Category Archives: Forking Thoughts

Random Forking Items of Interest

The Lemon Cucumber is totally WORTH A FORK!

Lemon Cucumber

Lemon Cucumber

I see these little cucumbers at the Farmer’s Market and I’m glad I picked some up. These are the BEST FORKING cucumbers I ever tried. They are very sweet with a good cucumber taste and crisp like an apple. the skin is thin and edible. They happen to also be burp free and lack any bitter taste.

These are delicious.

Made Lemon Verbena Lemon Pickles with Apple. Recipe to Follow.

Lemon Verbena Lemon Pickles with Apple

Lemon Verbena Lemon Pickles with Apple

The Lemon Cucumber is the BEST FORKING CUCUMBER I ever had in my life!

Worth a Fork! These are Forking Great!

Worth a Fork! These are Forking Great!

 The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

 

Baking Soda has More Culinary Uses Than You Forking Know

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Baking soda has many culinary uses in the kitchen that you might not forking know about.

A small amount of baking soda is added to popsicles to prevent them from getting forking rock hard.

Home made yogurt taste less tangy with a little added baking soda.

Although baking soda tends to make canned tomatoes to taste flat sometimes baking soda is added to neutralize acid.

Some cooks add baking soda to boiled vegetables to keep their color….however the vegetables do tend to get soggy.

I haven’t tried it but I read in Cook’s Illustrated Magazine that baking soda is used to help caramelize meat.

I have tried the Cook’s magazine recipe that uses baking soda to make better tasting browned potatoes.

When boiling eggs a little baking soda added to the water helps to make the shells peal off easily.

To make the best creamiest hummus add baking soda to the boiling garbanzo beans.

Bring to slow boil cream and add some baking soda to make cream cheese.

Perhaps these are more Uses for Baking Soda than you Forking Knew About?

The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

References

incredible egg.org

chowhound.com

Cook’s Illustrated Magazine

The Forking Truth is that Sometimes a Very Good Restaurant will SCREW UP

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The Forking Truth is that sometimes a Very Good Restaurant WILL SCREW UP. I was at this well known usually very good restaurant recently in Carefree Arizona. This is a restaurant that has a James Beard Nominated Chef/owner. I love nearly all the food I’ve tried at this Chef’s Restaurants. The food is always highest quality, mostly locally sourced, very creative and masterfully prepared. The food is always forking good and sometimes it’s so good it’s mind-blowing. I’ve been here several times before so I was looking forward to an amazing lunch. I have blogged about all the Chef’s other restaurants and was hoping for a new “Worth a Fork” story to tell. Sadly what happened to me here I wouldn’t want to happen to you so I don’t feel like writing a “Worth a Fork” story. Instead I have to just tell The Forking Truth about what happened kind of forking story.

We arrived and a server told us to pick any table we wanted so I picked a table facing the scenic mountains instead of the other direction with a table facing the parking lot. The server takes our beverage order and I soon receive an iced tea. I was looking forward to starting with a creative vegetable plate prepared with interesting ingredients I’d never think of paring together. Then a lunch plate of some sort and if I had room maybe dessert.

It wasn’t too busy yet in the restaurant and only a few tables were seated behind me.

Then the forking unthinkable happens.

Nobody forking comes back to wait on us……

We wait……

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We forking wait some more……

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We notice the three tables behind us were all waited on and those people are eating but we didn’t get any FORKING service.

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Why?

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What am I Forking Chopped Liver?

Forking Chopped Liver

Forking Chopped Liver

A forking Leper?

A Forking Leper

A Forking Leper

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Twenty five or more minutes go by so we decided to have lunch some forking place else.

Against my husband’s wishes I left $4.00 on the table. Not as a tip but I wanted to pay for the forking iced tea I hardly drank.

I wrote my story on one review site and the same day someone who identified themselves to me as the waitress from that restaurant contacted me to let me know that they apologized for bad service and wanted to buy me lunch. To me not getting waited on is the worst thing that can happen (besides forking food poisoning). It’s not like you got any food to rave or complain about. It’s like going to the amusement park and they won’t let you on any rides.

