Tropicalsenior

Welcome from an ex Seattleite, well, actually from Bellevue but I love Seattle and one thing about it that I miss is the endless variety of food that is available. I now live in Costa Rica and every time I think about Seattle I feel deprived. I don't know if you are allowed to put a link to your blog but I know that I can. I just spent the last 45 minutes reading all 16 pages of the recipe index. I am totally intrigued. I know nothing about the food of Sri Lanka but your pictures are gorgeous and I have read through some of the recipes and they are concise and easy to follow. Thank you. It is one of the best sites that I have read in the last few years. Everything is right to the point and not cluttered with advertising. Again, welcome. As you clearly love food, you have come to the right place and I'm looking forward to your contributions.

That's the one that I am planning on using. I'm surprised that it had such a small yield. Are you planning to make Katsu curry with it?

Which recipe did you use?

Thanks but what I really wanted to know was whether you use just the Japanese curry powder or whether you also add the garam masala.

Okay, I have my Japanese curry powder made. It smells delicious and I'm ready to make the roux. @weinoo I'm going to use the recipe that you have given. Do you add the garam masala when you make the roux?

Bureau of Land Management. It is federal owned land.

If you look far enough into the recipe that @weinoo gave, you will find this recipe for Japanese curry powder. https://www.justonecookbook.com/japanese-curry-powder/ I know that the recommendations from @Duvel are always good but there are some of us that just don't have access to these products so making it ourselves is the only option.

I'm fairly pleased with the longevity of my Hamilton Beach. My first one lasted 5 years and I noticed on the photo information that I bought this one exactly 4 years ago. I live in Costa Rica so my selection is pretty Limited. Either I get the cheap ones from China or the super expensive Imports. Which incidentally, are also made in China. I managed to find this one in PriceSmart which is our version of Costco. Wasn't terribly expensive so I don't feel bad about replacing them if they don't last up to expectation.

I too would go with a standard countertop convection oven and a very small microwave which is exactly what I have done. I have a Hamilton Beach convection oven that I love. It is 15 in high and the shelf above it is another 6 in up which is plenty. I have an 800 w microwave and I do a lot of cooking in my microwave. I had always gone with the big ones until I got a little one to use while my big one was being repaired. I wound up giving the big one away. My oven only goes to 450°, but I have found that that is enough to cook a very decent Pizza. I make cakes in it and bread and just about anything that you can think of. One thing that I really like about it is that it has an extremely low setting and I can use that to make yogurt.

I haven't been posting much on this topic lately because with my diminishing capabilities in the kitchen our meals are nourishing but visually pretty boring. But the last couple nights I did take some pictures. Asparagus is something that you rarely find here and when you do it is prohibitively expensive but the last few weeks I've been able to find it at a really good price and we are taking advantage of it. This was a breaded pork cutlet with asparagus and lemon, butter sauce. Although it is the rainy season here, it is still hotter than the hubs of hell in the afternoons. I decided to make a shrimp Louie with a base of romaine lettuce and avocado slices and a Crab Louie dressing. It was delicious and practically no after dinner clean up which was a real bonus in this heat.

That's the beauty of doing them in the instant pot. I have never had one of them crack.

I guess they would be handy if you like eating in bed.

The book is also available as an ebook. That's how I have it and it is one of the better ones to be able to read online.

I was just about to answer this but Patrick beat me to it. I agree completely with the idea that it is in the shaping. I have a pebbly glass tablet that I use for shaping the dough and I used to shape it without using any extra flour. I found out that the drag of the board sometimes prevented proper tension. Now I use just a tiny sprinkling of flour and it helps to eliminate pockets and makes for smoother surface.

In Costa Rica, hot dogs are sold with plastic skins that must be removed before cooking. I don't think there's a gringo here that hasn't thrown a hot dog on the barbie and wound up with melted plastic skin the first time. My friend Lenora couldn't figure out why would they would wrap them in plastic to sell them. I had to explain that they were made that way and that they were just too lazy to take off the skin before they sold them.

That was so true here. However now the only special International sections that you find are Italian and Chinese.

When we moved to Costa Rica 34 years ago, if we wanted a product from the states, we had to go to a specialty store. And they were super expensive. Today, I would estimate that 30% of the products on the grocery stores are from the states or from Europe. I can't even estimate the amount of products that are US copycats. And many of the copycats are more expensive than the imported products. A recent example that I saw was 12 oz of Walmart brand bacon for $8. A comparable brand of Costa Rican bacon was about $13. A package of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese was about $1.10. A comparable brand of the Costa Rican copycat, which I have to admit is delicious and much better, is about $2. Editing note: When I dictated this, instead of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese it came up with crapped macaroni and cheese which I thought was quite appropriate.

That's fine if you don't mind eating meatloaf for the next month.

That's what I used to do until bacon went to $15 a pound here.

Excellent advice so far. For tasting for seasoning I put a tablespoon pressed flat into the microwave for 18 seconds. If you don't have a microwave just use a small skillet. I use my KA to mix up the meatloaf now. For years I did it by hand but it got to be kind of hard for me and to tell the truth, I like it much better made this way.

I haven't had any experience in cooking octopus myself but I always heard that the rule for cooking it was 2 minutes or 2 hours. If you cooked it over 2 minutes it took 2 hours to get it tender again.

Well, here's my report on my shopping today. A little over 500 Colones equals $1 so this is about $10. It has .950 liters. This is the 'half gallon' of milk that I buy. It used to be 2 L but now it is only 1.8 and the price has gone up. I can get about 2 liters of yogurt from this and my favorite yogurt that I used to buy, is now 2600 colones a liter or about $5.

I'm also rather baffled by your intention to can already canned tomatoes. Canning is such a PITA and unless you've been doing things like this, the danger of botulism is high with tomato products. If freezer space is a problem, freeze them in Ziploc bags. I make a big batch of sauce and put it in quart size freezer bags. Freeze them flat on a tray and then just stack them in the freezer. It takes up a lot less room than jars do.

That's about the same as it is here in Costa Rica. I don't remember what the price was the last time I checked I just remember I thought gasp, shutter, I don't think so. Going shopping tomorrow so I will check for sure. As for Tang, it is Alive and Well down here in Central America. I can get it in about 10 flavors and it costs about 40 cents a package.

Have you tried it? @Smithy damn me if you like, but I always keep a big supply of these I'm sure you can find something comparable up there if you can't find Tang. I use them to flavor my yogurt and make a yogurt drink. My favorites are Fresa (strawberry) and Maracuya (passion fruit). They're great to have for a quick drink with dinner or for flavorings in desserts. A couple teaspoons of the maracuya make a super cornstarch pudding.