Okanagancook

And the information the USDA website is going to be the most accurate.

I found this little 'fellow' on my cherry tomato plant!

I put six eggs in for 5 minutes on high pressure, quick release. All fresh farms eggs. All about the same size. I opened two for sandwiches just now and one was quite green around the yolk while the other one was perfect. ????? Maybe something about the egg rather than the treatment. Weird. Can't explain it.

The Joy of Cooking masala blend is a 'classic' aromatic masala. Composed of spices that 'create heat in the body': cinnamon, cloves, black pepper and cardamon. My understanding is that this masala is used mostly with meat dishes and sometimes with poultry and rice. Sprinkled on the dish after cooking. Not used with fish or vegetables because it's aroma is considered too strong.

The Biltong turned out nice. You can see in the picture the doneness of the meat (the piece top right). It was in at 104F for 20 hours. Never eaten it before. I nice pepper-heat after it's been chewed awhile. It's a bit messy though. An outdoor snack, not for on the couch or in bed!

Just me last night...DH's Golf Mens Night. Chicken tender with tandoori spices; roasted potato cubes in duck fat and green beans with sauté onions. It's hard to eat when there is just one person.

With my new Excalibur drier I am making jerky. 6 1/2 lbs in all. Today a bought some round steaks, quite lean. Made five recipes. It was hot outside so decided to stay indoors. I made Biltong from Chris Taylor's website above. I have never tried it before but most recipes have the same procedure: Cut 1/2" thick; salt for an hour; scrape off salt; dip in cider vinegar for 3 minutes; coat in coarsely crushed whole coriander seeds and coarse cracked black pepper; with the Excalibur I hung the strip from hooks; drying at 104F for 24 hours. First three pictures. Next up was the Masaman Curry Jerky in the post above. Smells good. Marinating overnight. Fourth picture The jerky posted by TylerK quoted above. This one is going to be spicy. Fifth and sixth picture Thai Jerky from thebaldchef which has lemon grass, brown sugar, thai chili, black pepper and fish sauce, seventh pic Jerky from Serious Eats: Cook the Book. Contains Worchestership sauce, chipotle, pepper and a few other items. no pic Should be interesting. I sealed them in the vac sealer and threw them in the fridge. I used a carpaccio meat mallet to flatten the strips. Worked a treat. Last two pictures.

The macadamia nuts should be fine. I think they are added to the "bumbu" for texture like almonds are added to East Indian curries. They go rancid which is why they are kept in the freezer is my a guess.

On the topic of soft flour tortillas: We were at a winery BBQ a couple of weeks ago and the chef made these incredibly soft tacos which he prepared to receive a chunk of pork belly and some kind of mango sauce. Anyway, the tacos were amazing. Not very large, maybe three bites. I asked him how he made them and he said the secret is to not handle the dough very much...like pastry. So I googled around and found this site: http://www.lomexicano.com/recipe/flour-tortillas I used the variation at the bottom for smaller tortillas. These were the best ones I have made. I little thicker than my normal ones and I used rendered pork lard :-) I put the ingredients in a food processor and blended just until combined, turned the dough onto the counter and shaped it into a disk. So very little handling. They were cooked for 30 seconds on each side and then 30 sec more on the first side. Not very brown, heat regulation is important.

Excellent Shelby. I am waiting for it to arrive today. I have a pile of skinned, sliced and salted tomato slices ready to load in it! I am definitely making jerky. The recipes on line are quite similar, but this one caught my eye: Thai Nua Kem (from thebaldchef) top round beef sliced 2 T lemon grass 2T brown sugar 2T coarse black pepper 1T Thai chili 1 1/2 T salt 1T Fish sauce

Ok, those flat breads look awesome. Are they flour tortillas? They look nice and soft and not chewy. How do you make yours? Minimal kneading of possibly cake and all purpose flour mix with a touch of baking powder? Rest for an hour. Divide dough then rest again for 1 minutes. Cook 30 sec/side x 3??????

I have had both nuts and I think the candle nuts are a little larger than macadamia nuts. I would use 3 macadamia nuts for 2 candle nuts. Hope that helps without being able to source the candle nuts which will likely not be as fresh as any macadamia nut available.

Thanks for posting about beets. I have numerous beets out in the garden and need to wade in. Thanks for weighing it, you're so smart. I can use that info to determine my cooking time. I want to make beets with tehina from Zahav. If it is good I may take some down to our Syrian family living in the village. I don't think they planted beets in their garden plot.

I bet that deep fried eggplant is good! I love this book also. So many simple recipes and variations on a theme of ingredients. 35 years, eh? Wow. Kinda like my first book purchase, Claiborne's NYT cookbook. I used that exclusively for my first five years of cooking. Good memories.

Look what my sweetie made me. Overnight Country Brown Sour Dough from Water, Flour, Salt, Yeast. The flavour was decidedly sour dough. We thought it was going to be 'heavy' because it didn't rise all that much in the oven but it was very light in texture.

ground lamb kebabs which fell of the skewers...always happens to me; roasted okra and potatoes tossed in an anchovy/feta cheese/red wine vinegar/olive oil dressing; green beans with shallots and cucumber & tomato salad with just lemon juice and cumin.

Where the shrimps cold too? They look like really nice juicy shrimp. I like poaching shrimp very delicately in seasoned broth then cooling quickly.

Your meal looks delicious! I will look up that cabbage recipe seeing I have IK's book. I like your proportion of meat to sides. Lots of veggies. Good work.

Funny story today. I was loading up my "el-cheapo" dehydrator remarking to my DH "boy, we've had great use out of this cheapie little thing, I think it's been ten years". Took it out to the laundry area, plugged it in, walked away. Two hours later, DH says, 'how come the dehydrator is turned off?". Not turned off at all. Dead! Ha. As if on que. So I ordered one of these babies: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0115X5UGE/ref=pe_386430_203440370_TE_item

Shelby, it was garlic scapes that I was dehydrating along with some skinless tomato slices above. I used the ultra dry scapes to make my garlic scape salt. It turned out awesome! 1/4 cup of gray salt which is kinda moist and 1 teaspoon powdered garlic scapes both quickly combined in the spice grinder. Here's a pic. I have about 2/3 cup of garlic scape powder left over.

I used the oven for bacon: 400F on convection bake. Just put the slices on foil on the tray and let them go for about 15 minutes or so, turning to get both sides done. Of course, depends on the thickness of one's bacon as to how long but I was expecting lots of splatter but it a relatively 'clean' cook. They look so nice through the window, all bubbling away!

Drying some tomatoes because my freezers are full and so are my tomato plants in the garden. Also, some frozen garlic scapes. I ran into a gal last night who makes garlic scape salt and I want to try and make some. Once they thawed I was able to pull in the skins off the scapes quite easily. This should make them more tender and faster to dry.

Bacon and tomato sandwiches with homemade bacon and mayo.

We were just at a wine maker's dinner and one of the courses in the meal that was composed of everything local was "Joy Road Catering 2-year prosciutto" slices served with peach wedges, zucchini flower fritters filled with a local fresh cheese and edible flowers scattered about. Delicious as was the rest of the meal. Sorry no picture.

I could have tried whisking it in a larger bowl. Next time I'm doing 3 minutes longer in the IP and if not really creamy after that I will try the whisk, good idea.