Creative Toppings for Fast Food: Ideas Needed

[turbo]

Hmm...how would wasabi taste in sour cream? I know about wasabi in mayonaisse (which I'm not too fond of), and wasabi in mashed potatoes (which are very yummy), and if it went well in sour cream, that might be just the perfect topping for crab (or salmon if Evo prefers) in a potato skin. Hmm...my fridge has sour cream, and the spice cabinet has wasabi...I think another culinary experiment will be required this evening.

Be sure to report back! My favorite dressing for crab cakes is a 50:50 mix of our hot jalapeno/habanero salsa and mayo with some salt and lots of cracked black pepper, but I'm always ready to experiment with food.

 

[Ouabache]

I was afraid you were going to suggest sprinkling bugs on them.

No bugs in my potatoes please

Your creamed smoked salmon reminds me of "lox & cream cheese spread" (great on bagels). I bet both would be quite tastey on baked spuds.

lox - salty smoked salmon

 

[Moonbear]

Be sure to report back! My favorite dressing for crab cakes is a 50:50 mix of our hot jalapeno/habanero salsa and mayo with some salt and lots of cracked black pepper, but I'm always ready to experiment with food.

Well, last night's wasabi and sour cream experiment failed. I need to get fresh reagents. In other words, the wasabi tasted like dust...I think it got too old. No heat and little flavor. So, I need to try it again sometime. A regular horseradish sauce might work too, maybe even with a dollop of that salsa.

It's too bad you can't be around fragrances...everything you describe sounds so tasty that you could easily come up with an interesting menu for a little bistro type place. With the right location, you'd have no problem finding a steady stream of customers interested in unique, spicy foods (you could even have a couple mild dishes under the title "for the wusses" on the menu for people who accompany the spice lovers but can't take the heat).

 

[quantumdude]

My favorite potato condiment is Frank's Red Hot. I'd soak that spud till it was orange all the way through.

 

[turbo]

Well, last night's wasabi and sour cream experiment failed. I need to get fresh reagents. In other words, the wasabi tasted like dust...I think it got too old. No heat and little flavor. So, I need to try it again sometime. A regular horseradish sauce might work too, maybe even with a dollop of that salsa.

It's too bad you can't be around fragrances...everything you describe sounds so tasty that you could easily come up with an interesting menu for a little bistro type place. With the right location, you'd have no problem finding a steady stream of customers interested in unique, spicy foods (you could even have a couple mild dishes under the title "for the wusses" on the menu for people who accompany the spice lovers but can't take the heat).

Sorry to hear about the failure. Wasabi is probably like horseradish in that if it's not fresh, it's not too good. I've got to put up a big batch of ground horseradish this summer - the store-bought stuff is blah! My first experience with wasabi was at a outdoor sushi bar at the Maine Festival about 20 years ago. Fresh Atlantic salmon painted with wasabi on the inside and rolled around a cylinder-shaped mass of rice. Heaven!

I wouldn't mind running a lunch-only diner if I could tolerate being amongst "the fragranced" (almost everybody, these days). Instead of a menu, I think that I would simply run a couple of specials a day and people could have their choice of whatever I made that day. Not everything would be spicy, though. One of my recipes that my family loves is hickory-smoked Atlantic salmon filets, brined, dusted with cracked pepper and smoked in a maple-syrup glaze. If I take that up to my Dad's place on Christmas Eve, the family goes into "devour mode" and a big filet disappears in a couple of minutes along with the requisite crackers, sharp cheese, and hot mustards. Anyway, my diner would be along the lines of a daily surprise (good name!), since people wouldn't know what's for lunch unless they showed up.

 

[Math Is Hard]

My favorite potato condiment is Frank's Red Hot. I'd soak that spud till it was orange all the way through.

I need to try that. Last night I had no food in the house, so I had Frank's Red Hot on saltines for dinner.

 

[turbo]

I need to try that. Last night I had no food in the house, so I had Frank's Red Hot on saltines for dinner.

Holy cow! I was never THAT desperate for food when I was in school. I'd always have some leftover lentil soup, baked beans, pea soup, spaghetti, French soup (onions, leeks, rice, potato, with canned tomatoes) - something. I would cook every weekend so there was plenty of stuff to choose from during the week, and if friends dropped by and ate up some of my prepared stuff, at least I could make fried-egg sandwiches with cheese and hot sauce, or BLTs. There were a couple of young ladies who lived in an apartment across the street and neither of them could cook to save their souls. It's no wonder they both stayed so trim. I would have wasted away eating the stuff they called meals. I invited them for supper one night shortly after I moved into the neighborhood, and they were a bit skeptical at first, though they lost that attitude when they came in and smelled the spaghetti sauce and garlic bread.

 

[Math Is Hard]

I want to try making some of that French soup, turbo. I often make veggie soups with a canned tomato base.

 

[turbo]

I want to try making some of that French soup, turbo. I often make veggie soups with a canned tomato base.

