Darienne

Anythingbutplainchocolate, you have my sympathy also. Two years ago, my DH decided to rearrange my canned goods for me in a way that made 'much more' sense. To him. Not to me. Not at all. I did not shed a tear...but it took forever to put them back where they belonged. And without letting him know. Could not hurt his feelings.

No apples for us this year, after last year's amazing bounty. However, a bumper crop of wild grapes...more than I can use. Grape jelly is the result. Out on our perimeter walk this morning, we saw several puffballs, still small, and we'll watch them for picking this coming week. Ed loves puffball fried in butter. I freeze the extra for a variety of mushroom uses during the year.

I've never been to a 'culinary purposed' type Pot Luck, only the 'we're getting together for some non-food purpose and let's have fun and eat' type. Every group I've every belonged to has featured at least one yearly Pot Luck. Never thought of them of sources of gustatory delights. And I've come away with some pretty delicious recipes...and given out recipes also. In fact, the dish I bring for the entrance table to the Annual GourdFest and Pot Luck in Utah is always accompanied by many slips of the printed recipe. And all the slips are taken. Tostitos Kakimochi. Not high class, but I dare you to eat only one. I find Pot Lucks great fun. Always have; always will. You never know what you'll find.

Thinking about rose hips. At our Utah lodging, there is an amazing crop of rose hips every year and so far I have just looked at them in awe. Huge crop, gigantic rose hips. No one uses them at all. Although we are not great jam/jelly consumers, I thought this year I might try to make rose hip jelly, freezer quality. I don't have the equipment there to do anything else. Then I'll give it away to friends no doubt...if it tastes reasonably good. As for straining it, would glass sheers...which I use for straining, keeping fruit flies off, etc...work well enough? I've never opened a rose hip and don't know how large the seeds are. From reading the post in this topic, it seems that they would work. I used the sheers last week to strain wild grape jelly... I will report back in a few weeks if I try this. Thanks for any information. Just found this photo of one year's crop of rose hips in early October

Oh my! I am suffering from lollie-envy. Wonderful, Minas6907.

So yesterday friend Ruth, DH Ed and I picked wild grapes. Then I spent most of the afternoon washing, picking over, etc the grapes. (My hands and wrists complained last night.) First cooking. Drained all night. Purple/blue stains everywhere. Today I took half the grape pulp juice and made jelly. The other half I froze so that when Ruth comes back, we can make jelly together. And get more purple/blue stains everywhere. Delicious jelly. Very grapey.

Ditto Pierogi for me now. Except I would add Inter-library loan to the library list.

Followed Mjx's suggestion to the earlier topic and found Jaymes' Stacked Green Chile Enchiladas. Will actually try them next. Thanks, as always, Jaymes.

Pulled meat of any kind on small buns (that way you can have two) with sauces and roasted onions (less work than fried), cole slaw on the side. That's an easy meal. We tend to serve Tex/Cal/Mex. That's pretty casual. Salads that keep a few days are terrific for casual entertaining, things made with beans, sweet potatoes, quinoa, bulgur, chickpeas. Sometimes we do a Ploughman's Lunch for folks we are not sure of: cheeses, breads, fruits, cold meats (not for me), this and that. Ed makes a terrific macaroni and cheese dish which his Mother made. With a green salad, that's about as casual as you can get. I always have homemade ice cream in the freezer which makes a good dessert. I guess the list is endless. Best of luck to you.

All three desserts sound lovely...I'm going to make the Praline-Bourbon Custard Parfait...and I really enjoyed reading the entire article.

I have a lemon cream cheese pie from a very old cheese book which takes only one box of cheese and one egg and tastes wonderful. Of course, I would put a chocolate ganache on top. You could make the Margarita pie on graham crackers, although it's better on crushed pretzels. Any kind of pie which has cream cheese or whipped cream or both as the bulk ingredient. Yumm. How can you miss with cream cheese, whipped cream, lemon, booze....????

Did some ungrateful, picky guest complain? I'm not going to eat this blown turnover? I think not. I would have eaten one and been happy. Those who complained do not get invited back.

Your pie looks lovely. So glad you enjoyed it.

Ruth, those are exquisite.

