Tell us what you have cooked lately (that's interesting)

[Houngan]

Thanks! The texture was awesome, and this was my first attempt at anything sous vide. I basically just filled up my stock pot with water, put in the metal thing used for steaming potatoes (so that the meat would be more towards the center of pot, put in a thermometer, heated to 55C, dropped in the meat, and stirring and flipping the bag occasionally. I'll probably buy a sous vide supreme eventually, but this way worked very well for me.

As for time/temp I basically just asked a woman with far more sous vide experience than me. The cooking issues blog has some good info, and books like http://www.amazon.com/Under-Pressure.../dp/1579653510 should be useful.

Seems like someone should make a slow cooker with a sous vide capability, maybe a thin mesh grille on the bottom to keep the bag away and a magnetic stirrer. Add a temperature control and you've got something.

[Waltzer]

I'll probably buy a sous vide supreme eventually, but this way worked very well for me.

My experience with this thing is basically that if you can afford a Sous Vide Supreme, you should save up the couple hundred extra bucks you'd need to buy a Polyscience circulator and cook in a big pot or a cambro. The Sous Vide Supreme's water bath is too small, and it doesn't circulate, so it gets hot spots and it can't really cook enough to be practical. Also, since the bath is so small you can't do larger cuts that would benefit from the treatment.

Seems like someone should make a slow cooker with a sous vide capability, maybe a thin mesh grille on the bottom to keep the bag away and a magnetic stirrer. Add a temperature control and you've got something.

This is basically what a Sous Vide Supreme is, without the stirring.

[RichVR]

Could you use a sealed bag in a slow cooker? I'm guessing not because the temp of a slow cooker is higher than a sous vide device.

I've heard of using a small cooler, like for the size of a six pack and a coffee cup heater. Any thoughts?

[interman]

My experience with this thing is basically that if you can afford a Sous Vide Supreme, you should save up the couple hundred extra bucks you'd need to buy a Polyscience circulator and cook in a big pot or a cambro. The Sous Vide Supreme's water bath is too small, and it doesn't circulate, so it gets hot spots and it can't really cook enough to be practical. Also, since the bath is so small you can't do larger cuts that would benefit from the treatment.



This is basically what a Sous Vide Supreme is, without the stirring.

Ah yes I've heard of those. Thanks for the tip. That's probably the better choice.

[Houngan]

Could you use a sealed bag in a slow cooker? I'm guessing not because the temp of a slow cooker is higher than a sous vide device.

I've heard of using a small cooler, like for the size of a six pack and a coffee cup heater. Any thoughts?

Yeah, but what I'm not getting is that a slow cooker with a broader thermostat + baking rack = sous vide machine. A magnetic stirrer can be found in christmas toys these days, it's a tiny electric motor and a magnet, can't be more than $5. Somebody is missing out on a market.

H.

[Waltzer]

Could you use a sealed bag in a slow cooker? I'm guessing not because the temp of a slow cooker is higher than a sous vide device.

I've heard of using a small cooler, like for the size of a six pack and a coffee cup heater. Any thoughts?

Yeah, it's too hot. You could use it for vegetables, maybe, which need 185* F, but for veg it's every bit as easy to use a big pot, a slow flame, and a probe thermometer, since you're only cooking for an hour.

The cooler method works great for short stuff but can't insulate long enough to do, for example, 50-hour short ribs, although I guess you could replace the water bath every 4-6 hours.

[Morberis]

Mushroom soup with bacon and cilantro.

Your post inspired me to make something similar, could you link your recipe? Mine turned out great but for curiosity's sake.

I used about
4 pieces of bacon crumbled
1 quart chicken stock
1 med onion sauteed in 4 tbsp butter until clear
1/2 cup dry sherry
1 1/4 pounds white mushrooms, blended 1 pound of them with the soup and cut the other 1/4 pound into small pieces.
1 cup heavy cream. I couldn't find your non-sour creme in the 2 stores I checked (safeway, save-on-foods) that had 28% butterfat so I just used a heavy cream instead.
1.5 tbsp cilantro

Yours does look better. And if I were to do it again I would fry my mushrooms (or the ones that will be small pieces) with some butter before I added them. I also never strained mine but tbh after using the immersion blender there are almost no pieces in there other than the ones I deliberately added.

[interman]

Hmm I used almost exactly the same ingredients, though I used some curry powder too, and quite a bit of pepper (in retrospect probably too much), and the juice of half a lemon instead of alcohol. Perhaps the texture of mine is different. It was definitely on the thicker side, thanks to some corn starch, and having it simmer for a decent amount of time.

