gfweb

And now for an alternative to the preceding lovely and healthful and restrained dinners. NY Strip, potatoes augratin, & maple seared Brussels sprouts.

Just so long as they aren't eating Airedales...

You could that. I just gently tilted the pan up and down. Perhaps slosh was an overstatement.

What's the advantage to putting an insert in a SVS?

Hard to measure the oil temperature "without liquid". There wasn't enough oil for a probe thermometer. The pan was steel.

You assume incorrectly. Evaporation of water from the frying potatoes cools the oil. In a small amount of oil this can have a large effect.

Frying some julienned potatoes (not quite a latke) in a little oil. The center just wasn't cooking at a rate comparable to the edges. I used a laser thermometer to take the temp of the slow-cooking center and the edge. Edge was 400 deg and the center was 290! I know that this is not news, but I was impressed at the magnitude of the temperature drop. Gently sloshing the oil back and forth raised the temp of the center to 350 and frying sped up nicely. If only using a little oil, clearly sloshing is in order

Why don't rice maker companies make a couple of modifications, change the label and call it a sous vide unit? Probably for the same reason that it took 40 years of toaster ovens before Breville had the wit to make one that really works well.

I have no particular trouble with eating horse, if one cares to. That dish looks awfully tasty. I do worry that contamination of "good" beef with meat from cattle at risk for BSE might well also be occurring if horse can so easily find its way into the beef supply. Horse meat is , after all, detectable. Meat from BSE-at-risk cows would not be. Is the fate of questionable cows trackable? Do we really know that its been destroyed? Beef is more expensive than horse and there would be economic pressure to use those BSE cows.

Very nice discussion of Montreal Smoked Meat and curing techniques here http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/794033

I grind it.

I use the same spices that are in the rub that I cure with... minus the salt and nitrate. The mix varies a bit and typically has allspice, cardamom, black peppercorns, onion powder, mustard seed and a clove or two. I use much less for the preSV rub than the curing rub...a light dusting.

Soaks take away some of the spice. I tend to re-apply a bit of the spices for the SV cooking.

I like 140 for two days. I'll use brisket if I plan to serve it as dinner and the less fatty round if I'm making lunch meat. I corn my own using a mix of spices that I find tasty.

Let me say at the outset that I have no experience with either unit. But when I see wording like this, I suspect marketing people are trying to differentiate the two products and not cannibalize their more expensive restaurant unit's sales.

Yes. This one or the one with Fabio et al.

I tend to corn my own. Its very easy and you can adjust flavor to your taste. Just dry rub with appropriate spices/pink salt/salt...let sit in fridge for a few days...then soak and rinse to desalt a bit and then SV with more spice rubbed on.

More expensive than your range, but the Breville Smart Oven is the most used appliance we have. Just a bit bigger than a toaster oven, it can handle a 1/4 sheet pan and a decent-sized baking dish. Toasts fine, broils great,heats fast. Just a great unit.

If I had won, and things were going well, I wouldn't have the time or the risk tolerance for a second go-around.

Some people think that Bittman hasn't really read the original article http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2013/02/28/no-its-not-the-sugar-bittman-and-motherjones-have-overinterpreted-another-study/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+ScienceblogsChannelMedicineHealth+(ScienceBlogs+Channel+:+Medicine+&+Health) This sort of media misreading of studies is commonplace. The narrative that the writer has in his head is what counts to him/her, not the actual facts. Studies are interpreted to fit their presuppositions, not according to what they actually say. It is as though science must be made to support the writer's point of view, as opposed to the writer's point of view being driven by the scientific evidence. The problem is compounded by the scientific ignorance of most journalists who don't understand statistics and the inherent limitations in experiments and surveys. A recent obit of C.Everett Koop highlighted how rare it is for a public figure to be data-driven rather than agenda-driven. Koop astounded political foes by sticking with the data rather than his political presuppositions regarding HIV and abortion. He was a heroic figure in a situation that was otherwise lacking in principled public servants.

White Castle!

I just went to the Lunchables website, and randomly picked the "Light Bologna and American Cracker Stacker" box that has no drink. 320 Calories of which HALF are fat calories. 50% of calories from fat isn't good nutritionally.I happen to be a devotee of the South Beach Diet so I am not fat-phobic - but I am very conscience of what the major source of those fats are. I also pay attention to the balance between fats, protein, and carbs. Also addressing the busy parent syndrome excuse: When we were raising our daughters we both worked (still do) and still prepared real food that we cooked. They got a fast food meal about once a week. And we ate dinner together - it was a priority. I just went and looked at one of the meals with water. The ones that come with water ALSO come with a Kool-aid packet to add to the water. That makes it sugar water in the end. A 320 cal lunch is probably less than what most of us get from our sweetened coffee during the course of the day and certainly is less than the typical lunch. Yes 50% was fat, but 50% of a fairly small lunch is still a fairly small amount of fat. Do school lunches do as well? I doubt it. Not that I'm a defender of Lunchables, but come on, a slice of pizza is worse, a couple hot dogs are worse. Kids ain't vegans.

How much sodium, sugar and fat do you think are in the ones you remember? We can always think of worse stuff to feed kids - Bud Light has already been mentioned! Have you been talking to your mayor? What should a kid eat for lunch if not a sandwich and a cookie? Does giving him PB&J constitute child abuse?

The Lunchables that I remember aren't so bad nutritionally. Crackers, lunchmeat, cheese, some fruit maybe, a cookie?...sort of a deconstructed bag lunch. They are expensive for what you get, but not the horror that has been implied. I can think of worse things to feed a kid.

Cooks Illustrated answered the last question. They found that jarred minced garlic didn't taste the same as fresh minced when raw, but cooked they were equivalent.