[Battle of the Khao Soi]

Pulling this from the depths to ask a question... no pickled mustard greens available where I live, no luck finding a Canadian mail order source and fresh mustard greens to pickle myself aren't an option here either. Any suggestions for another green I can pickle that would make a viable, even if imperfect, substitute?

[Food in the time of a pandemic]

Just now, Anna N said:

 

Not to be flippant but indeed for we introverts— our time has come. 

Yes it has. Who knew hermit chic would become fashionable?  I decided to take a break from just in case prep for a couple days, just didn't feel like shopping again. I'm not of the tinfoil hat variety but it seems a bit odd when the hospital suddenly brings in more beds and starts setting up an assessment area outside of the actual hospital building and people who work there say things like "we're expecting the virus to be here in two weeks" like they spoke with it's agent and there was room on it's schedule to stop here on it's way west or something. So I'll continue what prepping I plan to do next week just in case that isn't just pessimism and they know something the rest of us in town haven't been told yet.

[Food in the time of a pandemic]

It's been getting above freezing during the day every day for over a week now so I worked to get the last of the ice and snow off of the back deck and tossed some burgers on the grill for me and the kid tonight. Still not isolating but, since my normal lifestyle is largely go to work, go to the store when necessary, go home, I've been preparing for this for years. Plus, my closest neighbor's house can't even be seen from my house once the leaves are on the trees so maintaining distance doesn't require any special effort from anywhere on the property. So really, the only difference to my lifestyle if they were to go to full lockdown is I wouldn't be going to work. 

[Food in the time of a pandemic]

After the initial panic-shop hit, the local store has recovered pretty well. They implemented limits on some items when they restocked and still don't have toilet paper but for the most part, you can get anything you normally could. The difficulty they were having getting certain things in didn't seem to last long but those are the things that now have limits. Toilet paper isn't an issue for me. I keep a small stock in the house anyway, daughter in house, but when everything disappeared from the shelves locally about 3 weeks ago and still hadn't reappeared as of this week, I ordered a case (48 rolls) through one of our suppliers at work and tucked it in a closet. Strangely, one of the things that was entirely cleaned out is canned coconut milk. Plenty of cow, soy and rice milk and even a hefty amount of evap on the shelf but not a single can of coconut milk. Fortunately, whoever grabbed all the cans didn't notice the 1 liter cartons on the next shelf over so I was still able to make my Massaman curry.  I'd send Anna some frozen veggies if that was possible, those don't look like they've been touched at all. 

[Easter chocolates 2020]

5 minutes ago, Jim D. said:

I can easily freeze the boxes for future use (there is nothing Eastery about them)

That's pretty much the case for what I wanted to do this year other than the "easily" part... I really don't have the freezer space available right now. I'm not doing too much stocking of people food at this point but I had to do some hefty just-in-case stocking for my pets because I can't get their food locally. And it has to stay frozen until needed so my little chest freezer is now a pet food freezer which means I'll have to either buy another freezer or not freeze chocolate.

[Easter chocolates 2020]

Anybody else thinking Easter production isn't gonna be worth it this year? I had big plans to try something different (for me) this year but Easter is coming fast and I'm not seeing a lot of potential for it to be worth the work in my area right now. There are a lot of untouched looking Easter candy displays in the local businesses right now and the stores have been ridiculously busy so people just aren't interested right now. I'm sure there will be a mad dash for those displays closer to the date for people with kids but I'm still not seeing a lot of potential for what I do this year.

Edit: and I really need to proof read before posting... 15 minutes in timeout for overuse of "right now."

[Food in the time of a pandemic]

24 minutes ago, Anna N said:

I thought I would try another tactic and see if my daughter would do a pick up. There are no pick up slots available until April 8. 

