CUISINE

Loving my new Air-frier.
Chicken tastes great, chips are super.
Been eating alot of salmon lately and the skin is lovely and crispy. Even warming pizza up is better.
Recommend getting one.

Hmm...have to get past the lack of a pan sauce for meats. Sounds good for browning veggies without getting them greasy though.

No. Really?

https://www.yahoo.com/news/tried-whirlpool-trick-making-perfect-140000288.html

hey Chris I am thinking of buying an air fryer too. Can you recommend one? I looked at a couple of brands but couldn't choose between them. The moulinex one looked ok. I would use it to cook oven ready chips mainly, and as there is a cooking oil crisis due to the war, it makes sense to cut down on using oil.

did the idea of cooking scrambled eggs in swirling water remind you to ask about oil free frying?

It was our health kick talk on the other thread. and realising I eat too much fat and sugar.

Well this really deserves it's own thread about aged whiskeys and the like, but we don't have one, likely can't keep such a thread going, so I'm posting it here.  This is mainly for Petty's benefit, if he cares to look in the non-fried food section.

Covid drove a lot of the classic jazz bars in Harlem out, as they always survived on a whiff and a prayer despite being nearly national landmarks.  I was checking out one of the new crop that sprang up ( more like little mom and pop restaurant/bars that sprang up and realized there were a lot of displaced musicians) and in the rather spare rack of bottles behind the bar the MacAllen 12 Scotch kept catching my eye.

So near the end of the first set I asked for a shot plus the smallest ice cube Keisha the barkeep could dredge up.   She gave me a substantial jigger and a half.  I sipped and was tasting some definite non dried fruit, so came home and had to look up the tasting notes:

Palate: Sweet and full, but not overly complex. Lots of sherry, plums, powdered sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg give it a silky, round mouthfeel. The finish is quick, with a mild burn and a long, lingering presence of sweetness reminding me of iced cinnamon rolls.

But when I got the bill, I was nearly knocked off the stool.  I also found this in the tasting notes:

As of March, 2016, four out of the the top ten most expensive whiskies to sell at auction were Macallans. At the time of this writing, The Macallan has swept the top five spots for most expensive bottles currently available via the website wine-searcher.com, in addition to nabbing a total of nine of the top 25 spots on that list.

Well dammit.  Serves me right I guess for not doing my research, but it was a nice sip, and the Harlem prices were probably half what I'd pay in mid town.

Ring a bell with you, Petty?

{{ MacAllen is a good whisky, good if expensive choice. Basic rules for buying whisky- if the bottle has dust on it its expensive, if its a single malt and not a blend, its expensive and may require a second mortage.
I personally prefer a smokier single malt myself, something earthy with a good tang of the peat in it (fruity belongs in wine ), but they too are at the more pricey end of the whisky market, hence cheap cheerful out your nut by bottom of the bottle buckie!  

Still dont complain Halfy, could have been worse a 60 year old bottle of MacAllen will set you back about 1.9 million!
Even just getting a 750ml bottle could cost you an arm and a leg, with according to google the cheapest option, the 18 year old being a mere snip at $250 a bottle!
I dont know what you paid for a single shot (or if you went mad and got a double) but I dont doubt it brought tears to the eyes as well as the wallet. }}

It was only a 12 year, at $25/shot.  I've heard tell of $150 shots out there, so I count myself lucky.   It was a podunk bar in an area considered obscure even by Harlem standards, so the chances of orderng a truly bank breaking shot was remote.

On the smoky side I once purchased a 10-year LaPhroaig for a 40% discount. Damn nice sip; kept the bottle around for weeks after I finished it (took 2 years) just to sniff the lingering perfume.

{{ I once had the great pleasure of drinking a 100 year old single malt, a real smoky peaty one whose cost I dont even want to hazard at. Best thing I ever drank- though to call it drinking is to do it a great disservice, it didnt even feel like drinking a liquid at all, it seemed to turn to a heady peaty vapour on the tongue - unbelievably good. }}

Mainly aimed for Petty and Blue, who have a taste for fine spirits.

