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[ev4n]

So this summer is all about redoing out kitchen.  A couple of week ago, we took out the old, barely functionling oven.  The new one was delivered, but not installed (we asked for and paid for installatoin, but whatevs).  So a neighbour and I installed it, and then we needed an electrician to hook is up.

Sadly, that required disconnecting the stove, which is being replaced with gas sometime this month, so ok.

So status:
New, double oven installed:  check.
New, gas cooktop:  Still on order

[lepetitfromage]

Last week, I made fruit salad and convinced myself that I could probably eat it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It was chock full of delightful fruits that were in season so they were all pretty cheap, too. I did cheat and use canned pineapple and mandarin oranges though.....just so much easier! In addition to those, it had peaches, gala apples, mango, blueberries, strawberries, watermelon and red grapes. I added about a quarter cup each of pineapple juice and orange juice. Soooo good. Plus- I learned how to properly cut a mango. I can't believe I struggled with that for so long. Thank you, YouTube!


2 nights ago, I made a giant bowl of pasta salad. Again....I could probably eat it every meal of the day. This one was much easier to prep than the fruit salad. Tri-color rotini, blanched broccoli florets and baby carrots, sliced black olives and chopped crab meat. Toss in Italian dressing and it's done. So simple and delicious!!


Apparently, this is the summer of the salad for me.



Oh, I almost forgot that I had a question-
I've recently discovered that I like cottage cheese. I like it even more with stuff mixed in (pineapple, sunflower seeds, soy nuts, sesame sticks, etc). Do any of you actually enjoy eating cottage cheese? If so, do you put anything in it? I'm looking for more ideas to try out.

[Lines]

I like it with salt and pepper, pineapple, pears, or peaches. My mom likes it with ripe summer tomatoes.

[Barmymoo]

Here they sell it with chives, which is delicious. It's good as a filling for baked potatoes.

[Papersatan]

I want to like cottage cheese so badly.  I should like it.  But I tried it once when I was little thinking it was going to be sweet, like a cheesecake ricepudding or something, and I have never gotten over the shock when it actually hit my tongue. :/

[Lines]

I've also known people to stuff it inside of sweet peppers to eat.

Kat, that's sad. But have you tried it with fruit? Just curious. I bet it wouldn't be bad with a little sugar/sweetner mixed in either, if the fruit doesn't give it enough sweetness. Actually I kind of want to try that now as a dessert alternative. Hmm.

[Papersatan]

I had it with fruit the first time, which is what led me to belive it was not going to taste so 'cheesy'  I think I'd like it better savory actually, with tomatoes sounds like it would be good, but I don't trust my mouth to agree.

[lepetitfromage]

Ohh, as a baked potato filling sounds delightful! I love all of the savory ideas

Kat- that sucks!! I hated it for a really long time but eventually warmed up to it when I discovered I could get it free lol. Maybe the baked potato thing would work for you too. As a topping it's not nearly as in-your-face as if you were eating a big ol' bowl of it. Plus, it might be reminiscent of sour cream in that scenario.....


As a side note, I have a passionate and undying love for sour cream. It even has its own song.

[Thrillho]

Cottage cheese disgusts me. Looks like feta that someone's already eaten.

[Lupercal]

Then I suggest you stay away from cottage cheese's special younger brother, Quark.

[Barmymoo]

Quark is one of my favourite words ever.

[Papersatan]

I like quark. And I like farmer cheese (a cousin in the other direction). It's just cottage cheese I don't like; it makes no sense.

[Aimless]

I'm not a big fan of quark apart from of its manufacturing process, but if I had to choose I think my favourite would be strange quark

As for cottage cheese, I have, at times, been obsessed with the stuff. I like it savory, pref. mixed with sundried tomatoes (or a paste made from sundried tomatoes) or canned tuna, some thyme and oregano, a glass of wine and thou... or just stuffed into a baguette or a wrap

[hedgie]

Well, I don't have anything yet.  But come 8 Aug, I have a massive multi-course meal planned, largely Moroccan food, for many people.  I don't want to reveal any spoilers yet, but I *will* post photos of the noms, and will certainly post responses.  If anyone wants the recipes/pics of stuff I've made before, just PM me, and I'll bother transferring them to an anon account.

