percival

Sicilian-style crema rinforzata gelato with Hawaiian candied ginger. Recipe on my blog. Nikon D3000, AF-S 35mm f/1.8G @ f/2.5, ISO 100. No light box, no fill, no flash. Just foam board on my kitchen countertop and horrid neon lights -- splash tile in the background. I post white balanced off the ring of the bowl. First try on setting it up, just with a teaspoon. Cut up some extra candied ginger to sprinkle on the top, then put the spoon in the bowl. If I weren't so tired, I would have dug out my macro light and my 60mm f2.0 macro and gone for a brighter diffused creamy white porcelain look.

Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries How often do you eat your veggies, really? I almost never did till the kidlet arrived. Now, at least 3/4 of the meals I make have veggies, and generally 2+ servings. Yesterday was even an all vegetarian day. And no potatoes. I'm by no means a vegetarian. House of Prime Rib is arguably my favorite restaurant in SF -- King's cut or go home. I've tried vegetarianism for an experiment -- zero cravings, food tasted good, but just difficult when you're at work or going out to dinner. The challenge is finding decent vegetables, and constantly going to the market daily for fresh produce. Best source: Asian supermarkets - 1/4 of the store is produce you've never seen before. Worst source: Trader Joe's -- half the "organic" produce is vacuum sealed and growing, and they sell more kinds of tortilla chips than greens. Flash frozen vegetables are a life saver, but you can only freeze certain kinds. Tomato/veggie juice is a great way to easily get greens in yer gullet. How do you add more veggies to your diet? Or have you given up greens, like most of America?

Fun/interesting thread. I guessed that alternate plants were being used a few posts in, before it was confirmed by the McGee quote. "If it looks like a duck and tastes like a duck..." right? Fishermen do this every single day in every single market. "White salmon" that's not salmon at all. "Basa" that's not catfish (but it is.) And the fact that trees have oils that weren't meant for human -- or more importantly, insect -- digestion. The "soapy" comment pretty much gave it away -- the taste of aldehydes, defensive chemicals released by plants that certain people tastes as bad, notably in cilantro, which McGee also wrote about in the NYT. Probably something similar is going on with those species of conifers. It would only affect certain people who had that genetically recessive ability, so most people would eat the nuts and go, "hey, these taste just like the regular pine nuts we sell -- bingo!"

Thanks for the info! It seems King Arthur uses a proprietary modified starch called Signature Secrets® which depresses the freezing point. It's normally used as a thickener that does not lump, does not require being pre-slurried, and freezes and thaws without separating. And researching smaller molecules, I found this great scientific article: Effects on Freezing Points of Carbohydrates Commonly Used in Frozen Desserts. Going to use that as a starting point -- galactose, fructose, glucose. Once I figure out the right cookie dough texture, then I'll worry about the ingredients. Going to experiment with hydrolyzing my own lactose, since I can't pick up galactose at the corner store.

Marcela Valladolid's Mexican Made Easy on Food Network is a Mexican cook who cooks Mexican food in Mexico. She's born in San Diego, lives and films in Tijuana -- her stunning kitchen view overlooking the Pacific makes Giada's Malibu ocean view look quaint -- and cooks Baja Mexican. Her show cooks authentic Baja Mexican food -- looks right to me, having grown up in SoCal -- and showcases authentic ingredients, but also gives accessible substitutes for people in Des Moines who can't find things like cajeta. Where's the crime in that? Her presentation style is also very easy to follow and actually instructive, as opposed to most of FN's big name celebriron chefs who just toss stuff down without measurements or temperatures, bam, cut to commercial, and return with a completed dish.

Two disadvantages to the BlendTec style blenders -- mine's at ~150 spin cycles: 1. Things get hot, even when you don't want them hot. Blend too long and your food heats up from the crazy rpm's. 2. Cellulose gets pureed when you're souping hard vegetables like carrots or broccoli, and you end up with a very unpleasant texture that you must sift out. Sometimes it's foam at the top and it's easy to remove. Other times it's all blended in and leaves you with poor mouthfeel.

That's a bit off. 365 days a year, 193 sammiches... I eat at most 60 a year, and that's high. Someone out there must be eating 2-3 sandwiches a day. It links a 2002 statement. 45 billion divided by the US population per the 2000 census (281 million) = 160 per, including babies and old geezers with no teeth... So 193 doesn't even work at all. And even 160 seems high. Three sandwiches a week? Removing those who just can't eat sandwiches, let's round up and say five sandwiches a week for those who actually eat sandwiches -- immigrants don't eat that many sandwiches, I'd imagine. Do you and everyone at home and at work eat a sandwich every weekday? They could be counting sandwiches made, not sold, or gross raw wheat flour divided by a percent they assume is being turned into sandwiches... I worked in the electronics biz and the marketing departments always shoved out garbage numbers. "$1B in sales on launch day!" = we pre-sold X units to retailers who will sell possibly/eventually at MSRP to equal $1B. "1B units shipped in the first quarter!" = we manufactured the units and got rid of them, god knows if they sell or end up in an e-waste dump.

