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Peterh

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  1. Peterh

    Preserved Lemons

    Use it to make your next batch!
  2. Thanks for asking. For a dinner party of 8: Moroccan Lamb Tagine with Winter Squash and Toasted Pine Nuts (p. 144) Bulgur Pilaf with Toasted Noodles (187) Roasted Late Summer Vegetables from the Island of Corfu (235) My Best Hummus (237) Tuscan White Beans with Sage and Garlic (246) My variations (intentional and not): For all dishes I tried to make a double or 1.5x amount. I didn't use a calculator and was kind of sloppy with my proportions. Tagine variations: My grocer didn't have enough shoulder arm chops, so I got some blade chops, too. The shoulder arm chops were a tad cheaper and the bone is simpler. Out of laziness, I didn't pull the meat out and cut it off the bones. I messed up and didn't realize I was out of honey, and I completely forgot about the pine nuts, even though I had them out and on the counter. Finally, I didn't make up La Kama spice mix, but tried to kind of put the right amount of its components in (except for cubeb berries, which I didn't have time to find/order). I probably didn't get the proportions right. Hummus variation: As usual when I make hummus, I used canned chick peas instead of starting from dried. Drain, rinse, skin, and put in food processor. My wife likes to serve this with pita wedges toasted into chips. I prefer untoasted. Beans: I used ordinary supermarket dried navy beans, soaked overnight and cooked in a crock pot style cooker. I'm not sure how they could have come out better. Pilaf: made in enameled cast iron French Oven. I used some Minor's beef base to make the broth. Vegetables: made in large, cast iron roasting pan. My comments: My Nose: Smell is an interesting sense. It's important to taste, but it gets overloaded quickly, and you don't notice how good everything smells. I went to the front door to greet some guests and got a shot of outside fresh air. Coming back inside, the aroma was amazing. I love cooking this food, but after standing over it, I think I miss out on some of the amazing flavor. This seems to happen when I cook from Wolfert cookbooks. Oh well. It's worth it, because I got so many raves from my guests. Saffron: It's in the tagine. Does it really do much? Did I perhaps not use enough? Or is just supposed to make the dish wonderful without diners really knowing why? Beans and Pilaf: Amazingly good. How the @#$*#% can dishes this simple and humble be this good? This is ridiculous! Hummus: I like making home-made hummus. I am amazed that people pay money for prepared hummus. It's so easy to toss it together. I usually use a lot more olive oil, but her recipe specifies cooking water from the chick peas. I need to do that more. I'm so astonished by how good the Tuscan beans were that I need to try making hummus from dried chick peas. Disappointment (tongue in cheek): I thought I cooked too much food. I was sure I had WAY too many beans. Why aren't there more leftovers? I probably need to figure out how to sneak in some new clay pots, too. A few days later, I soaked and cooked the rest of my dried navy beans -- I wanted to do something with the rest of my fresh sage (and I didn't have any leftover beans). I forgot the garlic, so I threw in some minced garlic after the beans were already cooked. With some of them, I made "White beans with Tuna" (p. 247) plus a salad for dinner for my wife and me. I probably used more beans and certainly less tuna than called for. Wow. Out-*$@$#^-standing. I still have some beans in the refrigerator. Mmmmm.
  3. So far everything I've made has been outstanding. Unfortunately (grin), I've been able to do so with a tagine, a crock pot, a steel roaster, and enameled cast iron pot. It's going to be tricky to get my wife to let me buy a bunch of new clay pots.
  4. I'd actually suggest "Claudia Sanders Dinner House Cookbook" for some rather traditional country cooking. It certainly isn't New Orleans style (although I definitely like both Cajun and Creole). It's not sophisticated, but that's the point. This is high fat, high carb food that grandma might have served for Sunday dinner. Butter, bacon, and salt are common. And yes, Claudia was the Colonel's wife. Please keep in mind that "Southern Food" is really fairly diverse, with different styles in different areas. You should get several different answers, and each might give you a view of a different aspect of Southern food.
  5. What's the deal with stones? Most people recommend using Japanese water stones to sharpen. These must be soaked well in water before using. As you sharpen, a slurry forms as you actually erode the stone, wearing it down. I think the advantage of these stones is twofold: 1) they have enough hardness to make an impression on harder steel in Japanese knives, and 2) the erosion or wearing down exposes fresh grit that can continue to do work on your edge. The sharpening stones I grew up with were either coarse and would cut, or fine and wouldn't really cut much. Japanese water stones seem to be able to cut aggressively even with a fine grit. This means that your stone will start to get "dished" as the middle wears down. You'll need to flatten it again with either a flattening stone or a sheet of wet/dry sandpaper over plate glass. There are a few different brands of stones like this, including Norton, King, etc. I bought a combination stone (one side fine, the other very fine) from a woodworking store. It's sold as a good stone to use for chisels, planes, and other cutting tools. They'd work great for western knives, too. I think the actual technique would be about the same, just a different angle. (BTW, I'm very happy with the Tojiro Gyuto I bought from JapaneseChefsKnife.com, even though it was a lower end product for them. Unfortunately, they can't sell them any more.)
  6. foodieforums.com has a lot of good information, too. Here's my try at a quick summary: - Japanese knives tend to be made with harder steel. This lets them be thinner and ground with a more acute angle so that people may say they are "sharper". - The harder steel lets them stay sharper longer. However, they can be chipped by cutting hard things like bones and frozen food. - Sharpening is different. The harder steel requires different stones, and techniques and angles are different because of more acute or one-sided edges. Definitely don't use the thing on the back of the can opener. - Traditional edges are one-sided, or single-bevel, like a chisel: \| , but many Japanese knives you can buy have a more western two-sided, double-bevel edge: \/. I have trouble with the single bevel. It seems strange to me. I'm sure someone who grew up using single-bevel knives would find double-bevel strange and difficult. - There are lots of purely traditional Japanese knife shapes. I don't understand Japanese cooking techniques enough to even try to explain them. - There are some westernized knife shapes that are more familiar to me. They still have different names: Gyuto = "cow sword", closest to western chef's knife Petty = a "petite" knife that can be used like a small chef's knife, large paring, or utility knife Santoku = "three virtues" is the darling of TV chefs. It's sort of a like a Guyto or chef's knife but not as pointy. It's supposed to be pointy enough for coring, but also act as a slicer and chopper. I also like the Nikiri, which is meant for slicing vegetables. It's shaped a little like a knife-like cleaver -- longer than a cleaver, but not as tall from spine to edge.
  7. We recently took the overnight train from Beijing to Xian. We had heard ahead of time that there would be a dining car. There was none. There was a snack cart that showed up only once, at the start of the trip. It included warmish beer, water, and juices as well as bags of snacks like nuts and such. It wouldn't have been good for a proper meal and it would have been hellish to try to keep toddlers happy. I'd highly recommend having meals off of the train, but also packing kid-friendly snacks.
  8. Peterh