[Lines]

So I think one of my favorite grilled cheeses I've made is now garlic and herb sourdough with mozzarella and minced garlic. A very close favorite was tomato basil bread with white cheddar cheese curds, pepper jack, and bacon.

[Barmymoo]

Mmmm I just made an experimental recipe that I was dubious about and it is delicious. It's called rice lentil polou and comes from Laurel's Kitchen (one of my favourite cookbooks) and there's a variant of it here. I used vegetable stock and no pine nuts, and ras el hanout instead of cinnamon. Served it with peas because I forgot to do green veg and that was the quickest thing to cook. Oh and I topped it with vegan mozzarella, nom nom nom.

[Thrillho]

Then I suggest you stay away from cottage cheese's special younger brother, Quark.

Isn't that a tiny theoretical molecule that could destroy the Earth?

[Barmymoo]

Dairy. It is truly the most dangerous of all the food groups.

[GarandMarine]

Then I suggest you stay away from cottage cheese's special younger brother, Quark.

Isn't that a tiny theoretical molecule that could destroy the Earth?

Nope. Let's go over to Professor GM for a brief explanation shall we?

A quark is an elementary particle and fundamental building block of all matter. Quarks team up to form giant robots err... composite particles called hadrons (HADrons. Perverts.) the most stable of which are protons and neutrons, the components of atomic nuclei.

You're probably thinking of the Higgs boson, who's discovery was announced by CERN on 4 July 2012 after being proposed in 1964. This is very important because it helps validate some of the untested areas of Standard Model physics. The boson itself isn't dangerous, in fact theoretically we're filled with them. The "danger" from the Higgs Boson was more centered around people who thought turning on the LHC would somehow generate a black hole. (A neat party trick)

The other possibility is anti-matter. Which is a whole other ball game that might be best explained by Montgomery Scott. (Also not theoretical just rare and dangerous)

[Barmymoo]

So if you're baking biscuits (cookies) and all you have is strong white bread flour, you probably don't need to use any baking powder. On the plus side my oat-raisin biscuits look super fluffy!

[bainidhe_dub]

Laurel's Kitchen

Have you tried her falafel recipe? It's excellent.

[cesium133]

The other possibility is anti-matter. Which is a whole other ball game that might be best explained by Montgomery Scott. (Also not theoretical just rare and dangerous)

Anti-matter is fun.  CERN has a project where they trap antihydrogen atoms to perform experiments on them. And contrary to certain movies, antihydrogen atoms cannot destroy the world.

[Aimless]

Nope. Let's go over to Professor GM for a brief explanation shall we?

A quark is an elementary particle and fundamental building block of all matter. Quarks team up to form giant robots err... composite particles called hadrons (HADrons. Perverts.) the most stable of which are protons and neutrons, the components of atomic nuclei.

Quarks also come in several different exciting flavours, some of which are charming or just strange




I have discovered something delicious:

Take some couscous
Add a stock-cube (I used chicken)
Add hot water
Add a very small amount of oyster-sauce
Add some olive-oil (we used something truffle-flavoured but it's the olivey flavour that's important)
Add some seaweed of the ogonori variety

It is SO TASTY! It can probably be varied with eg. a tiny hint of chili, a little teensy weensy bit of ginger- and onion-juice etc but it's just really yummy all on its own served it with oven-roasted salmon (roasted half a salmon last night and slathered it with a sauce made from oyster-sauce, sesame-seed oil, chipotle paste and some other stuff), cucumber and tomatoes from our balcony-jungle.

I wish the lettuce of lies would be replaced with the seaweed of scrumptiousness

[Thrillho]

Then I suggest you stay away from cottage cheese's special younger brother, Quark.

Isn't that a tiny theoretical molecule that could destroy the Earth?

Nope. Let's go over to Professor GM for a brief explanation shall we?

A quark is an elementary particle and fundamental building block of all matter. Quarks team up to form giant robots err... composite particles called hadrons (HADrons. Perverts.) the most stable of which are protons and neutrons, the components of atomic nuclei.

