Darienne

In Ontario, many households, including ours, are on Smart Meters for electricity. This means that between certain hours during winter hours and then somewhat altered hours during summer hours we have three levels of cost for electricity. I could try to use this scheme for cooking and baking...but I don't. I work in the kitchen during peak hours and don't see that I really have a lot of choice. We didn't choose to have Smart Meters either. So when you get down to it...I don't do much if anything to save energy in the kitchen I guess. Which isn't exactly what you asked for, is it?

Sorry, Heidih. I Googled 'self-incompatible' and just can't get the meaning in plain English. Could you please do this in just a couple of sentences for me (and possibly others) if it's possible. ...and why it should matter... Thanks. I've grown tomatillos for the past five years. Not well, as I have the blackest thumb in all captivity. However, I do get enough for our own use and tomatillos are one thing which is NEVER in the local grocery stores or markets. (Probably available in Toronto.) I container plant and my containers are a weird bunch of miss-matched items and so I have to water the plants according to container. You'd think with 100 acres that I'd do better than that. But there you have it. It is what it is.

OMG. I saw chocolates with a Durian filling. Now I really am jealous!

Kim, your cake looked delicious to me. I would have eaten it gladly. In fact, if anybody ever made me a cake, I would swoon from delight.

As hard-shelled gourd artisans...that's what my avatar photo is...my DH and I are very familiar with the 'calabash' and its uses in the world. (I use the word 'calabash' in quotation marks because the actual calabash comes from a calabash tree and although a dried calabash looks like a dried gourd to a great extent, it's not the same thing.) You might be interested to know that this milk substance is often mixed, in the dried and cleaned out gourd, with fresh animal blood for a meal. Don't know the name of this mixture, but it's not something which I am eager to try. Not now; not ever.

Why the proviso: 'not inside the house'?

That eggplant looks divine.

Well, if anyone IS an expert in this case, it is you, good sir. I said only what I had read on Wikipedia. Recado rojo or achiote paste is a popular blend of spices, originally used by the Maya peoples. It is now strongly associated with the Mexican and Belizean cuisine, especially of Yucatán and Oaxaca. The spice mixture usually includes annatto, Mexican oregano, cumin, clove, cinnamon, black pepper, allspice, garlic, and salt.[1][2] The annatto seeds dye the mixture red, and impart a distinctive red-orange color to the food. I know see that some of the names are used hither and yon by different folks...a lot like everything else in life. Still I am glad of the reason to look it all up again. However, I can tell you about canned beans and what they are, being pretty much of an expert in that area. Alas. (And said to the Bean Man...)

Been there, and done that with the bleach. But they still have only a 'life' to live. Particularly if visitors come...

Mine go daily into the microwave and I read that this is enough. Yes? No? Then I cut off their corners after a while and they become floor, door, etc sponges and we don't' mix them up. Then to the cellar for use there...and so to the garbage.

I noticed on our last visit to Utah...we live in Ontario...that I had trouble finding decent sponges and ended up tossing several kinds as useless. Just checked my sponge supply and they are 'no-name' brand, but still good. Could it be an international situation? What we have versus what you have? We also buy our sponges at a local cleaning supply house, Swish. And they are very good. Never had a sponge bleed color. Very strange to me.

We have run through (and given away) several dehydrators in the last umpty-one years. And now we have another one, gifted by our raw vegan daughter. Salton, 5 tray, conventional style. She made some cracker things while she was last here and I take it she uses hers constantly and didn't realize that I already had one (now given away). I've dried a number of things over the decades...and then ignored the dehydrator for months on end. (Sort of like the bread machine, pasta maker, etc...all of which were given away) I just can't seem to work it into our lives. Help.

Thanks Tri2Cook and dcarch for your posts. No, I did not see any paper husky bits on top of the few curled ferns there, just around the bottom. And yes, I might try buying some next time in town and comparing. And I still have the option of finding a local pro to ask. And T2C, thanks for going that extra mile and showing my photo to your local pro. I'll watch that patch carefully. (but not for the next few days...our dog is repairing from 2 ACL injuries and it's just too far to walk there and back each day as of yet)

Interesting issue...cardamom. I am a cardamom nut and always put twice as much as called for in anything desserty I make. And have never tasted anything resembling turpentine. And it's all pre-ground. I have always kept two kinds of cardamom. One I label 'dessert' and the other one 'food'. Are there two kinds of cardamom...or did I make this up?

There aren't a lot of fiddleheads out yet, and those that I saw yesterday are already past that stage. But the ones I did see are growing out of a brown papery husk-like covering and have a deep groove on their interior side. However I still feel really queasy about the entire project. I think I'll fall back to the 'asking an expert to come out to the farm to look' option. Thanks for the help, Tri2Cook. It's a good start.

Roughly speaking...how much money are we talking? In US or Canadian dollars specified please. Oh I mean for the Excalibur.

This is terrific. Congratulations, Kerry. You are one powerhouse of a woman!