Stories like this are what made me finally concede a little bit to the situation. I don't want to be caught with my pants down... especially with younger daughter still at home. So I did an inventory to see where I'm at. It was as I expected, food choices would get boring fast but we wouldn't go without something to eat for easily 3 - 4 weeks. I built on that a little bit by stocking up more on basics (flour, sugars, yeast, etc.) and upping the freezer content. I'm ignoring fun and fancy to save the space for high mileage. Mostly have flat, easily stacked 1 lb packages of ground beef and ground pork in the freezer right now. I already had 10 lbs. of Nathan's beef franks I ordered through a supplier at work in there as well as a few lbs of homemade breakfast sausage. The dogs were in preparation for warmer weather and grilling which still works because I already filled both tanks for my grill. That's about as far as I'm going to go right now, although I may add a few meat options that would be good in the smoker since the weather is starting to warm up. I don't expect the local store to shut down any time soon, the main reason I did this is because my son-in-law works at said local store and he told me they're having trouble getting some things in from their suppliers. But hearing about wait times to even be able to get groceries is definitely an added incentive to be a little less casual about it.

[Stuffed Cabbage Rolls: Cook-Off 36]

I previously posted this in the dinner thread because I completely forgot this one existed so this is a few weeks old. But just to throw a different twist in the list...



I stuffed these with homemade Cajun chaurice sausage and rice and topped 'em with a spicy Cajun style tomato sauce. I was happy with the result.

[Corned Beef At Home: Recipes, Tips, etc.]

I made the decision to give the good St. Patrick's corned beef a pass this year. Both the making and the eating. I wasn't getting excited about the idea of making it this year and the quality and price of what's generally available locally at the store makes that an easy no. But I'm still gonna enjoy seeing what everybody else did. 

[Mezcal]

So the mezcals available through the LCBO have always been of the very low to no smoke variety. I see they now have the Sombra Joven in stock and got excited until I read a few reviews saying it would appeal to fans of Islay scotches. My only experience with Islay scotch is the Laphroaig Quarter Cask which I disliked so much, even as a mixer, that I gave the entire $90 bottle, minus a couple ounces used in discovering I didn't like it, to a friend who loves the stuff. So I was hoping someone here can place this mezcal on the chart for me as compares to my Islay experience. If this stuff is loaded with that iodine and bandages thing the Laphroaig has going on, I'll take a definite pass. 

[Confections! What did we make? (2017 – )]

On 3/13/2020 at 5:26 PM, teonzo said:

I made a first batch of 3 kg, then now I'm making a second batch of 2.5 kg.

I'm genuinely impressed. I don't think I've eaten enough oranges in my entire life to save up 5.5 kg of peel... and I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that. 

[Pastry cream using whipping cream instead of milk?]

6 hours ago, pastrygirl said:

 

heavy cream AND butter would be quite rich, but I could see replacing milk + butter with cream and no additional butter to skip a step …

Yep, that would work too. "Six of one, half dozen of the other" scenario. 

[Pastry cream using whipping cream instead of milk?]

16 hours ago, AKS613 said:

Thanks everyone. I guess I’ll stick to the tried and true. 🙂

Don't stick to the tried and true based on what I said. Make a small batch with cream and see what you think. I was just relating my experience, not trying to deter you from having your own. You may decide it's the greatest thing ever and you'd be right because it's yours, not mine.

[Chocdoc and Friends Munch Michigan]

12 minutes ago, Kerry Beal said:

Only hint

 

 

 

If the more rock-like texture is really as simple as I've come up with from your hint, I hate my brain's lack of creativity because that one's been right in my face for a long time. The kid uses basically the same idea for certain types of texturing with her sculpture work. 

[Pastry cream using whipping cream instead of milk?]

I've done it and found it a waste of more-expensive-than-milk cream in my opinion. Pastry cream made with whole milk with the egg yolks and butter is rich enough that I didn't see a real benefit to the additional fat from the cream. If anything, it almost pushed it into that area where it's an unpleasant mouth feel. Where you feel like your mouth is coated in a greasy feeling after eating it. But that could just be me.

[Chocdoc and Friends Munch Michigan]

19 hours ago, Kerry Beal said:

May I just say that we all became so attached to this man and his family in the past 3 days that we were all pretty much in tears when we left.

In a thread full of amazing food and beautiful chocolate work, that one line tells me all I'd need to know about the man and his family. 

[Confections! What did we make? (2017 – )]

8 hours ago, Jim D. said:

I try to remember to find it all funny (as I bang a mold on the counter to the point where I think I may prove that polycarbonate can be shattered).

