dcarch

Thank you everyone! It was fun to enter, even more fun to win. :-) Recipe: I had this dish Lobster Carbonara at Maggiano's Little Italy restaurant in NY and I like it very much. As it happened, lobsters were on ½ price sale at $4.79 a lb., therefore I decided to make lobster carbonara. As far as carbonara goes, the recipe is fairly typical, but the difference of my dish was the spaghetti, which was home made and smoked. Normally it is not easy to make smoked pasta for carbonnara, because boiling takes away all the smoke flavor, and the recipe needs boiling hot pasta to cook the raw eggs. Using my pasta machine to make the spaghetti, I first cooked the spaghetti the normal boiling way. Then it went into my electric smoker for a blast of intense cold smoke. My smoker is PID temperature controlled and has a built-in humidifier. The spaghetti came out hot, smoky and very moist to complete this recipe. Also, the lobsters were smoked. The smoker was set at exactly 150F and the lobsters were able to be cold smoked for a long time without being overcooked. dcarch

"---We are creating aplication that will provide you recepie from items that you have in your fridge. -----" Almost everyone has the same foods in the refrigerator, fish, chicken, beef, pork, lettuce, spinach, butter, -----------. It is the seasonings/spices which can make interesting recipes. It is what kind of appliances you have that can make these interesting recipes. If your site can give me good recipes for the following input, I would pay to use you site, otherwise I Google: Bottom round beef garlic, pepper, salt, ketchup, butter, scallion, carrots, beer Stove, microwave, sous vide cooker, wokdcarch

I am very excited!!! On another food forum with 50,000 members, they sponsored a themed cooking competition, the theme is "Pasta" I was just informed that I won the first prize with this entry: "Smoked Lobster Carbonara" I have not found out what is the prize I will be awarded. The label "Freedom" is a required code word to make sure that the dish has been created just for this competition. dcarch

Cookalong – Lovely chilli with cornbread muffins. Beautiful plating on the others too. Franci – Wow! That rotisserie duck with cauliflower really get my appetite going crazy. Sapidus – Delicious Grilled chicken escabeche with grilled zuc. Ann_t – very tempting Yorkshire Pudding. scubadoo97 – perfect 5 spice duck. furzzy – fabulous rack of lamb. Steve Irby – very nice plating, Eggplant Parmesan. Ashen - Jacque pepin would be proud of your boneless chicken. Mm84321 – I never get weary looking at your creations. Keith – nice photography. robirdstx – You have inspired me to make some wings. Huiray – I have a lot of respect for those who cook the whole fish. rarerollingobject – that gorgeous braised beef cheeks reminds me of how much I miss your cooking. Kim – if you open a restaurant, I would eat there three meals a day everyday. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - A few recent meals. dcarch Sous vide pork chop on sauteed water melon rind Sous vide scallops on watermelon radish Smoked wings on hosta bollsoms

Found some colorful squash. Filet of sole in mustard sauce. dcarch

Do you eat raw oysters? raw clams? What do you think you will be eating? dcarch

I take back my comment regarding power switching. If I was to design this, I would have the PID to control a SCR to drive the heater, in which case, the switch will only be switching a very low current gate voltage to the SCR and about 10 watts for the motor. Touch screen is good also. dcarch

1. Unit is made in China. For $199.00, you can buy a lot of quality from China. For instance, you can get a good PID controller for less than $20.00 from China, shipping included. 2. The circulation motor looks like a shaded pole induction motor. Good choice of a motor. It is a very simple nothing-can-go-wrong motor. The only issue possibly would be if the motor is designed for vertical run. Typically the bronze bearings are meant for horizontal operations. 3. Heater looks like custom made just for this and should last. 4. My only concern is the sexy looking temperature adjustment dial, which I assume also is the on/off switch. That is not a very long lasting device, especially for switching high power. dcarch

Should be possible to do it yourself. The weakest component which limits this unit I believe is the circulator, based on the picture. If you use an insulated vessel, and add another cheap ($10.00) fountain pump, that 1000 watt heat should have no problem controlling 5 gallons or more capacity dcarch.