You're probably thinking of the Higgs boson, who's discovery was announced by CERN on 4 July 2012 after being proposed in 1964. This is very important because it helps validate some of the untested areas of Standard Model physics. The boson itself isn't dangerous, in fact theoretically we're filled with them. The "danger" from the Higgs Boson was more centered around people who thought turning on the LHC would somehow generate a black hole. (A neat party trick)

The other possibility is anti-matter. Which is a whole other ball game that might be best explained by Montgomery Scott. (Also not theoretical just rare and dangerous)

It wasn't the Higgs boson I was thinking of, my brother a while ago on his website (www.qntm.org) did an article on a series of ways you could destroy the Earth and one of them was quark-based, I know that much.

Interesting side note, Rush Limbaugh ended up reading almost the entire article out on air and using it as 'proof' that SUVs don't harm the planet. So... there's that.

[cesium133]

Ah, yeah, one of the conspiracy theories that people circulated about CERN was that the strange quarks produced in the reactions were going to convert up and down quarks in ordinary matter into strange quarks and destroy the world... 

[Aimless]

I dunno if they were that far off the mark though, those conspiracy nuts. The world has become increasingly strange since CERN's inception and we're clearly heading towards certain destruction


Tonight we've made rhubarb ice cream! We used an egg-free ice-cream base that uses cornstarch as a thickener, and, though I was very skeptical at first (because custard is delicious ) I must say I have been won over by this recipe. The flavour really is clearer, and it's simpler and easier and less time-consuming than making a custard base.

[Barmymoo]

Yeah, you were right about increasingly strange :p

[Aimless]

We made some sashimi:



Seared tuna, salmon, nile perch, scallops. There's a grocery store in town that's just getting better and better for every month when it comes to fresh affordable fish... we scored enough goodies for 10 delicious healthy meals for less than the cost of two mediocre restaurant lunches. Nile perch was a new one for me and it was just really tasty and just the perfect texture and consistency. I usually don't think about that but it was so striking I was like

[GarandMarine]

That's the best part about sushi. Fully enjoying the delicate flavors of the fish that are lost in the cooking process.

[Aimless]

It's just a great fish for mouthfeel

This has been followed up with two more tasty meals:

- Oven-baked char (deboned, placed upright in a a dish, filled with a thick sauce made from shallots, carrots, garlic and white wine, covered with very thinly sliced lightly-fried potato and some tasty cheese, baked for a little less than 30 mins in a 175C oven).

- Chicken-liver stew probably my best effort so far in the challenging world of stewing liver. I dredged them in some cornstarch, flour and salt, added them to a hot sauté-pan in which I'd already browned some onions and garlic in olive-oil along with thinly sliced carrots, added a stock-cube and some spices (pepper, paprika, a red chili and some smoked chipotle paste, cinnamon), some leftover white wine, a tin of whole tomatoes, a little bit of milk, some lemon and probably a few other things. It had to be balanced with a teensy weensy bit of sugar and I believe it could use some cumin as well but all in all it turned out to be a flavourful and thoroughly filling (but not heavy or too rich) stew that went well with couscous I'm pleased, the liver turned out absolutely perfect rather than being a little too dry and chewy as is usually their wont.

[Orkboy]

I didn't see a thread about cooking that wasn't old and dead, so here.  Post cooking stuff.  Or don't, I'm not the boss of you.


My chili recipe
AKA: All Hail to the Drinking Man
WARNING: NOT VEGETARIAN.  CONTAINS TASTY DEAD ANIMALS.

Chili is not an exact science, so there's a lot of room to customize.  I'll discuss different options in each step, and tell you what I prefer and why.

