Chris Hennes

If you could smell my house right now, you would understand that saving them is not an option: I am going to eat them for lunch. Today.

You won't regret it. I use my wok burner for a lot more than wok cooking: it's great for bringing huge pots of water to the boil quickly, for example. And I do all my deep frying outside now, to avoid coating the inside of the house with fryer oil, and the accompanying smell. What do you do when it's bloody cold out? For those three days, I don't wok . The weather is good here.

Interesting data point re: dry pasta dough. I just finished making up a new batch of the plain dough using my standard recipe/technique, and it required, for two cups of flour, an entire additional egg above what I normally have to add to get the right texture (I'm usually right at about three large eggs, today I needed just under four). It is bone dry here right now, so I'm guessing that the issue is the flour.

You won't regret it. I use my wok burner for a lot more than wok cooking: it's great for bringing huge pots of water to the boil quickly, for example. And I do all my deep frying outside now, to avoid coating the inside of the house with fryer oil, and the accompanying smell.

No, not caramelized at all, if I do it right: they are supposed to remain white, according to the recipe. And no beef stock on hand, alas. I'm trying to think of things I could fry them up with: presumably they will completely disintegrate, so that has to be OK in the dish.

I missed it too! The bolognese and bechamel are both made, but I have to put together the pasta this morning: theory says it's for dinner tonight, but only if I don't bork the pasta again.

Yes: if you find yourself making purees with any frequency, you might actually be able to completely justify the upfront cost of the blender in the reduced time you spend in front of the chinois.

30:7:13

Yes, a cup of whole milk.

This morning's coffee looks the same as every other morning's, I'll stop boring you with that, and start boring you with this: the construction of onion sables for tomorrow's dinner. This begins by making an onion butter, simmering 200g of sweet onion on 500g of butter for two hours. Throw out the onions, keep the butter. Anyone have any idea for what I should do with those onions? I've got to be able to turn them into some kind of lunch, they are onions cooked in butter! Yeah, I'm cheating, only 454g of butter, not 500g (I only need 100g of the finished product anyway): Slice the onion thin (on the mandoline): And onto the stove:

Me too. If there are two decent wines at the same price point and one has a screw cao, I'll buy it every time. When I was in Canada in January I was astounded by the terrific selection of wine with screw tops. It gets better every year, it seems, and is drifting (slowly!) into the higher end. Not that I can afford those. But still, it seems to be a good sign. It doesn't take too many bottles of cork-tainted wine poured down the drain to convince a guy that screw caps are the future. And the present, if I have anything to say about it.

Saran wrap! Great idea, I've been using a wax coating on the battens: it works, but you have to keep re-waxing them. I'll switch to Saran tomorrow first thing.

I use an modern, high-tech material formed from an extremely complex chemical synthesis of various petroleum products. (They are zip-top plastic bags with the sides and zipper cut off. 1 quart size. MUCH easier to deal with than Saran wrap, and you can even wash and re-use if you want to.)

That's a tough question: there is no doubt that the Vitaprep/Vitamix and the Blendtec are amazing blenders, basically in a category of their own. But you have to do a LOT of blending to get your money's worth. It hasn't been obvious this week, but I eat a lot of smoothies for lunch, so it's nice for that. It makes a fabulous mole, and a perfectly smooth hummus. Etc. But it is just a blender, after all. So "worth" definitely comes down to "do you cook things that need ridiculous amounts of blending power?" You may find that once you buy one your diet changes! But "worth" is a pretty personal appraisal. If you are trying to decide between a blender and snow cone maker, I say get the blender. If you are trying to decide between a blender and a sous vide rig? Get the sous vide rig.

