[Sea Hare]

Cuttlefish? The pic’s of the cut ones look like they have been cut through the cuttle.

[Making Marmalade: Tips & Techniques]

3 hours ago, FrogPrincesse said:

@JohnT Beet or cane, it’s sucrose. The source of sugar doesn’t make a difference with respect to reaching the gelling point.

What are your favorite citrus combinations to use?

Hi @FrogPrincesse, I do orange (not naval), orange & lemon, lemon, orange with lemon & grapefruit, grapefruit & lemon, plain kumquat and when I have too many kumquat I do a mixture of them and the above citrus. I also do limited jams of pineapple or blackberry or chunky apricot when they come into season. I hope to start chilli & onion chutney mid year sometime. My partner, Elizabeth, does her FH Vegan chilli sauce (Frightfully Hot) - I don’t like it but there are those that enjoy FH sauces!

[Making Marmalade: Tips & Techniques]

@TicTac we only have cane sugar in my part of the world, so I have no idea what would happen, or any difference, if a person uses beet sugar. So, my question is basically, what type of sugar are you using? I ask this simply because I do not know if there would be any difference between using cane v beet.

 

I make lots of different marmalade using different citrus and combinations of citrus and all set properly. I do bottle and give all bottles a 10 minute boiling water treatment within a few minutes of bottling so I only know the next day that all is good. I never use any commercial pectin - just the natural pectin in the fruit, as others appear to do in this thread.

[Making Marmalade: Tips & Techniques]

@Katie Meadow Surly your temp should read 221°F / 105°C and not 228°F? My marmalade is stopped at 105°C and I get a perfect set every time. If I use orange (Not Saville) I always add the juice of one lemon to the fluid to get the pectin to set. We do not get Saville oranges anywhere where I live.

[Storing Chilies: Jalapeños, Serranos, and Others]

Thanks Smithy, greatly appreciated. Love the “no cloves” comment 😀. I must admit that I have never found cloves in pickling spices here in the deep south of Africa.

[Storing Chilies: Jalapeños, Serranos, and Others]

@Smithy can you please post or PM me your favourite recipe for preserving / pickling Jalapeños. Yesterday evening our little supermarket in our village had stacks of them at a good price. JT.

[The price of eggs]

Free-range eggs at my local supermarket on the west coast of South Africa is equivalent to US$ 3.82 for a box of 18 XL. Eggs here are packed in boxes of 6, 12, 18, 30 or 36.

[A Cape Dutch South African meal: I need some help]

At the end of the day, that recipe will do but can be a bit lumpy if not stirred well with a whisk. You also need a pie / tart shell. Did it work for you?

[A Cape Dutch South African meal: I need some help]

MELKTERT - CRUSTLESS - SJA de Villiers

Makes 2 x 20cm tarts or 1 x 24cm tart

(I use 20cm thick aluminium tart pans with a 5cm height - a 3cm height also works)

 

Ingredients:

40g butter, melted

3 eggs, separated

225g sugar

140g cake flour (AP flour)

5ml baking powder

1ml salt

5ml vanilla extract

1 litre milk

cinnamon sugar, for sprinkling

 

Method:

Preheat a convection oven to 160°C.

Separate the eggs and beat the whites to stiff peaks.

Beat the melted butter, egg yolks and the sugar thoroughly.

Sift the cake flour, baking powder and salt together and fold into the egg mixture, adding the milk slowly.

Stir in the essence and mix well.

 

For large pie dishes:

Fold the stiffly beaten egg whites into the mixture and pour into 2 greased 20cm pie dishes and sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar.

Immediately place in the oven and bake for 20 minutes at 160°C before turning down the temperature by 30°C to 130°C. Continue baking a further 20 minutes until set. Remove from oven and let cool on a rack.

 

Notes:

The milk and eggs need to be at room temperature.

Let the tart cool completely in the pie dish and then flip it upside-down onto a large plate and then a second flip onto a serving plate.

 

[A Cape Dutch South African meal: I need some help]

Do you want a crusted one or crestless? The crustless is, for me, easier to make.

 

JohnT

[Canned sardines & other tinned seafood]

On 11/23/2022 at 8:35 PM, BeeZee said:

Tried this today for lunch, on some Wasa, a sprinkle of lemon juice. I like cracked black pepper and thought they could have had even more. Fish was mild, meaty texture, light smoke. They were pretty fused together in the tin so I found it hard to pull out whole fillets (4 in the tin). Fish was from Latvia.

 

The label says the product is from the cold waters of the North Sea but you say it is from Latvia. The two are very far from each other and not connected - Latvia is on the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea. It appears similar to tinned sardines we get in our local shops. They are branded under the “Lucky Star” label, a fully South African brand, with the processing factory being across the bay from where I live. Reading the fine print on the tin it says “Product of Indonesia”. Questionable? Oh yes! 