[RichVR]

This looked interesting: Ice Chest Sous Vide.

[Morberis]

Does anyone have any good stir fry recipes that use chili peppers? The local Earls has their Hunan kung pow and their chili's always explode with flavour in my mouth, as in they always seem filled with something.

But that's not necessary. In fact any recipes that are QT3 approved except for chili that use chili peppers would be lovely.

[RichVR]

Buy a bunch of dried chilis at a local store. Stay away from the plastic bags full of ancient chilis, because, they are ancient. Make sure that either:

1. The dried chilis that you use are intact. This will allow you to infuse an oil or a sauce with the flavor, but not impart tastebud killing heat. Then, you can remove them before serving.

2. If you like more heat, then a broken dried pepper is your friend. It will give up its seeds to the dish. Also the inside of the pepper will give more heat.

3. Used any type of dried pepper and put a bunch in a bottle of your favorite cooking oil. Cap it and let it sit. In a cool place, cause oil can actually go bad. But you knew that.

As for your question, any stir fry can benefit from chilis. General Tso and his friend Kung Pao would agree.

There are many recipes online. I hate to say it but, Google is your friend. Please report back when you make something fantastic!

[Christien Murawski]

Red Pepper Polenta

The recipe called for a mess of quick-cooking polenta, but I couldn't find that in any of the stores I went to and had plenty of cornmeal on hand, so I adapted.

Get 6 cups of liquid going (I used 4 chicken stock/2 water, but whatever) with some garlic and a pinch of salt. Stir in 1 1/3 cup cornmeal. Once boiling stir constantly for about 5 min. Reduce heat and partially cover. Cook 45 min stirring occasionally.

Preheat oven to 400F.

Get out a couple of jars of roasted red peppers. Drain out the water and chop up the peppers to whatever size suits you. Grate 6-8 ounces of fontina cheese, stir that in with about half a cup of parmesan cheese and a teaspoon of chopped up fresh rosemary. Crank in some pepper.

Butter up a baking dish. Here I'm a little fuzzy. The recipe calls for a 4-quart dish, but I was reducing the recipe so I used a 3-quart. Transfer polenta to dish, sprinkle on more parm and bake for about 30 minutes.

This is my first time trying this. I've made regular old polenta plenty of times, but never noodled with it like this. It came out delicious and creamy and cheesy, but way too loose. I think that's just the way polenta turns out though (initially). After an overnight in the fridge it was nice and sliceable, and I've tried it broiled and heated in a skillet and it's quite nice, but still gets too loose. Cold it's too compact. Not sure what to tinker with here to make it firm up. I'm thinking of maybe trying a loaf pan. That won't address the looseness but might allow it to puff up more.

Anyway, I love the taste, I'd just like to adjust it so that it'd be something I could bring to potluck-type things. Not sure if that'll be possible though.

Also today I made a grilled cheese with turkey and muenster in my waffle-iron...heaven.


-xtien

[Morberis]

Arise my favourite thread, arise!

So I moved into a fantastic new place, hardwood floors and, here's the important part, a gas stove! No room for my spices though, so I uh... I put up a spice rack in my room.



Anyway I had a party last weekend so I smoked 6 racks of ribs.






I had already pulled the top grill off. Sorry! By morning every rib was gone.

I used the spice rub that I posted about earlier in this thread.
Bonedust seasoning
1/2 cup paprika
1/4 chili powder
3 tbsp salt
2 tbsp ground coriander
2 tbsp garlic powder
2 tbsp curry powder
2 tbsp mustard powder
2 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp ground pepper
1 tbsp ground basil
1 tbsp ground thyme
1 tbsp ground cumin
1 tbsp cayenne pepper

For the sauce I used

Barbecue Spare Ribs with Ginger Ale (serves 6-8)

3-4 pounds spare ribs
1/2 cup barbecue dry rub spice mix
2 cups ketchup
1 cup ginger ale
1/2 cup rice wine vinegar
1/4 cup worcestershire sauce
2 Tablespoons honey
1 Tablespoon fresh grated ginger

Source

Tonight I made stir fry, a variation of what I also posted about earlier in this thread except I added a little dry sherry to the sauce.




My cooking has really come a long way, partly because of reading through this thread. Also from browsing Gojee.com which has rapidly become my favourite cooking site.

[interman]

Really liking gojee.com. Thanks for the tip, and good looking food!

