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browniebaker

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  1. I tried this method for dinner last night with a three-pound, unbrined, grocery-store-brand chicken, and the chicken was delicious. The skin was well browned and slightly crispy, while the breast meat was very juicy and tender. The inside of the oven was a bit oily from greasy spatters, but definitely the slight mess is worth it, for the time saved and the delicious results. This "recipe" is a keeper.
  2. Like you, I feel a meal is not a meal without the closure of dessert. Perhaps the new discipline is not so much cleaning one's plate as of old, but holding back during the main course so as to have have room for dessert. At a restaurant, that means sending the plate back half-eaten or asking for a doggie bag. At a restaurant where all the desserts look too banal to be appealing, I will actually go home and bake a proper dessert that same night. But, from informal discussions with friends and with other eGulleters, I do feel in the minority in my dedication to dessert.
  3. browniebaker

    Dinner! 2003

    Fourteen months? Wow! I'd be going wacko, too.
  4. browniebaker

    Dinner! 2003

    Last night was Indian night at our house, except for the easy dessert of store-bought ice cream: samosas - filled with peas, potatoes, and onions Kerala chicken stew cucumber raita spicy fried cauliflower rice dessert - strawberry ice cream, butter-pecan ice cream
  5. heaping bowl of butter-pecan ice cream Plugra butter on slab of warm bread
  6. Walker's Shortbread (second only to homemade, heavenly with a cup of warm Horlick's malted milk) Pepperidge Farms Orange Milano Girl Scout Thin Mints Petit Beurre Biscuits
  7. A real timesaver was figuring out one core formula for all the quickbreads that I bake a lot, including pancakes, waffles, biscuits, cornbread, muffins, quickbread loaves, and snacking cakes. The core formula that works for everything is, 2 cups flour 2 teaspoons baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt The variables depend on which quickbread I am making: eggs (1 or 2) liquid, such as milk, yogurt, or fruit juice (from 1/2 cup to 2-1/2 cups) oil or shortening (from 2 to 8 tablespoons) sweetener, such as white sugar, brown sugar, or honey (from 0 to 3/4 cups) substitution of cornmeal for all or part of the flour in core formula fruits, nuts, cheese, meat, flavorings, etc. When you bake as often as I do, this core formula lets you avoid having to consult a recipe every time. For example, rolled biscuits require the following variables in addition to the core ingredients: 7/8 cup buttermilk, 1/4 cup lard, and 2 tablespoons sugar. The recipes are all stored in my head!
  8. What was your family food culture when you were growing up? Upper-middle-class, Chinese-American. As part of the "brain drain" out of Taiwan, father and mother immigrated to the U.S. with my brothers and me in 1967 when I was two. When I was three, we settled in Nashville for good, where the dominant food culture was Southern. But father and mother never really took to American food, much preferring their native Chinese food. Was meal time important? Dinner was important. Mother cooked Chinese meals almost exclusively, at least when father was home, so we almost always had Chinese food for dinner. As a surgeon, father had long and variable hours at work. No matter what time he was coming home, as long as it was before 10 p.m., we children all had to wait for him so we could sit down together. It was terrible, being hungry and not knowing when we would eat. While waiting, we kids could have a little snack but were not allowed to sate out appetite for fear of ruining our dinner. If father was not coming home, say, for lunch on a weekend, we were allowed to have take-out fast-food (Burger King, Whattaburger, Captain D's, or KFC) or were left to fend for ourselves by scavenging in the pantry or fridge. Breakfasts were always "American" for the kids, such as scrambled eggs and toast, or cold cereal with milk, even though my father and mother would have their Chinese rice porridge and savory side dishes. Was cooking important? For mother, cooking was a wife's obligation, which she discharged only if she had to . She cooked only if father was home for the meal; she could get away with not cooking when it was just us kids and her. Dinner was never fewer than five "dishes": one