Shel_B

It really depends on what you want. I just finished infusing 10-oz of half-and-half with about 50 grams of dried mushrooms, mixed 20% shiitake and 80% porcini, and, as it is, the mushroom flavor is almost too strong for my intended use. Considering there will be butter and flour added to thicken the mixture (to make a condensed-type soup), as well as some aromatics and additional fresh mushrooms, it's expected that the infused flavor will be nicely balanced for my purposes. Here are the shiitake pieces before adding to the porcini pieces: And these are the porcini pieces: This is the combined pieces in the pot with 10-oz of half-and-half. Note the color of the dairy: I kept the temperature below boiling at all times. 208-degrees is the hottest I allowed the mixture to get: This shows the infused half-and-half ready to come off the heat. You can see it has a nice tan color. That color equals flavor, IMO: Finally, the strained infusion in a bowl, ready to be added to other ingredients to make the condensed soup:

If you look again, you'll see that the ingredient is Condensed cream of mushroom soup, which is an ingredient that we use in casseroles. Sorry if I'm too cryptic for you.

Let's see if I understand you. I want to infuse into milk or cream, and you're suggesting water ... is that correct? I don't necessarily want the dairy to evaporate, but if it does to some degree, it's the mushroom infused dairy taste that I want. Water will dilute the flavor of the dairy, yes? In the FWIW Dep't, some artisan cheeses are infused with mushrooms ... We can also add flavor in a more subtle way by infusing the milk with dried mushrooms,

Well, thanks for Googling around. I am not making a soup, rather, an ingredient that will replace an ingredient I can't get right now. I have no recipe just yet, only an idea, but I do want to try the dairy infusion as I think it will add to what I want to do. When I develop the recipe, and finalize the idea, I'll post it on eG. I found a couple of recipes that infuse dairy with mushroom pieces, so, at this point, I'm convinced it's a workable idea. In fact, there was a discussion here that I'd completely forgotten about, although it's for a dessert not a soup (which is not quite what I want to make in any case), as it's the infusion process that I am interested in at the moment. I'd be happy to send you the recipes I have in which the cream is infused with mushroom flavor. You said that I stated this step was but one of many in my 'recipe' - I didn't. What I said was that "the infusion would only be one step in the preparation ..." Since there's no recipe just yet, I can't say how many steps there may be, although the idea is taking shape.

Thanks for explaining that. The original idea was to infuse the dairy with pieces of dried mushroom, and at this point that's still the plan.

I am not making a cream sauce. The infusion I want to make will be done in milk or cream, so there is no water involved.

Pleased explain what difference it makes. I have several types - porcini, shiitake, candy cap, morel, and one other. I won't be using the candy cap, most likely a porcini-shitake blend.

Have you actually done that?

We have some potlucks coming up in the next couple of months, and the Condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup that we prefer is not available, so I decided to make my own. One idea that I want to play with is infusing the milk or cream with mushroom flavor from dried mushrooms. Might that work by simply heating the dairy and adding dried mushroom pieces and letting them steep? Is there more to it than that? And just to be clear, the infusion would only be one step in the preparation ... Thanks!

How did you get the heart-shaped brand on to the scallops?

Thanks for the compliment. I'm not yet very accomplished at making biscuits, so the puff pastry seemed like a good idea, and a good starting point for my first attempt. Certainly, other approaches to the topping will be tried. Circumstances dictated the easiest approach this time.

We don't drink much, so leftover wine and champagne is not unusual here, and I like to find uses for the leftovers. I used Dufour brand puff pastry. Ingredients are butter, flour, water, salt, and lemon juice.

We like parsnips, too, and I thought about using them, but the ones I saw in the market didn't look great, so I passed. Also, I sometimes think parsnips + carrots is a little much unless the proportions are just right. Having not made the pot pie before, I'd have just been guessing at the proportions. After making and eating this, I now have a better idea of what ingredients and proportions might work for subsequent pies. It's an evolving process.

This was quite an adventure. I never made a pot pie before, never used puff pastry, and I screwed up the recipe. I used way too much flour, and by the time I realized it didn't look right, I was deeply committed. I fiddled and fussed, and ended up saving the filling, but I also ended up with more pot pie than planned. There will be leftovers - lots of leftovers. But it turned out to be pretty good, especially for a first attempt. Use all dark meat chicken, as Toots doesn't care for breast. Chicken was diced and sautéed before adding to the dish. Sauce included champagne, left over from new years eve and frozen, butter, flour, chicken stock, cream, milk, tarragon. Other ingredients were carrots, leeks, celery, peas, and small onions. The puff pastry was Dufour, and the results were great. Buttery and flaky, except where the pastry came in contact with the filling. Seems that didn't help the flakiness. Overall I am happy with the first result, learned what I might do differently, and will definitely do this again.

