lemniscate

Actually, I was told that by the person who I got my grains from years ago. It may be an old wives tale about UHT and ultra-filtered milk (ie Fairlife) for kefir. I see on r/kefir that people use UHT without issues. I buy the UHT Costco 2% organic milk because it's what the household prefers. If it was just milk for my use, I'd be buying standard whole milk. So I supplement with the powdered whole I keep on hand for baking. I think lactose free milk is absolutely a no go since the grains live on the sugars in milk. Maybe that's where the confusion over what kind of milk is "kefir correct" origiinated.

I've been making kefir on and off for years. I have about a 1/3 cup of active grains. I've had success with using powdered milk (Nido brand, whole milk) in making kefir without having to search for milk that's not ultra-pasteurized or altered.

The weather has been spectacular so far. 78-80F and lots of sun. Which I guess can supercharge a sunny disposition. Apache Junction (we locals call it AJ) can be sedate and colorful all at the same time. But not known for outstanding culinary choices.

Local Costco had some interesting cheeses today, and I couldn't help myself. I'm gonna have a heck of charcuterie tray soon. But the investment is worth it, I love cheese. Mifroma Tete De Moine Rosette. Atalanta Snowdonia Ruby Mist Kirkland Signature Sartori Cabernet Sauvignon BellaVitano Cheese Beemster Gouda Aged 20 Month

Re: hand pie/meat muffin topic 😋 I had forgotten I had saved a recipe from an inactive internet link for a chicken pot pie muffin. (the origin link is dead, this wordpress is the only thing left, along with my saved recipe copy). It's written for keto use, but I don't care about that, so I imagine regular flour could be used? I imagine it could be done with sausage, ham or bacon also. Or lean pork. I saved it, but never tried it. I have my own ham in the freezer. I think I will finally try to do something.

I cure it and make my version of "Canadian" bacon out of it. Other than that, one way I can get a decent prep for it is sous vide. Another way I have liked pork loin is slice it thinnish raw, pound it thinner, sear it on a hot grill, squeeze some lime on it and put it between two tortillas with some Mexican white cheese and flip it on the grill again to warm the tortillas and melt the cheese. Serve with avocado salsa/tomatillo salsa. These are called chuleta suizas, but I can't find an English version of the recipe to post at the moment.

In our house it was raw egg used in the mix. I would imagine this type of stuffing might be akin to the European bread dumpling consistency. It is sliceable and dense. A stuffing that could be dunked into a puddle of gravy. I loved it with an over easy egg for breakfast in place of hash browns.

Mom did egg in her stuffing, she ground the boiled giblets in a hand crank grinder, mixed with the bagged seasoned stuffing croutons, chopped celery/onion, egg and milk. Stuffed it in the bird. It was dense, but I remember liking it. I can't remember the last time stuffing was cooked in a bird though. Went out of style pretty hard years ago.

There was no thought pre-Holiday to a dessert due to unplanned circumstances. Darn. I had 5-6 small apples, walnuts, a jar of cookie crumbs from an over baked batch, quick oats and condensed milk. Apple Crisp! I coated the apple chunks with the condensed milk instead of sugar. I layered chopped walnuts over those. I mixed the cookie crumbs, quick oats, and condensed milk for the topping. I used an 8 inch pyrex pie plate. I was afraid the condensed milk would have made the filling soupy, it did not at all. Quite proud of myself using existing pantry items for a quality dessert that will last us a couple days in servings.

I agree, these olives are great. Very smoky,meaty tasting. Thanks for your review.

The 2023 Vintage Spiced Ale is in now. It's quite good this year. Deep, dark, and complex. I think they dialed back on the ginger; sometimes ginger flavored ales taste like soap to me but I didn't pick that up in this year's beer. $5.99 for the 750ml, (brewed by Unibroue) Belgian Dark Spiced Ale.

Me neither. Recent lumbar issues in the household have changed plans drastically. It's stay home, stay still-ish, and eat what's easy in the pantry. Luckily we did some early shopping and are pretty well stocked.

You're right! There is an "s". I'm a rockhound and defaulted to the rock and not the town spelling.

Quartzite in the winter is cray-cray. Officially has 2500 population normally, but winter the general area has a temporary population of 1 million, in RV's, mostly dry camping. Some estimates are more than that. The exits and entrances and overpasses on the I-10 around Quartzite are quite insane in the winter months. There is no peace and quiet in Quartzite from Oct-Apr.

OMG! OMG! Thank you. Hilarious though, my Amazon subscription delivery of 12 boxes of London Sesame toast rounds is arriving today. I still will go get the brioche toasts too. Costco had Boursin on sale and I bought a few. I will need lots of cracker material.

The meat entree for our Thanksgiving is yet to be decided. But, going against the conventional theory of "never try a new untested recipe for a family gathering", I'm making a medieval blood sauce with the ancient sweet spice flavorings and seeing just how far I can push the boundaries. I have pig blood I sous vided previously in the freezer. At least there will be something to talk about outside of politics and religion 🙃 at the table.

Have you ever tried Kedem tea biscuits?

Sorry, yes. It's just called con for short amongst the people who taught me to use it. I guess I just got used to calling it that. Tomato with Chicken bouillon.

"con" is the magic ingredient for AZ Sonoran cooking. It's got msg and flavorings.

I am on Day 2 of pork Green Chile Stew marathon in the IP. We have many lbs of "pork trim meat" packages from our feral pig. I don't ask the processor grind any of our game meat, so I always end up with bits and pieces for other uses. This pig is lean, almost no fat, so different from a farmed swine. The meat is dark also, strongly muscled from roaming the terrain. Each package is about 4-5llbs. I will be using the vacuum chamber to pack and freeze the appropriate portions for future use. This is BIG BATCH cooking time for me. My recipe (this year) is not a recipe. It's a #10 can of green chiles, a jar of TJ's salse verde, some baby carrots (a handful), a couple tablespoons of con Tomate, and a package of the meat. I have a 6 qt IP. I use about 1/3 of the #10 can in the first batch and then I keep adding the rest in as the batches progress. I have been cooking for 60min and natural release to get the tender texture on the meat. I then remove the meat chunks to cool and add another package and some more of the green chiles and a few more carrots. I don't try to add more of the con Tomate because I think it will get too salty as I reuse the cooking juices. Do we love green chile stew? Yes, yes we do.

I found shelf stable fresh noodles and they have been under my nose at TJ's all the time. I had made char siu from one of the fresh hams off our harvested feral pig. I made a noodle stir fry dish with the diced meat, and a bag of the frozen stir fry veg. Really good easy and popular dish with the eaters. I didn't use the sauce packet in the veg. I just barely seasoned with a splash of soy and a dash of oyster sauce.

I don't even notice noise on my Paragon or the cheap Duxtop I have. It can't be noisier than an overhead exhaust fan. My normal flat glasstop stove cooking is noisier by far than induction due to the exhaust fan.

I always thought the Brach's MellowCreme pumpkin shaped versions tasted better, more buttery. That was the only "candy corn" I would look forward to at Halloween. Though, now I wouldn't eat one on a bet.

Cats, cocktails, a bit of sarcasm with a large dollop of Adventure. And that's only the eGullet part I got to see of Anna N. I can only imagine the other 99.99% of her. She was a presence. Godspeed @Anna N.