ATram

Hi guys, on my last trip to Vietnam i bought this lovely chili sauce in Hoi An that is usually used with Cao Lau. Now the sauce is over and i want to try to make one as close as possible. Anyone know how it´s made? Thanks!

Hi, in my recent visit to the usa i bought this excellent book. I couldn't find it anywhere in my country so i had to wait a little... Anyway, my main problem is that i can't find curing salts here! i dont know why because we have a lot of commercial chorizos and all kind of charcuterie, but no one wants to sell me curing salts! So i was thinking, anyone knows the exact compositions of Insta Cure #1 and #2? I have a friend who is chemistry and could get me food-grade sodium nitrite and sodium nitrate, but i don't want to poison myself or other people, so i would like to know the exact proportions. Thanks!

Let's say an american chef visits Uruguay, what would you recommend him to visit and to do? Which have been your most thrilling adventures there as an american tourist? What you think is unique and would impress any visitor? Thanks!

they say that if you add a peeled potato and simmer the broth/soup for a while it "absorbs" the salt excess. I never tried this because i doubt it really works. If i oversalt anything i usually try to play with acids and sugars, or adding more of the main ingredient, depending what we are talking about

Sweet Potatoe & Rosemary Gnocchi with beet sauce My firt attempt of this idea with excelent results. sorry for my lack of photography skills

What about CIA's piece of software i-COOK Pro? Anyone tried it? It's the first program I try and it's pretty good... A litte bit expensive i think for a recipe software (80 bucks) but pretty neat in the overall. Anyone know if The Professional Chef book by the CIA brings this software?

Yesterday a friend arrived home with a whole 10 kilos of jumbo shrimps and since then i have been wondering the ways im going to serve them. I want to serve them as appetizers, dont want to dish them. So im thinking im making something like brochettes and dips. I already have a couple of ideas but any suggestion is more than welcome. Thanks!

i dont know about argentinian, but here you have a source for uruguayan meat that is as good.

Kiwano & Strawberry Sorbet First time using kiwano, and i think it's great. Was a little bit sceptical when i tasted the plain fruit, but after making the sorbet with a little lemon juice it turned out very rich. Sorry for the photo, i'm a lame photographer...

I started using that method some years ago when Heston Blumenthal told his preference when doing roasted potatoes in this post. I found it better than doing it from raw potatoes.

im getting some new knives and im looking for a good case for them, something like a 7-10 knife roll. In amazon they have a very wide selection, global, wusthof, etc.. and need some advise with them. Any recommendation? Thanks!

Vadouvan, as your concern about the food grade of the products i have been digging a little bit and found out that the USP that says in one of the methocel (Metolose SM-15, as stated some posts above) stands for US Pharmacopeia and means that it is "Food Grade". The other two doesnt state that so i guess they are more something like agricultural/industrial grade, so i wont do eating experiments with them. I think that the SM-15 i have is the same or very similar to the A15C by Methocel used in ideasinfood as the number in the names indicate the viscocity grade of the compound which is one of the main caracteristics. If anyone have any experiment they would like to suggest for me to try and document dont hesitate in saying it, i would be excited to test- By the way, if anyone is intrested Biddle Sawyer is the sales representatives of the methyl cellulose im using, looks like you can order online or visit them in their new york store.

I asked him about if they were food grade or not and he said he thinks that yes... thanks for the tips s_sevilla, the first thing i tried to do was trying to dissolve it in water in many different ways, with some of the results you describe. I'll try your way of hydratation and see what happens. So far i tried with a disolution of 1-3% wt and didnt get a gel. I'll try with more concentrated solutions later.

Ok, this is what a friend, who studies chemistry, could get me from his job: (click for a larger photo) They are labled as: - Metolose SM-15 (methylcellulose usp) - Pharmacoat 615 (hydroxypropyl methyl cellulose) - Metolose 90SH-15000 (hydroxypropyl methyl cellulose) He also gave me some documentation that specifies everything about the compounds. The not so good news is that it has a list of applicable types (as i said before there are more than 20 different types of methylcellulose than can be prepared depending on the number of hydroxyl groups) for different fields and the ones I have are applicable for things like Fire-resistant coating, Paint, Self-leveling materials, Sand ant Tile cement mortar, Thermal paper, Printing paste, Agricultural chemicals, etc..... But im going to experiment with them anyway, as they are innocuous and i got them for free. I'll post any results i get. Edit: I did a quick scan of the docs for the ones that want to give it a read, it has some good information. Download the pdf from <a href="http://s90525316.onlinehome.us/temporal/Metolose doc.pdf">here</a>

thanks for the link johnder, i guess it didnt cross my mind to search for the full name of it. Bryan, ideasinfood was the trigger of my curiosity about methocel and the first thing i did was looking in at Dow Chemical web site for my local distributor. The call to them only confused me more, as they told me they had 20 different types of methylcellulose, which are named with letters and numbers, and the girl behind the phone knew even less than me about this product. I guess i'll try to get the methocel used by A. Talbot and give it a try.