Tri2Cook

I'm pretty sure that's exactly where he goes to forage. At least, when it's an option. I don't know what the foraging grounds are like where he is now but it looked like the (beautiful and scenic) middle of nowhere was where he was trekking before the move.

I know I'm frequently guilty of posting without pictures... but I had a bowl of rice for breakfast. Just your basic white rice with a little butter, salt and pepper. Didn't seem worth the bother of taking and posting a picture.

For some reason, even though I never make them, I tend to automatically think of the brightly colored Louisiana style when I hear Kings Cake. Took a second for that Galette des Rois to register. Kevin is a nice bonus.

I make it the lazier way... I add it to the shopping cart on chocolat-chocolat and click "order". I have made it myself and I really don't mind doing it, I just don't have a good place for pouring out a big batch where it can spread thin for cooling and I probably would mind making multiple small batches.

Yeah, I've seen that before. It's not really the same as asking for a half portion with nobody taking the other half but I can see their point. I think the logic there is probably, you're getting all of the service and filling the seating for two people but only spending the money for one person. I can see it being a problem if that's a normal occurrence for a location.

I'm betting you've done the microwave cakes using a cream whipper, how does the texture of this method compare? I like the whipper microwave cakes but this eliminates the need for and cleaning of the whipper. I don't doubt this is good or you wouldn't have posted it, just wondering what the texture is like.

It's not a common request at all where I work. We get the occasional customers that want to share something. I happily divide whatever it is between two plates rather than send out the plate with an accompanying empty plate because I'm nice like that ( actually, I just think it looks nicer that way and is more convenient for the customers... it's entirely possible they would prefer I didn't) but we don't get many requests for half-portions. I would say don't worry over it. If you want to ask about half-portions, ask. There is zero harm in asking, they won't chase you out or throw a spotlight on you or whisk you to the kitchen to make you the base for the next day's soup. They'll just say yes or no and maybe, if no, suggest things that are smaller or that are available as half-portions. There's no bad etiquette or anything involved with asking.

I was looking here. Not in a hurry anyway, just something to keep in mind for the future. I have enough chocolate stuff to concentrate on getting better at right now with the toys I already have.

I'm convinced... gonna have to search for the glycerine I thought I had. If I don't have it, ordering shall be done.

Absolutely, ask away. I don't mind making customers happy as long as they understand that it probably won't be an option with everything. The problem I run into is that there are a significant number of restaurant customers that don't have that understanding. Not the majority, but enough. So you send out a half portion of something to the person that requested it and the person sitting at the next table sees this. Then they ask for a half portion of what they want and throw a fit when told that item can't be divided. Those are the people that make me want to just toss a big "no" blanket over any and all special requests... but so far, I haven't allowed myself to go down that road.

I'd say it has to depend on type of food item. Other factors may be taken into consideration as well, but definitely that one. One place I worked built the lasagna in individual serving dishes during prep so we could just top it with cheese and toss it in the oven to order during the rush. A half-portion wasn't going to happen. I understand sometimes a person just wants a certain thing but expecting the restaurant to deal with the waste generated by dividing something that doesn't readily allow for the remaining portion to be sold to someone else so that the customer doesn't have to deal with that waste doesn't sound like a reasonable expectation to me.

Yeah, they have a decent selection of dried chilies. I ordered some in my last order. I don't order often, I try to wait until I have a nice cart-full because the shopping cart applies a 10% discount to the order once it passes the $100 point. So I plan things I want to make, add what I need to my cart and when it gets to the discount point, I order... and hope I'll get around to actually making all of the things I ordered for.

I look forward to seeing how this works out. I wanted to try it myself but kept putting off ordering the required glycerine. I thought I had some around here but if I do, I have no idea where I stashed it. Probably somewhere I knew I wouldn't forget...

Here's the link to the page. Like I said, I haven't messed with it yet so I'm not even sure if it's the same thing as we're discussing here. Sounds like it might be similar though. Edit: I just read through it again, been a while, and it looks like they forgot to mention adding the glucose listed in the ingredients during the instructions. I would assume it goes in during the heating though.

