slkinsey
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Posts posted by slkinsey
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Interesting that it's all kind of "sealed up" in a hermetic pasta chamber. This will presumably not allow for any escaping steam unless you cut vent holes in the top layer. Is this according to the recipe? Or do you normally do it this way? Also, is it supposed to be nude pasta on the top? I've always finished with a layer of ragu and grated parmigiano. Seems like naked pasta on top could dry out, get hard/crispy and interfere with slicing.
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Chris, when making baked lasagne dishes, I have always found it the most convenient to make the pasta as I was going along: First I'd portion the dough and kind-of "pre-roll" each portion, meaning that I'd do the whole folding and re-rolling thing until I got something I thought was ready for thinning, then I'd set that aside and do the next portion, and so on. After that, I'd just get my mise all set up with the baking dish, the ingredients and a sheet pan lined with tea towels all near a big pot of boiling water and a big bowl of ice water. Then it's simple to roll out one portion of pasta to the desired thickness, blanch in the boiling water, shock in the ice water, fish it out and put it on the tea towels to blot, cut it to size, put it in the baking dish, top with ingredients, now back to thinning the second portion of pasta. And so on. This can also be helpful if, after doing the process with one portion of pasta, you decide that you rolled it too thin or too thick -- because you can adjust the machine for the next portion.
This eliminates the hassle of having to find someplace to hand a zillion sheets of lasagna, and I anyway don't think fresh pasta particularly benefits from drying anyway.
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I don't think it's a byproduct, but I also (after reading some more) found out it's not any more expensive to produce. There just appears to be a lot less of it produced.
I think it may be a "time of the year" thing rather than a "production method" thing.
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Aren't those onions more or less an onion soubise now?
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Ever wonder how restaurants get pureed soups so silken and smooth? It's because they're using a high powered pro blender.
Of course they're probably also running it through some sort of sieve/strainer or maybe even a giant food mill.
We never bother. A high powered blender is more than sufficient assuming everything is cooked properly.
Exactly. I only bother running VitaPrepped purees through a fine sieve if I'm trying to do something like making a very thick puree of a green herb (meaning that I can't have very much liquid in the blender and I also can't run it for a very long time or I'll cook the green out). But for a soup? No need. I forget who I was discussing this with recently (johnder maybe?), but we remarked that there was an obvious positive difference in the quality of these purees immediately upon purchase of the high-power blender and changing nothing else.
Yes: if you find yourself making purees with any frequency, you might actually be able to completely justify the upfront cost of the [high powered] blender in the reduced time you spend in front of the chinois.I also find that it's a great way to extract extra flavors. For example, say you bought some nice shrimps and you want to make a shrimp sauce out of the shells. You can simmer some aromatics with the shells in white wine or whatever. But if you really want to get a ton of flavor out of those shells, put them into the VitaPrep and liquify the shrimp shells into the water. Then simmer this liquid with your aromatics and pour it through a strainer when you're finished.
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This is just an extremely expensive mokka. Any contraption that purports to make "espresso" needs to have a pressure pump, either mechanical or manual. You can't make espresso using naturally-produced steam to provide all the pressure. First of all, the temperature will be to hot when it starts, and second the pressure will not be consistent through the extraction. The Otto has some superficial features of an espresso machine, but it's still a mokka.
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I looked at the prices of Blendtec's seriously for the first time last month (after an attempted chicken liver mousse turned over-wet because the only way I could get my blender through it was by adding more cream). 350 bucks ?! Do you feel yours has been worth what you paid for it ?
That's a tough question: there is no doubt that the Vitaprep/Vitamix and the Blendtec are amazing blenders, basically in a category of their own. But you have to do a LOT of blending to get your money's worth. It hasn't been obvious this week, but I eat a lot of smoothies for lunch, so it's nice for that. It makes a fabulous mole, and a perfectly smooth hummus. Etc. But it is just a blender, after all. So "worth" definitely comes down to "do you cook things that need ridiculous amounts of blending power?" You may find that once you buy one your diet changes! But "worth" is a pretty personal appraisal. If you are trying to decide between a blender and snow cone maker, I say get the blender. If you are trying to decide between a blender and a sous vide rig? Get the sous vide rig.
