Darienne

We in this house are eggplant lovers and I am going to try Shel_B's interesting recipe. Never thought of doing that. Thanks.

I just made the Chantilly Cream recipe. 'The Best Chocolate Mousse of Your Life in Under 5 Minutes, Herve This and Heston Blumenthal. I can't believe it. It's incredible. It blows me away with its creamy deliciousness. I think I'm in love. :wub:

Not sealed. And indeed it is gone! End of problem. Thanks all for the help.

Thanks to all for suggestions. Alex: not pistoles, but in a block. Nutella is a good idea but not in our eating household. Wholemealcrank: I haven't tried to combine it with unsweetened chocolate or cocoa. Wasn't sure that you actually could with impunity. Merstar: I might try the espresso or cocoa powder idea and see what I get. ChrisZ: eat it? I'd have to be pretty hungry to do so. I was a war baby (WWII for you youngsters) and raised without sugar. Just don't like very sweet stuff. Tri2Cook: thanks for the offer. Will PM you. BTW, weighed it properly: 7 lbs, 4 oz right now. I think I'll melt some and add the cocoa and/or espresso. Thanks again all.

There's about 6 pounds of Guittard Milk Chocolate sitting in my basement, leftover from a long Christmas story which no one needs to hear. I don't like the taste of milk chocolate: never have, never will. I can always use it over a longish period in cakes, icings, candies, ice cream, whatever, to give away. However, is there some way to hide/mask/alter the milk chocolatey-ness of it and use it for things we, as confirmed dark bittersweet chocolate lovers, might enjoy?

Neighbor from across the road gifted us with a wonderful Savory Onion Bread yesterday. I had not had lunch at the time and devoured a huge chunk of it within minutes. She gave me the recipe today and I looked it up to pass it on: All Recipes It's a non-yeast bread and so can be made in just a few minutes. DH wants me to add crumbled bacon to it.

[Hi gingerpeachy, Took a quick look at the Dukan diet. If it works for you, then great. We each seem to settle on different configurations to get where we need to go. Congratulations on your excellent loss to date and you go, girl. Eating mindfully. That's a good thought.

I would have to be starving before I'd cook/eat anything with cream of whatever soup in it. It was the basis for much of the cooking in my family home. Yech. Asked the DH for his input and his first thought was Bisquick and pancake and other baking mixes. We were not long married(52 years this March) and one weekend I had run out of Bisquick to make biscuits. Then a light dawned. Maybe there was a recipe in my one cookbook to make biscuits. Made them from scratch that very day. Oh...is that how they taste? Yum. Still I blame the advent of McDonald's for most of the North American world's culinary ills.

Just reread the last few pages of this topic. Re-inspired me and more importantly, REMINDED me of what I was doing right and wrong. I had forgotten about Hot & Sour Soup, one of our mainstays. So delicious and so low calorie. Perfect for supper. Must make a batch. Heidi's ideas of salads which keep in the fridge for a few days brought back thoughts of summer. It's so cold in East Central Ontario in the winter, and the days are so short, and I get chilled by suppertime now that salads won't work for me. They do in the summer. I also like the thought of cooking vegetables ahead of time at their peak and then doing whatever with them. Haven't done that. Tend to roast them when they are past their prime. However, she says, congratulating herself, at least I've not thrown out a vegetable in two years at least now. We've just returned from a couple of months away, and the drive there is four to five days each way - 2400 miles. This time was the first time that an eating strategy has worked out well. Breakfast and lunch were shakes using the 'meal replacement plan' noted in an earlier post. Not yummy, but doable. Put the lunch portion in a plastic snak bag and made it in the car using what I think is the simplest, most incredible invention I've seen in a long time: Blender Bottle . We each have one now and they work so well. Snacks were small dark chocolate tablets (50 cals each) mixed with pecans. And we made it to Moab with NO WEIGHT GAIN!!! Supper was from grocery produce with added cheese. Salad dressing came from home. The trip home did not work as well. The weather was terrible and the driving exhausting. I had a recurrent bout of Spinal Stenosis. We ate out far more. But we made it home alive, unharmed, and only a couple of pounds up. So basically I've kept off 15 pounds since November. A new high, if you would, for me.

