Jump to content

JoNorvelleWalker

participating member
  • Posts

    14,798
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by JoNorvelleWalker

  1. 2 hours ago, Thanks for the Crepes said:

     

    Well ... electronic ovens do not like and cannot withstand high heat conditions. Yours is electronic, right, Jo?

     

    Course the oven could be spot on, and you can blame it on yourself as you have done, but I'm extremely suspecting of electronic appliances, cuz I hate them for the overpriced and short-lived things that they are. 😝

     

    As I was broiling tonight's pizza the oven shut itself off with an over-heat error message.

     

    • Sad 2
  2. 10 hours ago, gfron1 said:

    I'm going to show you something I've been eyeballing and reading all of these comments is making me second guess it. While I'd prefer my flatware stand out, it would be okay if it just disappeared all together - meaning good enough to make sense but not remarkable on a positive or negative side. LOOK HERE

     

    Not only do these pieces look impractical, they don't exactly scream "Ozarks" at me.  Isn't there some traditional regional pattern that you could emulate?

     

    My own stainless is Oneida but I no longer remember the name of the pattern.  The design is colonial but simple, and I would not trade it for the finest silver.  (I used to have the finest silver from when I was married and I gave it all away.)

     

    My main concern about flatware in a restaurant is "Is it clean?"

     

     

    Edit:  my Oneida pattern seems no longer available.  (Not to worry, I have lots.)  The closest current pattern I could find was Paul Revere:

    https://www.oneida.com/flatware/fine-flatware/paul-revere.html

     

    Very similar.  I think I should be most happy with Paul Revere if I found it in a restaurant.  Even if that patriot and rum bibber never made it to the Ozarks.

     

    • Like 2
  3. 12 hours ago, btbyrd said:

    Good lord, people. Don't use a hair dryer on your meat; blot it dry with paper towels. If that's still not dry enough for you, plop it on a rack in the fridge for like 10 minutes. Refrigeration sucks moisture from the air,  so your fridge is a great place to let surface moisture "flash off" (as Dave Arnold refers to the process). The air in your fridge isn't cold enough or conductive enough to really drop the core temp of your meat in that short amount of time, and it gives you a bit of extra insurance against overcooking during the final sear step.

     

    Hair dryers.

     

    Honestly.

     

    Granted the relative humidity in my refrigerator is too low for me to measure with my hygrometer.  However unless you own a fancy refrigerator that circulates dry air I'm not sure refrigerator drying will be that rapid -- besides, low humidity or not, water condenses on most everything in my refrigerator.

     

    Last night I did a boneless pork chop sous vide,  58C.  That seems to have been a good temperature for me but there were problems.*  This particular package of boneless rib chops were pre-brined.  Then I salted again before bagging.  After anovaing I dried with paper towels and the hair dryer on hot to see the difference from drying cool.  Wasn't paying much attention (blame World of Warcraft) and the blow drier rendered the fat.  Oops.

     

    After pan searing the pork was ham-like.  Tender, juicy, and not bad at all, but the unmistakable somewhat rubbery texture of ham.  Last time I buy expensive (granted, on sale) pre-brined fresh pork.

     

    I still think hair drying on cool has its place in my culinary repertoire.

     

     

    *dropping on the floor was one.

     

     

    • Like 2
  4. 1 hour ago, BonVivant said:

    My guesthouse's home-cooking on Yonaguni island.

    ...

    Okinawans eat a bit of everything and there's always seaweed and tofu in some form. The cuisine of Okinawa is a mix of other countries' with whom the former Ryukyu kingdom used to trade.

     

    Fascinating history, thanks for the link!

  5. 10 hours ago, Duvel said:

    Did you switch it on ?

     

    Don't know.  I thought I did.

     

    When I went to put the pie in the oven the display didn't look right so I turned the broiler on again.  After three minutes I pulled the pizza but the top crust didn't look right.  There should have been leopardizing on the top but it looked rather raw.  So I put it in again for another minute.  Still no joy.  Then another thirty seconds.

     

    After loading the poor pizza three times it wasn't as pretty as it might have been and stuff was dripping over the edges.  The top crust was still on this side of raw and the bottom crust was black.

     

     

    Compare this pizza with my last pizza from the other night:

     

    Dinner10252018.png

     

    Pizza10112018.png

     

     

    Edit:  the bottom pizza is 3 minutes.

     

     

    • Like 6
  6. 14 minutes ago, Thanks for the Crepes said:

     

    Well, it certainly looks delicious. I guess it could have raw dough in the center, but it doesn't appear to.

     

    I confess there is not much of it left.  But seriously, the top has no leopardizing while the bottom crust is black.  The pie should have been done in three minutes but I let it go four and a half minutes trying to get some color on the top.  All I can think of was that the broiler was not really on.

     

     

    • Like 2
  7. At work this evening I mentioned to a colleague that a bag of my bean club box arrived broken and spilled.  She said two bags of her bean club box arrived broken but she hadn't bothered to report it.  She assumed RG was trying to cram too much into the container.

     

    I hope @rancho_gordo is reading this so the packaging will be improved in the future.

     

  8. Dinner10252018.png

     

    Not as pretty as @Ann_T's but got the job done.  Actually I suspect the broiler never really came on.  The bottom of the pie was blackened but the top crust remained raw.  I may trouble shoot this when I'm sober.  Or I may just pretend it never happened.

