So my FIRST ATTEMPT EVER to make a pie was met with mild success. I used refrigerated pre-made pie crust because I really didn't want to put the effort into crust-making for my first shot, but it tasted alright. I think I used the wrong apples (granny smith) for the filling though; it came out too tart for my tastes (and hubby's). I might try fuji or golden delicious next time. The filling also came out kinda runny, despite adding corn starch. I didn't pre-cook the apples though, and I've seen that suggested in a few recipes, is that the secret?
Granny Smiths are my mom's go-to apple for apple pies, but your other questions now make me want to ask her for her recipe, since I can't actually remember how she does it.
Alligator ...well, although I've learned to make it the traditional way, it's been years since I either don't have the time or the will to spend too much time around the kitchen. So, I cut some corners. Here's how I do it: . Peel, deseed and cut 4 Golden apples in small chuncks. . Get one refrigerated pre-made pie crust. After you've put it in the pie baking dish, get a fork and make holes on it all over the botton of the pie's baking disk. . Put the sliced apples in the baking dish. . Then add 2 beaten eggs and 2 tablespoons of lemon juice to the contents of a can of sweetened condensed milk and mix it all together until the filling gets a bit thicker and uniform (if you do it by hand, it's about 3 to 5 mins.). . and finally, add the filling to the apples. If you like cinnammon, then sprinkle a bit of ground cinnammon on top. (don't overdue it tho. or the cinnammon taste will overpower everything else). put it in the oven for about 30 to 40 mins at 180 Celsius (preferably with the fan option if available). And that's it. That's my quick and easy apple pie recipe :)
So I thought I'd try the Good Eats' "perfect method for cooking steak", namely: - bring steak to room temperature - preheat oven to 500F with your skillet in there - take out hot skillet, sear steak for 30 seconds on each side - put in 500F oven for 2.5 minutes, flip, cook another 2.5 minutes - let rest 10m or so - eat Aside from burning my finger on the damn skillet, this turned out perfectly. Oh my god, this is the most magnificent KC strip I've ever made. A nicely seared exterior, tender and juicy inside, goes perfect with bleu cheese/horseradish garnish. I have never been so proud to be a carnivore. Mmm.
Holiday Baking Extravaganza Part 2 is complete! Guinness chocolate cookies are on the cooling racks. Lots of them.
I tend to use a mix of apples when I make a pie. Normally I will use granny smith, fuji, and golden delicious in an 1:1:1 ratio. That plus normal filling flavorings gives a good mix of sweet and tart. As to having a soggy apple pie, that is part of apple pie. If you precook them, you have to drastically reduce your cooking time (this also means you need to par-bake your crust) or else they will become soggy and mush like (I actually did this for my final). If you plan on precooking them use a thick slice to counter balance the second cooking process. Also, you can reduce the liquid that comes out of the apples and pour the thick syrup back over your apples to keep the "apple" taste in the filling. If you have a mandolin slice the apples very thin and use a high heat and low heat cooking method (about 400 for 20-ish minutes, then drop to 320 until done). This will not only help brown the crust (plus an application of an egg wash part way through, I put mine on when I lower the temperature) but also help seal the crust and cook long enough that the water evaporates out without turning everything to mush. I normally add flour and rum to my filling and toss with the apples, seems to work well.
This is exactly how we did it at the steakhouse. The only step I would suggest is to season the steak heavily first. The best part about this is when the steak comes out you can then use any flavored liquid (red wine, stock, etc) to deglaze the pan and swirl in some butter for a really good sauce to go with the steak. Protip: Always sauce under the steak (or any protein used) so everyone can see the star piece of he place and go "oohhh" over your food.
I used a mix of kosher salt, black pepper, white pepper, onion powder, and garlic powder with a little bit of cayenne.
Sauce over the steak will also make the crust soggy, and nobody wants that. (Flashbacks to the last time I had turkey with the in-laws. It came out of the oven with lovely deep brown crispy skin. Then my father-in-law proceeded to baste the turkey--it was done at this point, mind you--for like ten minutes. I came in and found him doing it and was like "What are you doing?!" He said he wanted to make sure that the bird was not dry. I told him that ship had already sailed, one way or the other, and all he was doing was making the skin soggy. He said "You eat the skin?" Sigh.)
Well, it did have the plus side of letting the turkey rest for a bit. Doin Chicken Vesuvio. The single pot meal with crispy potatoes, chicken, and peas in an herbed white wine sauce is one of my recent favorites.
Made cauliflower gratin for the first time. My attempt at cheese sauce was extremely underwhelming and next time I need to go a lot heavier on cheese and spices so I can get some real flavour in there. It all turned out bland and mushy and the only thing that saved the dish was the cumin-flavoured bread I ate it with.
Nute's steak looks very much like our dinner (but I didn't take pictures) Won a nice 1 kg rumpsteak at the christmas raffle in my daughter's class (one of the parents is a butcher). First I sliced the fat, rubbed it in lots of salt and pebber, seared it on a pan and gave it 20 minutes in the oven - then as something I've never tried before, I crumbled some excellent day old bread and fried it for a minute in butter with rosemary and salt and pebber. Spread that on top of the steak and baked it for 5 minutes more until golden. Rested it a bit and sliced it. I usually use a thermometer for large steaks, but this was quick and dirty and turned out excellent. I was afraid it was a bit too red for the kids liking, but my youngest ate 3 slices and hardly any of her favourite potatoes* * Diced, blanced, coated in heated olive oil, baked with rosemary and slightly crushed but unpeeled cloves of garlic.
