GloriousDawn

The 1961 edition is my well-loved kitchen companion for exactly that reason. Recipes made almost entirely from whole foods, full fat ingredients, and a keen awareness of both the utility and deliciousness of every sort of animal fat. Whenever I need to recreate a well-known dish in a low-carb way, I start with that copy of Larousse. It’s never let me down. Dear heavens, what I wouldn’t do to get my hands on a 1938 edition though.

I’m new here too! Welcome! 😁

Thank you, btw, to whichever staffer snapped the leash off my collar after 5 posts instead of making me post the full 10 first (not that that took long *cough*). 😆

Think I’m with @heidih on the general aversion to single-use kitchen tools. The only one I have (and love) is the Avocado Mangler™️ which makes producing guacamole in quantity at a gallop much less annoying. I don’t use it often, but I’m always grateful to have it when I need it. As for ground meat, my big ole silicone spatula does the job beautifully. 😍

So sorry, @liuzhou. Glad your mum got to see all of her family together again.

Can see it balancing coconut flour very well. Coconut flour is such thirsty stuff, you can end up with a crumbly too-dry mess without much effort. Glucomannan holds some absurdly high multiple of its own weight in liquid. I have a part almond flour, part coconut flour ‘cornbread’ in my queue of experiments. Will of course have to make a pot of chili to help wash it down. 🤓

Oh, goody. Currently tinkering with recreating the behavior of gluten in baked things that are not 80% starch. It’s becoming a salty undertaking. Little bit in the batter, most of it in my language. Good thing I have a willing volunteer to gladly fall upon the failures. Me: “You are a terrible food critic.” DW: “*munchmunchmunch* I know. *munchmunch* Sorry. (she’s so not sorry) *munch* Is there any more of that?” 😆

This one would be the Niagara Falls, US side. Being in China, I imagine you have some quite lovely ones there as well.

That’s the model I got last year, and I love it. My older IP is a 6qt. but I went for the 8qt. this time because there’s no such thing as too much chili con carne in the freezer. I use it most often to make yogurt, and that’s a lot less fiddly on this new IP. The ability to go from the stovetop to the IP or vice versa is a total win. I don’t see myself using the quick cool feature very often, but y’know, it’s there if I need it. My only minor gripe at the moment is that there’s no non-stick insert for the 8qt with handles, but that may get settled with new product releases. Overall, it’s on my short list of pry-it-from-my-cold-dead-hands favorite kitchen devices.

@Hassouni, that looks delicious. And I’m a fellow fan of glucomannan. You are not wrong about a little going a long way. My first go at thickening gravy with it was hilarious. I could have served it in slices. 😆 Have you tried baking with it? It seems that a 1% (1g glucomannan:100g gf flour) addition makes a reasonably effective stand-in for gluten. Half a % glucomannan plus half a % xanthan gum has also been interesting. I’ve been using the latter where a more rigid structure is called for.

Dear heavens, this is a total necro-post, but I had to weigh in as grain-free cooking has become one of my focuses. I’ve had decent success making roux with almond flour. It browns up beautifully and adds wonderful body to otherwise soupy dishes. It also picks up (obvs.) a decidedly nutty aroma which transforms into something quite exquisite if you toast the flour a bit beforehand. There’s a limit to how much it will actually thicken a dish. Almond is never going to suck up liquid like grains do, but if you need more, trading out a quarter to a third of your almond flour for coconut flour does improve things. How much you might taste coconut in the final dish depends on the sensitivity of your palate and on how much seasoning and spice are also involved. So, you might get a little coconut hit from, say, a bechamel but not a gumbo. Either way, it can make for some delicious roux-based cooking for the gluten intolerant or anyone generally avoiding starchy grains.

Thank you for the kindly welcome! 💖

Hello, all! Sort of fell over this place while doing ingredient research. A bunch of foodies talking about food? With references and such? Yes, please! I grew up in the South (Gulf Coast Texas) and learned the first things I ever knew about food at my Grandma’s elbow. Picked up both her fearless elan for cooking without a roadmap and her exacting sense of chemistry in baking. Probably inherited the densely packed tastebuds from her as well considering our shared detestation for certain flavors. Found my first copy of Larousse Gastronomique at nineteen (a beautiful early 20th Century copy—still have it) on a table at a Southern California flea market while on vacation. Have been in love with the gory details of making things taste divine ever since. In my later years, I’ve discovered an allergy to wheat and the fact that an excess of sugar is pretty much kryptonite to people of my relation. Gained and then (after long effort) lost over two hundred pounds, narrowly dodging diabetes, and finishing right about the time the COVID lockdown closed up the world. So I’ve been sitting here rock-throwing distance from a gigantic waterfall for over a year, in the best shape of my life, and researching how to make the foods I grew up eating in a way that won’t murder me before my time. So, I’m terribly pleased to find a bunch of people here who aren’t likely to mind me obsessing over some fiddly bit of chemistry or asking oddly specific food questions when I get around to that. It’s been a pleasure to catch up on your posts, and I hope I can make some contribution eventually myself. Cheers!