Is cheap salt ok for baking or cooking?

Swan_2

freyasmum wrote: »

I love my digital scale. Balance scales look ever so pretty but I was always concerned about the precision too so I bought the digital one. It's acurate to a gram which is important, IMO - lots of them are only accurate to 10g!

I've even been considering purchasing the teeny ones, accurate to the nth degree for some molecular gastronomy That would make some amazingly fun ice cream and jelly :A

Yes! On Food & Cooking had been my bedtime reading for the past few years


Oh. My. Goodness. That's amazing :shocked: Thanks! I'll see you in about a week

If money were no object, I'd have myself a copy of Modernist Cuisine and a nifty sous vide set up. I'm always in the kitchen playing around with different things, it's not a hardship to me. I love it


p.s. I also love salted caramel - it's delish broken up into little pieces and stirred through caramel ice cream :drool:

I absolutely love my digital scales too (accurate to 1g also) my treasured Weyluxes are now fullfilling a decorative role I have a set of those little ones, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was I bought them for

I love my On Food & Cooking & read it in bed too I'd love to read Modernist Cusine, even the photographs look cutting edge!

I've only managed to watch the first of those lectures, my wireless has been acting up & it's taken me 2 weeks to figure out it wasn't itunes at fault, so I've plugged in an ethernet cable & downloaded all 26 of them, I can't wait to watch the rest ... I got completely lost for hours following links to people & references from that first one

I love reading about experimental cooking, & love being in the kitchen but rarely actually get anything very special done ... & I'd love to make those little globes of 'caviar' with different flavours that burst on your tongue, I think you can buy kits now with all the necessary bits to make them.

talking of soud vide, I saw a video of someone 'hacking' a slow cooker so you could use it for sous vide, but I can't remember where, maybe You Tube?

I'm not fond of sweet things but that idea with the ice cream sounds lovely I'm trying to find that book with the recipe in it for CLARABEL, I'm so forgetful about which book a particular recipe is in


Have you ever brined meat? (salt reference ) it's on my list of things to try

freyasmum

Swan wrote: »

I absolutely love my digital scales too (accurate to 1g also) my treasured Weyluxes are now fullfilling a decorative role I have a set of those little ones, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was I bought them for

I love my On Food & Cooking & read it in bed too I'd love to read Modernist Cusine, even the photographs look cutting edge!

I've only managed to watch the first of those lectures, my wireless has been acting up & it's taken me 2 weeks to figure out it wasn't itunes at fault, so I've plugged in an ethernet cable & downloaded all 26 of them, I can't wait to watch the rest ... I got completely lost for hours following links to people & references from that first one

I love reading about experimental cooking, & love being in the kitchen but rarely actually get anything very special done ... & I'd love to make those little globes of 'caviar' with different flavours that burst on your tongue, I think you can buy kits now with all the necessary bits to make them.

talking of soud vide, I saw a video of someone 'hacking' a slow cooker so you could use it for sous vide, but I can't remember where, maybe You Tube?

I'm not fond of sweet things but that idea with the ice cream sounds lovely I'm trying to find that book with the recipe in it for CLARABEL, I'm so forgetful about which book a particular recipe is in


Have you ever brined meat? (salt reference ) it's on my list of things to try

I'm a bit wary of American recipes where they use cups for absolutely everything and seem to view scales as the work of the devil. I can't get my head around that because it seems obvious to me that it's easier with the scales? You actually have to work hard to make it go wrong.

The photographs look amazing! You can really see the work they've put in when you look through it on Amazon.

There are 52 lectures, make sure you don't miss half of them It'll take a while to finish downloading though.

I watched a programme with Eric Lanlard the other day and he showed a group how to do it. It seems really quite easy, all you had to do was add in some of the chemicals (I'm cautious of using that word because when people see it, they think what!? :eek: In our food!? But they seem to forget that sodium bicarbonate is a common ingredient) to the liquid you wanted to gellify and then add some chemicals into a bath and let them sit. I had a bit of a play with liquid nitrogen the other day as well. It's so cool :rotfl: I got so excited, I didn't even mean to make a pun there

I never even thought about a slow cooker for sous vide! It sounds so obvious when you say it though :doh: I have seen someone use a plastic cooler, some ziplock bags and a thermometer though. If I can find it, I'll add it in here if you wanna have a look.

I know what you mean about not being able to find recipes :rotfl:

I've brined pork chops, but never chicken. I found it seasons the meat nicely but didn't actually make a HUGE difference otherwise. I'd like to try chicken though.