Am I the only person here who prefers medium well to well done steaks? Make no mistake Nute, that looks like some damn fine meat but I just prefer my middle with as little pink as possible. (horseradish FTW though)
No, you're not. It looks gorgeous, but that's still a little terrifying. Also, herbed butter > horseradish, but ymmv.
I like a good medium rare, this was a bit on the rare side probably due to using a stainless steel skillet instead of cast iron (Hey, Secret Santa - HINT HINT!) but absolutely delicious. The garnish was a mix of blue cheese, creamed horseradish, and some mashed roasted garlic that was left over from Thanksgiving. I want to try it with a fondue instead of the blue cheese and see how it turns out.
To be fair, I never said I could cook steak like that. Aaron usually handles the big slabs of meat while I do the fiddly stuff on the side. :)
I just realized that being a very traditional home, my wife does most of the quick day to day cooking (her hours are better than mine and she works much closer to home, so she's the one actually present to do so) whereas I'm more into the large production cooking, she doesn't have the patience for which I then do on weekends and for guests. This has resulted in our American exchange student probably returning to Texas telling everybody "In Denmark the mens do all the cooking, while the wife entertains guests".
I'm making a conscious effort to like medium or even medium-rare, despite squeamishness. It makes a big difference to texture/taste. I find it works well to eat by candlelight :)
My wife gets into baking frenzies now and again (whereas my cooking love is slow cooked stews/ pates etc, hers is baking). So I've been fasting on banana bread, date & walnut loaf, carrot cake, chocolate & banana cake and various muffins/ cupcakes. Unfortunately she is leaving today for a 10 day trip, so back to famine...
I don't have it in front of me, but I use this crazy-ass America's Test Kitchen recipe with something like 5 pounds of apples. I usually use a mix of Braeburn and Granny Smiths so you get a nice mild flavor and tartness combined. Also, it involves per-cooking but that's not a huge deal if you're talking pie. I'll dig it up later and post it.
I decided to use up my pie crusts today by... making a pie. Sort of at least. first I tried some whacky ass attempt at rugehlah, which shall not be repeated. Then I used up the second pie crust in the package by making a very flat mince pie with a few ceremonial lattice stripes but no real top crust. It came out pretty well, actually. So that was kind of fun. Next up: Solstice cookies.
Is this too meta for the cooking thread? Pictures of hipsters taking pictures of their food. The level of concentration here is phenomenal:
Is taking pictures of your food a hipster thing? I don't get the whole taking a picture of food thing unless it's particularly visually interesting (I had a Bloody Caesar once that had two King Crab legs sticking out of it that I took a picture of) or you intend on doing something with the photo (review of the restaurant or something). But taking a photo of your Denny's Moon Over my Hammies is just, strange.
I tend to see it as no different than still life paintings of a bowl of fruit or whatnot. The arrangement of food can be elegant or sometimes just "damn that looks tasty".
As a form of art or practice there of, I can certainly see it. I'm not sure that's what buddy's doing in that picture though.
I had some leftover buttermilk that I didn't want to waste, so... Triple Berry Buttermilk Cake and Irish Soda Bread Muffins. The cake is amazing, the muffins are good but the caraway seed in some of the bites was a little strong.
If you haven't tried making your cheese sauce with xanthan gum or sodium citrate you are seriously missing out. Heavy starch-based thickeners are for the birds. The birds of the previous century, even! Old, sad birds who don't know about hydrocolloidal stabilizers! I know people get squicked out about anything that's not "natural" these days, but making a sauce that tastes only like liquid you made it from is pretty sweet. I use these for basically everything now, with the exception of heavy gravies where I feel like the starch is part of the appeal. But then, I cook those for an hour or so because I'm a sociopath.
My problem wasn't the thickener. My problem was that my cheese sauce barely tasted of cheese. I'll look into sciencing up my sauces though, flour has always been a pain to work with and get it even so I'm open to trying something new.
Bit after the fact, given that you've already made your gratin, but this might be a helpful place to start. Plus, you learn to make cheese sauce!
Plus from my side on using Xanthan. I do not use it very often, but for some sauces (and espumas of course) it is pretty cool to have. Regarding the cheese sauce I got into the habit of using a recipe by Blumenthal as base for what I do. However, the key thing I took from what he does is that he uses a bit of reduced wine and really good stock (chicken in his case, I sometime replace it with vegetable stock), and adds some fresh cheese in addition to the normal stuff to intensify it. Works well for me. Edit: Regarding the thickener, I recommend making processed cheese using sodium citrate once in your life. Pretty funny, definitely in the "how to play with food" category.
I think I have just come up with a brilliant idea (and I'm sure someone else has already done this). Get a booth at a barbecue festival/county fair/town shindig/etc and bring a huge smoker trailer or two or three and get them fired up early in the morning. Then you basically rent out spaces in the smoker for people to bring their own meat in. You slather it in whatever rub/sauce they want, slap it on the grill in the smoker with a numbered tag, and hand them a little receipt tag with a time circled when their barbecue should be done and ready to go. Six, eight, ten hours later you'll have people showing up to pick up their smoked whatever and voila.
While I really like this idea I also think it won't work. Nobody wants to wait for hours for their food, that's way too much fore-thought and complete removes potential impulse buyers. Pretty sure just providing the complete product is the best way to go.
You underestimate the barbecue crowd - a lot of people LOVE to get a smoker going pre-dawn just to have an afternoon joint. You wouldn't be catering to the impulse buyers, more of the enthusiasts without their own smokers.
