This is just a quick note to readers to let you all know that I'll be publishing a lot less frequently here at Casual Kitchen as I start up work on some other projects.
There's a few more things I'd still like to do here: strip down and simplify the layout, organize a guide for readers new to the site, put together a longer-form work based on some of Casual Kitchen's key topics, fix the ad units so I can monetize the site a little less incompetently, and so on.
But after more than ten years, 3.3 million pageviews (and counting) and well over a thousand articles, I'm (finally!) running out of things to say here. It's time to let this project go... and start something else.
Casual Kitchen has been a really fun writing project, one that exceeded anything I ever, ever expected. I hope readers have learned a few things over the course of this blog's life; I know I have by writing it.
Let me thank you, readers, for your all your support and interest!
--Dan
************************
You can support Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
Tuesday, August 20, 2019
This Nigerian nourishment is known as the Jollof Rice with a curve! It feels great to see the looks on your visitors' or companions' countenances when they think you are serving them the great old Jollof Rice yet bam, the minute the main spoon enters the mouth, you are certain to get the vibes of delight! It makes you feel better, isn't that right?
The most effective method to Cook Coconut Rice [Video]
White Coconut Rice
Indeed, it looks equivalent to the Jollof Rice you know however the fragrance and taste is unique. For what reason don't you shock your visitors today around evening time by setting up this simple supper formula?
This formula is for Jollof Coconut Rice, there's another adaptation of coconut rice known as the White Coconut Rice.
Coming up next are different varieties of Jollof Rice:
Hamburger Mince Jollof Rice
Smoky Party Jollof Rice without Firewood
Verdant Jollof Rice
Great Party Jollof Rice
Blended Vegetable Jollof Rice
Rice and Beans
Fixings
3 stogie cups | 750g long grain parboiled rice
500mls Tomato Stew
600 mls Coconut Milk
Chicken (entire chicken or drumsticks)
Bean stew pepper (to taste)
Salt (to taste)
1 medium onions
3 stock shapes
1 tablespoon thyme
Before you cook Coconut Rice
Set up the tomato stew in the event that you don't have some in the cooler. Visit the Tomato Stew page for subtleties on the best way to do that. It is prudent to plan tomato stew before hand and keep in the cooler. This is so that at whatever point you need to cook any jollof rice related dish, it is simply a question of adding it to your cooking.
On the off chance that you will utilize entire chicken, wash and cut the entire chicken into pieces. Spot the pieces in a pot; include water till it just covers the bits of chicken, include the slashed onions, stock blocks and thyme and begin cooking. The cooking time relies upon the sort of chicken. The chicken or cockerel cooks a lot quicker than the hen however the hen is more delectable.
Cooking till done and add salt to taste. Put the bits of chicken in a sifter to deplete, at that point fry with vegetable oil. You can likewise flame broil it in a broiler. This is to give it a brilliant look which is increasingly adequate particularly on the off chance that you have visitors for supper. Peruse how to season and flame broil chicken for increasingly one this.
Right now is an ideal opportunity to extricate the coconut milk. This is a significant simple errand on the off chance that you pursue the technique definite in How to Extract Coconut Milk. Put the coconut milk in a safe spot.
Parboil the rice utilizing the strategy point by point in parboiling rice for cooking coconut rice. Wash the parboiled rice and put in a strainer to deplete.
Cooking Directions
Presently we need a pot huge enough to oblige the rice till it is finished. Remember that the rice will regularly ascend by in any event one fourth of its amount from the parboiled state to the done state.
Pour the chicken stock, coconut milk and the tomato stew into the chose pot. Set on the stove to bubble. Include the depleted parboiled rice, salt and pepper to taste. In the event that vital, top up with water to bring the water level to a similar level as the rice. This is to guarantee that all the water evaporates when the rice is cooked.
Spread the pot and leave to cook on medium warmth. Thusly the rice does not consume before the water dries.
In the event that you parboiled the rice as depicted at parboiling rice for cooking coconut rice, the rice ought to be finished when the water is dry. Affirm that the rice is finished by tasting it. That is the manner in which coconut rice is cooked.
Present with Fried Plantain, Nigerian Moi, Nigerian Salad or Coleslaw.
On the off chance that you have any inquiries regarding getting ready Coconut Rice, click here to ask me.