Ingredients:
Meat - 1 lbs
Beans - 1 lbs
Tomatoes - 1 or 2 decent-sized tomatoes, or the equivalent canned. Three if you want sweeter chili
Onions - more is better.  One baseball-sized one should do
Garlic
Pepper/peppers
Salt
Cumin
Misc spices
Booze of your choice

(click to show/hide)

Meat:  Beef is best, but pork also works.  Any red meat should do fine.  There are, however, a few things to remember.  Pork has to be thoroughly cooked BEFORE adding it to the stew pot.  Beef just has to be browned, but pork cooks at a higher temperature.  The single most important rule is this: NO ground meat.  Seriously.  You lose flavor and texture using ground meat of any kind.  I prefer to buy either chopped-up cheap stew meat or whatever cut of beef is on sale and then chop it myself.  I don't mind bloody hands, but if you do, then get the pre-cut stuff.  It's labeled as "stew meat" at my grocery store, so look for that.  The cheap meat that's tough is perfectly fine.  Chili was actually developed as a way to make the tough, nearly-unchewable cuts of meat edible and tasty. 

I've had good results mixing kinds of meat.  I tried a beef/ham hock/bacon batch of chili that turned out well.  Experiment, and remember what works. 

Beans: Pinto beans are traditional, but anything except black beans works.  Black beans are a little heavy on flavor and tend to overwhelm everything else.  Canned or dry both work fine.  You don't need to pre-soak dry beans if you follow my directions on cooking time, but remember to wash then and sort through for bad beans and small rocks.  Not kidding.  Dry beans often have small rocks in there that make it through the packaging machines. 

Tomatoes:  Canned, whole, paste, diced, crushed, pretty much anything works.  I personally don't like canned tomato sauce, and if you use fresh tomatoes, peel them first.  Blanching them makes them easier to peel.  That's where you boil them really quick and then drop them in ice water to stop the cooking.  It makes the skins kinda wrinkle and separate.  My personal preference is for fresh tomatoes, but tomato paste brings a ton of flavor.  Canned diced tomatoes usually have this calcium stuff added to make them keep their shape, which is kinda gross if you think about it.

Onions:  White or yellow are best.  It's really hard to have too much onion, and really easy to not have enough. 

Prep time: Maybe 30 minutes, depending on your ingredient choices.
Cook time: At least 4 hours.  For good results, 6 hours.  For best results, 8 hours.  I dare you to try 24 hours.

• Chop everything.  Onions, tomatoes, meat, everything that can be chopped must be chopped.
   
• Get out your trusty Bigass Stew Pot (hereafter referred to as BSP).  The meat you chose should be in bite-sized pieces, either because you bought it that way or because you have a knife.  Toss it in, and brown the meat.  Pork has to cook more thoroughly, but I use beef, and it just needs to be browned.  If you picked hamburger, slap yourself and start over.  Hamburger is not the right choice for chili.  hamburger is for hamburgers.  And meatloaf.  But not chili.
   
• Have some of your tasty booze. I like Newcastle Brown Ale.  Shiner Bock is also good.
   
• Once the meat is browned, toss the onions, beans, tomatoes into the BSP, and add enough water to cover everything.  Don't drain the meat.  All that juice is delicious.  Bring it to a boil.
   
• This will take a while.  Have some more of your tasty booze.
   
• After everything has boiled, reduce the heat to a simmer, and bust out the spices.  The only spices you need are salt, some kind of chili pepper, garlic, and cumin.  I use a teaspoon of ground cumin, which is responsible for that distinct chili taste that's so hard to describe, about half a tablespoon of various powdered chilies, and a couple cloves of garlic.  The little cloves, not the bulb.  I had a friend use a whole bulb of garlic cuz he thought that's what I meant. We were vampire-resistant for weeks. 
  
  Your options for chilies are wide and varied.  Chili powder is fine, but if you use it, add other stuff to personalize it a bit.  I use jalapeno powder, habanero powder, ghost pepper powder (just a little), cayenne pepper, and black pepper.  When I can get them, I'll use fresh jalapenos which I chop myself, but if you do this, for the love of dog, wash your hands very thoroughly before you touch anything.  The oils the peppers leave on your hands will burn your eyes, your skin, and your loved ones.  Another excellent spice option is bell peppers.  Anything but green.  I find that the green ones taste a little grassy.  I like to mix red, yellow, and orange.  It creates a kind of fruity heat.  Feel free to make a sassy gay joke here, but it had better be really sassy.
   
