snowangel

The outdoor fridge is once again in operation. Reminder to self -- brush the snow off the pot when it quits snowing so I can find it under a pile of snow. Oh, wait. Today, it's an outdoor freezer!

Tim, I preface what this by letting you know that I use a Weber Kettle, so I'm not sure how much of what I say will apply. But, when I start out, I start with a 1/2 chimney, and never have to add more lit coals. I put in some unstarted charcoal, add the lit stuff, and a few more unlit briquettes to the top. Then the soaked wood. My kettle is pretty old, so nothing fits as tight as it would were it new, so I've found that it can be helpful to control the temp by shutting down the vents. I find it easier to goose up the heat than reduce it. Experience has taught me how to keep the temp on my kettle down to 225 or so (I use a regular oven thermometer on the rack beside the meat; works well for me). Part of it is just a lot of smoking so you can figure it out. My first experiences were not nearly as sucessful as they are now. Keeping the temp in line is automatic right now. And, after a certain point, adding more wood chunks is unnecessary, I feel. There is that debate about whether the meat quits absorbing the smoke at about 140, so I quit adding wood about 1/2 way through. (Cheap source of wood can be an apple orchard.) Your turkey sounds wonderful, and has given me a hankering to smoke one. I was most disappointed when my SIL served smoked turkey. She had paid someone $25.00 to smoke a turkey (which she provided). It was dry and not very smokey. I told her next year, I'll do the smoking!

I was looking at one of these this afternoon at Target. I was intrigued, so when I got home I did some Googling to find any users' reviews: there's a helpful review (mostly negative) at the link below: http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/cookw...5243916954.html ← To me, the biggest drawback would be lack of the smoking process. The tending, the beer drinking, going to bed smelling ever so slightly of whatever it is you smoked. And yes, you can smoke outdoors very successfully on the coldest days of winter.

This sounds way stupid, but has been a popular gift. I just hate trying to get plastic wrap on top of a bowl. It sticks to me, sticks to everything, but I can never get a good seal. So, got a roll of elastic, and cut various lengths and tied them. I've given these (in a variety of lengths already tied) many times and they are very popular.

Add Fuchsia Dunlop's Land of Plenty. $6.98 at Half Price Books. They never have a clue what these books are worth, thankfully.

I had every intention of making latkes tonight, but a meeting Paul and Diana needed to attend at 7:00 pm meant we needed a quick-to-get-on-the-table meal. Chili! 2 pounds of misc. pieces of venison (when I whacked up the deer quarters, I ended up with a pile of odd scraps), cubed and browned in bacon grease. A lot of onions and an obscene amount of garlic. That 3/4 pound package of ground venison that was rattling around in the freezer. The last of the tomatoes I froze this summer. Some roasted poblanos that fell on my foot when I opened the freezer. A mixture of a couple of kinds of chilis (ground) that I got at the coop and forgot to label. And, two cans of rotel. Oh, and 2 cans of kidney beans. It was the best ever chili. Eveyone really liked the combo of the small cubes of venison with the ground. I made 6 quarts, so we'll have plenty of chili in the freezer!

December 1, 2005 In the Star Tribune's Entertainment Section: A four-star review of La Belle Vie. In Counter Intelligence, restaurant news, including the closing of Bobino and promises of a new place to take that space. In Now Open, news that D'Amico does Mexican with the opening of Masa. I'm curious. Italian meets Mexican? Over in the Taste section: Annual winners of the annual Holiday Cookie Contest along with links to the recipes. An article on regional Good Gifts. A report on New Spirits. Lynn Rosetto Kasper does Stew. In Food Events, still no news of lutefisk dinners, but lefse lessons are available! Wine Events focuses on tastings for holiday dining and entertaining. Over at the Pioneer Press's Entertainment section: Presents for Foodies focuses on cookbooks. There's also Restaurant News as well as another article about Anemonie, Masa and Salut. In CityPage's Restaurant section, Dara visits Fugaise. ALthough I didn't post a report last week (I was out of town), she had nice reviews of Lucia's Bakery and Take Home and the Heartland Wine Bar. The current issue of Mix, a great inteview with Brenda Langton, owner/chef of Cafe Brenda and a proponent of local since long before it was fashionable. <><><><><> Media Digest Notes... Updates from some Twin Cities media outlets, which do not 'go to press' by Friday each week, may be edited into each week's post as they become available. Please do not reply on this thread. For discussion of any stories which are linked here, please feel free to start a new thread or contact the forum host or the "digester" who will be happy to do it for you.

