What's cooking? part 4

sorry to hijack the cooking thread, but

making black beans for the first time - some bean juice got on my countertop and left a stain that I can't remove w/ alcohol or vinegar or soap and water. tips??

bleach?

or maybe baking soda w/vinegar

bleach turned the stain red +_+

will try baking soda + vinegar

will also buy some hydrogen peroxide soon

What kind of surface is this stain on?

some kind of formica/plastic countertop. definitely not granite or enamel

baking soda paste didn't do much... will need to go to the pharmacy and buy some peroxide, I guess.

I had no idea black beans could stain like that!

It's the brief window right now where there's a lot of local produce - tail end of tomato season, ridiculous amounts of okra, the corn is finally good (it sucked for the first month), lima beans are here for their brief 2-3 week window, summer squash and winter squash will overlap for a little bit, there's so much watermelon I've been juicing and clarifying half of them, etc etc. I've got pickles going, kimchi, and a crockpot full of all the okra that I didn't get to picking until it was too big/tough to eat.

Tomorrow, succotash and okra-and-tomatoes.

I poured some peroxide over them and let it sit, and that seems to be doing the trick

back on topic: made bittman's 'my mom's peppers and onions' which is good! the onions caramelize and you get this sweet savory combination of onions and bell peppers. I'm going to put that in a tortilla with beer glazed black beans and rice tonight.

Making tom kha gai, simmering the galangal/ginger/lemongrass/garlic, and the smell is driving me mad with desire.

vinegary coleslaw >>>>> mayo-based

― excuse me you're a helluva guy (m coleman), Sunday, September 11, 2011 8:06 A

Making a late night snack curry - tofu, sweet potato, curry spices, onion/garlic/ginger, a bit of honey and some coconut milk, so simple and tasty.

Oh and chickpeas! forgot that.

I need a good recipe for a savory bread pudding, I think.

ooh i would love that. i don't like sweets so much but a savory bread pudding seems great for this time of year. actually, i made a butternut squash/kale/foccacia "stuffing" for thanksgiving last year that would almost qualify as a bread pudding. i wonder if it could be adapted...

during my 2 hours in the car dealership service waiting area today, i read this month's bon appetit cover to cover, and decided to make the korean steak tartare tonight. i've never attempted a raw dish at home and the bf was nervous but it was really good and we're not dead yet! had it with sticky rice and a mushroom/zucchini/green onion saute on the side.

haha I ordered steak tartare once because it sounded fancy and when it came I thought "did they just open a can of potted meat and upend it onto my plate"

mine was a little bit more loosely spooned rather than formed into a pretty circle.

when I made hamburgers from scratch this summer I couldn't stop myself from eating bits and pieces of the raw meat after I had seasoned it. u_u

well I bet they cheated with a cookie cutter! xp

true!

to be fair, the recipe just said to spoon the mixture onto the pears, so pooey on them for making me feel less than fancy.

haha I ordered steak tartare once because it sounded fancy and when it came I thought "did they just open a can of potted meat and upend it onto my plate"

had this exact same experience. was in France as a high schooler (on a sxhool trip) and thought the waiter was taking the piss. esp since he and the other waiters watched me eat it from a distance with smirks on their faces

q to you both: did you like it?

i had no idea that it would taste so good before i first tried it!

i had it for the first time earlier this year and i have to say i loved it. vinegary, rich, was great. would be scared to make it myself i think, tho there's no logical reason why. might buy mince from a particulrly good butcher.

I liked it! but I like raw protein in general. sushi is probably my fav food, too bad it's killing the planet. xp

I have a pork loin roast that I was thinking about braising low and slow in heavily spiced and seasoned stock like a chuck roast, but I'm not sure that's the best approach. It's a very lean cut, whereas chuck roast is well marbled, and I'm afraid the pork roast will just turn out tough. Any opinions?

I would also be wary with such a lean cut, but if you carefully monitored temp maybe you'd be OK? I pull pork off heat at 145. Living on the edge here.

Even a low temp braise will get the meat too hot too fast. I'd roast it in a low oven (250-300 F) until the interior is around 140/145. Coat in a nice dry rub of your spices first.

^^^I defer to Jaq on all cooking matters, but I've adapted a "no roasting below 450" stance a la Barbara Kafka.

Pork is so good when it's cooked low and slow! Beef and lamb are better done hot and fast to be sure.

any tips on using frozen corn? thaw first, or straight into the pan?

I throw straight into the pan, usually

My mouth wants some coffee ice cream but my body says "don't do it."

tried out the banana soft serve in my food processor. omg!

roasting a beautiful variety of beets
about to eat some prosciutto with fig jam and this crazy delicious aged sheepsmilk manchego
feel like a g with all this classy food

i also ate a croissant but i didn't make it

You fancy!

Our weather is too warm for all-day cooking this weekend, so I just cut up a bunch of veg into a crude salsa and chucked it over chorizo and black beans, and called it "tacos."

making this to take to sister's dinner party tonight: http://www.choosecherries.com/recipes/spinach_cherry_salad_with_cherry_vinaigrette_755.aspx

cept i'm using arugula and spinach instead of all spinach.

mexican chorizo or spanish? i got a new kind of spanish chorizo and i think i am going to try it tonight with some lentils and beet greens!?

Always the Spanish kind! I don't even know if I've ever seen the crumbly Mexican chorizo, although maybe I just haven't recognized it.

Chorizo + lentils + bitter greens sounds great, BTW.

i have an impossible time finding spanish chorizo here! sad because i much prefer it to mexican.

me too! like by leaps and bounds. don't really care for mexican chorizo because it is so insanely greasy. i'd eat it, but wouldn't cook with it or order it at a restaurant. it's ok.

a coworker recently informed me about this online spanish food source, and if anyone ever wants to get me a present...ZOMG
i've been wondering if there is a place i could get boquerones locally but i would also not mind having them delivered to my home.

http://www.tienda.com/ (deceptively simple url, no? how could i have not known about this?)

Really?? I just get the GOYA kind, usually. Or whatever is avail. I've never seen a store have more than one kind, like one brand p much fills the niche, but every grocery has SOME kind of sausage-shaped chorizo!

i am perplexed by this because no store here carries goya brand spanish chorizo -- they carry tons of other goya products, but the spanish chorizo is usually always palacios.

goya mexican chorizo yes, everywhere, and it is in a casing, but it is still not cured spanish chorizo. ime goya makes mostly latin american products. so weird!

tza, try adding some frozen mango to the banana soft serve, or blueberries, pineapple - it is n/l

Oh, LL, it is in a casing and that made me think it was Spanish! Because you showed a picture of loose crumbly Mex stuff and I didn't think past that. I'll look again at home but as always, yr prob right.

oh ok, that would explain it!

as for frozen bananas:

every week i buy 6-7 bananas, break them up into pieces, and freeze them. then i use these frozen bananas as a base for smoothies (+ kefir, another fruit -- usually mango or berry -- protein powder, ground flax, a little juice) and it's basically the same thing you guys are calling 'soft serve' -- mushed up fruit. i usually use my immersion blender to squash it all up because it's easy to clean compared to the food processor.

this is not revolutionary or even very interesting, but i thought i would share.

in sum, i always use frozen fruit because it makes for a nicer texture in the smoothie