A roll is a slice of bread. It's a loaf that's sliced almost in half, then folded. And lots of food can be picked up, in "wraps," and no one would consider them sandwiches, like the examples I listed. Sushi, egg rolls, won tons etc.

Wait, wait. How are candied apples not possible for an every day meal, or not accessible? I mentioned that this dessert did come with every meal, every day, as a freebie at the local Chinese joint. Take your sweet root vegetable or hard fruit of choice, stir fry medium with some sugar till it softens up a bit. In a separate pan, add lots of sugar and a little bit of water. Cook on high till it melts, but not till it browns. The ratio of sugar to water will determine how hard it gets when cooled. Experiment. Coat food, shove a stick in it, and serve with a bowl of cold water. Dip and serve, or instruct your diners that eating the food w/o dipping in water first would be an extremely painful experience. And that's not accessible? The only showy part is having diners do it themselves. The normal way would be just to let the sugar cool off on a pan in the kitchen.

I want to make a chewy cookie that doesn't freeze at 32 Fahrenheit. What can I add or sub into standard cookie dough to make this happen? Glucose, gums, glycerine, etc... just throwing out ideas. I'm sure someone out there has attempted and/or succeeded in this.

I'll bite. "A sandwich is a dish made up of a mostly solid filling, usually meat, atop or between slices of leavened bread, which is intended to be used as its exclusive container." An SF chowder bowl isn't a sandwich. Chowder's not solid. A Double Down isn't a sandwich. There's no bread. It' a Jeremiah tower of meat. It's a play on a sandwich, an homage, etc. It's actually very post modern of them. A wrap or a burrito isn't a sandwich. It's not bread. Sandwiches must use leavened bread. Otherwise, nachos could be considered sandwiches, or a Scotch egg, or pork katsu, or fish tacos, or mac n cheese with bread crumbs, or egg rolls, or won tons, or char siu bao, or sushi. A pork medallion served on a toasted round of brioche is not a sandwich. The brioche is not intended to be used as a container. The dish requires it to be contained on a plate. That leaves hamburgers, hot dogs, Monte Cristos, PB&J's, and leftover Turkey Day open-faced drowned-in-gravy dealios as sammiches. Too much food. Need a nap.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose... Growing up, the only restaurants my dad ever took us to were either diners or Chinese. The Great Wall of China was literally down the street from us, so we went often. The food was typical, but the dessert -- those very apples of which you wrote -- was delish, free, and always served with every meal. Basically candied apples, cut in chunks, and then dipped in molten sugar and hardened. They never were hardened right there at the table, but that does give it a a cool kitsch factor, along the lines of Szechuan beef on a sizzling plate. To fancify, I'd make it more than just water. Add color. From something expensive and endangered. Locally organically harvested distilled rarified... water.

I do mean gummy. That is the intention, not pilaf. And the rapid boiling in a large volume of water does exactly what stirring is attempting to do -- rub the rice against its neighbors -- but does it without me having to stand there, stirring, adding more water, stirring again, and does it without breaking apart the rice.

I stand corrected. I didn't know there was a roller attachment.

Well the argument with alien breeds doesn't really work with salmon. Rodents and birds and kudzu can breed like wildfire. Salmon just doesn't. It's rapidly dying out from overfishing, all around the world. Introducing another breed of salmon just mean an alternate harvest -- trust me, fishermen aren't going to somehow ignore catching these giant salmon if they should somehow "get loose." The main objection to farmed salmon is that it's messy, lots of coastal pollution. This fish would be no different than other farmed salmon. Both put the ease off of wild salmon. If people are going to object, don't object to eating GMO salmon. Object to eating salmon, period. And back to the topic: nothing offends me more than seeing packages of pre-boiled pasta at the supermarket. "Just add water, nuke, and serve." .... .... -__-

Best way I've found to get the bacon to stay is just wrap it around the dog while raw, then spear with toothpicks and render at medium till crispy. The toothpicks also help keep the thing from rolling around, making browning on all sides easier. As a whole, the dish is just too salty and greasy. I think sauerkraut and/or a vinegary, mustardy potato salad would help balance it out a lot.

Hands down, elementary school fried chicken. Extra greasy, with a bread crumb crust designed purely to soak in as much of the oil as possible. Junior high was unmemorable. High school, I think they served the same fried chicken. And work? Fortune 500 company with no cafeteria. Everyone eats at the nearby Safeway. =/ (And the absolute worst? School pizza with that soggy, almost Play-Do like texture, with the purple tomato sauce, cheese closer to couch vinyl, and "pepperoni" bits... /shudder)

It's pure nostalgia. Little in this world is more comforting than the memory of food. That's what you're eating. Reconstituted memories. When I need a pick-me-up, I go shopping. Sometimes, I go shopping for food. I'll get something I haven't had in eons, ethnic stuff I used to get when I was young that you can't find in a Safeway. And you know, you can't be nostalgic or regress when you're young. Not temporally possible. That's just craving what you ate last week. When you hit puberty. I have a new kidlet who can eat as much as I do, if I let him. When he tries out things for the first time and his face lights up, it's like I'm trying it for the first time. I think, wow, if this is nummy, wait'll he tries that! And I start flipping my mental food Rolodex, searching for things new to try. And if I haven't tried it, he hasn't tried it, either. So because of him, I go and try new things in my advancing decrepitude. Have my tastes changed? Sure. Like seasons. I go through phases, as I always have, and in that, I'm consistent. Then again, I've always been the most adventurous in the family, food and otherwise.