A little practice and a sharp knife, you can cut ribbons of squash for interesting recipes. dcarch

Cherry tomatoes look like cherries and grape tomatoes look like grapes, that is all. Google Image of each and you will see the difference. dcarch

Where are you sourcing good meat for those prices? PM is OK if you rather not post. Shoprite supermarket, (NY area) for their store card members. Trimmed lamb loin chops, $5.99 a lb. dcarch

If some one wants to treat me to a Kobe dinner, I would really enjoy it. Meanwhile I have been overloading (in NYC) on: Porter House $3.99 a lb. Rib eye steak $5.99 a lb. T-bone $4.99 a lb. dcarch

"Heh. Cute fella. That was spaghetti squash, yes? The squash blossom pizza looks fantastic. No stuffing in the blossoms, I think? What was the cheese on it and how long did you "finish it off" at to melt the cheese in?" Yes, spaghetti squash, which is off-topic, not summer squash, which I apologized already. :-) Yes, I had stuffing in the blossoms. Blue cheese nuggets. Moz. cheese on top, which is not that much flavor. The blue cheese inside the blossoms gives that little surprise flavor when you bite into it. dcarch.

"---Well, I for one would be interested in your recipes - whether already published or not. ---" Hahaaa! You asked for it!! I know, a little off-topic (sorry). Just to get everyone in a good mood. :-) dcarch Spaghetti & Meatballs Squash blossom pizza

Thanks. Yes, I couldn't find zuc flowers that day, and I have Cucumber flowers. The green strings are zuc skin shredded because they take longer to cook. The green sprinkles are powdered wasabi peas. Thanks. Fairly simple minded dish. Quick and easy. dcarch

Great idea of a thread! There will be an over supply of squash, we need an over supply of ideas! Farmers market Zucchini made into frittata di zucchini. dcarch

For a long time, the Chinese thought truffles tasted like mud. They fed the truffles to pigs. Now they feed their truffles to the Europeans. dcarch

Love red bean ice cream, and red bean ice. dcarch

Many of these foods are just everyday inexpensive meals to keep you from going hungry. They are not supposed to be three star gourmet treats. How about Boxty, Colcannon, Black pudding, shepherd's pie? Do you go nuts for them? dcarch

Thanks, PC. I was able to source some frozen Pandan leaves. Rice crispy shells; Really nice to make, great for snacking too. 1. Cook rice in flavored water, like chicken stock or beef stock. 2. Let rice cool down, then sandwich rice in between two sheets of produce bag plastic. 3. Use a rolling pin and roll rice into a thin sheet about two grains of rice thick. 4. Completely dehydrate the sheets of rice. 5. Deep fry the sheets. The rice puff up very quickly in hot oil. 6. Remove the rice sheets, careful not to make them too brown. Drain the sheets on paper towel. 7. while the sheet are still very hot, you can bent and form them into shapes. dcarch

Anna and Kerry, I could be wrong. In reading thru this thread, I seem to think that you guys really like cooking, eating and drinking. LOL! Thanks a million for this fantastic, educational and delicious thread so far. I really appreciate it. dcarch

Do not worry about food! You can get good French food everywhere. You can only sight-see Paris in Paris. dcarch

Lousy dinner party. Bad food. That's why I decided not to go. dcarch (Hahaa! two thumbs up!)

cookalong – Beautiful photos. Sapidus – The Keema with greens looks like a very delicious and healthy dish Panaderia Canadiense – Your roast spring lamb is also giving me a craving. Robirdstx – Two recent dinners, two decent dinners. Franci – I have noticed your mastery of using eggplants. Ann_t – Chicken is so ordinary, except if it comes out from your kitchen. David Ross – Very artistic pea soup. Ashen – that smoked ribs can win any competition. ------------------------- Got hold of some pandan leaves. Made filet of sole in pandan sauce. Cherries are in season, and shrimps are on sale. I made shrimps with cherries and cherry sauce, on deep fried puffed rice shells. dcarch