Just throw it together and adjust to taste as you go. I like to use lots of leeks and onions, and tend to cut them and the potatoes fairly small. Use decent canned tomatoes, and add water, too, because the rice will soak up water as its cooking. Use real rice, like a nice Basmati. The extra cooking time required by Basmati will give the flavors a chance to get into the rice and potatoes. Serve with buttered saltines on the side. That's real comfort food. It was cheap enough so that my mother could make it pretty frequently all winter and we all loved it. You'll have to judge on the salt and pepper. She never put in additional salt because she made the soup from leeks that we had salted down the previous fall. Good luck.

 

[scorpa]

I need to try that. Last night I had no food in the house, so I had Frank's Red Hot on saltines for dinner.

Haha I hear yah MIH. I haven't been grocery shopping in about a month so I finally went today and I have food again. I may make a chicken stew or something now :D

 

[turbo]

Haha I hear yah MIH. I haven't been grocery shopping in about a month so I finally went today and I have food again. I may make a chicken stew or something now :D

No matter what you do with that chicken, DO NOT toss the carcass! If you don't already have a decent cleaver/ or a set of poultry shears, go get some (preferably the shears) tomorrow. When you have stripped the meat off the carcass, chop up the bones with your shears and boil the living heck out of it. You can either freeze this stock, or use it immediately to make casseroles or soups later. Please do this. It is the Pons Asinorum of cooking and you will be able to extend this to other concepts, like NEVER throwing away the juice from boiled vegetables!

 

[turbo]

Sorry, Scorpa. I didn't mean to holler (using caps on you) but it is incredibly important to use vegetable juices (what you boiled your potatoes or carrots in for instance) and meat stock to make healthy meals for yourself. Take care.

 

[end3r7]

We have this place near my campus (Texas A&M) called Potato Shack. Let's say I've had every type of Potato you can think of. I love the Teriaky one that they have though, yummy.

 

[scorpa]

Sorry, Scorpa. I didn't mean to holler (using caps on you) but it is incredibly important to use vegetable juices (what you boiled your potatoes or carrots in for instance) and meat stock to make healthy meals for yourself. Take care.

Lol no worries Turbo, I never even noticed I won't throw away the carcass if I ever make a chicken but this time I just bought a chicken breast to use in the stew (cheating i know haha!), but I didn't know about keeping the water you boil vegetables in. What are you supposed to do with that? Or is that what you meant by the juice from boiled veggies ??

I changed my mind for tomorrow though I think I am going to bake some salmon, and have rice and broccoli. I like to add some chicken stock into the broccoli when I boil it...tastes real good.

 

[Moonbear]

We have this place near my campus (Texas A&M) called Potato Shack. Let's say I've had every type of Potato you can think of. I love the Teriaky one that they have though, yummy.

Mmmm...that's always a fun thing about living near college campuses. There's often one place that you just wouldn't find anywhere but near a college campus that has really good food, but just different and great for snacking. Well, except here. I can't think of anything here that you can't find everywhere else in the country.

 

[turbo]

Lol no worries Turbo, I never even noticed I won't throw away the carcass if I ever make a chicken but this time I just bought a chicken breast to use in the stew (cheating i know haha!), but I didn't know about keeping the water you boil vegetables in. What are you supposed to do with that? Or is that what you meant by the juice from boiled veggies ??

I changed my mind for tomorrow though I think I am going to bake some salmon, and have rice and broccoli. I like to add some chicken stock into the broccoli when I boil it...tastes real good.

Use a heavy plastic bucket (or two, if you want to segregate them) to store in your freezer, and every time you have juices from steamed or boiled vegetables, add the juices to the (selected) bucket. These juices are prime carriers of nutrients from the vegetables that were cooked in them, and they are very flavorful. Don't ever use canned or dried "soup stock" to cook with. They are guaranteed to be mostly food-processing by-products laced with MSG and salt, with no regard for your health.

For your salmon: I like to bake salmon by dusting it with cracked black pepper and salt and coating it with a thin layer of mayo (to prevent drying). Enclose a sprig or two of fresh dill and seal the filet in a wrap of aluminum foil for about 20 min in a pre-heated oven at 375-400 deg F. Bon appetit, Scorpa!

 

[scorpa]

Use a heavy plastic bucket (or two, if you want to segregate them) to store in your freezer, and every time you have juices from steamed or boiled vegetables, add the juices to the (selected) bucket. These juices are prime carriers of nutrients from the vegetables that were cooked in them, and they are very flavorful. Don't ever use canned or dried "soup stock" to cook with. They are guaranteed to be mostly food-processing by-products laced with MSG and salt, with no regard for your health.

For your salmon: I like to bake salmon by dusting it with cracked black pepper and salt and coating it with a thin layer of mayo (to prevent drying). Enclose a sprig or two of fresh dill and seal the filet in a wrap of aluminum foil for about 20 min in a pre-heated oven at 375-400 deg F. Bon appetit, Scorpa!

Cool that is how I usually cook my salmon but I never would have thought of the cracked black pepper and mayo, I usually do it with butter, onions and dill. I'll have to give that a try!

