Home Cooking Gourmet

Real Macaroni and Cheese

dd — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 02:53:09 +0000

I know Mac and cheese is popular: Kraft sells over 1 million boxes a day. Though buying it is easy, the taste is ok unless I’m *very* hungry. It was time to make it from scratch. I usually don’t make things with butter but I made an exception.

Macaroni and Cheese Recipe

Ingredients

4 oz uncooked elbow pasta (macaroni)
1 cup milk
paprika
1/2 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese
2 TBS butter (I used bakeable margarine)

Directions

Make macaroni according to directions. Drain.
While heat is on med-low, stir in 1/2 cup milk, butter, and cheese until melted. Add more milk until sauce is thick. Sprinkle with paprika.

Epilogue

Originally I put in the 1 cup milk and the sauce was too thin. Definitely tastes better than the old standby and just about as easy to make.
This goes well with baked beans.

dtc

Copyright © 2008 Smartlab Software, LLC
This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only.
The use of this feed on other websites breaches copyright. If this content is not in your news reader, it makes the page you are viewing an infringement of the copyright. (Digital Fingerprint:
4c0109039d6d359a52f973236af865e4)

Kitchen Thermometer Calibration

dd — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:01:43 +0000

This holiday season make sure your kitchen thermometers are accurate. It is easy to do and only takes a few minutes. Though the thermometers may, and I emphasize may, have been accurate at the time of purchase, exposure to high temperatures and other conditions may have compromised their accuracy. Don’t get caught with your mercury down…check out your thermometer today.

dtc

dougthecook Thanksgiving Recipes

dd — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 02:46:35 +0000

I consolidated several Thanksgiving recipes on a new web page. Hope you enjoy!

dtc

No Cook Pizza Sauce

dd — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 23:46:36 +0000

My next experiment in making pizza will be this: mix all the ingredients of pizza sauce and put it directly on the pizza without cooking the sauce. This should be interesting. It will be a variation of Margherita pizza (dougarita?).

Doug

A Very Handy Cookbook

dd — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 19:29:35 +0000

How to Break an Egg. Don’t let the title fool you. It has over 1,400 tips, how-tos, emergency fix-its, and handy techniques. Just reading it is inspirational. A definite kitchen staple.

dougthecook

Baking Tips

dd — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 18:55:04 +0000

I’ve started to collect baking tips at dougthecook. There is also a link to submit your own (you’ll be duly credited!).

dtc

Mixing Ingredients Order

dd — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 03:43:00 +0000

I was making a marinade for chicken fajitas which calls for several items including cilantro. In the past I would mix up the ingredients and put in the spices last. This resulted in a lot of floaters. Tonight I put the spices in first then the dry stuff then mixed in the wet ingredients. Practically no floaters. Another mystery solved.

Doug

Pizza Dough and Milk

dd — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:27:02 +0000

Using skimmed milk instead of water, dougthecook pizza dough had different characteristics, as expected. The dough cooked through rather than a little gooey in the middle. It rolled out nice but was a little more dense than the water version. And chewier.

dtc

Pizza Dough Variation

dd — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 15:21:55 +0000

Sounds like a classical music passage. From a hint I found at Cooks Illustrated I used milk instead of water to make pizza dough. The dough was a little less wet than the water-based one but still pliable. As they say the proof is in the pizza and I will find out tonight how well it tastes. As an aside, I do not think any pizzerias use milk in their dough as it would be too expensive.

Doug

Disappearing Tomatoes

dd — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 14:55:12 +0000

A tomato sauce without tomatoes? Read on.
Dinner was salmon with tomato-caper sauce after an all-day house paintfest.

The tomatoes were Romas from our garden. I decided to remove the skins by cutting a small slit in them, boiling them for 30 seconds, plunging them in cold water, then peeling off the skins. Worked great. They were chopped up and put in the sauce per the recipe. After most of the liquid dissipated the tomatoes were barely discernable. The sauce tasted especially excellent, though.

Moral? Leave the skins on for show or take them off for the dough.

Doug