Thanks, Ms. Reichl, for joining us. I received the new Gourmet Cookbook as a gift (mine has orange, not yellow recipe titles, which I can easily read without my reading glasses). This book languished for about a year. My immediate reaction with a cookbook is to take it to bed, and quite frankly, this one does not rest on one's chest easily. It is just too flat big to read. However, I have been pulling it out very frequently, and am delighted every time, and have a few questions: Your intro talks about the number of times recipes were tested, and the culling process. Where were the recipes tested? Did you do any testing at home with kids who only eat white foods, husbands who long for their mother's cooking? You mentioned the many versions of vinegar pie that had appeared over the years. What was it that swayed you to the one printed? I appreciate very much that the various notes that are sprinkled throughout do not, like the Cook's Illustrated compendium that came out at about the same time, does not include particular product recommendations/testings. How did you decide what to include in these sidebars? Introductions to the recipes. How many of you were involved in these introductions? Finally, congrats on this book. It has an absolutely outstanding index. I don't know who was responsible for the indexing, but I certainly appreciate the ability to check the index for most main ingredients and come up with a list.

Interesting that you bring this up! I have been thinking of the same thing, ever since this weekend when we had some orange haberno marmalade. I, like fifi, think that these peppers need to be fully seeded and deveined. This marmalade was outstanding. A very nice combo. Expecially with a runny brie. Along these same lines, I have a couple of gallons of rasberry juice (it has been reduced a bit) in the freezer and have been contemplating a raspberry/chipotle jelly. Any ideas on this? Use dried chipotles? Re-consituted ones? Or, chipotles in adobo with the adobo removed?

Over on the Cooking forum, we're having a Potato Pancake Cookoff. The basic premise of the cookoffs is that we I've never had latkes that weren't part of a buffet (ala steam tray). And, I want to make them myself. There is a whole 'nother topic on eGullet that discusses latke's, and there is some debate as to whether to use the box grater or the food processor. Most of the discussion mentioned using matzo meal as a binder, but the Gourmet recipe very specifically says not to do that. Talk latkes! I have a mess of potatoes (russets), a lot of sour cream and some divine smoked salmon. And, a hungry family.

So, before I delve into making potato pancakes, what should I serve with them? I know I'm in lefse country. I hate lefse. I hate the idea of butter and sugar on that potato pancake, which I think is more like a crepe. I'm thinking of trying latkes. Need side ideas before I pull out the grater and devour the available info.

Welcome to blog world! How old are your kids? How do they play into the food planning? My oldest (15) and youngest (10 today) are now taking an active part in cooking and meal planning. Will they hate you at the end of the blog? Mine were mighty glad when we could eat dinner after my blogs without having to take pictures first. And, should you need RecipeGullet help, I'm your person, just PM me.

I had so much fun making Potstickers today, I'm thinking that I should make a mess more and give frozen potstickers, along with cooking instructions, for Christmas gifts. They are an ultimate fast food.

I'll get the recipe into RecipeGullet within the next day or two. It's a riff off of the recipe from Barbara Tropp's Modern Art of Chinese Cooking. I must confess that I used purchased wrappers (hands head in shame). Her pleating instructions are outstanding. No, I don't boil them first. Put them in a hot pan that has some oil; putting them in butted up against each other. When the bottoms get nice and golden, add some stock, reduce heat, and put a lid on. When they are done (I think about 10 minutes? I'll have to check), remove lid to boil off the little stock remaining and turn out onto a plate. One of the things I like is having a mess of these in the freezer. I can pull out 1/2 a dozen and fix them for a quick lunch in a very small skillet, or use a lot for a quick dinner (ultimate fast food). If they are frozen, I do not defrost them before cooking. Edited to add: Daniel, it took me just under 45 minutes to fill and pleat them. I can do this in my sleep. I don't know how many thousands I've made over the years.