Next time we have steak, I'm gonna try the salting method (on topic!). You leave the steaks on the side and literally cover them with a good bit of salt till you can only see a bit of the meat and leave them for about an hour an inch, so if they're wo inches thick, leave them for two hours. Then, rinse them completely, dry them thoroughly and cook as normal. It doesn't make them salty, it just seasons the meat nicely inside and breaks down the proteins so it's nice and tender.

I cook my meat with a thermometer as well - it meats everything's perfectly cooked and never dry. I love it!

Swan_2

freyasmum wrote: »

I'm a bit wary of American recipes where they use cups for absolutely everything and seem to view scales as the work of the devil. I can't get my head around that because it seems obvious to me that it's easier with the scales? You actually have to work hard to make it go wrong.
I detest cup measurements, they drive me mad :mad: if I try an American recipe & like it enough to make again I'll convert it to weights, but it's so fiddly & messy
I read somewhere that Americans use cups because it was easier to carry cups than scales in a wagon heading West, that does make sense, but I'm not sure if I believe it, it sounds a bit like a folk tale to me

The photographs look amazing! You can really see the work they've put in when you look through it on Amazon.
yes, I had a look at it after I'd watched that first lecture, I can't remember what links led me there but some of the photography is jaw dropping!

There are 52 lectures, make sure you don't miss half of them It'll take a while to finish downloading though.
I think half of them are the audio versions, the first 14 are from 2011 & the other 12 are from 2101, I'm wondering if it'd be best to watch the earlier ones first
I'm taking my laptop to bed to watch some of them tonight

I watched a programme with Eric Lanlard the other day and he showed a group how to do it. It seems really quite easy, all you had to do was add in some of the chemicals (I'm cautious of using that word because when people see it, they think what!? :eek: In our food!? But they seem to forget that sodium bicarbonate is a common ingredient) to the liquid you wanted to gellify and then add some chemicals into a bath and let them sit. I had a bit of a play with liquid nitrogen the other day as well. It's so cool :rotfl: I got so excited, I didn't even mean to make a pun there
ha ha but wow! what did you do with the liquid nitrogen?
I wonder if I could ask for a kit of some sort for my birthday? :think:


I never even thought about a slow cooker for sous vide! It sounds so obvious when you say it though :doh: I have seen someone use a plastic cooler, some ziplock bags and a thermometer though. If I can find it, I'll add it in here if you wanna have a look.
I gave my slow cooker away after the disgusting chicken episode(s) I wonder if I could ask for it back? mind the 'hack' did involve attaching a thermostat to the control panel, it looked really Heath Robinson, I'm not sure I should attempt something like that knowing my propensity for disaster in the kitchen :rotfl:

yes I'd like to see that cooler thing

I know what you mean about not being able to find recipes :rotfl:
I've gotten so bad I started putting family recipes on a blog so I won't lose them

I've brined pork chops, but never chicken. I found it seasons the meat nicely but didn't actually make a HUGE difference otherwise. I'd like to try chicken though.

Next time we have steak, I'm gonna try the salting method (on topic!). You leave the steaks on the side and literally cover them with a good bit of salt till you can only see a bit of the meat and leave them for about an hour an inch, so if they're wo inches thick, leave them for two hours. Then, rinse them completely, dry them thoroughly and cook as normal. It doesn't make them salty, it just seasons the meat nicely inside and breaks down the proteins so it's nice and tender.
oh that sounds interesting, I haven't heard of that salting method, I might give that a go next time we've got steak

I cook my meat with a thermometer as well - it meats everything's perfectly cooked and never dry. I love it!

I've got my trusty old sugar thermometer & an electronic one with a probe on the end of a long wire, but I really fancy one of those ones you see used for testing hot food at the point of sale, a decent one is quite expensive though, I don't know what I want it for I just fancy one

freyasmum

Well that wasn't easy :rotfl:

I detest cup measurements, they drive me mad if I try an American recipe & like it enough to make again I'll convert it to weights, but it's so fiddly & messy
I read somewhere that Americans use cups because it was easier to carry cups than scales in a wagon heading West, that does make sense, but I'm not sure if I believe it, it sounds a bit like a folk tale to me
I do too! It does sound like it might make a bit of sense when you think that the scales they’d have to use would be much heavier than the little box we’d have to pick up today. But really, you’d think in this day and age people wouldn’t be scared of them?

