dcarch

" dcarch – your strawberries are especially amazing, my friend! Are they completely sliced through and then stuffed or only partially sliced? And what is sprinkled over?" Kim, that's very easy. Stick a tooth pick or skewer thru the strawberry, and you can do a spiral cut without the strawberry falling apart. I admire your ability in the leftover makeovers. It is an art form. dcarch

rarerollingobject - thank you for the secret of making perfect squid; get your self slightly inebriated first. LOL. Amazing BBQ'd king prawns, doused with yuzu tobasco. I have been trying to buy a yuzu tree. A gulf ball size yuzu is $3.00 here, if you can find it. Panaderia Canadiense – the fuzzy picture cannot hide the fact that your Valencia orange and ginger soup is beautifully plated. mm84321 – pictures of the unknown weed and it’s flowers. dcarch

Those are from my lawn. No they are not chives. I had found out that they are edible a few years back, but have since forgotten the name. The flowers open during the day and close during the night. May be someone can tell the name. dcarch Check out Oxalis, aka Shamrock plants. They're a common garden weed over much of the western hemisphere, and have edible flowers that look just like those. No, the flowers look the same, but the leaves are different. I will take a picture tomorrow. dcarch

I set the temp at 132F I had it in the bath for 24 hours. Then torched Came out good, dcarch

Those are from my lawn. No they are not chives. I had found out that they are edible a few years back, but have since forgotten the name. The flowers open during the day and close during the night. May be someone can tell the name. rarerollingobject, those of us who have tried to cook squid can instantly tell that your squid is a dish of beauty. Totally amazing in the exact timing in cooking. There is a very narrow window between overcooking and raw squid. Beautifully photographed too. dcarch

That sounds like a nice different contrast. How did you treat the tapioca pearls - boiled in a seasoned broth and folded into the rice or?? In deed, I wanted to add some complexity to a simple wild rice dish by giving it a contrasting texture. The tapioca was simmered in clam juicy then folded into the wild rice. The clam taste makes it appropriate to serve the dish in a sea shell. dcarch

I have not posted in the past many days. I am amazed by the incredible display of gastronomic wizardries by everyone. Been very busy with work, getting the garden ready for spring and income tax obligations. So please pardon my enjoying your work but not commenting. I did take time to prepare an Easter meal. Sous vide leg of lamb on hosta shoots from my garden. Asparagus with oyster mushrooms. Real wild rice with tapioca. Strawberries with cream filling. dcarch

A non-customer uses your bathroom, falls down and gets hurt. He can sue you for big time money just the same. dcarch

Thank you everyone. SylviaLovegren, yes, forsythia blossoms are edible. They are just for looks, not nuch taste to them. Panaderia Canadiense and Rotuts, this was not a difficult way to stuff a cabbage. The key is to have a pot of very hot water to dip the head of cabbage in to cook the outter leaves just soft enough to peel back without damaging them, but not to cook them "welldone". Depending on your recipe on how much is your stuffing, at some point, you can cut out the heart of the cabbage. After you put in the stuffing, you can easily fold back the leaves, and it will look like the head of cabbage has never been openned. Just a tip: If you are doing a very large head of cabbage using pork ot chicken, make sure you check the internal temperature or precook the pork or chicken first. It was fun to see the surprised look on your dinner guests' face when you bring out a whole head of cabbage. They were surprised again when they realized the inside was stuffed. dcarch

When Cabbage was on sale on St. Pat's Day, I got too many of them. Got to use them up. Let me share with you one way to stuff a cabbage. dcarch Openning up the whole cabbage Stuffed Stuffed and cooked Plated

It is simple to stablize the chimney starter. Get three small C clamps to clamp on the bottom edge of the starter. dcarch

Get a small metal container that has a very tight lid. After you have done cooking, dump the hot burning charcoal into the container and cover it. The coal will soon be extinguished and can be reused. Somehow I think there needs to have some holes made at the top of the starter to improve vertical ventilation, otherwise it may not be hot enough. dcarch

If you can hookup a small charcoal grill with a hair dryer or a leaf blower, you can have a furnace hot enough to melt metal. Similar to this one: I recommend a variable motor speed control so that you can vary the heat. dcarch

It is possible that shorter people live longer, but of course I was only pointing out that there are places where non-organic food culture does not prevent long life expectance. dcarch

Oh come now, that isn't even remotely valid to your assertion. Many of those countries have very significantly different farming practices and regulations, different eating habits, etc. Their focus on "organic" may well be different, but partly because half the stuff US agri gets up to isn't legal there anyway, or not an issue in the first place. And their life expectancy are very tied up in availability of health care, diet etc. Correlating that to the concern over organic is utter hogwash. Or pink slime, or something... I have been to two of those places, Hongkong and Macao. They only import farmed seafood from China, pesticized produce, MSG in dishes, ----etc. No health care system in those places. dcarch

I'm a little curious about which locations you mean, and the source of information regarding indifference to organic food. I just Google "life span/expectance by country" dcarch

Random thoughts: 1. The more animal (beef) parts we don't eat, the more cows we will have to kill and higher prices for meat. 2. Areas with The longest life span, are areas where people don't care about organic foods. dcarch

Thank you for doing this whole topic. It has been fascinating. dcarch

You may want to consider this meanwhile: Use any ice cube tray. After the ice cubes have formed, take the tray out fron the freezer for a few minutes. Pour the ice cubes in a container that you put in the freezer. This is great for the summer time or when you have guests. You can make a big bucket of cubes and never have to struggle. dcarch

I've done it plenty of times. It doesn't turn out to have discernable little chunks of undercooked bacon in it. It mostly just adds some juiciness and that bacony smokiness. I'd suggest this falls into the "don't knock it til you've tried it" category. I am sure it will make the burger taste good. My point is eating raw bacon safety. dcarch

The ones I have read, about 20, made not much sense. My comments to the ones mentioned by the above posters: #15 from Joanne Chang: "When chopping herbs, toss a little salt onto the cutting board; it will keep the herbs from flying around." Use the correct knife and knife techniques. I have not found herbs flying around a problem. 27. Take the time to actually read recipes through before you begin. There are some many lousy recipes out there, read the reviews first not the recipes. 99. My general advice to home cooks is that if you think you have added enough salt, double it. My tip would be the opposite. 59. When grinding your own beef for burgers, grind in some bacon. I am not sure. You grind you own meat just so that you can make burgers not welldone. Imagine bacon not welldone. “I like 39 about smashing garlic inside a Ziploc bag; why didn't I think of that?” Because it takes time to look for a bag and cleaning the bag afterwards. Garlic taste on a board is never a problem for me. 91. Caramelize onions very quickly by cooking them in a dry nonstick sauté pan over medium-high heat. They will caramelize beautifully in a lot less time than with traditional methods. I can’t see how non-stick pan can give more BTUs to caramelize onions. The fastest way I know is to microwave the onions to soft then saute on a hot pan. 76. Shoes off, music on, favorite beverage in hand — enjoy your time in the kitchen. Do not turn on your music, hearing what you food is doing while being cooked is very important. dcarch

Truly amazing parade of food everyone! Dejah, I wish I was your neighbor to get that coconut/panko shrimp basket. Kim, that burger is bursting with flavor! Is that a cut resistant glove in the first photo? Bruce, indeed, great photo. rarerollingobject, I can put my fingers on it, but there is something naturally beatiful about you food. I like the prawn dish with the design on the plate which symbolizes ocean waves. How appropreiate for prawns. robirdstx, nice plating! EnriqueB, Thank you. Your Roasted red mullet, so nicely done. percyn, Leftover Chicken Biryani and Lamb Dhansak? Master of gastronomic renovation! SobaAddict70, those are very colorful and delicious looking dishes. Poached farm egg, leeks, salmon roe, WOW! Prawncrackers, what a feast for my eyes looking at those beautifully photoed dishes! kayb, Cajun boiled shrimp, with frozen maragaritas, just lovely, lovely! patrickamory, very dramatic Pollo alla calabrese.. --------------------------------------------------------------- I saved all the corned beef juice and made corned pork. Pretty good. And sous vide lamb with mint sause. Dcarch ----------------------------------------------

I believe that article is fundamentally wrong about the phenomenon of boiling. In the conditions that general kitchen boiling and boiling over take place, it has nothing to do with the concept of “Superheating”. Boiling and boiling over in normal cooking is nothing more than the boiling point of the liquid mixture has been reached and vaporization occurs to dissipate heat energy based on the latent heat property of the liquid mixture. The temperature of the boiling liquid mixture is always constant, not higher and not lower. Superheating never occurs. dcarch

Boiling over has to do with the viscocity, texture, surface tension of the liquid and possibly many other factors. I am not sure if there is one solution that will stop all boil over situations. Perhap one sure way to stop boiling overs is to make sure the food never boils. If you put your food in a pot, and the pot in another pot with boiling water, the food will reach very close to 100 degrees F, but never boils. dcarch

If it happens that you over boil, you will need to clean up just that once. If you use that "Spill Stop", you have an extra thing to clean up every single time. dcarch