What can you expect in the Food Thread on PF?

[turbo]

The venison boiled-dinner was fantastic, including that wonderful wine-laced gravy. Best of all, I've got lots of left-overs for breakfasts, lunches, etc. I browned the roast thoroughly before adding the wine and water, and all that residue from the browning was lifted by the wine during the simmering, making the base for a very dark rich gravy.

 

[Astronuc]

Supper was sublime! Instead of using celery and green peppers (which are strong enough to overpower the flavor of the shrimp), we sauteed crushed garlic, chopped onions, mushrooms, and snow peas in butter, reserved the vegetables, sauteed the shrimp and stirred the vegetables back in before serving over Basmati rice.

I have spoken to my father's new neighbor a few times, and though I don't really know him, I LOVE that guy. When he and his buddies come up to fish or go snowmobiling, they stock up on food, and when they head back to the coast, they give my father all the perishables. Plus, the guy brings my father one-clawed lobsters that he catches, and fresh Atlantic scallops and shrimp that he barters for on the docks. What a great connection!

Um - you really need to film this. It sounds a lot more interesting than what I've seen on most cooking shows.

And maybe Evo could do a guest appearance.

 

[turbo]

Um - you really need to film this. It sounds a lot more interesting than what I've seen on most cooking shows.

And maybe Evo could do a guest appearance.

I think you'd like our stir-fries. I really don't miss the Food Network at all. My wife and I have better ideas, anyway, and we don't have to pretend that the food is good. It is!

I'm not saying that the TV-show food is not that great, but it certainly seemed that lots of the raves were really over-the-top. I tend to judge how good the food is by how fast it disappears. We had our niece and her husband over last weekend so he could measure the kitchen for cabinets, and we served spinach salad, crab-cakes, and my home-made tartar sauce, made very simply with chili relish, salt, pepper, and mayonnaise. That stuff practically disappeared, and I had to make more sauce for the crab-cakes - very popular!

 

[LowlyPion]

... and I figure that as much as we both love cooking and canning, it's not out-of-line to invest a couple of grand in a great range.

I wonder if you have considered the extravagance of an Aga Cooker?

Being designed by a blind physicist and all might be appealing. And your living in a colder part of the country ... I think if you can't justify it then just about no one south of the Arctic Circle can.

 

[turbo]

I wonder if you have considered the extravagance of an Aga Cooker?

Being designed by a blind physicist and all might be appealing. And your living in a colder part of the country ... I think if you can't justify it then just about no one south of the Arctic Circle can.

Thanks for the suggestion: One problem - they are all either all-electric or dual-fuel. We want to run the oven on propane, as well as the stove-top, and all the pro-quality ranges are dual-fuel, these days. The Electrolux range I want is very heavy, tough, well-insulated, with features that would help me with canning, salsa-making, pickling, etc. My wife and I have had electrically-heated ovens in the past and we don't want any more of them. Gas ovens make moister breads and pies, and combined with the convection feature, we'll be able to get more consistent results with 2-rack baking. The Electrolux range line is the highest-quality all-gas range that I have found. We have KitchenAid appliances and cookware, but the KitchenAid ranges look tinny and cheap in comparison.

 

[turbo]

I should mention that when Bosch owned KitchenAid, they equipped the KA cook-tops with very superior burners. Unfortunately, they never fitted those burners to the KA ranges, and later when Whirlpool bought KA from Bosch, they dragged the brand down to the level of rest of the US appliance industry.

 

[Astronuc]

I think you'd like our stir-fries. I really don't miss the Food Network at all. My wife and I have better ideas, anyway, and we don't have to pretend that the food is good. It is!

I enjoyed the dinner we had, and I'm sure I'd enjoy anything you'd cook up. I like everything in this thread.

I may have some free time this summer.

 

[turbo]

I enjoyed the dinner we had, and I'm sure I'd enjoy anything you'd cook up. I like everything in this thread.

I may have some free time this summer.

Please, please come up for a visit. I'd love to cook some more stuff for you and your family. I could be persuaded to make marinated spicy grilled Tiger shrimp with grilled mixed vegetables (LOVE those wire baskets), and some jalapeno poppers for appetizers. You still haven't tasted my home-made Carribean red chili relish, either. I think you'd be impressed. My chili-head neighbor refused additional jars after the first one (I heard 2nd-hand stories from guys at the paper mill about how mean that relish was) and my little brother has not asked for a 2nd jar, either. I may either have to tone it down a bit with cayenne and jalapeno, or just jar it up for myself as "private stock".

