What was the most difficult or complicated thing you ever cooked, as regards
cooking methods rather than ingredients, and would you do it again?

47 responses total.

Hm.  The top contenders are a meal with tofu that was made from scratch (I've
done it a few times; it's only worth doing for entertainment value; store
bought tofu tastes better), an Ethiopian feast (the batter for the Injera
(flatbread) has to sit out for 3 days, which really isn't hard, just slow;
I'd definitely do this again and again), and, the winner, sag paneer, an
Indian dish with home-made cheese that is made with a similar process to
making tofu.  Tofu is harder to make than paneer, because you start with
soybeans and make soymilk to make tofu, while for paneer you start with cow's
milk at the point where tofu would be using soymilk.  My sag paneer recipe
is an all day affair, but the resulting meal is yummy enough to be well worth
it.

Hm.  I'm sure I've made other even-more-complicated things.  Gotta think about
this.

To me complicated or difficult means lots of shopping for the
right ingredients and clean-up afterwards.  I don't think I've
ever made a meal where the actual food prep was a long and involved
process.  But I've most certainly prepared meals where the kitchen
looked like a tornado had touched down.  And for the most part the
extra effort wasn't evident in the final product.

I'm in awe of anyone who'd make their own tofu.  Kudos.

We also made tofu (the fibrous leftovers, called okara, were worth it, but
the tofu was rather scanty), injera, and some sort of cheese (with vegetable
rennet made from mushrooms).  Must be something else....
Tortillas.  First go to visit friends in Indiana farm country.  Repair the
vehicle when a bolt falls into the starter.  Continue to friends' house.
(Jim, they don't want to hear the details of the bolt, torque converter and
gears, even if it did take five hours to fix, five miles from nowhere).
Borrow a bunch of ears of field corn from a neighbor, and run them through
an antique corn-shelling machine.  Sort out all the moldy kernels by hand (the
cobs had been sitting on the stalks for a while.  Store in a cool dry place
for a year while you hunt for a source of lime (CaOH).  Tour the water
treatment plant and note that they treat the water with lime.  Borrow a little
bit with promises to be careful (in contact with water it heats up and
splatters and it hot and caustic).  Put a cup or so of corn into water to
which you have carefully added as much lime as will dissolve (a teaspoon is
more than adequate) and watch it turn from red to green.  Leave to soak
overnight.  The next day boil for an hour to accelerate the chemical reaction
between the lime (originally made by Mexicans from burnt oyster shells, but
we cheated) and the corn, which not only loosens the husks but causes some
precursor of niacin (I think it is) to convert to niacin so you will not get
pellagra from eating mainly corn (like the Europeans did when they treated
it like wheat and ground the whole thing raw, without no treatment).  Rinse
many times in lots of cold water, after the first few rinses start rubbing
to remove husks, which will float away in rinse water.  Then make yourself
a metate and grindstone (or if you are very lazy use a Columbian hand-powered
flour grinder on medium setting) to smash the boiled kernels into a sort of
mush.  (If you are exceptionally lazy you can buy preprepared masa harina and
add water and get to this stage at once).  Make a ball a bit larger than a
golf ball, smash flat on a small plate, and bake on a hot stone over an open
fire (or use a frying pan with some oil in it, but be prepared to have a lot
of blackened oil on your pan).  Share with the neighbors and vow never again.
        We figured this out from reading a book on preColumbian Mexican
cooking.  There are lots more descriptions of how to prepare corn there.  The
Mexican cookbooks all said that authentic tortillas were made from masa
harina, which eliminates most of the fun.
        Ingredients:  lime, water, corn (and optional oil)

I think the most difficult was when I did a largish dinner for a bunch of
dinner, and made  this chicken and sausage and prune stuff that was really
yummy, but a real pain the tush, especially when paired with corn popovers.
But boy oh boy was it good!  :)

Eeyore, did you make sausages out of chickens and prunes?  What was the
difficult part, I am intrigued.  Do you have a surefire way to get your
popovers to pop?  Most of the time I forget to leave the lumps in, and they
become dense muffins.

Warning on the lime water - be very sure not to put your hands in it, the
stuff dissolves grease from your skin.  Rinse the boiled corn many times under
a faucet first, no touching until rinsed. (Learned from mistakes).

Anyone with difficult breads or pastries?  (I once made Danish).

I used to make beer, which I used some concentrates for.  It was a lot of
cleaning, then boil up a mass of stuff, then put in a big jug in the basement
for a month, then more cleaning (all the bottles), then more work, then more
time in the basement.  I don't drink enough beer anymore to bother.