I had a hankering for pot stickers. So, I made about 130 of these I put most of them on cookie sheets in the freezer; once frozen into zip lock bags. I pot stickered the rest of them and served them with a stir fried broccoli with tons of garlic and a splash of nam pla. For dessert, a few more pot stickers and a clemantine.

From experience in Thailand, there is the Squid Brand camp, and the Tiparos camp. I'm a Tiparos woman, but next time, I will get a bottle of Squid Brand and do a comparison. I do know that my local Asian market outsells Tiparos to Squid by a fairly large margin. And, I do know that the bottles that are labeled with the nutrition label including the ingredients are not necessarily correct. On the last two bottles of Tiparos, the U. S. added-on label listed sugar as an ingredient, but this was not included in the Thai label.

I have left the full fat caps on my smokeme pieces. Stock report. It is barely burbling away. Interesting that there is almost no skimming with this stock, and it was a different kind of skimming. None of that foamy stuff. Just a couple of blobs of stuff. The house smells good. I opted not to add anything to the stock, just the meaty bones, which we whacked with an axe to try and break them up (unsuccessful, but I think I exposed some good bone stuff). I think I need a band saw.

Thanks, Nancy, for the report. As you can see here, it has been cut up, wrapped, and labeled. But, my labeling sometimes doesn't indicate what the cut it, but the intent. The smoking is going to have to wait for a bit. But, I will report!

Well, those four quarters have been taken care of: Nicely wrapped in butcher paper, labeled well, and secured with electrical tape (it was what I could find, thanks to my son and his friends). These deer are interesting. This was my first attempt at home butchering. I have learned a lot. You can see the "weapons" of destruction: a hack saw and a strange knife given to me my a former neighbor who worked in a slaugther house. I would take that knife over any cleaver any day. It is made of that stuff that rusts if you don't dry it immediately, and takes a sharp like no other knife I've ever had. There's a reason those deer can leap as far as they can. You know how when you cut up a chicken those tendons around the joints just slice really easily? Well, with a deer, they are almost like bone. The fat is odd, too. Very hard. There are some bones in a stock pot merrily simmering away. I don't know what I'll do with venison stock, but I'll find a use. The packets of meat are out on the deck in our single digit windchill getting a head start of freezing before hitting the deep freeze. Next time it will be neater and cleaner. I doubt I'll ever send one away again for butchering, as long as someone else will skin the thing for me. The $20 extra to have the damned thing skinned was money well worth it.

Let me tell you. I've smoked sub-zero. I've had to shovel show off the deck and once had to remove about a 1/2 food of snow from the Weber. But, damn it, I smoked, and it was wonderful. It is actually easier to control temp when it is really cold and snowy! You are not crazy. Absolutely not. What else are you going to do on a snowy, cool day?

As I've reported here, I'm in a rather hurried search of ways in which to process these quarters. Although the meat is not terribly well marbeled, the shoulders do have a very nice fat cap. Suggestions on smoking venison, (as well as dealing with the rest of these parts), is most appreciated. I am accomplished at smoking the normal stuff -- briskets, butts, shoulders, turkeys -- but venison is different. Does that connective tissue respond the same way it does in pork? Rub, no rub? Wood type? Advice, please!

HELP!!!! (yes, I am shouting). This is on the table on my deck and I need to take care of it. Advice, please! I have until Thursday morning when I leave for a long weekend. Fortunately it is cold outside. It is two fore and two rear-quarters of a little doe. All manner of knives and power tools available.

There is a whole topic on Bacon Candy.

Chris, I've been using the method jackal illustrates in his eGCI class -- Potato Primer with great success.

Dave's recipe can be found in RecipeGullet, right here!