2921

My experience with this thing is basically that if you can afford a Sous Vide Supreme, you should save up the couple hundred extra bucks you’d need to buy a Polyscience circulator and cook in a big pot or a cambro. The Sous Vide Supreme’s water bath is too small, and it doesn’t circulate, so it gets hot spots and it can’t really cook enough to be practical. Also, since the bath is so small you can’t do larger cuts that would benefit from the treatment.

Seems like someone should make a slow cooker with a sous vide capability, maybe a thin mesh grille on the bottom to keep the bag away and a magnetic stirrer. Add a temperature control and you’ve got something.

This is basically what a Sous Vide Supreme is, without the stirring.

2922

Could you use a sealed bag in a slow cooker? I’m guessing not because the temp of a slow cooker is higher than a sous vide device.

I’ve heard of using a small cooler, like for the size of a six pack and a coffee cup heater. Any thoughts?

2923

Ah yes I’ve heard of those. Thanks for the tip. That’s probably the better choice.

2924

Yeah, but what I’m not getting is that a slow cooker with a broader thermostat + baking rack = sous vide machine. A magnetic stirrer can be found in christmas toys these days, it’s a tiny electric motor and a magnet, can’t be more than $5. Somebody is missing out on a market.

H.

2925

Yeah, it’s too hot. You could use it for vegetables, maybe, which need 185* F, but for veg it’s every bit as easy to use a big pot, a slow flame, and a probe thermometer, since you’re only cooking for an hour.

The cooler method works great for short stuff but can’t insulate long enough to do, for example, 50-hour short ribs, although I guess you could replace the water bath every 4-6 hours.

2926

Your post inspired me to make something similar, could you link your recipe? Mine turned out great but for curiosity’s sake.

I used about
4 pieces of bacon crumbled
1 quart chicken stock
1 med onion sauteed in 4 tbsp butter until clear
1/2 cup dry sherry
1 1/4 pounds white mushrooms, blended 1 pound of them with the soup and cut the other 1/4 pound into small pieces.
1 cup heavy cream. I couldn’t find your non-sour creme in the 2 stores I checked (safeway, save-on-foods) that had 28% butterfat so I just used a heavy cream instead.
1.5 tbsp cilantro

Yours does look better. And if I were to do it again I would fry my mushrooms (or the ones that will be small pieces) with some butter before I added them. I also never strained mine but tbh after using the immersion blender there are almost no pieces in there other than the ones I deliberately added.

2927

Hmm I used almost exactly the same ingredients, though I used some curry powder too, and quite a bit of pepper (in retrospect probably too much), and the juice of half a lemon instead of alcohol. Perhaps the texture of mine is different. It was definitely on the thicker side, thanks to some corn starch, and having it simmer for a decent amount of time.

2928

This looked interesting: Ice Chest Sous Vide.

2929

Does anyone have any good stir fry recipes that use chili peppers? The local Earls has their Hunan kung pow and their chili’s always explode with flavour in my mouth, as in they always seem filled with something.

But that’s not necessary. In fact any recipes that are QT3 approved except for chili that use chili peppers would be lovely.

2930

Buy a bunch of dried chilis at a local store. Stay away from the plastic bags full of ancient chilis, because, they are ancient. Make sure that either:

  1. The dried chilis that you use are intact. This will allow you to infuse an oil or a sauce with the flavor, but not impart tastebud killing heat. Then, you can remove them before serving.

  2. If you like more heat, then a broken dried pepper is your friend. It will give up its seeds to the dish. Also the inside of the pepper will give more heat.

  3. Used any type of dried pepper and put a bunch in a bottle of your favorite cooking oil. Cap it and let it sit. In a cool place, cause oil can actually go bad. But you knew that.

As for your question, any stir fry can benefit from chilis. General Tso and his friend Kung Pao would agree.

There are many recipes online. I hate to say it but, Google is your friend. Please report back when you make something fantastic!

2931

Red Pepper Polenta

The recipe called for a mess of quick-cooking polenta, but I couldn’t find that in any of the stores I went to and had plenty of cornmeal on hand, so I adapted.

Get 6 cups of liquid going (I used 4 chicken stock/2 water, but whatever) with some garlic and a pinch of salt. Stir in 1 1/3 cup cornmeal. Once boiling stir constantly for about 5 min. Reduce heat and partially cover. Cook 45 min stirring occasionally.

Preheat oven to 400F.

Get out a couple of jars of roasted red peppers. Drain out the water and chop up the peppers to whatever size suits you. Grate 6-8 ounces of fontina cheese, stir that in with about half a cup of parmesan cheese and a teaspoon of chopped up fresh rosemary. Crank in some pepper.

Butter up a baking dish. Here I’m a little fuzzy. The recipe calls for a 4-quart dish, but I was reducing the recipe so I used a 3-quart. Transfer polenta to dish, sprinkle on more parm and bake for about 30 minutes.