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I would have thought the owner would have apologized on this one because it’s a biggy…I think.

I was very unhappy about making the trip to this restaurant and not getting waited on. I traveled maybe 30-45 forking minutes to dine here. It’s not terribly far but it’s not in my forking back yard either.

I also feel really forking weird about the offer to come back because if I come back to take them up on the free lunch offer they might just artificially kiss up to me.

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I’m just very unhappy that this happened…….

I guess I should be happy that they want to fix this and I should take them up on their offer.

I do note that you will usually get service from this particular restaurant and the food is usually very good but, on my last visit THEY DID FORKING SCREW UP.

As a forking update…..Nothing has happened so far…………

The Forking Truth is that Sometimes A Very Good Restaurant WILL SCREW UP and if they are a very good restaurant they will try to fix it.

The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

I got a Dog who Forking LOVES Romaine Lettuce

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Normally this cute Aussie looks like this, with a squeaky ball in her mouth ready to play catch. But something forking weird happens every forking time I start washing the romaine.

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My little buddy sits behind my feet and taps my leg letting me know she wants forking lettuce. She gives me this cute doggie smile and I have to give her forking lettuce.

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So then I forking give her some.

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I give her several pieces.

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She doesn’t behave this way for any other food.  I have noticed she is also oddly found of BEANS and inhales them. She sucks them up like a vacuum. But Romaine lettuce is the only food that makes her give me leg taps.

I think she’s forking unusual but very cute!

"I FORKING love romaine lettuce"

“I FORKING love romaine lettuce”

 The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

The Healthiest Cheapest and Best Snack Food can be made in your Forking Microwave Oven

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Carrot Chips- carrots are cheap about $2.99 for 5 lbs. Just slice them thin place in a microwave safe plate for about 3 minutes. Wipe the plate dry add a light coating of nonstick spray to your plate turn the carrots over and they only need 1-2 minutes more and you have chips. Finish with some fresh ground sea salt.

 

Potato Chips

Potato Chips- Potatoes are forking cheap. You can usually buy a ten pound bag of spuds for less than $3.00. Potato chips cook up faster than carrots in the microwave. Just slice them thin and try 3 minutes in the microwave. Wipe out plate or bowl and potato that isn’t done put back and microwave 30 seconds at a time till done. Finish with sea salt

 

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Pop corn not from a store bought bag with that yucky chemical goo but using dried kernels. Just 1/4 cup of kernels in a brown paper lunch bag that is folded close. Let the microwave go about 2 minutes (or when you hear the popping almost stopping) and you have cheap healthy pop corn. No fat is needed. Loose pop corn is very cheap and a 10 lb. bag will last you a year and it only cost about $1.00 a lb. I do note for the best tasting and textured pop corn you need to use the BIG kernels.

These are Good and that's The Forking Truth

These are Good, Healthy, Forking Cheap  and that’s The Forking Truth

Thanksgiving 2015 Got Forking Stuffed

Thanksgiving 2015

Thanksgiving 2015

Not many people can say they cooked a forking 500 turkey dinners all by themselves. But that was a long time ago. I think I worked harder on serving just 10 people than the 500 I did once. This year I cooked for only 10 people but made enough food for maybe 20. I prepared over 20 items. My husband prepared the mashed potatoes.  I know I didn’t have to prepare so many different dishes but I wanted too. To me Thanksgiving is an abundance of turkey, stuffing and potatoes that you share with who ever you forking can so you should offer all you can of those items and then some. Here’s what I forking served this year.

Fennel Fava Radish and Walnut Salad in Lemon Dijon Dressing

Fennel Fava Radish and Walnut Salad in Lemon Dijon Dressing

Thanksgiving Style Individual Turkey Meatloaf

Thanksgiving Style Individual Turkey Meatloaves

I prepared turkey four forking ways!

