paulraphael

I've had no trouble doing this when making the dough with instant yeast. If you're using a sourdough culture, it's likely to cause problems. I mostly use sourdough for pizza now, so instead of freezing half the batch, I make a loaf a bread out of it.

Great find. I was shopping Amazon and the restaurant stores. Never saw a set of the casters for $40.

My biggest argument against casters is that they're shockingly expensive. I priced out some wire shelving a couple of years ago and the casters cost more than than everything else put together. I ended up improvising some light duty ones (which required some drilling ... I used the kinds that go on the bottom of a desk chair). But if you want the standard heavy duty ones that go with the shelving, you need to be a smarter shopper than me or plan a bigger budget.

Probably most of them, but the one I linked above is 25-1/2.

I just did a quick look on webreastaurant store. They have many under $2000. I just don't know anything about the quality or the noise level.

We're shopping for a new fridge, and are dismayed by how many of them seem crappy, or expensive, or both. It's also a bit of a challenge to find one that's relatively shallow (doesn't jut out far beyond cabinets) and that will fit in our 31" wide slot. This got me thinking about commercial reach-in fridges. We could get a separate freezer for not too much, and put it ... somewhere. The commercial fridges are so much better designed than the consumer nonsense that I want to round up everyone from LG to Sub Zero and stone them to death. I don't know why everyone isn't making a fridge that's rectangular on the inside, easy to clean, and with an unlimited number of adjustable shelf positions. For extra credit, it could be configured to hold sheet pans instead of shelves. My fear is that it would be loud. They advertise 1/4 horsepower to 3/4 horsepower compressors, and this makes me think of a portable generator or sump pump. Not something I want to cohabitate with. Also, I wonder if the affordable brands (like Avantco) are reliable. Would the actual good ones cost as much as the high end consumer fridges? Anyone with experience with these things? I'm assuming it will turn out to be a bad idea, but wanted to double check.

Agreed. And please don't call heavy cream, egg yolk, and a pinch of salt "ice cream." It's not.

My girlfriend says watermelon is a superfood, and I choose to believe.

I just figure that where there's food, there's smoke ... If you can't sear at high temperatures (or if you're dealing with something thin and especially vulnerable to cooking through) you can get some help from chemistry. I keep a blend onhand that's about 1 part baking soda to 5 parts dextrose. sprinkle it onto the food right after drying it. Shazam. Nearly instant maillard reactions. This could help get a good sear if you're forced to use a nonstick pan.

Sticking shouldn't be a problem with steak on any surface. Just don't try to move it until it's started to brown. Assuming the pan is hot enough, and the meat reasonably dry, it will release. Sticking problems are always technique problems.

I can't find much research on hydrogen peroxide as a sanitizer, except in specialized situations like breweries. Which seems strange—it's great stuff, is very safe to use, is non-corrosive to metals, doesn't damage textiles, etc. etc.. When I worked in a commercial kitchen ages ago we used Ajax-like stuff that said "oxygen bleach cleaner" on the label. It was peroxide based. The idea is that it wouldn't attack stainless steel the way chlorine bleach does. But I never see this stuff anymore. I recently found a Clorox hydrogen peroxide disinfectant online. The stuff is great—I used it to clean up the house after a recent bout of norovirus left the place disgusting and infectious (I won't go into details). This stuff is packaged for hospitals, with a huge label that tells you how to use it to kill everything. It's non-toxic and actually smells good! But it's a strong disinfectant, not a sanitizer. My only guess about peroxide's unpopularity is that weak solutions of it are unstable. They just last a little while, and then you just have a bottle of plain water.

Is this based on any research? Sounds dubious to me. Sandpaper comes in grits finer than the fiber structure of the wood. And I don't think the problem is microgrooves; it's deep grooves. FWIW, David Smith the Boardsmith finishes his wood boards with a belt sander before shipping them to customers. The surface is like glass.

Just don't use a planer on an endgrain board. You'll destroy the board and probably also the planer. 2nd hand advice from the Boardsmith.

Sandpaper (in a palm sander) has worked fine on all my boards. It probably depends on the depth of the grooves. I cut lightly, and use a serrated knife on my bread board only, so I'm not dealing with deep valleys.

Thanks for posting, Lisa. That's all very interesting, although it doesn't suggest that the quats are getting into the environment kitchen sanitizers. The small streams / muddy areas suggests that these quats did not originate in kitchen sinks that's drain to municipal sewers and sewage treatment. I suspect further study will show that the environmental quats are coming from other sources. Some of these sources they mention are new to me ... hand sanitizers and shampoos. These strike me as bad ideas.

In response to the original question, the most important thing with plastic cutting boards is to throw them out when they get deeply scored. Someone around here said they had luck sanding them smooth, but most people say they melt and make a gummy mess if you sand them, which makes them disposable. Beyond that, washing them thoroughly in hot, soapy water is the most important step, and is usually all that's necessary. Sanitizing is a perfectly reasonable precaution (I do it just as a good habit), but unless you're cooking professionally or cooking for people you know to be immune-compromised, it's optional. Vinegar is slightly effective. I think quaternary ammonium compounds (from the restaurant store or online) are the best all around (see above). Doing a thorough job with the washing is always most important. Sanitizers of all kinds (bleach included) are ineffective if there's any food residue on the board.

