What's cooking? part 4

I wonder why I never made parmesan biscuits before - so easy! 4.5oz plain flour, 4.5oz butter, 1oz grated parmesan, a pinch of cayenne and a hefty grind of black pepper. All store cupboard ingredients, only 10 mins in the oven and HIGHLY addictive.

It always makes me feel like such an old lady, but reading the weekly grocery circulars is really a weekly peak for me. Avocados 8 for $1!

^^^^one of the few things I miss about Texass is avacado deals like this all the damn time!!!

Potato soup and cornbread, perfect to go with the winter storm rolling in.

so i want to cook this recipe that involves a mushroom sauce - shiitake mushrooms, garlic, sake and lemon. but i don't have sake. i have close proximity to a corner store where i could get some kind of wine.

what would be a suitable replacement?

most recipes say you can sub dry sherry for rice wine

but i guess a recipe that asks for sake is not asking for rice wine

i bet it's too late but thinking about this, a rice wine substitute would probably be fine in that context. i don't really get why a recipe would ask for sake if it's to be cooked because sake doesn't taste like much to me except alcohol. it's like half-strength vodka so you could probably even add that (and then the alcohol just cooks off). can you tell i don't like sake.....
someone who cooks with that could probably answer better but that's how i would guess

yeah see sake and vodka dont taste anything alike

they both taste like alcohol and water to me, i really have no taste for sake at all

yeah i was gonna say try mirin?

oh also if you have a korean grocery/liquor store you could use soju, which i know is not like sake but it also tastes the same to me! this is how i cook by substituting things that aren't real substitutes

i do that all the time :)

soju http://www.rabbitsonline.net/images/emoticons/disgust.gif

i had a pretty awesome soju bloody mary once at a korean place. they serve it with a cucumber kimchee garnish and fresh horseradish!

ehh i already sent jordan out for dry white wine - i think i will add 3/4 dry white and 1/4 mirin, since i have some of that.

ok that might be good; i've only downed it straight.

xpost

sounds good to me - white wine would work well w/ the rest of the ingredients anyway.

Dry vermouth, too.

fuck amazing dinner just now. rubbed some harissa on two chicken thighs and griddled them nicely, then had them with chickpeas which i roasted with a crushed clove of garlic or two then tossed in cumin powder and a pinch of chilli, salt, and pepper. so fucking good!

so my dad got me an induction cooktop for my 30th, and judging from its maiden voyage its streets ahead of the electric jobs i've got in my apt

woah cool!

yeah i just gotta figure out where to ~put~ it

Induction is so great - I love the single burner I've got. I was really worried at first about putting it on top of the metal stove (magnetism!), so kept it on the butcher block. Which was a pain, so now it lives on the stove where it gets used more than any of the official stove burners.

btw, happy birthday, gbx!

i'd love to put it on one of my burners, but there's no outlet on that side of the room :-/

brussel sprouts, kohlrabi and radishes + crispy chicken thighs

all from "ad hoc at home"

thomas keller is a serious dude. but what i like about this book is that the recipes are simple, but without shortcuts. he's like "this is the right way to do it, and this is why it's worthwhile."

Baking a pumpkin cheesecake w/ almond flour crust right now.

I like that kind of cookbook, lukas. Like Mastering the Art of French Cooking - so many steps! But if you skip or combine steps, the results aren't the same.

stir fry: tofu, ginger, garlic, parsley, yellow bell pepper, tomato, tamari, rice vngr

jaq are you gluten-free now or just having fun w different flours?

tza, not intentionally gluten-free, but a side-effect of no sugars/no starches current way of life. But also having great fun with almond and coconut flours especially. Coconut flour makes v. delicious brownies, btw, plus is mad crazy to work with - 2 tbsp = 1 cup wheat flour!

oooh that sounds like it'd be good! let me know if you come across any a+ recipes!

So far, cookies/brownies are the only 100% coconut flour things I've made that rate pretty good. I tried making crepes with it and they were just too weird and WRONG. I will be trying it out for breading at some point though, and blending it with almond flour makes it more batter-y.

eggplant manicotti in the oven - uses strips of roasted eggplant instead of noodles. i think i may like it better than regular manicotti! the filling is fat free ricotta, baby spinach, asiago, egg, dash of crushed red pepper. homemade marinara on top and bottom of baking dish.

That sounds amazing. Did you use a recipe or just wing it. Either way - I'm gonna copy.

sorta followed this: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Eggplant-Manicotti-with-Ricotta-Asiago-and-Spinach-Filling-105539

love that a recipe from 2001 has to have a footnote telling you where to find asiago cheese. lol.

That sounds really good, will be trying it soon. I've been using arugula instead of spinach in stuff lately - frittata, lasagna, salad, etc.

oooh yum. i've also used a lot of arugula lately. can't get enough of it!

another big soup: onions, carrots, celery, bok choy, red potatoes, yellow squash, garlic, basil, chives, tamari

just made my first chicken marsala. i used smart balance and rice flour for the chicken to be sort of health conscious - yum!

Makin german potato salad with some lovely local baby tatoes from the markets I got today. Will add celery, dill and dill pickles, some haedboiled egg, and a mayo/sour cream/lemon dressing.

if i have a recipe that requires lobster mushrooms, what's the closest sub if i can't find any? oyster mushrooms?

i guess? what are lobster mushrooms?

Lobster mushroom (Hypomyces lactifluorum) is not a mushroom, but rather a parasitic ascomycete that grows on mushrooms, turning them a reddish orange color that resembles the outer shell of a cooked lobster. It colonizes members of the genera Lactarius (Milk-caps) and Russula, such as Russula brevipes and Lactarius piperatus in North America. At maturity, H. lactifluorum thoroughly covers its host, rendering it unidentifiable. Lobster mushrooms are widely eaten and enjoyed; they are commercially marketed and are commonly found in some large grocery stores. They have a seafood-like flavor and a firm, dense texture. According to some, they may taste somewhat spicy if the host mushroom is an acrid Lactarius.

Just popped this brisket into the oven. The apple barbecue sauce looked interesting.
http://www.cookingchanneltv.com/recipes/chuck-hughes/brisket-sandwich-recipe/index.html

20 peeled and very thinly sliced fresh ginger

oh yeah, I left the ginger out of that sauce. Best guess, it was supposed to be 2".

I don't know though, a 2" piece would be a lot of ginger.

how do you guys store your fresh-cut herbs so that they keep for more than a couple days?

Stems in a glass of water in the fridge if there's room. If not, I wrap the stems in a damp paper towel then waxed paper with the leaves out in the open and hope for the best.