Sous Vide Turkey Breast with Oven Crisp Turkey Skin

Comments I got were..”.How did you cook this?” …..”This turkey is forking moist”……

Oven Fried Crisp Turkey Wings (425 degrees F for about one hour) (just drizzle them with evoo s&p garlic and paprika)

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Oven Roasted Turkey Legs

Herbed Turkey Gravy

Herbed Turkey Gravy

Traditional Stuffing and Rosemary Herb Stuffing

Traditional Stuffing and Rosemary Herb Stuffing

Leek Pudding

Leek Pudding

Cornbread Stuffing

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Mashed Potatoes

Potato Casserole

Potato Casserole

Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Pecans, Dates and some Brown Sugar

Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Pecans, Dates and some Brown Sugar

Sweet Potatoes with Cherry peppers, Figs, Green Onions and Balsamic Drizzle

Sweet Potatoes with Cherry peppers, Figs, Green Onions and Balsamic Drizzle

Some people really enjoyed the non-traditional Sweet Potatoes with Figs, Green Onions, Chiles and Balsamic Drizzle (add s&p drizzle evoo roast potatoes at 425 degrees F for about 20 minutes vegetables for about 15 min)

Italian Style Beans

Italian Style Beans

Macaroni and Cheese

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Cranberry Sauce with Hibiscus

Cranberry Sauce with Hibiscus

Rainbow Carrots

Vegetable Essence Spinach with onion

Sweet Corn off the Cob

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Soaked Semolina Limequat Cakes with Sumac Citrus Mascarpone

Bouchons (Bouchon Bakery Recipe – very chocolate very moist individual cakes)

A few Chocolate Pots de Creme

Cinnamon Brown Sugared Chestnuts in Crispy Wontons (served with honey)

Cinnamon Brown Sugared Chestnuts in Crispy Wontons (served with honey)

Cinnamon Brown Sugared Chestnuts in Crispy Won Tons served with honey

Cinnamon Crumb Bars with Apple

Lots of wine

Guest brought the pumpkin pie

Hope you also had Thanksgiving Dinner too and got Forking stuffed too!

This was Forking Good and that's The Forking Truth

This was Forking Great and that’s The Forking Truth

 

WTFork AUTOMATED GELATO MACHINES

 

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I never have seen a forking automated gelato machine before.  It’s very hard to find TASTY gelato where I live. I do have the option of purchasing forking not so good gelato from my local supermarket or traveling about a forking forty minutes to a good gelato shop so this gelato machine wetted my appetite for a delicious refreshing gelato.

I looked at the machine and saw it takes credit cards or cash and offers gelato in twelve forking flavors of mostly gelato and a couple of frozen fruit confections. I picked banana cheese cake gelato because that sounded interesting and I didn’t want to get disappointed with a flavor I know and love. I thought the gelato would squirt out of a forking hose I saw. But no then a door opened up and I saw lots of little four ounce tubs of gelato.

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The hose lowered itself.

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And then lifts up my forking gelato.

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Then drops it down and I pick it up from a door.

The gelato is packed with a little wooden spoon and the gelato is hard as a forking rock so I walk around the mall with it for a bit until my hand hurt similar to frost bite.

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By banana cheese cake flavor did have a creamy banana taste and little chunks of store bought like cheese cake in it. Not the worst and not the best gelato as it was ok. My husband’s pistachio was less creamy and had an abundance of almonds in it and was way more almond than forking pistachio. I think a forking quarter of a cup of almonds were in his tiny cup. Maybe it was an off batch.

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Worth a try if your at Arrowhead Mall in AZ. Although this gelato might not win any prizes for being the best it also not the worst out there either. The Forking Truth is that I’ve paid much more than the $3.75  for worst.

 The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth – Hot Dogs-Vegetarian are NOT and Some Have Human DNA

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The Forking Truth is that the Clear Foods Company released a report that analyzed ingredients at a molecular level in hot dogs and sausages. Clear Foods analyzed 345 hot dog and sausage products from 75 brands and found HUMAN DNA in 2% of the samples and forking found human DNA in 2/3rds of vegetarian samples or to be exact 67% due to hygienic issues with humans.

