Normally, a company that makes a retail product likes to have its name all over that product.

If you have a brand of cream cheese in your fridge OTHER THAN Philadelphia, check the label on the foil and see if it the foil carries the name of a manufacturer.

The only brand of creamcheese I have ever seen that carries the manufacturer's name on the aluminum inner wrapper is PHILADELPHIA. None of the others do!

I would love to know why that is. It's awfully odd.

A friend raved about these devices--but she's not a "real" cook. Seeking opinions on them as accessories, and also opinions about best brands.

I'm looking for a recipe for breakfast bars that doesn't use a lot of sweetener (sugar, molasses, honey, etc)...anyone know of any such, any links, etc? Thanks.

There's a supermarket called Ream's in the Salt Lake City area. It's a regular supermarket, and often has good prices on sale items, but the look of this place is especially UNinviting: not nearly as well-lit as more popular supermarkets, and just not the kind of place that you want to go in and see what's going on.

Does anyone have any info that would explain why a supermarket would want to make itself look like this? It would not take a lot of money to make the place more inviting, and I don't think it takes a genius to see there's something just "not right" about this place. That makes me think this look is very deliberate. Anyone have any info that would help me understand this? Thanks.

A friend reported this incident from her youth, decades ago, and I am wondering if anyone else has ever heard of this:

my aunt was making turkey gravy and burned the flour in the roux. She corrected it by adding some peanut butter. The gravy did not taste of peanut butter, but seemed like it always was.

Fluffy matzoh balls? I've never heard of such a thing! True matzoh balls have the density (and weight) of lead; anything else is...?? Well, I don't know the name for a "fluffy" matzoh ball....<very big grin> Sorry, couldn't resist.

I've made a few rye breads in which I substituted a small amount of Bob's Red Mill Malted Barley Flour for some of the yeast. The breads came out very nice, and rose fast.

The barley flour apparently is a yeast nutrient. Presumably this means that it helps the yeast multiply faster than not using it. But is there any real difference between just using more yeast to start with, and using some of this stuff? (Other than cost.)

Another consideration is the fact that fat in your gut slows down digestion and hunger. So eating some fat may in the long(er) run cut down on the calories you consume.

OTOH, you could save a LOT of calories by just foregoing the stuff entirely, or taking only 1/2 of a "normal" portion.

<rant mode: on> I'm constantly surprised and amazed at the stupid things people do, eating-wise. For expl, I know a fellow who;'s a PhD psychologist. I was at dinner with him the other day., at an Italian rest. This fellow has recently started VISIBLY gaining wgt. Nevertheless, he requested a ginger-ale with his dinner--not low-cal, but normal calorie--then had another one. (I cannot imagine drinking a sugary beverage with a meal--wouldn't it kill the taste?) And as his side dish, he requested spaghetti with tomato sauce! Spaghetti is a refined carb, so not so healthy for you--and not especially high in taste, either (why not just eat the sauce and skip the pasta???).

I never fail to be impressed--negatively--at the silliness and short-sightedness of some cookbook authors.

Case in point: a recipe that appeared in a second-tier, major-metro-area newspaper this past weekend, for a black bean dip to serve 8.

The recipe is garnished with sour cream--1/4 cup. The author of this recipe is a host of a TV cooking show, and her credit lists one cookbook (there could be more, of course).

The author calls for *reduced fat* sour cream. 1/4 cup divided by 8 servings means an average of 1/2 tablespoon per serving.

Figuring 60 calories per T of regular sour cream, and perhaps 10 calories per T of reduced-fat sour cream, that means that using the reduced calorie sour cream saves a whopping 25 calories! Total. And all that substitution costs is taste.....

I've seen lots of short-sightedness of this kind with cookbook authors--limiting the amount of fat, and salt, often when the amount of fat, or salt, per serving, is minimal. Sad.

I was discussing the topic of "salt and soup" with someone recently, and I stated that it was just about impossible to make a low-salt soup that had any taste. The other person responded that with sufficient amount of spicing it was possible.

Anyone have any opinions, experience, science, etc that might be enlightening?

Thank you. (I was aware of that from my wine-making days. )

Any guesses as to what might happen if the honey is omitted?

This is not my recipe; I have suggested to the person who makes this, that he do the obvious experiment.

A friend makes a "honey-wheat" bread that contains yeast, and honey. I did not detect any honey taste in the bread. My recollection is that yeast will start digesting the honey before it digests the wheat--which I suspect means that the honey works mainly to feed the yeast.

Does anyone here have enough knowledge of this stuff to explain it in more depth?

Thanks. Now, what about keeping it as free of air as possible, while it is fermenting? Do you make an effort to put the (unfermented) kim chi in some kind of container that elmininates oxygen?

For those with any knowledge making kim chi at home:

some recipes call for making a "porridge" with rice flour (actually, water thickened.with rice flour and other ingredients).

But some recipes do NOT call for rice flour.

What's the difference? Does it really come out better if you use rice flour?

I have a recipe for a yeast bread that includes 2 T of honey.