I haven't shattered a mold yet but I once had 17 of 18 pieces fall right out and after a few polite taps didn't dislodge the remaining piece, I smacked it on the table hard enough that the entire bottom piece of chocolate from closing the cavity blew off. The shell and most of it's filling was still in the mold though. My usual "something's wrong, go bother Kerry" resulted in her suggesting sticking it in the freezer briefly which I did and it came right out after that. But the damage had already been done so I had to eat it. That was a shame. 

[Food in the time of a pandemic]

6 minutes ago, JeanneCake said:

Kim, you've made me remember I should have a plan for milk

Fortunately, if it got to that point here, I'm ok with evaporated milk. We always had regular milk in the house growing up but we also always had cans of evap in the house because it was cheap. Me and my 4 brothers and sisters grew up on hot cereals for breakfast and apparently it was cheaper to have us use evap on our hot cereal than the regular milk. So it's what I was used to and I still like it so I could get by on it if I had to. I don't love it as a beverage but I don't drink a lot of milk anyway and, diluted with water, I'd rather drink it than the powdered stuff I've had.

[Sponge Candy, Cinder toffee, Sponge toffee, whatever]

When Heston Blumenthal does aerated chocolates, he places the molds in a vacuum chamber and pulls enough vacuum to increase the bubbles and loft then leaves it under vacuum until the chocolate sets. Would that work with sponge toffee? I'd take one for the team and find out but I don't own a chamber sealer. If someone else decides to take one for the team, I accept no responsibility if you end up with hardened sugar all over the inside of your machine. 

[Meeting-friendly snacks to bake]

3 hours ago, teonzo said:

I can only imagine how good the Audrey Hepburn brownies could be.

 

Admit it, you wanted to leave off "brownies"... or is that just me.  

The brownies do indeed look tasty though.

Edit: I just realized (2 hours after I posted this) the original post was actually "Katherine Hepburn‘s brownies". Is it bad that my brain automatically inserts Audrey any time it sees any mention of a Hepburn? 😆

[Ganache: Tips, Techniques & Troubleshooting]

8 hours ago, keychris said:

 

Depending how much of each we're talking, coconut cream and heavy cream have quite different fat levels (24ish vs 35ish%) which could have an impact on your ganache texture.

There is that. I'm usually going in the opposite direction so I hadn't considered that. With the stuff available locally where I live, adding a packet of coconut cream powder to a can of coconut milk puts it almost exactly at the fat level of heavy cream so I do that sometimes if I want to introduce coconut flavor to an existing ganache recipe.

[Ganache: Tips, Techniques & Troubleshooting]

14 hours ago, GRiker said:

It's from Greweling's Chocolate and Confections at home.

I have that book, it never occurred to me before, but I could just replace the cream of coconut with more heavy cream and see how that tastes. 

[Ganache: Tips, Techniques & Troubleshooting]

6 hours ago, Jim D. said:

Ewald Notter has a very good lime ganache that I use frequently.

Thanks! I have one of his books, I'll see if it's in there.

[It's Fat Tuesday!]

2 hours ago, gfweb said:

whats your sausage recipe?

I use brown sugar, salt, pepper, cayenne, crushed red pepper, dried thyme, ground coriander, dried sage and the thing that finally brought it together. I kept messing with the proportions of the aforementioned ingredients and couldn't get exactly what I was looking for. The flavor was nice, it just wasn't really popping . So I tossed a little MSG in my next batch and that was the ticket. I'm not super careful with the measurements but for 1 pound ground pork I use about 1 tsp brown sugar, 1 tsp salt, 3/4 tsp pepper, 1/2 tsp crushed red pepper, 1/4 tsp thyme, 1/4 tsp coriander, 1/4 tsp MSG and anywhere from 1/2 to 1 tsp cayenne and sage depending on what I'm in the mood for at the moment. Sometimes I go even higher on both the cayenne and crushed red pepper and I've left the sage out completely a few times. I've also substituted a couple tbsp. maple syrup for the brown sugar. I've made a mild version by leaving out the cayenne and using less crushed red pepper. Basically, I got a base sausage I was happy with and I just play around with it now and then.

[Easter chocolates 2020]

26 minutes ago, Louise nadine brill said:

Haha...it is such a strange mould!

Yeah, it is. I had no choice, had to have it. I keep avoiding buying holiday specific molds just because of the once-a-year usage factor but I know someday I'm going to have break on that.