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And that AIN’T ALL They Found……

God this forking sucks!

God this forking sucks!

It’s forking Disturbing

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It’s Shocking

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They Forking found that 10% of Vegetarian Products they tested FORKING CONTAINED MEAT!

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Clear Foods found chicken in vegetarian breakfast sausage and pork in a vegetarian hot dog.

More bad news…….

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The Examiner.com wrote in their article that if you want to avoid pork you should avoid chicken and turkey products because pork was found in 3% of the samples. Not listed on the label but used as a forking substitute.

The good news is that Clear Foods also reported no problems with a few brands of Hot Dogs. They said these hot dogs were made with integrity and were high quality.

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Butterball, Eckrich, McCormick, Gardein and Hebrew National

 The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

Resources

examiner.com

CBS news.com

WTSP.com

AOL.Com

People Don’t know WTFork a Good Baked Item Should Taste Like

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After tasting some of the desserts I’ve tried fairly recently around where I live I truly believe that people don’t know WTFork a Good Baked Item should taste like.

No……. I’m not talking forking fancy smancy high end Las Vegas Desserts like the ones below.

Jean Philippe Aria Las Vegas

Jean Philippe Aria Las Vegas NV.

I talking good baked goods and desserts that just about everyone loves like  pies, cookies, bagels, cream puffs, cakes and breads. Desserts that are free of non-dairy whipped cream and artificial flavorings. Desserts that aren’t made with fillings from a can or package. Honest to goodness real desserts that are made with butter, fresh eggs and cream. I’m also talking real breads. Crusty, flavorful breads. Real breads that you look forward to eat.

When I was growing up it seemed every neighborhood had at least one bakery. No matter what kind of bakery I went in to Italian, Jewish or German……… where I grew up…… during that time you could always count on something fresh baked and scrumptious. The bakeries had this great aroma that I still remember. The aroma of fresh baked goods was so good your belly would forking hurt if you didn’t eat something.

Real bakeries were also very noisy places.

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You hear lots of machinery. Heavy duty mixers, the cash register, the conversations of customers.  You’d always hear the mechanic loud thundering roar of maybe several different bread slicing machines going-

Bread Slicers looked something like this

Bread Slicers looked something like this

slicing fresh loves of crusty breads for customers that were waiting in the long line. In those days even the forking malls all had bakeries. They weren’t the same as the free standing bakeries but looking back a whole heck of a lot better than some of what I see today sometimes. In those old days you’d make the weekly trip to the bakery to purchase bread and a few treats. Once in a while you might order a cake for a special occasion. Children were always given a few complimentary cookies and if a child was lucky their parent let them pick out a special yummy treat. In those days people cared about quality. You could partake in enjoying natural ingredients like real butter, eggs and real cream in your fresh baked goods no matter what bakery you walked into. The whole bakery smelled like sugar and spice. If you worked in a bakery you left smelling like a donut. (I know because I did)

Time has marched on and things are different now. Life styles have changed. People are busier than ever and are always on the go working more hours. Doing more things.

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Many people are also more health conscience too, they are working out and are not eating desserts or breads like they used too.

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So weekly trips to the bakery are made by less people these days. They are not a priority these days. Fewer more limited new bakeries do pop up every once in a while and also many of the old bakeries have shuttered since the neighborhood  bakery for most people is a relic of the past.

People these days often settle for convenience and pick up something processed and cheaper from their local supermarket.

Typical baked item from any local supermarket

Typical baked item from any local supermarket

Something created with man made chemicals that sort of looks like dessert. Something that can sit on a shelf for a long time. Something that anybody can whip up possibly even made by the guy pictured below

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by only adding a few ingredients, mixing it (with something clean one hopes) and baking it in a timed oven….DING!. Just add some pudding from a can or a mix and some non-dairy cream and Woop there it is. Many people actually think this sort of dessert taste good and this is what dessert actually is because that is what they are used too.

