paulraphael

What about grease coating the blower housing and the blower itself? This is where I've seen videos of the cleaning process and felt like the whole idea was problematic.

Have you cleaned it? What was that like?

Quick addendum ... That Prestige hood I mentioned above is discontinued. They're no longer making anything in a functional size. Another company called Trade-Wind makes a solid looking contender. I've looked deeper into commercial hoods; they seem viable if you have space / tolerance for something 48" wide or more. Anything smaller would mean custom fabrication. Be aware that commercial hoods all work with remote blowers—either inline (installed in the duct, probably in an attic) or a powered roof exhaust fan.

Here's some updated research ... I'm slowly planning a kitchen and looking at all the options. Ventilation is the hardest problem I'm facing, because every domestic range hood is designed primarily for esthetics. Even the ones that aim for a "commercial" esthetic copy the visuals while ignoring the engineering of functional commercial hoods. If you have a big enough range to justify a 48" wide hood (I don't) then by far the best option is a commercial hood by Accurex, CaptiveAire, Hoodmart, Advanced Hood Systems, or someone similar. If you don't want the commercial look, and you have $$$ for the project, you can just buy the mechanism and have a carpenter build a custom enclosure for it. It can be wood, doesn't matter—as long as the dimensions are right. Some of these hoods are available with a built-in makeup air system that will make system design easier. I don't believe you'll have to find a restaurant hood installer to design and build the system. Any good HVAC contractor who understands the engineering and can read the specs should be able to do this. Next best option, and the most reasonable for more of us, is a barbeque hood installed indoors. These are pretty much the only products that the domestic hood makers design to actually do the job. This is the route I'd like to go. Options include Proline, Tade-Wind, Victory. Maybe also Prestige (I can't tell if this company is still in business ... they don't answer, so I've crossed them off my shortlist). These outdoor hoods all raise the intake baffles above the bottom rim of the hood. They're also deeper from front to back (30" to 36", rather than the usual 22"-24"). This all creates more capture volume—the empty space that's the secret to making a hood work; it's the difference between capturing some of the smoke and grease coming off your pans vs. all of it. It also lets the hood be installed higher above the range: 42" instead of the usual 36" limit (which for me means not having to stoop to avoid banging my head). Commercial hoods are designed like big upside down shoe-boxes; they have huge capture area. This is why they can be way up above the cook's heads, be nearly silent, use much less powerful blowers for a given size, and be nearly 100% effective. Nothing escapes into the kitchen. Regular domestic hoods are designed more like ceiling vents; they let a bunch of the smoke and grease into the room, and clear it out eventually. The BBQ hoods are kind of in the middle. They're almost as effective as a commercial hood, but because of the reduced capture volume, require big powerful loud blowers. Be sure to research and budget for makeup air. If you're installing 1200+CFM blowers it's not optional. Unfortunately this is another rabbit hole; I haven't done the work on it yet. So far I can say: it looks boring! TL;DR: For my purposes, a BBQ hood looks like the best option. Until I do this project I'll rely on opening the windows and listening to my girlfriend's coughing fits and accusations that I'm giving us both cancer.

I'm not sure what the best method is with ICC. Does it let you create a custom ingredient? If so I'd just create your own custom strawberry, using this simple formula that I outlined on the blog post: I use the Nutritionist V. Database, which assumes an average brix of 6.9. [Or use your own preferred source if you have one that's more accurate for the fruit you source] If I measure 8.5, then this is 1.23 times the average. Use this as your conversion factor. Multiply the total solids, the POD (sweetness) and the PAC (freezing point depression) by this factor. The software I built has a brix field, so it does this automagically ... I've been lucky enough to not have to wade to deeply into brix calculations in a long time.

My avatar just had a cup of AI coffee and said it was the best ever.

I sauté over very high heat with a neutral oil, going for lots of color on the beans without letting them loose all their crunch. Let them sit a while between tosses so color can develop. Toss in the pan with salt and pepper, or (usually) sriracha. Optionally a little mango chutney. Fast, easy, super tasty. If you don't have a good hood (I don't) it's also smoky.

I believe so. It might just have some weatherproofing you don't need.

I'm not convinced any of their products besides ranges are particularly good. I didn't mention brands because my research is from a couple of years ago, and isn't compete. I found this problem difficult enough that I've been kicking it down the road. I'll revisit when I'm ready to actually rebuild the whole kitchen. Here are my old notes, all for a 42" wide hood, which is probably adequate for a 36" range: Prestige Pro-Line “High Capacity” 42” PLHC42300 - 42"W x 30"D x 18"H Largest containment area I've found in domestic hoods 1200CFM / 10” duct Lights at top of crown instead of front light bar May be mounted up to 42” above cooking surface Best WPD38I42SB 42” 13000CFM 27” Deep—seems ideal Internal blower INCLUDED 3” extension available to increase capture area Proline 42” PLFW 832.42 2000 cfm 25.5” deep Internal single or dual blower (1000/2000) The very best hoods are made by CaptiveAire and Accurex. These are commercial products, so it may be hard or impossible to find someone who will install it for you (but not as hard as with something dangerous like a commercial range). They also specialize in larger sizes, so finding something that fits your design can be harder. CaptivAire https://www.captiveaire.com/catalog/list.asp?cattypeid=64 Accurex https://www.captiveaire.com/catalog/list.asp?cattypeid=64 I haven't yet investigated the option I mentioned in the earlier post (getting a bare insert that fits into custom cabinetry). I assumed this would be too expensive, but now know a carpenter to ask about this.

