blue_dolphin

I'll go ahead and add my 2 cents on the the Ninja Creami. You specified a batch size of 1 - 2 qts. The Creami containers hold either 1 pint for the original or 1.5 pts for the newer machine. Neither are going to make the batch size you specified although it's possible to prep and freeze multiple Creami containers (assuming you've purchased them) and spin them one after the other. If you want to learn about the art and science of ice cream making, a true ice cream machine is probably the better choice. There will likely be a learning curve. If you want to play around with lots of flavors, make quick sorbets or frozen yogurt from summer fruit, those small Creami containers are a plus. You can spin as little as 1/3 of a pint. You don't really need to learn a lot about ice cream to use the thing. You may need to put stuff back in the freezer to firm up if the spin cycle warmed your mix up too much or you might need a quick re-spin if your ice cream has gotten too hard sitting in the freezer but it's usually pretty edible once you've gotten that down. If you do get a Creami, I'd recommend skipping their recipes, unless they've improved them a lot. I tend to use ice cream recipes from my cookbooks or that handy sorbet template that was shared here a while back.

You might peruse this topic about the Ninja Creami. Quite a few of us have one. And this topic on homemade ice cream may also be of interest.

I guess I'm a lazy eater but I also prefer salads with more bite-sized ingredients than something that needs carving. I've gone to Little Gem lettuce in a Caesar instead of full-size Romaine. More crunch, less limp. Some curly escarole/frisée in the mix if I've got it for a touch of bitterness.

Arancini are one of the best reasons I know to make risotto and those look great! Two holiday appropriate lunches. Yesterday, I had a spiral-cut kimchi dog with cabbage and watermelon radish slaw dressed with yuzu koshu mayo and Homesteader's New England Baked Beans from Cool Beans. Today, I pulled out a foil packet that I thought was pulled pork but turned out to be pork belly burnt ends. I could only make out ZEF BBQ Pork on the label 🙃 No matter, I sliced and crisped them up and they made for a fine sandwich. Same slaw as yesterday on the sandwich but with Southern Baked Beans, also from Cool Beans, instead of the New England style. I was curious to try both vegan baked bean recipes as I usually put some sort of pork into baked beans. The New England style were a bit sweet and very mushy (baking 8 hrs after they're already very tender will do that). The Southern Baked beans were good texture-wise but could have used a touch of the sweetness and vinegar in the first recipe. They have now been combined and we'll see how that works tomorrow!

I've picked up the TJ's kimchi to use in a pinch. It is indeed a very small jar, and like the kraut, it’s more of a fresh, lightly fermented kimchi. Not my first choice but I didn’t find it leaving as much to be desired as @rotuts did. I think it would be a good intro to kimchi - very easy to use a pair of scissors to chop up the contents right in the little jar and spoon out a small amount.

The only sauerkraut I've made is the one from Vivian Howard's This Will Make It Taste Good, which also included cucumber, though hers specifies English rather then Persian. I ended up using this TJ's kraut in the book recipes when mine ran out. I found the flavor of this to be very similar to what I made: more fresh, tangy and pickle-y than seriously funky.

This article agrees with what @Maison Rustique said, What Is Cornmeal and Which Type Should You Buy?

At least check out the airport with me! I'd pay money for a food tour of that Singapore airport led by @KennethT with wine and beverage commentary by his wife!

Seen on Facebook, tagged #momhacks

Curry Gai Lan Chow Fun from Tenderheart

@Pete Fred, you nailed it! Strawberries and ice cream are the best uses for that extra vecchio stuff, at least in my book!

Grilled white sea bass from the weekly fish share with a pat of Gabrielle Hamilton's preserved lemon compound butter, along with my riff on a za'atar zucchini pasta dish from Tenderheart. The recipe called for instant ramen noodles but they refused to come forth from the pantry when I summoned them so I went with these little lemon guys from Trader Joe's which only take 5 or 6 min to cook. Also, I added sugar snap peas and little cherry tomatoes

The Amá Spice Mix in his book of the same name calls for the following dried chiles 8 arbol chiles 5 guajillo chiles 5 New Mexico chiles 5 chipotle chiles 4 chiles negro 4 mulato chiles 4 pasilla de Oaxaca chiles 4 cascabel chiles All the chiles are toasted in a 350°F oven for ~ 10 min until brittle and fragrant, stemmed, seeded, ground to a powder and mixed with 1 tsp salt. It's a great mix - very flavorful but not searingly hot, though one could easily add a very spicy variety to boost the heat if that was the goal. Edited to add that this is the main seasoning in the chorizo recipe in the book and it's really fabulous!

Chicken laab from Night + Market with microwave sticky rice, sugar snap peas standing in for the recipe's green beans, cabbage and cucumber. I liked that this recipe specified the order of adding ingredients to the meat, tossing lightly after each addition. Fish sauce and a pinch of sugar go in while the meat is still warm, then it's allowed to cool and the roasted chile powder, shallot, green onions, mint, cilantro and lime juice are added sequentially with the toasted rice powder added last so the sturdier ingredients get more tossing and the herbs are spared until near the end.

I made a half batch, 6" square pan version of the Mexican Chocolate Brownies Stuffed with Dulce de Leche from The Global Pantry Cookbook. They are very rich and gooey but the flavors are great. Two nice things about the recipe are that the batter gets mixed up in the same pan you use to melt the butter and Mexican chocolate and you line the baking pan with foil so there's no sticky pan to scrub. I might try a longer bake time in the next round, you can see how gooey they are. The recipe has you put half the batter in the pan, then drizzle on warmed dulce de leche, then dollop on the remaining batter and gently spread it to cover the dulce de leche. I could work on doing a better job with the spreading as you can see I got some dulce de leche bubbling up around the edges and looking like some sort of fungus: The photo in the book actually has the same thing going on but since I used Cacao Berry's Extra Brute cocoa powder, my brownies are darker so the dulce de leche stands out more. I need to stash these in the freezer to save myself from them 🙃