For the first time ever I'm getting paid to make a birthday cake. This one is for a Ghanaian girl's 25th birthday. It's not going to be huge due to budget constraints, but I'm thinking strawberry mousse, vanilla cream, homemade fondant, royal icing, various fancy piped stuff, fondant/gum flowers. Classy, white, some pink, and some purple.

[Siren]

Really liking gojee.com. Thanks for the tip, and good looking food!

For the first time ever I'm getting paid to make a birthday cake. This one is for a Ghanaian girl's 25th birthday. It's not going to be huge due to budget constraints, but I'm thinking strawberry mousse, vanilla cream, homemade fondant, royal icing, various fancy piped stuff, fondant/gum flowers. Classy, white, some pink, and some purple.

Definitely use marshmallow fondant instead of the regular stuff. It tastes so much better!

[CLWheeljack]

Honestly, I see very little reason to ever use fondant at all. It's for looking at, and cakes should be for eating.

Nonetheless, that sounds like quite an impressive cake. Be sure to check in with photos when you're done!

[Armando Penblade]

Sweet Jesus bacon smells so good while it's baking.

Preparing for Barfood Burger tonight. 1/3lb patty of 85/15 ground ground cooked with salt and fresh-ground black pepper, served on a potato roll with shredded lettuce, sliced tomatoes and onions, jalepenos, pepperjack cheese, and chipotle mayo (maybe french fried onions, too). On the side are some "extra crispy" seasoned fries that have been sent through my trusty deep fryer, then coated with shredded cheddar and chopped, fresh-baked bacon :)

YEAH FAT.

[Ed Solomon]

Hotdog with kimchi. Very tasty.

[interman]

Honestly, I see very little reason to ever use fondant at all. It's for looking at, and cakes should be for eating.

Nonetheless, that sounds like quite an impressive cake. Be sure to check in with photos when you're done!

For some reason marshmallows are hilariously expensive in Norway. Ended up going with a (homemade, ugh) marzipan layer with royal icing on top. Got the first icing layer pretty much done last night. Today I'm grinding off some of the unevenness and doing a thinner layer of icing. It's not going to look as crisp as I originally wanted, but still pretty decent. Pics coming tomorrow probably.

[Reemul]

That gojee site is great thanks for the link.

I really like cooking but am finding it tough at the moment, 2 young kids get fed at 17.30pm and the wife and I are eating at 8pm. I start work at 7am so by then I am struggling a bit

Now the weather is getting better i like to do a quick bit of barbecue just for the 2 of us, nothing to in depth just quick and simple.

Diced pork on skewers. Drizzle in lemon and salt and rotate slowly until nicely cooked, adding lemon as they cook.

Add a toasted on the barbecue pitta bread, some Grilled haloumi cheese and some plain greek yoghurt. A small salad, I like Lettuce, cabbage, peppers, tomato, cucumber and a mustard salad dressing and a glass of wine.

The haloumi is tricky in that you want it nicely cooked but soft in the middle. Frying is best but very unhealthy but grilling can leave it too crispy.

Just to add it's over charcoal not gas, as above I find Pork tastes so much better on the charcoal

Just to add I am not a great Pork fan but the barbecue seems to really bring it's flavours out comapred to the oven.

[interman]

You can (relatively) easily make stuff more in depth by preparing stuff in advance. An example would be cooking good stock, reducing it quite a lot, and freezing it as ice cubes.

[interman]

Finished up the cake, and overall it went pretty good. I don't make a lot of cakes, but I got some fun experience making this one from scratch.

Basically it's (syrup soaked) sponge, strawberry mousse with lots of strawberries scattered around, more sponge, creme patissiere, more sponge, marzipan (close to 50% almonds), royal icing, then fondant to make the decorations.

What went well:
Although I had to whip it by hand the sponge was nice and fluffy. Next time I'll remember to get my mixer back in time.

The mousse was pretty awesome. Basically strawberry jam and the juice of one lemon mixed with gelatine. Fold in italian meringue (which is why lemon really helps, as it's sweet as fuck), then fold in whipped cream.

The fondant was nice, and easy to work with. I made a bunch of invert sugar as a substitute for corn syrup, and it worked just fine. Considering it was my first time using fondant I think the decorations turned out okay, though my writing needs work.

What could've been better:
The marzipan was tricky. First off you can't buy almond flour here, so I had to make that. Blanched and shocked a pound of almonds, dried them, then got to work with my chefs knife and sifter. It took almost two hours. I've gotta find an almond grinder for reals.