Depiction:
Discover direct why Nigerian seared rice is so mainstream by attempting this delectable, simple formula. Served nearby chicken, its unrealistic. Regardless of whether you have it as a side dish or a dinner all alone, the hot flavors will have you at the main nibble.
Fixings:
2 cups in length grain white rice
2 huge green peppers
1 little cabbage
1 huge onion
½ cup green beans
4 huge carrots
2 cups chicken stock
½ tbsp. white pepper
3 cooking spoons groundnut oil
4 huge chicken thighs (or other meat of decision)
1 tsp. curry powder
Flavoring and salt to taste
Strategy:
Wash and flavor the chicken pieces. Bubble until delicate, at that point fry or flame broil them.
Hack the carrot, cabbage, green pepper and green beans.
Parboil the rice, at that point cook in the chicken stock (include 2 additional cups of water). Cook until practically delicate, at that point put in a safe spot.
Put a perfect griddle ablaze. Add groundnut oil and onion to the dish. Blend for a moment at that point include the carrot and green beans. Mix for one more moment.
Include the cabbage, green pepper, white pepper, curry, flavoring and salt to taste (attempt to keep it somewhat hot). Pan fried food for 2 minutes.
Add the rice to the blend, mix and stew for 5 minutes. Present with the chicken.
Discover direct why Nigerian seared rice is so mainstream by attempting this delectable, simple formula. Served nearby chicken, its unrealistic. Regardless of whether you have it as a side dish or a dinner all alone, the hot flavors will have you at the main nibble.
Fixings:
2 cups in length grain white rice
2 huge green peppers
1 little cabbage
1 huge onion
½ cup green beans
4 huge carrots
2 cups chicken stock
½ tbsp. white pepper
3 cooking spoons groundnut oil
4 huge chicken thighs (or other meat of decision)
1 tsp. curry powder
Flavoring and salt to taste
Strategy:
Wash and flavor the chicken pieces. Bubble until delicate, at that point fry or flame broil them.
Hack the carrot, cabbage, green pepper and green beans.
Parboil the rice, at that point cook in the chicken stock (include 2 additional cups of water). Cook until practically delicate, at that point put in a safe spot.
Put a perfect griddle ablaze. Add groundnut oil and onion to the dish. Blend for a moment at that point include the carrot and green beans. Mix for one more moment.
Include the cabbage, green pepper, white pepper, curry, flavoring and salt to taste (attempt to keep it somewhat hot). Pan fried food for 2 minutes.
Add the rice to the blend, mix and stew for 5 minutes. Present with the chicken.
My Ego Doesn’t Want to Hear It. Why?
"You're going to want to 'peel' your feet up off the pavement more. And then lay them back down with a mid-sole strike. It'll help you make more of a circular motion with your legs as you run."
This was Laura, helping correct my running form, and quoting directly from Danny Dreyer's excellent book Chi Running. Which, oddly enough, I had her read years ago to improve her running form. Hmm.
I had a negative reaction to this comment, even considering it (wrongly, as we will soon see) vaguely condescending.
My reaction was nothing more than my ego attempting to "protect" me. And what I'd like to do in today's post is explore how dangerous our egos can be when they defensively and aggressively overprotect us.
I'll start by considering reality from my ego's deeply insecure point of view. Assume for the moment that my ego was 100% correct in its worst-case interpretation of Laura's comment: that Laura's intention was to lord over me how terrible my running form was, and by implicit comparison how amazingly perfect her form is. Her comment was intended to condescend and to indicate superiority.
Yes, I know this sounds ridiculous already (I mean, jeez, who wants to go through life automatically assuming such negative intent in everything said around you? [1]), but bear with me.
Now, we're both reasonably intelligent people who try to be "meta" about a conversation while we're in it. We're both mostly aware that it pays to say things in such a way that the other people understands the point you're trying to make. Likewise, we also try to be aware that the other person has "intentionality" in what he or she says too. In other words: I can generally assume if something is important enough for Laura to say, there's most likely a decent reason for her to bother to say it.
Otherwise, I've chosen to marry somebody who blithers at me for no discernible reason, something I really don't want to be true.
Once you start considering the real purpose of a conversation about running form (instead of your ego's insecure and false assumptions about that purpose), and once you ruminate a little bit about why somebody might offer a suggestion about something they noticed about your form, you start to see how important intentionality is, and likewise how important it is to assume positive intent in what others say to you.
