blue_dolphin

Yesterday's harissa grilled swordfish joined today's Caesar for lunch: I was wary of drying out the fish but a quick CSO steam bake warm-up at 250°F for 4 min did the trick and they tasted just as good, if not better than yesterday.

Welcome, @Kiwiross! I regularly lurk in the chocolate topics and am always fascinated to learn how these beautiful confections are made and all the behind-the-scenes discussion of making a chocolate business work. Sounds like you are a natural fit for the eG chocolateers! Where in New Zealand are you located? Such a beautiful country! Have you read the various posts about the mostly annual eGullet Chocolate and Confectionery Workshop? Next year will be near Austin,TX. Since they are moving from the US/Canada border down closer to the US southern border, maybe the southern hemisphere will be next!

Patience, grasshopper! I'm sure there will be a dedicated topic coming our way someday soon. Maybe there will even be grasshoppers!

Good catch! @rotuts, note that when you are browsing a topic, the search bar selection can default to searching that topic and you need to change that to Everywhere if you want to search everything. That default can vary depending on how you are viewing the forum: phone, tablet, computer, etc so worth checking if your search returns unexpected results.

I searched for “sous vide” and found topics going back at least to 2004 like this one: Sous Vide: Recipes, Techniques & Equipment (Part 1) Sous Vide search results

I'll have to revisit those olive crackers. I thought they were soft, stale and musty and pitched them after a bite. Sounds like I may have gotten a bad pack.

It does not circulate the water so it apparently relies on convection for that. I'd say with the heat coming from the large bottom surface, it's probably less of a concern than with an immersion circulator sitting in a corner but I wouldn't want to put in multiple bags separated in a rack like I've seen some people do for sous vide. I have no need for a giant 15 pound, 7 qt slow cooker. It's really huge! But it has some nice features like that integrated thermometer and the side handles and the clips to secure the lid for transporting. Though, at close to 30 lbs when full, it's not exactly something I could easily lug around in any case!

Swordfish brochettes with basil and harissa from Melissa Clark's Dinner in French over polenta After marinating the swordfish chunks in a mix of toasted fennel seeds, harissa, garlic, olive oil, lemon & lime zest, this recipe includes a very messy step of stuffing a large basil leaf, dipped in the marinade into a slit in the swordfish cubes before they go on the skewers and get grilled. I can't really say that was worth the effort but it gave me something to do while the polenta was cooking!

This is from one of Kris Yenbamroong's recipes in Night + Market: Canned tuna (or other meat or fish) yum. I got swordfish in this week's fish share so I grilled some to use in place of the canned tuna. The fish, sweet onion, tomato and herbs are tossed in a dressing of fish sauce, lime juice, garlic and Thai chiles so it's not your typical tuna salad! I had this with steamed jasmine rice and sliced cucumber per the recipe plus sliced radish and snap peas for crunch.

Pork and Morning Glory Curry from Night + Market

If anyone's looking for bean salad ideas, Rancho Gordo is featuring a different bean salad recipe every day in the month of July. Today's is a corona bean salad. You can see them all at this link.

Here’s a gift link to the article: 15 of Our Readers’ Favorite Pizza Places Around the World

I've seen them at the local Indian grocery and at larger farmers markets, usually labeled Ivy Gourd or Tendli but haven’t tried them.

My local BBQ source, Logan Sandoval of ZEF BBQ is one of the contestants so, of course, I will be cheering for him.

I find the bean cook times in that book to be on the long side, at least for RG beans but he has some good ideas. I think I made all the bean dips and he used them in some nice combos that made them more of a meal. Like the the roasted cauliflower served on black chickpea hummus with black garlic and preserved lemon and the Roasted Beet Hummus Bowl with Turmeric Tahini and Peanut Dukkah, both of which I posted in the lunch topic.

@Smithy, thinking of unseasoned beans reminded me of several baking recipes in Joe Yonan's book, Cool Beans. Do you have that one? There's a Coconut cream bean pie, Five-spice pumpkin-oat muffins, Plantain, black sesame, and white bean quick bread, Cardamom, lime, and white bean bundt cake and Mint chocolate chip and white bean-oat cookies. They sound very curious but if you're in the mood to play around, they could be fun!

Yeah, mine came with three and I bought 2 more. I see all sorts of options in the Creami ads peppering my feeds over this holiday season and lead-up to Amazon/Walmart/Target days. I agree that frozen yogurt is nice to make but I already have a blender that makes good smoothies, milkshakes, frozen drinks and slushies in quart-plus quantities with no need to pre-freeze anything other than ice cubes so there's no big advantage there for me (who believes 1/2 a pint to be a VERY large serving of ice cream but can empty a pint of a watermelon frozé slushy in no time on a hot day) YMMV

@Smithy, I can't speak from direct experience as I always season the beans while cooking but I agree with @Maison Rustique's suggestion of a bean dip or spread of some sort. It's always my go-to for an overcooked bean. This recipe from Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Every Day for a white bean spread with rosemary and toasted almonds is one of my favorites. The garlic and rosemary are gently warmed in olive oil and then strained out so their flavors are mellow rather than harsh. One of the best things I made recently with Royal Coronas was a recipe for mustard-marinated beans with shaved asparagus and parsley from Abra Berens' Grist. See photo in this post. Any combo of a crunchy + a leafy green would work. My beans were slightly overcooked but mixing them gently with the vinaigrette helped them stay separate and seasoned them nicely as well. Do warm them up so they'll absorb the seasonings well. Her vinaigrette (1 shallot, minced, 1/2 cup olive oil, 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar, 1/4 cup whole grain or Dijon mustard, 1/2 t salt) packs a nice mustardy punch, but I'm sure you could use your favorite dressing. Edited to add that I used half whole grain and half Dijon in the dressing.

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?