Magictofu

I was offered one of the newer edition for review and it does cover most bases but because it lacks some of the old fashion recipe people expect in this book, many do not like it. So my suggestion is to find out exactly why you want this type of encyclopedic book and make your choice based on that.

I am thinking that you might have forgotten to add sugar to your cure.

If you are scared, the easy way is to cook them, debone them, place the flesh in a mold, cool in the fridge, cut slices, add bread crumbs and pan fry. If you have access to Bouchon (or is it in the Frrench Laundry?), there is a great recipe. I once prepared a variation of this dish and wrote a post on my old blog about it: http://slurpandburp.blogspot.com/2006/01/p...-de-cochon.html

Thanks David for the nice comments about the picture. It was actually taken by my mom's partner. pfunk_49, no worries about hijacking the thread, it should be about venison loins anyway. Your idea seem quite interesting and might try it next time I can put my hands on venison.

I have read a lot of contradicting articles over the last few years about weight loss, nutrition and health. The amount of information currently available to anyone who want to cook meals in a way that is conductive to weight loss and health is so massive and contradictory that I am trully unable to provide any suggestion for a decent cokbook. I too am in need of a culinary compass here. I often think that anybook with the word "low" in its title does not start on the right track. I would love to find good books with words like "balanced", "nourishing" etc. in their title. I have read good reviews of the new Bittman's book from a health and weight loss perspective. Any comments on this book or any other similar book?

This is an interesting point and it should factor in the design of your oven. The more mass (i.e. bricks and concrete) the more stable the temperature will be over a period of time after firing it but the longer (and the more wood) it will take to bring your oven to temperature. Backyard pizza fanatics might prefer a lighter construction in order to have pizzas more often but serious bakers might prefer having more thermal mass to increase their baking time.

I slurp because its a lot more fun.

Anyhting that you can bake in a normal oven should work in a wood oven... baked pasta like lasagna should work great.

VDPloeg, I actually wanted to try the american version of Canadian Bacon knowing very well that this is not what we, Canadian, are used to. I agree with you that the Charcuterie recipe tastes like ham. However, I can't recall eating "smoked" back bacon here... could it be a variation mostly found in Southern Ontario? Is it different rom peameal bacon?

It took me a while to report back but here's the result: venison roast with a port wine sauce, green beans, braised red cabbage and mashed jerusalem artichokes. Sorry for the messy plate, this is not restaurant food and does not have to be perfect. It was appreciated by all but in retrospect I realize that I should have done a better job at removing the silverskin to make sure that all bites would be as tender as possible. I'll know better next time. I also think that my sauce could have been a bit less reduced, it was a bit too thick and strong in flavour.

I like to eat them raw when walking along rocky beaches in the St-Lawrence estuary. They overcook easily.

Alkaline water is used in dough to make them more elastic... it should be used in very small quantity because it can be dangerous to ingest it.

There is an interesting table comparing the different standards for raising chicken in the UK (Europe?) on Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstal's Chicken Out website: link I will never argue that you can't find anything better from a small local farms but the organic standards are the only ones that we have appart from national standards that applies to everyone. Livestock on a small farms can be badly treated if no one is there to enforce some minimal rules. If you know or trust a small local farmer that is willing to provide you with meat I agree that you are probably better off but in the absence of such relationship, organic labels are extremely useful.

Section 3 of the OCIA International Certification Standards document is also prescribing minimal welfare standards (link)

Because all the certification standards I am aware of prescribe minimal animal welfare standards. Here's an excerp from one of the certification organization (ecocert Canada) that I see very often around where I live: (http://www.ecocertcanada.com/eng/RABAN_E_2009.pdf) There might be cases when dubious certification organizations have no similar standards but since the label organic is increasingly reglemented by government worldwide, I assume, perhaps wrongly, that such organizations are rare.

Even supermarket organic food has to follow minimal standards. While it is probably true that there are farmers and firms that only follow the very minimum to obtain their certification, I would argue that even this small step is a good one. I never understood why so many people always talk about nutrients and pesticide residue when they talk about organic food... it seems like a very minor issue compared to the wider environmental and animal welfare benefits. I tend to prefer organic eggs, dairy and meat over fruits, vegetables and grains because of the animal welfare benefits (and often taste benefits) but will always pick organic produces when the price difference is not too large.

My 2 years old son banging pots and pans together?

Q: What is white, wiggly and goes through walls? A: A piece of magic tofu

Citric acid was mentioned earlier. Do people use it at home?

I sent an email to the manufacturer about the bitterness I was talking about, they responded almost immediately (impressive!). Here's their answer: I never smoked anything for more than 3 hours but I think I'll cut the smoking time on my future experiments, it has the added bonus of saving me some money on bisquettes.

This is so unfair! We still have 3 feet of snow on the ground and are barely escaping of a cold snap with -30C (-22F) temperatures. I will start seedlings in a few weeks.

Often, the problem with acidity is that we do not have a wide choice of ingredients at hand to adjust a dish. Vinegar and citrus fruits comes to mind easily Than what do we have: - some other fruits like cranberries and granny smith apples - some herbs and vegetables such as sorrel - rhubarb What else?

No, I have a regular electric Bradley Smoker. I also replaced the pan with a larger one. Do you keep the damper completely open? I only leave a crack to keep some of the heat inside since I have only been using my smoker in the winter so far... yesterday the temperature dropped to -30C (-22F) so I thought closing the damper was the right thing to do.

My Canadian bacon is ready. I left it in the brine for about 72 hours and smoked it for a bit less than 3 hours. The result is a bit too salty to my taste and the smoke flavour too pronounced. Then I am more used to unsmoked peameal bacon than what Americans call Canadian Bacon. It is not the first time I got this very pronounced and a slightly bitter taste after smoking in my Bradley Smoker. I think I smoke things for too long in there... or is this something about this type of smoker?

Don't know about the position of razor clams but since these can live outside the water for a while, I assume the damp (not wet), dark and (very cold) regime should work. Mussels and some clams stay alive surprisingly long (don't know enough about razor clams though).