Margaret Pilgrim

Pepperidge Farms Bordeau are great "dunkers". Wine, coffee, tea if you must...

If you love Chef Choice, you don't have to put up with plugged in vibrations. I use their hand held model

Can hyou give us a couple of sneak peeks? Or is that against copyright?

That's called cooking.

A wine cork works well as a cover for a spike ...

I swear by Bamix immersion blenders. Whereas recipes say to blend then strain, I find that straining is unnecessary when making a velvety soup or sauce. But to make mayo, I simply use a wire coil whisk in a French "working jar" It emulsifies into mayo in under a minute, cap with its lid. Rinse whisk and done..

We somehow acquired one of these. Pretty unbreakable. You can have one too as this one is on eBay now. $38.

I've never had a stand mixer. Some people bemoan having a deprived childhood. I have a deprived adulthood.

Taking a Labor Day holiday from the kitchen, tonight's plate is truly American. Mrs. Paul's fish sticks, Hellman's tartar sauce.steamed broccoli with Velveeta sauce, pan fried potatoes with off camera Del Monte catsup. Don't worry, I'll be back at work soon.

From Toliver's quote, " just pull some local permits to get certified by the Riverside County public health office." Maybe I'm just jaundiced by SF's legendary red tape, but this sounds fraught with gotchas.

Shain, thanks much for this. FWIW, I find a two tined fork, like a small carving set fork, invaluable for "fluffing" rice and pilaf-like foods.

The couscous pictured above is actually moghrabiah, Lebonese couscous. Slightly larger than Israeli. Cousins.

KISS. If there are no better (intelligible) instructions on the package, boil in salted water until tender. Husband said I could have let this boil a few more minutes, but it was not much more than al dente.

Beets with Momofuku ranch (Sarah Leah Chase's) Hungarian chicken, with Israeli couscous

Blistered shishitos, Maldon salt. Pasta with raw tomato sauce, Sungold cherry tomatoes courtesy of country neighbors.

That shouldn't exist here, as we respect and learn from others' taste and experience.

I dogsit....

Roasted or split and grilled Cornish hen with Cape Cod beach plum sauce.

Totally agree, and expand your list to include hand formed pastas, puff pastry and friends, croquembouche, ballotine of chicken, etc, etc. These are all flights of kitchen fancy, projects one undertakes for the "fun" of it. If they don't sound like fun, I'd steer clear.

Granted it's a surprise squelcher, but there's always the good, old, "If you could have anything in the world for your Birthday Dinner,..that I can create in a rental kitchen...what would it be?"

What would he order were you able to go out? That's a start...

Nice shape. Are they filled?

Combining last night's leftover grilled chicken and steamed rice, new egg, scallions, peas and scrap of bacon -> Fried Rice

I guess it would depend on the viewer. Some would be inspired to follow along. Others to say, "Screw it. I'll buy mine." In all events the video is a valuable anthropological document.

Totally agree. I don’t know Diane’s suggestions. My point was that newbies should not be discouraged by seemingly complicated versions from experts or food media. Again, JUST DO IT.