 

[turbo]

Don't buy Debbie Meyers Green Bags. My wife apparently saw the ads on morning TV and picked up a box after work yesterday. Luckily, she hadn't opened them yet, and I had a chance to look them up on Google. Consumer Reports says that other methods of food storage work better and keep food from spoiling longer, including run-of-the mill Ziplock bags. That box of pricey bags is going back to the store for a refund.

http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/news/2008/07/debbie-meyer-green-bags/overview/storing-fruit-ov.htm

 

[LowlyPion]

Don't buy Debbie Meyers Green Bags.

There's a thread on this in Product Claims
https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=231111

 

[LowlyPion]

I saw a Jacques Pépin show this afternoon. He's apparently into quick meals and quite frankly I made a couple of his dishes this evening, and found them much better suited to my palate than Rachel Ray's coarser tastes.

It was a relief not hearing that chatty sing song anything that comes into her head malarkey punctuated with EVOO or her adolescent vocabulary.

 

[Evo]

Somehow I can't imagine Pepin saying "yummo".

 

[Evo]

YAY! The new season of Dinner:impossible with Robert Irvine starts April 8th!

 

[LowlyPion]

Somehow I can't imagine Pepin saying "yummo".

I did 2 of the recipes tonight ... well sort of with my mods ... as I was off to the store right after. The pork tenderloin medallions with a mixed fruit (mission fig, apricot and raisin and grape butter garlic and a little balsamic) compote. Then I pan fried the baby spinach leaves with pecans and a little of the compote. He didn't do the cheese popovers I did, but they take a little longer to pull off, at least for me, in just half an hour. Another very satisfying meal though ... no leftovers.

The recipes were relatively simple though and not the ingredient lotto that Rachel Ray tends to play throwing combinations of things together.

 

[Evo]

Oddly, the best spaghetti and meatballs I've ever eaten is a 98 cent Banquet frozen tv dinner. I love these things.

 

[ViewsofMars]

Share your favourite recipes, your kind of cuisine and favourite dishes, dining experiences, or even your kitchen antics and fiascos.

One of my favorite, once in a lifetime dining experiences was at a Ritz Carlton Hotel. It was a 15 course meal by a world renowned chef.

This is a favorite recipe that I've shared with friends. They love it as much as I do.

CHINESE CHICKEN SALAD

DRESSING – Mix following ingredients and set aside.

1 tbs. Soyo sauce
½ teas. Seasame oil
¼ cup canola oil
1/3 cup rice vinegar
1/3 cup sugar or honey

SALAD – Mix the following ingredients in a large bowl.

1 head cabbage finely sliced
6 green onions chopped
½ bunch cilantro chopped
2 big cans of white chicken meat drained and shredded (Opitional)

SAUTE – Fry the following ingredients until golden brown

½ cube butter
1pkg. Of sliced almonds
1 pkg. Ramen oriental chicken flavored noodle soup
(crunch the noodles up into small pieces and also
sprinkle the flavoring packet into the frying pan
with these ingredients.)
2 tbls. Seseme seeds

Combine and toss all ingredients prior to serving.

This salad will feed a party of 8. Sometimes I mix the salad without the dressing. Store it in my refrigerator and graze off of it for days. It's really good stuff.

 

[Evo]

VoM, that sounds really good but the ramen soup sounds a bit scary.

 

[Evo]

I went out and bought tons of food the other day. I found that when I bought foods that I realized that I was connecting certain foods with certain members.

Here is what I associate with certain members

Doc Al - sardines

Hurkyl - ground beef for tacos and frozen pizza, ice cream, cajun chicken and Wendy's Baconator

Kurdt and cristo - corned beef

Christina - I can no longer look at fish without thinking of worms

turbo-1 - salmon, soups, stews

Ivan Seeking - steak

Zapper Z - anything exotic and exiting

Astronuc - roast bee, ok he corrected that to beef, but I wouldn't have been surprised if he had indeed roasted a bee and served it surrounded by tiny vegetables

Of course anything spicy hot will forever be turbo & astro, cookies (biscuits) and whisky will always be Kurdt, as will cookie dough ice cream and 4 pints of beer, vegan mcknia and lisab's daughter, moose or elk with cloudberry sauce - Astro

humanino - octopus suction cups

The Baconator for those of you that do not know this exquisite parcel of beef, bacon and cheese.

