Kitchen jobs you hate beyond reason

[JeanneCake]

23 hours ago, TdeV said:

@JeanneCake, what marvellous news! An Amazon search shows brushes which can be added to the end of a drill, or a Rubbermaid thingy which looks like an electric toothbrush. Could you please tell us a little more about your devices?

I hope this works!

 

This is what we bought for the shop,  it works well and we just change the heads when we need to. Electric spin brush for cleaning (eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

Edited December 30, 2021 by Smithy
fix link. i hope! (log)

[KennethT]

9 hours ago, liuzhou said:

I can only think of one thing that I avoid doing.

 

Breaking down a chicken? No problem. Boning a duck? Great fun. Filetting a fish? Ditto. Chopping onions? A breeze. Prepping squid? My favourite kitchen job!

 

But one of my favourite dishes is 辣子鸡 (là zi jī ) or chicken in chillies. This Sichuan dish requires that 50 grams of dried chillies be snipped in half and then as many of the seeds as possible removed. I'm not squeamish about it or worried about the heat or anything similar. It's just plain boring and always takes longer than you can imagine. 50 g of dried chillies is more than you might think.

 

So I have to work myself up to it. This means I don't eat it as often as I would like. I need to find a volunteer chilli snipper.

 

 

 

Can you reuse the chillies or would they get burnt the next time around?

 

I understand though - my curry powder required about 150g of chillies, snipped and deseeded.

[lemniscate]

21 hours ago, ElsieD said:

And here I thought I was the only one.  I detest prepping onions though I enjoy eating them.

 

I am also an onion chopping hater.  I have resorted to using freeze-dried chopped onions.  Just grab a handful and toss in the pot.  If you want for a salad, just rehydrate in the salad dressing/vinegar/liquid before adding.  The freeze dried taste like fresh onions to me.  

 

I saw some packages of freeze dried chopped shallots in the Asian supermarket.  I will be picking some of those up soon.

[chromedome]

1 hour ago, JeanneCake said:

I hope this works!

 

This is what we bought for the shop,  it works well and we just change the heads when we need to.  Electric spin scrubber brush

Looks cool. That being said, given a choice between making a task less onerous/marginally entertaining, and avoiding it altogether, I'd still opt for avoiding it altogether.

[liuzhou]

33 minutes ago, KennethT said:

Can you reuse the chillies or would they get burnt the next time around?

 

 

I wouldn't. You have to be pretty careful not to burn them first time round.

[ElsieD]

36 minutes ago, lemniscate said:

 

I am also an onion chopping hater.  I have resorted to using freeze-dried chopped onions.  Just grab a handful and toss in the pot.  If you want for a salad, just rehydrate in the salad dressing/vinegar/liquid before adding.  The freeze dried taste like fresh onions to me.  

 

I saw some packages of freeze dried chopped shallots in the Asian supermarket.  I will be picking some of those up soon.

 

That's a great idea.  I don't recall having seen freeze dried onions except in those little spice bottles.  Where do you get them?

[Darienne]

35 minutes ago, ElsieD said:

 

That's a great idea.  I don't recall having seen freeze dried onions except in those little spice bottles.  Where do you get them?

I buy them at a local bulk food store.  But mainly I used my own...which means much slicing and chopping and much dehydrating but so much less expensive.

 

Added:  But then I don't hate chopping onions...except when I am pressed for time.  Then I do hate it.   But that is not beyond reason.

 

Edited December 29, 2021 by Darienne (log)

[lemniscate]

22 minutes ago, ElsieD said:

 

That's a great idea.  I don't recall having seen freeze dried onions except in those little spice bottles.  Where do you get them?

 

I love the Honeyville product, unfortunately, out of stock at the moment.  While there appears to be "sticker shock" at the price of a #10 can, it will last a long time even after open, no waste, no rot, can be stored on shelf.  It takes a bit to learn how much is the same of half small onion, or what a cup of regular chopped onion is equal to in freeze dried form.  

 

It seems Covid and the prepping craze has Honeyville out of their usual stock.   I just use it because I feel it's a superior product.

 

There's a brand called LIfehouse I have not tried.  I think Costco carries some of their stuff.  Also some company called Thrive (which sounds like a MLM setup).

 

 

[lemniscate]

3 minutes ago, Darienne said:

I buy them at a local bulk food store.  But mainly I used my own...which means much slicing and chopping and much dehydrating but so much less expensive.

 

Added:  But then I don't hate chopping onions...except when I am pressed for time.  Then I do hate it.   But that is not beyond reason.

 

 

Are they freeze-dried or just the normal dehydrated type in the bulk bin?  I would jump at bulk price on freeze dried version.  Dehydrated, not so much.

[Darienne]

5 minutes ago, lemniscate said:

 

Are they freeze-dried or just the normal dehydrated type in the bulk bin?  I would jump at bulk price on freeze dried version.  Dehydrated, not so much.

Good point.  Didn't think carefully on that one.  I suppose they are just normal dehydrated.  Even so, the price of the normal dehydrated onions is far greater than simply using fresh onions and chopping them...or dehydrating your own when a really good buy for onions comes up, say 10 pounds for $1.99. 

 

Why does that matter, if I might ask?  

[lemniscate]

1 minute ago, Darienne said:

Why does that matter, if I might ask?  

for me, texture.

[ElsieD]

I just spent too much time looking for where I can buy  freeze dried onions in Canada.  So far I've come up empty.  Between the price of the product and shipping costs, buying them from the US is not something I'll be doing any time soon.  I'll check the Asian supermarket for the dried shallots when I next go there.

