Kouign Aman

I like the freeze dried tropical fruits for snacks.

I've always liked chili-infused oil for popping corn.

I think the thinness is part of what makes them distinctive and delicious. The only think I dont like about Kettle brand chips is they are too thick. They dont always crunch easily.

Worst case, you have custard sauce now, yes? If recooking doesnt work, its time for a berry pie!

Upside down. Just because.

Never worked in a lab that trusted the graduated cylinders which are +/- 5% generally. They were for ballparking, but all final measures were by weight. I think my baking is more forgiving than my assay reagent formulations. After all, even if I weigh the flour, its a different volume in the Arizona desert than in the Miami sog. Editted to add: the new Pyrex design is dreadful indeed. Ick.

99 Ranch had packets of unflavored agar agar that were tempting, except for their intensely dyed colors of maraschino red and xmas tree green. Yikes! Be kinda fun to make a layered dessert along the lines of Rachel's rainbow jello mold, but use a different jelling agent every few layers. Such fun to play with the different shattering characteristics as its eaten.

Polenta = mush. Fried polenta = fried mush. Good stuff.

Hey gfweb, you like those Herrs ripple chips, eh?

Since I dont get to choose when the waiter chooses to top up my glass, I may well be midsentence, either listening, or speaking, and not want to interrupt to say "no thanks", so, a hand gesture. It seems a reasonable behaviour to me. I could rest my spoon across the top of the glass, I suppose. (Yes, I've resorted to this with my coffee cup, when the refills were coming so fast that declining them was interfering with actually eating my breakfast).

Oooh, make it again and post a picture! I miss this thread when it goes dormant too long.

You could calculate. Its been a long time since I did pH calculations for buffers and solutions, and I'm in no mind to refresh my skills.

Give me the proportions - I'll test the pH. I learned of the technique on this thread, so no info for you. Both Darienne and ScoopKW posted that they use baking soda, so may have proportions. Tri2Cook posted this: I use 1/2 cup salt and 2 tsp baking soda in a gallon of water but that's numbers I picked up from a recipe that requires peeling eggs that are still in a very delicate state well before hard boiled...

There is a dinner thread for pix of food that looks bloody awful. I think dessert would fit in there just fine.

Oh yeah, you are gonna get the 'squeeeeee!', no worries. They are all so cute, who can pick a favorite! Sparkly pearly unicorn oh my! Rainbow sheep and dragon! the Faun! They are so cute, it is to swoon!

naiads and dryads, unicorns and pegasi, puzzled possom mom & babies, a hookah-smoking caterpillar, winged giant south american rodent (once allowed to substitute for fish on Fridays), sparkly tapirs.

If its true that the egg shell lets in the boiling solution, and that high pH eggs peel easier, then adding baking soda to the boiling water should make them easier to peel. Baking soda is alkaline, so adding it to water raises the pH of the solution. I havent tested to see what pH you end up with, but I'm sure someone on eG has a pH meter or the little test strips and can tell us.

I'd like to be able to make a few authentic chinese dishes without having to think too hard about it - that just needs repetition with the recipes. Expand my Italian repertoire start deep frying again (but that's going to wait til there's a backsplash, which is no time soon) pan-fry meat. I am defeated by a porkchop, as was my mother before me (she just didnt know she was defeated). More different types of vegetables and more preparations of my standard 5 (carrots, cabbage, broccoli, spinach, green beans)

I agree w the suggestion to develop a set of 12 or so super reliable recipes. The other thing that helps is menu planning. Deciding what to cook tonight eats up a considerable portion of the time available for cooking. If you know in advance its pasta alfredo, then you get right to washing the veg and grating the cheese while the pasta boils. Another help is the fabulous storage characteristics of onions, garlic, and cabbage. A head of cabbage lves in the veg drawer of the fridge until that night when we're out of everything and havent time to shop.

Yeast extract is cheaper and 'cleaner' tasting but touchy to use in cooking because its so salty (Marmite, Vegemite).

3 - 7 pm tonight is the Farmer's Market off Moreno in San Diego. Funny location - between PetCo and ToysRUs with Armstrong Nursery near by & a dog-friendly barbecue place across the street. Even if the Farmer's Market is a bust, there's lots of potential for wallet damage.

Huh. Learned something. The spouse just looked at me with that 'duh, everybody knows that' look.

There is, for a certain genetic subset of the population. Fairly small one. It would be interesting to compare the sodium levels of one's home cooking with that of the much maligned processed and restaurant foods.

Would any avocado leaves do, or is it varietal specific, or do the Oaxacan leaves taste different due to terroir?

I'm not following why you think enamel wouldn't scratch a glass cooktop but iron would. Enamel is harder than iron. More brittle, but harder. Wipe stove top clean, keep bottom of pan clean, dont slide pan or smack it down onto the top. You got the pans you want, at a price that works for you. Happy for you.