lemniscate

We still go through an embarrassing volume the Grand Galettes in our house (thank you Costco), but got to talking about peanut butter cookies. I was searching for European brand peanut butter cookies (not wafers, not sandwich) and can't seem to find a commercial brand that makes them. Are peanut butter cookies not a thing in European baking? I'd love to try a peanut butter sable cookie, but I don't want to bake it.

I wanted a light tall fizzy drink. I bought this San Pellegrino Momenti Peach/Clementine for someone else and held a 6 pack back for myself. It's too....fragrant for my tastes to drink straight. And it's pretty sweet, but only 35 cals. I tried it with vodka and the fragrance and sweet were just too much. Desperation tried a shot of orange liqueur and that fixed it. Actually had two of these last night.

Well, yeah, salty, but not like saltine salty. Balanced. I have eaten them plain and with soft butter. I have cream cheese on deck, I imagine that's the perfect spread for these.

These are friggin' delicious.

I've made banana syrup out of the peels, just sugar them and let the sit for a while. Very intense banana flavor. It's rare we have bananas in the house. I like the finger bananas from the Asian market over the Cavendish any day.

Giant portobello caps are my favorite use for panini press. Also using the bigger white mushrooms for "smash burger" sliders too. I really mash down on those.

I order farm raised elk from Costco online. I believe it's Canadian by origin. The meat is indeed tender and much easier to get good results from braising/SV. The wild harvest ones around here are athletes and, yeah, it takes some special time and handling to get good results from the meat. We go years between even getting drawn for an elk ticket. I prefer the antlerless over the antlered by a lot for eating.

Outside of fuel generators, I guess looking into a battery storage/solar solution is another route. You don't have to have solar for a Powerwall(Tesla) and can charge at grid off-peak hours to hold energy. I think there are other solutions outside of Tesla tech that are out there. Link to an article detailing restaurants with battery backup.

Dates, figs or sultanas blended in can really tame a wild overfunky kefir. A little goes a long way. I am using up a bag of forgotten sweetened dried cranberries and I like the flavor of that also.

TJ's run today. Overload on the sweets, I love Ube and I like mochi, so tried these selections. Pretzels tiny and not too sweet with a good bite of salt; Ube shortbread are tiny and very vanilla-y and tender; brown sugar mochi is the least sweet of them all and one bite packages (great for roadtrips), I enjoy the texture to sweet ratio and non-mochi eater liked it too, quite a surprise to me. I think the ube limited run items are at the end now. Felt lucky to find them. Didn't want to put much energy into cooking tonight, so grabbed the karaage (pleases all in the house) and the chicken gyoza. Grabbed a frozen kimbap to see what the fuss is about. Kickin myself for missing on the guacasalsa. Will obtain later.

It's dry warm weather here, so I just put them on a piece of parchment in my outdoor countertop oven (not turned on) and left them air dry for about 5-6 days. To be honest they were probably done in 3 days, but I kept forgetting to check them. Here's a link for an example.

I just divided my grains and dehydrated half after rinsing thoroughly. I put the dried ones in a baggie with powdered milk and put in the freezer. These will be a backup supply in case I lose my working grains in the future.

I am spectacularly lazy about my kefir. I will use it regularly and then forget it. BUT, I keep mine in the refrigerator almost exclusively. It really slows down the culturing so that it harder to get away from you. It's like the slow cold bread dough method, it's still working but at a much reduced rate. Maybe try that for a while and see if it suits you. I think the 3 to 4 days is way too much at room temp. I never go more that 12-24 hours at room temp before I put it in the fridge. I would suggest to sieve it though, for your preferred consistency. And try to reuse those grains.

