Darienne

Thanks paulraphael, ice mentor supreme. The mix is not hard...it's like soft serve, but the dasher thingy is a pain to scrape off with all the bits and pieces sticking out. And I'm not much good with my arms and hands anymore getting stuff out of a straight-sided bowl. I figured with all the engineering types on eG that someone would have some clever idea of how to do this thing easily and with grace. I already don't spin it as long as the suggested time prescribed and goodness knows, soon the problem will be keeping it cool long enough to get it churned. I usually bungee-cord two athletic-type icing packs around the outside of the machine to keep it cool in the humid heat (which we haven't begun to get yet.)

Might have missed something, but could someone tell me about the black shirts?

Since I found a Cuisinart ICE-20 ice cream machine several years ago in a Utah second-hand store for $5, our lives have changed dramatically. Well, maybe not dramatically, but definitely for the better. From an ice cream 'distainer', I have become an ice cream lover and am quite popular in my neighborhood, especially with the children. Ice cream is constantly on the menu. The problem remains though: how on earth to get the churned mixture out of the inner bowl and off the dasher with any ease. I use a large and a thin silicone spatula and a plastic putty scraper. When my DH is around, he helps get the mixture out with his superior forearm strength, but then this morning the task was mine alone and I muttered rudely as I struggled to get all the mixture out. All shared tips and tricks for this job greatly appreciated. (Am waiting for the lilacs to bloom to try dcarch's Lilac Ice Cream.)

What beauties those chocolates are.

So, in keeping with my solemn promise, I made a brand new recipe from Power Hungry: Morning Maple Bars, p.68-69, using the maple syrup given to us by maple syrup producing neighbors just on Friday. Followed the recipe pretty religiously except, of course, leaving out the salt (high blood pressure dictates) and using peanut butter instead of another seed butter which would have been preferable. Alas we live way out in the middle of nowhere and if you don't have, you don't get. The results were very nice, except, as warned in the 'tips', the maple syrup was somewhat overwhelmed by the peanut flavor. I even did the prescribed toasting which the tips said you could ignore. Not nutty or seedy enough for my taste, although very nice. Still useful for breakfast.

Finally did a variation on the Citrus-Seed-Fruit Bars, Cardamom Fig Bars. Did not toast the walnuts (how lazy can you get?) and added a whole teaspoon of ground cardamom. Delicious. Great. Loved them. The only problem is that the cheapest figs I can buy cost double the best dates. And as for the basic Citrus-Seed-Fruit Bars, I process only the pepitas. Don't bother with the smaller seeds. I really do have to try something completely new.

Thanks very much, dcarch. I will have to translate that into my own ingredient and cooking method, but you have provided what I needed and I am grateful. Our lilacs are not in bloom yet so it may be quite a while until I get a chance to make the ice cream, but I'll report back when I do. Thanks again.

Went through Las Vegas back in 1985 and stopped for gas at 5:30 am. And the gas station was full of slot machines. We definitely weren't in Ontario any more!

Well, you caught my attention. Love Middle Eastern food and will also ILL the book from our library. ps. Done.

We have lilacs all over the farm. They escaped from the other farm house many decades ago. Would love your recipe for lilac ice cream, dcarch.

Canned mackerel tasted awful to me. Used to feed it to the four-legged ones before the price went sky high.

Thank you, kind sir. And here was I just about to work with Poblanos this very morning. Shall try this way. ps. Just realized that I took for granted that haresfur was a male name...

Of course, huiray. How stupid of me. I've never connected the day lilies that I buy in the local Asian grocery to make Hot and Sour Soup with the Day Lilies which grow around the house.

Have to try the Day Lily shoots. If there is one thing which we have around the farmhouse in great profusion, it's Day Lilies. Never heard of this before. Thanks.

Firstly my Trudeau spatulas. Solid silicone. Love 'em. Secondly my Paderno pots. Solely for my use for making confections, ice cream, etc. I have 5 different sizes with lids, all bought over 5 years when they came on sale.

Something curry-related could be homemade curried popcorn.

Hello Cinamon, You say you are FROM Japan. Does that mean that you are in the USA now? And I imagine you cook Japanese dishes? Welcome to eGullet.

So I said I'd try every recipe in the book and eventually I will but now that I've found a delicious one for daily breakfasts, it's become less of an imperative to keep trying new ones right now. Basically I'm working on perfecting making a double batch of the Citrus-Seed-Fruit Bars. My food processor is not up to the job as described by the author, particularly not for a double batch, and so I've worked around the directions. First of all I quit roasting the seeds. Inherent laziness and honestly I could not tell the difference between roasted and unroasted. I dump all the seedy things into the processor and chop them really lightly. I like the pieces as big as the mixture can manage. Then I heat the apricots in the microwave to soften them and chop them. Then heat the dates in the microwave to soften them and chop them into a paste. Each processing gets dumped into a large bowl. This is all mixed by hand and then I add the wet/citrus stuff (eliminating the salt) and mix well by hand. Into a 9"x11" pan, lined with an inexpensive silicone mat cut to size. Smoothed with a silicone spatula and into the oven it goes. Done. Oh, and I cut them into 16 instead of 20. They are the lowest calorie of the power bars at 105 each for 10 in a single recipe. Two bars is 210 at 10/recipe and that's not enough for breakfast. Not elegant. But done quickly and with two of us eating them for breakfast they don't last long. Not to mention the occasional mid-day snack. Just love 'em.

We eat 'salad' for supper every second night. That is, the entire meal is salad. We eat our dinner at noonish time. The way farmers did. We're old guys and feel that we sleep better without a full stomach. Sometimes our salad is basically a tossed type salad with a lemon vinaigrette with inclusions of just about anything I choose. Wouldn't ever call it a 'kitchen sink' salad though... Other times, it's a bed of green with cut tomato on top and the choice of a few made salads from my repertoire (which has been aided and abetted by eGullet folks over the years with recipes to feed our large gang during our Annual Dog Weekend), for instance: bean salad, broccoli and cauliflower salad, quinoa salad, tabbouleh (without tomatoes always), etc; or chunks of cheddar or slices of cold meats or canned corned beef when I'm feeling like it. Nothing fancy or worth photographing, but very satisfying. Oh, the other night is usually home made soup.

Just to add to janeer's suggestion of the cold poached salmon...we once went to a wedding reception and they served a cold poached salmon on a mirror platter surrounded by I can't remember what. Oh, cucumber standup thingies...but my main point is that the salmon was covered in thin slices of cucumber laid to represent its scales...one of the most beautiful platters I've ever seen. But then maybe that's not uncommon. We don't go to a lot of upscale weddings.

Have a choice as to where to post this dessert: Capirotada, the traditional Mexican bread pudding, the Lenten variety without milk or eggs. Love it. (The big spoon is hiding the hole where we 'tested' the pudding.)

I really like the chocolate coating idea. Would the chocolate work as a wetness barrier even if it were not in temper, but merely melted?

And there would never be puff pastry in mine, nor phyllo, without commercially available brands. And who could live without having Spanakopita?

What Smithy said: a bulk food store for sure.

Probably too late, but I would have roasted them and frozen them.