7
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What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking?
What food and drinks have you been enjoying (or not enjoying) recently? Have you cooked or created anything interesting? Tell us about it!
What food and drinks have you been enjoying (or not enjoying) recently? Have you cooked or created anything interesting? Tell us about it!
I've been experimenting with foaming cold coffee, there's a technique where you do an espresso, then add ice and foam it with steam like you would with milk. That works well but it's a lot of work. I've been trying instead to prepare filter coffee in advance, cool it, and then foam it using an immersion blender, that actually works quite well, the texture is really nice, although I think the novelty will wear off. I wrote a shot "blog" post about it.
I read through the link and ended up preparing the "original" recipe using espresso, also called an Aerocano. Excellent 10/10. I would agree that it's similar to nitro cold brew but I actually prefer it compared to nitro; I found it much less bitter. Only issue is that it does require a pitcher that is on the larger side and preferably clear glass.
I would do it more but I only have a hand-grinder so espresso is a bit of a workout... I'm doing more filters these days.
I had a KIN K6 hand grinder for about a year and a half and got to the point where it was just too annoying, so I very recently picked up an Option-O LAGOM casa. So far it has been amazing, I've definitely noticed an increase in consistency and shot quality that I didn't expect to happen, but conceptually makes sense.
Unfortunately now my grinder is far more expensive than my espresso machine, so that's the next thing that I'd like to upgrade (maybe for Christmas). A double boiler would be great as my gaggia classic is just a single.
It seems nice, lack of space was a big factor for going manual, so something compact like this would make sense.
Recently baked some chocolate banana bread! I'm slowly going through a 5lb bag of flour I bought and I had some leftover super ripe bananas. I've heard many times to bake banana bread if you've got ripe bananas leftover but I usually eat my bananas by then. This time, I had some ripe bananas leftover after my parents bought some while they were visiting and didn't eat them all before they left. I was following an online recipe that then said to add chocolate chips at the end. I then thought to myself, what if I just add cocoa powder instead? I mixed some dutch cocoa powder into my batter and then baked it in a quarter sheet tray. The result was a cakey brownie-like bread that's just addicting. I managed to quickly go through my small tray in just a few days. I ran out of bananas so I can't make it again this week but I will definitely be making it again in the future.
I often have one banana out of a bunch that goes overripe. Rather than force myself to eat it or get rid of it, I toss it in the freezer to make banana bread once enough have accumulated. The nice thing about freezer bananas is they mash up more easily, too!
Ooh that's smart, will definitely try that!