Mike Nolan
Forum Replies Created
-
AuthorPosts
-
I would worry about the glue used to hold the bristles in on a paint brush, and possibly about the metal clasp. Neither may be food-safe, but maybe they don't touch the food enough to be a problem. They sure are a whole lot cheaper than pastry brushes, though.
I wound up buying a small chest freezer at a Sams Club (in Omaha, the Lincoln stores didn't have it in stock) when our SubZero upright freezer needed servicing last spring, at this point I still have some of the things that were in the upright in the chest freezer, I've been using things up and the chest freezer will eventually be dedicated mostly to baking needs.
I may need to order a 25 or 50 pound bag of medium rye flour at some point when I resume rye baking, most of it will also go in the freezer. (I've found that the 62 ounce candy jars for things like M&M's make great flour storage containers for freezing, they stack well.)
I've got cataract surgery scheduled for late January and mid-February, I'm limiting my kitchen experiments for now because reading a new recipe is really hard.
The one at King Arthur does not appear to have beads at the tip of each strand, which IMHO get in the way. I'll put it on my watch list for the next time I order from them, probably next year. (They usually have a $3.14 shipping offer for an order or $31.41 or more around Pi day.)
I'm wondering if I put my too-stiff boar bristle brushes in some boiling water if they'd loosen up. Worst that happens is they come apart and I have to throw them away, but I'm close to doing that anyway.
I see Zyliss basting brushes on Amazon, not sure if they're what you have, these seem geared towards barbecue. Next time I'm near a Le Creuset store, I plan to see if they still have that small brush (It was in a display by the register.)
My wife is making another batch of black bean soup, she soaked the beans with a little baking soda this time, then rinsed them off several times.
They're breaking up MUCH faster. In addition to some chopped celery and carrot, I put in some frozen celery pulp and carrot pulp from my vinegar batches.
I took the rest of the pulp (about a pound of each) and added some onion pulp, some of the tomatoes that I picked in October before the frost that have been sitting in trays in the garage, some turnip, some left over leeks from potato-leek soup and a bunch of spices, to make a nice pot of vegetable stock.
The King Arthur Baking Companion is easy to read and has good drawings. It also covers nearly every type of baking. Even my wife has taken to using it over The Joy of Cooking. (Although IMHO TJOC has gone downhill since the 50's, the editions we prefer were printed in the 40's.)
It isn't what I'd call a good first book, but Beard on Bread is a book every bread baker should read at some point, I'm one of many bakers who got excited about bread baking by that book. James Beard was one of the best food writers of all time, I have several of his books.
I find myself using Hamelman's book more than any of Peter Reinhart's books these days, though I wouldn't recommend either author as a first book on baking. The front matter of Hamelman messes with my mind every time I read it (which is a good thing.)
I haven't found a book I'd recommend as a starter (pun intended) on sourdough, most of them are better for bakers with some experience.
I have several silicone brushes, I find they work better for some tasks, like brushing on egg wash, than others, like brushing on melted butter. The one I use most is a really small one from Le Creuset.
I have a really soft one that is ONLY used to brush excess flour off. I've been tempted to try my camera lens air blower (sometimes called a lens rocket because of the shape) for that, but if I do that I'll probably buy one just for that purpose as I don't want flour or oils anywhere near my lenses.
I find using boar bristle brushes for oils and butter tends to stiffen them over time, and I have a couple that are probably past due for replacement.
My theory with pastry brushes is you buy 'em when you find 'em. That applies to scrub brushes as well.
The way I currently store them is in a round utensil caddy, that way the brushes themselves aren't touching much of anything other than possibly each other.
Some electric ovens don't give you a choice, if they sense the oven is cold they use both elements to try to get it up to temp as fast as possible.
That's why I said you need to know what YOUR oven does!
MY son has a Fisher and Paykel dual wall oven that has over a half dozen mode settings, and I have no clue what most of them do.
In a pinch, you can use a bit of loosely wadded up paper towel to brush off excess flour. But I'd be lost without my array of pastry brushes in a variety of materials, sizes and stiffness.
The challenge with starting to bake in a cold oven is you need to know your oven well, at least for electric ovens.
Some electric ovens turn on both the upper and lower element during a pre-heat cycle, which can cause premature browning on the top.
Didn't have it with a hot dog, but the buns/rolls went well with the vegetable beef soup I made today. In fact, I had two of them.
I made a big pot of vegetable beef soup today.
Hard rolls at a higher temp makes sense to me but not buns where you want them to be soft.
I did the hot dog buns today, 17 minutes at 350. Didn't get quite as much rise as I was hoping for, but I made them kind of small (1.65 ounces each) so that probably impacted height somewhat.
I'll probably have one for supper with some vegetable beef soup.
No, this was a pretty basic black bean soup: Black beans, onion, carrot, celery, bay leaf, oregano and sherry. (I'd have added thyme and maybe a little rosemary, I think both pair well with legumes.)
She was trying to stay away from the 'Southwest' flavor profile, so no cumin and, obviously, no garlic.
ATK did a test of beans soaked in water, water with baking soda (alkali solution) and water with citric acid (acetic solution), the ones in the baking soda were the softest and cooked faster, the ones in the acid didn't soften much and took much longer to cook. I don't think they tried salt water, but it would also be mildly alkali.
-
AuthorPosts
