rant: recipe reviews without trying the recipe
arkansas girl
9 years ago
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New Recipe Review-April 2011
Comments (4)We had Nita's Rigatoni and Sausage last night. I doubled everything but the pasta, as per her notes. It was pretty good. Made a lot. I did catch DH sneaking a can of tomato sauce into the leftovers. Gotta have red sauce with pasta. LOL From NitaAZ Rigatoni and Sausage Penne Rigatoni 1 lb. 1-pound Italian sausage without casing 1 red bell pepper, diced 2 cups onion, finely chopped 1 tablespoon chopped garlic 1 teaspoon Basil salt and pepper � cup olive oil 2 large bunches spinach or one large bag Boil water, add some salt and Pasta and boil for 15 minutes until al dente, drain and put back in pan. Brown sausage, remove to a bowl. Add some oil to pan and cook onion until glazed. Add in red pepper, garlic, Basil, salt and pepper and heat through for a few minutes. Add meat back to pan and reheat. Dump all into pasta and add about � cup olive oil; stir. Throw in fresh spinach and stir around until it is wilted but not too wilted. Serve with freshly grated Parmesan cheese. A salad goes great with this meal. If you want to spice it up some you can use hot sausage or a mixture of both hot and mild. You can also add some red pepper flakes for some heat. * We like it best if you double everything and only use the one-pound of pasta. I don�t do the hot and spicy....See MoreNew Recipe Review - November 2010
Comments (53)I made the pecan tart on Ann's blog. I sent it to the grandparent's house yesterday while still warm. Alice took it with her when she went for a visit yesterday. The recipe as given: Double Chocolate Pecan Pie ========================== For the filling: 3 tbsp. unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch pieces ¾ cup packed dark brown sugar ½ tsp. salt 2 large eggs ½ cup corn syrup (I used half maple syrup, half corn syrup) 1 tsp. vanilla extract 1 cup pecans, toasted and chopped into small pieces 3 oz. semi-sweet chocolate, coarsely chopped 3 oz. bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped Butter-Lard Pastry ================== Edited: May/20092 cups all purpose flour 3/4 teaspoon salt 1/3 cup butter 1/3 cup lard (or shortening- Crisco) 5 to 6 tablespoons of ice water For sweet pies add 1 to 2 teaspoons white sugar. Mix flour with salt, and cut in butter and lard. An easy way to cut in the fat is to use a food Processor. Cut the butter and lard into cubes add to the flour and pulse. Butter/lard should be the size of peas. Pour mixture into a bowl and add the icewater, mixing quickly with a fork, just until the dough come stogether. Turn out on to floured board and form into a ball. Cut into two pieces, wrap in plastic and refrigerate for an hour. Another way to cut into the butter is to use a box grater. Makes the perfect size pieces of butter. Just make sure that the butter is very cold. NOTE: This crust is also perfect made with all butter. On a lightly-floured work surface, roll the pie dough out into a 12-inch round. Transfer the round to a 9-inch pie plate by rolling the dough around the rolling pin and unrolling it over the pie pan. Trim the edges as necessary and create a fluted pattern using a finger to make the indentations. Freeze the dough-lined pie plate until firm and very cold, about 30 minutes. Adjust an oven rack to lower middle position and heat the oven to 375° F. Remove the dough-lined plate from the freezer, press a sheet of foil inside the pie shell and fill with ceramic baking beads. Bake about 30 minutes, until the dough looks dry and light in color. Carefully remove the foil and weights. Continue baking the crust 5-6 minutes more, until light golden brown. While the pie crust is baking, make the filling. Melt the butter in a medium heatproof bowl set over a pot of simmering water. Remove the bowl from the double boiler but maintain the simmering water. Stir in the sugar and salt with a wooden spoon until the butter is absorbed. Beat in the eggs, corn syrup and vanilla. Return the bowl to the double boiler and heat, stirring frequently, until the mixture is shiny and hot to the touch, about 130° F on an instant-read thermometer. Remove from the heat and stir in the pecans. As soon as the pie shell comes out of the oven, lower the oven temperature to 275° F. Pour the filling into the pie shell. Scatter the chopped chocolate pieces over the filling and press into the filling with the back of a spoon. Bake on the middle rack of the oven about 50-60 minutes, until the pie looks set but slightly soft, like gelatin, when gently pressed with the back of a spoon. Transfer to a wire cooling rack and allow to cool for at least 4 hours. _________________________________________________________ With apologies to Ann, I got lazy! I also wanted all pecan, no chocolate. I omitted the chocolate and added another cup of pecans. I left the pecans as whole halves, I didn't chop, nor did I toast. I also didn't prebake the crust. I put the two cups of pecans in the chilled crust in the tart pan and poured the egg/sugar/butter/maple syrup mix (which I heated in the double boiler until the sugar was dissolved) over the pecans. I baked it at 350 until it was set and the crust was golden brown. About 45 minutes. The report from all who had a piece was that it was absolutely wonderful. Thank you Ann! Here is a link that might be useful: Pecan Tart...See MoreRecipe reviews - early morning internet wandering
