zoe b

I just made the Amazing Five Hour Duck last night with a free range duck from a local farmer--it was fabulous! It was more like a Four Hour Duck--this duck had less fat i think than supermarket ducks, and was thoroughly cooked at four hours--super crispy skin, nicely browned--lots of cracklings around the neck & tail for the chef. No more fat was cooking off at that point. I roasted some carrots & potatoes in the drippings & fat, quartered the duck and glazed it with an Asian style hoisin based BBQ sauce--put the quarters on top of the veggies and finished the cooking. Served with steamed broccoli--one of the best meals i've ever had. The meat pulled apart--it was stringy, and a little crispy in parts & tender in others. It was very flavorful--not dark or gamy tasting, but just full of duckishness. The skin was crisp, but not too greasy. This was so easy, yet so good.

I render buffalo tallow to use in soapmaking--do it in the oven in a roaster--and that really smells up the house--smells like a giant greasy rib roast is being cooked to death in your oven--my husband TRULY hates this! Zoe

On another forum that I belong to, an Australian member posted about Oz Tops http://www.oztops.com.au/ She's been using them to ferment/carbonate fruit juices--sort of like making hard cider. They sound really delicious. I love hard cider--made some perfect hard cider one time accidentally by leaving a jug of cider on the porch--the highs & lows of temp were just right to make a sparkling, fizzy, delicious drink--I've always wanted to be able to replicate this. Oz Tops is having trouble exporting to the US--because of the wine yeast that's part of the kit--so dumb, but whatever... I'd love to be able to try this--there's an American company selling a similar item EZ Caps www.ezcaps.com/ has anyone tried them? I also found a lot of sources for wine yeast online, and i think there's a hobby brewing store not too far away from me to buy refills of the yeast. Zoe

I was just visiting friends and they were talking about a stand on the boardwalk at Far Rockaway that sold these--apparently they were fried noodle cups shaped something like an upside down top hat, filled with chop suey, or whatever Chinese food of the day that you wanted. Zoe

thanks, Rhonda, i went over and joined--found a few suggestions of places to check out--one we have gone to a few times--Plyler's--I don't care for it, but the Hub is a sucker for an all you can eat.

I don't work in a restaurant, but I am a soapmaker, and use a ton of oils that always seem to end up on the floor no matter how careful i am-- I just started using Fabuloso --it is extremely cheap and cleans my tile floor beautifully.

how about a green tea for one of the iced teas--I think it is delicious plain, but lends itself to many added flavers, too. I just buy it in teabags from the Asian grocer--I'm sure there are Asian suppliers that would supply in bulk in Canada. Z

Just wanted to add that the Hub ate at Denny's last week--he was enroute to Ohio from NJ--he reported that he had a delicious (standard sized) blue cheese burger with fries there--he said that the fries were really good, too--and best of all, a Yuengling was $1.79! He didn't know about the Straub's beer --we will do further research on this! I must say that we are thrilled to find a good place to eat along 80--we travel to Ohio several times a year and had just about given up--we ate fast food both ways the last time--and that was truly depressing.... Zoe

another trick--carefully ladle the top four inches or so of the stock into a bowl or measuring cup--try and make sure you get all the fat --stick it in the freezer for 1/2 hour or so--the fat should harden and you can put the rest back in the pot I have a flat ladle--if you have something flattish more than bowl shaped use that--eve a large spoon.

I think the most interesting thing in the piece is that when Michelle Obama was asked about her favorite thing to make and about cooking in general that she answered TRUTHFULLY that it isn't her thing. How many hideous ladies' magazine articles have there been over the years touting a First Lady's favorite recipe for something--something that we could suspect was written by a pr person, not treasured and made often by the First Lady. She is going to be herself come what may, --just the fact that the Obamas love good food and support locally grown is a gigantic step forward. The White House garden is a wonderful start--focussing on the idea of having fresh food available in communities is big--I've been to towns where there are just a few sad withered pieces of vegetation in the produce section in supermarkets in poorer sections--let's make fresh food available first--later we can whip people into cooking it for themselves--one thing at a time, please. I didn't love the piece--thought it was kind of an attention grabber sort of thing to write--a little too Maureen Dowdish for me.