In what sense is quaternary ammonia less eco-friendly? It's non-toxic at working dilutions. It doesn't damage stainless steel or textiles like bleach does, it doesn't form carcinogenic dioxins like bleach does, it doesn't produce irritating fumes like bleach does. The only time you need test strips is if you're using it as the final rinse in a hand-washing sink and you want to make sure it hasn't been exhausted. Or if you want to check that your employees have mixed it properly. If you're mixing working solution in a spray bottle, you don't need test strips. The shelf life of the working solution in a bottle is over 6 months. I bought my 1-gallon jug of concentrate in 2008 and it's about 2/3 gone now. The concentrate has an indefinite shelf life. When it's gone I'll probably get tablets, like these. At under $9 for 150 gallons of working solution, price isn't much of an issue. I can see just two potential issues with quats: they're not effective against norovirus, which is one of the more common sources of foodborne illness. And they leave a germicidal residue on surfaces. This residue can remain active for many hours, possibly even a few days. There's some concern that this could play a part in creating sanitizer-resistant strains of bacteria. This is a hypothetical concern with quats, but the same phenomenon has been shown to be real with triclosan, which has led to efforts to ban triclosan in antibacterial soaps and hand cleaners.

The idea of extended cooking is somewhat misunderstood around here. It can potentially do just two things: -increase the solids content through evaporation. -get the milk proteins to work more efficiently as ice cream emulsifiers For the first function, this method is no better than simply adding solids in the form of nonfat milk. I'd argue that it's worse, because it's less controllable and is time-consuming. The second function is irrelevant if you have other emulsifying ingredients in the formula. Like egg yolks. Commercial ice cream makers like Jenni's use heat denaturation because they want to avoid eggs (an esthetic choice), and they want to avoid additional emulsifying ingredients (a marketing choice). If these aren't your concerns, then there's no compelling reason to go through the trouble. There's a slight chance that if you made two versions side-by side with identical final formulas (one made with heat reduction, one made with additional cream and nonfat solids and other solid ingredients) you'd get slight textural and flavor differences. But I've never seen this done—certainly not in a controlled, blind taste test. If you want to experiment with heat denaturization, at the very least do it logically and leave the eggs out. I've written about using denatured proteins as emulsifiers here, and as stabilizers here. The truth is that the published science on these topics, with regards to ice cream, is scarce. Most of the practical knowledge lies behind closed doors at places like Jeni's and Haagen Dazs. Jeni might give you some hints if you ask nicely but the big guys won't.

Some chefs / restauranteurs will buy just about everything used except refrigerators and freezers. They're money pits if anything's wrong with them, and you have to know an unreasonable amount to to effectively inspect them yourself. If any are local, maybe you could hire a repair person to inspect it? I see the dilemma. Blast freezers cost a fortune.

There shouldn't be any health concerns. The meat isn't breaded, so you're not adding fat. I haven't used the deep fry approach, but people I know who do this all fry after sous-vide, so they don't lose the crispness to the water bath. And they all get a deeper brown and more serious crust than what I'm seeing in your pictures. I'd suggest playing with oil temperature and time, and either just sticking with the post-fry, or try it both before and after.

Thanks Diana, the starter's going great. My goal is pizza, but have been making one or two big boules a week and am gradually refining the process. I've been finding most of my information online. I realize I don't care too much about formulas and styles; I'm not trying to build a repertoire of different kinds of bread. I have an idea of the kind of daily bread I like (a S.F.-like sourdough boule with a bit more subtlety) and what kind of pizza dough (about 3/4 of the way from NYC to Naples). What's most helpful is sources on the science and on techniques. The folklore and self-contradictory advice and anti-science makes me lose my mind. I don't know how anyone puts up with it. My best source so far has been at pizzamaking.com. I've found things like temperature/activity graphs for wild yeasts and lactobacilli. Between this and understanding gluten development it seems you could make whatever kind of bread you wanted. I've already disowned a lot of what I've learned from Peter Reinhart. I've made pretty good bread by his methods, but his arguments go against the science. You can make the same bread or better bread by faster and simpler methods. I'm intrigued by Hamelman ... maybe I'll get his book. But may be content with the web for a while. I'll check out wildyeast blog and perfectloaf. Thanks again!

I think Deryn's idea would probably work. It's pretty close to a baked hollandaise sauce (minus the wine). The whipped yolks in a hollandaise are called a sabayon—the French version of zabaione / zabaglione. A contemporary approach would be to use an N02 siphon. Blend the yolks, sugar, milk/cream, put into the siphon, foam into your custard cups, and cook in a water bath. I'm guessing it would maintain its foam structure.

I, for one, welcome our new popsicle overlord. Can you school us a little on how you make these?

Has anyone tried making pistachio paste with a vitamix or similar blender? I make nut butters all the time in mine, and contrary to what I was told, get results that are as smooth as anything from the store. Results depend somewhat on the oil content of the nuts. Almonds (which are similar to pistachios) need a little added oil to blend smooth. But pecans and walnuts have more than enough on their own. I wouldn't want to do this all day ... these blenders are irritatingly loud, and a bit of a pain to scrape out. I got a silicone spatula that's the right size for contours of the jug, and I use earplugs. For once a week or so it's pretty painless.

I forgot this topic existed. And am glad no one was overly confused by my abbreviating locust bean gum "lcb." I've done a lot of experimenting since last year and have completely ditched this Migoya formula, but not locust bean gum, which seems to be the best of the conventional gums for taming ice crystals. The xanthan / lbg combination forms a pretty strong gel. The base will turn into a thick pudding when it ages, and will need to be turned into a fluid gel with a stick blender before you can spin it. Even then, the viscosity will be very high; more than what's ideal for most ice creams. This formula might work for a very low-fat or no-fat ice cream that benefits from the gelling (to make up for a lack of creaminess. Xanthan is also not the most efficient stabilizer. I've ditched it and now use a more conventional combination of locust, guar, and carrageenan (I use lambda carrageenan, because it doesn't form a gel in dairy). Right now my favorite ratio is 4 : 2 : 1, with the total of this used at around 0.15%. There's a lot of wiggle room. If you want more body and chew, increase the guar. If you want a thicker, creamier melted viscosity, increase the carrageenan. I've written about this in much greater detail here.