I did some searching for the casting/modling jelly the last time he posted something with the chocolate nails and had no luck. I did find a recipe for a DIY version but haven't tried it. It uses gelatin, water, glycerin, glucose and denatured alcohol.

Since I live a few kilometers north of nowhere, many things people can probably buy at their local gas station in a pinch aren't available within about 5 hours drive. For here in Canada, I use the South China Seas site for a lot of international ingredient stuff. A lot of the perishable stuff, they won't ship but in addition to the non-perishables, I can get fresh lime leaves, lemongrass and galangal and a few other tolerant perishables shipped.

They look awesome! Even with you pointing it out, I don't see anything that looks bad to me. But I do understand that perfectionist thing that makes the tiniest flaw on our own work be the only thing we can see when we look at it.

I'm thinking of today more as college football bowl game day than New Year's Eve and I don't really have any food traditions for the day other than making sure it's food that can be done ahead or that doesn't require any serious work so that I don't miss any game time being in the kitchen. I steamed a couple lbs. of shrimp and started a pot of soup in the crock pot this morning. The soup is my variation on a recipe I saw on Facebook. It's a bbq chicken soup that was using a little more convenience stuff than even I was happy with (and I don't snub that stuff as much as I probably should with my home cooking) so I modified it to my liking. Dessert wasn't in the plans at all but I called an audible this morning and made a batch of butterscotch pudding. The kid's gone to a friend's for the weekend so it's just me, the food and football all day. New Year's Day will probably just be leftovers... so I guess it kinda falls in line with Anna's tradition.

Me too.

Never had it, never even heard of it... but I have to admit I'm kinda fascinated by that recipe. I was surprised at the end to see the pinecones aren't just to infuse flavor but actually remain in the finished product. Now I want to try it. I really hope I remember to watch for the young green pinecones next spring.

It's out of my budget at either price but honestly, I'm not feeling any nagging desire to have it. I do hope it succeeds in funding for those who want it because it'll be fun seeing what people get up to with it. I think it's cool and 8 - 10 years ago me would probably be trying hard to find a way to fit it in the budget... but today me isn't really tempted. I might buy it if it were $100 (because it is cool) but I don't think I'd actually want it any more than I do now.

Nope. I'm not ruling out the possibility of operator error somewhere in the process, though it's not exactly difficult, but I'm really not all that impressed with it. It's not bad at all. it's just not good enough to be worth all the fancy ingredients that don't appear in more usual versions. Oh well, it got me off my behind and doing something yesterday since I had the day off and now I know.

Not sure if I'm sold on the peanut butter fudge or not. I guess I need to be fair and give it a day before I do an official taste. It's more ingredient and labor intensive than the peanut butter fudge my grandmother always made. At this point, tasting right after agitating before dumping it in the frame, the peanut butter flavor is definitely there and fine but not as intense as in my grandmother's version. I'm hoping the flavor will come forward more by the time it sets and ripens a bit. Can't compare the texture at this point since I just finished it. I think I'm going to hold off doing other flavors until I see what I think of this batch. If the flavor balances a little more and I like the texture, I'll give one or two others a shot.

I haven't had any bad handle burns at work but I've had more than one (which means I apparently don't learn from my mistakes) nasty steam burn across my wrist from popping a lid up on a pot to take a peek while in a hurry. One wrist has what seems to be a now permanent tattoo that looks more like a bruise than a burn where the blister usually appears each time it happens. Each time, after the requisite discouraging words are uttered, I tell myself "lift it the other way, dumbass". But somewhere deep inside, I know I'll do it again. So there's really no point in me saying "I will never again..." for that one.

There are some sandwiches in the book that sound pretty tasty and some not so much. So probably on par with what we'd get with a sandwich book published today. Despite my mocking it a bit in my previous post, I'd eat that limburger and bologna on rye. I just wouldn't expect a lot of company while doing so.