paulraphael

I haven't been following the creami thread, is there concern that it doesn't grind as fine as a Paco? Maybe. I haven't experimented enough yet. Thyme is a burly herb compared with things like mint and basil; I've found that it infuses nicely on the stove when you cook ice cream the old fashioned way. My curiosity with sous vide is about 1) is there an ideal extraction temperature to get the best flavors, and is it close enough to the ideal cooking temperatures for dairy proteins? and 2) can you capture more vibrant flavors by infusing in a sealed bag? The sealed bag aspect is often the most interesting. You can retain so many delicate aromas when you use sv for things like seafood and vegetable stocks. But sometimes you can get more than you bargain for (garlic!) As far as temperatures, I've been reading all the food science papers I can find, and there's very little guidance on temperature vs. flavor for herbs. You could fill a library with papers on this topic regarding teas and coffees. One of these summers I'll have to do a whole lot of tedious experiments. Please post your results!

One thought: if you're mostly making ice creams and sorbets with a Paco Jet, you get most of its advantages if you serve right after processing. While you can certainly make ice cream ahead of time to store in the freezer, you'll then have to formulate your recipes much more like conventional ones, in order to preserve the texture. You won't be able to do magic tricks like making a sorbet out of 100% fruit unless you're serving it immediately.

Most freezers should get that cold. That's the temperature I keep my freezer and it's not a fancy one.

Funny, I always do the opposite. When I see a recipe like carrot cake that uses oil, I see how much butter I can substitute. Butter tastes better. Especially if you brown it. I'll get additional moisture from water in added dairy (yogurt, sour cream, creme fraiche etc.) or by subbing in a sugar syrup (honey, trimoline).

Same Sorrel. She's doing something really clever by taking advantage of the Paco Jet. By grinding up the herbs after they're frozen solid, she's not allowing the enzymes to go to work and brown leaves (and wreck the flavors). The enzymes are inactive at those low temperatures. It's a similar idea to what Dave Arnold does with his nitro muddling technique for cocktails. My approach to herbs in ice cream is always changing. I'm a little surprised by how adamant my earlier posts are in this thread; some of these herb flavors—especially mint—are the most challenging to get right in my experience. Mint is just so incredibly delicate. Lauren Eldridge's approach should work with mint, but only with a Paco Jet or equivalent. Next week I'm actually visiting a consulting client on-site to help him work out a process for fresh mint flavor. He's opening a liquid nitrogen ice cream shop, so we're hoping to work out a process that takes advantage of the LN2. Probably will share some elements of the Dave Arnold and Lauren Eldridge methods.

Yeah, when I got much above 70% in my pizza attempt days, the dough became unmanageable. My kung fu wasn't good enough. Kitchen ended up looking like a kindergarten craft project gone wrong, and there was lots of yelling.

This was my idea of heaven when I was a teenager growing up in Chicago. Of course back then, the only thing I wanted from food was MORE. I can't eat this stuff anymore. It doesn't even register as pizza.

I'd like to see a side-by-side comparison of the Nemo, the Paco Jet, and the Ninja. Not holding my breath ... probably not too many people have all 3.

I convert almost every recipe to grams. I found a downloadable table online years ago, and have added to it and changed some of the values based on my own measurements. It annoys me to have to do this. I'd rather punish publishers and never buy a book that's so retrograde as to only have cup and teaspoon measures. But alas, in some cases there's no better book. I don't like volume measurements at all, even in metric. You've got a scale; why not just weigh your liquids? Measuring cups are all wildly inaccurate anyway. The exception to all this is cocktails. Even the most science-minded mixologists have found that the old-time volume measures work best for booze. I also sometimes use measuring spoons for ingredients like leavening, if I'm in a hurry and accuracy isn't important (pancakes, etc.). Breaking out the 0.01g scale for this stuff can be a bit time consuming.

Since discovering sherry vinegar I almost never reach for regular red wine versions. This palomino vinegar is a great all-purpose choice, and costs around 72¢ an ounce. Makes everything better. One red wine vinegar I still keep around, mostly for certain kinds of vinaigrettes, is this Grenache vinegar. Very bright and fruity, in a way that sherry vinegar never is. But it's over the budget, especially if you include shipping (they have it on Amazon for about $1.40/oz last I checked).

My policy is to cook the meat properly, and send the barbarians to the microwave. Walk of shame.

