don't have pics of the first ones. They had flat tops (and I got the same number of cupcakes both times), a thick crust, and a coarser crumb. Anyway, there are holes inside, and the texture is well...odd. It's soft--and it should be, since I used a very low protein content flour--but it's kinda got that stick to your upper palate feel once it melts in your mouth. I think it's some kind of cake flour, but it's marketed as "superlite" and is also known as "Hong Kong flour." It didn't occur to me to write down the protein content, and I can't find it online. My proportions: 130g sugar for burning 100g sugar 122g butter 350g flour 1 tsp lime juice--because my grandpa swore that it'd improve the texture and it works for my mom's pound cake and it was in the fridge The rest were as stated by Susan. My mom says the holes were caused by uneven folding of egg whites (probably true). I've not exactly gotten the folding in knack yet. I'm reasonably sure they were not underbaked, because I did the skewer test and the spring back test. Any ideas? Okay, it keeps telling me there's something wrong I'm doing, but I can't figure out what, so the piccies are Cupcakes a la Snowangel.

Cupcakes. Cornflake clusters. More cocoa cookies. Coffee cookies. I'm pigging out before it's all gone on Sunday--it's the first day of the New Year you see.

Acid will help lighten a pound cake. At least, that's my grandpa's theory who passed it on to my mom who passed it on to me. What we do is add a teaspoon of lime/lemon juice per 4 ounces of butter. First cream the butter/sugar, add in the juice and beat it, before adding eggs.

Really? Interesting, thanks for the tip, Wendy. Though it seems my cupcake skills have all sorts of interesting problems--you'll see when I resurrect the cupcake thread.