You are definitely my go-to-glacee mentor in eG. As for buying young stem ginger. I've never seen it for sale as such and don't think we can buy it period. I've seen only the larger mature kind. But folks seem to love the more tender cubed ginger purchased sitting in syrup and my problem was allowing myself to get hooked into something I should have refused to do. Gee, that sounds so unusual!! Still it's done.

Not in my experience. You just get little pale cocoa-coloured pearls leaking out instead. Well, as they say, now I know. They will still love them. :wub: So good that the mistakes in confections are still delicious and enjoyed.

It's the next morning. Minimal oozing. Checked a few pieces and it's not bad at all. (I'm not selling these.) However, kudos to you, Kerry, there are teensy weensy little white spots on some of them. The pieces go out today and so I'll watch them. And I'll NEVER do this again in this time period. Nope, I'll say, it can't be done so don't ask me. I didn't have days to dry. And I had to use this kind of ginger because that's the kind the recipients want...not the other kind alas! Still these folks would eat the stuff happily no matter what I did or how it looked. I did buy a few of the other pieces and dip them for us, and of course they are never any trouble at all. I love both kinds. Perhaps the cornstarch pearls could be averted if the cocoa and cornstarch had been well mixed...??

It's adding baking soda to the water to make the eggs peel more easily.

The topic of leaking centers has been addressed before: "Leaky chocolate covered peanut butter balls" and "Leaky cherries", but I am dealing with candied ginger pieces in syrup and it's always a problem. (Funny...I googled the problem and found my own posts in eG.) In the PB balls posts, Kerry suggests letting the ginger pieces dry out for a few days. Would that I had a few days. I bought the ginger in syrup today and it has to go out as a gift tomorrow. I have run out of time. In my earlier post, I wondered about precoating the pieces in powdered sugar and cornstarch (and I never tried it). Today I patted the pieces with paper toweling...satisfactory to a point. Next, into a bag of cocoa, shake the cocoa on, shake the cocoa off, and spread on a paper towel. One hour later: most pieces look dry...a few look a tad syrup-ish. Not perfect. Next, repeated above process with some cornstarch. Twenty minutes later: they still all look dry. They still taste just fine. Who has a brilliant tip for me? Or will this latest attempt probably work? I will get back one way or t'other.

Interesting posts. I am married to a man who salts his food without tasting it. Oh well... According to my personal anecdotal and totally unscientific evidence, Americans use more sugar than Canadians, while Canadians. on the other hand, use more salt than Americans do. Certainly Canadian butter is saltier than American, while American grocery-store purchased bakery goods are far sweeter than their Canadian counterparts.

I love the sheep. :wub:

There wasn't anything I could reply to your questions, but I am eager to know what you did in the end and how it turned out?

I've never tried anything like this, but I think I'm going to... Thanks.

I'm really enjoying this.

We are not what you would call social drinkers. I quit drinking for the most part a few years ago and DH drinks one neat vodka before bed. Oh, I sip vodka if I have a coughing fit in the night. Not exciting. Last weekend was the Annual Dog Weekend which meant lots of food and lots of drink. American dog friends brought an assortment of stuff with them, most of which I have never seen before and have no idea of whether I could get them in Canada. Left to right: * Kirkland Tequila – in Ontario we can get liquor only in an LCBO * Patron Silver Tequila – very nice, very expensive in Canada, for sipping * Svedka vodka – love the snazzy red, white and blue bottle. Keeping the empty bottle in the Americana Room, assembled in the beginning to annoy our anti-American friends. Yes, there are anti-American Canadians (idiots) * Patron XO Tequila Café – very tasty for sipping * Pinnacle Chocolate Whipped Vodka. It was served by a friend from DE mixed with cherry juice. I have no idea why. I thought it was awful, but others liked it. From France * Three Olives Vodka – empty bottle; I never got to taste it. * Fireball Red Hot Cinnamon Whisky – ironically made in Canada, exported to the USA, and brought back across the border. I love pretty much anything with a bite. * Vincent Van Gogh Dutch Chocolate Flavored Vodka – just opened it and tasted it. I hope that without being rude or hurting our friends, I can dissuade them from bringing either of the chocolate-flavored vodkas again. (No, they don’t belong to eGullet.) There was much drinking of frozen Margaritas made from Goya Peach, Mango, and Pear. Personally, I like the regular lime based best by far.