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Morkai

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Posts posted by Morkai

  1. On 2/10/2016 at 2:50 PM, Katie Meadow said:

    I have made two dishes in the book and eaten a third at a friend's. Most recently I made the Massaman curry, which was really good. My only complaint was that in order to braise the chicken with liquid that covers you need a lot of liquid and the dish ends up more like soup. Still very good. The next day I drained off some of the liquid and reduced it for a less soupy curry. Very very good. This is just the kind of dish that leftovers were made for. A great use for dark meat chicken.

     

    I chronicled my experience with the Beef Noodle Soup on the thread Beef Cuts for Soup. Fabulous flavorful stock, but the meat needed more cook time since it wasn't the tenderest cut. Totally worth tweaking.

     

    A friend served the Miso Glazed Eggplant and it was quite nice. Not my favorite way to eat eggplant, but good. He says he makes it frequently, and he also likes the recipe for Oshitashi. He is an enthusiastic reader of LP magazine, which I am not. He just returned from Japan and although he loves this book he used the term "dumbed down" for some of the recipes. I don't agree. I would say there are some short cuts, but they make sense and the results are quality. Plus I think the suggestions up front for pantry staples are well thought out. 

     

    I'm not a stranger to Asian food, and have been cooking Viet dishes and various wontons and pot stickers and stir-fry for some time. I also have taken an intensive week-long class in Thai cooking. I see this book as a very useful basic resource. The recipes include lots of classics that you have probably eaten if you eat Asian food out and for the most part they are not tricky and are forgiving if you lack either time or esoteric ingredients. Unique to this book is that the range of recipes covers a wide swath of Asian foods, which is different than most specialized Asian cookbooks. The LP cuteness self-congratulatory factor is just short of annoying, but to make up for it the authors do seem genuinely friendly.

     

    I'm happy that there is a thread dedicated to this book and will continue to post in it as I work through the recipes. Don't expect a systematic Chris Hennes treatment! Right now I'm having a love affair with potato kugel. 

     

     

    Question - The recipe simply says "add chicken" and the ingredient list is "1.5 lbs chicken thighs". Do you put in the thighs whole and break up later while eating?

     

    Did you slice the thighs into large chunks?

     

    Did you use skin on?

     

    My inclination would be to use boneless/skinless for easier eating and to cut them up. 


    Anyone got any ideas?

  2. We're planning to use a mixture of extra sharp cheddar, gruyere, and comte. 

     

    There is Parmesan that is littered on the top. 

     

    I am liking the idea of doing a MC-like citrate substitution. Once made and refrigerated, will it bake well? Hoping to keep that gooey Velveeta-like texture. 

     

    Thanks all!

  3. I am planning on making Michael Ruhlman's macaroni and cheese this weekend for a party. In the recipe, you make a soubise sauce with flour, butter, milk, and carmelized onions. You hand blend these all together (with some spices), and then add the grated cheese to the hot liquid to melt. Then you can mix in with the cooked pasta and keep overnight in the fridge.

     

    Then I remembered I have sodium citrate in the pantry. 

     

    We like this recipe, but find that it's not as "cheesy" or "creamy" as we'd like it to be sometimes, especially after cooking. Would adding a dash of sodium citrate to the cheese/soubise mixture help keep it that classic cheesy texture? Even if it sat overnight in the fridge and was then baked? As I am making this along with smoking a couple pork butts for my girlfriend's co-workers, I really don't want to have a food disaster! 

     

    Thanks all,

     

    Mork

  4. I stumbled upon these short ribs recently at a local Korean grocery store. I noticed that they were labeled as choice grade, and certainly were surrounded by other packages of the same cut, but they appeared to have significantly better marbling. As in, they didn't look anything like the others - much, much, much more marbling. I am pretty certain these were mislabeled, and must be from a higher grade. 

     

    Anyhow, I have never quite seen short ribs cut like this before, which, along with their significant marbling is making me question how to use them. They appear to be very thickly cut flanken short ribs. 