I would say, however, that there are certain things you can really only do with a high powered pro blender. So eve if you want to do those things only occasionally, you may want one. And this can come even in fairly mundane form. Ever wonder how restaurants get pureed soups so silken and smooth? It's because they're using a high powered pro blender.
But, I suppose it actually makes sense to call the Italian-American version "lasagna" and the Italian version "lasagne al forno" as a way of distinguishing between the two.But in Italy, 'lasagne al forno' is a pretty generic name, connected with no one, specific recipe; it's more usual for the dish to have a specific name.
Right. I was sort-of just speculating as to why it might make some sense to distinguish this way. But maybe it doesn't. The Italian-American version (tomato sauce, ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese,dry pasta) is fairly distinct from most Italian iterations (my favorite of which is vincigrassi
).'Lasagne' sounds like 'lasagna', except it's got an 'eh' at the end, instead of an 'ah' (because it's plural: 'lasagne' are the pasta strips themselves; if you fixed yourself just one strip with sauce and so on, it truly would be a 'lasagna'). But now that I think about it, in the US 'lasagna' often gets a schwa sound at the end, which could be interpreted either way.I wonder if it came to be known here as "lasagna," in its singular form, because that's what it said on the boxes sold in the US? Generally speaking, Americans don't know that the commonly spoken form of most pasta names is the plural (spaghetti = plural of spaghetto and so on). Americans would call a spaghetto a single "piece of spaghetti" or a single "spaghetti noodle."
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Huh. I just call it that (whether I'm making the Emilia-Romagna version or the Italian-American version) because that's what it is. For the same reason I don't call a single sandwich a "panini."
But, I suppose it actually makes sense to call the Italian-American version "lasagna" and the Italian version "lasagne al forno" as a way of distinguishing between the two.
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I'm amused by the title "lasagne al forno", even tho I want to try the recipe.
What's amusing about the title? This is actual Italian name for the baked, layered dish typically called "lasagna" in the United States (meaning "lasagna noodles [cooked] in the oven").
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So the main thing you prefer electric smoothtop is because it's easy to clean? I'm not saying that's not a legitimate reason to prefer electric smoothtop over gas. For me, what I don't like about them is that the cookware has to be perfectly flat or the heat conduction is wonky. I have any number of pans that have curves or raised rims or other quirks that would make them less suitable for a smoothtop. And I've never found (although I imagine they exist) smoothtops that can get a thick pan as screamingly hot as I can over gas. Of course, I don't have the luxury of a high power wok burner (or a backyard to fire one up in, for that matter). And I don't find cleanup of a gas range all that burdensome.
But that's why they make more than one kind: You don't mind having to play "burner hopscotch" in order to quickly regulate heat, I don't mind the way a gas stove cleans up. We both do mind the other thing.
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My problem with doing beans in the PC is that the timing is critical. Too short and they're raw, too long and you have bean mush
One way to avoid this is to hydrate the beans in salted water (let's say a 5% brine). Then change the water and cook on high pressure for 20 minutes. Pretreating with salt results in a firmer, "fudgey" interior texture rather than a looser, creamy interior texture. But this is a texture I prefer for many preparations. More to the point, it solves the problems of splitting skins and bean mush from slight overcooking. And the beans are salted throughout.
In particular - Nathan said you can get the same results [as you would get using a nonventing pressure cooker] by just moderating the heat enough [on a venting pressure cooker] such that you don't get venting (which isn't that hard in practice).This is what I do. I have a gigantic WAFCO pressure canner I use to make stock. I just balance three quarters on top of the jiggle weight set to 15 PSI and then the gauge reaches 15, I moderate the heat to keep it right around 15. No venting.
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You're supposed to clean the grill side, Mitch.
Personally, I think grill pans are a waste. Unless you have some serious need to have faux grill marks on your food.