I’ve been making sourdough pancakes lately. They work equally well baked in a skillet or on a griddle. for the skillet version I preheat the skillet in the oven, add butter and apple or pear slices in a layer on the bottom, and slide it into the oven. Flip it onto a plate. I think any typical pancake batter would work.

https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2022/dec/25/mafia-themed-food-items-unacceptable-says-italian-farmers-group

Blue Star the disaster that they were several years ago. The company did a redesign of the problem parts (in 2016 maybe?) and now their reliability is closer to average for high-end ranges. Which sadly isn't anything to brag about. When you look at complaints, look closely. These ranges have qualities some consider a feature and others a bug. They're designed to be user-maintained. Things like ignitors (even in the oven) are user serviceable. The ranges come apart like lego (you rarely need more than a Philips screw driver) and many of the parts that need replacing are industry standard—so you don't even have to replace with Blue star OEM parts. People who expect a luxury product that will never ask them to pick a screwdriver are not thrilled with this bargain. Know which team you're on. It's true that Blue Star is is not the only game in town for high BTUs. But if you want true open burners—and for me this is not negotiable—there are only three makers left: Blue Star, American Range, and Capital.

I think that's probably right. I don't find the Appleton especially rough, but it has a burnt / bitter edge that reminds me of dark molasses. I worried that the flavor would be too strong in the ice cream. It wasn't. My thoughts are that either 1) as Blue Dolphin suggests, the sharp edge just becomes character when softened by the sugar and dairy, or 2) the sugar and dairy are so dominant that you'll have a hard time differentiating between any rums. Remember that you're basically making a tiki drink that's under 3% ABV. As they say in science, "further research is warranted."

Almost anything can work in a paco jet, so it's impossible to say if a paco jet recipe will work in a regular ice machine without analyzing it.

Hi, sorry for the late reply. Just saw your post. You've gotten the right answers on making your own. It would not be a cornstarch blend, but rather an enzymatic process that I've never heard of anyone doing at home. I feel your pain on the cost. Atomized glucose is supposed to be cheap. The crazy prices are because of global supply chain woes. I don't have a clue about the details of this, but it was confirmed by a food scientist I spoke to at a national ice cream brand. They're scrambling to find more affordable alternatives. I find it baffling that prices would be high even in the US, where we have a permanent corn glut. But maybe most of the glucose powders are produced in China? Who knows.

I offer a recipe and a rant rebuttal.

Exactly. Whatever you get, avoid things that can have errors that generate error messages. I'm in your boat right now, kind of. In a new (to us) 120 year-old house that ravenously devours money. I'd love to replace the 30" electric range with a 36" Bluestar. But there's no budget this year for a major kitchen Reno. I have the luxury of waiting, because the stupid electric range is not broken (yet). Also the kitchen isn't starved for workspace. Sounds to me like you need that 6" of counter space more than another pair of burners. If this is true, go for the 30" range. The cool factor of the big one might come with a worse workflow. I want 36" for fairly specific reasons. I'd like to have the so-called simmer burner front center, because I do lots of sauces, and the regular open burners are too big for things like the 0.75L saucepans I often use. I also find crowding to be a nuisance with big stock pots and 12" skillets, etc. But 36" ranges have some drawbacks. One is that the oven is probably going to be bigger and more energy-hungry than what you need most of the time. I don't think you get more power with the 36" oven, which means you'll get longer preheat times. The 30" ovens are plenty big. I believe they'll take a full-sheet pan (can someone confirm?)

Ha. No, just curious. Unfortunately your range is from a time when they were having major quality problems. I'd say "quality control" but many of the problems look like design flaws ... like the oven floor rivets, and the door hinges. They've fixed all this stuff. I know that doesn't do you any good. And I know no one wants to spend $400 on an oven thermostat—but I don't think that's the worst news. Those are parts that do die over the course of decades. A bonus with Bluestar is they come apart like lego and are easy to work on. There are youtube videos that show you how to replace the part, and probably the only tool you'll need is a philips screwdriver. The only thing that looks tricky is routing wires through the oven.

Is this the RCS you bought in the early 2010s?

Some believe gingerbread architecture should fit the spirit of its time.

Interesting. Too late for us for that. Recessed fixtures are all installed.

I haven't seen that Hue switch. We're fans of Hue lights for some rooms (probably not the kitchen). Our favorite switch for them is the Aurora (ironically, it's made by Lutron). It's exactly like the one you linked but only one button. We find it perfect. You don't choose scenes from the wall switch ... you just get the last one used. But you get on, off, and dimming, with a 100% intuitive single control. It can snap on to an un-smart wall switch (and keep you from turning off the hard-wired switch) or stick on a dummy wall plate. We love these for the living room and bedroom. But they only control Hue bulbs, and there aren't any of these that make sense for the kitchen.

Yes, the Diva switch looks like an improvement. And it's new as of this summer. We're hoping they have an improved Pico in the works. It's so strange to me that I haven't found a single review complaining about the user interface. They have Pico switches at my girlfriend's office; she says everyone fears / mocks them.