Ttogull

I am a huge fan of Heston Blumenthal. I am making his Chicken Tikka-Masala for dinner tonight. I've been working on it for a couple of days. Anyway, do you know if this book corresponds to a new TV series? I don't find mention of it. I find that I enjoy watching the TV show before trying the dish, as I understand better why things are being done.

Yes, thank you. Although it is so good, it's hard to believe!

I have a portable (single) induction burner that I use for outside and for occasional needs for an extra burner. It came with a tester for compatible pots: a fridge magnet. If it sticks, the pot will work. The burner is more powerful than my gas stove, at least for boiling water. It boils at about 75% of the time. There are two potential downsides. On high, it uses quite a bit of power - pretty much all of the standard 15 amp house circuit. For this reason, I thinks double burner, if it exists, would be limited. Whether this is an issue depends, I guess, on how your apartment is wired. I don't know these things. For me, I have to be sure I have everything else on the circuit turned off to avoid a tripped circuit. In recollection I seem to recall a dual burner unit. But my recollection, perhaps faulty, is that it would cycle between the units to keep under the 15 amps. And my recollection was that some did not like the cycling. The other is ventilation. You can do some serious searing on this sucker, but there is no ventilation hood above it. But it's great for boiling, simmering, pressure cooking, etc.

I'm not 100% sure I follow. Hot smoking on a Weber seems to be straightforward. I've watched a couple of Heston Blumenthal episodes where he does cold smoking on a Weber kettle. I haven't tried the method myself. Three aluminum pans. One holds the wood chips. One holds the item to be smoked. The third has ice. The pan with ice is put below the pan with the item to be smoked (on the charcoal grate). The pan with the item to be smoked is put on the above grill grate directly above hte pan with ice. The wood chip pan is put on the charcoal grate beside the item to be smoked. The wood chips are hit with heat - IIRC, this is something like a blowtorch. Once the chips are smoking, the cover to the grill is put on. As I recall, this is done up to 4 times, every 15 minutes. As I said, I haven't tried it. But I can't see why it would not work.

I hope I am not out of touch here. But as far as things I've made that are incredibly good and vegetarian, one has to be fermented black-eyed pea fritters. I started with Purcell Farms black-eyed peas, and then followed the Sandor Katz "recipe": http://books.google.com/books?id=-zmLa205d0QC&pg=PA315&lpg=PA315&dq=fermented+black+eyed+pea+fritters&source=bl&ots=x8qiT2Ctx7&sig=OY6V5JQ0biM308jF11wHyS-rX54&hl=en&sa=X&ei=avVYUeG1F5Lo0AHU-IFQ&ved=0CGAQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=fermented%20black%20eyed%20pea%20fritters&f=false They would go incredibly well with eggs, as well as with a vinegar-based hot sauce. Sorry if this is not what you had in mind. But they are out of this world.

I have a ginger garlic brine for tandoori chicken that will kick your ass!

Odd, I made roast chicken tonight. With broccoli potato hash. And I made it much differently than I have before, and I loved it. Skin like glass for the first time. But first, you forgot the most important factor in making good roast chicken. The chicken. I didn't realize ubtil I started buying chickens from farms and quality butchers. A good chicken smells a lot like...chicken. The crap sold in chain stores doesn't. There is a chapter in Pandora's Lunchbox about flavorless chicken. The upshot is that mass chickens are grown too fast to taste like chicken. The chicken is the biggest difference in the taste of roast chicken. Also, mass-produced chickens are typically processed. Injected saline, flavors, and maybe preservatives. God only knows what his does to the texture, flavor, etc. of chicken. A chicken cannot naturally hang out in an open meat cooler for weeks, which is true for the chickens often sold by mass producers. And what happens when you brine an already preserved chicken? Again, Pandora's Lunchbox has some discussion, but good butchers will discuss this too.the funny thing is that all the butchers I talk to say that it is impossible to find unprocessed mass produced pork, but everyone is worried about chickens. Aside from that, I always brine. I never did before, but Heston Blumenthal convinced me. I usually do beer can style, but honestly I cannot tell a difference if I brine first. Tonight was a first where I trussed the chicken, put it breast side up in a hot skillet, and cooked in the oven at 475F until 155F. What a mess! It was Keller's Bouchon recipe. And it was probably the best I've made. I had never seen chicken skin look like glass until this - it was translucent, and it shattered when I put the probe in. The meat was awesome too,, but that is typical with good chicken and brining.

