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food hints
2010-Jan-18, Monday 11:36 amNot full recipes, but hints of recipes that could be written.
Basil: It turns out that basil is the secret ingredient to making great non-alcoholic margaritas. Something about the aftertaste of the basil mimics the tequila that should normally be in the drink. A few months back, I picked up some basil limeade (lime, water, sugar, basil) made by a St. Paul company called Golden Fig. I tried it with crushed ice and some added salt. It was a pretty good imitation of a margarita! It would be interesting to develop a recipe for making the icy drink direct from fresh ingredients. I've used up all the basil limeade, but I can still get raw ingredients at the grocery store.
Dry Ice: In my long term efforts to simplify cooking, I go camping without any foods that need to be cooked. Refrigeration, however, I do accommodate. I keep things in an ice chest with dry ice (frozen carbon dioxide gas). I discovered by accident that fresh whole fruit kept this way will become infused with carbon dioxide gas, making it all bubbly inside the fruit. Fizzy fruit juice, still inside the fruit. Fun!
Rice Flour: I dislike cooking bread products made with rice flour, but I found another great use for the stuff. It works great (better than corn meal) for dusting bread that's being made into pizza crust. Similarly, it makes a great covering for wet foods that need to be baked until they form a crunchy crust. I've used it on sliced potatoes that I bake into "french fries". Very crispy. I've also used it on frozen diced chicken bits before baking them. Again, nice and crispy without adding a distracting flavor to it.
Orange Marmalade: Another discovery based on simplified cooking. Using the above baked chicken bits in a bowl of mixed rice (white and black) with frozen broccoli, two heaping tablespoons of orange marmalade make a decent dressing. It could probably be improved by replacing one of the tablespoons with either fresh squeezed orange juice or even a tablespoon of frozen orange concentrate. I'll keep experimenting. Now I just need to find a suitable non-meat replacement for the chicken bits. The bitterness of the orange rinds in the marmalade work well in this dish.
Basil: It turns out that basil is the secret ingredient to making great non-alcoholic margaritas. Something about the aftertaste of the basil mimics the tequila that should normally be in the drink. A few months back, I picked up some basil limeade (lime, water, sugar, basil) made by a St. Paul company called Golden Fig. I tried it with crushed ice and some added salt. It was a pretty good imitation of a margarita! It would be interesting to develop a recipe for making the icy drink direct from fresh ingredients. I've used up all the basil limeade, but I can still get raw ingredients at the grocery store.
Dry Ice: In my long term efforts to simplify cooking, I go camping without any foods that need to be cooked. Refrigeration, however, I do accommodate. I keep things in an ice chest with dry ice (frozen carbon dioxide gas). I discovered by accident that fresh whole fruit kept this way will become infused with carbon dioxide gas, making it all bubbly inside the fruit. Fizzy fruit juice, still inside the fruit. Fun!
Rice Flour: I dislike cooking bread products made with rice flour, but I found another great use for the stuff. It works great (better than corn meal) for dusting bread that's being made into pizza crust. Similarly, it makes a great covering for wet foods that need to be baked until they form a crunchy crust. I've used it on sliced potatoes that I bake into "french fries". Very crispy. I've also used it on frozen diced chicken bits before baking them. Again, nice and crispy without adding a distracting flavor to it.
Orange Marmalade: Another discovery based on simplified cooking. Using the above baked chicken bits in a bowl of mixed rice (white and black) with frozen broccoli, two heaping tablespoons of orange marmalade make a decent dressing. It could probably be improved by replacing one of the tablespoons with either fresh squeezed orange juice or even a tablespoon of frozen orange concentrate. I'll keep experimenting. Now I just need to find a suitable non-meat replacement for the chicken bits. The bitterness of the orange rinds in the marmalade work well in this dish.