soup, three platters of meats and/or vegetables, and rice or noodles. Mother was always horrified to hear of other women who cooked only three dishes for dinner. Mother also believed in eating well; she thought nothing of spending money on choice ingredients like jumbo shrimp or crab or fish for every day. One of my friends was amazed at the dinner she had at our house one evening and asked whether we ate like that every night; the truth was, we did. What were the penalties for putting elbows on the table? None. Father and mother did not care, or even know much, about American table manners. I learned American table manners from school, TV, and etiquette books. Who cooked in the family? Mother only. The kids' role was to set the table and to take turns washing dishes. Later, when we kids left for college, father started doing the dishes. He cooked only once, when we kids were little and mother went to New York City for a week while her parents were visiting during a world tour; he still brags about that omelette he made. Years later, when mother went to Taiwan for two weeks to attend a funeral, I, a fifteen-year-old who knew nothing of cooking, cooked horrid meals for father and my brothers. Were restaurant meals common, or for special occassions? We went out often to eat, no special occasion needed; it was a treat for mother, who didn't really like to cook. We had dinner usually at Chinese or Japanese restaurants. If dinner was at an American restaurant, it was at a mainstream chain like Bonanza steakhouse or Red Lobster. (I am sure my parents' negative opinion of the palatability of American food came from being exposed to it only at such chain restaurants.) Until I left home for college in Massachusetts, my only exposure to American food came from the school dining-hall and fast-food or chain restaurants. Did children have a "kiddy table" when guests were over? Yes. As the only daughter, I was the designated babysitter for all the kids. And Chinese people do invite kids over along with adults. We sat at the kitchen table, separate from the adults in the dining room, but we ate the same food as the adults. The children were always served first and settled at the children's table before the adults began to eat. Mother and father never prepared special foods just for children, thank goodness. When did you get that first sip of wine? Not at home. Father was not a drinker, having the Asian intolerance for alcohol. Mother could hold her liquor, but she would drink it alone as a snack at any time of day, a tiny glass of either Jack Daniels or Manishevitz. Manishevitz was father and mother's idea of dinner wine to serve when guests came over; they had no idea about all the different wines out there. The only other alcohol they ever served when guests came over was Pabst Blue Ribbon or Schlitz beer; they didn't know any other beers existed. Was there a pre-meal prayer? No. Taoists don't pray before a meal. On special holidays, or on the anniversary of ancestors' deaths, offerings of food were made at an altar with lit sticks of incense stuck into the foods so that the food would waft up to the heavens along with the smoke. After the offerings, we would take the incense- sticks out of the food and eat the food at the next meal. Was there a rotating menu (e.g., meatloaf every Thursday)? No. Mother cooked whatever she felt like. Often what she cooked was determined by what she had just harvested from her huge backyard Chinese-vegetable garden (which land I always thought would have been better used for a swimming pool). How much of your family culture is being replicated in your present-day family life? Not as much is being replicated as would be if I had married within my culture. Having married an Americanized Korean, and being rather Americanized myself, I find that we don't much celebrate the Chinese holidays, although I feel guilty for not trying harder. We go out to eat for the lunar new year, but that is about it. I do try to cook the Chinese foods of my childhood for two reasons: I miss them sometimes, and I want my children to know and enjoy these foods. Certainly my family eats a broader range of cuisines than my parents did; I cook rice as part of a Chinese meal maybe once every two weeks, if that. But meals at my house are mostly simple and consist of just three dishes, which mother is horrified to hear, since she thinks any less than five dishes constitutes eating like a pauper.