We must be brothers. El Yucateco first, and I want to like Sriracha but just can't. I have more than 50 bottles of hot sauces, not including backups of my favorites. I pick them all for taste, and specifically exclude any that have names meant to appeal to "show-offs". Cholula and Tabasco are probably the mildest I have, and the hottest are varied. I have a couple of bhut jolokia. For me, the flavors are very roughly divided by pepper, vinegar, carrot, and mustard. Can't tell you why. The habanero family is my favorite. And for most applications, I prefer no vinegar. This fits El Yucateco perfectly, although they do have jalapeno too. So there is red hab, green hab, and xxx hab, which I guess is really more roasted. I think if you were to use just use normal bell peppers and compare the flavor differences among red, green, and roasted, you'd have a good idea of the differences in these sauces. When it comes to breakfast, though, for some reason I like vinegar, especially with eggs. I love Marie Sharp for this. Some have carrot, and some not. For me, the carrot makes a big difference, but which I choose depends on the food and my mood. Habanero ketchup is a good idea. I use Melinda's, but I don't think it is special. Finally, there is mustard. If you want hot mustard, you have to try Lottie's. Absolute fantastic taste. But it might as well be called Lottery's, because 3 bites might be mild while the 4th burns your face off. Really great with hot dogs. I have a couple other Carribean mustards that are nice. I am less familiar with Asian-style sauces, so I mean no insult by not mentioning them. ETA: one of my favorites is Two Flaming Arrows, labeled an authentic Indian product from New Mexico. No idea about that, but it's like Tabasco with real taste and heat, and goes well with greens.

I have been working quite a bit with the "Fat Free" Mac and cheese. Does anyone know how fat free it really is? I know the cheese water does not become solid after refrigeration. I want to make the more famous version, but this one is so good that, when I want Mac and cheese, I gotta have the FF version.. Tonight I made a Parmesan version and discovered a really nice new fold-in for the mouthfeel: puréed flageolet beans. I'll have to try it again, but I might prefer that to the cauliflower in the original recipe. The beans are richer, earthier, while the cauliflower somehow seems brighter. Tough to explain. But It's amazing how the bean or cauliflower taste simply vanishes in the final dish. I've even used the general idea of the FF method (with cauliflower and cheese water) to remake tuna casserole. It was better than the original, but I need to make some adjustments. Has anybody done other fold-ins? I guess the cauliflower one is well-known because I hav found similar applications in several other books. The only other post I found on this mentions that he cheese crumbles made from the leftover fat solids had no taste. I have done this now a dozen or so times, and I have found the same except for one type of cheese: sharp cheddar. The others are just bland. Tried he Parmesan today, and nada. The sharp cheddar crumbles by themselves don't taste all that great ( little bitter) but on top of the Mac and cheese they taste great and have a nice texture clash. The sharp cheddar crumbles are also great on eggs, guacamole, beans, and probably a lot more.

Dcarch You are my hero. That is an excellent idea! One question - what is the layer of white between the cracklin powder and the yellowish potatoes?

I agree. A tiny amount goes a very long way, and as said the taste is not reminiscent of grill flavor. For me, the Taste is pretty much The same as the smell when charcoal is first lit - not appealing. Charcoal salt is good on the right application, but I wouldn't want it a lot. I also haven't tried the oil, but oddly I've had a bit of ash from spent charcoal. A completely different taste. No bitterness at all. In my mind's tongue, I think it would be a good combination.

I think maybe covering at once wth a lid might be more relayed to avoiding a fire than trapping steam! In any case, this sounds like a good technique. There are lots of places it might be useful. Another possibility might be to burn wood chunks down to embers and do the same. The difference is that wood chunks, I would think anyway, should impart more smoke flavor. IMO, charcoal has most of the wood aromatics burned off, which I think was what was meant above by "flavorless." (I do not find charcoal flavorless, but rather bitter and unappealing.). Mesquite oil for steaks, cherry or apple oil for fish, oak oil for veggies... It might even work by putting embers in melted butter. Smoked beurre noisette on scrambled eggs?

Apparently it is an El Bulli thing. Here is a link: http://books.google.com/books?id=6PCrdGUUyz4C&pg=PA388&lpg=PA388&dq=charcoal+oil+adria&source=bl&ots=DspXbYwI0t&sig=cB9BjHqjEHt-13dLir8ygr8ooag&hl=en&sa=X&ei=rbdMUcWVBaHc0QHUwID4Bg&ved=0CD8Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=charcoal oil adria&f=false It is charcoal burned down to embers, cooled, and then put in oil. Inspired by charcoal milk. EDIT: I don't think raw charcoal would taste good infused in oil. A tiny bit of raw charcoal is good added to salt. I often cook meat directly on coals, and charcoal ashes sometimes stick to the meat. That is pretty good.

I grewup in Texas, and the prevailing attitude was that good BBQ needs no sauce. BBQ sauce only went into baked beans. That said, since leaving TX, I would accept none other than Stubbs, either the original or the spicy. Roasted chicken and Stubbs, mmmm.... I do not like sweet stuff, but I cannot imagine good BBQ sauce without sugar. IMHO, the sugar balances the other very strong flavors. Alot of sauces go too far and make the sauce mostly sweet, but not Stubbs IMHO. My recollection is that Elgins is also good in this regard, but is special order last I checked. If you are hellbent on no sugar, my first guess would be one of Paul Kirk's books. It wouldn't be commercial, but it might be a start.