• Allow everything to simmer with the lid on for a few hours.  Stir the BSP every 30-45 minutes, and be sure to scrape the bottom to prevent anything from burning.  If you've had enough booze, you may want to cackle and pretend to be a witch stirring a cauldron.  Feel free.  If not, have some more tasty, tasty booze.  Add more water if it's in danger of drying out.  If you used dry beans without pre-soaking them, it'll probably need more water.
   
• After a few hours, all the flavors have started to blend nicely.  Taste some of the broth and decide how to adjust the seasoning.  I usually end up adding more of everything at this step.  I season lightly at first, because you can add more if it's not enough, but you can't take it back out if it's too much.  Once it tastes about right, put the lid back on and let it finish cooking.  We want 6-8 hours of total simmer time, so be patient.  Remember to stir occasionally.  Some stoves seem prone to burning your precious chili.  I feel like electric stoves are worse about it, but I'm not sure.
  
  Important Note:  Some of you are probably wondering about the long cook time.  The reason for this is so that the connective tissue in the meat can break down and escape into the broth.  When we finish, what started as tough chunks of beef will have a texture similar to that of pulled pork, and this is why.  The melted connective tissue also creates the sort of heartiness that Japanese cooking calls kokumi.  It's hard to describe, but it's worth it when just the broth has enough heartiness to it to be filling.
   
• After everything has cooked, we reach my favorite step.  Add booze.  Allow to cook without the lid for about 10-30 minutes. 
  
  I usually add beer, because that's what I drink.  Not the fizzy yellow pisswater that many people drink, and not the bitter German beers either.  The best beer for chili has color and flavor, but isn't too thick or bitter.  I have also tried bourbon, whiskey, vodka, and honey bourbon.  Different kind of booze will have different effects, but generally, the flavor will remain while the alcohol cooks out.  While vodka doesn't have any real flavor on its own, it lends a very subtle kind of clear-palate kind of feeling to the chili.  I would imagine that red wine would work well, but the sweet stuff like cider seems like it would detract from the flavor of the chili.
   
• Turn off the heat, and let the chili sit.  I let it sit long enough to make rice.  This lets the flavors finish mingling, and lets the chili cool enough to eat, and I like my chili over rice.
   
• Eat delicious chili.  Have some more tasty booze while you eat. 

[Orkboy]

Guess I should have looked in the less logical place, outside of the Make board.  Why didn't it come up when I did a forum search, though?

[Barmymoo]

Because the search tool is borked. I shall merge your thread into the other thread, rather like folding in butter and sugar.

Your chilli recipe sounds good (I'd sub in a vegan alternative for the meat, but that's easy with chilli!) but it is lacking three or four squares of dark chocolate or two teaspoons of cocoa powder.

[pwhodges]

Because the search tool is borked.

If you click the Search button in the menu, rather than using the displayed search box, you will now get the advanced search form (it was an option you had to click through to - I've now made it default), in which you can specify to search in specific sections of the forum, and/or for specific users' posts.  This takes a lot of load off the search engine and works much better in many cases.

I intend to add an index to the database shortly which would make a huge difference, but first need to confirm that the server resource for that is available.

[lepetitfromage]

Your recipe sounds delightful and I enjoyed your delivery as well I could visualize each step.

I usually make my chili with ground beef because I'm impatient but I'm thinking of going with a nice cheap cut next time now that I know I can (and should). Plus, ground beef has gotten ridiculously expensive!!

[cesium133]

I've never tried adding beer to my chili. Maybe I'll try it next time I make chili. I make mine in a slow-cooker, so that I can have it cook while I'm away at work, and I use cubed pieces of beef rather than ground beef.

[GarandMarine]

Whiskey works really well when I add it to mine.

[bainidhe_dub]

I feel like this is a good time to offer a cornbread recipe, if you want to go that direction instead of rice to accompany your chili. It's hearty and dense, not particularly sweet.

1 1/2 cups cornmeal
3/4 cup white flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
2 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
1/4 cup sugar

1 1/2 cups nonfat buttermilk (or combine 1 1/2 cups skim milk and 1 t vinegar)
3 T melted butter or oil
1 whole egg
2 egg whites

Combine dry ingredients. Combine wet ingredients. Add wet to dry. Bake in sprayed pan 30-45 minutes.

Shit, I guess I need to ask my Mom what temperature it bakes at. Probably 350F.