  9. Autumn's definitely the best for food, and I am not saying that just because autumn is coming or because autumn is my favorite season in all other respects. Like other animals, in autumn we start to put on a layer of fat for the winter, no bathing suits to worry about. It starts with Halloween candy, and the eating continues through the Thanksgiving feast to the non-stop eating of the winter holidays. As an amateur baker, I love how the weather cools in autumn and I can once again fire up the stove with the added bonus of heating the house. Come autumn, I simply do more cooking and baking than I have all the hot summer long. Long braising and long roasting are a joy in the cool seasons. Some foods I refuse to cook at other times of the year, just to keep the autumnal favorites true to season in my family's taste-memories: apple pie, pumpkin pie, fruitcake, gingerbread, chestnuts, and butternut squash. I won't even buy apples or pears in spring or summer, even though modern technology makes them available in grocery stores year-round.
  10. chocolate rice krispies treat (made by adding 1/2 cup Dutch-processed cocoa to the recipe on the cereal box), very dark and chocolatey
  11. The potatoes are put in the pot later than the pork and spices.
  12. In my mother's kitchen: Mother's only cutting board is a thick round slab of wood that has cracked in two and been stapled back together, has developed rot and mildew in the crack where food and moisture collect, and smells as delicious as a compost heap. I threw away the cutting board once, but mother dug it out of the trash can outdoors and brought it back to the kitchen. Mother keeps various and sundry plastic lidded containers, from store-bought foods, for use as food-storage. The problem is, the containers are stacked high up in a cabinet but the lids are in drawer on the opposite end of the kitchen and, after you cross the kitchen with the container, it still takes several minutes of trial and error to match a lid to the container. Mother hardly ever washes out her pots and pans. Pots and pans full of grease and food particles are stored in the oven and taken out for cooking the next meal using the same grease. She says you have to wash out a pan only if there is food stuck on, which might burn. It's amazing that no one ever gets food poisoning. Mother keeps uncooked meats on the counter-top for hours before cooking, and she keeps cooked meats out on the table until midnight because she thinks one of my brothers might come over late in the evening and want to eat something. Mother puts MSG in everything, even potato salad, even though my father has hypertension and has to take medication for the condition. Believe me, I've tried talking to her about this. Just so you know what I'm dealing with: She also refuses to wear a seat belt because she read that a seat belt can kill you in case of a crash.
  13. This thread reminded me of a short-lived friendship I had several years ago with a woman who, when I invited her and her toddler over for a playdate for the first time and asked whether there were any foods they could not eat, told me that she and her toddler eat only pizza or turkey sandwiches for lunch, nothing else, and the pizza had to be store-bought, and they would drink only bottled water. I soon found that her severe food restrictions was one manifestation of a very controlling personality that made it very hard to be her friend.
  14. In my kitchen, mom is dangerous. She grabs the knife out of my hands because I'm not cutting eggplant the way she would cut it. In her kitchen, my childhood role is still the role I play as an adult: I help with minor food prep, stand around, and chat and gossip. I don't even try to tell her how to cook. Mom is a good influence on my cooking, in a perverse way. Cooking to her was always a detested chore that she did only if father was going to be home for the meal; the rest of the time we kids were left to scrounge for food from the pantry or refrigerator. And I never want it to be like that for my kids, so I put my all into cooking for them. In that way, mom's an inspiration -- not to be like her.
  15. Ooooh, I love shortbread and shortbread molds! Don't get me started! If your mold is a fired ceramic, it may be made for baking in. Just wash it first with soap and water, as you would any ceramic dish, and let it dry completely before using. But if you don't want to bake in it, you can press your shortbread dough into the oiled and floured mold and turn it out onto a baking sheet. Here's my recipe for shortbread, using my 9" round thistle-design ceramic mold (Baker's Catalog still sells it); it explains what I do when using the mold only to shape the dough, not to bake in: SHORTBREAD 3/4 cup unsalted butter 1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour (using dip-and-sweep method of measuring) 1/2 cup rice flour (using dip-and-sweep method of measuring) 3/8 cup sugar Position oven-rack at center of oven. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Oil and flour round, thistle-design mold. Rub together butter, flour, rice flour, and sugar until dough coheres into ball. Knead until smooth. Press into mold from center outward, to fill all recesses of mold. Loosening edges of dough with knife, turn out onto light-colored aluminum cookie sheet lined with non-stick silicone baking mat. Bake for 20 minutes, or just until edges turn lightly golden. Remove from oven. Slice into wedges while still warm, cutting from edges toward center to minimize crumbling at edges. Cool to room temperature. I oil the mold by brushing a light coat of vegetable oil on the mold, making sure to cover all the recesses of the design. I have never tried brushing melted butter on the mold, and I wonder whether that would be effective and whether that would make any difference in the taste. Anyone???