My understanding is there are only two ways to do heart: very quick or slow. I've seen deer heart stuffed and then baked, and it looked really good. My preference, though, is grilling it. The following recipe is making my mouth water. http://honest-food.net/2012/06/13/grilled-deer-heart-recipe/

I use Evernote for the ones I want to keep track of but don't really want to print. It comes with a browser add-on, and you just click the little button and it saves an actual copy of the page somewhere in the clouds. It's free but capped per month - I haven't yet hit the caps. You can pay to loosen the caps. It also has the benefit that it is the same on all your devices, so if you clipped on your computer and later decide at the grocery store that you want to make the recipe, you can access it with your smartphone.

I use Evernote for the ones I want to keep track of but don't really want to print. It comes with a browser add-on, and you just click the little button and it saves an actual copy of the page somewhere in the clouds. It's free but capped per month - I haven't yet hit the caps. You can pay to loosen the caps. It also has the benefit that it is the same on all your devices, so if you clipped on your computer and later decide at the grocery store that you want to make the recipe, you can access it with your smartphone.

I have seen lots of de Arbol and buy them 2 or 3 times a year in Texas. The OP's chiles do not look like de Arbol to me. The shoulders are too narrow. I've seen chiles like the OP's in more Asian type stores, and they are usually labeled Thai chiles. I think it would be strange to see de arbols in MA. The flavors are very different. De arbols are more smoky. For me the heat is ver quick and sharp without much linger. The Thai seems hotter, sticks around, and builds.

I have bought frozen roasted New Mexico chilies and had thence shipped. I have bought cases of NM chilies, roasted them myself over smoke, and frozen. I have gone into the local fields to pick my own red jalapeños and chocolate poblanos, roasted them, and frozen them. I have directly frozen de arbol, fatalli, red savina, chocolate habanero, etc. etc. They are all good until the next season. The texture is not quite right for a fresh salsa, but they work in a lot of roasted salsas, as well as any cooked dish I can think of. Other methods are ok, but IMHO freezing best preserves the characteristics of the pepper. It really depends on the application. My needs work better with frozen. @Nancy. It's easy to make chipotles. A chipotle is simply a smoked pepper ( not necessarily an jalapeño). I simply throw a pepper on the smoker when I am doing other stuff. You can smoke it all the way to dry, and turn into powder if you want. Or just part way and add adobo sauce (recipes abound on the net). I don't know why, but pretty much everyone I know thinks the heat of a pepper is massively intensified by smoke. The best tasting one I have done is a smoked chocolate habanero, but I think I cried from pain/pleasure.

I might be wrong, but I think in this recipe the cooking accommodated a clay cooking pot. Some clay pots cannot be put on a stove to first bring to a boil (OTOH some can). I have both types. I would be hesitant to bring beans to a full boil even in the stove-top compatible. I exclusively use the stove-top compatible clay pots in the summer; both in the winter. Also the former when cooking beans in a fireplace, which is just awesome. I don't understand the cooking times listed here. I buy my beans almost exclusively from Rancho Gordo (the rest from Purcell Mountain) and even if I cooked them the day they arrived they would be inedible after 90 minutes sans soak at 275. I'm sure it depends on the type of bean. Black runner beans would take 8 to 10 hours, I would think. Fantastic beans, but they take forever. Maybe pinquitos would be ok. I never presoak. I cooked beans in various vessels for years. Love clay. But I think patrickamory is spot on. I don't see any comparison to pressure cooking. Faster cooking, sure, but the taste is just a world apart. If you have a pressure cooker, you must try cooking beans conventionally and PCed for comparison. It's amazing. I say this while being in love with my clay pots - PC rocks. There is the caveat that some kidney-type beans need an early boil to deactivate a toxin. I don't eat kidney beans, so I don't worry about it.

Would the Parmesan cheese require you to refrigerate? A lot of places that sell cheese leave their hard aged cheeses at room temp, including Parmesan, Gouda, cheddar, etc.

Thank you all! I am definitely going to try this soon.

That was not clear in your original post. Anyway, if you are a fan of brown rice, you might consider giving farro a try. It is very good. I had forgotten that I've also made barley risotto. Also very good. You might consider doing a search for brown basmati risotto. I did this some time ago, and turned up a few recipes for brown rice risotto. Haven't actually tried them, but if dcarch's results are similar I'm going to have to do so very soon. That looks good.

Farro risotto is very good, particularly mushroom. Lots of recipes out there. I use the PC method, so I can't help with a non-PC version. It's definitely worth a try.

I had a dish at an Indian restaurant called Aloo Bhopli Mirchi that listed caramelized gram flour as an ingredient. It was terrific. Sadly, however, I cannot find a description of how the garam flour might have been caramelized. Indeed, a Google search using " caramelized gram flour" with the quote marks included only gives references to the restaurant where I had the dish. I'd like to learn how to caramelize gram flour for other potential dishes. My best guess at this point is that gram flour was used to make something akin to a roux. Does anybody have any suggestions or ideas? Thanks in advance.