Let's go back to my ego for a second, and return to my ego's negative interpretation of Laura's statement. My ego arrived at this negative interpretation in a split second, without any real consideration of Laura's intentions. The only thing it "considered" was the idea that I was likely being insulted somehow. Thus my ego reacted in order to protect itself from a potential ego injury... and this ended up preventing me from improving my running form, by insta-rejecting an excellent idea from a book I already knew and totally agreed with.
Thanks ego! Thanks a lot.
If you can believe it, it gets even worse: our ego protection reaction, if it's habitual, will condition our psychological environment (including those people unfortunate enough to be in it) to never offer us any helpful suggestions. Think about it: if I were to react this way to every idea or suggestion Laura ever makes, eventually she'll stop bothering to try and help me.
A disturbing way to look at this is to conclude that the more reactant your ego, the more your life will be bereft of help in all forms.
Yes, you and I both know the truism about never giving unsolicited advice. But at the same time, helpful suggestions exist only if they manifest in other peoples' minds, and those helpful ideas and suggestions appear in other's minds when they appear, not necessarily when we want them to appear. Thus we have to be ready for this "help" on other peoples' schedule, not on our own. It's just like being consistently ready in case a teacher appears.
There's yet another aspect of our ego protection reflex that's just as pernicious. Consider an example I read recently about trees in a biosphere project. Scientists couldn't understand why all the trees inside of the biosphere kept falling over before they matured. Well, it turns out that if you're a tree inside a biosphere, you never get exposed to wind. Wind is a type of stressor, and trees exposed to wind as they mature become far stronger and resilient. [2]
Essentially, our egos want to keep us in a biosphere, where we never face any wind. Our egos presume negative intent, they presume insult and condescension, and they do so instantly, reflexively. If all we do is reflexively ego-protect, all we'll end up with is a fragile, brittle, easy-to-injure psyche.
So I started peeling up my feet.
Footnotes:
[1] One useful heuristic to use at all times when interacting with others: do not automatically presume negative intent in the things other people say.
[2] A fancy word for this is hormesis, or hormetic response. The tree's hormetic response to wind strengthens it over time. For further reading on the human body's hormetic response to running and how even running shoes intefere with hormesis, see also What Barefoot Running Taught Us About Expensive Sneakers (And What Nike and Others Really Don't Want You To Know)
*****************
You can help support the work I do here at Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!
This was Laura, helping correct my running form, and quoting directly from Danny Dreyer's excellent book Chi Running. Which, oddly enough, I had her read years ago to improve her running form. Hmm.
I had a negative reaction to this comment, even considering it (wrongly, as we will soon see) vaguely condescending.
My reaction was nothing more than my ego attempting to "protect" me. And what I'd like to do in today's post is explore how dangerous our egos can be when they defensively and aggressively overprotect us.
I'll start by considering reality from my ego's deeply insecure point of view. Assume for the moment that my ego was 100% correct in its worst-case interpretation of Laura's comment: that Laura's intention was to lord over me how terrible my running form was, and by implicit comparison how amazingly perfect her form is. Her comment was intended to condescend and to indicate superiority.
Yes, I know this sounds ridiculous already (I mean, jeez, who wants to go through life automatically assuming such negative intent in everything said around you? [1]), but bear with me.
Now, we're both reasonably intelligent people who try to be "meta" about a conversation while we're in it. We're both mostly aware that it pays to say things in such a way that the other people understands the point you're trying to make. Likewise, we also try to be aware that the other person has "intentionality" in what he or she says too. In other words: I can generally assume if something is important enough for Laura to say, there's most likely a decent reason for her to bother to say it.
Otherwise, I've chosen to marry somebody who blithers at me for no discernible reason, something I really don't want to be true.
Once you start considering the real purpose of a conversation about running form (instead of your ego's insecure and false assumptions about that purpose), and once you ruminate a little bit about why somebody might offer a suggestion about something they noticed about your form, you start to see how important intentionality is, and likewise how important it is to assume positive intent in what others say to you.
Let's go back to my ego for a second, and return to my ego's negative interpretation of Laura's statement. My ego arrived at this negative interpretation in a split second, without any real consideration of Laura's intentions. The only thing it "considered" was the idea that I was likely being insulted somehow. Thus my ego reacted in order to protect itself from a potential ego injury... and this ended up preventing me from improving my running form, by insta-rejecting an excellent idea from a book I already knew and totally agreed with.
