Tropicalsenior

Then I love this company. In this day and age we need a good laugh. I see that it's an American company so it's not a bad Chinese translation.

If she got the recipe verbally from a friend I would go for Chives.

This can't possibly be for real.

As I took my casserole out of the oven last night I had to laugh at myself and think that I'm a poor one to give advice on oven protection. I just had to take a picture of my HotPads, as we always called them. I have no idea how old they are and they have sure been through the wringer. Yes, they are clean. They have even been bleached but they are just so old and stained that they can't help it. Twice I have gotten brand new pads and thrown these away. Both times I've used the new pads for a couple days and retrieved the old ones. I have five or six really pretty ones that would do the job but they're just too pretty and I save them to use as trivets on my glass top table. They say that old friends are the best. I guess that applies to HotPads, too.

Not very fancy but I just had a craving for tuna casserole. For those of you who have been following this topic no, I did not use this recipe. It might have given me the idea, though.

Remember how good the Pillsbury cook-off books were when they first started making them? Almost everything was made from scratch and from things that you probably had in your pantry and then they went nuts. They were nothing but exotic ingredients and 'start with this mix'. I guess I was living with hope but I just went on buying them.

This was so prevalent in all the cookbooks. Another thing that was popular was the canned Chow Mein noodles. Anything that they could top it with or stick it in was Oriental. Their idea of Mexican was also a little off. If they could put chili powder, cheddar cheese, or beans in it it was Mexican.

I know, I feel the pain, too. While I was searching to see if anyone had covered this topic I ran a cross it and read it end-to-end. He was truly a treasure. He was talking about the pamphlets that were put out by companies and some of them were hilarious and some of them were awfully good. I was a sucker for those and I was always lucky if I could find one recipe that I could use. But I still bought the next one. when it came out. They always put them at the head of the checkout stand were you could read them during the hours that you stood waiting to get out of the place. They were a real gotcha.

You are so right. I have 2 quart size, 2 two cupper's and 2 1 cupper's. I have a big complaint with a few of them. Some of mine are over 20 years old and the measurements are painted on the side. Those I can read just fine. Some of the newer ones have raised glass measurement indicators. When your eyes get older you don't see so well and sometimes these are almost impossible to read. As for grabbing things out of the oven, some of the Pans have edges that are hard to grip with an oven mitt. For that I use this. I have two of these and I gifted one to a friend of mine that has the same problem. I bought them in my favorite little Chinese restaurant supply store and they were labeled just Microwave Grabbers. They work great for pulling things out of the instant pot, microwave, or the oven.

I think I'll pass on the oven mitt soup.

Two beautiful books that I go to quite often are Steamboat Entertains by the Colorado Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club and Back Home Again by the Junior League of Indianapolis. They are both beautifully done and contain a lot of recipes from local restaurants.

How right you are. I found out that when I transitioned from the professional kitchen to my own I did change to pot holders. I just make sure that they are thick and well-insulated. That was for two reasons. One, as I worked less and less in the kitchen my hands were no longer heat-proof. At one time I could turn a steak with my hands. No more! Two, using an unlimited amount of side towels is great when somebody else is doing the laundry but when you have to do it, sometimes you think twice about it.

I know that this is an old one that has been around for a long time but I found it in an old church cookbook that was raising money for their missionary fund. Elephant Stew 1 elephant salt and pepper to taste 2 rabbits (optional) brown gravy Cut elephant into bite-sized pieces. This should take about two months. Add enough brown gravy to cover. Cook over a kerosene fire at 465 degrees for about 4 weeks. This will serve about 3,800 people. If more are expected, two rabbits may be added, but do this only if necessary as most people do not like to find hare in their stew.

That seems to be an issue and so many of them and I think, yes, they just didn't want or didn't dare to offend other members. And some of the recipes were so bad that they had to have known that no one would cook them. They weren't just a product of the South. They were a nationwide craze. At one time I had cookbooks from all over the United States and some from Canada. Some were very well written and some were an absolute hoot. They showed so much about the organizations and the areas that they came from. I had one from a Country Club group in Seattle that was all caviar and lobsters. I had one from a small group in Missouri that was all Campbell's and Jell-O. They are truly a history of the people and the food of that time.

