dcarch

Good link. Here are the issues: Most material has some hydroscopic properties. Wood, paper, potato chips, --- even plastics. The question is how much. Salts are well known for their very strong affinity to water, they are very hygroscopic, so much so that they are used frequently as desiccants. Many salts, such as snow melting salts, if you don’t cover the bag, they will soon absorb so much water that they liquefy into a puddle of water that they absorb, which is known as Deliquescence. If you put salt, a strong hygroscopic substance next to rice, guess which way the water is going to go. For argument’s sake, let’s say rice is a stronger absorber of water than salt, in a salt shaker, which is open to moisture in air, how can it keep on absorbing water like a perpetual motion machine? There is no known desiccant that can last forever, certainly not an extremely weak one like rice. dcarch

OK! Look, I just found this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_chloride Sodium chloride, "-----Sodium chloride is sometimes used as a cheap and safe desiccant because of its hygroscopic properties, making salting an effective method of food preservation historically; the salt draws water out of bacteria through osmotic pressure, keeping it from reproducing, a major source of food spoilage. Even though more effective desiccants are available, few are safe for humans to ingest.---" As I suspect, when you put rice in salt, actually the salt is keeping the rice dry, not the other way around. Salt is much stronger in grabing moisture than rice. dcarch

In fact, although I'm no camper and have never done it, my backpacking friends tell me that in the morning, they routinely put regular raw, dry rice into a plastic bag, add water, and then set out on their hike. They tell me that the rice does not need to be cooked. It only has to be in the water. It soaks up all the water and is ready to eat by dinnertime. Soaking something in water until it is puffed up wet is not considered desiccant in action or it is hygroscopic. I think that is more capiliary or osmosis in action. If you leave salt in open very humid air it can have such strong afinity to draw in moisture that it will eventually melt in a puddle of water it absorbs. I seem to think that salt’s hydroscopic ablity is much stronger that rice, therefore it may actually be keeping the rice dry, not the other way around. Nevertheless, the key question needs to be anwered is, where does rice keep all the water it draws in if it can continually keep the salt dry? dcarch

andiesenji, "---Obviously other people have been using this solution to a nagging problem for at least a century, probably much longer, but as I have had this discussion with people who had been around that much longer than my 72 years, and I did a basic Google search and found thousands of sites that note this remedy for the problem, I figure it has worked for many others.---" Note that my question is not if rice works to make salt flows better. I am only questioning if rice acts as a desiccant. A salt shaker is open to the atmosphere, normal atmosphere has infinte moisture content. Can rice keep on absorbing water indefinitely? Where do all the water absorbed go? dcarch

Mjx, "---Wouldn't the humidity in the enclosed space of a salt shaker, especially if it's made of something relatively non-porous, reach higher levels than what you'd get outside, even on a really humid day?---" Good question. Because of moth problems, my rice is always baked in the oven and then kept in air-tight containers, in sealed plastic bags. Even 11.11 oz ( a lot more than those few grains of rice in a shaker) of very dried rice in a very humid day did not absort any noticeable moisture. a. I think the main function of rice in salt sakers is to un-clump salt by impact. b. In an open container such as a salt shaker, the rice will reach maximum moisture soon and cannot possibly keep on absorbing moisture forever. Where would the moisture go? c. In order for the rice to extract moisture from the salt, it has to have higher affinity chemically to water then salt. In general I think salt has a stronger attraction to H2O than rice. Infact, the salt is probably keeping the rice dry, and the salt is also keeping the rice from getting moldy. Hence, when you look at the rice in a salt shaker, it's so dry and nice, giving the impression that rice is a good drying agent. I am under the impression that even chemical desiccant packs work only once, and in a tightly sealed container. dcarch

In another thread, it was mentioned that rice can be used to keep salt, spice, etc. dry. I just cannot understand how rice can act as a desiccant. It does not have any hygroscopic substance in its composition, no more than any other similar organic material. Rice in the open may absorb some moisture in the air depending on relative humidity, and once it is at that point, it cannot take in any more moisture. The amount of moisture it can take in based on humidity, I would think is extremely small. As an experiment, I put some fairly dry rice in a container and measured the rice on a digital scale, the scale measured 11.11 oz. I took the rice outside in extremely humid air, and left it there for two days and one night. I immediately measured the rice again, it read 11.11 oz. apparently it had not gained more than 0.009 oz (resolution of my scale). Is this another kitchen myth? dcarch

I know it is a common belief, but I am not sure if rice actually dehumidifies. dcarch

robirdstx – You are a master of pork tacos. percyn – nice buns you have (for the duck) and a beautiful tomato pie. Prawncrackers – Love your mushroom dish. I will try to duplicate the Spaghetti alla Puttanesca with cherry tomatoes. I have in my garden all those cherry tomatoes. Very nice whole steamed turbot and garlic steamed shrimps also. Kim – Fried chicken and chocolate cake, life is good! Very sloppy chicken sandwich with gravy as it should be. Very funny, chicken liver in a heart-shaped dish. Genkinaonna – georgeous plating of your squash dish. Scottyboy – If I can make chicken skin that good, I wouldn’t mind throwing away the chicken just to have the skin. Shelby – that is a decadent peanut butter pie! SobaAddict70 – I have the same problem, besieged with tomatoes from my garden. I will have to steal your idea and make myself a dish of Fusilli with cow's milk ricotta cheese and uncooked heirloom tomato sauce. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- It’s been hot here in NYC. Eating ice cream can really chill you down. I made mango ice cream with crispy mango chips in mango cones And I make coconut ice cream with a splash of crème de mint. Dcarch