Thanks ego! Thanks a lot.
If you can believe it, it gets even worse: our ego protection reaction, if it's habitual, will condition our psychological environment (including those people unfortunate enough to be in it) to never offer us any helpful suggestions. Think about it: if I were to react this way to every idea or suggestion Laura ever makes, eventually she'll stop bothering to try and help me.
A disturbing way to look at this is to conclude that the more reactant your ego, the more your life will be bereft of help in all forms.
Yes, you and I both know the truism about never giving unsolicited advice. But at the same time, helpful suggestions exist only if they manifest in other peoples' minds, and those helpful ideas and suggestions appear in other's minds when they appear, not necessarily when we want them to appear. Thus we have to be ready for this "help" on other peoples' schedule, not on our own. It's just like being consistently ready in case a teacher appears.
There's yet another aspect of our ego protection reflex that's just as pernicious. Consider an example I read recently about trees in a biosphere project. Scientists couldn't understand why all the trees inside of the biosphere kept falling over before they matured. Well, it turns out that if you're a tree inside a biosphere, you never get exposed to wind. Wind is a type of stressor, and trees exposed to wind as they mature become far stronger and resilient. [2]
Essentially, our egos want to keep us in a biosphere, where we never face any wind. Our egos presume negative intent, they presume insult and condescension, and they do so instantly, reflexively. If all we do is reflexively ego-protect, all we'll end up with is a fragile, brittle, easy-to-injure psyche.
So I started peeling up my feet.
Footnotes:
[1] One useful heuristic to use at all times when interacting with others: do not automatically presume negative intent in the things other people say.
[2] A fancy word for this is hormesis, or hormetic response. The tree's hormetic response to wind strengthens it over time. For further reading on the human body's hormetic response to running and how even running shoes intefere with hormesis, see also What Barefoot Running Taught Us About Expensive Sneakers (And What Nike and Others Really Don't Want You To Know)
*****************
You can help support the work I do here at Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!
Tuesday, August 13, 2019
Why Are Vegan and Vegetarian Recipes Obsessed with Looking Like Meat-Based Meals?
Why do so many vegan or vegetarian recipes try to look like meat-based meals?
Here's a textbook example of what I mean, a vegan deviled eggs recipe. This recipe is totally vegan, with no animal products used at all, but it is designed to look exactly like a non-vegan food.
In other words, it's supposed to be a simulacrum of a food a vegan wouldn't eat.
Now, my goal isn't to criticize this person's recipe per se. [1] What I want to do is get at a more central problem endemic to vegan and vegetarian cuisine. Which is:
With so many great vegan and vegetarian recipes out there, what is the benefit of making facsimiles of the very foods you would never eat in the first place?
Remember, here at Casual Kitchen we are not vegan or vegetarian, but we often eat vegan or vegetarian meals, and we feature dozens and dozens of easy, healthy and laughably cheap vegan and vegetarian recipes here at this blog.
But imagine a rabid meat eater who didn't know any better. To her, it would seem as if vegan and vegetarian cooking has an insecurity complex. A form of penis envy even. It's as if vegan/vegetarian cooking somehow is all worried that it isn't "real" food, so in order to compensate, it has to somehow imitate or resemble non-vegetarian food.
And so, we are presented with processed pseudo-foods like tofu scramble, vegetarian hotdogs, or my personal favorite: tofurkey. It all suggests that unless a meal looks or seems like meat it can't be taken seriously as a meal.
We all know that this could not be further from the truth. Vegans and vegetarians have no reason to be insecure--much less have penis envy--about what and how they eat. So why the imitative food simulacra? Why so many processed pseudo-foods when there are so many amazing vegan and vegetarian recipes already out there?
Readers, what do you think?
READ NEXT: Casual Kitchen's Core Principles: #2: Embrace Low-Meat Cooking
Footnote:
[1] That said, I can't say I'm appetized by egg whites made of agar agar, which then require a dose of black pepper to mask the taste. This is pure pseudo-food.
You can help support the work I do here at Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!
Here's a textbook example of what I mean, a vegan deviled eggs recipe. This recipe is totally vegan, with no animal products used at all, but it is designed to look exactly like a non-vegan food.