I make kefir. The lumps from what I can see are the actual kefir cultures (lumpy brain pale colored material). I get the separation in my kefir, to me it's normal. I stir it to a homogeneous consistency with a spoon and then pour through a fine sieve. What's in the sieve (the grains) I put into a container to make the next batch of kefir. The sieved liquid is the usable kefir and I mix it with the flavor of the day or just drink it straight. Are you using a new pack of that powder stuff everytime you make kefir? I've never used that method or product before, my kefir grains are years old right now. The clumps on your whisk resemble the kefir cultures (grains).

We harvested a feral pig in 2023; the getting is fairly easy, the sanitary safe processing can be fairly challenging and pricy. We will be eating that animal for another 12 months. 1 300lb pig for a small household is a steady food source with good processing and storage. My sous vide and Instant pot and meat grinder got a really good workout making now and future meals out of the sow. The feral pig problem is actually quite horrifying for native environments and agriculture.

I've ordered some of the Wickedly Prime snacks, toffee coconut cashews and cinnamon sugar almonds. The cashews are standout, I've reordered several times. But that's about it for Wickedly Prime. I remember amz having lots more WP snacks a couple years ago, now there's barely handful of offerings under that brand. I never saw any of those WP offerings as a TJ's substitute. It just didn't equate in my mind that there was a plan to compete. I shop TJ's at least a couple times a month for many things. I don't think amz can compete with TJ's in cachet, shopper experience and flexibility. I do mourn many departed items myself.

I have multiple freezer and fridges, some are remote, that I wanted to keep tabs on. I've had very good results so far with the Temp Stick product. Setup is easy and it does seem to be pretty accurate. They do advise using Energizer Ultimate Lithium AA batteries, which are a bit pricy. But if it saves $$$ in freezer food loss, worth it. These do go on sale a few times a year, so signing up for the newsletter for sales promotions can save a few bucks.

Local Hero is one of my all time fave soundtracks and movie. Seems to be forgotten in the mists of time. I love The Rocketeer soundtrack (James Horner), another overlooked piece of happiness.

Ramen Rater says ~4 min. This site says 5 min. 【Steps to cook】 1) Boil water and add noodles 2) Cook for 5 minutes with stirring occasionally 3) Remove from heat, drain and 8 spoons of water 4) Add little salt, pepper & margarine or soy sauce (light/dark/sweet)

I think just under 5 min works for me. Less if like a chew to them.

Costco filet mignons, butter basted SV gold potatoes in mushroom sauce SV carrots in butter/honey mustard glaze Steamed green beans cranberry relish fresh fruit for dessert. I won the egg battle this year.

I bought a sampler of pili nuts to try for happy hour snacking. Not sure how I came upon their site. These are really tasty, like a buttery peanut/macadamia flavor. I haven't tried all the flavors yet. They also sent a sample of Buyo hot sauce that I tried on some leftovers fries. Nice. A little vinegary, a tiny sweetness and a punchy heat. If I order more pili nuts I will definitely add some of the hot sauce.

This reminds me of some produce in the "Sun Parlour" area of Canada would ripen faster than the American (SE Michigan) side and the Canadian farmers would beat the locals to market (mainly Eastern Market, Detroit). My Dad said that that area of Ontario had a general slope south to the sun/soil temps was friendlier in early growing year. I also have a vague memory of a CBC show called Sun Parlour Country.

I bought a 16 pack of Ottogi plain instant noodle (eG-friendly Amazon.com link), a little over $1 a pack. I can pair these with my homemade stock, an egg, hot sauce and some chopped green onions and be very happy. Recommended.

My Joule started reporting error codes (blinking red light) while trying to do a cook. I had to do a deep cleaning because there was debris in the propeller and wrapped around the shaft. I suspect there was a label or something like it that got into a previous cook on a bag and dissolved enough to enter the Joule. The bottom magnet unscrews and the red propeller just pulls off. I had been doing the 50/50 vinegar jar rinse every 3-4 months depending on use. This debris would have been unaffected by that process. I really thought I was going to have to junk the Joules, but after the deep cleaning and 2 additional vinegar flushes, it's back and able to handle log cooks, thus far. I'll take a bit of luck with it.