  16. I recommend pickling the wood, for a lighter look, while minimizing the need for touch-ups later. You will get chips and abrasions over time, and the need for touching-up will be less frequent if the cabinet color is close to the underlying wood color. Pickling results in something just a few shades lighter than the wood and easy to maintain. The wood grain shows, too, which is attractive. Just be sure to keep the leftover paint in a mason jar for easy access when touch-ups are required.
  17. browniebaker

    Potato Salad

    My tastes vacillate between two potato salads that reflect the Asian and American (Southern) influences in my childhood. The Asian: My mom has always made a shrimp-and-potato salad such as you see in many Chinese cookbooks. It is sweet and peppery and umami-ish, containing the following: small shrimp, salted, skillet-cooked, and peeled baking potatoes, boiled in salted water, skinned, and diced carrots, boiled and diced fresh green peas mayonnaise monosodium glutamate sugar ground black pepper salt Note the MSG! My mom insists on using baking potatoes, otherwise it would not "get fluffy when stirred," she says. The Southern side of me also likes a mashed-potato salad made with the following and served either slightly warm, room temperature, or cold: baking potatoes, boiled in salted water, skinned, and coarsely mashed eggs, hard-boiled and coarsely chopped dill pickles, finely diced scallions, finely sliced Hellman’s mayonnaise sour cream dill-pickle juice ground mustard ground black pepper salt I guess the common denominator between the two potato salads in my life is the use of baking potatoes. My taste for a "fluffy" potato salad must come from early and repeated exposure to my mom's "fluffy" shrimp-potato salad. I like the waxy-potato salads, too, though, maybe equally. But I refuse to use MSG in any of my cooking, not even when I make my mom's shrimp-potato salad!
  18. My sweet tooth is curious: what are "double pastries'? Were these pastries something you could try, or did they have lard in them? I'm wondering, "double"-what -- does this have anything to do with the "double happiness" Chinese character that is prevalent at weddings?
  19. Thanks for the recipe! A couple of questions, though: 1) What the heck are "Magi-Cake strips" and what store can I find them in? Would a water bath be a good substitution? 2) You mentioned pouring the batter into the pan but made no mention if the pan is greased & floured. If the pan isn't, do the brownies stick or do they come out easily? Magi-Cake is a brand-name for the spongy metallic-fabric strips that are soaked in water and wrapped around the outside of cake pans to minimize doming by keeping the edges of the batter from setting much sooner than the center. I use these to equalize the texture between the edges and center, to keep the edges from drying out before the center is done. Other brands of cake strips are made, too; Wilton makes them. You can easily find cake strips at baking supply stores. Some retailers that sell these are Baker's Catalog, Fante's, Sur La Table, Kitchen Etc., and even craft stores like A.C. Moore. As the recipe states, you don't have to use these strips; just bake for 30 to 35 minutes instead of 50 to 55 minutes. A water bath is not a substitute for the strips. A water bath would change the texture of the brownies to something else entirely. Gummy, I should think. I don't grease and flour the pan; the large amount of butter makes it unnecessary, but, then again, I use (and the recipe calls for) a square cheesecake pan from which brownies (1) are easily removed with the removable bottom and (2) emerge with perfectly square corners, even the corner pieces. I use Parrish's Magic-Line cheesecake pans for almost all my cake-baking, just for the ease of removal; the bottom is simply pushed up and out of the pan, with the cake still resting on it. This makes cutting the brownies easy and neat. If you use a regular pan without a removable bottom, you might want to grease (but not flour), for ease of removal. In fact, I've decided that I am going to revise the recipe in the egullet recipe archives to call for greasing, just in case someone uses a regular pan; can't hurt. BTW, what I used to do before I bought square cheesecake pans was to line the regular square pan with aluminum foil so that the edges overhung the walls of the pan, then grease the foil as well as the exposed two interior walls of the pan. After the brownies were baked and cooled in the pan, I lifted the whole cake out using the two overhanging pieces of foil. Also, note that I specify a light-colored pan. The light color is another factor in keeping the edge of the batter from setting much sooner than the center and thus keeping the edges from drying out before the center is done. If you use a dark-colored pan, you might ewant to check for doneness sooner than specified, as the batter will bake more quickly. I guess you can tell from my special tools and tactics that I am something of a nut about brownie-baking? Golly, by now you are probably sorry you asked for my recipe. I hope none of these special tools and tactics discourages you from trying the recipe. Just bake these brownies without cake strips in a greased square pan and they will do just fine.