Covering the top was easy enough, but the sides were a huge pain. I was going by http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PbOkVa_-38 which looks seriously awesome. Basically you cut a circle for the top, and then a long strip for the sides. Doing that was easy enough, but getting the strip to stay on was hard as hell, even with jam and egg whites. Eventually it looked okay, and I figured I'd smooth it out using icing - which was the next thing that needs improvement. I think once whatever I'm icing is smoother it'll be far easier.

Next time I'm going to try a different approach using ganache to fill the inside, and then cover using marshmallow fondant, which should be far easier to mold smoothly.

The girl loved the cake though, and taste wise it was where it should be.

[Morberis]

My roommate is highly allergic to a few things, mainly wheat (not gluten), eggs, dairy but a few other things like garlic, sesame, and mildly sugar. So basically she gets to eat really healthy food only.

Anyway she's been down the last few days so I decided to cook a few things for her. The first off is a chocolate pudding that takes about a minute, the second which was harder was a non-dairy, no-egg, no-wheat cheesecake. But Morberis, how does that work isn't the main ingrediant in cheesecake a dairy product? Why yes, yes it is which is why she hasnt been able to have her favourite food in 5 years.

First though, pudding.

Chia Chocolate Pudding

3/4 cup Chocolate almond milk
1/4 cup chia seeds
1 tbsp cocoa powder
1/2 tbsp sugar

MIX! Let sit 30 minutes. DONE!



Same consistancy as pudding, the seeds crackle a bit which I really like.

Vegan Chocolate Cheesecake

Crust
3/4 cup almond meal (ground almond)
1/4 cocoa powder
3/4 cup corn flour is what I used
1 tea ground cinnamon
1/4 tea salt
1/3 cup maple syrup, I used Honey
1/4 cup oil, I used canola but if I ahd almond I would have used that. My sesame oil might kill her if she ate it

Topping
1/4 cup egg replacement powder
1/4 cup + 2 tbsp hot water
2/3 cup dairy free dark chocolate
1 tbsp dairy free margarine
32 ox dair free cream cheese
1 cup sugar
1/2 t vanilla. I used 1 tbsp

Prep!
1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Lightly oil a 10' pan

2. Crust, make it! Combine almond meal, cocoa powder, flour, cinnamon, salt. In another bowl combine maple syrup and oil, mix until... mixed. Combine! Mix until mixed. Should be crumbly.

3. Press dough into pan and poke with a fork so that it doesn't bubble. Bake for 7 minutes. Cool.

4. Turn oven up to 400 F

5. Filling, this is the time to make it. Combine egg replacement powder and water, mix until consistant - it should be stiff.Place chocolate chips and margarine in a boil proof bown, place in a pot of boiling water that won't overflow into the bowl. Melt and mix well so that it doesn't burn. Remove.

6. In a large bowl mix cream cheese and sugar, use an electric hand mixer for 4 minutes until consistant or like me use a spoon until consistant - make sure you move your arm really fast and imitate the sound of a blender. Add in egg replacement mix, mix. Add in chocolate, mix.

7. Pour filling over the crust, smooth. Bake at 400F for 5 minutes, turn down to 275 and bake for 40 minutes. Open the oven for 4 minutes between to cool.

[CourteousD]

Arise!

This evening, the house special (and a blue plate special, at that) was "Grilled Swordfish a la Vermont and New Hampshire":



And the lifetime achievement award goes to.... Tangerine Counter Top!

Tangerine Counter Top would like to thank its long-time partner, Non-Abrasive Cleaner, and the year 1974.

[Brad Grenz]

Made some nice Pad Thai this week.

[TimElhajj]

damn brad that looks good.

[Christien Murawski]

Agreed. Brad that looks good. Do you mind breaking down how you did it? I'd love to add that to my repertoire.

And thanks, CourteousD, for bumping this thread. I've missed it.


-xtien

[Houngan]

Hmm, I had a weird impulse to make mustard. I dug out the bag of Amish mustard seed I've had for probably six years, threw in a half cup of seed to three TBPS of AC vinegar, salt, pepper, and paprika then turned on the cuisinart and let it run. Drizzled in a few splashes of olive oil and it came together, and it isn't insanely hot like my earlier efforts. I'm not sure if it's the age of the seeds or if I did something different.

However, it did come out more mayonnaise than mustard in the consistency department, I think I need to throw it back in, add some new seeds for texture, and water it down a bit.

[Enidigm]

I have about 1x10^24 native chiltepin peppers. What do i do with them? They are hot as arrrgggg.

[Ed Solomon]

I have about 1x10^24 native chiltepin peppers. What do i do with them? They are hot as arrrgggg.

Dry them. I've never done it but just put them in the oven as low as it will go with the door propped open a smidgen and see what happens.