The most important elements are the aperture dimensions the and capture volume. The aperture dimensions are the width and depth of the actual opening of the hood (if there's a light bar or something, this doesn't count.). The capture volume is this multiplied by the depth. The Aperture dimensions need to be larger than the active area of the range top. Ideally, you'd calculate a line from the edge of the range that tilts out 10° from vertical (both to the side and to the front of the range). So the higher the hood, the larger it should be. You will almost never see them specified large enough. The capture volume is also critical; it creates a buffer where plumes of smoke and grease can be trapped before the fans are able to suck them away. No hood blower is powerful enough to keep up with big plumes of smoke and atomized grease without an adequate buffer. The good news is that if you have ample capture volume, you can get away with less air flow. Next time you visit a restaurant kitchen, take a look at the design of the hood. In most cases it will be large, and have 12" to 18" height. That height is mostly taken up by empty space; it's all about the capture volume. These big dimensions let the hood be mounted very high (so even your tallest, most ridiculous chef hat won't bump into it. You can even have the Pope come over and cook for you). And the hood will probably be quiet. Commercial kitchens can be loud places, but the hoods usually just sound like a whisper. Because with that design, they don't need massive airflow. You do need to consider air flow, but not in the way the salespeople tell you. The flow rate number that matters much more than CFM is the linear speed of the air, measured in feet-per-second. You want the air to be moving upward at a fast enough rate to influence the path of the grease and smoke. And you need the air to be moving over the louvers in the vent at a high enough speed to function properly. If the air is moving too slowly, the grease and the air don't get separated by the louvers, and the grease goes up the vent, coating the sides of everything and increasing the risk of fire. Cleaning out a long greasy 10" duct is a horrible job. If the air moves over the louvers at a high enough speed, the louvers change the direction of the air quickly enough, and the grease particles get centrifuged out in to the grease collection area, which is only slightly miserable to clean (it's designed to be cleaned; most louvers can also go in the dishwasher). There are formulas for calculating necessary linear air speed based on your dimensions.

I can share my hood research if anyone's interested. It's a few years out of date now; I don't know how much the landscape has changed. I identified a half dozen hoods that are likely to work to an acceptable standard (be able to keep up with most bursts of smoke and atomized grease from hot food hitting a pan, but not likely completely reliable). Another option is to buy an "insert" vent, which is the hood mechanism with louvers but no hood. This gets installed into a hood that's built as custom cabinetry. If you go this route, you can build the hood to dimensions that make engineering sense, and you can have a hood that works as well as a restaurant installation. Some advantages of this approach, if you do the design properly: It can be situated much higher than a standard hood, so no risk of knocking off your chef hat or sombrero (if you've got high enough ceilings). It can be designed to actually work. Meaning, nothing escapes. No matter how much smoke or how big the plumes of atomized grease you send into the air, they get captured. Your house will not smell like Cajun blackened fish. You won't need very high CFM, so it can be much quieter than a regular domestic hood, and you won't need as powerful a makeup air system. So it won't tank your heating / AC bills as badly. It can be made to match the style of your kitchen. Equipment costs can be lower, because of lower power demands. Installation price will probably be much higher.

Hoods are the hardest thing to buy, because the residential hood companies are mostly peddling nonsense and the commercial companies won't talk to you. Most of the conventional wisdom is wrong or misleading. Cubic feet per minute of air flow is not a useful measurement for much; there's no way to translate BTUs/hr of range power to CuF/m. The important factors are range dimensions and basic hood design, particularly the geometry and the cubic feet of hood capture area—a specification I've seen mentioned exactly never by a domestic hood company. Here's the best short summary of how to design a hood system that I've found. Here's a longer version (scroll past the health scare part). If you figure out an easy way to translate this into a purchase and design decision, please share!

We're about to move my mom out of the apartment where she's lived for 50 years, which means moving and distributing a whole lot of things. One of those things is a bottle of Poire William that might date to the 60s or 70s. The booze isn't that old (my dad has been refilling the bottle over the decades) but there's an ancient pear in there. I worry that this pear could basically be mush. Or could it be as good as ever? Will transporting this bottle risk demolishing the pear or will it be fine? Right now there's barely enough brandy to cover the pear; I'd top it off before moving it in order to minimize motion. Thoughs?

I forget if you covered this early, but wouldn't inulin be closer flax fiber than either of those gums?

One quick thought ... if I'm spending any real money on a pairing knife, I want one that doesn't have a bolster, and that has its heel separated from the handle. Like those Geshins Btbyrd shows. Otherwise sharpening is too hard. You want to be able to reach the whole length of the blade with your stones.