Googled 'lead in crockpots' and got a lot of websites with differing information. Any engineering or chemical types out there with some useful information on the subject? I have three older Rival crockpots and one fairly recent Franklin Chef. I don't want to toss them all but will do so if the more worrisome websites are correct. Thanks.

Your questions are way beyond my ken, but I did catch the 'lead contamination' bit. Three of my crockpots are old and I'd like to know where they stand in this issue. Please. Don't leave us all hanging. Thanks.

Green lentils in our very favorite lentil soup from Bon Appetit Made the last batch just two days ago. I use more spinach and don't add the crushed red pepper. Love that lentil soup.

You two eat so well. I am so jealous of the huge range of excellent restaurants from which you can pick.

It's cold and frozen in the cold frozen far north and we've just returned from the Southwest where I gave in and bought Jeni's book. Finally started to look at it last night. Now I've reread this thread, and will finish reading DL's thread plus all 93 comments AND then start in on the recipes. There's not a lot of ice cream posting at this date but I shall begin. Two days ago I did make DL's Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream...so simple to throw together and everyone loves it. We're demolishing a foundation wall in our century farmhouse and we need a dust annihilator. Two days ago, DH misread the grocery list and bought a double container of cream cheese when all we needed was cream. Could this have been a prophetic move on his part?

The mole looks great...but that kitchen. O, that kitchen. I could kill for that kitchen!!!!

Wonderful as always. It's pretty fail-proof. I added a dollop of Kahlua for an extra zip.

Here's another good website for sensible eating. I have used quite a number of these recipes. What Would Cathy Eat?

I have this vague memory from a couple of years ago when confectionery partner Barbara and I made green marshmallow lollipops for St. Patrick's and after the main slab had been cut out and assembled, Barbara took the slightly raggy cut-off ends and wrapped them around the sticks. It worked quite well. (That was in my marshmallow craze period. )

Is that one HUGE rounding error! Thanks for the input.

Almost one year later and again questions about condensed milk arise. Again, making DL's Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream and starting with two cans of milk because one can is not enough. OK. So DL calls for 1 1/2 cups or 600 grams. So I weighed the milk as I poured it and found that a very generous 1 1/2 cups (up over the rim a bit) weighed only 516 grams. Do you suppose that different brands of condensed milk weigh different amounts, as in Brand A is actually heavier than Brand B? Hardly important for ice cream, but still puzzling...

Thanks for the roo explanation. Didn't mean to send you off to do research...not in the middle of also writing and cooking a week's worth of blog. Thanks. (I do understand about gun permits. We are Canadians.)

Questions for when you have time. How does the average kangaroo make its way from hopping around into the meat counter? Are they farmed? How old are they when killed? Do you eat the liver, kidneys, etc? Shot wild? Who dispatches them? Etc.

Very interesting post. I can't recall ever seeing any silicone lids in a kitchen store, but will look for them. My one simple use for such an item is when making quick lollipops in the microwave. Instead of the on again - off again plastic wrap, I started to use a sort of knobby silicone square trivety thing. Just looks like a blue silicone square with knobs up and down. Works perfectly and so much less trouble.

If you are able to keep records of what is in your freezer, then you will not forget what it is the bottom of it. Granted this takes a certain amount of self-discipline, but for us it is worth it in the end. We have not had to throw anything out for years now. But then our freezer is well organized with interior squared buckets which hold items according to some rationale, e.g., Mexican ingredients, nuts & dried fruits, vegetables, raw meats, cooked meats, etc. Just throwing it into the ring...

I never gave any thought to box graters. Just got mine out to have a look. All it says is that it's stainless steel and made in Sweden. I think I've had it forever.