memesuze
-
Posts
521 -
Joined
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Store
Help Articles
Posts posted by memesuze
-
-
I prefer the Unicorn Peppergun for one-handed operation - tried the Pepperball, didn't like it as well as the Peppergun - and I think the mechanism on these is sturdier
-
just visualize the downstairs staff in Upstairs, Downstairs or Gosford Park - someone always had a big bowl resting on her hip, beating away
-
wow - just look at the difference between the two kitchens - you guys, including Bruce, rock. Thanks for going into so much detail about your whole process with us.
-
I like supplementing the big oval with a 2 5/8 quart soup pot - perfect size for a pound of beans, a batch of soup, you name it. Then you might think about a gratin - now that I have one, I make gratins - never did before.
-
never having been in DF before, and very few "fine dining" meals under my belt in any city, I'd still repeat our recent meal at Izote in a heartbeat - wonderful food, terrific presentation, and entrees in the 16-22 USD range
-
I did square foot gardening for a few years - since it's been years since I read the book, I don't know if it's recommended that the beds be built up, but mine were made out of 2x10s, partially sunk into the ground, filled with the original dirt heavily amended with good manure compost. I liked being able to reach everything within the square easily. If I needed to have different watering for different beds, it was easy, and I seem to remember being able to water by using a ring of leaky pipe.
-
I've had "regular" basil plants that got to be 2x2x2 easily - so the pairing with a tomato plant in that size cooler may not work. Just be aware that you may need to rip it out....and keep the flower buds pruned back religiously, or it will bolt and then be ready only for the compost bin....in all likelihood, one plant or two of the thyme won't be too much
I love this vicarious gardening you're allowing us to do....
-
October is my favorite month to visit New Mexico, but since I usually linger in Taos, I'll let others chime in for Santa Fe, other than to say I've enjoyed Ten Thousand Waves - a wonderful hot tub facility open to the night sky
-
This is the biggest reason why I don't grow squash anymore.
Squash bugs suck sap from plants, and cause leaves to wilt. They begin showing up in May and June, and almost immediately, start laying eggs. The eggs are bronze-colored, and are laid in clusters on the leaves. If you find the eggs, squish ‘em, and control the remaining adults with natural repellants or insecticides.
Squash bugs can be persistent, but even they aren’t as difficult to control as the squash vine borer. The larva of the squash vine borer drills into the vine, interrupting the flow of nutrients and causing the plant to wilt. At this point, there are only two options: carefully slit the stem open and kill the worm [pressing the stem back together and hoping it survives], or inject the stem above where the worm is with Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki). Watch for the looks at the pharmacy or other store when you go looking for a syringe....The best control is to monitor your plants closely, since early signs of feeding indicate that other eggs will be hatching soon.
-
tomatoes need at least 6-8 hours of good sun to produce well [full sun is full sun - no shading from trees at all] - and my experience with morning sun is that often morning clouds don't break up until 9.30 or 10 am, which wouldn't give you enough sun time. You should try one just to prove me wrong, but don't spend all your effort on lotsa tomato plants.
Check for a local organic gardeners group, a master gardeners group, and the local county extension agent - they know their stuff.
When using nurseries, go for the non-chain store, local mom-and-pop ones - they're there for the love of the garden, not simply shoe salesmen in disguise.
There's a difference between determinate and indeterminate tomatoes - the former tend to put on one big crop, suitable for canners; the latter produce for months on end, and consequently their vines continue to grow and grow and grow....my Sweet 100 cherries always climbed up out of a six-foot tall wooden frame I built, continued down the outside of the frame and took out after the neighbors
Put your effort into food products you really love, that produce wonderful fruits, and aren't susceptible to bad pests [squash is notorious for instant decline from squash vine borers and squash bugs, and it's so easy to find decent squash at the market, not necessarily the case with tomatoes, Asian eggplants, unusual peppers like pimento, and herbs]
-
I've heard roy-bus and roy-boss
-
We don't have any posted rules, but once a month I put a sign warning that on the coming Friday, all will be purged, unless it appears with a name and a date within that week. Then on Saturday, I purge....wonderful feeling.
-
I'm going back and forth, trying to decide whether to sell my 60-year-old classic Chambers range
, and get a dual-fuel.my considerations:
I can't spend more than around $2K, so I've been looking at the GE Profile 30"
the best home-made bread I've had is consistently produced in a gas range [Wolf] - just how much better is an electric oven - is it consistency of temperature? in what applications does the "moisture" content of gas make a difference? does it just boil down to the expertise and finesse of the user?
I don't want to spend an arm and a leg on utility bills - but I'm not so sure that conventional wisdom about gas being cheaper will continue to be true, post-Katrina, or even farther down the road - what about solar power or wind power - any problems with a resistive device such as an electric oven
I want to be ecologically conscious if I can
the interior of my Chambers doesn't lend itself well to half-sheet pans lying flat on the racks [18x18x12]
I have a Cadco commercial convection countertop model which holds three quarter-sheet pans
the broiler on the Chambers is somewhat small - if you watch Rachel Ray, you've seen it - and I tend to broil a lot of meat and fish [mostly single servings], but I don't know much about the broilers on the dual-fuels, versus what a new gas broiler would be if I got a single-fuel [gas, of course] model
I like the retro look of the Chambers, and know that once I give it up, I'll never find one as cheap as this one was
Such a personal decision - any thoughts?
edit: after thinking about what I wrote, I remembered the main reason I had gotten the Cadco - it takes forever to heat up the oven in the Chambers, and once it's heated, and cooking is over, the residual heat takes another forever to dissipate - far too long for our hot Austin summers, so I will be replacing the Chambers.