Edit: Confirmed - bake at 350F. Baking time will depend on the size of your pan & therefore how thick the batter is.

[ankhtahr]

I'm definitely going to try that Chili recipe. It sounds really great. And you seem to take your Chili really seriously, so I'm pretty sure you know what you're talking about.

As I'm not exactly familiar with imperial units and don't have much experience with cooking in general I just wonder how many people this recipe will serve. The occasion I have in mind is four people.

And I'll have to decide what whisky to put in there. I really like my whiskys, so I don't exactly like pouring them into food. Anyone know a nice, smoky but cheap scotch blend?

[Aimless]

Support Beer & Bacon Spaghetti-Sauce for our Special Friends Supporters:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2060386968/beer-and-bacon-spaghetti-sauce/

Sorry, it was just too intriguing and adorable

[GarandMarine]

I want to kick him $20. I am intrigued by his apple die and dumplings

[Orkboy]

I'm definitely going to try that Chili recipe. It sounds really great. And you seem to take your Chili really seriously, so I'm pretty sure you know what you're talking about.

As I'm not exactly familiar with imperial units and don't have much experience with cooking in general I just wonder how many people this recipe will serve. The occasion I have in mind is four people.

And I'll have to decide what whisky to put in there. I really like my whiskys, so I don't exactly like pouring them into food. Anyone know a nice, smoky but cheap scotch blend?

1 lbs is .45 kg, and 1 teaspoon is about 5 mL.  This is usually enough for everyone in my gaming group (6 people) to have a bowl or two.  That being said, it makes perfect leftovers, so feel free to double up and just pack the rest into a tupperware and heat it up later.

EDIT:
The best way to eat leftover chili.

• Get burrito-size tortillas.  That's the fuggin huge ones
• Put rice and chili on the tortilla
• Fold it shut on all sides, like you were making a buurrito.  Because you are.
• Grill it in a skillet.  No oil or anything.  Start with the fold-side down to seal it shut.
• Enjoy your grilled chili-rito

[hedgie]

So next week, I'm making a big Mid-Eastern meal.  Several courses, and none of the stuff 'cept the lamb will cost too much.  The only disadvantage is that by making everything from the base ingredients, I'll be in the kitchen for at *least* 6 hours, and will have to periodically disappear during the meal in order to finish the next course.

[The Seldom Killer]

Made courgette and lemon soup last night. Just as the heatwave has ended it's nice to want a hot meal at the end of the day but still didn't want anything too heavy. Chopped up four smallish courgettes and fried in a pan until a bit caramelised and reserved. Fried a finely chopped onion until soft. Added a finely chopped stick of celery and three chopped garlic cloves and fried for a couple of minutes. Returned the courgettes to the pan and added a teaspoon of vegetable stock, a teaspoon of thyme, a cup of water, a pinch of salt, a big grind of pepper, a bay leaf, a small splash of balsamic. Simmered for about 15 minutes. Blended and added the juice and grated rind of a lemon and a bit more water until I was happy with the consistency. Ate with some beetroot and butterbean salad and some honey and lavender bread.

[GarandMarine]

Real talk, going to be making some chicken fajita type stuff tomorrow with spanish rice, orange, yellow and red peppers, red onion, chicken (surprisingly vital to the recipe), some jalapeno peppers, hawt sauce, various motivating spices and fresh avocado.

[GarandMarine]

Mission accomplished:

[Loki]

I made taco salad two days ago. It was generally well-received.

[ankhtahr]

I now have a copy of my grandmother's noodle salad recipe. Yum.

[bainidhe_dub]

So I'm making a pastry custard from scratch today, and I'm really nervous about the combining-hot-milk-and-eggs step. Anyone familiar with this process have any tips or know of a good youtube tutorial or something? I'm giving this one shot and if I fuck it up I'm using Jell-O pudding.

[Papersatan]

Without knowing your specific recipe my general tips are:

have the eggs at room temp
put a little of the hot milk into the eggs and stir like crazy and keep doing this until they are warm
then slowly pour them into the hot milk while stirring like crazy

It can help to have an extra set of hands: one person to stir while the other pours.