In other words, it's supposed to be a simulacrum of a food a vegan wouldn't eat.
Now, my goal isn't to criticize this person's recipe per se. [1] What I want to do is get at a more central problem endemic to vegan and vegetarian cuisine. Which is:
With so many great vegan and vegetarian recipes out there, what is the benefit of making facsimiles of the very foods you would never eat in the first place?
Remember, here at Casual Kitchen we are not vegan or vegetarian, but we often eat vegan or vegetarian meals, and we feature dozens and dozens of easy, healthy and laughably cheap vegan and vegetarian recipes here at this blog.
But imagine a rabid meat eater who didn't know any better. To her, it would seem as if vegan and vegetarian cooking has an insecurity complex. A form of penis envy even. It's as if vegan/vegetarian cooking somehow is all worried that it isn't "real" food, so in order to compensate, it has to somehow imitate or resemble non-vegetarian food.
And so, we are presented with processed pseudo-foods like tofu scramble, vegetarian hotdogs, or my personal favorite: tofurkey. It all suggests that unless a meal looks or seems like meat it can't be taken seriously as a meal.
We all know that this could not be further from the truth. Vegans and vegetarians have no reason to be insecure--much less have penis envy--about what and how they eat. So why the imitative food simulacra? Why so many processed pseudo-foods when there are so many amazing vegan and vegetarian recipes already out there?
Readers, what do you think?
READ NEXT: Casual Kitchen's Core Principles: #2: Embrace Low-Meat Cooking
Footnote:
[1] That said, I can't say I'm appetized by egg whites made of agar agar, which then require a dose of black pepper to mask the taste. This is pure pseudo-food.
You can help support the work I do here at Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!
Monday, August 12, 2019
Launch step-by-step Peach Melba roulade
Fixings
50g spread
, dissolved, at that point cooled, in addition to extra for the tin
6 huge eggs
175g brilliant caster sugar, in addition to 3 tbsp extra for cleaning
120g self-raising flour
For the filling
1 tsp vanilla concentrate
420g can peach
in syrup, depleted (save the syrup), and generally slashed
75g raspberry coulis (we utilized instant from Waitrose)
150g pack raspberry
200ml twofold cream
Strategy
Dispatch well ordered
Warmth stove to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Margarine and line a 25 x 35cm Swiss move tin with preparing material. In an enormous bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar utilizing an electric hand blender until light in shading and cushioned – this will take around 5 mins.
Filter the flour into the bowl. Utilizing an enormous metal spoon, delicately crease it into the eggs. Pour in the margarine and rapidly overlay to join. Be mindful so as not to overmix, as this will thump all the let some circulation into of the whisked eggs. Empty the blend into the lined tin and smooth out to the edges with your spoon. Heat for 12-15 mins until cooked through and springy.
Lay a sheet of heating material, bigger than your wipe, on your work surface and residue with the rest of the sugar. Flip the wipe onto the sugary surface and cautiously strip off the material coating the base of the wipe. Utilize the sheet underneath to help you firmly move up your roulade. Leave to cool.
To make the filling, include the vanilla and 3 tbsp of the peach syrup to the cream and rush with electric blenders until it frames delicate pinnacles. Overlap in half of the hacked peaches and swell down the middle the coulis.
Unroll the roulade, expel the preparing material and spread with the peachy cream. Disperse the raspberries and the rest of the peaches over the top. Sprinkle with the remaining coulis and firmly re-roll the roulade. Move to a serving plate or board and serve straight away.
50g spread
, dissolved, at that point cooled, in addition to extra for the tin
6 huge eggs
175g brilliant caster sugar, in addition to 3 tbsp extra for cleaning
120g self-raising flour
For the filling
1 tsp vanilla concentrate
420g can peach
in syrup, depleted (save the syrup), and generally slashed
75g raspberry coulis (we utilized instant from Waitrose)
150g pack raspberry
200ml twofold cream
Strategy
Dispatch well ordered
Warmth stove to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Margarine and line a 25 x 35cm Swiss move tin with preparing material. In an enormous bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar utilizing an electric hand blender until light in shading and cushioned – this will take around 5 mins.