But I'm still back to the need for a dual fuel, and even taking into account Dave's comments re: the grates holding residual heat from the burners, am not ready to give up a gas cooktop. So help wonderbread and I out with the decision about what type of oven. I would use the oven for all types of food: braises, roasts, breads, desserts....
-
Now I know not to scramble eggs in a cast iron pan. I don't think it was seasoned enough or something.
It's got to be the seasoning - my go-to skillet for my scrambled eggs is a well-seasoned cast iron skillet - and I've never had anything resembling green eggs.
-
-
I just buy one minimally decent all-purpose size at a local grocery store and donate it to the rental when I leave - it's always sharper than theirs - not worth the hassle of carrying my own
-
We have a deck of our own this year - hurrah - and plan to do a couple of potted plants on it. We want to have one of the pots filled with herbs - can someone help me out here? I've always lived in a cement jungle where gardening is a bit out of reach, so this will be my first time planning something like this. If I want 3 or 4 different types of herbs in a pot, how big do I need to go? Spacing? Herbs that won't be fussy growing near each other? Thanks in advance.
not sure where you're located or what size pots you intend to use, but down here in Austin, I can't grow more than one herb per 12-inch pot - you'll sacrifice crop if you crowd. And my basil, when not planted in the ground, loved being in a half-whiskey barrel - it and oregano can reach to three feet across and high. I like planting many of my herbs in thick white clay 12-inch pots because I can regulate the water easier than in the groundm and many herbs like well-draining soil. Never had any real thriving success with thyme or sage before pots. Only oregano, chives, Mexican marigold mint [our tarragon substitute], and basils are planted directly in the landscape.
-
Are soup pots OK for braising? (there is one on sale now) What are the difference between it and the round French Oven? Is it shallower?
I have a 2.5 qt soup pot which is the perfect size for making a pot of beans, using a standard 1# beans, in the oven or stovetop. Being half the capactiy of my 5qt French oven, it is somewhat smaller in height and width. The sides are curved out then inward from base to top, rather than being straight-ish in the French oven one.
It could do a small braise, saving the French oven for a big braise - get 'em both, you won't regret it. And get them at an outlet - especially if you can wait for one of the semiannual sales - huge discounts and I always buy carefully from the back room where the "seconds" are - minor cosmetic blemishes that have absolutely no effect on cooking with them. IIRC, I got my 5quart French Oven for about $70 when all was said and done.
-
Any of the tea drinkers out there have a link for an excellent water heater/teapot for travel?
for tea, I take an immersion coil heater from my local hardware store, an insulated mug ['cause it's unbreakable], and an infuser basket for loose tea if I don't have some high-quality teabags. This way I have a mug to drink from, without taking up space with a water heater appliance and teapot - as Alton says, multi-task
-
We think we've found our floor.
And then we watched This Old House, and saw the episode on which they were putting in the kitchen floor in the house they're renovating in Washington DC. It was a click-together linoleum floor. And as my husband and I watched them set the floor in place on TV and listened to them talk about it, we just looked at each other, thinking the same thing: "That's our floor!" We liked the overall look, and when they showed us the side view we liked that it looked robust, and we liked their blue color although it probably won't work in our kitchen which will have yellow and red accents. We also liked that the linoleum is considered a much "greener" material than vinyl. So we watched the credits, and saw a line for Marmoleum floor. There are places around here that sell it, and we'll be going to look in person. But this looks like a prime candidate.
In other news, we know about what we'll be looking for in lighting, and we know what we'll need to do for the utilities. My husband has a preliminary calendar of events, and if everything goes as planned, we'd be done by the end of July. Which is good, because we need to be done by the end of August when classes start!
MelissaH
here's information on maintenance - it takes more care than CVT
-
no, it's not, Mexican oregano has pink flowers and, as a plant, looks AND tastes, entirely different from epazote.
Although some might say the substitution would work, I wouldn't say the flavors are at all similar. To me, that would be akin to saying that, if you don't have cilantro, substitute parsley or oregano
-
what's the "use by" date for lemons preserved with the slow Wolfert method - I've been overlooking a batch of Meyers and a batch of regulars I made last year.
-
please note that the 20+ year old KAs likely were Hobarts; the newer ones aren't made by Hobart and have had some negative press in terms of kneading heavy doughs [not mixing, kneading] because the now-plastic gear breaks - just depends on what kind of work you'll be putting it through
-
I'm quite satisfied with my digital postal scale from OfficeDepot or OfficeMax - metric or English, IIRC measures in tenths of an ounce and whole grams, tare function, low profile, regularly around $30-35, but less on sale.....and I have a $75 digital scale that measures smaller quantities of grams - down to the 100th of a gram - more often use for my tea, but could use for small baking quantities if necessary
Pepper and Salt Mills/Grinders
in Kitchen Consumer
Posted
if, by output, you mean speed of coverage - it's not quite as good as my regular size Magnum - but then I'm usually using only one hand, and often that is my weaker left one - as you know, with the Magnums, it's a two-handed operation which automatically gives faster coverage because of that. I think if I were using both hands on the Peppergun, I'd approach the Magnum. Is the only difference between the large and the regular Magnum a difference in capacity?
but if you didn't mean speed of coverage, I'm not sure how to answer
I just know that I'm glad I found the Unicorn models, and all my friends who succumb are satisfied - I was gifted with the mini-grinder to take along with me on excursions