She does not, she was journaling and figuring out Christmas recipes. She sent me that as a shopping list. Recipe is from here, she’s made it a couple times.
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Pure Everclear? What’s your simple syrup mix/ratio for the Everclear?
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right? can only get the 151 proof here. was gonna say “how much sugar you gon add to that?!”
ETA: i use the 151 to make some “magic” tinctures. two drops in a hot cuppa and - magic!
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I’m intrigued, though. It hadn’t occurred to me to try pure Everclear and then adjust the simple syrup accordingly.
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The “recipe” calls for 500ml grain alcohol 95% (says high proof vodka is not “authentic”) to steep the lemon zest, then dilute after steeping with a simple syrup of 300g sugar to 500ml water. I think that part will require a little experimenting though.
Thoughts?
Also, Everclear is f’ing expensive!
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How much lemon peel?
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Zest only (no pith) from 5 decent sized Meyer lemons. I didn’t weigh the zest, which in retrospect I should have. Should I add more, do you think?
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I dunno. Yours are ultra fresh. And they are so, so good looking in that pic. I use the zest of 12-20 lemons for 750ml 190” Everclear and 750ml vodka. (12-20 depending on what I’m going for. 12, and I’ve added mango, that sort of thing). Your lemons will do much better, flavor-wise. But you’ll prolly need to attenuate the Everclear to some degree with a simple syrup?
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Definitely! Otherwise it’ll be lemon-infused firewater or disinfectant, and that would be such a waste. How much simple syrup will be a bit of trial and error, I think.
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I can’t wait to hear the results!
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That’s how the italians who make infused liquors do it, everclear add lemon peel|green walnuts|orange peel|various herbs, then cut with sugar+water.
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So, I tried baking some No Knead Bread…without great success…but all’s well that ends well: it is now some tasty Melba Toast.
All I had was pastry flour (soft wheat) instead of bread flour (hard wheat), so that’s what I used—I mean, I figured it wouldn’t be perfect but it would still be bread, right? (I know, I know.) I used 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour and 2 cups unbleached pastry flour.
The “dough” was very runny. And for reasons, it sat/rose in the bowl for 2.5 hours longer than it should have (recipe said to let it sit on the counter in the bowl for 16-20 hours; I let it go for 22.5 hours).
Then you stir it a little and dump it onto a piece of parchment paper, and let it sit on the counter like that for 30 minutes. It was so runny—is that how it’s supposed to be?? I was afraid it would run onto the floor, but it didn’t. 
Not having a Dutch oven, I baked it in a preheated Pyrex with the lid on for the first 30 minutes, then with lid off until it seemed done. The bread came out very dense and m0ist—it was cooked through but was sticky on the knife, and (to me) not really pleasant to eat. It tasted strongly of yeast, too much for my liking. For sure it was not how it’s supposed to be.
The bulk of it sat uneaten in the fridge for a week… Well, “waste not want not”, and yesterday the oven was on for something, so I sliced the bread about .25-inch thick, laid the slices out on cookie sheets, sprinkled them lightly with salt, and dried and toasted them in the oven. Voilà, Melba toast (or rusks, depending on what you like to call it).
Had some leftover tahini sauce (for noodles)—with lots of ginger and garlic—which was very thick, and spread on like a pâté. Hmm, not bad! The whole wheat gave it kind of a grainy ending on the tongue, like a Ry-Krisp cracker.
But what it really called out for was some cheese. So today I went out and got some Gouda and some Swiss. The Swiss did nothing for it, but it turned out the Gouda goes really well with it, the whole being better than the sum of the parts. (For one thing, it no longer seems overly yeasty.)
After labeling the photo file “Noknead Melba” and then laughing when I saw it typed out, I’m calling my rescued failure “Knock-kneed Melba toast” 
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I’ve had decent success with this recipe:
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Thanks! I did buy some bread flour, and one day soon will try a no-knead bread again.
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That dough was just too wet. Even adding more flour, of any variety, would have helped. Enough practice that you can tell when you need to adjust the recipe is essential. If keeping several different flours around is a hassle you can get a packet of wheat gluten and just add some to whatever flour you have on hand.
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I was sick all through Christmas so today I finally cooked my standing rib roast with yorkshire pudding!
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A new tradition, El Sur empanadas for the New year.
Reminder to self, heat the cheese ones less time or lower temperature.
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Nice! Lacy browned cheese for the win!
My daughter and I were set to make Aussie meat pies (I made the filling, she made the dough) but a family friend gave us fresh spring rolls so we refrigerated the meat pie ingredients for later and devoured the spring rolls for dinner while they were still crispy!
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