Some years ago I bought a black Le Creuset "Dutch" oven. I'd already had a white one of about the same capacity, and had used a friend's orange-colored one several times. I discovered that I could reduce the oven temp by 25-degrees with the black pot and get the same results as with the other pots. I have two 8 x 8 baking dishes, one being a dark brown glass Pyrex (Visions, I think it's called) and the other a white Corningware dish. They definitely cook differently. I always make certain foods in specific dishes, never changing. For example, my brownies are made in the brown Pyrex, my baked rice in the Corningware. Here they are, side-by-side: I wouldn't say that dark pans work better, but they certainly work differently, and depending on what result you want, they could be better, or worse. What this has to do with the best way to clean a sheet pan eludes me, but it seemed like a good place to address your comment. I like the examples and explanation in the link.

That is what I saw on a chart on the Dufour site, but, to my mind, the chart was vague as it didn't specify the package I purchased. Thanks so much!

Not yet. Believe it or not, I've not had any sugar in the house except for about a cup or two of vanilla sugar, and no plain vinegar, just expensive vinegars for cooking, salad, etc. I picked up some sugar yesterday and later today or tomorrow I'll grab some inexpensive vinegar. Then, over the weekend, when I'm planning to use the oven, I'll give it a try.

I recently purchased a box of Dufour puff pastry, 14-oz. There's nothing on the box that indicated the size of the sheets. Does anyone know what the dimensions of the sheets are? Will it fit over a 9 x 9 baking dish with some overage? Thanks!

Repaire de Bandits Catalans, or more commonly described as Lemon Garlic Chicken. Turned out just fine, and if I were to make it today, it would be a lot better as I'm now a more experienced cook. One day I want to make Chicken with Garlic Pearls and Sauterne Wine Sauce, Poulet aux Perles d'Ail Doux et au Sauternes - no pork in either of these dishes. Remember, though, you can add other cheese ... not the same but often just as good or better.

It's often been suggested to store vanilla beans in sugar as the beans impart a vanilla flavor to the sugar. If vanilla beans impart flavor to the sugar, do they lose some of their flavor? Do the seeds, which don't come in direct contact with the sugar, lose any of their flavor? If the same vanilla beans and seeds are used with the vanilla sugar in a dessert, like a custard or panna cotta, would the dessert have a more intense vanilla flavor? Would using a "fresh" vanilla bean and the enhanced vanilla sugar provide greater flavor to the custard, etc?

Pork is a main ingredient in many recipes, and over the years I've experimented with omitting pork products from any number of recipes, sometimes intentionally, sometimes by circumstance (not having the ingredient on hand), and sometimes by accident. In just about every case, the dish suffered by leaving out the pork component. That said, sometimes another ingredient can be substituted (such as smoked turkey thighs in place of smoked ham shanks or hocks) in some dishes. Other times you end up with a much different dish than intended by the recipe, which is not always a bad thing. I think you'd have to try each dish you're interested in, and see how it works for you, or your guests. For example, there are some ingredients Toots doesn't like, and I either eliminate them or substitute something similar. IMO, many of those dishes suffer because of the omission/substitution, and it sometimes bothers me a lot that the change was made, yet Toots is happy and content, and that's what matters most to me. However, when I make the dish for myself, I wouldn't omit or substitute the ingredient. So I compromise ... we each get what we want, but not necessarily in the same dish at the same time. All that said, just because you may not prepare some (or many) of the recipes in a particular book, isn't, IMO, reason enough to not have it to complete your collection of the author's books. If you're buying the book as a collector, it's a different situation than if you're buying the book to cook from, although it seems you're looking to do both. I'd buy the book and be done with it. You can never tell when one of the recipes you'd never cook may come in handy, even if only for an idea or to share with someone else. I cherish my signed, first edition of The Cooking of Southwest France even though only one recipe from it has been prepared. I've learned a lot just from reading the book, which was enjoyable time spent.

Trader Joe's Frozen Pitted Dark Sweet Cherries: I've not seen these before, and have been looking for such an item for a while. A few days ago I found some at Whole Foods - they were a little more expensive than the TJ's product, and from the standpoint of taste, I found them to be comparable. At the local store, the TJ's cherries are $3.69 for a 1-lb package. By comparison, the Whole Foods brand was $3.99.

OSHA Regulatory Status This material is considered hazardous by the OSHA Hazard Communication Standard (29 CFR 1910.1200). http://www.rscbrands.com/products/msds/EBT32.PDF IMO, one would be foolish to use this in and around their home. What's your suggestion for disposing of the waste generated by using this. I checked with our recycling center, and, around here at least, it must be disposed of at a hazardous waste site.

My latest purchases were spices from Penzeys: cumin seed, three types of black pepper, Mexican oregano, and epazote.

A friend of mine noted something similar ...