lemniscate

@Shelby So, I know I've seen from your posts that you deep fry fresh okra. Ever try to batter and deep fry the pickled okra, akin to deep fried pickle chips I see in sports bars? Any idea if that would work?

@Shelby I have a question on consumption of your preserves. Do you end up using all/most of the jars you put up over winter/spring/early summer until next harvest season?

(eG-friendly Amazon.com link) Tonnino Tuna Filet,Olive Oil 6.7 Oz (Pack Of 6) (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) Tonnino Tuna Filet, Spring Water 6.7 Oz (Pack Of 6) (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) Tonnino Tuna Ventresca 6.7 Oz (Pack Of 6) (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) Tonnino Tuna Oregano 6.7 Oz (Pack Of 6) (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) Tonnino Tuna Garlic 6.7 Oz (Pack Of 6) (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) Tonnino Lemon Pepper 6.7 Oz (Pack Of 6) All of the offerings above show a Prime Day deal, but the $$ varies by flavors.

Inspecting Prime Day offerings that I might care about: Tonnino tuna in jars 6-pk. Looks like the Yellowfin in olive oil and spring water only deviate from the 2022 prices by +.40 cents. The Ventresca jars 6-pk increaase is a little less than +$3 USD per pack vs 2022. These are Prime Day pricing comparisons from different years.

My next trip to TJ's will include those olive crackers. Thanks for describing. I miss the Pane Guttiau Sardinian Parchment Crackers.

Also Amazon Prime Day is 16th-17th, so WF will have interesting discounts. I use Amazon Fresh sometimes and I'm getting early Prime offers already. Not buying though. yet.

Best I can do is a chef video of the press, mine is not this clean.

Ah, it's offsite at the remote kitchen. Don't cook there in the summer.

I'm one to talk, my panini press came from the MOMA store on clearance, clearance, clearance after an Italian themed installation. The brand is Milantoast, which I had never seen here in the States. It's a heavy beast.

Go to a thrift shop. That's where most panini presses end up. I've seen at least 3 of the expensive Cuisinart Elites (+$150 new) in the last few months, virtually unused, for less than $20USD sitting on the shelves. I'm guessing wedding gifts that went unused and eventually donated during a downsize purge.

Decent heat but I find this unpleasantly salty. I added more vinegar to make it palatable to me.

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).