jimb0

sorry, it was just some stuff i came across while searching for ideas about this; i didn’t keep any references at hand, though you’re right, i should have. i thought of m&ms, too, but i suspect they get some kind of spray coating and drying that isn’t as feasible at home? or is it just coarse coating and a bunch of industrial panners? i don’t actually know, though. most of you guys are way more experienced than i am with respect to chocolates, i just don’t think it’s completely impossible. admittedly though i assume you’d have to let the sugar cool more than it would if it were sugar bubbling away in his video. i would guess the biggest issue is just preventing the two from completely mixing; i don’t think the chocolate would need to remain tempered so it’d be fine to melt it if you can let it cool and resolidify later.

to be clear i still think you can do a candy-coated chocolate dish at home like this. and without "circumventing the laws of thermodynamics." there are certainly references to dipping chocolates in sugar on the internet. however, i've been pouring over his fruits book, from which the dill apple recipe posted earlier is found. nowhere in the recipe itself does it mention anything about the exterior clear glaze; it finishes it with a dip into a glaçage that has stuff like sweetened condensed milk and white chocolate in it; imo pretty clearly it's the second light green layer just under the surface. with that said, i did find a potential clue in an illustration he'd left behind. note that he explicitly points to a "glaçage kappa" (kappa frosting) in the drawing. this reference to kappa isn't found anywhere in the recipe or in the back of the book which covers directions for making the base coatings for some of these dishes. i haven't used kappa carrageenan much, but it's my understanding that it's one of the more brittle gel formers. i went back and looked at the tatin video more closely and this time i noticed that his chocolate stem is pressed into the top. it's possible that this is a hard shell and there's been a hole poked into the top; we can't see the surface into which the chocolate stick is pressed. but chances are good that it just pokes through because this is a carrageenan glaze. probably sweetened and/or flavoured, and there's probably some addition of a calcium salt or maybe he just has really hard water.

🙄 oh come on. i think you guys are overestimating how quickly a ball of chocolate that's been in the freezer for hours is going to melt, to be frank. my guess is that if this uses the hot sugar dip, some of it very quickly hardens on contact. it's not a sustained exposure. i don't know what else it could be unless he's doing something like glazing it with a transparent glaze and pouring ln2 over it.

i don't know why but for some reason this whole past year the 473mL containers of heavy cream have been cheaper per millilitre than the 1L cartons so i've been buying them by the cartload.

i made a curried turkey pie for lunch yesterday with some rando bowl of curry sauce i found in the fridge from last month. made it into a gravy with some flour and turkey stock, and chopped up the last of the turkey legs from christmas (incidentally this turkey was so good i've ordered two more from the farm and plan on keeping them in the freezer for a while). i was in the mood to make a pastry since i've had a bowl of grated butter sitting in the freezer for a month, now, and i wanted the bowl back. quick 3-2-1 dough, folded a few times, rolled out a turned into a free-form tart on a sheet. such a great way to use up leftovers. of course? there are a few threads on this that might be of interest:

i’ve read through this recipe several times now, and i think they’ve used a different picture. the picture on that page clearly shows a hard, transparent coating (there’s a shard visible on the lower left), so it’s not a mirror glaze. in the finishing steps, though, the recipe only references the white chocolate coating. i even snagged a copy of the cookbook to look it up and the recipe and picture are the same, so i’m calling foul. i will note, however, that even in this recipe the core is basically frozen solid before being dipped in the chocolate coating (which is 1:1 white chocolate and pure cocoa butter, with colourings and vanilla powder, so it could get very hard indeed) so i think both actually do use a hot syrup / caramel of some kind, issues with temperature stability and production aside.

thanks friend. i would have liked them to be a little smoother, but the dough was a bit sticky.

i ordered some local “cooking pears” from the local organic delivery service and hey were definitely too ugly to do much else with, haha. chopped up peel and all into the vitamix, a bit too much sugar, and cooked until soft a brown. i stirred in a knob of butter just to make it a little creamy. i was going to stir in some spices but the pear flavour was honestly too nice to dilute.

made some softball-sized dinner rolls for the so for supper tonight. these suckers are like pillows. eaten with butter and a pear reduction (and a broccoli stem soup).

it's a friend's birthday today, and they're alone in lockdown so i dropped off a box of sweets: salted caramels, bourbon balls, and a butter cake (filled with a 1.5:1 chocolate butter ganache, frosted with salted coffee buttercream, coated with a white chocolate milk crumb).

i find it works well with high fat sauces like doing mac and cheese. lately i've been using pennes.

i don't think it's a stupid idea. like any technique, it's a tool and has its place; that doesn't mean it should be used in every situation. there's any number of reasons why it might be interesting to try even outside of doing commercial foodservice prep. traditionally cooked pasta wastes a huge amount of water and dumps a ton of heat into the kitchen. i've done the presoak for summer pasta dishes before when i didn't want to put a lot of heat in the kitchen and make the a/c work overtime. tangentially related i've lately been cooking pasta in just enough water that i don't need to drain it (i err on the side of too little and add more as it cooks if necessary) and i really like the result.