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I made a very tasty chili con carne recently using a mixture of sous vide and other techniques, as summed up below:
As chance would have it, I'm making chili as well. Here's my recipe:
5 pounds beef shank, coarse ground on my home grinder
2.5 cups ancho chili paste
2.5 cups pasilla chili paste
2 tbsp sweet Spanish paprika
2 Spanish onions
3 pounds cherry tomatoes
2 tbsps whole cumin
1 tbsp Mexican oregano
3 whole star anise
- Tomatoes were pressure cooked at 15 PSI for 20 minutes. The exuded liquid was reduced to a glaze, the tomatoes scraped through a fine sieve, then both parts combined
- Onions were diced fine, then browned to very dark over high heat in copious bacon fat with the star anise
- Cumin was dry-roasted in pan until fragrant, then ground to powder in spice grinder
- Tomato, chili paste, spices and onions (minus star anise) were combined, brought to brief simmer, and cooled
- Cooled chili base was combined with the ground meat, and the whole works was vacuum bagged and cooked 48 hours at 62C (in process)
Once cooked, I will freeze it and reheat on super bowl sunday, adjusting seasonings as necessary, add a pound or two of pork butt that I've cut into 1-inch cubes, browned extra-dark, pressure cooked for 20 minutes and coarsely shredded, and stir in some red bell peppers that I've roasted and pureed. I will offer a spicy chili butter along with creme fraiche, etc. so that that people can adjust the heat up or down to their preferred level.
As you can see, my recipe is predicated on the idea that chili con carne is really mostly about the chili component. I like to use about a cup of chili paste per pound of meat. I'm using beef shank and sous vide so that I can get all the meaty gelatin without the dry, grainy texture that often comes from simmered long-cooked ground meat.
I would call this a qualified success. Next time around, I'll go all-cubes with the meat and cook everything together sous vide. The ground beef shank didn't have quite as much texture as I would have liked. A good way to get plenty of Maillard flavors without overcooking the meat is to very aggressively brown the exterior of large pieces, and then cut those large pieces down to the actual size you would like to have. All that said, I also can't help wondering whether it might work just as well or better to do the whole thing in the pressure cooker.
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NYC is a pretty big place. What neighborhoods are you looking at?
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Michaela, I think this is because richer-flavored foods are almost always higher in fat. Indeed, for most people, "rich" is just a convenient way to say "lots of fat."
What are some examples of rich-tasting foods that have a more-filling-than-expected effect that are not also high in fat?
First thing that springs to mind is peposo. Just a cheap cut of beef, tomatoes, garlic, a little wine, and lots of pepper, braised for a couple of hours, then reduced. Since traditionally, the meat isn't even browned, there's very little fat. Yet, the flavour is so intense, it's borders on the uncomfortable to eat without an accompaniment (potatoes are traditional, but I have problems with them, so I often go with a red lentil puree). I'm sure it's possible to gorge yourself on this, but no one I know seems to do this.
I'd put dried fruit and bresaola in this category, too.
Let's look at what you're talking about, though...
Leaving aside the fact that many cheap cuts are actually quite high in fat, you're not exactly saying that peposo makes you full so much as you're saying that the intensity of flavor makes it difficult for you to eat all that much of it. Considering that you're eating it with an accompanying starch, the guess is that you don't necessarily eat a notably smaller quantity of food when you're having this dish.
Dried fruit, of course, is actually quite filling. This is because it's full of fiber, and when it rehydrates in your stomach it fills it up. Think about eating 4 dried apricots. It doesn't seem like that much food, but it's just 4 apricots with the water removed. So if the 4 fresh ones would fill you up, it makes sense that the 4 dried ones will too.
Bresaola and other salty, concentrated foods like this are again ones where you might feel sated due to the intensity of flavor, saltiness and high caloric load rather than physically "full." In the case of bresaola, although its richness may not come from fat, it is still very highly concentrated calories.
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Michaela, I think this is because richer-flavored foods are almost always higher in fat. Indeed, for most people, "rich" is just a convenient way to say "lots of fat."
What are some examples of rich-tasting foods that have a more-filling-than-expected effect that are not also high in fat?
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I think there may be a confusion between richer flavors, as one would get from deeply browned meats, and richer food, as one would get from a high fat content.
When it comes to richer or more intense flavors, I don't see that they would make you feel full faster. As for richer food, it absolutely does make you feel full faster because you're eating a lot of calories. It's worthy of note that your example of Indian food is not only highly flavored, but in restaurants especially the sauces are very high in fat.
