dcarch

"------My Meyer lemon, admittedly not a dwarf but grown from a seed from my parents' ranch, never produced fruit at all. -----" OMG! I think my little Meyer lemon tree may soon die! It is blossoming with tiny lemons, It must have at least 100 tiny lemons on the branches !!! The branches are going to collapse if the lemons get bigger. I will have pictures in another day. You cannot grow Meyer lemon from seeds. Throw it out and buy one from a nursery. dcarch BTW, this is not off topic. Citrus leaves are used as herbs.

"---, I'd get a couple HVAC companies to give me a design build bid. ----" One of the problem is in an apartment building, you are not allowed to have permanent installations to the building. Both condos and apartments, you are not allowed to modify windows. ------------------------------------ Check ebay and Craigslist, you may find a used Electronic air filter(purifier, precipitator) for a reasonable price. Electrostatic air cleaner is what bars use to filter out cigar smoke and tobacco smell. dcarch

I am a little surprised, may be by my incorrect understanding of science. 1. As I understand, when you use normal vacuum packing for freezer, it is really not vacuum that is the reason, because that is not a vacuum that you have created. All you are doing is to move as much air as possible to have the plastic making direct contact with the food to prevent water from sublime away (freezer burn). The package is still at normal atmospheric pressure. 2. Some of you may be familiar with playing with vacuum. If you place water in a vacuum, water will quickly start to boil at room temperature and quickly evaporate away. It would seem to me that if you put bread in a vacuum chamber, the bread will first burst, then it would not take long for the bread to be completely dried out, and some fruits to explode. Check youtube marshmallow in vacuum and see what happens. dcarch

A little vitamin C powder to give sour taste. dcarch

Not herbs. Look into dwarf citrus fruits. I grow in five-gallon tubs Meyer lemon, yuzu orange, and one more which I don't remember the name off hand. Wonderful for cooking. dcarch

Also, an easy way to understand this is, when you focus your eyes on something close to you, the objects in the distance become out of focus, and vice versa. But if you look thru a pin hole, then everything close and far will be in focus. dcarch

HI, From 0 degrees F. to fully cooked temperature in a beer cooler... How many weeks does that take? What temp is the final? I don't remember the exact temperature and time. I have that info somewhere in my several computers. It really does not take long to get the interior temperature up to cooked temperature from frozen. 5 hours? Ideally, the dark meat and the white meat should be sous vided at a different temperature. I often just do it in the middle, still much better than roasting. There are two issues to deal with doing it this way: 1. the giblets will be cooked in the paper bag inside the turkey. 2. find a way to crispy up the skin. dcarch

Teo, There is a thread some place in this forum you can post pictures and ask the members to give you suggestions for improvement. I am at work now, perhaps someone here can tell you where that thread is and you can start there. dcarch

I don't know much about this either, other than the fact that autoclaves are required to be filled with steam to facilitate better heat transfer. For the purpose of lobster cooking it is possible that they reduce the pressure and temperature, so that the lobster with not be overcooked. dcarch

And this is a serious answer. I use a large beer cooler. You know how difficult it is to time a big frozen turkey, you first need to thaw it in the fridge for three to five days, then you need to figure out how long to cook the bird so that you done overcook too moucu the outside to get the internal temperature to safe zone. With sous vide, the entire frozen bird goes in the cooker, no thawing, and there will be no overcooking, under-cooking inside or outside. dcarch

All good points regarding polarizing lens. With photography as I said, you can spend a fortune and spend a life time and still have lots to learn. OTOH, for those of you who suffer from Phood-photo-phobia, there are also the cheap, the simple and the quick to have something very decent. That's basically all I do with all my food photos that I have posted here on this forum. Autofocus for digital cameras uses different techniques, and can have different effects if you use a polarizing filter. The pictures above, I used "The cheap" I actually used my $4.00 (Linear) drug store polarizer sunglasses, duct taped to my Nikon Coolpix 8400, set to autofocus. In any case, if you have problems, food pictures look better set to manual anyway, to give you more interesting depth of field control. dcarch

Very nice dishes everyone, very impressive. Very nice composition for the pictures also. For those of you who are interested in having better (and easy) control of light reflections of your photos, check out my recent post on the "The Food Photography Topic" Thread. dcarch

I have said that there are simple things you can do which doesn't entail a great deal of time and money to give you more options to achieve disirable photo effects. One of the annoying thing with picture taking is unwanted reflections. You can buy a polarizing filter for your lens and significantly eliminate them. The filter is not expensive from $5.00 to $20. just find one that fits your lens screw mount. The following side-by-side photos show identical lighting, exposure, and angle of shot for the pictures. By changing the rotation of the filter, you can cut out a significant amount of unwanted reflections. This can give you better saturation of colors and sharper definition of you subject. dcarch

For me, I depend a lot on seasoning and marinating to give turkey flavor. I don't want the meat to be over flavored and too salty. I also mostly sous vide turkey. The whole long cooking time of the turkey is kind of like brining and marinating at the same time. Given the fact that I think turkey meat taste good by itself, extra good with good gravy and fantastic with nice stuffing. I feel the single most important issue with cooking turkey is to achieve good meat texture, and with sous vide, it can be done with some degree of assurance. dcarch

Actually the vise will make it much more difficult. I have seen a device similar to this: http://www.sifc.co.za/images/squash_cutter.jpg but bigger for chopping squashes or watermelons. The method I detailed above has worked for me very well. I enjoy cooking carrots cores and the "bark" separate for smoothies. dcarch

Certain aspect of religious based recipes, it is a good idea to be very close to the recipes. And don't be too creative with special recipes (vegetarian, vegan, etc) and health related recipes (no peanuts, gluten free, etc). dcarch

If you follow recipes exactly, you will end up with a pantry with more spices than a spice store, and leftover ingredients in your refrigerator to feed an army. There are many recipes, by the nature of the science, must be exact, like how many grams of baking soda, and what temperature for chocolate, otherwise, have fun with substitutions. dcarch

This are the two way I have done successfully, without digital injuries: Center cutting the carrot - Use a Chinese cleaver to cut just a little into the carrot lengthwise, then while holding the cleaver which secures the carrot, use your other hand to hammer down on the cleaver's spine to split the carrot in half. If your hand is very tender, then put a folded towel on the cleaver. Cutting around the carrot's core - First use a peeler to flatten one side so it will not rotate, then do the above. dcarch 13" long carrots cut lengthwise, with lobster

I am keeping an eye on this thread. Very interesting topic. dcarch

"-----but I definitely think there is a difference between sea salts from different regions. -------" Not to disagree with your point, I am just curious. Isn't it true that all oceans are connected and water moves from one sea to the other (sea current) non-stop? We even find stuff from Japan (tsunami) drift to our (USA) shores. dcarch

Chef Central in NY, 50,000 sq. ft. of shopping. dcarch

Seems like we need another funnies.* dcarch *Again, Moderators, cartoons are my work. No copyright issues.

LOL! dcarch

I may be wrong on this, I thought that the process of crystallization actually purifies the substance. It is kind of like "Zone Refining" in computer chip making to get ultra pure silicone. dcarch

Great for a Halloween dish. dcarch