Comments (15)I change recipes, too, because for the most part I know what I'm doing. There were a few I used for the holidays this year from CF where I held back some salt and sugar, adjusted for slightly different ingredients or whatnot, and I mentioned my changes when praising the recipes, because I didn't make them exactly. But I did use the recipes more than not and do consider that I "made" them. No butterscotch, though. :) OTOH....if the recipe didn't come out nicely (which didn't happen...they were all great), I wouldn't blame the recipe itself if I changed it! But there's also the problem of ingredients and basic methods. Like people don't know that they need to use butter (not the kind with oil in it) or baking sticks or that if it's not said, recipes mean size large eggs--unless it's an amateur recipe and the author doesn't know to specify if they're extra large--or that beet sugar might ruin your baking. They don't know that the "beat butter and sugar" step is for whipping in air and shortchange or omit it. They don't know that oven temperature is the number on the thermometer (that you put in the oven) not on the dial, or even that opening the door can affect the baking. A lot of people who think they're following the recipe as written and having failures, still may be doing it all wrong. I would never review a recipe that I hadn't made, though in certain situations I might comment "sounds good" or "do you think it would work with peaches rather than pears?" but I don't bother reading the ones that didn't either. You can tell from what they say. A useful comment is like for the GF pie crust that says roll between layers of plastic wrap because it's more like a sticky batter than a dough. A skipable comment, true or not, is the family liked or hated it. Somewhat more useful is "this is my new go-to". Re reviews in general, you can usually tell by the details whether they're authentic. Paid reviews, unless it's a real reviewer who's just being paid for the writing, can't know the specifics. Most are farmed to foreign countries, and the workers are chosen for their ability to write decent English rather than their knowledge of what they're speaking of. Speaking of which, a family member asked for pizza for dinner way too late for me to make it. I googled best pizza nearby and most of the listed restaurants had pictures of the dining rooms (and they all looked the same--trendy post-industrial charcuterie chic). One place showed a pizza (a tasty looking one). I looked up the reviews. On Yelp, the average was only 3.5 stars. The negative reviews, however, were about whether the delivered sandwich was cold, the waiter surly, the GF choices limited (they have GF pizza!), or whatnot. The five star reviews all praised the pizza (in long, detailed, multiple paragraphs telling all about their visits and experiences), and many praised the service and attention to customer satisfaction. We got the pizza. It was really good. Much better than many from "better" (i.e., more expensive, more established) restaurants. Reviews can be revelatory if you read them well and look for the things you want to know, rather than just accepting the things they want to tell you....See MoreA first world brat (me) and her first world rant (recipe websites)
Comments (65)Annie1992 — i’m with you on that grade B real maple syrup! That’s the only thing we use when we want maple syrup. That corn syrup stuff has a mouth feel that is like cardboard gelatin. I rarely buy or use Cool Whip, but one of my in-laws used to make this particular dessert with Cool Whip and strawberries because her children liked it. She use frozen strawberries but with a lot of fresh strawberries on top. I developed a fondness for it :-) I rarely buy or use Cool Whip, but one of my in-laws used to make this particular dessert with Cool Whip and strawberries because her children like it. She use frozen strawberries but with a lot of fresh strawberries on top. I developed a fondness for it :-) That Wired article on Cool Whip is funny. I do remember the polysorbate 60 from reading the list of ingredients decades ago. It really is gooood. Probably a recipe from one of those “Women’s Magazines” decades ago. I made this for a party, and to keep in the fast ingredients spirit, use canned whipped cream (one can discern)....See Morearkansas girl
9 years agolast modified: 9 years ago
party_music50
9 years agoarkansas girl
9 years agoAdella Bedella
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carabubble
9 years agoblfenton
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Jasdip
9 years ago
Yayagal
9 years ago
gyr_falcon
9 years ago
plllog
9 years agolast modified: 9 years ago
Fun2BHere
9 years agoarkansas girl
9 years ago
Olychick
9 years agolast modified: 9 years ago
lisa_fla
9 years agoJasdip
9 years ago
Alisande
9 years agoarkansas girl
9 years agoOlychick
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rob333 (zone 7b)
9 years agoGeorgysmom
9 years agoarkansas girl
9 years agoplllog
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