 

[turbo]

I will play chef tomorrow. My wife will be home later in the day, after taking care of her mother starting later this afternoon. The weather has been very nice, and we put the patio furniture on the back deck and I've got it all cleaned up. If the weather cooperates, I will invite my father to have a cookout with us. I'm going to grill up some nice steaks and grill sliced vegetables in a wire clamshell basket, basting with a mix of olive oil, lemon juice, burgundy, chili relish, and whatever spices appeal to me when I'm making the basting sauce. Dry mustard, black pepper, salt, basil, oregano, ground cumin seed, Javin curry powder...?? Who knows? I try not to plan these things out - it's more fun just winging it.

 

[turbo]

I have always been a fan of French cutlery, and have been a bit leery about lighter foreign-made stuff. My wife bought a 5" utility knife by Kuhn Rikon a week ago, and I am pretty impressed. It is a light carbon-steel blade with an anti-stick coating and a lightweight ergonomic grip. I am not willing to relinquish my Sabbatier 6" chef's knife, but at less than 1/3 the price the Kuhn Rikon is very impressive. I am considering buying a couple of their paring knives and a chef's knife to supplement our cutlery. Carbon-steel needs a bit more attention than SS, but most cooks here already know that. The utility knife is very nice. K-R is a Swiss company, but the knives are made in China - the quality is very good, despite what I would have expected.

 

[Evo]

I like my Wusthof Trident knives. I want to try one of those ceramic knives. I have an old carbon steel knife, I keep it dry and clean, so no problems, and I've had it for many years. Let me know how that one holds up turbo.

I just finished baking a 12 pound ham. Good eats are in my future.

 

[turbo]

I like my Wusthof Trident knives. I want to try one of those ceramic knives. I have an old carbon steel knife, I keep it dry and clean, so no problems, and I've had it for many years. Let me know how that one holds up turbo.

I just finished baking a 12 pound ham. Good eats are in my future.

Those are good knives, as are most of the old German brands. I prefer the French-made 4-star Elephant Sabbatier knives for their lightness, balance, and edge-holding abilities. If I could have afforded a full set of those years back, I would have bought the whole deal. As an amateur knife-maker, I have nothing but respect for that brand. Fantastic mix of toughness, flexibility, and edge-retention. NOTE: If you like cooking and you don't own a 4-star Elephant Sabbatier Knife, buy a 6" carbon steel chef's knife. You will never own another knife that is half as handy in the kitchen.

If this Kuhn-Rikon holds up well, I will buy more. The price is fantastic and the ergonomics of the grip suit both my wife and me. We both have smallish hands, and arthritis sometimes gives me problems.

Edit: Before you consider buying a ceramic knife consider that they are very fragile (think chips on every little hard impact), and that you would have to contract with someone with diamond tools to re-sharpen them as they wear. Very few people have the capability to re-edge ceramic knives as they dull.

 

[LowlyPion]

I have always been a fan of French cutlery, and have been a bit leery about lighter foreign-made stuff. My wife bought a 5" utility knife by Kuhn Rikon a week ago, and I am pretty impressed. It is a light carbon-steel blade with an anti-stick coating and a lightweight ergonomic grip. I am not willing to relinquish my Sabbatier 6" chef's knife, but at less than 1/3 the price the Kuhn Rikon is very impressive. I am considering buying a couple of their paring knives and a chef's knife to supplement our cutlery. Carbon-steel needs a bit more attention than SS, but most cooks here already know that. The utility knife is very nice. K-R is a Swiss company, but the knives are made in China - the quality is very good, despite what I would have expected.

I have a collection of mostly Sabatier myself. Though I did recently get an inexpensive Cuisinart Santoku blade that makes a good quick use dice of onions, or cutting small cuts of meats and requires a little less care. But I do appreciate the edge I can keep on the Sabatiers. I sometimes even clean the stains off them, so I am not a complete purist.

 

[turbo]

I have a collection of mostly Sabatier myself. Though I did recently get an inexpensive Cuisinart Santoku blade that makes a good quick use dice of onions, or cutting small cuts of meats and requires a little less care. But I do appreciate the edge I can keep on the Sabatiers. I sometimes even clean the stains off them, so I am not a complete purist.