This puzzles me. Won't the honey be digested first, and therefore won't any sweetness from the honey disappear?

If so, is there any real purpose to adding honey? It's *very* unusual to see any kind of sugar in a east bread.

I have a package of some dried (but supple) yellow-ish stuff called "dried polyg onatum". What is this stuff and what are the best ways to cook it? Thanks.

TTOOMMYY et al:

I checked and I was wrong. The problem was the price labelling on the shelf--it was not very clear (a problem I have found often at BJ's), and, in what I think is violation of the law in my state, the individual package was not price-marked.

TTOOMYY: That is exactly what I saw, in reverse--the price of the spinach was $1.99 on Sunday, and much higher yesterday. I thot I noticed this in the past, but I never pursued it; I will pursue it now and write down prices.

I have also noticed, as I'm sure others have, that many of the prices at BJs are nothing special--often close to (sometimes even higher than!) prices elsewhere. I get the sense that lots of shoppers there are not careful, *skeptical* shoppers.

I am a new (and so far infrequent) member of BJ's Warehouse.

Today I was looking at the price of a package of baby spinach, which I had bought a few days ago, and the price had gone up significantly. I've had that sense before, on other items.

Am I correct? If so, is this a widely-known phenomenon?

"pretty well-established that they're worse for you than sugar"? Documentation please, Professor.

As to the drawbacks of sugar...are you familiar with some of the work that's been done by, umm, is it Dr. Lustig?

I've seen 2 different classes of recipes for ketjap manis. One caramelizes the sugar, the other mixes brown sugar with soy sauce and other ingredients.

I made the one using caramelized sugar. It's a bit of a pain in the neck, because dissolving the caramelized sugar with the soy sauce takes a lot of stirring.

Anyone have any opinions on which is better? Does it really matter, since presumably the sugar, in whatever form, is a tiny part of a finished dish?

I recently made some sauerkraut from scratch, and altho it tasted OK, and smelled "pretty much OK", I thot I detected a yeasty aroma. (I only tasted a tiny amount.) I used the appropriate amount of salt for the amount of cabbage I had, and I was scrupulously clean, I sealed the fermenting jar with a bag of brine, etc etc.

Can anyone suggest what I did wrong? And more important, a way to avoid yeast when fermenting cabbage?

I make some (classic style) fermented kosher-style dill pickles, and that process is not nearly as complicated or fussy as cabbage. I wash the kirby cucumbers, weight them down in a plastic (food grade) pail, put in spices and brine, and wait 7--10 days. I tried this method years ago with cabbage (I wrapped the cabbage shreds in cheesecloth), and I don't recall the results, except that the results were not satisfying.

There must be some simpler way. Anyone have suggestions? The taste of fresh ( uncooked) sauerkraut is just fabulous.

I've always thought of induction cooktops as gimmicks, not nearly as flexible or useful as gas, etc. But it occurs to me that I could be wrong.

So i'd appreciate any comments or stories (from experience) anyone can supply. Can you use all the cookware you used before getting the induction cooktop? Amount of heat it can supply? ETC. I am in the very early stages of planning a kitchen remodelling. Thanks.

These posts are all extremely interestg.

It seems to me that the bottom line is, a cook has to be extremely careful--and/or thought-ful--when making a recipe, esp. if it comes from the (really) MASS media, but also if it comes from a cookbook.

And wasn't there some sort of scandal a few years ago abouta cookbook by some celeb or celebrated author, that was shown not to have tested, recipe by recipe?

tcamp:

1. I, too, have never noticed low-sodium hoisin.

2. You're absolutely right about recipes in many mass media. The writers of those recipes, aside from often being ignorant about basic food principles ("boil water till sugar dissolves"??? C'mon!), seem to me to be afraid that readers will object to robust tastes--and as well, will be too stupid to understand "if you think 1/2 tsp of herb X is too much, use 1/4 tsp!"

I was leafing through a spice catalog I received (from a company that shall remain nameless). There was a recipe for chicken skewers with sauce.

The recipe includes these ingredients (exact quote):

3 T soy sauce (we used reduced sodium)
1/2 C hoisin sauce (...lower sodium if you can find it)
1/4 t powdered ginger

I have 2 observations about these ingredients:

1. This recipe produces 12 skewers. So how much sodium per serving does the recipe creator think will be saved?

2. Only 1/4 t ginger? What is the recipe creator afraid of, that people will actually get a taste or hint of ginger?

Does anyone here know of a site (or organization?) with a comprehensive, searchable listing of:

--drop-in gas cooktops
--gas wall ovens?

I will be doing some kitchen remodeling soon, and I'm looking for sites that I can search by specification, e.g. "show me all cooktops of 12,000 or more BTUs, or show me all 30" cooktops , etc. Same for wall ovens.

Thanks.

OK, but *why* are they shelf-stable? Chemicals? Moisture content?

I opened this package of tortillas at least 2 weeks ago. By now I would have expected it to get moldy. There must be something in it that prevents mold. But whatr?