I think half of them are the audio versions, the first 14 are from 2011 & the other 12 are from 2101, I'm wondering if it'd be best to watch the earlier ones first
I'm taking my laptop to bed to watch some of them tonight
Ahh.. oops! Lol.

ha ha but wow! what did you do with the liquid nitrogen?
I wonder if I could ask for a kit of some sort for my birthday?
To be perfectly honest, I (deliberately) completely wasted the first bit. Shoved a bit into a sinkful of hot water. My mum and I stood, transfixed, for a good while watching it all bubbling up and smoking away :rotfl: I stuck some more in a bottle of coke and had instantly iced coke. I didn't try the ice cream thing though.

A kit for what, the nitrogen? Or the molecular ingredients? If you look HERE there's a kit for spherification and in the blurb it tells you what you need and the amounts so if you wanted to have a go, you'd know what you needed. You actually only need sodium alganate, xanthan gum (which I'm sure I've seen in Tesco?), and calcium chloride for the bath. I'm sure then if you google for those supplies in the UK you'd be able to find them cheaply enough.

I gave my slow cooker away after the disgusting chicken episode(s) I wonder if I could ask for it back? mind the 'hack' did involve attaching a thermostat to the control panel, it looked really Heath Robinson, I'm not sure I should attempt something like that knowing my propensity for disaster in the kitchen
I don't like my slow cooker very much, either. Everything comes out tasting the same, IMO LoL! you might be a bit safer with the beer cooler version

I managed to find it - Beer cooler sous vide

I've gotten so bad I started putting family recipes on a blogso I won't lose them
That's a good idea! I'd thought about - and I know how narcissistic this sounds - putting all my recipes into a book and having it printed. My writing is alright... for the first few lines and then it changes and it makes it look all messy. And I'm a bit of a perfectionist

oh that sounds interesting, I haven't heard of that salting method, I might give that a go next time we've got steak
Well you can’t brine steak cos it would make it all water-logged and tasteless. So it’s the best way to get the flavour in, apparently.

I've got my trusty old sugar thermometer & an electronic one with a probe on the end of a long wire, but I really fancy one of those ones you see used for testing hot food at the point of sale, a decent one is quite expensive though, I don't know what I want it for I just fancy one
I have a sugar thermometer and a battery powered salter one, not an expensive one – though I’d love one of those – but, like you, I don’t know why. I have no need for it while I’ve still got mine. But I want it



btw - thanks don't seem to be 'sticking' well tonight? :undecided

London_Town

Ben84 wrote: »

I've been making all my bread and dough type recipes with lo-salt for years and the results are good, so it certainly can work. One point though is I don't like the taste of salt so use relatively little when I'm cooking, a 670g of bread flour loaf I put about 1/3rd a teaspoon in. Maybe it works better in smaller amounts than you have tried so far?

Maybe Ben, thanks for that. What I may also try is mixing half low salt and half normal salt to see what happens.

BitterAndTwisted

About the Americans using volume instead of weight: I suspect some of our impoverished ancestors did the same, too. I can't imagine many working-class households in the 19th century could have afforded to have expensive weighing scales in their kitchens either. I know for a fact that mine wouldn't. But maybe they didn't need recipes or exact measurements: I know my German granny never weighed anything, everything she ever cooked, baked or preserved was all done by eye.

Swan_2

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

About the Americans using volume instead of weight: I suspect some of our impoverished ancestors did the same, too. I can't imagine many working-class households in the 19th century could have afforded to have expensive weighing scales in their kitchens either. I know for a fact that mine wouldn't. But maybe they didn't need recipes or exact measurements: I know my German granny never weighed anything, everything she ever cooked, baked or preserved was all done by eye.

you're right, of course they wouldn't have had scales, I think I was actually the first member of my family to have them

I still use recipes from both of my Grannies, which must date back around 100 years now & I still use their cup & spoon measurements with great success


EDIT ... it's interesting though that we now use weights & the Americans still use cups, I wonder what brought about that change over here? :think:

Swan_2

freyasmum wrote: »

To be perfectly honest, I (deliberately) completely wasted the first bit. Shoved a bit into a sinkful of hot water. My mum and I stood, transfixed, for a good while watching it all bubbling up and smoking away :rotfl: I stuck some more in a bottle of coke and had instantly iced coke. I didn't try the ice cream thing though.
I’d probably have ended up putting all of mine in the sink or sneaked some into the bath just before someone went for a shower :whistle:


A kit for what, the nitrogen? Or the molecular ingredients? If you look HERE there's a kit for spherification and in the blurb it tells you what you need and the amounts so if you wanted to have a go, you'd know what you needed. You actually only need sodium alganate, xanthan gum (which I'm sure I've seen in Tesco?), and calcium chloride for the bath. I'm sure then if you google for those supplies in the UK you'd be able to find them cheaply enough.
Hmmm, I’ll have a look around, I like the idea of getting those kind of things as gifts. I got some nice French manufactured drop forged knives from the family for my birthday a couple of years ago & my friends all though it was a terrible gift. I was delighted


I don't like my slow cooker very much, either. Everything comes out tasting the same, IMO LoL! you might be a bit safer with the beer cooler version

I managed to find it - Beer cooler sous vide
Apart from soup, everything came out of the SC like ready meals _pale_

thanks for the link, I think I'd need a risk asessment done before I attempted it & oh, they’ve got that thermometer I want :envious smiley:


That's a good idea! I'd thought about - and I know how narcissistic this sounds - putting all my recipes into a book and having it printed. My writing is alright... for the first few lines and then it changes and it makes it look all messy. And I'm a bit of a perfectionist
the blog works really well, it’s not public, but if anyone wants a recipe I’ve put on it I can just point them in its direction

Oh, never thought of publishing, but it makes sense. I started writing mine in an index book about 20 years ago & like you the title & first few ingredients look fine but my handwriting gradually deteriorates into its usual illegible scrawl!


I have a sugar thermometer and a battery powered salter one, not an expensive one – though I’d love one of those – but, like you, I don’t know why. I have no need for it while I’ve still got mine. But I want it
After producing a batch of very tasty but very sticky salted caramel yesterday, I think my sugar thermometer may have given up the ghost & will be joining the Weylux scales in decorative retirement
& no it's not an excuse to be able to buy a new one :rotfl:


btw - thanks don't seem to be 'sticking' well tonight? :undecided

I think it’s something to do with the changes being made for the new look forum, I don’t like the fixed width at all … I’ve got mine doctored so the forum fills the whole screen & there’s no masthead or sidebar :shhh:

freyasmum

I’d probably have ended up putting all of mine in the sink or sneaked some into the bath just before someone went for a shower
It’s great fun
PMSL, they’d have had a fit :rotfl:


Hmmm, I’ll have a look around, I like the idea of getting those kind of things as gifts. I got some nice French manufactured drop forged knives from the family for my birthday a couple of years ago & my friends all though it was a terrible gift. I was delighted
They’re actually not as expensive as you might think. Xanthan Gum is around £2.50 for a tube in Tesco and the other two can be got for less than £10/100g. Now that you’re mentioning birthdays, mine is in March… :think:


Me too. I love kitchen items as gifts, and my favourite thing to use is a really good, sharp knife. They’re brilliant and I don’t even care how scary that makes me sound!

Apart from soup, everything came out of the SC like ready meals

thanks for the link, I think I'd need a risk asessment done before I attempted it & oh, they’ve got that thermometer I want :envious smiley:
I feel evil now; I laughed at that

the blog works really well, it’s not public, but if anyone wants a recipe I’ve put on it I can just point them in its direction

Oh, never thought of publishing, but it makes sense. I started writing mine in an index book about 20 years ago & like you the title & first few ingredients look fine but my handwriting gradually deteriorates into its usual illegible scrawl!
The blog sounds much easier than constantly having to print out recipes for people as well!

I don’t mean publishing as in making it available for everyone – I’m not that bad I just mean having one or two printed off for me. I’m getting well ahead of myself – my little girl is only five My mum has beautiful, consistent handwriting and I’m always rather envious that mine can't look like that. Though I do have a few Tessa Kiros books and I love the look of them; the way she’s got old photos and memories inside and it’s much more than just a collection of recipes.

I’d have all our favourite family recipes in it from things my granny made (fruit loaf – in to things that my little one loves and a few pages of notes including equipment that could be handy, timings and temperatures for cooking meats, etc.


After producing a batch of very tasty but very sticky salted caramel yesterday, I think my sugar thermometer may have given up the ghost & will be joining the Weylux scales in decorative retirement
& no it's not an excuse to be able to buy a new one
Yea, that’s what they all say


I think it’s something to do with the changes being made for the new look forum, I don’t like the fixed width at all … I’ve got mine doctored so the forum fills the whole screen & there’s no masthead or sidebar
So have I :rotfl: