Santa was very nice to me
I received a new My Weigh KD-8000 scale to replace the Oxo scale that developed some form of digital psychosis recently. More capacity and an even easier to read display make it a pleasure to use. It's already received quite a workout just since Christmas.
There are also two new books that are competing for my attention. One is Ken Forkish's Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast which has been much discussed here. The other is Cooking for Geeks: Real Science, Great Hacks, and Good Food by Jeff Potter. It's sort of but not exactly a lighter version of Shirley Corriher's CookWise, aimed at a younger, techier crowd. Perhaps I've been acting more engineer-ish than usual lately? I've gotten about a third of the way into it and am enjoying the author's observations at least as much as the technical information.
The best gift of all is a houseful of kids and grandkids, which is why this post is a short one.
Paul
Comments
A good scale makes a world of difference when baking, nice gift! And baking books, I got a copy of Ken Forkish's book, too, along with several others. Not sure now if they want me to read or bake?
Enjoy having your family around you - clearly one of the best benefits to the holidays!
Cathy
Of having kids and grandkids at hand! :-(
Nice books and toys, too!
Try to squeeze a review of Potter's book for us into you busy life. One of my sons gave me Harold McGee's "On Food and Cooking" for some occasion or other. It's fascinating, but I've used it as a reference. I wouldn't want to read it cover to cover.
Have a great time with your family and a Happy, Healthy New Year!
David
A friend of mine gave me the Potter book for my birthday, and it is great fun. I have both of McGee's books, and I also have Corriher - and like you I keep them for reference rather than light reading. Potter is a different deal. It can also be a useful reference, and I haven't yet felt compelled to go cover to cover, but I do find that it's fun to dip into it at random and follow tangents wherever they lead. Come for the information, stay for the entertainment - or vice versa. I tend to think of it as being less organized than the other books of its type, but on taking a closer look I realize that that's not really true; what gives that impression is the breezy, bloggy tone of the writing and the variation in idiom. I do get the gut feeling that this book is informed by, and aimed at, a post-internet sensibility and attention span; it's easy to take it in small nuggets, and the nuggets themselves represent a lot of different styles. Lots of sidebars, interjections, interviews with a wide range of foodie personalities, illustrations, charts, and free-associations. Lots of visual variety - especially considering that it's basically two-color. Almost a multi-media feel, if one can say that about a 100% print effort (and I can, so I do). So it's fun, and sometimes silly... but it's also PACKED with solid and fascinating information; chunks of real science, as the subtitle says, accompanied by plain-language explanations that make a lot of sense to the more narratively-inclined.
Plenty of depth and detail, presented in a carnival of curiosity.
Thanks for the book title. Looks like fun. I love discovering the science beneath things as it very much makes things much easier to understand - i.e. they suddenly make sense. Those lovely ah-haa moments. I will order a copy from the library and take a gander.
Funny you should mention the My Weigh scale. It was one of the first scales I tried out when I began started baking. It is a nice scale but the one I ended up using is an Escali because it is more compact and fits in one of my kitchen drawers whereas the MW stands too tall to fit into the drawer so it sits unused as a back up if my Escali fails me.
They do make a wonderful mini scale for measuring minute amounts and I do use one of those for measuring out weights that are less than a gram - IY, spices etc. It is small and compact and fits in a small drawer too so it is used a lot. All about space on my counter tops and making sure I leave room for other family members :*) A balancing act for sure or my baking
toysequipment could easily take over in a heart beat….Janet