     

    I was thinking of trying to remove the bones form each of the three pieces and cook the short ribs like steaks, to medium to let the fat render a bit. Any thoughts or suggestions? How is this cut normally used?

     

     

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  5. The beer batter couldn't be simpler. What I usually do is take a random amount of all purpose flour and a bit of salt and add beer until the batter is still quite thick, almost as thick as store bought vanilla custard. I coat the fish in seasoned flour, batter and then roll the fish trough panko breadcrumbs and really pack/pat the breadcrumbs on the fish. If you want I can write down measurements next time :smile:. And the nice thing is, that batter will work with anything. I've tried chicken, courgette, prawns and even banana.

     

    Well, if it's not a crazy amount of trouble (don't want to put you through excess work), I would love if it you managed to jot down the amounts. My vision of custard, well, who knows what that will turn out like! Looks remarkable. Thanks for the advice!

  6. OKPSCf9.jpg?1

    Cod fried in beer batter and panko breadcrumbs (extremely crispy, really love doing it that way), with mushy peas with mint, tomato salad with mint and homemade tartar sauce with beetroot roses

     

    spipet, that is a beautiful crust on that fish. Did you make the beer batter on your own, or did you use a recipe?

    • Like 1
  7. I am happy to report that Lobels reached out to me immediately and offered to send two new steaks on the spot. There are absolutely no complaints in the customer service department. I'll post some cooked pictures soon, I am sure they will be spot on. 

    • Like 5
  8. Here are the steaks. The porterhouse has salt and pepper on it, so it may be more difficult to see, but I think you can see the clear thick striations throughout the strip portion that I fear will be tough. There's even a thin one that hugs the bone. 

     

    As for the ribeye, it looks... fine. If this is what I saw a local butcher I would be satisfied, but this is supposed to be the creme de la creme. I certainly wouldn't think this was the "top 2%" of prime steaks, as Lobel's advertises. Simply by visual inspection, I would not think the ribeye here compares to the beauty posted above. Perhaps looks aren't everything. 

     

     

     

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  9. Hi Rotuts. 

     

    I'll try to take a photo tonight when I get home.

     

    I have lots of experience with sous-vide for steaks, but in some ways I feel that a steak like this deserves a "primal" technique. Risk of overcooking, but that's part of the challenge, isn't it? Man vs. meat. 

     

    When I sous-vide I usually sear on the grill and quickly baste with melted butter with herbs and roasted garlic. I hear the calls to keep beef of this caliber "pure", using salt and pepper and little else. I usually prefer it my way :)

    • Like 1
  10. I recently came into possession of a 36 oz porterhouse and a 24 oz ribeye from Lobels. 

     

    I cannot yet speak to the flavor, but I must say, at first glance I was disappointed by the looks of the meat. The strip section of the porterhouse looks to have a thick tendon running through the middle, the color is a pinkish hue, and the marbling seems fairly average. Considering the cost was $180.00+ for these two pieces of meat, I feel a bit let down. The ribeye looks better, but nothing like picture I have seen of Lobel's in the past. For instance, the following picture was uploaded by an eGullet member as representative of Lobel's quality:

     

    gallery_1_295_10784.jpg

     

    My steak does not look like that - though it is the same cut, same purveyor, and same size. That steak seems worthy of an $80.00 price tag. 

     

    Regardless, I am trying to decide how to cook these. Right now I have the porterhouse in the fridge, heavily salted. It's either sous-vide then a char on the grill, or slow cooked on the cool side of the grill basted with butter/herbs/roasted garlic and then seared up near target temp. Does anyone have any suggestions on how I should proceed? 

  11.  

    here is a shot of the chicken hours after it was fried.. it stays crunchy for the most part, in the fridge the last couple times.  good picnic chicken i would say..

     

    If i had to over analyze.  that would piece of chicken, the drumstick in the front of the photo. The top meaty area was actually the side it was resting on in the fridge.. that's why it looks more flat and less textured.  But, yeh, not important.