    Lamb burgers

    Consider lamb breast. It should be cheap, if you find it. There used to be a lamb wholesaler / processor near me where I could still buy a single leg at retail. Once, the guy there grabbed a packet of ground lamb breast out of a refrigerator and stuffed it into my hands while I was leaving. It was pretty good. I think his real business was from chops and legs, but he still had all the other parts. As a result, he'd practically (or completely!) give away the less-popular breast meat. Now, if it's bone-in, it might not be worth the trouble. And I certainly wouldn't pay a premium for it.
  9. Check Craigslist, ebay, and local used for-sale ads for *some* stuff. Stick with stuff that people are getting rid of because they just bought a new house but want to remodel the kitchen with all new trophy kitchen appliances. Beware, though. They will lie about the age of the appliance. Find the serial number plate. It might list the mfg date, or you might be able to use the serial number to get the date from the manufacturer's web site or an 800-number. I'd only trust a used dishwasher or fridge if it was a really good deal and fairly new. If you have room, get more than one dishwasher. Dishwashers are sometimes cheaper than cabinets. If you get enough of them, you never have to empty the dishwasher. Just use them for storing your plates and glasses! (I'm not completely kidding here.) When laying out cabinets, consider what happens when you need to replace your appliances. The refrigerator I *want* to buy is a half inch too tall for the space I have. And there's no way I can replace my range with a 36" unit -- I can't just get rid of a cabinet to one side. A big mistake to avoid can happen if you put down a new floor. Be careful that it isn't so thick that your dishwasher can never come out. It will eventually break. To replace it, you need to slide it out. If the floor is too thick, it'll be blocked in.
  10. I hope so. Three 60 lb units stacked is the same as one 180 lb person. Four is the same as a 110 lb person and a 130 lb person standing close together, perhaps hugging.
  11. Before you blame the vent for the oven not getting hot, check your door gaskets. Perhaps they're shot. Also, do you have a good oven thermometer to confirm how hot your oven really is? Oven thermostats are notoriously inaccurate.
  12. Peterh