I let my carbon-steel knives get a dark patina (protective oxidation, in my mind) on the body of the blade, but I keep touching up the edges with a steel so they are always shaving-sharp. When you rub a finger across the edge of a good knife, it should always sound like "zing". I'll use carbon-steel knives to cut tomatoes, lemons, and other acidic stuff, but they always get rinsed off immediately afterward.

 

[LowlyPion]

I let my carbon-steel knives get a dark patina (protective oxidation, in my mind) on the body of the blade, but I keep touching up the edges with a steel so they are always shaving-sharp. When you rub a finger across the edge of a good knife, it should always sound like "zing". I'll use carbon-steel knives to cut tomatoes, lemons, and other acidic stuff, but they always get rinsed off immediately afterward.

My method (don't cringe now) is to use powdered Ajax and a wine cork to lightly work the paste to buff out some of the more egregious stains and even out and lighten the blade a bit, but I am not anal about keeping them showroom bright or anything like that. They are my trusty tools and I like to keep them sharp enough to easily cut a piece of paper.

 

[turbo]

My method (don't cringe now) is to use powdered Ajax and a wine cork to lightly work the paste to buff out some of the more egregious stains and even out and lighten the blade a bit, but I am not anal about keeping them showroom bright or anything like that. They are my trusty tools and I like to keep them sharp enough to easily cut a piece of paper.

OK, now I'm scared! Well-used carbon-steel knives should have a dark patina. That patina stabilizes the surface against further oxidation. Then, maintain the edge. I have a 2-sided diamond hone and a decent steel, and there is little that a decent knife needs apart from a little periodic touch-up to keep it operating at top performance. To be fair, the diamond hone gets used most when cleavers, butcher-knives, and other softer-steel tools need to be re-sharpened.

 

[Evo]

Have either of you owned a Wusthof Trident? They are <cough> superior to Sabatier, but they are also a lot more expensive. A hell of a lot more expensive, but once you use one...

A Sabatier 14 piece knife set sells for $99.99

A Wusthof Trident 8 piece sells for $299.99

I believe I paid over $100 just for my chef's knife 30 years ago, but it is something I will hand down to the Evo Child, who will never use it.

 

[turbo]

Have either of you owned a Wusthof Trident? They are <cough> superior to Sabatier, but they are also a lot more expensive. A hell of a lot more expensive, but once you use one...

A Sabatier 14 piece knife set sells for $99.99

A Wusthof Trident 8 piece sells for $299.99

I believe I paid over $100 just for my chef's knife 30 years ago, but it is something I will hand down to the Evo Child, who will never use it.

Yes - one of my mother's hand-me-down knives from her mother was a of that brand.

BTW, if you can find a Sabatier 14-piece knife set (real, not fantasy) I will gladly buy
all the 14-piece sets that I can get for $99 each. That is unreal pricing on high-quality cutlery.

 

[Evo]

Yes - one of my mother's hand-me-down knives from her mother was a of that brand.

BTW, if you can find a Sabatier 14-piece knife set (real, not fantasy) I will gladly buy
all the 14-piece sets that I can get for $99 each. That is unreal pricing on high-quality cutlery.

Amazon.com. but they are out of them and don't know if they will restock.

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4HPIA_enUS312US243&q=sabatier

Sabatier has even shut down their website for their knives. What's going on?

http://www.shop.sabatier.com/

 

[LowlyPion]

Have either of you owned a Wusthof Trident? They are <cough> superior to Sabatier, but they are also a lot more expensive. A hell of a lot more expensive, but once you use one...

A Sabatier 14 piece knife set sells for $99.99

A Wusthof Trident 8 piece sells for $299.99

I believe I paid over $100 just for my chef's knife 30 years ago, but it is something I will hand down to the Evo Child, who will never use it.

If you mean superior in price, then no. But as I recall, I did pay more than that for the Sabatier knives I've had.

By that measure Rachel Ray has superior gear too.

I've been quite satisfied that my Sabatier was good enough for whatever my purposes. I think the Sabatier is priced less because the blades do discolor, they aren't stainless, but that of course makes them easier to sharpen too with a couple of quick passes of the sharpening rod. I have a couple of stainless blades and they are good, but I guess I just prefer the carbon steel blades.

 

[Evo]

If you mean superior in price, then no. But as I recall, I did pay more than that for the Sabatier knives I've had.

By that measure Rachel Ray has superior gear too.