One of the instances of regional cookbooks was book called The Encyclopedia of Chinese Cooking. It was written by a Chinese chef and had a wealth of information. It had to have taken him years to write it. But the recipes were written in a format it was practically impossible, definitely frustrating for any Westerner to follow, especially home Cooks of the sixties when this book was written. How much more knowledge we could have had in those times about other cultures had they been better written, edited, or translated. I remember some years ago when I got my first Mexican cookbook that was actually written by a Mexican. A friend of mine from California was reading it and she was absolutely aghast at this Mexican's idea of what Mexican food was.

Good point but not everyone here is a professional. First point, over time in a professional kitchen we all seemed to develop what they call 'asbestos hands'. We can stand a lot more heat than most people. Point 2, because we can't stop for minor burns, we become more tolerant of the pain. The article that Heidi mentions actually does talk about side towels, pros and cons. "While people often ask what kind of oven mitts professionals use, chefs, line cooks, and bakers actually reach for side towels 99% of the time. These inexpensive cotton cloths can be used in large quantities and tossed in the laundry for quick cleaning. They serve as oven mitts, pot holders, and trivets and can be used to wipe up messes or wipe down stations at the end of a shift. But, for all of their versatility, they do the bare minimum to prevent burns (have you seen a line cook’s arms?) and will lose their heat resistance if even slightly damp. They can also catch fire quickly if left too close to a heat source".

Great article! They did bring out one point that I think is so crucial for you. "A good mitt should also be flexible enough to allow you to move your hands around, and grip onto a pair of tongs or a whisk with the same dexterity you have when handling a tall-sided baking dish or a sheet tray."

Since this is the subject near and dear to my heart, I decided that if I wanted to pursue this I had better start another topic before we got kicked from this one

To start with I want to give you one of my favorites. In an old church cookbook I found this recipe. The author was obviously a woman of few words. My Tuna Casserole Ingredients One can of tuna One can of mushroom soup Noodles Preparation Cook noodles, open cans of tuna and soup, mix with the noodles, bake and serve. I always thought that she must have been the president of the club or that she knew where all the bodies were buried.

In a discussion of Recipe Bloopers @liuzhou and I veered off into the subject of how much culture plays a part in the way recipes are written and how differently recipes used to be written in our own countries and it brought this topic to mind. You've all seen them and probably owned a few of them. Love them or hate them, they are a big part of our food history. A lot of the regional cook books are written by immigrants to their new lands that want to share their food Heritage with others. Sometimes they are so badly written or translated that they are practically useless. The second group is the fundraising community or Church Cookbooks as they were called. Recipes that were contributed by the members; some of them could probably never boil water but just had to get their two cents worth in. Some of them contained real jewels, recipes that you had eaten in the past and never thought that you would see again. What are your thoughts on these cookbooks and what particular memories, recipes, or laughs come to mind?

The culprit for me is usually eGullet. I can get so deep in a rabbit hole that I don't even know what day it is.

The trick is to get one with a buzzer that is loud enough to hear and annoying enough that you just have to shut it off. On my phone, I downloaded a sound that is so loud and so screeching that I can't ignore it. I also use it as an alarm in the morning. I get up in self-defense. I never hit the snooze button because one shock like that in the morning is enough.

Thank you. Rock sugar didn't even enter my mind. Neither of us has said that the cookbook was bad, just poorly formatted. As she said, all the ingredients were listed using letters and the ingredients were added according to letter not name. You had to keep referring back to the ingredient list to see what you were going to add next. Some of the recipes had up to 20 ingredients and you felt that you were going blind by the time that you added them all. The only way that I could use it was to copy out the recipe using the standard format. It was a shame because it was a very informative book. It definitely wasn't a book for a novice cook or one with little patience. Unfortunately the latter category describes me to a T.

I see quite a bit of char siu on your plates. Do you have a good source to buy it or do you make your own?

I hear you! From where I'm sitting right now I can see three timers that I use all the time plus I use the timer on my telephone. Oh, and I have an app that has multiple timers. I sure hate it though when the timer goes off and I can't remember what I set it for.