For pork, you could brine for a day, then do 131-135 Fahrenheit for 6-8 hours to get the collagenase to do its duty on the meat and get it medium rare. It'll still be tough and none of the fat will have rendered. You intend to finish the cooking in the smoker, right?

You could get a meat grinding attachment and avoid most of the the E. coli goodness of supermarket grind, and make your own brisket-chuck blend. I'd pass on the noodle extruder attachment. Pushing isn't the same as folding and stretching, texture-wise.

We're a culture on the move. I'm from California, the land that practically invented drive through restaurants, drive ins, and fast food. When I'm out with the kidlet, I'll choose drive-thru over sit-down almost always. Sammiches and burgers are to-go food. They get it down the gullet. (He doesn't eat fast food. I grab fast food because I often miss meals while feeding him, and there's errands to run.) I actually eat more "Mexican" fast food than actual sandwiches to go: burritos, fish tacos. At home, the only sandwich in regular rotation is cheese toast (and bagels and cream cheese, stretching the definition). Nitrates are bad, mmkay, and kidlet doesn't like sweet, so PB&J's are a no-go.

Risotto really is a matter of taste. Some like more chew, some don't. Some like wetter, some don't. Some like more gummy/gooey, some don't. I'm firmly in the camp that I don't want any sort of bite to my rice. That's not firm -- that's uncooked. One thing I think everyone can agree on: broken grains of rice ain't pretty. And the easiest way to break them is to stir too vigorously. I make risotto almost every morning for breakfast. The most rock solid method: 1 cup of rice, 5 cups of water, bring to a heavy boil for 20 minutes, then stir vigorously with a wooden spoon for 3-5 minutes, depending on how you like the texture. (These measurements are for my rice, my pot, my burner. These all directly affect your cooking time. Yours will be different. You need to figure it out.) The only thing that stirring does is break down the rice. That's what makes your risotto gummy. Do it too much and you break up all the rice. Do it too early, like at the beginning of cooking, and you're really doing nothing, just knocking around dry grains in water. And sure, you can stir till water is almost all gone, add more, and repeat for 20 minutes, or you can just do it enough time to know around how much water you'll actually need, and just dump in that much to start with. You can go short, and add more as needed in the last few minutes. It's easier to add more water than remove more water, yeah? One thing I've found is that making risotto in a frying pan instead of a pot actually result in a better texture, as there's a more equal distribution of heat, and you knock around less rice with each rotation, but the rate of water evaporation is very high, as well as the increased amount of churning necessary, so you need to constantly add water and hand-hold the entire process. No thanks. I've got an example recipe of what I do here at my blog.

I use chopsticks daily. I'm sure I used them before spoons or forks or knives. The kidlet uses a spoon. He's already got enough scars on his face, thanks. I like the Korean metal chopsticks because they don't warp. I disklike the Korean metal chopsticks because you burn your fingers if you're eating anything hot. Like bibimbap. Or soondubu. Don't get me started on serving people boiling hot soup in metal bowls and steaming hot rice in 400+ degree stoneware. I intensely dislike Japanese chopsticks, not only because they're pointy, but primarily because they warp extremely easily. It's hard enough to grab anything with two sticks that intentionally do not meet -- two sticks that simultaneously intentionally and unintentionally do not meet is beyond ridiculous. And how do they warp? If they get too hot. If they get too wet. You know, things that never ever happen to eating utensils. I have dozens of pairs, and I clear out the warped ones regularly. I wouldn't even buy them, but the Japanese part of the family prefers to eat challenged. Mind you, all chopsticks warp, but Chinese bamboo and melamine ones last a helluva lot longer straight, because there's just more material. They resist heat better. And water doesn't do anything to melamine. I picked up some nice ones in Vietnam. Hand carved hardwood, lacquered, with inlaid mother of pearl. Cheaper than dirt in dollars. The taper is closer to Japanese, but thicker. They warp, but they look damn good before they do. I'd say best way to save your chopsticks: never cook with them, never use them to spear big pieces of meat, never leave them sitting in water, and immediately dry them off after washing. And if you're using cheap melamine ones: so what if you ruin them, they're a nickel a pair.

Thanks for the link. The thing is huge for a P&S. It wouldn't fit in my pocket. That works against it, especially for a "second camera." I guess it all comes down to price. Dial it down and it gets more attractive... Still, extremely pricey if used primarily for food blogging.

Both salt and alcohol dry out meat. The longer you marinate, the more jerky-like the texture.