keri

I think the key in the ice cream debate is texture. With better quality ingredients, you can get better flavor homemade, but the creamy texture depends largely on being able to cool the ice cream quickly so it becomes a matter of access to professional equipment. The best recipe and highest quality ingredients will make good ice cream at home, but not as good as it could be.

I don't think you're wrong to feel discriminated against. Many people in this thread have offered other reasonable explanations to try to soothe your feathers, including good ones (he has more experience in areas they want, like budget) and bad ones (his daddy/golfing buddy, etc getting the job for him). Any of these might be true or it could just be that they don't like your mohawk or tattoos or age. In this economy, they can pick whatever reason they want and they'll still have applicants out the door. Some of those factors against you, you can change to try to present a more professional or mainstream image, but some things you either can't or won't, and with those, you'll either have to accept that people have their own opinions or try to change their opinions. Having tattoos and a mohawk, you've probably dealt with it before. Some people have to deal with even more, like sexism and racism; at least be thankful you were born on the right side of those issues. I don't know what answer you're looking for. Discrimination is wrong, that's easy. Are you looking for an explanation or sympathetic ears or a solution? Will any of those help? When you're young, you get angry and disappointed at the disparity between how things are and how they should be. I'm not religious, but one gem that helped me deal was the serenity prayer: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference." If you're not religious, cross out the god, but the sentiment is still the same. Hope it helps!

My mom always used to make this and if I remember correctly, it's just out of a box. This is the brand we always got, I think. You should be able to find it in most Chinese stores. I'm not really sure what the deeper almond taste you mean is, but this stuff always tasted pretty good. Just make sure you use less liquid (milk, water or whatever) than the recipe indicates so you end up with a more dense "tofu", both in firmness and flavor. And no, it's definitely not tofu. More like an almond-flavored jello. As for bitter almonds, they do contain trace amounts of cyanide, but poisoning is rare and the amount of cyanide is affected by soil conditions, watering, etc. Looking it up, it IS possible. There's 4 to 9 mg of cyanide per almond and a minimum lethal dose is 50 mg or 0.5 mg per kg of body weight, so you wouldn't have to ingest many to make you sick. But then again, they do contain essential oils which might be that missing flavor you want. Up to you if you want to risk it, but anecdotally, I used to eat them all the time as a kid and never got sick from them, and it should have taken only 1-2 almonds.

djyee100: Thanks for pointing me to that! Looks like there's a lot of different methods there, I'm sure I'll find one that works for us. It seems like the methods vary a lot though. Some say to use boiling water, yours says cool or room temp, it's all very confusing for beginner cooks. Prawncrackers: Despite your troubles, I have to say that the photo of the duck looks absolutely mouthwatering anyway! SobaAddict70: Beautiful photo as always, looks like a very fresh and summery meal and a good way to use up those cherry tomatoes. Kim: Thanks for the welcome! The cauliflower was ok, but when I tried it a second time, it went from not enough vinegar to too much all at once. Still trying to find the balance, the way my mom makes it, haha. And yes, this place is very inspiring. With just the two of us, boyfriend and I get lazy with meals quite often, so it's nice to have a reason to make something special (to our standards, at least!) Your fried tomatoes look amazing, I've never had them before, will have to look them up!

After our laziest weekend food-wise so far (frozen pizza, chinese takeout, sandwiches), boyfriend and I finally cooked for real yesterday; we decided to try making pad thai, which he loves now. Neither of us have ever made thai food before, but we think it turned out pretty well and I actually have a pic that I'm proud to post here! We're completely at a loss about how to cook rice noodles, though. It either turns into a congealed, sticky, cut-with-a-knife blob or stays a bit too crunchy despite cooking for many times longer than the package indicates. Can anyone shed some light on this?

I'm not really a pizza enthusiast despite growing up in Chicago, but the idea of a tortilla press for pizza dough still has me cringing. You might get the desired shape but the thickness would be all wrong, wouldn't it? You'd have the thickest dough in the center, which is great for a tortilla designed to hold food, but do you want the edges of the pizza dough to be the thinnest parts? As for sticking, I think flour might help more in that regard than cornmeal, but without testing, it's really hard to estimate how much flour you'd need to keep it from sticking, and that would depend on the rate of cooling in your coolers, the humidity, and all sorts of other unpredictable factors that you'd be hardpressed to plan against even with testing. I think the best option would be precooking and then thoroughly dusting with flour. Maybe keep them in separate large ziploc bags stacked? Good luck with your dilemma and I hope it all works out!

Man, the stuff that people make for dinner everyday looks absolutely amazing. Having recently graduated from dorm rooms and cafeterias, I thought the boyfriend and I were eating well, but looks like we have a long way to go in our meals. Since it's just the two of us, we usually keep weekday dinners very simple, although we try longer recipes on weekends. And neither of us are very experienced cooks. I wish I had photos, but I'll try to get some tonight. Yesterday we had an absolutely horrible rice noodle dish..not sure what went wrong, but I think the recipe itself was just bland and boring, but boyfriend picked it out and we both get to try a couple of new recipes of our own choosing each week. It was basically rice noodles with soy sauce and chili sauce. Even doubling the garlic and sauces didn't add much flavor to the bland, overcooked noodles. Bleh, won't be trying that again. To go with it, I tried copying a chinese-style cauliflower dish my mom makes and that I loved as a child. It's basically stir-fried/steamed cauliflower with a chinese black vinegar sauce, thickened with cornstarch. I thought that was quite tasty because I love cauliflower but I'm not sure of the reception on boyfriend's end, never having been a fan of the veggie, or vegetables in general. He's a bread, meat and cheese type of guy, but he's slowly coming around! (actually more quickly than I expected, he's very open to trying new foods) We finished it off with a mint chocolate chip ice cream sandwich for me (very un-all-natural storebrand, I'm sure) and a huge soup bowl of chocolate, chocolate chip and chocolate drizzle ice cream for him. A dinner in the life of two 20-somethings in their first apartment and 2nd month at homecooking. I hope it provides at least a bit of amusement and some good-natured pity!

This sounds interesting, I'm looking forward to trying it! Usually when I cook with vinegar, it's one of the predominant flavors; I've never tried it as a subtle addition, but I do believe in the balance of flavors in cooking, so should be tasty! Thanks for the tip!

Canned tomatoes, because I'm very picky with them, having parents who always had a garden plot growing up. I have no problem admitting that with a certain few foods, I NEED them fresh-picked, at the peak of ripeness, namely tomatoes and strawberries, or I won't eat them. They taste too fake otherwise, and unfortunately, they're terribly hard to find in supermarkets because they go bad so quickly after that. And I feel the texture is better in sauces than using a very juicy/watery fresh tomato, and the taste is less acidic. Growing up, my parents almost never used canned veggies, so I guess I almost always prefer fresh. But the boyfriend makes a delicious green bean casserole with ingredients 100% out of cans or jars (maybe this should go in the hall of shame...) and I absolutely love it and am afraid of asking him to try it with fresh beans, because I love the soft texture of the canned ones as is. I also like canned peaches when they're out of season, but nothing beats a juicy fresh peach in season. With pineapples, I really can't tell much difference, as long as they're well drained and cool. And I suck at cutting them up, and the canned ones never leave bits of core.