Cooking

Chicken soup is my favorite. Especially doctored up from basic noodle bases and broths or made from scratch.

Also ramen.

"Allah may guide their bullets, but Jesus helps those who aim down the sights."

Damn it, it happened again. I must've gotten hubris, because as soon as I manage to impress myself a little bit (In this case, after I managed to make some good sourdough bread without a scale), I'm immediately struck by karma.

My sourdough bread ended up with a line of raw dough at the bottom today. Something went wrong with the second fermentation, because they didn't rise at all. I guess the room was too cold, after all. And something must've been off with the ingredient measurements, because the dough was more stodgy than usual when kneading it. I must've not had enough water when feeding my sourdough in preparation.

---

I'll have to get my revenge round tomorrow.

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

Sorry to bump, but I had my sourdough retribution: Yesterday's batch of bread turned out great again! I think it was indeed the second fermentation going wrong that caused Friday's mishap, so I put the dough to rise in a warmer room.

And on a different note, I invented a tasty blondie. I used a brownie recipe that I've made so many times that I can practically do it in my sleep now, except I left out the cocoa powder, and instead I browned the butter and added almond paste, raspberries and pieces of browned white chocolate to the batter. Delicious!

Edited by MagmaTeaMerry on Mar 21st 2021 at 8:19:38 PM

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

I remember one time when I made brownies, I had to microwave a Hershey bar because I found out too late that I didn’t have the chocolate frosting that I needed. -talks like Comic Book Guy- Best. Improvisation. Ever.

I like to keep my audience riveted.

Sorry about the double post, but I just had a sublime thought that I had to put down. Remember my earlier post about what kind of dessert to have on the last night of National Princess Week? I just had an idea for the main course. I feel very tempted to cook up some surf and turf. Though what should the surf part be? Should I have the classic steamed lobster tail or change it up with something different? I was thinking of either a grilled salmon filet or some popcorn shrimp.

I like to keep my audience riveted.

I'm making some desserts for Easter.

One of the ideas I had was for meringue nests. Simply put, it's Swiss meringue piped into the shape of bird's nests, and we're going to fill them with whipped cream and chocolate eggs. I'll also make some miniaure mud cakes with strawberries, because chcoolate is tasty.

I was also thinking of making sugar cookies in the shape of chickens.

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

Do you have any dishes that were common in your household and you didn't realize that it wasn't part of the "national palate", so to speak, until you were older?

A dish that my Dad used to make (Mom sometimes, but Dad was the one who taught her) was called, uh... "When you're strapped for cash". No, seriously. That's what it was called. I think it was a recipe from a student cookbook he had or something...?

Anyway, it consists of toast topped with a boiled egg, white sauce flavored with mustard and bacon. Not exactly the healthiest meal out there, but we loved the simplicity of it. Also, you know, can't go wrong with bread, bacon, eggs and mustard.

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

Well, my dinner for the last night of National Princess Week turned out excellently. My dessert... not quite. x_x Let me put it this way: if this were an anime, this is the part where I'd look at the screen with an embarrassed grin while sweat droping. XD ^_^;;

I like to keep my audience riveted.

I made Maritime-style potato fish cakes tonight.

Mashed potatoes with salmon, Dijon mustard, green onions and dill, bound together with the potatoes' starch and a couple beaten eggs, formed into cakes, dredged in flour, then fried up in an absolutely sinful amount of butter and oil (yes, both; otherwise the butter scorches).

I pretty much had to pair them with a spinach salad.

I like salmon with pepper on top. When we have it for dinner, it is usually with chips.

"Listen up, Marina, because this is SUPER important. Whatever you do, don't eat th“ “DON'T EAT WHAT?! Your text box ran out of space!”

One of my favourite dishes to cook is poached salmon. I start with butter in the pan, sautee some onions and green/sweet peppers. Once they get caramelized, I put the salmon on the pan to brown it and some garlic. Once the garlic starts to get aromatic, I put in a mix of chicken stock and white wine. I throw in some veggies like celery, carrots, mini potatoes and broccoli. For seasoning I use anise stars, salt, pepper and celery salt. Bring to a boil and simmer. Once the liquid has evaporated, let it sit for a few minutes and serve.

