KennethT

What what?

Yes, I want the sourness of a green tomato - but it would be difficult to do 1/2 1/2 - first of all, I'm planning to use them tomorrow, so it won't be very long to begin with. I probably could have left them on the countertop and they'd be fine for that long. But they're also going to be mixed with a bunch of chillis, shallots and garlic and all mashed together so I don't think there would be much to compare.

This isn't really a preservation question but I didn't know where else to put it.... how should I keep green tomatoes to keep them green and NOT ripening? Is it ok to refrigerate for short periods (a couple days)? Usually you don't want to refrigerate tomatoes, but I don't know if that applies to green ones that you want to keep green. I also have a root cellar (wine fridge) that's kept at 55F and relatively high humidity. Tks...

I've always wondered what happens to rice paddy fish (and now rice paddy eels) when the paddies are drained? I get that the crabs can burrow into the dirt but wondered about the non air breathing stuff.

@TdeV Me too!! One way to see if it would work would be to puree one onion and see if it can fry it at medium heat with maybe 1-2T of oil until the oil separates back out. I'd love to see how much human intervention it would need to do it evenly.

How does the Corningware kettle work? My mother used a Corningware baking dish (similar, if not the same as, the one you just got) and it was oven-safe, obviously. But a kettle requires direct heat - like over a gas flame, or electric burner which are much hotter than oven temp air. Or is the kettle more of a tea pot that is meant to have boiling water poured into it?

Hmmm.... I'm definitely at least partially (if not mostly) to blame to your misunderstanding - my description was not nearly detailed enough. I should have written to slice each cheek close to, but not through, the center of the lime - like cutting the flesh of an apple off of its core. Those lime cheeks are easy to squeeze, and you can even kind of rub the two cheek halves back and forth against each other (with the flesh side inside, skin outside) to get the juice out without getting the pith too involved - sort of like rubbing your forefinger and thumb together.

Thanks, but can it stir small quantities while frying in a small amount of oil? Not a quart of soup, but stirring (and wiping the bottom so it doesn't burn) say a half cup of spice paste?

@Smithy I used to use a juice press years ago but stopped due to exactly what @Kerry Beal says - I'd squeeze so hard to get every last drop out (most probably oversqueezing) I'd also get a lot of bitterness from the pith. Doing it the SE Asian way relieves me of that problem - and since I don't usually need nearly the amount of juice you used, it's not a big deal if I don't get every last drop anymore.... I found this video which illustrates the SE Asian method - TBH, I haven't watched the whole video, but near the middle where she starts cutting looks how I do it.

Isn't that more of a blender that heats? Does it continually scrape the bottom or does it have blades that turn to stir a soup or something?

I didn't measure, but it is pretty big...

Ha! It seemed like a product sold on late night TV but it actually looked pretty solid when I unpacked it. It's a good idea - just too bad it didn't work as well as it could've! Part of me feels like I should design my own version - that could be fun.... Not of a complete cooker, but the automated stirring function...

I had high hopes for this device: https://www.amazon.com/STIRMAX-Multi-Cooker-Automatic-programmable-Simmering/dp/B0DC1T1F36/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=2ALKEQSAU0MDC&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.KmC0Kqgeq7oXNwgT_2sw-5hsWS7uOtFbUMINaFZa8MbHNckPFfQwRRcGqfm-B8wDUueN3WoXczgWEwjDenv-KiijkLjZaBhU7nZ6rC5uMobLeusKxQ1cCOSV_7jUAs06TV-mY6hQrfhSAbWiY8I0ZY4eykebKJ-ji4uyHhzM51xWhhhxEwD3Fy01YhW8VszGuUCoYgd9hUmWvWFRqETUcUgVaObuL6G51hRqmCKt6KM.1pEqI7ArR6lICHA15thBtJeV__Md33IBL4hngdXEXZ0&dib_tag=se&keywords=power%2Bxl%2Bstir%2Bmax%2Bmulti%2Bcooker&qid=1742489461&sprefix=power%2Bxl%2Caps%2C100&sr=8-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&th=1 It's designed to automatically stir foods that are cooking in it - I thought it would be a great thing to use to automate frying Malay/Indo/Nyonya curry pastes (typically fried in oil prior to adding liquids) or making long cooked (and constantly stirred) stuff like rendang. I received it the other day and finally got to try it out last night. I tested it with frying some pureed onion. Unfortunately, the stirring doesn't work nearly as well as I'd hoped it would - there's a decent sized gap between the stirring blade and the pan's bottom and there's 4 spots on the corners of the square pan where the food accumulates and A) doesn't actually cook there as there's only little heat and B) doesn't get out of there unless manually moved (which kinda defeats the purpose of an automated stirring mechanism, no?) Disappointed... and it's being returned this weekend...

