blue_dolphin

Me, too! I was thinking of an asparagus omelet but @Anna N's post just above got me thinking noodles so linguine with asparagus, pancetta, black pepper butter and an egg. A riff on Joshua McFadden's Pasta alla Gricia from Six Seasons where he calls for 4 oz of sugar snap peas/2 oz pasta/serving. I used the same proportions, but with asparagus......and added an egg to bring some sunshine to a foggy morning.

A little more carnitas fun. I must say that having this pre-cooked meat at hand certainly facilitates a porky sandwich . I sliced up one of the post-sous vide ribs hunks from above, broiled it a bit for crispness and tucked it into a toasted roll. Sliced pork: Tossed with reduced bag jus and a little lard and broiled to crisp. Too bad you can't hear the sizzle in that photo above! Porky sandwich:

Last week, in sort of a follow-up to the Washington Post article, Evan Kleiman interviewed an Austrian chef, Bernhard Mairinger, whose Beverly Hills restaurants have closed on her Good Food Podcast. Listen at this link.

Leftovers of the Potato and Roasted Cauliflower Salad with Olives, Feta and Arugula from Six Seasons that I made the other night The book says this salad is to be served somewhere between warm and room temp so I put it in the CSO on the warming setting, 125°F to take the refrigerator chill off while I cooked the egg and chopped the arugula and tomato. Just right.

It was a choice, based on my poor decision to start the cook at 2PM, meaning 36 hrs was going to be at 2AM. I decided to go a few hrs longer rather than shorter because I'm generally more industrious in the AM than late at night but I think either would have been fine. Kenji's range for this temp was 24-36 hrs.

Sous vide pork carnitas from Serious Eats, as continued from here, using country-style pork ribs. Some of the meat after ~ 40 hrs @ 145°F: After the sous vide bath, I separated the meat into small chunks, added some beer and a little piloncillo to the bag jus and reduced it down, then tossed the meat in that reduction plus just a little lard (almost no fat had rendered into the jus) before broiling to get crispy edges on the chunks. Not bad. I probably should have used more salt but otherwise the flavor and texture are excellent. I only crisped up a portion of the meat. With the others, I'll try searing some larger chunks in a cast iron skillet instead of broiling. Served for dinner over here.

Sous vide pork carnitas from Serious Eats as described here and here. Served with freshly made corn tortillas from the Mexican supermarket, sliced avocado and sides from Nopalito: Salsa Cruda, Ensalada Repollo, Escabeche Rojo and Frijoles Pinquitos de la Olla.

Not a one. Nor anything food-related that I could see. I'm glad you asked though as it prompted me to check out the other Prime reading options and download the current issue of Food & Wine, a magazine that my library doesn't have available online.

Lovely! I'm reading and thoroughly enjoying Ed Lee's Buttermilk Graffiti: A Chef's Journey to Discover America's New Melting-Pot Cuisine. If anyone here would like a little side-trip while we wait for our Hobbit to return, the first chapter in the book, "Pilgrimage for a Beignet" is available to read via Amazon's "Look Inside" feature, including his recipe for matcha beignets.

I read this page and it seemed pretty clear and just as you described - one book/month. They publish a list of 6 "editor selected books" each month and you can pick one. It's free for Prime members, otherwise you can sign up for the email and get the book for $1.99. The main Amazon First Reads page shows this month's book and has a link to sign up for the monthly First Reads email. You can see previous selections here.

Potato and Roasted Cauliflower Salad with Olives, Feta and Arugula from Six Seasons p 163. This is an excellent salad, about half and half potato and cauliflower. I knew I wanted this salad to be a meal and debated between adding an egg or some nice tuna belly. I went with the egg but will try tuna with the leftovers. I mostly followed the recipe but instead of using the food processor to whip the feta and olive oil into a creamy dressing, I just crumbled some feta over the potatoes and cauliflower while they were still warm. That pretty much melted into them and I crumbled a little more over the salad just before serving.

OK. The carnitas got me. I've been cooking from Nopalito and considering trying the recipe in the book - it's a fry in lard version and calls for 4 lbs of lard. I know it can be reused but I don't see myself using that much anytime soon. I studied the carnitas topic that @Smithy referenced and checked out the Serious Eats method that @rotuts mentioned. I decided to try the SV method since it uses the same seasonings as the Nopalito so hopefully I will get something similar. 3 lbs of country-style pork ribs from Sprouts: They're conveniently about 2 inches thick, as Kenji recommends. Inconveniently, they're not boneless and the bottom piece had particularly sharp piece of bone at one end so cut it out. The middle piece also has a bone but it's not sharp and I was able to turn it sideways to avoid any bag-bone contact. Bagged up with seasonings: The bag is now swimming at 145°F for 36 hrs. Nopalito adds some beer late in the cook. I would have had to freeze it into a beer cube in order to seal it up in this bag so I left it out for now. I plan to cube this up for browning so I'll decide whether or not to add a little beer at that time. Perhaps I will cook down the bag jus with a little beer and a bit of piloncillo and moisten the meat cubes with that before I brown them.