     

    • Like 6
    • Haha 9
  9. @JoaoBertinatti was your question specifically about lactose free ice cream?  If so I am afraid I have nothing to contribute.  But I have recently tasted some excellent commercially made ice cream that does not use gums nor stabilizers:

     

    https://forums.egullet.org/topic/72119-americas-favorite-ice-cream-guess/?do=findComment&comment=2175368

     

    I have tried MVR milk for ice cream as reported earlier in this thread; however I went back to concentrating the milk for the ice cream base while pasteurizing.  In the US or at least in this part of the US, MVR milk (as I understand the term) with reduced lactose is available in grocery stores.

     

    Thankfully I am blessed with good ice cream genetics and lactose is not an issue for me.

     

     

    • Like 2
  10. 7 minutes ago, Ann_T said:

    Pizza Night.

     

    Pizza night here too, but I am fortifying myself before I throw the pizza in the oven, and anyway I'm sure mine will not look as good as yours.

     

    • Like 2
    • Haha 1
  11. Tonight it's a bowl of McConnell's.  My impression continues that it's really good stuff.  The ingredients include no gums.  Nonetheless the texture and melting characteristics surpass Graeter's which relies on gums.  McConnell's (lack of) sweetness and it's subtle flavor is much more to my taste.

     

    I couldn't even find the waxiness that I complained of the other night when I was testing both ice creams together.  Graeter's is a few dollar's less expensive per pint but it's still no contest.

     

    • Like 2
  12. 10 hours ago, iggiggiggy said:

    The hair dryer is a novel idea! That should cut down on the amount of paper towels I usually use. ha ha ha

     

    Let me attempt the next one using your approach. It sounds good on paper, now time to put the hair dryer to it :)  :) 

     

     

     

    I'd wipe with paper towels first though.

     

  13. 45 minutes ago, Kim Shook said:

    Cool.  So, can you alternate between hair and chicken, or does this need to be a dedicated dryer?  'Cause I can just imagine Mr. Kim's reaction when I say I need a blow dryer for the kitchen.  He still hasn't bought the little heater I've requested for turning our kitchen half bath into a proofing room.

     

    Multifunction product.

     

    • Like 2
  14. 1 hour ago, sbain said:

    When you say "spatula" I am assuming you aren't using a regular 'ol spatula (offset or otherwise). I don't think that will give you good results. get yourself one of these scrapers (or something like it) that can do the whole mold in one go. And If my scraper gets dirty I simply wash it (hot water, then completely dry) before scraping. It's got to be clean if you want a smooth surface. And I second what others have said: press down firmly and evenly and try to do it one smooth, fast, hard swipe. going back and fussing over each one will lead to problems...

     

    Good luck!

     

    Thanks!  This is what I'm scraping with:

    http://amzn.com/B00076R2R6

     

    The width is just right for the molds.

     

  15. Last night I prepared perhaps the best chicken I have had -- or best CSO chicken (which is pretty much saying the same thing).

    https://forums.egullet.org/topic/156030-dinner-2018-part-1/?do=findComment&comment=2175137

     

    Nothing special in the settings, just steam bake 20 minutes at 450F.  What I did differently, after salting the bird for an hour or so I directed my new hair dryer on it for about half an hour.  Cold air at maximum fan speed, till the skin appeared translucent and quite dry.  I claim no originality for this, just google "hair dryer chicken"*.  But the combination of dry skin and steam was something to behold.

     

    A few days ago I got the new dryer motivated by chocolate work.  So far it's been great for surfaces of sous vide steaks, skin of chicken parts, and under breasts (my own).

     

     

    *Marcella Hazan has an old recipe for hair dryer duck.  However Hazan boils her duck then blasts it with hot air.

     

    • Like 4
    • Haha 2
  16. 5 hours ago, MelissaH said:

    I've tried a few flavors of Graeters, and was not impressed, especially at $8/pint. I was especially unimpressed by the flavors with chocolate chips, as the chocolate seemed to be gathered into a few very large chunks rather than well dispersed throughout.

     

    Around here, I'd just as soon save my pennies and get ice cream from Perry's or Byrne Dairy. Maybe Graeter's tastes better in Cincinnati?

     

    I would not go out of my way to buy Graeter's again but it was on sale, and I wanted to see what the hype was about.  The ingredients include carob gum and guar gum, and with that help I would have expected the texture to be better.

     

    Anyone else have opinions of McConnell's?

     

    • Like 1
  17. 6 hours ago, Tri2Cook said:


    Heston Blumenthal does that with chocolate he sprays into the molds from a cream whipper with a couple charges shaken into the chocolate. Makes the aerated chocolate that can be found in Greweling's book but with much bigger bubbles. He leaves it under vacuum until the chocolate is set.

     

    I've now read much of Greweling but I forgot to look for that iSi technique.  When I wake up a bit I'll go look for it.  Is Blumenthal's vacuum method documented in a book someplace?

     

    Still trying to figure out how to keep the spatula clean each time for scraping molds.  I suppose one could use a fresh spatula for each mold.  I'm not filling a lot of molds at one sitting.  Any other methods for insuring a beautiful smooth surface for the backside?

     

  18. This was supposed to have been duck...

     

    Dinner10222018.png

     

     

    CSO chicken, blood orange sauce.  Sauce recipe from Girl & The Fig Cookbook.  Half recipe.  I'd heard dark rumors of blood diamonds out of Africa.  My first time dealing in blood oranges.  Blood oranges:  7-8 oranges @$3.99...you do the math.  Sauce said to last 10 days, hardly made it through the night.

     

    Served with wild rice and barely blanched Brussel's sprouts.  Methode rotuts ad libitum.  Blood orange sauce went particularly well with sprouts.

     

     

    Edit:  I forgot to mention pomegranate.

     

    • Like 15
×
×
  • Create New...