Filter the flour into the bowl. Utilizing an enormous metal spoon, delicately crease it into the eggs. Pour in the margarine and rapidly overlay to join. Be mindful so as not to overmix, as this will thump all the let some circulation into of the whisked eggs. Empty the blend into the lined tin and smooth out to the edges with your spoon. Heat for 12-15 mins until cooked through and springy.
Lay a sheet of heating material, bigger than your wipe, on your work surface and residue with the rest of the sugar. Flip the wipe onto the sugary surface and cautiously strip off the material coating the base of the wipe. Utilize the sheet underneath to help you firmly move up your roulade. Leave to cool.
To make the filling, include the vanilla and 3 tbsp of the peach syrup to the cream and rush with electric blenders until it frames delicate pinnacles. Overlap in half of the hacked peaches and swell down the middle the coulis.
Unroll the roulade, expel the preparing material and spread with the peachy cream. Disperse the raspberries and the rest of the peaches over the top. Sprinkle with the remaining coulis and firmly re-roll the roulade. Move to a serving plate or board and serve straight away.
Fixings
500g/1lb 1oz solid white bread flour, in addition to some additional flour for wrapping up
40g/1½oz delicate spread
12g/2 sachets quick activity dried yeast
2 tsp salt
about 300ml/10¾fl oz lukewarm water (warm not cold – about body temperature)
somewhat olive or sunflower oil
Instructions to recordings
Technique
500g/1lb 1oz solid white bread flour, in addition to some additional flour for wrapping up
40g/1½oz delicate spread
12g/2 sachets quick activity dried yeast
2 tsp salt
about 300ml/10¾fl oz lukewarm water (warm not cold – about body temperature)
somewhat olive or sunflower oil
Instructions to recordings
Technique
- Put the flour into an enormous blending bowl and include the spread. Include the yeast at one side of the bowl and include the salt at the other, generally the salt will slaughter the yeast. Mix every one of the fixings with a spoon to consolidate.
- Include half of the water and turn the blend round with your fingers. Keep on including water a little at any given moment, consolidating admirably, until you've grabbed the majority of the flour from the sides of the bowl. You should not have to include the majority of the water, or you may need to include somewhat more – you need a mixture that is very much consolidated and delicate, however not sticky or soaked. Blend with your fingers to ensure the majority of the fixings are joined and utilize the blend to clean within the bowl. Prop up until the blend shapes an unpleasant batter.
- Use about a teaspoon of oil to delicately oil a perfect work surface (utilizing oil rather than flour will keep the surface of the mixture steady). Turn out your batter onto the lubed work surface (ensure you have a lot of room).
- Crease the most distant edge of the batter into the center of the mixture, at that point turn the mixture by 45 degrees and rehash. Do this multiple times until the batter is in all respects gently covered all over in olive oil.
- Presently utilize your hands to ply the mixture: drive the batter out one way with the impact point of your hand, at that point overlap it back on itself. Turn the mixture by 90 degrees and rehash. Massaging along these lines extends the gluten and makes the mixture versatile. Do this for around 4 or 5 minutes until the batter is smooth and stretchy. Work rapidly with the goal that the blend doesn't adhere to your hands – on the off chance that it gets too sticky you can add a little flour to your hands.
- Clean and gently oil your blending bowl and set the batter back into it. Spread with a soggy tea towel or gently oiled stick film and put it aside to demonstrate. This gives the yeast time to work: the mixture should twofold in size. This should take around 60 minutes, yet will fluctuate contingent upon the temperature of your room (don't put the bowl in a hot spot or the yeast will work too rapidly).
- Line a heating plate with preparing or silicone paper (not greaseproof).
- When the mixture has multiplied in size scratch it out of the bowl to shape it. The surface ought to be fun and glossy. Turn it out onto a delicately floured surface and thump it back by manipulating it immovably to 'thump' out the air. Utilize your hand to roll the batter up, at that point turn by 45 degrees and move it up once more. Rehash a few times. Delicately transform and smooth the mixture into a round portion shape.
- Spot the portion onto the lined heating plate, spread with a tea towel or delicately oiled stick film and leave to demonstrate until it's multiplied in size. This will take about 60 minutes, however might be faster or more slow contingent upon how warm your kitchen is.
- Preheat the broiler to 220C (200C fan helped)/425F/Gas 7. Put an old, void broiling tin into the base of the broiler.