Just caught the last half of PBS's (the American equivalent of BBC) "Water of Life", which is a documentary on Scotch Whiskey.

I've seen better editing and production values, but the interviews are first rate. I caught the second half, with a good 30 minutes on Bruichladdich, which seems to be the most innovative of distilleries. Produced the most highly peated scotch in known history (Octomore) and demonstrated that terroir does indeed matter for barley. The idea was largely pooh-poohed until recently, but they arm twisted some farmers on the island of Islay to grow barley, then had a sit-down to discuss the spirits produced. They said it was eye-opening to hear the farmers taste and discuss the differences: "so your land is more gravel and sand, and I can taste the minerals, as opposed to the depth of my more loamy soil". New ground broken.

Then they were looking at the new batch of apprentice distillers taking over, some of them young women. The passion was heart warming.

I may not know much about scotch, but this was a treasure. Not sure if you can get it without navigating a pay wall, but I found it well worth the watch.

{{ Need a VPN if youre in the UK there is trailer for it on youtube however- }}

I'm kind of getting to the back of the pantry over here since it's been a while since I went shopping, and I just made rice with sardines in tomato sauce on top. It's... ok.
But I gotta say, it's the closest I've ever come, visually, to eating bloody orc fingers on a base of fat maggots.

Um.....

Too far?

I've decided I really don't like sardines. blech.

I didn't know Norc had a pasta named after her!

Young Irish folks being befuddled by a series of typical American bourbon cocktails. Funny to me because we consider these to be fairly everyday drinks but they're thrown for a loop.

{{ Im horrified Irish young folk have fallen so low as to be drinking American bourbon in the first place, and from glasses!! Alcohol should be consumed directly from a bottle contained in a brown paper bag or at a push a plastic shopping bag What has happened to the standards for alcholism in these isles?!! They dont even get wildy drunk verbally abuse the people behind the camera and threaten to kill them and their descendants before falling over in a steaming heap. Its a disgrace! The closest they should come to a cocktail is when they are violently sick afterwards and find inexplicable chunks of carrot in their vomit  Call themselves Irish?! }}

They do seem a bit too adorable to pass as proper drunks. Kids these days are all sweetness and entitlement. Must be the effects of PC culture running riot.

halfwise wrote:I didn't know Norc had a pasta named after her!

I assume something unexpectedly happens when you cook it, and it never turns out the way you planned?

I think you need to swear a mile a minute while cooking it.

What's this I hear that Brits typically only eat pancakes on Shrove Tuesday? A shame.

{{ Yup pancake Tuesday. Not thats its a law or policed or anything so some deviants do eat pancakes on other days. Mad

Besides why would you want pancakes to start your day when you can have a solid, weighty bowl of porridge (with salt not sugar you heathens! Mad ) followed by a full Scottish (2 square sausage, 2 black pudding, 2 runny fried eggs, 2 tattie scones, 2 crispy bacon, beans and plum tomatoes just for some colour and finish mopping up the remains with a slice of bread, plain bread not pan) now thats a breakfast you know you've had Twisted Evil }}

Pancakes don't have to be the full breakfast, but they definitely anchor it when present.

Ever since a friend passed me some of her sourdough starter and clued me in that sourdough pancakes can be made from pure sourdough plus an egg and some leavening I haven't gone a week without them.

But I've modified it by taking about 3/4 cup of sourdough (made from whole wheat and corn meal), a dollop of Greek yoghurt (that's my secret, really enhances browning) a scant teaspoon of baking soda and a few flavorings like vanilla, cinammon, etc. Use maple syrup, though brown sugar and butter is amazing as well.

then you can throw in some eggs and bacon/sausage, whatever else you want. But the pancakes are the star.

Why in heaven's name would you only do this once a year??!

Keep in mind that these aren't the silly little things you yanks eat... these are proper pancakes.