I treated myself to some decadent Chocolate con Chiles from Nopalito. It is so, so rich! The milk and cream are simmered with vanilla, cinnamon stick, orange zest, 3 kinds of chiles, a little sugar and a dash of salt before being strained and then whipped with a generous amount (2 oz/serving) of bittersweet chocolate. I used Rancho Gordo's Mexican chocolate. The recipe says that any kitchen whisk will do if you don't have a molinillo. I started with a regular whisk but recommend turning to your immersion blender to really get lots of the foam that makes Mexican hot chocolate such a treat! No neurological symptoms thus far ....just a bit of guilt for indulging in something so rich!

@JoNorvelleWalker, I have also experienced water boiling out in between the stockpot and pasta insert. It can be limited somewhat by taking the lid off once the water is boiling, adjusting the heat to maintain a low boil and using a minimum amount of water in the pot. I generally only use it when I have some quantity of things to blanch for a short period of time as it's easy to lower and remove them quickly. For pasta, I use a regular pot and follow the method @Toliver described, using the same colander he linked to. I put the serving bowl under the colander to catch some pasta water if needed and to warm the serving bowl. I'm not usually cooking tons of pasta so I can use a smaller pan and don't need a stockpot. For spaghetti, I sometimes use a skillet.

Yesterday's late lunch/early dinner assembled from previously prepared items from the Nopalito cookbook. Quesadilla stuffed with the Vegetales con Aceite de Chile Cascabel served with Salsa Cilantro, Guacamole, Frijoles Negros de la Olla, Crema and Escabeche Rojo. The pickled red onions are excellent. I ate about 3 X the amount in the photo.

Scrambled egg, soy chorizo and cheese quesadilla Sides are all from Nopalito - braised pinquito beans, salsa cilantro, crema and pickled red onions

I've mentioned this before. I keep a sewing gauge in my knife drawer. Handy to measure thickness of fish, rolled doughs or slices of anything.

I don't think you can do much better than the info on these eG threads but Instant Pot® Obsession: The Ultimate Electric Pressure Cooker Cookbook for Cooking Everything Fast by @JAZ is an excellent Instant Pot primer. It's basic and simple - not a lot of glam photos - but chock full of useful information. At the moment, the Kindle version is $1.67 on Amazon.com.

Thank you for leading me to another eG rabbit hole with that Carnitas topic! I usually make Establos carnitas. They are made by going down the street to Establos Carniceria and ordering take-out !

Cinco de Mayo cocktail hour. As mentioned above, Queso Flameado con Chorizo y Nopales, Guacamole and an El Diablo, all from Nopalito, accompanied by sorry, salty, store-bought chips. Multiply the El Diablo a few times and the concerns about the chips just disappear !

I started off with Nopales con Huevo from Diana Kennedy's Essential Cuisines of Mexico, Frijoles Negros de la Olla and Vegetales con Aceite de Chile Cascabel from Nopalito for my breakfast. For later, I'm thinking Queso Flameado con Chorizo y Nopales, Guacamole, Salsa Cilantro and an El Diablo cocktail, all also from Nopalito, accompanied by sorry, store-bought chips.

I'd love to try that ramp butter. Of course, I'd love to try ramps, too A rather unsightly start to my Cinco do Mayo. Vegetales con Aceite de Chile Cascabel from Nopalito made with potatoes, onion, carrots, Brussels sprouts and asparagus. Frijoles Negros de la Olla and Nopales con Huevo from Diana Kennedy's Essential Cuisines of Mexico.

In 2017, they did a 50% off special in the summer and a free-shipping special (no discount) in December. I have the 20 and 25 paella pans in my cart and am dithering on adding a 25 sauté pan. I already have old style 20 and 23 pans and a 10.5 inch cast iron pan so I'm not sure.... Edited to add that I stopped dithering and added the 25 pan to my order. Done.

Before I realized that this was a fresh harvest photo,, I thought you had devoted your fanciful plating skills to making a carrot dish that looked like dirty, freshly harvested carrots. They do look nicer cleaned up and on the plate!

I'm not sure about the handles. I was hoping they wouldn't be too tall.