  20. I like that, too. I don't like nut/fruit cakes that have an evident taste of lard, though, let alone ham in them. My mother likes best the mixed-nut mooncakes that have not only lard and bits of ham but also a prominent taste of GARLIC! She declares the ones without ham and garlic to be pale and poor versions. I myself am ecumenical and never met a mooncake I did not like -- although I can truthfully say that only because I never met a durian mooncake, or even a durian.
  21. Thanks, Sinclair. I've got Pam, so tomorrow's breakfast will be popovers. Can't wait to try it out on my family of guinea pigs. A success to report: this morning's popovers flew right out of the pan. My husband actually thanked me for making popovers. Thank you, Sinclair, for perhaps the best practical tip I've gotten on egullet.com.
  22. A key influence was my mother, in a negative way. She didn't like to cook. And she did not cook unless my father was home for dinner. So we three children were left to fend for ourselves by scavenging the pantry and fridge for lunches (father was at work) and for dinners (on the nights that father was working late). As a mother of two now, I make sure to prepare meals and snacks for my kids. I never want them to feel that I don't care and that there is nothing to eat in the house, the way I used to feel. Today my mother thinks I spend too much time and effort in cooking and cannot understand why I go to so much trouble. Another key influence is being a Southerner married to a New Yorker and transplanted to the mid-Atlantic after having lived in New England. I am always mindful that I should cook the traditional foods of the South, so that my children don't lose touch with that side of their family background. It is a bit of an up-hill battle because my New-Yorker husband fails to appreciate, even disdains, many of these Southern foods, which makes me all the more chauvinistic about pimento cheese, unsweetened cornbread, sweet tea, etc. All my avid cooking today can be traced back to the red Betty Crocker cookbook that I mail-ordered through a book club in 1972 at the age of eight. The first recipes I tried were the shortbread, lemon squares, filled turnovers, rumballs for my teacher at Christmas, pear pie using windfall from the Bosc pear tree in our backyard, and a garlicky vegetable relish that I made and brought to third-grade class for a pot-luck and that was waaaay to0 sophisticated for that crowd!
  23. I think even the best-made bechamel-based cheese sauce cannot be as smooth as a cheese sauce made with rice flour or cornstarch. Nor can it be as smooth as a cheese sauce made with eggs and evaporated milk as in Cook's Illustrated's and John Thorne's recipes for mac and cheese. I have indeed tried all of the above sauces for mac and cheese, and the bechamel-based sauce is less smooth, more pasty or gluey, even, yes, more "grainy" than all the other sauces. It's just the nature of wheat flour. Graininess is relative.
  24. Thanks, Sinclair. I've got Pam, so tomorrow's breakfast will be popovers. Can't wait to try it out on my family of guinea pigs.
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