    All things Pork/Ham

    A friend's dad would put "country style ribs" into a baking pan, dump on a bunch of barbecue sauce, and bake for a while. I think country style ribs are really just shoulder meat cut up in rib-shaped hunks. Neither high cuisine or true barbecue, but I remember it as tasty. I like to buy a loin and cut it into chops and leave a nice roast-sized piece, freezing what we don't eat that night. The chops can fried or braised like usual. You can also use pork chops for all kinds of stir-fry. A lot of Chinese recipes call for pork belly, though. I have trouble finding that except after it's cured into bacon, so if you can get the processor to just give you some pork belly I'd be jealous. For variety, get a bag of panko bread crumbs at an Asian grocery and see what it says. I haven't done them in a while, but typical breading process is dip in flour, then egg, then bread crumbs, and pan fry / sautee in a little butter and olive oil. Cutting them thin lets them cook quickly. Thinly sliced pork loin stands in pretty well for veal in a lot of situations. Make German schnitzels. Make Italian scallopinis.
  13. The grocery store? Derby Pie is a trademark of Kern's Kitchen. You might find a recipe for, say, horse race pie or whatever. It'll taste pretty much the same. It isn't an official Derby Pie unless they make it. The Kern's kitchen site (derbypie.com) lists some places that will ship you a Derby Pie. I know I've seen them in other stores. I'm pretty sure they're often stocked at a lot of local supermarkets and even jumbo liquor stores like Liquor barn (liquorbarn.com). Many restaurants have them on their menu, too. They buy, slice, and serve them, perhaps after adding some decoration. I think the Brown does this.
  14. Many places have adequate hot browns, and some like to do interesting variations. Unfortunately, I can't think of one that jumps out. Of course, you could go to the Brown Hotel, where it was invented. "J. Graham's Cafe" is what you want. While the English Grill is excellent, it's certainly in the fine dining category. The Brown is downtown at Fourth and Broadway. BTW, a hot brown is definitely NOT a carry-out dish. Some casual icons include Mike Linnig's, Kaelin's, and Lynn's Paradise Cafe. Mike Linnig's is a summer tradition in a blue-collar end of town. Fried fish, onion rings, frog legs, and long-neck beers. Families would sit outside on concrete picnic tables or in screened-in "cabins." There is some indoor seating, too, and they are open in winter. It's good, but definitely not upscale. (mikelinnigsrestaurant.com) Even though Mike Linnig's has been around since 1925, many people on the other end of town have never been there. Make sure you get the onion rings. Lynn's has updated comfort food and a retro / funky / cool decor. I'm not sure if they're targeting the cool artistic hipsters or just people who want to pretend to be hipsters but are too old. Very popular for brunch. (lynnsparadisecafe.com) I'm torn on Kaelin's (kaelins.com). I've eaten there once or twice, but I can't remember much about it. It's really an old-fashioned (not "bistro", but perhaps not quite bar and grill either) neighborhood casual place, but it's not in my neighborhood. However, they claim to have invented the cheeseburger. It might be worth being able to say you've done it. To prevent getting flamed, let me mention that Louisville has a couple of great restaurant strips. The main one is along Bardstown Road, starting at about Jack Fry's, one of my favorites, and running south a couple of miles. Shrimp grits. Go figure. But it's not cheap nor very casual. The other strip is Frankfort Avenue. While there are a lot of places within a couple of blocks of Ewing Ave, I really like the Patron at Canons Ln. and Maido at Pope. Maido is a Japanese sake pub food place, with lots of wonderful small dishes, much like Spanish tapas. (maidosakebar.com). As for hotels, I'm afraid I live here so I don't tend to stay in local hotels. Executive Inn is near the airport but I don't know how nice it is. There are a couple Hilton, Courtyard, etc. along Crittenden Dr. and Phillips Ln. that are new and probably pretty nice. The Brown and Seelbach downtown are certainly very nice, but not cheap.
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