- Following an hour the portion ought to have demonstrated (risen once more). Sprinkle some flour on top and in all respects tenderly rub it in. Utilize an enormous, sharp blade to make shallow cuts (about 1cm/½in profound) over the highest point of the portion to make a jewel design.
- Put the portion (on its preparing plate) into the center of the broiler. Empty virus water into the unfilled broiling plate at the base of the broiler just before you shut the entryway – this makes steam which enables the portion to build up a fresh and glossy hull.
- Heat the portion for around 30 minutes.
- The portion is cooked when it's risen and brilliant. To check, remove it from the broiler and tap it delicately underneath – it should sound empty. Turn onto a wire rack to cool.
Tuesday, August 6, 2019
A Sucker Born Every Minute in the Spice Aisle
Everybody knows the famous quote from P.T. Barnum: "There's a sucker born every minute."
I'm one of those suckers.
The other day Laura was making a recipe from her Indian cookbook and she asked if I'd like her to grind up some extra coriander. "We should never buy ground coriander at the grocery store any more. We have a lifetime supply right here." She reached into her big secret bag of Indian spices and pulled out two packages of coriander seeds, 600 grams in total (about 21 ounces), which, together, cost about $4.50.
Needless to say these coriander seeds were not purchased in the grocery store spice aisle--as Casual Kitchen readers know, the grocery store spice aisle is a corporate conspiracy that exists for no reason other than take willingly captive and credulous consumers and rudely separate them from their money. Laura long ago got smart: she buys all her spices at an Indian grocer.
We also have a little $18 spice grinder, and Laura used it to grind up enough whole coriander seeds to fill a just-emptied 1.25 ounce jar of McCormick ground coriander. It took two minutes.
Okay. Let's do some math and find out how much of a sucker I've been by buying ground coriander in a standard grocery store--in total contravention of my very own recommendations here at this blog.
* At our grocery store, it costs $7.99 to buy that 1.25 ounce jar of ground coriander.[1]
* Laura's 21 ounces of whole coriander seeds = 16.8 x 1.25 ounce jars.
* 16.8 jars of grocery store ground coriander at $7.99 per 1.25 ounce jar = $134.23.
In other words, Laura paid $4.50 for spices that would cost $134 in the grocery store.
And here comes the part about me being a sucker. I was paying a markup of more than 2,900.00% for a spice. (!!!!!) [math: 134.23 / 4.50 = 29.88 or 2,988%]
I get queasy just thinking about it.
Stay out of the grocery store spice aisle. It's an oligopoly designed to overcharge you. And they do it because they can.
Instead, find another source away from this totally non-competitive market environment, like a local ethnic food market. And if you can buy your spices in whole form, all the better: they'll be cheaper still and they'll last forever.[2]
My example of spice industry exploitation is interesting to me (uh, and hopefully to you too, dear readers), because it basically involves me acting out of convenience while not thinking. However, another consumer might easily argue, "Heck, does the eight bucks I wasted on 1.25 ounces of coriander really matter? Really? What's the big deal?"
Well, on one level, it's not a big deal. It's only eight bucks. But then again, doing things on a small level trains you for detecting and avoiding exploitation on a much larger level. Furthermore, it trains us in the healthy exercise of throwing creativity--rather than money--at a problem.
And even on this small level it isn't really that small: there's enough value in Laura's $4.50 worth of whole coriander seeds to pay for six spice grinders, which we could use to grind up any other whole spices we might purchase, which will help us further escape the clutches of the spice cabal.
Back to P.T. Barnum's quote about suckers. Everybody knows this quote, but rarely do people enjoy finding out that they're the sucker. That phrase is always for somebody else. Right? Which is why it's always painful to figure out that you've been a sucker who's been getting needlessly separated from your money, for years, for no real reason. Easier just to argue that it's only eight bucks, and eight bucks doesn't really make a difference.
READ NEXT: What's Your Favorite Consumer Empowerment Tip?
And: Recipe: Saag Murgh (Chicken with Spinach)
Footnotes:
[1] This 1.25 ounce jar of ground coriander used to cost $6.99, but in recent years McCormick has jumped on the organic bandwagon, and so they've added both the magic word “organic” and another dollar of price premium to their already overpriced product. Lovely.