I really like it in a Sesame noodle recipe i clipped out of the paper years ago--it was sent in by a man from Singapore & is unusual in that it has black tea in it-- the vinegar adds to the flavor in a delicious way. I also add it to stir fried cabbage and in other vegetable dishes, but after reading here I'll try it in braised meat dishes, and also i like the idea of reducing it to a glaze. Z

I think if it's a good business at a good price it IS a good time to have an artisan bakery--a nice loaf of bread is a relatively affordable treat even on a tight budget. I do wonder about moving right away, too--what about selling at a farmer's market to increase retail business--this would be cheap and easy to do--then think about moving down the road in a year or so. Zoe

Love the cakes on your website--the Birkin bag is very cute! How about Delicious--or Delicious Cafe--? This wouldn't limit you to just sounding like a bakery.

Ambra--you can always blame it on hormones, or PMS as Maggi suggests--our lady stuff is always useful to terrorize our loved ones. Z

I also seem to be in one of those slumps--the other night I was making lemon chicken for dinner--Eileen Yin Fei Lo's recipe from her Low Fat cookbook--you steam everything--I was mixing up the marinade/sauce--added the "cornstarch" last and it fizzed up--this did not make me think that anything at all could be wrong. Left it to sit, then steamed everything--when it was finished, the sauce hadn't thickened--again had no thoughts on this--served the chicken, broccoli and sauce over the rice--started eating--it tasted just awful! I eventually figured that i grabbed the baking soda box instead of cornstarch. This is only the biggest goof of the past week--there are more. I have a friend who's into astrology--she will always say some planet is in retrograde when this kind of thing is going on....

yes, I learned this tactic from my mother--she always told us that kids didn't like real maple syrup--that Log Cabin was better! now that the kids are grown, if I'm feeling really selfish, I make hard crunchy biscotti instead of nice soft cookies--so my Hub, for once, won't eat them all in one day! Z

I just tried 2 different iced teas sweetened with stevia--I found it artificial tasting--not like sugar or honey at all-- if you can't have sugar it would be acceptable--it at least doesn't have the aftertaste of artificial sweeteners .

along the lines of the vichyssoise--another nice soup is a puree of chicken (or any) stock, cooked vegetables--broccoli or spinach--whatever is cheap and nice--and cooked rice--it's pretty tasty--and infinitely variable--and you could leave half unpureed and feed it to the family. Zoe

hah, I thought of something to take that could be smoked, but it wouldn't get past the dogs at the airport! What about a pastrami? That's pretty New Yorky. Or if you can get a NY state duck--duck is just fabulous smoked. The reason I thought of duck is that at a Farm market that i do in NJ, one of the farmers had beautiful 4 lb ducks this week. Or fresh mozzarella, smoked--or what about some kind of fish--is it too early for bluefish? Z

Glad you were safe--we were wondering whether our tiny garden would survive here in NW NJ--but nothing like having a vineyard to really up the angst level. There's a reason why farmers are pessimists, isn't there? Zoe

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/20/dining/2...html?ref=dining anyone else made it yet? any thoughts? I made it yesterday--it was extremely easy--more time in clean up than prep--it got nice & firm very quickly--the texture was good--not like pudding, but smooth and rich feeling. It's very sweet, and ,the hub and I both think, has too much chocolate ( never thought I'd say that). I'm thinking of different tweaks--using strong coffee for the water, definitely less chili powder as it was too hot--although this may be just my chili powder. From what I've read, getting rid of the soy and bland taste is the goal in tofu pudding. I think a coffee and less chocolate one could be good, also brown sugar might be a good flavor--of course then you'd probably need to sub something for the fat in the chocolate. Zoe

this recipe looks like it might work--although I'm not enough of a candy maker to really tell from just looking at it. Scroll down-- http://www.dyannbakes.com/ edited to add-- prairiegirl oops--didn't read your post to the end.......

a whole foie gras from a friend who knows how i love it.

hah! that's my method, exactly--you forgot to mention dipping it in salt first! If anyone's in the kitchenwith me for this, they can share, otherwise it's all mine... Zoe

I just added some to a batch of Sables--just very fine julienned the fresh leaves. Z