2017 Black Friday Deals worth mentioning

I’d buy individual pens on Amazon if they’d let me. I bought shoelaces too. I got toilet paper delivered to my door via PrimeNow in under 2 hours.

I pay the salaries for my doormen, and literally all they do is say Hi when I walk by and hand me packages. I don’t have them walk my dog or water my plants or carry heavy stuff for me. Not a shred of guilt.

Let me check on this thread about air fryers.

Oh, it’s about Amazon customer service now.

What is your favorite color and why?

It sounds like you’re looking for the Bargain Thread since both Black Friday and Cyber Monday are over, thus the delivery talk of the things we already purchased. I don’t buy into this Black Friday or Cyber Monday week crap. According to some of the retailers they’ve been doing Black Friday since July.

O.k., I feel better now, heh. I’ve been recovering from a lengthy hospital stay, so I’ve been relying on this stuff a lot more than usual (I’ve only been outside 14 times since October 4th), but still feel guilty about being needy. (doing better now btw)

Sorry to hear it, but glad to hear you’re recovering!

I’m sure your doormen don’t mind doing all that stuff, particularly with christmas coming up. I have to tip 14 people this year, sigh.

I hope your recovery goes well.

Glad you are okay. And don’t feel guilty, the retailers use minimum orders, add-on items, etc. to guide customer behavior. if they wanted to stop that, they certainly could.

I just want to make sure you know that good homemade fries require far more prep work than frozen (regardless of your cooking method). Frozen fries are generally blanched (and perhaps soaked in cold water as well) and have some oil added. Both of these steps are important. The oil because the fries will dry out otherwise with a dry cooking method (you don’t need much though).

The most important part however is the blanching process. Potatoes are loaded with water, and water is the enemy of the “golden crispy fry”. Potatoes also take a long time to cook. It doesn’t matter if you’re using an air fryer or an industrial deep fryer—fresh cut potatoes will be a limp mess if not prepped properly. This is the reason most restaurants use frozen fries. They’re cheap, quick, simple, and extremely consistent. Fresh cut fries aren’t exactly expensive to make, but the time that goes into the good ones is substantial. Not only are they often soaked and blanched, but many places also freeze them and then cook them to get the desired result.

Do you know that fluffy texture the inside of a good fry has? That’s what you want, but keep in mind that the final cooking process isn’t what produces that texture. It’s the prep work. The final step is basically just crisping up the outside. And the thicker the fry the longer it’s going to take.

All that work for fries…

I just toss some frozen tater-TOTS into the oven for 30 minutes. :p

useful french fry tips: http://aht.seriouseats.com/2010/05/the-burger-lab-how-to-make-perfect-mcdonalds-style-french-fries.html

No problem… I did get an extension, and the $5 btw…

Yeah thanks… I’ve been reading up on it a bit, and bought a book of air-fryer recipes… with my 7 year old, I only have one chance to make it good, or I don’t get another chance lol… I’ll clip your info for reference

Ok, so what the heck is an air fryer?

It’s a very small convection oven with an infared heating element.

Count me in the ‘Complain like hell to Amazon’ group. I’m currently missing a package worth about $40 that Amazon tracking (which is the worst thing ever devised) says was delivered yesterday at 1:52pm. Multiple chat reps have assured me that the package was simply mislabeled as ‘delivered’ but there’s no way it’s actually coming. Either they dropped it off at the wrong place or it’s lost in transit somewhere. One said they were issuing a $10 promo credit to make up for the delay but I don’t think they actually did. I finally got a rep that issued a full refund just now but even they assured me that the box would be coming tomorrow. They’re some of the most optimistic people around.

Hell I once added an item to my cart and it showed up as being $1 more than advertised so I asked customer support why that was and they gave me a $5 gift card and asked if that solved the problem. I’m pretty sure the $5 gift card is just Amazon support’s standard operating procedure for making people go away.

Have I mentioned how much I absolutely love Amazon, by the way? I ordered something Friday afternoon and it arrived at my doorstep less than 24 hours later, and I live outside a small town nowhere near a distribution center. Two of my sisters live in the Columbus area and they routinely get orders delivered mere hours after placing them. Amazon is just in another league.

Got one of my Target orders today, I used my 15% Cyber Monday discount for exciting things like pet food, fabric softener and something called an Igloo Counter-top Ice Maker… yeah that Ice Maker isn’t mine. Someone screwed up at the warehouse. No wonder that box was so heavy.

You’re lucky. It used to be like that here because the distribution center was just up the road. Now they ship me things from New Jersey or further (I’m in PA) even with two centers within 50 miles of my house.

Something is broken in their fulfillment right now in some parts of the country.

Interesting read. I like McDonald’s fries compared to places like Steak 'n Shake.

This is the single best article on the subject, ever, and is an absolute must read if you care about cooking fries. I was gonna post the link but Discourse helpfully let me know someone had already posted it upstream.

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THANKS DISCOURSE U R GR8