[Cleaning a cast-iron waffle-maker]

Please post a pic of your iron opened so we can see the inside.

 

Is it a true waffle iron or a jaffle iron?

 

JohnT

[Steamed Bao Buns]

@Dejah Many thanks for your recipe too. Something more for me to experiment with.

[Steamed Bao Buns]

@liuzhouThanks for the recipe. I will give it a go, hopefully this next weekend, and do some pulled pork as a filling.

[Steamed Bao Buns]

@liuzhouThank you, it would be greatly appreciated.

[Steamed Bao Buns]

Does anybody have a tried and tested recipe for steamed Bao buns in English? I have tried a few recipes off the internet but, either I am not good at making them (highly possible) or the recipes I used are not too good. I have never seen a Bao bun, never mind them been made! And cannot find them offered in our local Chinese restaurants or would have asked for a recipe or lesson on making them.

[Bread recipes for sealed bread pans?]

Do a Google search for “boston loaf south africa” and see what comes up. Usually a fruit or date style bread, sliced for tea or coffee.

[Making large numbers of tart/tartelette shells: How?]

@Rajala, if I may ask, as I am a bit confused regarding this thread, what pastry recipe are you using that is giving you so many problems?

[Pickled Onions]

From my chef school and catering days:

 

Quick Pickled Onions For Salad Topping

Take medium sized onions, peel and cut in half. Thinly slice into half moons.

Put into a bowl and just cover with apple cider vinegar then stir-in and dissolve a tablespoon of sugar (the sugar is to take any “bite” from the vinegar, not to sweeten the mixture). Once the sugar has dissolved, remove the onions and sprinkle over the salad.

 

It’s all quick and easy and tastes good, maintaining the crispness of the onion. I sometimes use this also for sprinkling on a pizza before it goes into the oven!

 

I have never tried to preserve any remaining onion (there is seldom any remaining), but presume it will store for a time in the refrigerator.

[Unusual & mysterious kitchen gadgets]

The anvil shaped insert at the top of the round section is to cut the foil off the top of a sealed corked bottle (wine bottle).

[Quiche questions]

@pistolabella So, what did you bake and how did you do them? And, we’re your efforts appreciated?

[Meeting-friendly snacks to bake]

@Anna N Those really look more'ish to me! I am sure the vultures at the office will get stuck into them and polish them off with relish! 

[ENO Stoves]

I am busy trying to source a new 2 burner stove with oven (all one gimballed unit) for my little boat. ENO appear to be the new manufactures of what I previously knew as a Force 10 stove. Force 10 used to be a Canadian product but I am not sure who ENO are, where they are based and know nothing about ENO. There appears to be some positive feedback about the ENO stoves and, within the marine industry, some pretty negative comment.

 

Does anybody have any experience or feedback on ENO products - they apparently make domestic stoves and BBQ's as well.

 

John

[Boat Cookery]

7 hours ago, FauxPas said:

 

This appeals to me. Proportions? And when you say English mustard, do you mean the dry mustard like Keen's? 

 

 

This is one of marinades that just goes by looks. If it looks right, it is! Basically I put a tablespoon of the powdered English mustard into a ramekin, put the juice of a lemon in and a tablespoon of brown sugar. Stir it up and adjust with a bit more lemon juice if need be. Stir well and let stand to let the sugar disolve, giving a stir every now and a gain. I use pork cutlet chops and coat  with the marinade. Let the chops marinade for about half an hour then oven bake or grill. The sugar will caramelise and the lemon juice will tenderise.

[Boat Cookery]

On 16 August 2018 at 11:09 PM, Smithy said:

 

I am still getting my mind wrapped round the idea of squid coming up on deck at night. Does this happen only at a low speed, or can they snag a boat doing 10 knots or better? How high off the water is the deck, that they're clambering aboard? Please tell more about this when you get a chance. 

We  are normally trying to go as fast as possible but you will find we normally average just over 6 knots. The deck height varies, depending on the boat, but with most modern catamarans, the deck of a 40 to 50 foot cat is normally around 2 metres above sea level. But, I have seen squid shoot about 4 metres out of the water and belly flop onto the deck. I have also seen flying fish hit the helmsman, sitting with his head 4 metres above the water level, knocking the helmsman out cold. This is why, at night, no lights are allowed on watch except the Tri-colour navigation light at the top of the mast. The flying fish are also attracted to light. It is very seldom that you can get a smallish sailboat going 10 knots unless in some fast flowing current - we normally have full fuel and water tanks and a massive amount of provisions.