451–460 of 721 posts
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Wait until you see the family recipes for limoncello.
That's one where I'm ok with people not having to do all the steps: I can't even imagine a grandpa try to distill alcohol in their basement or something.
Much to the chagrin of my mother, I made it a point about a decade ago to standardize old family recipes on "from scratch" versions. As part of the process, I also did some research on old recipes and fixed some of the corruption of these recipes that occurred during the copying and recitation, bolstering them with culinary techniques that were in use at the time. I also captured things that drift over time, such as…
I tried my best to update several of my family recipes. A common measure in many of them was “an egg” e.g. “an egg of butter, cold”. This is meant to be an egg-sized quantity of butter, but what was a normal sized egg in 1905?
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Even regional differences in things. If you say "one bar of butter", "one stick of butter", and "one pat of butter", these can all refer to three different things or the same thing, depending on where you are located. East Coast and West Coast US butter are sold in different size blocks (though both are "8 tbsp") however sometimes you'll find 4tbsp sticks on the west coast that look like 1/2 an East Coast stick that…
Meanwhile, here in Canada I've never seen "sticks of butter", only the large bricks. They're the same size as American ones, and labeled as 454g, but I only recently found out that in some places in the US, they cut them in fours. Before that, the phrase didn't mean anything to me, and I thought it referred to throwing the whole brick in. The smaller 250g packages also exist, but they're rare. I can't guarantee that…
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Ive made great cookies from 100 year old recipes. Why do would i want a carbon copy of a store cookie. Ive never used or really seem cake mix in stores my whole life. Feels... American.
Europe accounts for 31% of baking mix sales while North America accounts for 24.5%. https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/bakery-p...
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Wait until you see the family recipes for limoncello.
That's one where I'm ok with people not having to do all the steps: I can't even imagine a grandpa try to distill alcohol in their basement or something.
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If you look up the purpose of the various ingredients you quickly find that they are simply filling roles that other more commonly used household ingredients can take with minimal to no impact on flavor. Dextrins, for example, are simply thickening agents. Corn starch/potato starch. glycerides are literally just fats and added because most fats can't be powdered. Butter works just as well and is in fact preferable. S…
Nothing in this comment suggests anything bad about them, just that you can do it a different way. If that's the reason to dismiss them, that's a very shallow reason.
> That's also why making your own cakes trying to imitate them quickly becomes a fool's errand. You're never going to beat the chemistry that's in the box, and even if you did it would look more like molecular gastronomy than baking.
My point was that these added ingredients aren't special space magic, they all have a purpose and that purpose is something home bakers can often replicate with simple ingredients.
I'm refuting the notion that it's impossible to best the box because of the exotic ingredients.
I make no claim as to whether box vs common ingredients are better/healthier/etc. They are what they are.
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Even regional differences in things. If you say "one bar of butter", "one stick of butter", and "one pat of butter", these can all refer to three different things or the same thing, depending on where you are located. East Coast and West Coast US butter are sold in different size blocks (though both are "8 tbsp") however sometimes you'll find 4tbsp sticks on the west coast that look like 1/2 an East Coast stick that…
Here in the UK, there's a trend of selling 200g blocks for certain brands that ruin recipes. We have to be careful to avoid those and stick to the 250g ones. Yes, I know we could cut 50g of another block but then we'd need to measure, and we'd have an open brick to keep. It steals part of the joy of baking, forcing us to think instead of feel.
Most butter here (and in a number of other countries) have measuring lines on the pack itself in 50g increments, so while I agree with you it's a nuisance to have an open one to deal with, the measurement part is usually a matter of using a knife along the marked line...
If the "certain brands" you refer to don't have those measuring lines, though, then a pox on them...
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Nothing in this comment suggests anything bad about them, just that you can do it a different way. If that's the reason to dismiss them, that's a very shallow reason.
That's not the claim I'm refuting, this is > That's also why making your own cakes trying to imitate them quickly becomes a fool's errand. You're never going to beat the chemistry that's in the box, and even if you did it would look more like molecular gastronomy than baking. My point was that these added ingredients aren't special space magic, they all have a purpose and that purpose is something home bakers can oft…
But I wish you would have replied to the comment making that claim. Not one by a different person making a different point.
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> 1 egg, you get exactly one chance to use an egg that's reasonably sized relative to the other ingredients. I've always had the habit of weighing the eggs I use and adjusting the rest of the recipe for baking. Some recipes also includes weight of eggs in grams for exactly that reason. (Tip for converting, if it's a European recipe assume 45g per egg), if it's US assume 60g per egg. > The cost savings has been incred…
> A lot of food don't taste as good after being frozen (especially in a home freezer) How you reheat the food makes a huge difference. Freezer => microwave is noob tier. What you want is something like: freezer => thaw 24-48h in fridge => stir fry for 5 minutes. Make some fresh pasta each time. Start preheating the oven right before your 1130 meeting starts. This stuff doesn't take that long. Adding a bit of extra ce…