Mjx

As someone with slightly high blood-pressure (well controlled by some old line medicine), I feel that there is most likely a link between sodium and high blood pressure, and there's plenty of proof about the link between high blood pressure and various other health issues. So I think it's a good move for these companies to proactively attempt to do certain health-positive things to their food. What about you? My first reaction was 'Mitch just wants to see us scream and rant' On the other hand, I've seen so many people reach for the salt shaker and stat shaking out salt without having tasted so much as a bite, I think getting people to pause, taste, and think about how much, if any salt the food needs, is a good idea. There will be plenty of people who will scream about 'nanny governments', of course, so I'm hoping that the emphasis will stay on the way food tastes. But it isn't as though they're witholdingt he salt altogether. Most people who have high blood pressure and take care of themselves are unlikely to thoughtlessly reach for the salt shaker, so I'm a bit sceptical about any purported health benefits of not having the salt shaker on the table.

Have you tried cutting back on the mayo? The way it coats things can really mute flavours.

Damn, these are cute.

Research is great. My boyfriend and I spend absurd amounts of time trying to determine what is 'perfect' for our needs (the previously mentioned Dutch oven was a major bargain, and I stood there in the shop, clutching it, while my boyfriend compared prices online, and we debated how much we'd actually use it); we spend substantial portions of our holidays in cookware shops, and return home with things no sane person would try to stuff into a plane carryon. The posts and pans: Of what you have, what do you use a lot now? If you never use something, it probably isn't worth upgrading. If you use something a lot, and it works fine, stick with what you have, and look to upgrade elsewhere. Is there an expiry date on that certificate? If you have the time, allow yourself it. Do you tend to make a lot of big batches of food, and freeze/refrigerate for upcoming days? Do you make small, on the spot things? How big are the burners on your stove? Are there certain kinds of things you really enjoy? Your requirements and tastes are certainly going to evolve, but they're not going to change altogether, so where you are now can tell you some important things about what you'll find useful in the future. Especially when it comes to saute pans, there's a good chance you won't need more than one, but your standard batch size should direct your decision about which size to get. It's never occurred to me to get an omelette pan, but we never seem to need one; a skillet is a good idea, since it's versatile, and you can use it for omelettes, too. I don't care for non-stick pans, and never seem to miss having one, regardless of what I make in a pan. A stockpot is great if you actually make stock, or steamed puddings, or batches of soup that are big enough to fill the pot. I use one quite often but this doesn't make it a 'must' for everyone. Not sure what an 'everyday pan' is, but it sounds like the sort of things that's supposed to be useful for everything, but ends up being sort of inefficient at everything.

If you get a set, make certain that the knives are full size, or that their being less than full size is not a problem for you (e.g. you may not make really wide loaves of bread, or you may seldom use a chef's knife), since one thing that manufacturers often do with sets is to include knives that are a bit shorter than those you get if you buy them separately (this seems to hold true particularly for bread and chef's knives). Glass cooktops (I think that's what you mean..?) are excellent, one of the topics addressed by eG's Dave the Cook in Flameout. I use a big oval Le Creuset Dutch oven on a glass cooktop all the time, and it hasn't scratched yet; I'm just careful to not drag it (or any other pan) over the surface.

I'm with those who recommend building your selection carefully, and based on what you actually cook. There are few more annoying things than kitchen packed with items that are never used, but take up space and used the money you could have applied to things you really want and need. For example, I don't have a mixer and doubt I'll be getting one anytime soon, even though I 'Ooh' and 'Aah' over them when I see them in shops; I bake a lot of bread, but my hands and a handheld mixer do everything I need in that department. Egg whites? Same thing. On the other hand, I could think of a number of uses to which i might put a food processor, marble slab, or cleaver (for breaking up chickens and so on, for stock). Take your time. Think about the things you want and need, and look at the topics discussing them (e.g. there is at least one knife thread that has masses of useful information). Cook's Illustrated magazine also has product reviews that are particularly helpful when you don't have a lot of experience (e.g. they advise against knife sets, which are often bloated and undersized, and recommend building your own, choosing knives you will actually use), and can start feeling overwhelmed by tsunami of hyper-detailed information from experienced enthusiasts; I don't always agree with CI's conclusions, but the do make for an excellent starting point, and since their discussions are very specific and clear, you can easily identify points that may be meaningless to you (e.g. a pan might be downgraded for being very heavy for its size, but you're over 6 feet all and regularly carry whole trees home as firewood). If you get dishes, make sure you also get a decent selection of usefully-sized serving pieces; it's the sort of thing you can otherwise discover you need at the most aggravating time.