It varies pretty widely: we typically call it 12%. This being Modernist Cuisine, they call for the egg yolks by weight, not by count, so that's not the issue. I just don't have enough experience with this type of dough to evaluate it properly. When I make pasta traditionally I simply use whole eggs and flour: no water at all. So the ratios are not something I can evaluate: I wound up with a dry, sandy dough when following the recipe, so I added more water to bring it together. It still wasn't the same texture I am used to, but considering the ingredient variation that's hardly surprising. Brilliant idea for a stand-mixer mod. I might have to add that to my project list.

This is true (well, probably...) but it's still possible to get something like that look doing it for real: janeer's looks pretty close to me, it just needs more styling with the spatula to be a pretty good match.

I find that keeping the chocolate in temper makes the ganache set up much faster (though I'm not sure this is your issue, a few days is a long time to get it to set tempered or no!). I use the hot cream technique as well, but let the cream cool down before pouring it over the chocolate. I don't remember what the magic temp is though (and it depends on the ratio of cream to chocolate, of course).

This evening's beverage selection, from the clearance aisle (the orange dot). I am a big fan of screw caps, so I try to support whatever vineyards are using them these days: you'll notice more than a few in my collection, among both whites and reds.

I actually did try to get the consistency to the correct feel, about doubling the water quantity they called for: alas, my entire pasta experience to date has been with whole egg/no water pastas, so apparently I need to recalibrate. The recipe calls for AP flour and then a supplement of 1.2% gluten flour.

Was your chocolate tempered?

The two techniques I've used to style meringue both start with just laying down your meringue like normal. Then, I use a small spatula to either tap at the surface to make little spikes, or to sort of scoop at the surface to make wave shapes. The example you link to there seems to have a swirl mixed in with a wave, I guess it's all in the wrist! It looks to me like the meringue in that second photo is underwhipped, but maybe that's just the photo.

Did you decide what you are going to do with them (besides just eat them compulsively ) ?

So, the backup plan for tonight's dinner was to make tomorrow's dinner instead, which was designed to be fast to make: back to Bayless's Fiesta at Rick's and to my favorite recipe in the book, Creamy Chicken and Greens with Roasted Poblano and Caramelized Onion. I am making this as a taco filling (you could just serve it as-is, or use it as a chip dip, or put it on toast points, etc.) so I started by making tortillas. Here is my setup: I think there are probably as many "secrets" to making tortillas as there are Mexican grandmothers, but here's my technique. I have a single cooking surface at a single temperature: medium high or so on my electric range. I'm using a non-stick pan here only because it's the only one I've got with low sides: tortillas won't stick to a plain steel or cast iron surface either, as long as it's hot enough. I let it heat all the way up before beginning, then I put a tortilla on. I give it just a few seconds, enough time to release from the pan if you give the handle a shake, then I flip it over for the first time: At this point I scoop and form the next tortilla while I am waiting. You have to make sure to give it enough time on this side or it won't puff up properly and will tend to wind up doughy inside. I wait until I can smell toasting corn before I flip it. If your timing is right, the tortilla will immediately puff up like a pita bread: It takes less time to cook this side since it's already partially cooked, but again, once you can smell the corn toasting, take it off. They should look something like this: OK, onto the filling.The poblanos are roasted and sliced: Meanwhile you saute the chicken. Remove it and add the onions. Cook them until they take on some color: Add the poblanos and garlic to the onions: Let that cook until fragrant, then add the greens (spinach in this case), stock, and thyme: Let that cook for a few minutes: Reduce that to a glaze over high heat, then add the crema (or cream, as I had to do here, being out of crema): Reduce until it's the desired consistency: And served: This is the first time I've used cream instead of crema in this dish: it was still a delicious dish, but the crema makes a difference, so if you have access to it, use that instead for sure.

In this book, he's got a "Lasagne all'anitra all'Aretina" (made with duck... I was tempted, there's a duck in the fridge, but I was going to make confit this weekend).

I only make one kind of lasagne al forno: this one. So usually laziness prevails when I'm telling my wife what's for dinner. How do you pronounce "lasagne" in Italian? Is is more or less like the American English pronunciation of "lasagna"?