This is my first time trying this. I’ve made regular old polenta plenty of times, but never noodled with it like this. It came out delicious and creamy and cheesy, but way too loose. I think that’s just the way polenta turns out though (initially). After an overnight in the fridge it was nice and sliceable, and I’ve tried it broiled and heated in a skillet and it’s quite nice, but still gets too loose. Cold it’s too compact. Not sure what to tinker with here to make it firm up. I’m thinking of maybe trying a loaf pan. That won’t address the looseness but might allow it to puff up more.

Anyway, I love the taste, I’d just like to adjust it so that it’d be something I could bring to potluck-type things. Not sure if that’ll be possible though.

Also today I made a grilled cheese with turkey and muenster in my waffle-iron…heaven.

-xtien

2932

Arise my favourite thread, arise!

So I moved into a fantastic new place, hardwood floors and, here’s the important part, a gas stove! No room for my spices though, so I uh… I put up a spice rack in my room.

Anyway I had a party last weekend so I smoked 6 racks of ribs.


I had already pulled the top grill off. Sorry! By morning every rib was gone.

I used the spice rub that I posted about earlier in this thread.
Bonedust seasoning
1/2 cup paprika
1/4 chili powder
3 tbsp salt
2 tbsp ground coriander
2 tbsp garlic powder
2 tbsp curry powder
2 tbsp mustard powder
2 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp ground pepper
1 tbsp ground basil
1 tbsp ground thyme
1 tbsp ground cumin
1 tbsp cayenne pepper

For the sauce I used

Barbecue Spare Ribs with Ginger Ale (serves 6-8)

3-4 pounds spare ribs
1/2 cup barbecue dry rub spice mix
2 cups ketchup
1 cup ginger ale
1/2 cup rice wine vinegar
1/4 cup worcestershire sauce
2 Tablespoons honey
1 Tablespoon fresh grated ginger
Source

Tonight I made stir fry, a variation of what I also posted about earlier in this thread except I added a little dry sherry to the sauce.


My cooking has really come a long way, partly because of reading through this thread. Also from browsing Gojee.com which has rapidly become my favourite cooking site.

2933

Really liking gojee.com. Thanks for the tip, and good looking food!

For the first time ever I’m getting paid to make a birthday cake. This one is for a Ghanaian girl’s 25th birthday. It’s not going to be huge due to budget constraints, but I’m thinking strawberry mousse, vanilla cream, homemade fondant, royal icing, various fancy piped stuff, fondant/gum flowers. Classy, white, some pink, and some purple.

2934

Definitely use marshmallow fondant instead of the regular stuff. It tastes so much better!

2935

Honestly, I see very little reason to ever use fondant at all. It’s for looking at, and cakes should be for eating.

Nonetheless, that sounds like quite an impressive cake. Be sure to check in with photos when you’re done!

2936

Sweet Jesus bacon smells so good while it’s baking.

Preparing for Barfood Burger tonight. 1/3lb patty of 85/15 ground ground cooked with salt and fresh-ground black pepper, served on a potato roll with shredded lettuce, sliced tomatoes and onions, jalepenos, pepperjack cheese, and chipotle mayo (maybe french fried onions, too). On the side are some “extra crispy” seasoned fries that have been sent through my trusty deep fryer, then coated with shredded cheddar and chopped, fresh-baked bacon :)

YEAH FAT.

2937

Hotdog with kimchi. Very tasty.

2938

For some reason marshmallows are hilariously expensive in Norway. Ended up going with a (homemade, ugh) marzipan layer with royal icing on top. Got the first icing layer pretty much done last night. Today I’m grinding off some of the unevenness and doing a thinner layer of icing. It’s not going to look as crisp as I originally wanted, but still pretty decent. Pics coming tomorrow probably.

2939

That gojee site is great thanks for the link.

I really like cooking but am finding it tough at the moment, 2 young kids get fed at 17.30pm and the wife and I are eating at 8pm. I start work at 7am so by then I am struggling a bit

Now the weather is getting better i like to do a quick bit of barbecue just for the 2 of us, nothing to in depth just quick and simple.

Diced pork on skewers. Drizzle in lemon and salt and rotate slowly until nicely cooked, adding lemon as they cook.

Add a toasted on the barbecue pitta bread, some Grilled haloumi cheese and some plain greek yoghurt. A small salad, I like Lettuce, cabbage, peppers, tomato, cucumber and a mustard salad dressing and a glass of wine.

The haloumi is tricky in that you want it nicely cooked but soft in the middle. Frying is best but very unhealthy but grilling can leave it too crispy.

Just to add it’s over charcoal not gas, as above I find Pork tastes so much better on the charcoal

Just to add I am not a great Pork fan but the barbecue seems to really bring it’s flavours out comapred to the oven.

2940

You can (relatively) easily make stuff more in depth by preparing stuff in advance. An example would be cooking good stock, reducing it quite a lot, and freezing it as ice cubes.