KennethT

I wonder if it has just blown a fuse? TBH, I don't know if the machine has a fuse, but I'd assume it would. If so, the next question would be why it blew teh fuse in the first place....

We're headed to St. Lucia over Christmas. Jetblue has 2 direct flights from New York, one at 8AM and the other at 11AM. We booked the 11AM flight, a while ago, but just last week, they cancelled it and moved us to the 8AM flight!!! We were trying to relax and take it easy on this trip.... oh well. I hope you enjoy your stay. I can't wait to see what you make in a foreign kitchen.

Two of my kencur from Indonesia have sprouted. I heard they were slow growing but this is hilarious. The one on the right seems to have grown 2-3mm in the last week or so!

the spice paste is homemade. I make a large batch and then freeze. I'm not a big fan of premade pastes - way too many preservatives. Also, this soup is more Javanese but I was in Sulawesi. I didn't see this type of soup anywhere during the trip.

Indonesian chicken soup - but I was out of limes! The horror! And only 1 meal left of my spice paste...

Everything I grow is indoors. I'm in a small NYC apartment with no outdoor space.

Oh, and you can definitely run tomatoes/cucumbers and peppers off the same reservoir, but they shouldn't really be grouped together for best results - at least the cucumber. Cucumber likes lower light levels than tomato/pepper so putting them all together would cause problems for one or the other. Plus, since the cucumber doesn't have as much light, it wouldn't need as strong of a nutrient solution but would probably be ok with sharing.

Yes, lettuce (where you harvest the whole head) and other short term things are great in NFT. I used to grow yu choi (kind of like a skinnier bok choi) in my NFT - I wouldn't harvest the whole head, just clip the outer stems. It lasted several months with twice weekly harvests enough for 2 of us for dinner, but after a while, the root system became unmanageable and I chopped the whole thing and started over. I grew an heirloom tomato plant in an ebb/flow setup. It probably got to about 6 months old, providing us with basically 1-2 tomato per day until the root system wound up completely filling the 3 gallon bucket that was its home and the roots wound their way into the fill/drain pipe. I came home from work one day to find a small lake of about 15 gallons of nutrient on the floor as the timer turned the pump on when no one was home and since the tube was blocked, it sprang a leak in one of the couplings upstream and went all over the floor. So no more ebb/flow for me unless it's a plant with a much smaller root system or I'm able to put a lot more sensors/controls in to keep that kind of thing from happening again. Now, growing in coco in fabric pots with a drip system, I don't have to worry about that anymore. After a while I'll see the plants vigor slowing a bit and I can check the roots out to see if they've completely taken over the pot so I can either do some root trimming or transplant into a larger fabric pot. I have a kaffir lime tree and a curry leaf tree that are now at least 5 years old and still doing great. So I'm team coco all the way for those kinds of plants.

Nice. I've been growing hydroponically in my NYC apartment (under lights) for like 15 years. What type of system are you running? With herbs/lettuce, I assume it's a DIY NFT? I used to have an NFT for my herbs, but a lot of my herbs I keep for long periods of time (I had a basil tree that was almost a year old). By that time, the roots had completely filled my 5x5" PVC fencepost trough and I had serious ponding going on. So now I grow all my long term herbs in coco and haven't looked back.

I'm not trying to be snarky at all - just curious - what makes provolone and pineapple Hawaiian? I understand the pineapple, but the provolone? Is that a German thing?

I was actually thinking about how different bottled mineral waters taste different. For instance, Vichy Catalan is very different from Gerolsteiner. I had once read a blog of someone who was really into sparkling waters and he had created recipes for maybe 10 different popular waters - from varying types of salts to carbonation level. He basically took reverse osmosis water and then made his custom waters using that.

If it's a Thai curry, it's common to use cilantro roots in the paste.

Interesting. When I think of custom seltzers I think of different salts to change taste or texture.

We have the same thing (minus the toothpick). You get the utensils whether you want them or not. My wife says that one of the reasons she loves going to Asia is that you can pick your teeth at the table and not offend anyone...

Well, it certainly can't make them any worse! That actually makes them seem almost edible.

I didn't realize that octopus lived in Vienna... Seriously, I saw something similar to this in Indonesia, but the sausages were made from chicken and they were octopused on both ends. it was the first time I'd ever seen anything like it.

Interesting - thanks for this. I knew it was at least somewhat allowable because, years ago, Singapore Airlines used to serve a small container of ice cream with dinner and I noticed that they stored it in styrofoam coolers with dry ice. When I get frozen food delivered from Wild Fork, it comes in an insulated cardboard box with a piece of dry ice on top. I don't think they added more than a couple pounds of it and the contents when shipped via UPS ground (from a 1 day point) came in still frozen with most of the dry ice still intact. I think 5.5 pounds of dry ice is a LOT of dry ice for 1 cooler. When I get 20 pounds of dry ice pellets for industrial purposes, it comes in a large sack that won't fit in my cooler!

I think it's a combination of factors - genetics and amount of UV the fruit gets. Some varieties of tomato have thicker skins than others. The more you go down the rabbit hole of heirlooms the more variation you'll find. Years ago, I grew an heirloom Goose Creek tomato plant in my apartment under lights. The variety is prized for its flavor and rightfully so - best tomato I've ever had hands down. Thin skins, but I've never had one grown outdoors getting a lot of natural light. But, in general, fruit will thicken their skins when exposed to more UV light. In many places (including California), wine grape growers will shade the fruit so as to prevent excessive ripeness and skin thickening.

Can't wait to see what you do in a foreign kitchen! If it's available near you (and allowable on the plane - I think it is) you can use dry ice rather than freezer packs. That should keep everything frozen for at least 24 hours. You can put it in a paper bag and lay on top of the frozen food in the cooler - you don't want to touch it with your bare hands.

I find that a lot of traditional curries always taste better than they look! BTW - I think yours looks great!

Or it was a plane that had no one else in it!

Is this your stovetop smoker? Can you provide more info about it? What type of wood do you put in the bottom? Does it get covered during cooking?

We have similar tracking with our delivery services. My question about the crispy shrimp shells was more due to the fact that I find the shells start to get a little leathery maybe 10 minutes after cooking them as the hot meat steams the shells from the inside, and if they're in a pile (like in a serving bowl), the ones in the middle steam even faster. I was curious how the crispiness survived being in a sealed plastic container (our common delivery packaging) which traps in the steam.

I like watching YouTube videos of various Aunties, Grandmas and the occasional Uncle making similar dishes to get an idea of ingredients and technique. I prefer videos made in the country of the dish I'm looking to make so that it wouldn't be already modified. Google translate and closed captioning is my friend.

After the south Indian restaurant in Singapore, time to do some experiments. First crack at chicken curry. It was tasty but not nearly as intense as I'd like. More trials needed.