Most cookbooks are useless

a reply to: zosimov

I just like food. I love it all. Lamb meatballs though can be amazing. I'm a huge fan of skewered meats cooked over high flame.

I love afghan food. Pakistani food. Middle eastern foods of all shape and size. The spices in North Africa are a game changer. I have a recipe somewhere buried in my closet for this spiced date doughnut that is being served as an appetizer at NUR the restaurant I worked at in Union square NYC. You should yelp that restaurant. The flavors there were hard for me to grasp since I'm French trained but damn were they interesting. They all spoke broken Israeli English and I only speak broken Spanish/French.......

a reply to: zosimov

Oh, hummus is best when you make your own!

We also have a chicken/chickpea meatball soup we make that's really good that's supposed to be Iranian ... I think. It tastes really good in the winter.

We have an eclectic mix of things in our binder.

a reply to: ketsuko

I agree about homemade hummus! And that soup sounds delicious.

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

Thanks, look forward to it.

As for hot dogs, I eat the good kind. In fact next week I'm at conference in Maine and will stop by Flo's to get some fantastic dogs there.

However, I do love beets. They're nature's viagra after all. I use them in my juices all the time and also love roasted beets with goat cheese and pistachios. Are they all nitrated up if eaten raw or roasted?

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

lol, cheers, brother You write about food with gusto
My Libyan students made me some killer cous cous and a few other delicious dishes I couldn't name. Also have a recipe for Moroccan chicken that is so good. I'll dig it out and share here tomorrow if anyone's interested.

a reply to: TobyFlenderson

Beets are great for you.

Nitrites are fine as well in the minuscule amount we consume them. Pink salt is added to make sure botulism doesn't occur in meats that are cooked or smoked under 200 degrees. When meat is cooked under 200 degrees for a long period of time it is the danger zone. Pink salt eradicates that problem.

a reply to: zosimov

-raises hand and waves vigorously-

I want, I want!!!

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

I do my confit at 250. Is that too high?

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

I have a book of Italian desserts that is a Da Vinci in artful presentation. I gain weight just looking at the photos. I've never made a single dessert from the book and many are not complicated for an experienced home cook but I'm afraid they won't be nearly as pretty.
You're a chef? What genre? I'm just a cook but I love cooking and I love good food.

a reply to: OtherSideOfTheCoin

I use the internet for inspiration too. I've been cooking since I was a kid in my mother's kitchen and I'm sixty now. I get good ideas and sometimes I combine recipes or methods to make things interesting. I make a pastrami that I'd never have been able to achieve without the internet. It takes more than a week from start to finish to make one and it's gone in four or five sandwiches with nothing but some ground black pepper and a little puddle of grease left on the platter.
The web site even has a little video from When Harry met Sally when they're in the deli. You know the scene... Oh god oh yes....

a reply to: tinner07

Equal parts fat and flour. Oil, butter, rendered fat from meat. Low temp to cook out the flour without burning and raise the temp when you add the liquid.

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

He could be making chicken gravy.

a reply to: edaced4

I start smaller. Two tablespoons fat two of flour and two cups liquid. But I'm a home cook and no one ever uses left over gravy except at thanksgiving. Or piquant sauce for that matter lol.

I tend to use cook books as a start. I need the cook temperatures and times. Also to get a starting idea on what to put in. I enjoy just adding what sounds good at that moment.

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

What are you making? Gumbo or mac & cheese?

I have a recipe for chicken and dumplings that I like. It calls for a roux but doesnt really say how to make it. I have looked online but curios as to how you would make one.

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman
a reply to: ketsuko

Moroccan Chicken (lol, not sure if that what Moroccan's call it)

2 large lemons
1 Tbsp Olive Oil
1 large onion, halved then thinly sliced
2 pressed garlic cloves
1 Tbsp paprika
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
2 cups low sodium chicken roth
1/2 cup green olives
1 4.5lb chicken, cut into 8 pieces and skin removed

1. Cut 1 lemon into 8 wedges
2. Squeeze 2 Tbsp juice from second lemon, reserve
3. Heat oil in large skillet at medium high
4. Add onion, season with salt and pepper and saute until golden brown
5. Add next 5 ingredients (garlic and spices) and stir for 1 minute
6. Add broth and bring to a boil
7. Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper and add to skillet
8. Add lemon wedges
9. Cover, reduce heat to medium low and simmer until chicken is cooked through, 25-30 mins
10. Transfer chicken to platter
11. Add olives and lemon juice to skillet, increase temp to high to thicken.
12. Pour contents of skillet over chicken and serve.


Very delicious recipe! Thanks for yours!

originally posted by: TobyFlenderson
I do my confit at 250. Is that too high?

I do mine at 200*.

a reply to: TobyFlenderson

How many pounds of confit do you usually do at one time? I'm going to have to convert for you. My recipe is for 37 lbs.

250 is fine. 200 hundred is fine. If your oven is not top notch it's probably doing only 225 anyway.

I'm sure the confit recipe you use is just as good as mine. How long do you cure the duck for? Do you overhaul it? Do you rinse it before cooking? Do you cook it submerged in duck fat? How do you know it's done?

a reply to: tinner07

Sillyolme knows his/her? Stuff for making a great roux. But if you're making chicken and dumplings you could also just do a quick butter/flour roux as a thickener.

A good ol' Cajun roux like sillyolme said is 50/50 oil/flour.

Grab your cast iron or ceramic cast iron and get your oil smoking hot. Once the oil is hot add the flour about 1/3 at a time and whisk constantly. If you get black specks it's burned 👎 And start again. As soon. As you get the color your after it's done. Remove from heat and keep stiring for a good 3 minutes until it's cool. BAM!

a reply to: TheAlleghenyGentleman

I'm always interested in the science of transformation. Why slow cooking does this and fast cooking does that and why add fat after the pan is hot so foods won't stick . It's fascinating.
For years I wondered about the magic restaurants put into making simple scrambled eggs that have a sweet aftertaste and light yellow color because any I'd ever had at home just didn't taste or look quite the same and then I learned the very simple step of lowering that heat so the proteins in the egg don't seize up. I mean really, it's a chemical physical reaction and the solution to not seizing up the proteins is to just get those protein strands relaaaaax. Nice relaxing heat, nothing too hot and scary. Now my scrambled eggs are sweet and tender and taste like the butter they were cooked in.
Better living through chemistry.