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“We offer classic drinks like martinis, margaritas and negronis, that are familiar to customers, but give them our own twist by making them with bourbon because it’s an indigenous American spirit, that’s very popular in the South.”
Sorry - it ain't a classic if it's made that way. Just sayin'.
I don't disagree with your fundamental point, just like I abhor the practice of calling something a "Bourbon Sidecar." But I don't think that's quite what they're saying. It seems like they're saying that they riff on the classics by making them with bourbon, and they're indicating that they're riffs by calling it a "Kentucky Margarita" or a "Bourbon Dark & Stormy." It's not like they're making the drink with Jim Beam Black Cherry Bourbon and just calling it a "Margarita." And I don't get the impression they're saying that the Kentucky Margarita is a classic.
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Outgassing? Of what? It's an element.
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I'm not sure what you were expecting, but the Chinatown fishmongers in NYC have always been poor quality. Generally-speaking they cater to a low-income community of people who eat a lot of fish, so they are offering second-quality stuff at low prices. Check out a meat market catering to low income populations that eat a lot of meat and you'll see similar things.
I've lived in NYC for 20 years, and there's never been a time I've seen anything in the Chinatown fish markets I wanted to buy. There are some good fish markets near Chinatown (e.g., the lobster farm), but these aren't what I'd call "Chinatown fish markets." If you want a high-quality Asian-style fish market, you have to go somewhere with a sufficiently large population of affluent Asians.
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I think it depends, Chris. There's more than one kind of hash, in my opinion. There are hashes that are made with big pieces, and those made with small pieces. Some are dry and held together only loosely, and some are moist and bound. And a range of in-between those four poles.
Here's something I posted in a thread on crisping hash some years ago that may be relevant:
I think it depends on what kind of hash you're going for. Not all hash is supposed to be crispy. I call that a "dry hash" -- which says something not only about the final texture but also the way it's made.
Anyway, in my experience, the variables that need to be controlled in order to make a crispy hash are: high heat, don't crowd the pan, use a low-sided frypan so water has a chance to quickly evaporate (this is why it's easiest top do on a big commercial griddle), don't agitate the ingredients until they have had a chance to crisp, use a floury potato as opposed to a waxy potato, keep everything as dry as possible, cook the potatoes all alone until they're 3/4 of where you want them to end up. Do these things, and you should be able to get it crispy. Here is a dry crispy turkey hash in process:
If you want it to hold together in one mass, you could then pour all of that into a small skillet with some additional fat, crenk up the heat, toss in a little water to get the potato pieces to stick together, and cook it dry.
Personally, I've come to prefer the non-crispy kind of hash that is bound with a little cream (in this case, cream on the left and leftover creamed spinach on the right),
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On a related note, I've been informed that part of the problem is that lignin - unlike collagen - doesn't dissolve when you cook it. I'm not very good at telling the difference, though. How do I find an SV-appropriate piece of meat?
I'm not quite sure what this means. Lignin is present in plant matter, not in meat as far as I know.
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I think you have the right idea. Cook through SV, then chill, de-bag and let the chicken skin dry out, then deep fry at very high temperature (no coating).
What spices, seeds, and nuts have you pressure cooked?
in Cooking
Posted · Edited by slkinsey (log)
Not really, though. What you seem to have achieved is 5 minute steamed garlic that is softened but barely caramelized, not 5 minute fully caramelized garlic confit. A completely different product that doesn't have much in common with the original. I would think that before claiming to have reengineered a process to produce an equivalent result in 4% of the time, you would make the original recipe to understand what the result should be.
The point of the MC technique also has to do with the interaction of the oil and garlic, and the fact that you can infuse other flavors (herb, etc.) into the garlic and the oil. Certainly one could roast 35 cloves of garlic in the oven for an hour or so, and you would get a fair amount of caramelization. But it wouldn't be as even, and there would be moisture loss, etc.
I don't think canning garlic in oil for storage would be a good idea. This is not recommended in the USDA canning guide, and I believe there have even been questions of safety related to commercial products. One reason jarred chopped garlic doesn't taste quite right is because acid is added to bring the pH to safe levels for canning.