I guess there is a reason why osso bucco is traditionally done with veal shanks. I slowly braise beef shanks to get a broth and meat for borschtsch, but apart from that, I honestly do not have much use for it.
They are not labeled "sweet" or "dry" when you go to the grocery store to buy one. Their descriptions have things like "baked, feminine aroma with tight, zesty, legs" or some other such nonsense.
Except, that's only true in strawmanland. Wine terminology is pretty consistent and reproducible. Exception, as usually, exist. Also, don't you have at least one decent wine store in the region where you just could ask something like "I need something to braise a lamb shank in, what would you recommend?". They tend to know their stuff.
Massively illustrated cookbooks are not necessarily bad - though I give you that most people just use them for the coffee table. One book in my collection that I really like is Murata's "Kaiseki". Sure, the recipes in there are only a footnote in culinary shorthand and you REALLY need to know what you are doing if you want to reproduce them, but I learned a lot about the aesthetics of plating even if most of the recipes are clearly above my level.
I second that. As a next step, I suggest Robuchon's "The Complete Robuchon" - it's a mixture of technique and actual recipes, showing basic preparations for all kinds of meats and produce. French tradition at its finest, in particular the potato chapter.
That's some dedication - trying a recipe three times to see whether it has a point when it clearly looks like it is technically flawed like hell. I mean, no browning? No mirepoix? Can as well just drop the shank in the trash, then.
. Like you say, there's no physical dexterity in cooking. So this isn't a valid analogy at all.
Knife skills are physical dexterity. Fileting a fish. Deboning a chicken. It's not all about dexterity, sure, but it plays into it. The analogy is fine - some things, like estimating done-ness of a piece of meat, you only learn by trial and experience and not by reading a recipe.
A proper "cookbook for geeks" wouldn't have complete recipes, it would have a bunch of examples of techniques - here's how to make a roux, here's how to make that into a white sauce, you can do a bunch of stuff to that white sauce now like make it a cheese sauce, that kind of thing.
There's enough of that kind available - Jacques Pepin's Techniques is quite good, though the illustration quality lacks sadly.
But, yeah, that review is atrocious. Sadly, enough people seem indeed to grow up withour knowing the basics of cooking and eating. We are losing parts of an essential cultural technique outside of some niches. Hell, I once saw premade scrambled eggs on toast deep-frozen in a supermarket. WTF.
That's pretty much the standard view of peak oil theorists - see Kunstler's slow decline. I am not particularly aware of anyone with reason who does not subscribe to thath model. Haven't seen any current shock theories with regard to peak oil.
Every whine about "why is this stuff that matters" should result in a one week insta-ban, increased exponentially for repeat offenders. If the topic does not interest you, how about not clicking on it? To hard for the thing you use in place of a brain?
So, a professional in his field takes his time to not only answer the questions posed, but does so in a well written essay. And all you can conjure up from your two working neurons is a screech out of your basement to the effect of "TL:DR". Great work, oh intellectual giant.
The one just a bit larger than the currently available. Look at the goalposts, see them move. I suggest not to waste energy on such arguments any more.
Buy yourself a gulf stream and some decent loess soils and podsols instead of acidic peat bogs after your permafrost thaws up, then we talk about growing stuff.
You mean the screeching alarmists stating that each and every change we might have to make would mean the end of industrial civilization, kill the economy and have as all huddling around campfires in caves again? Those alarmists?
Is the snow just retreating in summer, or do the winters get less atrocious, too? If the latter, I might pack my stuff and join you in Iceland. Love the place, but I am psychologically unfit for the winters....
Not only that, while plant life moves farther north, at the same time, the hadley cells are expanding - and with them the desert belts around the equator. Doesn't look like we are gaining green areas in total.
Definitely an interesting concept. That would be farm subsidies as they should be.
I moved to the countryside myself, recently. I can buy a lot of stuff directly from the farmers around here - and it generally is cheaper than in the supermarket. If you don't have to pay upfront for a subscription, you definitely save money. Heck, I get my eggs from the neighbour - the hens are just on the other side of my fence. 1 Euro, 50 cents for the dozen. For free range, (non-certified)-organic - it's twice that in the supermarket. Added bonus - I get some chicken manure for free to boost the nitrogen in my compost.
Excuse me, small tip from your friendly neighbourhood necromancer - don't feed your thralls a steady diet of brains. Brains are high in calories and fat, you'd end up with couch potatoe zombies, totally useless. Brains are a small treat for a job well done. Normal diet for your thralls should be based on lean muscle and crunchy bones. Time to re-read the Necronomicon, dear colleague!
Actually, with a well set-up organic, in particular permaculture, system you can easily establish a closed nutrient cycle at or even over our current "green revolution" yields. What you can't do, however, is producing those yields with the minimal amount of manual labor we are utilizing today.
That said, easy it is not. I keep my garden running well without adding synthetic fertilizers. Still, I bring in foreign biomass - vegetable trimmings from bought vegetables in the compost, chicken manure from my neighbours chickens. I'd need substantially more area to really establish a closed circle.
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I guess there is a reason why osso bucco is traditionally done with veal shanks. I slowly braise beef shanks to get a broth and meat for borschtsch, but apart from that, I honestly do not have much use for it.
They are not labeled "sweet" or "dry" when you go to the grocery store to buy one. Their descriptions have things like "baked, feminine aroma with tight, zesty, legs" or some other such nonsense.