How is the snail powder made?

Thanks. Did you notice if they put a moisture barrier between ingredients and bread, like sliced cheese or something?

I know this is like a year old, but when you'd order these, how did it arrive? Was the bread separate or already put together? I'm wondering how they kept the bread from either getting soggy from prolonged contact with the other ingredients or stale from being at refrig temps for a while...

I recently made a new batch of spice paste for the Nyonya buah keluak chicken, so... Now that I'm making the sauce thicker (a la Violet Oon) I think I'll cut back on the tamarind - it overshadowed everything this time.

@Smithy One thing to keep in mind is that key limes have seeds. The way they're juiced all over SE Asia (that's pretty much the only kind of lime they have there) is to make 3 vertical cuts, basically cutting the cheeks off - all the seeds should be left in the core and each cheek should squeeze really easily. You can also squeeze the core, but, you know, seeds. Another way I've seen is just to cut straight into the lime, vertically, about halfway through and squeeze while leaving the knife in the cut (which tries to block the seeds).

I think I'd get on a plane and fly there! I could clean out the store!

I wonder how well the camera works after a few months of use and the lens is covered in "patina"....

While I loved duck sauce as a kid (always with egg rolls!!!), I think they're mostly sugar (or cornsyrup).

This was a first attempt at making nasi brongkos. Typically made with beef (shank or shin), instead, I made patties using ground bison. We loved this dish when we visited Jogjakarta but it took until now to finally want to make it at home. In my research, I was surprised to learn that it uses kluwak (buah keluak in Malaysian) which is the black nut paste which we had fallen inlove with. In this dish, the nut meat is mashed into the bumbu (spice paste) and fried before adding water (I used pork stock since I didn't have beef stock and since I was using ground meat that I wasn't cooking for a long time, wanted some extra mouthfeel) and coconut milk. We had originally thought that this dish used a few dried spices like cloves and cinnamon, but not one recipe/video of people making it used spices other than some ground coriander - although maybe 3/4 or the recipes used another unexpected ingredient - fresh kencur. Typically, this dish has a more soupy consistency but I decided to make mine thicker as I was nervous that the flavor would be too diluted. All in all, it was delicious, but I think it needs a little work to make it how we remembered it.

I feel the same way about most mocktails - I wonder if it's from the glycerol that is present in alcoholic beverages which gives viscosity, that isn't present in non-alcoholic ingredients. Maybe someone should experiment with adding a few drops of vegetable glycerine or something to help give it more weight. I have to say - for a restaurant that obviously puts weight on presentation - the ice cream scoop of mashed potato is a little off-putting.

@C. sapidus Lots of Viet dishes (especially in central Vietnam) use peppercorn rather than chilli. I remember eating banh canh (an udon-like noodle soup) in Hue in which the broth was mostly peppercorn, and there was a dish on the table with tons of ground peppercorn so you could add even more. I also remember in Saigon where it's common to make a paste out of salt/peppercorn/lime juice (although sometimes it's salt/chilli/lime juice) that's used for dipping fish/seafood but also common with fruit - fantastic with somewhat bland fruit like dragonfruit.

Or maybe they used all the salt on the tuna and had none left for the mahi!