RapierFugue
Posts: 4740
Joined: 3/16/2006
From: London, England
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: wandersalone
FYI
I have first dibs on Rapier Fugue and his mad cooking skillz 
I generally go into raptures anytime I meet a man who will cook for me and thankfully a lot of guys I have dated have done just that.
lol ... I don't actually consider myself “skilful” per se, more that, when it comes to cooking, I have a sort of near-OCD degree of finicky as it pertains to getting things right (I'm like that with a lot of things I'm interested in). I spend ages perfecting the technique necessary to do each thing, be it baking bread, doing Italian, or Chinese, or Indian, or Sushi, or whatever. I tend to “get into” a cuisine, cook various examples of it to destruction, and once I’ve mastered it commit 2 or 3 of the best dishes to my “best of” list. I’ve been cooking since I was 5, so there’d be something very wrong if I wasn't halfway competent by now.
Currently, this is my fave simple dessert; it’s so easy, but so yummy. It’s also highly fattening, and has shedloads of chocolate, so it must be good 
Chocolate Chestnut Thingy:
5oz butter
3 oz icing sugar
8 oz plain chocolate (the good, high-percentage of cocoa solids stuff)
1 tin (approx. 400g) chestnut puree
2 tablespoons brandy or rum
Method:
1. Melt chocolate in bowl over hot water and allow to cool slightly.
2. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy.
3. Push chestnut puree through a sieve to make it ultra-smooth. (or leave a few little lumps of chestnut in if you can’t be bothered, it’ll still be yummy)
4. Mix all ingredients together.
5. Place in a small loaf tin.
6. Chill for at least 1 hour in fridge, but overnight is best.
7. Place loaf tin in hot water for a few seconds to loosen, then run a palate knife around the edges to loosen further, then turn out onto serving dish. If you want to, grate a little more dark chocolate on top.
8. Slice and serve with cream.
It’s a very heavy consistency, sort of like an even more dense chocolate cheesecake. A little goes a long way, so it’s good for dinner parties, coz a) you can make it in advance and have it sitting waiting in the fridge and b) it doesn’t take up much table space coz it’s so rich and so dense.
Generally speaking, if you’re prepared to put the hours into practice, just about anything is possible; sushi took me quite a long time to get right (and even now, whenever I do it, the first one I do is never quite right) because it uses such different skills to western cooking, and I’m also only so-so with bread; for some reason it’s never quite as good as I think it should be, and I've come to the conclusion I'm just not one of nature’s natural bread bakers. Chinese also requires you re-learn how to cook, because using a wok properly goes contrary to the way European cooking uses heat; you have a very hot pan (wok), and you don't mess too much with the temperature, but rather use the speed of turning of the food and the placement of the wok to get the right results. That took me a couple of dishes to work out, but no biggie.
Other than that it’s just the experience to know your ingredients and how they will react to one another, the knowledge to understand the best way (and timing) to combine them, and the patience to perfect a recipe, rather than relying on it being good first time out. I’m also a compulsive “fiddler” with recipes, so I almost never end up with the best version being the first I tried. The following is a very good “first date” recipe, because it’s a) visually stunning, b) utterly delicious and c) again, can be made in advance. It’s a bit fiddly and time-consuming to make, as well as seeming to use every item in the kitchen, but worth it, although again it’s hardly low-cal, but then so few of the really good things in life are. It’s also not too heavy, so if you are possibly going to become “intimate” at some point in the evening you won’t both feel like you've just tried to eat an entire whale between you – for this reason I tend to avoid heavy curries and rich, cream-based sauces if there’s a possibility of “happy times” later in the evening.
http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/type-of-dish/party-food/salmon-coulibiac.html
I substitute basmati and wild rice mix for the plain rice – gives it an extra dimension.
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RE: Ladies, how much cooking does it take to impress you? - 
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