     

     

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    That's the texture I have been searching for in my fried chicken. Do you mind sharing your process? I have been continually let down by recipes that sound promising only to end up with soggy texture after a few minutes, brittle hard crusts, or too-dark skin. 

    • Like 1
  12. Patrickamory: we love chicken dopiaza! Sounds like crazy amount of onions, but so necessary. I like the bits you have on top of the chicken. 

     

    Made oven baked parmesan / panko coated chicken for supper. The crust was crispy, and the chicken was moist. We ate this with a whole mess of stir-fried vegetables.

     

    Gotta admit, that chicken does look very moist. And the breading looks quite good. Unusually good for baked chicken tenders. Care to share your secret? Brine?

  13. Jerk chicken with coconut rice and peas. Used Kenji Alt-Lopez's method from seriouseats.com where bay leaves and allspice berries are used to smoke the chicken in lieu of pimento wood.

    Given all the trouble, I would have rather had pimento wood. Still, turned out okay.

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    • Like 3
  14. Steve Irby: What did you think of the Turchetta? Did you cool it before you fried it?

    I thought it was a terrific recipe and the flavor has improved after a couple of days of rest. I prepped the turkey two days before thanksgiving and used Active RM to bind the skin and meat. After removing the tenderloins I dusted them with the Activa and formed a nice little roll that I seasoned with cajun seasoning and cooked at the same time. The breast went pretty much from the circulator to the fryer which was a wok.

    That's interesting. I made the same for our Thanksgiving. I went basically from the circulator to the wok, and I found that by the time it was fried (about 8 minutes total), that the interior was overcooked. I noticed later that the recipes calls for putting the turchetta into an ice bath for 5 minutes, or running it under cool water for 10 before frying. I don't think this step was emphasized enough, and I was wondering if that was my problem, but it sounds like you did the same as I did and it was just fine.

  15. On 11/25/2013 at 10:48 AM, onefeynman said:

    What's the wait like for an Anova order to Canada? I deeply regret ordering the sansaire now that I have to wait till February...

    I placed the order last Monday. Shipped on Friday. Estimated to arrive on Wednesday.

    Not so enthralled with customer service, but I understand it's a smaller operation. Sent an e-mail last Tuesday, still haven't received a response. From reading through this thread, I'm not alone with that situation.

  16. The fact that the delay wasn't even emailed to those of us who pre-ordered, but instead posted on their blog the day before the announced ship date made the switch to Anova much easier.

    I received an emailing explaining the delay. Perhaps you opted out of updates on kickstarter?

    I also have the Anova, but I'm thinking/hoping the Sansaire is going to be a more stable product. I don't see any certification stickers on the Anova, so I'm doubting they went through as thorough a process as Sansaire seems to be doing.

    I've only had the Anova for about a week. It works well enough, but it's a bit quirky (touch screen is finicky, random reboots, etc.).

    I pre-ordered it on their website, but wasn't part of the Kickstarter crowd. I just rechecked my e-mail and my spam folders but didn't receive anything. I know I wasn't an early adopter like those on Kickstarter, but I would hope I am still deserving of an e-mail! It may have been a simple oversight, but it's still disappointing to have to go looking for myself to be let down.

    Random reboots? Is that a common problem on the Anova? That indicates a massive food safety issue. I've been looking through the Anova thread and haven't come across that yet. That's a little unnerving!

  17. I had the Sansaire ordered, and canceled upon news of this latest pushback. I guess these things are to be expected, but I planned to use mine for the holiday season. I went with the Anova.

    I have to admit, though I understand the need for a delay, and I understand the idea that this should be "expected," I am still a little annoyed at the way Sansaire is conducting business. When a company gives you an expected ship date of November 18th, they should inform you of a two month delay well before November 17th. The fact that the delay wasn't even emailed to those of us who pre-ordered, but instead posted on their blog the day before the announced ship date made the switch to Anova much easier.

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