It just forking KILLS ME that a few local bakeries in my area put out baked goods that are on par with the level of supermarket bakeries.

Lemon Bar from Baker Wee Glendale AZ

Lemon Bar from Baker Wee Glendale AZ

Recently I thought I’d try a baked treat from a bakery I was passing by on the way home from some place. The bakery offered me a rugula while I was deciding on what I’d try. I thought the rugula was pretty good and thought whatever I tried would be ok because after all it was from a bakery. I love lemon bars because of the lemony filling, the tasty crumbs and they usually have a buttery tender crust. I love the play between tangy, sweet and savory, so I picked a lemon bar thinking it would be just right. I dug into the lemony curd first. It had this unnatural flavor like low quality lemonade. It also lacked the creamy, silky mouthfeel of natural lemon curd that’s rich and carefully made. Instead this lemon filling was sort of Jell-o like. I don’t think a human created it. Perhaps something demonic?  I think the yellow goo was made in a laboratory and stored in a can till it got sold to this bakery.

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The top crumbs were edible but not delicious and buttery. The bottom crust was as thick as a life raft

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and hard like cement.

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God this lemon bar was terrible I thought I was going to cough up a forking brick from the few bites I ate. It was so bad I can never step in this bakery again.

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Another bakery not too far from out of my way is an Italian Bakery.

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I thought they’d make an OK Italian Rum Cake that I wanted to give someone for a gift. I thought the cake looked ok and this bakery just like the last one I spoke about gets very high reviews on a certain review website. This cake purchase goes a half year back so I don’t remember every detail about the cake but I do remember the filling most because it was very unnatural tasting so much so it was memorable. I remember the filling was what made eating the cake next to impossible. The filling tasted like they dumped in a whole bottle of forking rum extract into the filling. Rum extract not forking real rum……..rum extract.  I don’t recall the rest of the cake being very tasty but I can tell you the filling made it a lost cause.  I felt terrible when I tasted this cake, sorry and embarrassed that I gave it to someone.

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I also purchased what they called Italian bread from this bakery and I kid you not. The bread tasted like squishy unnatural white bread from the forking supermarket. I can never go back to that bakery either. Eating baked goods from those bakeries was just like purchasing a baked good from the supermarket or from the dollar store. They were just very unappetizing. It forking saddens me and confuses me. I have no understanding on why you’d open a bakery if you aren’t baking scrumptious decadent treats?

 

It appears that these bakeries have enough business. Both have been in business for years and both have great reviews on a certain review website. Maybe it’s all because people don’t know what the fork Good Baked goods should taste like.

The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth

The Chile Relleno I will never Forking order Again

Popo's Fiesta Del Sol Glendale AZ

Popo’s Fiesta Del Sol Glendale AZ

A chile Relleno is usually but not always a stuffed Poblano Pepper. It is usually stuffed with cheese but can also be stuffed with meat and might come with a sauce. Somethings it’s fried and sometimes it isn’t.

Below is a picture of a typical Chile Relleno.

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Often a Chile Relleno might look like this inside.

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Below is a Central Mexican Style Chile Relleno.

Los Sombreros Scottsdale AZ

Los Sombreros Scottsdale AZ

Here’s what the Chile Relleno I recently had looked like inside.

Popo's Fiesta Del Sol Glendale AZ

Popo’s Fiesta Del Sol Glendale AZ

It was a green chile stuffed with white mild cheese that was topped with egg whites that were covered in green chile sauce and LOTS of cheddar cheese. It truly might not be the worst one out there but it tasted terrible to me. That heavy cheese and not so tasty sauce really KILLED the delicate fluffy egg whites. It was like putting a shag rug over your down blanket. Inside was a mild green chile that was kind of hard in texture and also had no color at all from being cooked. My forking stomach just locked up and I couldn’t eat anymore of it.

This is the First Chile Relleno I didn’t forking like.

The Forking Truth

The Forking Truth