Except, that's only true in strawmanland. Wine terminology is pretty consistent and reproducible. Exception, as usually, exist. Also, don't you have at least one decent wine store in the region where you just could ask something like "I need something to braise a lamb shank in, what would you recommend?". They tend to know their stuff.
Massively illustrated cookbooks are not necessarily bad - though I give you that most people just use them for the coffee table. One book in my collection that I really like is Murata's "Kaiseki". Sure, the recipes in there are only a footnote in culinary shorthand and you REALLY need to know what you are doing if you want to reproduce them, but I learned a lot about the aesthetics of plating even if most of the recipes are clearly above my level.
I second that. As a next step, I suggest Robuchon's "The Complete Robuchon" - it's a mixture of technique and actual recipes, showing basic preparations for all kinds of meats and produce. French tradition at its finest, in particular the potato chapter.
That's some dedication - trying a recipe three times to see whether it has a point when it clearly looks like it is technically flawed like hell. I mean, no browning? No mirepoix? Can as well just drop the shank in the trash, then.
. Like you say, there's no physical dexterity in cooking. So this isn't a valid analogy at all.
Knife skills are physical dexterity. Fileting a fish. Deboning a chicken. It's not all about dexterity, sure, but it plays into it. The analogy is fine - some things, like estimating done-ness of a piece of meat, you only learn by trial and experience and not by reading a recipe.
A proper "cookbook for geeks" wouldn't have complete recipes, it would have a bunch of examples of techniques - here's how to make a roux, here's how to make that into a white sauce, you can do a bunch of stuff to that white sauce now like make it a cheese sauce, that kind of thing.
There's enough of that kind available - Jacques Pepin's Techniques is quite good, though the illustration quality lacks sadly.
But, yeah, that review is atrocious. Sadly, enough people seem indeed to grow up withour knowing the basics of cooking and eating. We are losing parts of an essential cultural technique outside of some niches. Hell, I once saw premade scrambled eggs on toast deep-frozen in a supermarket. WTF.
To add: It's "the long emergency" in Kunstler parlance, if I am not mistaken.
That's pretty much the standard view of peak oil theorists - see Kunstler's slow decline. I am not particularly aware of anyone with reason who does not subscribe to thath model. Haven't seen any current shock theories with regard to peak oil.
Every whine about "why is this stuff that matters" should result in a one week insta-ban, increased exponentially for repeat offenders. If the topic does not interest you, how about not clicking on it? To hard for the thing you use in place of a brain?
So, a professional in his field takes his time to not only answer the questions posed, but does so in a well written essay. And all you can conjure up from your two working neurons is a screech out of your basement to the effect of "TL:DR". Great work, oh intellectual giant.
Of course - you are completely right about those factors. But they add to natural desertification due to Hadley cell expansion.
God forbid we report about news for nerds. It's all about pre-selected bullcrap to feed your personal biases today, isn't it?
Newsflash - nobody cares about you. No black helicopters out there, son.
The one just a bit larger than the currently available. Look at the goalposts, see them move. I suggest not to waste energy on such arguments any more.
Buy yourself a gulf stream and some decent loess soils and podsols instead of acidic peat bogs after your permafrost thaws up, then we talk about growing stuff.
You mean the screeching alarmists stating that each and every change we might have to make would mean the end of industrial civilization, kill the economy and have as all huddling around campfires in caves again? Those alarmists?
Is the snow just retreating in summer, or do the winters get less atrocious, too? If the latter, I might pack my stuff and join you in Iceland. Love the place, but I am psychologically unfit for the winters....
Not only that, while plant life moves farther north, at the same time, the hadley cells are expanding - and with them the desert belts around the equator. Doesn't look like we are gaining green areas in total.
False dichotomy, much? Ah, hell, it's just two in one post with three lines of content, nothing to worry about.
Definitely an interesting concept. That would be farm subsidies as they should be.
I moved to the countryside myself, recently. I can buy a lot of stuff directly from the farmers around here - and it generally is cheaper than in the supermarket. If you don't have to pay upfront for a subscription, you definitely save money. Heck, I get my eggs from the neighbour - the hens are just on the other side of my fence. 1 Euro, 50 cents for the dozen. For free range, (non-certified)-organic - it's twice that in the supermarket. Added bonus - I get some chicken manure for free to boost the nitrogen in my compost.
Slashdot. News for nerds, stuff for morons with the attention span of a gnat. How the mighty have fallen.
The Old Ones help us, in the end we might get arrested for constructing slippery slopes! Think of the Children, my friends!!
Excuse me, small tip from your friendly neighbourhood necromancer - don't feed your thralls a steady diet of brains. Brains are high in calories and fat, you'd end up with couch potatoe zombies, totally useless. Brains are a small treat for a job well done. Normal diet for your thralls should be based on lean muscle and crunchy bones. Time to re-read the Necronomicon, dear colleague!
Actually, with a well set-up organic, in particular permaculture, system you can easily establish a closed nutrient cycle at or even over our current "green revolution" yields. What you can't do, however, is producing those yields with the minimal amount of manual labor we are utilizing today.
That said, easy it is not. I keep my garden running well without adding synthetic fertilizers. Still, I bring in foreign biomass - vegetable trimmings from bought vegetables in the compost, chicken manure from my neighbours chickens. I'd need substantially more area to really establish a closed circle.