Pine nuts - $50.00 a lb. Sunflower seeds - $2.00 a lb. You can use almost any other nuts. Tastes just as good. dcarch

At the end, you can't take it with you, except what you put in your stomach. dcarch

I don't know. Never tested it. However, they do sell 130v light bulbs to run on 120v for areas where you don't want to replace bulbs frequently. 130V bulbs running on 120V lasts 2.8 times longer. A resistence heater is the same as a light bulb. So running a 220v heater on 110 v, the heater probably will last 10,000 years. dcarch

For a water heater, you can try using a 220vac 2,000 watt heater and run it at 110vac. If you still want to run it at even lower wattage, run it thru a diode which will cut the current (watts) in half again. Any time you run an electric heating element at lower wattage, you extend the useful life of the heater greatly. dcarch

I'm very interested in reading about your plating in general if you want to write something about it. Thanks for asking. Plating! Plating! Plating! With all these TV competitions, shows, it seems that if you can’t plate, you can’t play! I don’t know if I am qualified to discuss plating in general, not being an expert myself. Perhaps I can talk about my own silly food-plays thinking/techniques. First, I don’t do food carving or food topiary. It takes too much time and it can in fact turn some people off. Most of the time I just pile food on a plate. I believe everyone can plate food well. If you can say, “Wow! That is a beautiful plate!” that means you have a good sense of esthetics. I think that is all you need to plate food well. In truth a good photographer is really not that good. He/she takes a thousand pictures, and in that thousand, there is one or two which look promising. After a lot of cropping, and darkroom ( now Photoshoping) trickeries, a masterpiece worth framing materializes. The most important thing about food plating is start doing it and do it as often as you can, even if you are cooking just for yourself. After a while, when you look at the ingredients of a recipe, a thousand images of how you can plate that dish will scroll through in your visual mind, and you just pick and try out the one or two which you feel might work. A little final arranging and garnishing, Voila! “WOW! Too pretty to eat” will be exclaimed by all your dinner companions. If you Google “How to plate food”, you will get thousands of hits. IMHO, all those “do this” and “do that” are meaningless. Painting by numbers will not make you a great artist. Plating by formula will not encourage you to develop spontaneous creativity. Have fun. Plating is rewarding, and it is free. dcarch

You know the under-the-counter corner kitchen cabinet? Something like this in there would work well for what you need. http://www.storageessentials.co.uk/shop/file+storage/images/library/Rotating%20unit.jpg dcarch

Keep two stacks of plates? dcarch

IMHO, sushi is all about presentation. How many sushi and sashimi recipes have you seen? dcarch

To answer your question first, it depends on the spoon's shape and the consistence of the sauce/gravy. IMHO, that technique is getting kind of over used. It is kind of getting boring. dcarch

As I understand how things work: 1. A motor's power rating is based on the maxium load you put on it before it generated too much heat and burns the coils out. Or in the case of an induction motor, the motor stalls. 2. A motor draws very little power if it is just free-wheeling or has a very light load. dcarch

Motorized planner blade steel is probably very good steel to make into a knife. dcarch

Thanks! I have made knives with metal files. Very difficult to work with, but you get a very sharp knife at the end. I may get some 1095 steel to make a chef knife. I still have many old non-carbide blade. You should try to make one yourself. Nice steel and the right kind of thickness for a knife. The brass "ferrule" was a plumbing coupler. dcarch

Thank you. It is not easy to find a good high-carbon steel cleaver. Everything is stainless steel nowadays. I had to make my own. dcarch

I don't have a point to proof. I am not disputing the fact that a belt sander is a great tool for sharpening knives. As I said, I use one and most professionals also use belt sanders in their shops. I am just wondering if you have overlooked the important fact that the OP is a complete beginner with a good quality knife asking for advice to sharpen his knife. Frankly I have never heard of recommending a belt sander for a rank beginner starting out to sharpen a good quality knife. dcarch

Not completely true for a universal (not induction) motor. I believe all blenders have universal motors. A universal motor can in fact be run on zero hz (flat voltage), namely direct current. An induction motor is a scynchronous motor, it's RPM is frequency dependent. dcarch

Thanks guys. I cut the blade out from the saw on a wet tile saw but with a metal cutting wheel. I need a very tough edge, but not a very hard edge, so I didn't need to harden the already hardened tool steel saw blade. the grinding and rough sharpening were done with an angle grinder, again, with water. It does keep a sharpe edge very well. I left the saw tooth on for mainly two reasons, one is to use that end of the knife to jaccard tenderize meat, the other is to use it as a scraper to form/shape sauce for interesting plating looks. I had no idea what to do with the hole that came with the saw blade. May be I can use that as a finger hole and learn to swing the knife like a cowboy with his six-shooter. dcarch

HowardLi, I am very puzzled by why you are so insistent in recommending to a beginner to use a belt sander to sharpen an expensive knife. I am surprised that you feel that for a beginner, it is easy to correctly put on a convex edge on a knife. I am surprised that you feel a beginner has no problem in telling when a critical edge can be permanently de-tempered and destroyed on an electric grinder. I am surprised that you are unfamiliar with the fact that most sanding belts are printed inside the belt with directional arrows to run in only one direction. As a machine shop teacher in a college for many years, my experience in what beginners can do with motorized machines are very different than yours. As a long time part-time knife maker, I know how difficult even for me to do things right with a belt sander. For your pleasure, one of the many knives I made just for fun, with a convex edge. dcarch