[lemniscate]

1 minute ago, ElsieD said:

I just spent too much time looking for where I can buy  freeze dried onions in Canada.  So far I've come up empty.  Between the price of the product and shipping costs, buying them from the US is not something I'll be doing any time soon.  I'll check the Asian supermarket for the dried shallots when I next go there.

 

I agree, I looked too and you have really no way to get these even the littlest bit economically.   I think the shallots are a product of Vietnam if that helps.  They are in a plastic bag.   You could try a bit of the regular dehydrated like @Darienne uses, to experiment.

 

[lindag]

I'm curious about freeze dried products like onions, garlic and herbs.

Are they worth using?  Would you use them in dishes where you normally would use fresh?

[JeanneCake]

23 hours ago, TdeV said:

@JeanneCake, what marvellous news! An Amazon search shows brushes which can be added to the end of a drill, or a Rubbermaid thingy which looks like an electric toothbrush. Could you please tell us a little more about your devices?

 

Here is a link that I hope works.  You'd never believe that in a previous life as a technical trainer I taught people how to program and set up their telecommunications networks to do video conferencing.  And then fiber optics technology.  Because I can't link anything successfully

Electric spin brush to clean grout and other stuff! (eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

[rotuts]

@JeanneCake 

 

thank your for the pic

 

Im not sure what this i9s , 

 

but is its what Ive been thinking about 

 

looking forward to hearing more.

[Orbit]

5 hours ago, lindag said:

I'm curious about freeze dried products like onions, garlic and herbs.

Are they worth using?  Would you use them in dishes where you normally would use fresh?

 

I use freeze dried chopped shallots from Penzey's in sauces and stews; I find it works well.

[Annie_H]

2 hours ago, lindag said:

I'm curious about freeze dried products like onions, garlic and herbs.

Are they worth using?  Would you use them in dishes where you normally would use fresh?

It depends. If freezer space is limited and subject to power outages or just like to have something quick and healthy on hand freeze dried  veg and fruit are nice things to have. Veg and fruits are in the 65 to 85% water category. Freeze drying does the job more efficiently than dehydrating. Holding the nutrients and most like fresh when hydrated. Longer shelf life. 

I worked on a project in a remote village, with a tiny grocery the size of a standard living room. A few ripe bananas with individual priced stickers based on weight, etc. 

I ordered from https://www.northbaytrading.com/dried-vegetables/freeze-dried-vegetables

I needed something similar to the cup soups. Not the junk ones but more like the ones from health food stores. With freeze dried miso and bone broth I made excellent hearty soups using an electric teapot plugged into a generator. I recall making a few varieties but the leek, potato, and various veg was stellar. They also have tomato flake and powder. The corn made a decent chowder. My husband visited and brought up a big duffle bag of treats as his checked baggage. 

It was easy to hit the 99$ free shipping. I must have made 100+ soups and with dried/freeze dried fruits, nuts, with a granola type snack gorp I was happy. Freeze dried seems expensive but my soups probably cost 50-75cents with much more veg than the dinky purchased cups. 

 

During the first lock-down with long lines and zero delivery times we finally nailed one but it was a local restaurant supply. They opened up to home delivery as restaurants were closing. But most offerings were bulk at first until they started breaking up cases. Fortunately downstairs at the time was cold storage. 

 

I made sofrito and all the basic miro poix basics. Celery, onion, shallot, garlic, yada-yada. Froze in quart flat packs. Zipped in the cuisinart. Hot pan stove top. Having prepped mirepoix big batch in flat-packed quart zip-locks....break off a frozen chunk. 

[scubadoo97]

20 hours ago, gfweb said:

Me too. I pretty much enjoy all of it. Emptying a dishwasher is least favorite,  but not odious.

 

Fooling with risotto or polenta...enjoyable and a reason to drink some wine.

Making stock....ditto

Breaking down a bird....surgery!

Baking is like accounting, I hire that out.

 

.

 As a chemistry major at one time in undergrad, my typical line is cooking is like organic chemistry.   You combine X and Y and get Z.  Baking is like quantitative analysis, where you have to measure each ingredient on a triple beam scale and if your off the result will fail 

[Robenco15]

Grating cheese. 

[Margaret Pilgrim]

27 minutes ago, Robenco15 said:

Grating cheese. 

I'll grate your cheese if you'll chop my vegetables.   

[MaryIsobel]

I don't like grating cheese either and I can't even tell you why. I used to despise unloading the dishwasher until one day many years ago when I timed myself and found that it took about 3 minutes. After that I would just tell myself it takes 3 minutes! I get Alexa to play some favourite song and by the time the song is over, I'm usually done.

[scubadoo97]

I do what’s needed. Washing pot and pans isn’t my favorite activity but it’s all part of the process.  
And yes we do have a dishwasher but sometimes it’s just easier or takes less time to hand wash,  dry and put everything away 

[JoNorvelleWalker]

58 minutes ago, MaryIsobel said:

I don't like grating cheese either and I can't even tell you why.

 

Having just grated up a piece of Parmesan I could tell you why.  But I now have cut resistant gloves.  Grating Parmesan in quantity also requires a modicum of strength, something I do not posses.

 

Here I must confess I have an as yet unassayed Parmesan grating disc for my ancient Cuisinart.  It terrifies.  We all must live or die by our culinary inquietudes.

 

[weinoo]

 

The Moulinex makes quick work of grating even larger quantities of Pamigiano.