Damn, if Zig read that, he would have started to eat himself!

"Listen up, Marina, because this is SUPER important. Whatever you do, don't eat th“ “DON'T EAT WHAT?! Your text box ran out of space!”

The other day I made me a variety of panko fried chicken for dinner using Italian style pre-seasoned panko bread crumbs. It turned out pretty good. Normally I add my own seasonings to it.

Last night I made pizza using a Pilsbury pre made crust with a triple cheddar blend, mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses topped with pepperoni and black olives. It was excellent.

Edited by MajorTom on Apr 30th 2021 at 5:46:28 AM

"Allah may guide their bullets, but Jesus helps those who aim down the sights."

I made some queso sauce today. I don't know if it was an "authentic" Mexican recipe, but at this point, it doesn't matter because it was absolutely delicious!

I'm never buying that gross canned stuff again - I'll start buying cans upon cans of evaporated milk instead, no matter how hard it might be to get a hold of it here. Where has this cheese sauce been all my life?!

And I also made Chef John's carnitas. I was worried because I've only made carnitas once before, and not in this oven. But the meat turned out to be fork-tender. Could've been crispier, but tasty all the same.

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

Tonight’s dinner was as I call them “enchiladas gringas”, enchiladas made with flour tortillas and stuff with beans in addition to beef and cheese.

I made a modification that greatly aided it, i took a little bit of sauce and coated the bottom of the glass pan I bake it in before I loaded it up. Made the bottom part a fair bit tastier, perhaps because it no longer was quite so well done cooking wise. Occasionally it has come close to burning there before.

I think I’ll implement this new discovery from here on out.

"Allah may guide their bullets, but Jesus helps those who aim down the sights."

My brother made cookie recipe with basic ingredients but it made my tongue itch. I have no idea why.

Any fellow experimental cooks around these parts? Which experimental dish was your biggest success... and which was your biggest failure?

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

^ Some of the dishes I make quasi-regularly originally started as experiments or derivatives. My enchiladas recipe, panko chicken and breakfast quesadillas all were that way.

Can't say I've experimented and had an Epic Fail though, I'm much too cautious cooking-wise to have that happen. (My Ma has had a few though.)

"Allah may guide their bullets, but Jesus helps those who aim down the sights."

I just screwed up the cheese sauce for a mac and cheese the other day. I barely had enough cheese to make a sauce but I wanted to get rid of the cheese somehow. The concoction was very liquidy so I added some flour to thicken it...and it tasted very floury. Epic fail on my part.

^ If you want to thicken sauces and gravy but don't want it to taste overly flour-y, make and use a roux.

All you need to make one is butter and flour.

"Allah may guide their bullets, but Jesus helps those who aim down the sights."

And with roux-based sauces: Cold liquid + hot roux = no lumps.

... Unless I remember that wrong. Or is that just when you make béchamel?

Edited by MagmaTeaMerry on May 6th 2021 at 9:10:59 PM

My AO3 profile. Let sleeping cats lie and be cute and calming.

Seriously considering shirking my Huon FM barbecue duties and sneaking off to Woolworths under the pretense of buying more bread/paper napkins/etc. so I can actually buy chocolate to make brownies bc goddamn I am craving brownies like mad

FC: SW-1445-0294-1719/PSN: TekkenGirl4Lyfe/Currently playing: Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade

I'm going to do that fun thing again. My dinner tonight is going to be a pot roast that I'll cook in the crock pot. And not only that, I'm going to time it so that it'll finish cooking right when Svengoolie comes on.

I like to keep my audience riveted.

I made brownies today. They were delicious. And I reached A support with Claude. Happy Reiko is happy~

FC: SW-1445-0294-1719/PSN: TekkenGirl4Lyfe/Currently playing: Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade

Made a sweet and sour chicken with leftover saffron rice from Indian take-out on the weekend. I grilled the chicken rather than fry it. Very good.

Are there any cooking youtube channels people recommend? I quite like Sam the Cooking Guy andChef Jean-Pierre.