JoNorvelleWalker

Sometimes I hate you Kerry. I have a satisfactory enough Zojirushi but I just clicked on the Philips to arrive tomorrow. Amazon's price was $243.03.

The package consists of two oddly shaped small steaks, each about right for my appetite. I'll try for a picture tomorrow. I must say it looked really good for an inexpensive bit of meat. No membrane that I remember. And that USDA Choice sticker sucked me in. I'm not completely broke at the moment and my eye flirted with the Prime boneless rib eye not that much further down the display. But much more fun to learn something!

From tonight's episode of "Name That Steak" a friend kindly took me to Shoprite after work. No chuck eye steak, but they did have something called "chuck fillet steak" that looked attractive and it was labeled USDA Choice. Sous vide suggestions?

I didn't pay too much attention but tonight in the local Shoprite there was posted a Perdue recall.

No, the crust of last night's boule was not as nice as last week's steam bake followed by convection bake. I'm not worried about the bit of burning. I chalk that up to a slight error in division of the dough, making the boule a bit too big for the CSO. I can't speak for the crumb as I donated the boule to a dear friend to feed her starving teenagers. Edit: as of early this morning I'm informed the boule was all but gone.

Tonight's loaves: This was experiment baking the boule on the CSO bread function setting. (As always the baguette is baked in a conventional oven, since a ruler would demonstrate the baguette fits not in the CSO.) For comparison here are last week's loaves -- boule steam baked fifteen minutes followed by convection bake, from further up the thread: All other parameters held as closely as I could manage. (Reminder again, only the boule is baked in the CSO.) I searched back though old posts. In my hands the bread function has never produced enough steam for my loaves. There must be a reason Modernist Bread did not suggest it.

Sounds like you fit in well here. But shouldn't you sub absinthe for the vodka?

Santo Tomas Bomba rice paella and a liter of MR: Pea harvest from my dining room... all four and a half of them: Unashamedly supplemented with Whole Foods frozen peas, not shown.

Check out their Beef Round Eye Round Steak.

Never mind. I wasn't very hungry anyhow.

I will never again steam bake my chicken thigh an hour at 300F, but with the CSO actually set at 450F. Sometimes it pays to trust your nose rather than the clock.

I like goulash. I haven't made it in forever. I dug out the recipe. Nope, not going to happen, never be able to masticate that beef. Any young maidens dying to come over and prechew, please PM. Grinding with bacon sounds the best suggestion. Or better, just bacon. But I have no bacon.

I've been only once to Amsterdam and what I desired more than anything else was a vanilla milkshake.

I didn't bake today, but for a test I ran the CSO bread function and timed it. From the audio and visual cues it appears the bread function applies steam for the first eight minutes of the cycle. I question if eight minutes is really long enough to be ideal. Hamelman calls for steam until the bread colors. I'm sure there is a discussion somewhere in Modernist Bread about how long to steam in general, though I am still puzzled why MB calls for baking on the steam-bake function. Not that bread baked on the steam-bake function is bad by any means. Sad that @nathanm never shows up anymore. Anyhow Hamelman's book Bread is a whole lot easier to lift. Another puzzlement: although I wasn't baking I was retrograding the starch of a several day old loaf. I do this often using steam and then convection bake. What I noticed this time was that the bottom burnt. No big deal for my dinner as I can just cut the burnt parts off. But now I question if the bread function is really, really doing the same thing as steam-bake followed by convection bake. I never recall the bottom having burnt before.

Before I posted I already had my refund from amazon. They said I could keep the steak. As much as I'm tempted I'd hate to throw it out.

I had never heard of a chuck eye steak but it sounded interesting. Today amazon had chuck eye steak on offer and I made my purchase. When it arrived with some disappointment I noticed the label read "Beef Round Eye Round Steak". To my knowledge chuck is from the shoulder while round is from the nether end. Can these cuts be marketed the same? Anyhow the meat looks like round and not like chuck. It does not look like the chuck eye steak picture on the prime now website. My teeth are not the greatest and I detest beef round almost as much as kale. Can sous vide redeem chuck eye steak if it's cut from the round? I'd consider grinding the meat but there is essentially no fat except for a small strip on one side. I could pound it, I suppose, but I'm not sure pounding it would really help. It might make me feel better.

Oh, good! I was afraid you would say kale.

Thanks, I may give the bread setting another try. Do you preheat your CSO? I have a half inch steel plate in mine and I preheat for at least an hour.

Tonight: I do repent me I spent most of my existence without good pizza.

You are cruel. It's resting in the trash. I know, as my father used to say: "Willful waste makes woeful want."

I'm thinking next time to try 10 minutes steam, 20 minutes no steam and see what happens. Edit: even so, as I remember, even full 30 minutes steam is preferable to the bread setting. I suspect the bread setting doesn't steam for long enough, at least for a boule.

At the time I found the cashew I was not eGulleting. But by coincidence the last time I was eating cashews at the computer (until, that is, just now) I was indeed eGulleting. Nuts.com has $10 off at the moment and I am desperately trying to work down inventory.

One of the joys of eGulleting in this weather are my cozy fleece-lined moccasins. This afternoon one foot was uncharacteristically uncomfortable. This evening when I went to take my shower I found a cashew.

Jury returned and my boule crust was my finest ever. Once again I must call out Modernist Bread for bad advice. This was 15 minutes steam, 15 minutes no steam. Really, no comparison.

Forgive me that I do like chicken cacciatore. This time (besides Soave) washed down with a goodly glass of Appleton 21. Tomorrow is shaping up to be a snow day. If tomorrow is not a snow day I may regret this. Bread not shown but some of my best loaves ever. Oh, why not -- bread shown.