[2] Another scam about spices is the idea that they "fade" over time and thus need to be thrown out every so often. In some places you will even see recommendations to throw out "old" spices after as little as six months, something that is scandalously, criminally false. Of course the spice industry would love for you to throw out and re-buy all your spices every six months.
You can help support the work I do here at Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!
I'm one of those suckers.
The other day Laura was making a recipe from her Indian cookbook and she asked if I'd like her to grind up some extra coriander. "We should never buy ground coriander at the grocery store any more. We have a lifetime supply right here." She reached into her big secret bag of Indian spices and pulled out two packages of coriander seeds, 600 grams in total (about 21 ounces), which, together, cost about $4.50.
Needless to say these coriander seeds were not purchased in the grocery store spice aisle--as Casual Kitchen readers know, the grocery store spice aisle is a corporate conspiracy that exists for no reason other than take willingly captive and credulous consumers and rudely separate them from their money. Laura long ago got smart: she buys all her spices at an Indian grocer.
We also have a little $18 spice grinder, and Laura used it to grind up enough whole coriander seeds to fill a just-emptied 1.25 ounce jar of McCormick ground coriander. It took two minutes.
Okay. Let's do some math and find out how much of a sucker I've been by buying ground coriander in a standard grocery store--in total contravention of my very own recommendations here at this blog.
* At our grocery store, it costs $7.99 to buy that 1.25 ounce jar of ground coriander.[1]
* Laura's 21 ounces of whole coriander seeds = 16.8 x 1.25 ounce jars.
* 16.8 jars of grocery store ground coriander at $7.99 per 1.25 ounce jar = $134.23.
In other words, Laura paid $4.50 for spices that would cost $134 in the grocery store.
And here comes the part about me being a sucker. I was paying a markup of more than 2,900.00% for a spice. (!!!!!) [math: 134.23 / 4.50 = 29.88 or 2,988%]
I get queasy just thinking about it.
Stay out of the grocery store spice aisle. It's an oligopoly designed to overcharge you. And they do it because they can.
Instead, find another source away from this totally non-competitive market environment, like a local ethnic food market. And if you can buy your spices in whole form, all the better: they'll be cheaper still and they'll last forever.[2]
My example of spice industry exploitation is interesting to me (uh, and hopefully to you too, dear readers), because it basically involves me acting out of convenience while not thinking. However, another consumer might easily argue, "Heck, does the eight bucks I wasted on 1.25 ounces of coriander really matter? Really? What's the big deal?"
Well, on one level, it's not a big deal. It's only eight bucks. But then again, doing things on a small level trains you for detecting and avoiding exploitation on a much larger level. Furthermore, it trains us in the healthy exercise of throwing creativity--rather than money--at a problem.
And even on this small level it isn't really that small: there's enough value in Laura's $4.50 worth of whole coriander seeds to pay for six spice grinders, which we could use to grind up any other whole spices we might purchase, which will help us further escape the clutches of the spice cabal.
Back to P.T. Barnum's quote about suckers. Everybody knows this quote, but rarely do people enjoy finding out that they're the sucker. That phrase is always for somebody else. Right? Which is why it's always painful to figure out that you've been a sucker who's been getting needlessly separated from your money, for years, for no real reason. Easier just to argue that it's only eight bucks, and eight bucks doesn't really make a difference.
READ NEXT: What's Your Favorite Consumer Empowerment Tip?
And: Recipe: Saag Murgh (Chicken with Spinach)
Footnotes:
[1] This 1.25 ounce jar of ground coriander used to cost $6.99, but in recent years McCormick has jumped on the organic bandwagon, and so they've added both the magic word “organic” and another dollar of price premium to their already overpriced product. Lovely.
[2] Another scam about spices is the idea that they "fade" over time and thus need to be thrown out every so often. In some places you will even see recommendations to throw out "old" spices after as little as six months, something that is scandalously, criminally false. Of course the spice industry would love for you to throw out and re-buy all your spices every six months.
You can help support the work I do here at Casual Kitchen by visiting Amazon via any link on this site. Amazon pays a small commission to me based on whatever purchase you make on that visit, and it's at no extra cost to you. Thank you!
And, if you are interested at all in cryptocurrencies, yet another way you can help support my work here is to use this link to open up your own cryptocurrency account at Coinbase. I will receive a small affiliate commission with each opened account. Once again, thank you for your support!