i believe alex and aki, the ideas in food people, have discussed this. i find it hit and miss, and there's definitely still timing involved as you can soak them for too long even when cold. it can definitely work, though.

i've been buying 'Silken' apples from a local farm for a few months, now. i mostly buy them as parrot treats, but they're quite nice. i don't see them being sold as a large commercial cultivar as they seem to bruise and brown easily, but they have a really intense aroma, almost like honey. i feel like the texture is similar to a honeycrisp, so some may or may not enjoy, and i dunno how well they'd stand up to a lot of cooking, but with thin slicing and a delicate handling they made a nice bowl of fried apples.

not to mention that if you're taking a pan camping, a large skillet is going to be something of a pain. i have a tiny one, probably six inches? that i use for frying 1 - 2 eggs. works a treat (i should mention i don't take it camping, though).

i don't care for the "i've never washed and i haven't gotten sick" arguments, as you hear the same thing about leaving the turkey on the back porch to thaw. with that said it's unlikely that a truly contaminated batch of greens is going to be sanitized in a fashion that neither leaves residue nor materially affects the product. if you are feeding immunocompromised sorts, simply blanch them to pasteurize. if not, a good wash with plain water will be sufficient. i do have a bottle of the fruit and veg wash which is basically just a light, neutral soap; it only gets used to remove waxes from something where the peel might get eaten.

really giving second, third, and fourth thoughts to the APO. we have/had an electrolux convection microwave oven (extremely not recommended) and it's been slowly giving us electrical issues, and yesterday the door handle literally snapped off in two places when i opened it. i have a pair of vicegrips attached to the broken plastic mount for the moment.

i've not used one of these but presumably the slower it works the less risk of heat and oxidation to affect the flavour. to that end i wonder if anyone has come up with a vacuum juicer before edit: presumably they can (but not necessarily are) quieter.

yeah, that pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter.

I think that’s a reasonably impressive stat, though Anova’s I believe goes up to 60L. Both are more than enough, really. I read in the manual that it’ll take timers of up to 99 hours, so that’s my stab at a maximum run time (can it overheat pushing 90C for that long, though, idk). I’m sure this will be targeted at mostly restaurant / commercial lines with the polyscience branding - I’m aware that there are a few here who buy the stuff, but I’d wager they are more exception than rule. Don’t get me wrong, I’d probably buy one if I were wealthy, haha. (I did manage to snag a return anova pro recently for $40, though, so maybe I should shut up). One cool feature related to the haccp app is the ability to log, save, and email all your cook times, either to yourself or your food inspector.

I didn't read all of the post but I would point out that the biggest determinant to egg flavour is what the chickens themselves eat (ah i see nyleve pointed this out just above!). It sort of doesn't matter what kind they are. High fat diets can create some insane eggs. I listened to an interview with one dude who started letting his chickens gorge themselves (not forced at all, they'll be happy to eat) and he said that the eggs had giant, rich yolks. of course a downside was that the chickens were slightly more prone to cardiac arrest when a plane flew over, or something. but i mean. gotta break some eggs, right?

PolyScience has been doing some instagram teases. At first I thought this might just be the first time this is coming to this part of the world, but it seems to be a whole new product. Immersion circulator with networking, touchscreen, and probe. But they're being sly and using the product name in the hashtags if people pay attention. The design reminds me a lot of the Anova premium model. The probe is interesting, though, and they'll sell little sticker blocks you attach to the outside of your bags, then drive the probe through to maintain integrity. i also like that it looks like you can use it in a shallow pan. they show it off being used with some ramekins, or a probe driven through a terrine lid , with the bath coming up to the lip. kind of a fun idea, though i doubt i'll be able to afford this guy for home use. there are a bunch of press photos on their flickr account here the instruction manual is up on the fcc i wonder if they were planning on launching this much earlier this year and got delayed because of the pandemic...it looks like their HACCP iOS app was uploaded in december of last year and updated with explicit references to this product all the way back in may

thanks, man. when i roast poultry i always stick my hands under the skin and loosen it so that it's really only attached at the edges, then i shove butter underneath and rub it around. this works best if the bird isn't too just-out-of-the-fridge-cold. i don't remember what was in this, but i was regrettably out of sage so probably just some oregano, salt, maybe garlic. then just brush a little rice bran oil (any oil is fine, this is just my standard cooking oil) on top and roast 'er up. i salted before the oven but peppered after since i figured the pepper might get burnt.

perfection. this year i was lazy and only made eight rolls out of a normal batch of dough for first thanksgiving. i think i'll just do it this way from now on; anyone who eats one dinner roll is probably going to eat two, anyway :V

i didn't get a chance to post first thanksgiving: it's tempting to have second thanksgiving with at least one other couple, but i'm not sure we'll end up doing it. edit: incidentally, as always, spatchcocked that bad boy. cooked in less than an hour. heritage bird from local place.