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Food Thread: The Probe...Use The Probe...
Temperature Is Nothing To Guess At!

That's halibut. It's not salmon, which is easy to cook, and it's not a thin filet so it takes so little time it's tough to overcook by much.

No, it's a thick and relatively lean fish, which makes it surprisingly difficult to cook correctly. and because it is lean, when it is overcooked it isn't nearly as good as the equivalent piece of a fattier fish like salmon. Hell, I can eat salmon from damned near raw to damned near crumbling, and because it is pretty fatty it tastes pretty good. Not great, but certainly not dusty and dry.

And because halibut is stupidly expensive, cooking it at home or ordering it at a restaurant can require a second mortgage, so the cook had better pay attention!

Give me a steak or a piece of salmon, and I'll cook it without worrying about anything. But with certain foods like halibut, I use a thermometer. That doesn't mean I am inexperienced or afraid. it means that I want the end result to be tasty and correctly cooked. There are good ones to be had for a reasonable amount of money...I swear by Thermoworks products, but whatever works for you is better than nothing.

And one more thing. If you get a temperature probe, use it on foods that you know how to cook, just so you have a baseline. It's great practice, and it is useful when you are at your SiL's house and have to bail her out because that third margarita put her on her ass and people still want to eat!

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The federal government, in its infinite wisdom, is pushing for a record amount of ethanol to be blended into the nation's gasoline supply. Aside from the pesky little fact that it makes fuel more, not less expensive, it shifts resources away from food production, and that is never a good thing, but is even worse now, because of the many problems in the agricultural supply chain.

In America, food will become more expensive (oh joy!), but I doubt anyone is going to starve. But on the margins in the poorest nations on earth, people WILL starve! it is basic economics, and I have been harping about it for years, and will continue to harp on it until the ethanol lobby (Iowa corn farmers and Minnesota distillers) get slapped around by a sane Congress (that will never happen) or a sane president (deSantis 2024!)

Farm land is for food. Oil wells are for fuel. That's not really complicated, except for our elites.

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Cookies are good. Even mediocre cookies are fun to eat. But I have discovered in my dotage that I prefer cookies that are a little bit less sweet than what is typical. And that sounds like nonsense...how can a cookie (which is chock full of sugar) be less sweet. And of course the answer is that the sweet should be balanced by other flavors that complement it and tone it down. otherwise you are left with a mouthful of the sugar jar and not much else.

Which is why the oatmeal raisin cookie is tied for first as the greatest cookie on earth. Because the cinnamon and oats tone down the aggressive sweetness of the base cookie. Just like the mild bitterness of the chocolate tones down the sweetness of the chocolate-chip cookie.

Why am I jabbering about this? Because I had a white-chocolate-chip cookie last weekend and I was struck by the monochromatic sweetness.

I wonder how chocolate-chip cookies would be made with one of those insanely bitter chocolates? You know, the 85% stuff that is just weird on its own.

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From a lurker (and regular reader!). These look great! I had no idea that armadillo eggs were edible...

I'm definitely a lurker and have sent along a few ideas but this Memorial Day's weekend winner was the "Smoked Armadillo Egg." Cored jalapeño peppers stuffed with cream cheese, BBQ seasoning and breakfast sausage. All wrapped in three strips of bacon and grilled until about 160 degrees. The pics made five jalapeño s with 4 oz of cream cheese, two tablespoons of your favorite BBQ seasoning mixed in and about two or three tablespoons of breakfast sausage. Scale up from there but I had leftover mixture and it depends on the size of the jalapeño s. I used mesquite wood chips on a gas grill wrapped in foil with holes cut to bring out the smoke. I have a smoker but the rest of the family isn't as big of a fan of smoked food as I am so we improvise.

But then he goes completely off the rails into cocktail insanity.

Separate note and maybe there should be a subsection on "drinks and cocktails" with the food thread...seems like a nice pairing!

Favorite of mine is the Negroni (more than once I've had someone cock their head sideways and do a double take thinking I said something that was insensitive...the times we live in I guess). Super easy to make and is fantastic during the warm summer months( or cold months...or any month!). Bitter sweet and packs a punch...also a bit of an acquired taste but fantastic.

Equal parts gin, sweet vermouth and Campari (or Aperol if you're looking for something smoother and less alcohol). Stir in a mixer with ice and pour in a tumbler over a large ice cube. Garnish with an orange peel.

My current favorite mix consists of Roku Gin, Campari and Dolin Rouge Vermouth. Roku Gin is fairly inexpensive but rivals the taste of other pricier botanical gins. Sweet vermouth comes in a variety of flavors so it depends on what you like and the price range. I'd recommend testing the cheaper ones first if you're looking to try the cocktail...if you don't like it there's always a Manhattan for the vermouth!

Not the "Drinks And Cocktails" section. That's a good idea. But the Negroni monstrosity should long ago have been relegated to the ash heap of drinking history. And I like bitters in cocktails!
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I may have mentioned this dish before, in the forgotten mists of a bygone age, but if there are any Scotsmen reading this, you are a lucky people!

Traditional Scottish Cullen Skink
Aside from an absolutely fantastic name, this is a great and weird dish. Smoky fish, potatoes, a bit of sweet leek, all held together by a rich cream base. The only problem is finding smoked haddock. You'll either have to make it yourself (not as easy as it sounds), or buy it. It's called Finnan Haddie, and it's a bitch to find!
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Sold to me by a couple of LGBTBBQ Grrl Power nutjobs. But they were pleasant and happy and laughed with us and weren't offended by a bunch of middle-aged white guys.

I'm as political (and angry) as anyone, and I am very well aware of the degradation of society in which these folks participate. But I also subscribe to Dennis Prager's "macro vs. micro." I can be against something in the larger world of politics and culture, but personal contact with nice people, no matter what their politics, trumps almost everything else.

For instance, Bluebell doesn't (for some strange and unfathomable reason) eat oysters and cauliflower, yet in all other respects she is a fine woman. I mean, it's not as if she is a Red Sox fan or something else beyond the pale.

******Romaine lettuce that is green, instead of the white crap they sell that has never seen a photon, pork rib roasts from the front end of the pig where all the good and fatty meat lives, carrots that don't taste like stalky chalk, spare bottles of Van Winkle Special Reserve 12 Year Old Bourbon, an herb garden that actually produces herbs (but no basil!), well-marbled NY strip steaks and elk backstrap to: cbd dot aoshq at gmail dot com.

And don't think that you are off the hook with maple syrup and French Toast: I'm watching you...all of you! And I am watching you perverts who shake Manhattans and keeping a list for the Burning Times.