 

[turbo]

Cool that is how I usually cook my salmon but I never would have thought of the cracked black pepper and mayo, I usually do it with butter, onions and dill. I'll have to give that a try!

I've tried baking salmon with onions, but to my taste, the onions overpower the salmon's flavor, so I cook them separately. Of course, since you're operating your oven anyway, you can bake your onions in tin foil, too, with salt, pepper and butter, and bake a potato or two. Sometimes instead of baking potatoes whole, we cut them into slices and bake them in tin foil in butter, salt and pepper along with the sliced onions. It's an easy meal, with easy clean-up, and we often cook potatoes on the grill that way, too. Sometimes we add sliced peppers (hot and/or sweet ones) to the foil packet.

 

[J77]

Did anyone already mention... when cooking them, have as metal sweker stuck through them -- cooks the middle faster.

 

[chaoseverlasting]

Man... does a good appetite come with studying all the stuff that we do? Heck, I love baking bread with mozzeralla on top and eating with this Hienz chutney sauce that you get.

 

[chaoseverlasting]

No matter what you do with that chicken, DO NOT toss the carcass! If you don't already have a decent cleaver/ or a set of poultry shears, go get some (preferably the shears) tomorrow. When you have stripped the meat off the carcass, chop up the bones with your shears and boil the living heck out of it. You can either freeze this stock, or use it immediately to make casseroles or soups later. Please do this. It is the Pons Asinorum of cooking and you will be able to extend this to other concepts, like NEVER throwing away the juice from boiled vegetables!

You know, there's this curry my mom cooks that she uses in pretty much everything. Ill ask her how she does it, but you can put boiled egg in it, chicken, lightly sauteed veges of all kinds, and I think its the basis of Punjabi cooking. The slight variation in the ingredients makes such a huge difference to the final product, that its amazing.

 

[turbo]

I'd be interested in the curry recipe. There is such variation that it's staggering. It's like salsa here. My wife and I can several recipes of salsa each season - some relatively mild, and some that you need to warn people about if they are not used to very hot stuff. Anyway, my wife makes a curried chicken dish with green peppers and onions that is fantastic on a bed of basmati rice.

 

[hypatia]

My potato binge is carried over for another night with ...Un-stuffed peppers.

Diced green and red peppers,one hot pepper, sweet onion, garlic and a large can of tomato chunks{include the juice}. I'll add a 1/2 pound of browned venison and let the whole think cook for about a hour, covered.
I have some really big Red skin potatos that I'm cutting in half and brushing with olive oil and topping with black pepper and corse sea salt.
The unstuffed peppers will go in the bottom of a shallow bowl and the Potatos on top{keeping with the unstuffed idea}.

 

[turbo]

Wow! That sounds great! I may have to try that one.

 

[dontdisturbmycircles]

Yum, I just bought a bunch of potatoes and have to try out some of these ideas! So many ideas to try.

I need to try that. Last night I had no food in the house, so I had Frank's Red Hot on saltines for dinner.

mm, franks red hot is great.

 

[scorpa]

You know, there's this curry my mom cooks that she uses in pretty much everything. Ill ask her how she does it, but you can put boiled egg in it, chicken, lightly sauteed veges of all kinds, and I think its the basis of Punjabi cooking. The slight variation in the ingredients makes such a huge difference to the final product, that its amazing.

I've never had curry, ever. I don't even really know what it is although I hear about it all the time. Is it like a spice? Stupid question probably but oh well

 

[turbo]

Curry is a mixture of spices that at the very least can be added to lend character to rice or other bland foods. It is found across huge expanses of Asia and has infinite regional variability. Generally, it is designed to add "hotness" or what the Cajuns would call a "piquant" character to dishes. I do not have enough knowledge about curries to comment further, but some of the curried dish recipes that my wife and I have tried making have been all over the map in flavor, hotness, etc. It would be nice to have access to Indian/Pakistani specialty shops to try using some of their raw ingredients, but in north central Maine, you're not going to find a lot of that.

 

[chaoseverlasting]

Curry is like a mixture of spices, and herbs, cooked in a certain way to lend a special flavour to a certain dish. There are several variations as T1 mentioned, and even in India, the recipe varies from region to region.

If you go to the north, they have a characteristic way of cooking their food with or without curry, and the recipe for curry may vary depending on what you want to cook. Like fish curry is different from chicken curry (the preparation of the sauce). And if you have a certain dish in the north, the same dish may have a totally different taste in the south.

 

[chaoseverlasting]

Here's the quick version (mom was in a hurry):

Heat some oil in a large pan
Add one chopped onion along with some cloves of ginger and garlic (some)
Add some garam masala (I have no idea what the composition of that is)
Powdered black pepper
Powdered red chilli
Some haldi (tumeric I think)

Add some water to keep the mixture liquidey (no idea what that means)
2 tomatoes (puree them in a blender)
And cook till it bubbles a bit.
Then you can add your vegetables/chicken(boiled or lightly cooked) etc etc...