Daeren is a (good) bad influence on me and my eating habits and I must concede the potato recipe to him.
I’m a little bit mad that I got into cooking again now after literally nine years of…not doing that. I should have done this earlier. It has awoken a dumb reptile part of my creative brain that demands I keep innovating and experimenting and gives me something to look forward to. Current plan is mixing tamari sauce and pineapple juice in a bag of chicken then sving it for a few hours. If it turns out good, I will definitely share what I did, but admittedly it will probably boil down to a small bottle of pineapple juice and some tamari sauce.
A few days ago, I made pizza from scratch, and put different peppers on it to try them out. Except, I forgot to write down what each of the peppers were, so I’m not really sure what’s there. But, the Jalapeno was still easily the hottest.
I topped it with pepperoni, after this shot, for some better taste.
Also, I’m usually pretty good at spicy food, but I totally had tears from my eyes watering when I ate a few slices.
I have this constant list of “kitchen stuff” that I want and I feel like it’s ever-growing. I’m always like, “If I just had X thing, oh man, I could make anything,” and then I get that thing and I go, “yeah, but if I also had Y thing, there’s nothing I couldn’t cook!”
Right now my list includes an immersion blender, a mortar and pestle, a mandoline, and a microplane grater. I wonder what will find its way on when I get all of those.
I will admit, taking a bite, when my pizza slice says, “You’re becoming more like your father,” or “USE THE BOOST TO GET THROUGH!” it is a little off-putting.
Making homemade pizza for the first time today. I’m using a pesto sauce because tomato is harsh on my acid reflux. Thinking broccoli and maybe bacon or pancetta. I’m hoping the crust turns out crispy without burning.
(also huh I thought I posted this but apparently I didn’t!)
e: Or maybe I accidentally posted this in two threads in which case my bad.
I do have a food processor, and a KitchenAid stand mixer my parents got me for Christmas a couple years back. I like them both very much.
Is an Instant Pot a brand of pressure cooker? I really want a good pressure cooker–I have a crappy aluminum one but I’d love a really good one.
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On the topic of pizza, I’ve had great results following this recipe for a big Sicilian-style pan pizza from Serious Eats. I made it for a party a couple months ago and it went really, really well. It’s surprisingly easy and you get such a gloriously crispy crust.
An instant pot is both a slow cooker and a pressure cooker, and because it’s able to do either it can be programmed to actually do a ton of other things too; it can be a rice cooker, a yogurt maker, etc. It has a saute setting also so you can do the prep steps in the same pot you do the cooking in.
FWIW, I get a lot of use out of my immersion blender and mandoline.
My microplane does get a good deal of use but it’s mostly for grating parmesian cheese, though there are a few recipes that require grated ginger that I find it useful for.
My mortar and pestle mainly only gets use when I need to crush a large amount of peppercorns or realize I’m all out of ground cloves and need to make some of my own from whole cloves.
Speaking of kitchen gadgets Amazon currently has a bunch of Kitchenaid standing mixers on sale, some up to 1/2 off, and boy howdy am I tempted. My current mixer is old enough that I reeeally could use a newer one, but not old enough that I need a new one.
Does anyone have any experience with the meat grinder and pasta roller attachments for these things? Do they work well?
I just got a pasta roller attachment for Christmas and I’ve used it once. It worked pretty damn well. I haven’t gotten a meat grinder attachment yet but I really want one, maybe use it to make my own sausage.
I made butter chicken the other night, but it raised a question. My butter chicken was fine, but why does it never taste even remotely like the butter chicken I can buy in literally any Indian restaurant? What do they know that I don’t? ;_;
I don’t normally get to cook dinner during the week, but I got some simple spaghetti and meatballs done. 'Eat balls were beef and pork, sauce was a $2 thing I got at Aldi. All came together quite nicely.
I’m dating/living with a picky eater and it’s like the one downside to our relationship. There are so many things I want to cook and/or cook with that she really doesn’t like so it really narrows what I cook at home. She’s definitely not as bad of a picky eater as some other people I’ve known–I knew a girl in grad school who basically subsisted on pasta and chicken nuggets, and no, I’m not exaggerating–but she hates things like mushrooms, all fish and seafood, any member of the brassica family that isn’t broccoli, and celery, like really hates celery. As in, if I put celery in the Thanksgiving stuffing I make, she would notice and it would ruin it for her.
Sometimes I cook us separate meals so that I can cook myself some Brussels sprouts or fish, but I have a goal to one day make fish or mushrooms that she likes. I have no idea if “converting” a picky eater once they reach adulthood is actually possible or not, but damn it, I have to believe.
