Food

the king of frying pans

http://www.finnstyle.com/da98fr.html

I have circulon infinite ones. Pretty good for the price

I've got a couple of the Le Creuset Toughened Non-Stick frying pans and they're boss. Heavy and expensive but so nice to cook with. But should you want a lid you need to buy separately which is crap. Keep an eye on online stores, they come up as special offers, John Lewis and Bicester outlet store too.

Yeah, LeC are ace. Was pondering a ceramic pan from them anyway.

Get decent cast iron and season them properly or use the non stick utensils.

Or go stainless steel that way you can clean them till shiney again.

Ceramic are shit, have had a few friends try them and the pan has stopped being non stick pretty quick.

I have le creuset pans that I bought second hand that needed cleaning. Frying pans went to either a shot blaster or wire bush attachment on an angle grinder on the inside and proffesional degreasser on the outside and they come up like new.

Yeah, cast iron is lovely for sure.... maybe i'm being lazy, maybe I treat my cast iron pot badly, but - and this I guess is crucial - I've never been able to cook a non sticking egg on cast iron after frying bacon in the pan.

Made the best carbonara I've made for a while, on top of some home made tagliatelle...
Just a few tweaks to my normal recipe-
Used a mild chorizo and fresh leeks, and a couple tablespoons of the pasta water when they'd cooked through, then pasta back in and egg plus Parmesan mixture off the heat.
Pasta was made using the standard method. Simplest of sauces and one of- if not the best.

Just back from lunch at Le Caprice. Steak Tartare, Roast Guineafowl, Raspberry Meringue.. Lovely, especially because someone else was paying.

Nice cookbook thoughts, purchases have been made, ta.

Cooked pork ribs yesterday, began by poaching in apple juice, water, garlic, onion, chilli & celery. I've kept the resulting stock and am thinking raaahman. Anyone got a recipe or link to...?

Also worth keeping an eye on TK max i got a Le Cr casserole dish that was about half price.

nothing beats a simple but well made dish :)

Quick triple d query, I want to make superior fried chicken.
So soak in brine, soak in buttermilk, roll in flour, deep fry, eat gorgeous fried chicken until I've got a chicken baby belly.
Question is this, is there anything I can do with the buttermilk I have soaked the chicken in? Or do I just chuck it? Don't like to waste stuff so would prefer to use it in some way if possible...

Raw chicken plus dairy product = nope

Yeah - I'd agree with the above. The cost of buttermilk is minimal and meeting your guts for 48 hours isn't

Make a nice milkshake

*do not drink it

Also cook books wise these are what I've been using most recently:

hemsley and hemsley
Social Suppers - Jason Atherton
Best Ever Dishes - Tom Kerridge
My simple Italian -Theo Randall
Eat - Nigel Slater

TK Max and Sainsbury have been my go to places for pans in the last year but previously I also bought some De Buyer and they were great

Brine with a big dash of fish sauce. If you like KFC. See my kfc link.

Why would you use buttermilk? What difference does it make?

TK are brilliant for homewares, bought craploads of Le Creuset ovenware there for pennies... Still loving my Stellar saucepans as well, top quality, minimum dorra...

Sadly due to working beforehand I didn't have the chance to turn up to Sat Bains half cut.

It wasn't cheap but it was really very good. Added a few extra to end up with thirteen courses and ten wines (well nine plus a sake).

I surprised myself by having the asparagus course as my favourite.

scanpan.
I've had one for ten years and used it almost daily, and it's pretty much as good as new.
They're not as non-stick as a brand new teflon pan, but they're much better than stainless and you can treat them badly, unlike cast iron.

hemsley and hemsley

I tried to hate this book because every other page is a hipster pic of the girls but some of the recipes are great, the almond coated chicken is a regular in our house. Their broth (used in multiple recipes) is a ballache though, few people have got time to get bone marrow etc

De Buyer
Yeah I've got good things from TK Max in the past. De Buyer look nice. Pro!

Ahh now there's a good point. I've got a Scanpan roasting dish and it's fucking amazing.