Marabou chocolate flavoured Philadelphia cream cheese: http://www.philadelp...a1&PagecRef=798. The caption says, 'Let yourself be surprised'. Saw a billboard for this last night, coming home from a dinner party; I didn't feel surprised, I felt 'Holy-hell-I'm-much-drunker-than-I-thought', so I had to look it up today, to see whether it actually existed outside my red-wine-inflamed mind. It does. Is this a thing anywhere else, or are the Philadelphia people just pranking Denmark?

Heaps of information of information on pate de fruits in these topics, just for starters (there are also quite a few others): Pate de Fruit (Fruit Pastes/Fruit Jellies), Pate de fruit, and Questions on Pate de Fruit.

No problem though, since plenty of today's Germans are enthusiastically vegetarian or vegan (and will tell you all about it), so leaving out the any meat/meat-derived ingredients wouldn't even be 'unGerman'

This is extremely pretty! How was the flavour?

That's Hall of Shame! Well, okay. How about if you sprinkle some crystals of instant coffee or smoked salt over it? It's a real improvement!

Doesn't seem like refrigerating would make any difference, if the the coconut milk is homogenized.

For weight, durability, sturdiness, and keeping contaminants out of what they hold, plastic containers are hard to beat, so would a solution for storing them out of sight be something you'd consider? Are any of the floor-level, what-look-like-cabinets actually tall drawers? If not, do you have the option of converting the space behind them to hold tall drawers? I can't recall whether I've ever seen this in the US, but in Denmark, it's a popular solution for holding large/heavy items.

No need to be even a little depressed, since a woman's scorn is an entirely different thing than a woman scorned... I'm guessing that yours must contain some element that leaves behind it at least a trace of shame or humiliation, at least as an after-effect (from screaming in pain..?)

I don't think i would have stuck around long enough to find out whether or not the food was good. Such comprehensive neglect of basic hygiene isn't something I can see paying for.

Wait: what is your go-to version now (just to establish some sort of frame of reference for what you aren't in the mood for doing more of)?

I tend to be bothered by pretty much everything, but discreet photography in a restaurant isn't one of those things. By 'discreet' I mean you only take pictures of the food on/people at your table (okay, I can understand the urge to take that big group that includes the waiter, which is a tradition that apparently goes as far back as photgraphy), you don't engage in moves that encroach on diners at other tables (if I keep wondering if or when you're going to back into me, I'm going to become irritable), and you don't use flash. That last one is probably open to debate: I find a flash going off like a slap across the eyes (but as I said, pretty much everty damn thing bothers me, so).

Even if I'm using a knife that's been recently sharpened, the only thing I've found to get rid of that is to resharpen/steel the blade; as far as I can make, out that happens when the less-sharp portion of the knife pushes, rather than immediately cuts the food (one portion of the blade may be receiving more impact, and dulling more quickly than rest).

If you can get some rabbit, it's awfully good with various kinds of winter squash (so are lamb and goat).

Since some of the ingredients are difficult to find in small quantities and are quite expensive, you may want to take a look at the WTT/WTB: Sharing Modernist Ingredients topic.

Birthday cake for my boyfriend's father: For some reason, chocolate is the go-to flavour for birthday cakes in my boyfriend's family. The marzipan things at the bases of the candles are a joking allusion to my boyfriend's father's aversion to anchovies. I was stymied in my effort to make things that look like anchovy filets, because Danish marzipan has a surprisingly rough texture, and you can't make a really thin layer of it that holds together, so these look more like herring filets (if you have a good imagination). At the last minute I discovered that, thanks to my not checking its condition beforehand, the gel writing medium had seized up in the tube and smelled slightly stale, so I used tweezers to position a gajillion tiny sprinkles instead. This made a for a rather wobbly looking inscription, since my hands shook pretty much the entire time (I was so worried I was going to screw it up). The flags were a late addition: a birthday cake here just has to have flags!

If you have your heart set on using the root (and although there are some rerences to its 'special flavour', other sources simply mention its signficance as a starch), you might try growing the plant (Orchis macula), which thrives in wide range of climates (including some cold and harsh ones). In Turkey, they seem bent on eating the plant out of existence, so I'd feel irresponsible recommending trying to get the root powder. Might the owners of Zahav tell you about what the malabi-flavoured custard contained, and what they used (the menu just says 'malabi mousse', which could as easily refer to a flavour palette as a specific ingredient)?

There's this: http://www.israelikitchen.com/tag/malabi/. The orchid root traditionally used [in some versions] is apparently endangered, and not strictly required by the recipe.

Any chance that you accidentally used to much leavening, or the wrong one? It's the sort of thing I've done with recipes that I know so well, there is a chance that I may switch autopilot when I use them. Or, heat spike in the oven?

Congratulations! In terms of purchases made, did you notice any patterns of preferences that might be useful to you in the future?