[Mike Nolan]

I don't think so, the system says she registered but has never logged on to post. She may be reading without logging in, there's no way to track that. I did get a followup email noting their account had been hacked.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Mike Nolan.

[Mike Nolan]

I went out and bought a cheap Sharper Image mandoline just to get the guard. I actually like that guard more than the one that goes with my much more expensive Matfer Bourgeat mandoline. The Matfer is kind of complicated to set up but works well for large volume slicing. But in some ways, the old Vegematic from the early 60's was hard to beat.

I'm pretty careful around mandolines, the only one I ever cut myself on was a Progressive one that had three separate blades that would snap in, but they wouldn't stay put and it would fall apart like a house of cards. I threw that one away. (I've been satisfied with most of the Progressive tools I have, I've got a potato slicer that works very well.)

[Mike Nolan]

I always wince when I watch chefs using a mandoline without using the safety guard.

[Mike Nolan]

I'm glad to hear the government had some common sense for a change on the nutrition label.

I agree with some of the changes they made, especially to serving sizes. A candy bar that was labeled as 1 1/2 servings wasn't likely to be only 2/3 eaten in a single sitting.

But much of the information is still relatively useless for cooking. A serving of flour is 1/4 cup (around 29 grams) which generally has 3, 4, or 5 grams of protein. You can differentiate between really soft flours, like a cake flour, and really hard ones with that information (which you probably already knew), but that's about all.

[Mike Nolan]

Sometimes it seems like more work to go out to eat and hassle with what is safe for my wife to eat on the menu than to just cook something at home.

And so many of the restaurants are really noisy these days, you can't hardly hear the person sitting across from you talking without yelling. And then they play REALLY LOUD MUSIC so you can't hear the conversation at other tables, or anything else.

Also, they jam as many tables as they can in the dining room and the decor doesn't do much to dampen sound, either, no carpet, no tablecloth, no ceiling tiles. And having the kitchen open to the dining room just adds to the noise level.

[Mike Nolan]

We had French onion soup again, and there's enough left for another round of it. This is from a batch I made and froze in 2012, it kept very well in the freezer. Since then I've switched to making it with chicken stock instead of beef stock.

[Mike Nolan]

Happy Birthday, and thanks to Sara Wirth for reminding us.

[Mike Nolan]

I'm not sure why, but this is the second or third post from you that my anti-spam filter has classified as spam after you edited it. I marked it as not spam, let's see if it stays up.

[Mike Nolan]

Yeah, that sounds like the run-of-the-mill spice blend that shows up on things like Google.

[Mike Nolan]

We're having French Onion Soup tonight, out of the freezer.

Len, you'll have to tell us how that spice is, some Caribbean spices can be pretty hot.

[Mike Nolan]

I get confused when I'm at my son's house, his ovens have too many options and I don't know what several of them do.

[Mike Nolan]

We used to eat a lot of Velveeta years ago. I opened one package and it was a dark brown color. I contacted Kraft and they assured us it was OK and sent us some coupons.

But after we moved to Lincoln and I started grad school, I think our food preferences drifted away from using it.

As I understand it, anything called "American Cheese" is a processed cheese food and not pure cheese. (I did like the way Velveeta melted, though..)

[Mike Nolan]

Celebrity does strange things to many people. I can't say I've ever heard any bad stories about Julia Child, though. (She was known to be a practical joker.)

[Mike Nolan]

bulkfoods.com has yellow split peas at a little over $2 per pound for five pounds, plus shipping. They're in Chicago, so shipping to Indiana may be reasonable. If you order $75 or more from them, shipping is just $5. I get citric acid powder from them (I use it in the dishwasher, among other things) and it isn't hard for me to hit $75.

Unfortunately, they don't carry medium rye flour, which is what I'm currently shopping for. Many of the recipes in The Rye Baker call for medium rye flour, and it looks like if I do all 78 recipe just once I'll need somewhere between 50 and 150 pounds of it. I haven't checked the local Sysco office yet, so I don't know if they stock it, but I can get it online for about $1.35 a pound (in a 50 pound bag), including shipping. Not surprisingly, the shipping is more expensive than the flour. If I can wait until summer, I may be able to get my son to pick up a big bag from Stover Company near Pittsburgh for under $21, if they decide to drive out here for their usual summer visit.

Honeyville has yellow split peas, 25 pounds for 40.99, and they now offer $6.99 flat rate shipping. That would bring the cost for 50 pounds of medium rye flour for me down to about $1.24 a pound. Sara Wirth used to order from them a lot, I don't know if she still does, both of you are in their truck route area.

[Mike Nolan]

Remember that butter is about 20% water, so when substituting oil you should probably add a little water as well.

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