Besides, you don't have a basement now.  Anyone ever try making sauerkraut,
which also needs a cool basement?  Or anything else fermented?

   the most difficult meal i ever helped with was a family-gathering
pig roast.  start with an old, oval, 150-or-so-gallon furnace oil tank.
lay the tank on its side and cut in half lengthways.  install hinges,
vents, a handle for the half that's going to be the lid, and grill(s).
put roaster on cinderblocks so as not to damage the ground under it.
get lots and lots of charcoal.  early the next morning, place charcola
in bottom half of roaster and ignite.  place grill(s) over charcoal.
when the fire is ready, place whole gutted pig on grill and cook until
midafternoon, raising lid periodically to check on its progress and/or
add barbeque sauce.  get help to turn the pig.  when the pig is done,
place on board and carry into kitchen to be placed on table with all
the other stuff everyone else has been cooking all day.  grab a plate,
get in line, and eat in the company of your extended family.

They used to use spits turned by little dogs on treadmills.

How heavy a pig, and did you buy it commercially?

In Belgrade people would cook suckling pigs for New Year's (when the country
cousins came to visit) and take it to be baked in the bakery.

   walter, i was about thirteen when i helped with the pig roast.  i'm
not sure where the pig came from, and it was big enough to feed around
twenty-five or thirty people (small family gathering that time) with
leftovers.

I tried making bagles once. They tasted right, but the texture, shape,
color, etc, were off. Not worth the hours involved.

That's odd, we recently made bagels and they looked a whole lot like the
commercial variety, but tasted much better (ours were whole wheat).  Have you
tried adding a bit of wheat gluten to make them chewier?  For color, you can
dip them in egg yolk before baking.  We shaped ours by making a ball and then
poking a hole in the middle of it and evening out the bumps.  The whole
process was not much more than an hour, including mixing, rising, boiling,
and baking.

Wow, sounds easy. It must have been the recipe I used. Just reading it
took an hour. Maybe I'll try again.

I've made bagels a few times, using the breadmaker to knead and doing the rest
by hand.  It was easy, and the resulting bagels were good, although not as
wonderful as the amazing bagels from back home.

re:  7
I just brewed up a really nice Bock.  It was a subtle full bodied Bock.
Here's how I did it.
"Tasted" some Negro Mondelo I think.  Write down procedures so we don't miss
anything.
 
Called Bill.  Began primary boil at 4:28 p.m. added Munton's Extra Dark
Unhopped Spray Malt Extract (dry) 1/2 cup, one cup brown sugar, and into 3
cups of Corn Sugar, boiled in 2 gallons of water.  Stirred constantly and
watched in case of "boil over."
 
Take pot off of stove at 5:03 p.m. and added Coopers Stout Dark 1 can
(pre-hopped), Morgan's Dark Crystal Malt 1/2 can (for sweetness), Lager Malt
1/4 can, 1 cup black strap molasses (to mellow out the aftertaste of a heavy
Bock beer).  Mix thoroughly (not to burn the ingredients) and bring to a boil.
Stirred constantly and watched in case of "boil over."
 
"Tasted" Samuel Adams White Ale (ick) and Some Belgian Ale that tasted kind
of like a wine.
 
Began secondary boil at 5:13 p.m. and ended at 5:45.  Added finishing hops
(1 tablespoon of Cascade hops) at 5:40.
 
Called Bill, and Bottled after 10 days with 1/4 tablespoon of powered pure
vitamin-c (an anti-oxidant), and 3/4 cup of Corn Sugar.  We had some kind of
Voodoo ale from Florida, Some kind of Irish Stout, and Something else that
I am pretty sure tasted really good.  Managed to get a lots of water, an
aspirin and a tablet of vitamin c before I slept so the hangover was minimal.
 
The Bock was the best we ever made.

P.S. Bottled first, drank later and Secondary Fermentation lasted 10 days more
or less.  And being fanatical about sterilization procedures makes a good Bock
a lot better.

Historically Bock Beer was the last brew of the season when the temperature
was getting too high.  It was also where they cleaned out the barrel, used
the bottom of the barrel in the spring time.  You get whatever is left in the
vat, so it tends to be darker and ferments at a warmer temperature.

YOu are invited to the Ann Arbor Culinary Historians meeting April 19, 7 p.m.
Unitarian Church:  Beyond Budweiser:  Beer from Bablyonia to Arbor Brewing
Company.  They have talks every third Sunday.  This year we heard about
Michigan wines, and about vinegars, and last year olive oils and chocolates
and bread, etc.  There are good potlucks twice a year for members.  Nonmembers
are welcome to come to the occasional lecture.

