Any chefs in the house?

[vig]

The devils food lol.
I had a spag bol with veggie mince once without knowing and it tasted ok. Never again though.
Each to there own I guess
Live and let live

The secret to a nice veggie mince is to let the mince stand in the sauce for a few hours. It takes on more flavour and is reasonably acceptable. I much prefer the real thing but HID doesn't.

Endorse the lea & perrins. Best sauce EVER!


Marsala... Make your own Zabaglione. Time consuming but absolutely delish Mmmmmmm

 

[viscount17]

Ketap Manis is an Indonesian/Malay dark sweet soya sauce,

Molasses sugar is a substitute for Palm sugar,which is not as easy to get. Use it to add to stir fries, curries etc for sweetening.

Fish sauce is also a priority - it's a way to add salt without using salt

 

[viscount17]

and no, Tom Yam is nothing to do with tomatoes,

it's another spicy hot paste, use it to add to Pad Thai noodles (the flat ones), stir fries
It's also used for hot/sour soups

 

[backwoodsman]

... As for salad dressings. You can't go far wong with shaking up a mixture of olive oil & whole grain mustard. Add to it what you wish but keep it reletively simple, as if you try adding too many flavours all you'll end up with is a muddy mess, tastewise. Though there are many other sorts of dressing, this is perhaps the best & simplest imo...

No, no, no Smooooooooth dijon mustard...

Cap-full of white wine vinegar, very large blob of smoooooooth mustard on tea-spoon.Chopped fresh basil. Mix. Then keep adding olive oil until it's the thickness you want. (Can add a few drop water to thin it down if you want).

Grainy ?? Gordon Bennett, Grainy ???

 

[Cernunnos]

lol... its more an experience thing & knowing how much to pour or spoon, or how much of a handful to toss in... lol

Think its probaly wise to give you a link for french dressing... same idea should work well whether with white wine vinegar or not, simply changes consistancy & of course the taste.

http://www.thefoody.com/veg/frenchdressing.html

http://www.eighth-day.co.uk/recipes/cfrendrs.htm

Essentially you can change weights & meassures to suite yourself, there are few hard & fast rules in cooking.

Either way, just put the ingedients in an old clean jam jar or screw down bottle & shake up well. Quick shake before you need to use again.

I have added sugar or even honey or any number of things on occasion depending on what I'm after. Some people like to add things like chillis or chilli powder to the basic ingredients.

 

[Farneyman]

Cern,

Thanks again,
Just another quick ? Will the dressing keep in the fridge and if so for how long roughly?

 

[Cernunnos]

... As for salad dressings. You can't go far wong with shaking up a mixture of olive oil & whole grain mustard. Add to it what you wish but keep it reletively simple, as if you try adding too many flavours all you'll end up with is a muddy mess, tastewise. Though there are many other sorts of dressing, this is perhaps the best & simplest imo...

No, no, no Smooooooooth dijon mustard...

Cap-full of white wine vinegar, very large blob of smoooooooth mustard on tea-spoon.Chopped fresh basil. Mix. Then keep adding olive oil until it's the thickness you want. (Can add a few drop water to thin it down if you want).

Grainy ?? Gordon Bennett, Grainy ???

Think about it, if you are going to add say crushed peppercorns like I otherwise would then you might as well use wholegrain mustard. Dijon is certainly the orthentic way of producing a French dressing. Most would thin down with wine vinegar, but I like mine quite thick. Mine isn't a French dressing per'ce, its simply a dressing I like with salad. Infact I happen to like german wholegrain mustard but would probably use a slightly different one for dressings.

 

[Cernunnos]

Cern,

Thanks again,
Just another quick ? Will the dressing keep in the fridge and if so for how long roughly?

Most Oil or vinegar bassed mixes will keep well due to their nature. Though I don't think I'd want to keep a home made one sitting around in the fridge for more than a week. Say thee or four days to be on the safe side.

 

[haplesshacker]

I'm not much in the kitchen department. But a salad dressing that I know is 50:50 extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Then add mustard powder or regular mustard if no powder, but stir well, to taste. Even friends of mine like it!! Quick and simple.

 

[viscount17]

can't see the point of dijon mustard, or german or american mustard - where's the bite?

 

[Cernunnos]

In that case Viscount17 use English Bustard, Tobasco or whatever you want to whichever base you prefer...

simples