I've been quite satisfied that my Sabatier was good enough for whatever my purposes. I think the Sabatier is priced less because the blades do discolor, they aren't stainless, but that of course makes them easier to sharpen too with a couple of quick passes of the sharpening rod. I have a couple of stainless blades and they are good, but I guess I just prefer the carbon steel blades.

Try one, you'll love it.

There is just a feel, a heft, a balance with Wusthof that you don't get with Sabatier.

 

[LowlyPion]

OK, now I'm scared! Well-used carbon-steel knives should have a dark patina. That patina stabilizes the surface against further oxidation. Then, maintain the edge. I have a 2-sided diamond hone and a decent steel, and there is little that a decent knife needs apart from a little periodic touch-up to keep it operating at top performance. To be fair, the diamond hone gets used most when cleavers, butcher-knives, and other softer-steel tools need to be re-sharpened.

Yeah, well, I'm not always careful. Sometimes a piece of onion gets stuck to the blade or I leave it on the counter and a little water might get trapped underneath overnight. Evening out the coloration makes me feel a little better about my crimes, It let's me feel less guilty, even though you might see it as compounding the offense.

I do just use the steel rod for sharpening, and that is most satisfactory.

 

[turbo]

Try one, you'll love it.

There is just a feel, a heft, a balance with Wusthof that you don't get with Sabatier.

There are Sabatiers, and there are Sabatiers. Apparently any knife-maker in that region can glom onto that name at will. The ones I buy have a 4-star and elephant logo. A 6" carbon steel chef's knife can run you about $70 or so. I bought my first Sabatier around 1976 or so at the grand opening of a store that sold high-end cookware. It was on sale for about $25. I picked it up, thumbed the edge and heard it "zing" and just had to have it. That was 1/2 day's pay for me in those days. My favorite knife ever, and it got lost years later in one of our frequent moves (chasing jobs kept us mobile).

As you can see, buying a 14-piece knife set for $99 does not get you the quality of a decent forged Sabatier - just some knives with a name on them. Here's the real deal, and even these are the "inox" stainless blades. The carbon-steel blades are much more expensive.
http://www.greatfrenchknives.com/sets.html

 

[turbo]

Supper last night was wonderful! I grilled baskets of sliced summer squash, red onions, bell peppers, and mushroom and basted them with a sauce I whipped up. It started with about a cup (+) of Burgundy, the juice of two lemons, about 1/4 cup of extra-virgin olive oil, oregano, basil, black pepper, and salt and some Javin brand curry powder. I also added a hefty squeeze of ketchup to the sauce so I could get it to blacken on the vegetables a bit. Once the vegetables were about done, I shuffled those clamshell baskets off to one side with the burner on low, turned up the other side of the grill to high and cooked up a 1" thick boneless rib-eye. It was very cold and windy out of the deck, so we had to eat inside, but it felt great to have a "cookout" with fresh vegetables. Store-bought vegetables are a poor substitute, but in a few months we'll be doing it "for real" with the good stuff from the garden.

Edit: I cut the lemons with a SS blade, but gave the new little 5" Kuhn Rikon carbon-steel blade a workout cutting the vegetables. The blade has a non-stick coating that is a bit rough, and it releases cleanly. Slicing summer squash and onions can often result in having previous slices "hitch-hike" on the blade, but this knife cut cleanly with no sticking. Score one for the cheapo knife. I still prefer my Sabatier 6" chef for food-prep though.

 

[turbo]

During food-prep for tonight's supper (including slicing potatoes and onions) I gave the Sabatier and the Kuhn Rikon a side-by side evaluation. The Sabatier is well-balanced and slightly blade-heavy with a nice bolster to help center the mass of the knife. It's great for slicing, but it is also very nice for light-weight chopping like mincing scallions and chives and garlic. The Kuhn Rikon is very thin and light and though it does a great job of slicing vegetables (with the aforementioned non-stick coatings to release thin slices easily) the lack of forward-weight will prompt me to grab the Sabatier instead when I have some light chopping to do. The nice curve of the Kuhn Rikon's edge should allow easy mincing with a rocking motion, though I would like to have a little more heft in the KR for chopping. Both knives will have a place in the kitchen (5-6" blades are tops!) but despite the expense of a hand-forged Sabatier ($70+ for a 6" chef's knife) I would pay it all over again to replace it. Balance is not as much of an issue with paring knives, so I may spring for a couple of KR parers. My next 8-10" chef's knife will definitely be a Sabatier 4-star elephant, though. (Be still my wallet!)