How much beer can you drink and still read the clock and thermometer?

That sounds really interesting, but unfortunately I live in Kalihi, on the
island of Oahu.  
 
 How much beer can I drink and still read the clock and thermometer?  Hmm...
I think I can do eight without "serious" loss.

Do you know anything about 'native' cooking in Hawaii?  Or any dishes cooked
there which people here might not know about?  Somehow I had not associated
Hawaii with bock beer.  Are there other fermented drinks made there?

Keesan:  I made this stew-type thing...it's in the New Basics cookbook....It's
been a couple of years, though....

I love making bagels, but it's been awhile...the ones I made didn't
necessaruky taste or look like bought bagels, but they had a charm all their
own...I loved them.  :)

What I think is that the bought bagels did not taste like fresh ones would
have.  People get used to store-bought stuff and then try to duplicate that,
and the store-bought stuff is made for longer shelf-life, not taste, or for
manufacture with machinery.

re: 21  Hawai'i is not known for it's Bock beer.  It's just that I love Bock.
 
Hawai'i is one of the strangest places to learn cooking.  We have influences
from the east and west.  Some dishes blend well and others...  Another local
drink is called Okolehau which I am tracking down and going to brew, I'll let
you know how it turns out.  This brew is I am told became really popular
during the Prohibition and that my grandfather (who died from cancer) brewed.

I adored the variety of restaurants in Hawaii.  I had expected a limited list
of boring restaurants, and instead found spectacular restaurants from a huge
list of different types of cuisine.  I hope to one day go back and eat myself
silly.  :)

Well, in the meantime maybe you can ask Walter for the recipes for some of
the more interesting dishes there, and we can all learn about them.  What do
you remember eating there that we don't have here?  We went to a lecture once
and learned about all sorts of sweet and salty snacks, and 'shave ice'.

???
<i knows nothing about Hawaiian cooking - who's keesan talking about?>

(I think she meant Warren, not Walter.)

Yes, Warren was the one.  I get names mixed up all the time, sorry.

That's okay Keesan.  I am told that I "look" like a Walter.  (But I think
Walter looks a lot better than I)  : (
I really don't cook authentic pre-contact or traditional Hawaiian food.  I
tend to cook "local style," which is a fusion of many cultures.
 
Fried Rice 
 
Ingredients:
 
Leftover rice or fresh rice.
Meat (some kind) 
Vegetable (some kind)
egg (one or two)
Black or white pepper 
Garlic
oyster sauce (or shrimp and oyster)
 
I usually start by frying the meat(s).  I usually add spam and leftover meat
frying it up cut small.  Then I throw in everything else mixing up everything
else except the eggs, which I save for last.  I then pull all of the food to
the side and fry the egg(s) and  The vegetables I use tend toward cabbage,
green peas, carrots, and celery.  
 
10-15 minutes.
 

This sounds pretty good.  I think I'll try it soon. I suppose, though,
if you're using fresh rice, you have to add some water or some chicken 
stock.

There are a couple of fried rice recipes in the Grex recipe archives, too,
someplace in the "rice" category.

???  Who's seen both of us to compare?  (Or aren't you taking about i?)

To quote:  Walter looks a lot better than I.  (not 'i').
How do you keep the rice from burning while you are frying it?  It is starchy
and tends to stick to the pan when I try.  Maybe lots of oil.

Lots of Oyster sauce and some shoyu.

Oops need some oil as well.

When I make fried rice, I cook everything else first, then add rice at the
end and continue heating only until everything is warmed through.  The rice
part itself isn't really fried.

I personally prefer it when the rice is really fried.  I also have problems
with sticking, in many cases.  <sigh>  Pre-heating the rice, having lots of
really hot oil, and adding rice slowly may all help.

We picked some ears of dry corn, with large red kernels, and are attempint
go make tortillas again.  The first batch did not have enough lime, and the
skins would not come off.  With skins, it would not hold together.  The second
batch I got the skins off okay,l rubbing against a safety grater (which I have
never been able to grate with), but apparently did not cook long enough, as
it was dry and crumbly.  I am at the moment making polenta out of it by
boiling with lots of water and stirring frequently.  I added spinach, bought
at the farmer's market a couple of weeks ago.  It kept well.  I may cool and
then fry the polenta for breakfast as a change from oatmeal.  40 min was too
short for boiling, 1.5 hours too long (the sugar went into the water).

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