Have the camera at the ready for the daily round the farm walk. Will report back. Thanks so much for sharing, Tri2Cook.

Thanks so much for the information, Tri2Cook. I have also now done a bit of Googling, and between that and your information, I should have a better idea. There are a couple of curled fronds which have come up already and tomorrow I'll have a closer look at them. Maybe pick them...take a photo and post it on this thread. Maybe I can find someone locally who will look at them for me. We have this huge patch of ferns, year after year, and I've always been leery of picking them and eating them. ...There's a local naturalist, very knowledgeable, author of books on the local area. He's the man one contacts when something interesting happens locally. I seem to spot unusual things on our farm quite often. Maybe he knows someone near by who might help in this case. That would make me feel much better.

I need to ask a question about fiddle-heads. Every year we have a huge patch of what I would call fiddle-heads on the farm. They grow into huge green ferns later in the season. Are these the ferns which grow from the kind of fiddle-heads that folks eat? Is there such a thing as a non-edible fiddle-head? I'd be afraid to cook and eat them until someone could answer these questions. Thanks.

Cinco de Mayo is here and we had Chiles en Nogada for lunch. The pictures I took were all incredibly fuzzy and so I didn't post one. Sorry. Don't know why. They were delicious and we both enjoyed them muchly. My long-time Picadillo recipe is from Elisabeth Ortiz, The Complete Book of Mexican Cooking. First ppb edition, 1967. It predates my interest in Mexican food...or even cooking for that matter...and I have NO idea of why I bought it way back when. It's absolutely in tatters from age and use. I merge the two Ortiz recipes and I used bananas and apples as the fruit. Oh, and add cocoa just for the heck of it. Two problems remain: - the poblanos were not very strong after blackening under the broiler. Too much heat and ended up partially cooked. Not sure what to do. I have a little propane stove put aside for emergencies. Maybe I could use it in future. Not sure what the objection is to the poblano skin. Doesn't seem all that substantial to me and I ignore it for Chile Verde and Rajas and using Poblanos in salads. - the sauce. I can't do mortar and pestle with these hands and in the food processor the walnuts cannot be ground to a smooth nothing. Little bits remain. Now I don't really care, but it's not satisfactory to serve to guests in this state. What to do. Thanks to all who helped me in this new venture. It really turned out well and I'll do it again.

Funny, just as I was thinking of answering you, I returned to that old thread and found my own response on it. My "Picadillo a la Cabana" (still don't know how to put a tilde on the 'n' when online) which is exactly what I'd make again this time given your answer...which I greatly appreciated. You are definitely my first go-to mentor for things Mexican. And, of course, I always have dried cranberries on hand. So, I'll do just that...soldier on and make the dish. Thanks for the encouragement.

Picking up this thread 11 years later... Chiles en nogada have been mentioned recently in a eG thread: (I still don't know how to post other eG sites) Cinco de Mayo...What will you make?? in Food Traditions & Culture and I said I would make these for the first time on this coming Tuesday. However, I hae ma doots. My recipe comes from Rick Bayless posted by Jaymes. Poblanos imported into Canada are obviously not the prime kind and I have no idea of their growing season. Actually I can't recall if their origins are noted. I have never seen white walnuts for sale and have only the regular kind...these from North Carolina sent to me by an eG chum. We can't buy pears which are local in May. And there are no peaches at any prices. Haven't seen a fresh plantain recently although in all fairness they might be in the stores. I could buy a pomegranate although most of it would go to waste. DH hates them. Question: should I just make something else? BTW, I've never had this dish. Mexican restaurants in Peterborough are pretty much limited to non-pork dishes (no, I'm not kidding) and feature mostly tacos. What to do?

Like a gazillion other adults in North America, I weigh far more than I should. Plus I am now battling a number of ailments, some of basically my own doing and neglect, and others for which I have little or no responsibility...like crippling Spinal Stenosis. (Well, I don't think it's my fault.) But with every extra pound I carry, I suffer x amount of extra pain,...etc, etc. So I am very interested in keeping my weight as low as I possibly can. Which is, as we all know, very, very hard to do, particularly if you love food. Thus I am very interested in your thread. If you can make it both weight helpful and still interesting to eat, I'm for it. We have recently stumbled across the concept of eating reheated rice and other grains and carb-laden foods. As I understand it: cook it with some coconut oil, let it cool for a period, reheat it and eat it, and presto chango, it is transformed into a lesser caloric-laden dish. Love it. Are you intending to work that concept into your re-formulating of recipes?

Not really living in a tropical area...the snow is just gone. I've never seen frozen coconut in a grocery store, but then I'll ask in my Asian grocery next time I'm in. I have purchased a lot of coconuts in my life and have had only 2 or maybe 3 be bad. Which might be dumb luck. I would expect to have better luck in Kensington Market in Toronto where there would be markets which must keep produce fresh or lost customers. It's a great place to shop. If you want to drive to Toronto which we no longer want to do. Unless we have to.