qhartman's Profile

Against! Sugar is bad, but artificial sweeteners are worse. We at least have a decent understanding of what sugar does to you. Who knows what is going on with those artificial sweeteners? The only studies I've seen done on them were done people who would have an incentive to show them to be safe OR were inconclusive. Who knows? I don't want to support a sweet habit using artificial sweeteners only to find out 20 years from now that they were damaging my body and we just didn't realize it at the time. Besides, they give me headaches!

I'll take the extra calories and be honest about what I'm doing to myself than lie to myself and say I'm making a "healthy" choice, when really I'm tricking myself into rationalizing continuing an unhealthy habit. Diet soda is a perfect example of this. There are so many reasons to avoid soda besides the calories, but by taking those out of the equation you are able to rationalize a poor choice.

I stick to honey and minimally processed cane sugar, but more than that I try to break my sweettooth! Now that I've started eating paleo 80% of the time, sugary things taste too sweet to me and kinda make me gag.

I have a Frigidaire glasstop that I generally like. My only real issue with it is that if pans don't have a perfectly flat bottom the heat transfer sucks big time. Unfortunately one of our favorite pans got overheated and warped, so it's now a hassle to use.

Since it's almost inevitable that pans will warp given enough time, I'm strongly inclined to have my next stove be gas powered. If that's not an option for some reason I'll be looking hard at induction.

My wife and I go yurting in Oregon often. It's basically the same thing, except in a yurt. And quite a good time.

I use cast iron on mine all the time w/o a problem. I also don't slam it around though.

I asked an appliance guy about this a couple years ago, and according to him this seems to be an old problem that has more or less been solved, but the warnings persist even though modern cooktops are strong enough that the risk from the heavy pan is minimal.

In the grand scheme of things, 550 degrees isn't really that hot. As your friend said, if it wasn't meant to go that high, it wouldn't be on the dial. I'd wager if you could get the inside of a typical oven up over 1500 degrees everything would still be fine.

There's absolutely no more risk from shorting out at 550 than there is at any other temperature. The way most (if not all) electric ovens work is by turning the heat element on and off to heat the oven appropriately. If you want it hotter, it just leaves it on longer. It's not pushing more power through or something like that. If you have a device you can watch power consumption with (an ammeter) you can actually watch the cycles happen. The meter will peg out near the oven's maximum draw rating for a few seconds, then settle down to a lower level, then peak, etc...

Don't forget that a steel isn't for sharpening knives, it's for prolonging the life of the edge on an already sharp knife. Trying to use one to put and edge an already dull blade will be an exercise in near-futility. I have a set like this for my sharpening chores, and it is pretty awesome. I've managed to bring some really abused knives back from the dead with it:

http://www.amazon.com/Lansky-Professional-Sharpening-System-Serrated/dp/B001KN3OKO

@nionon - I would speculate that, like most other seed crops, they seeds are washed before processing, so a fair amount of chemical residue on the surface of them will be removed. Also, since the seeds are pressed to extract the oil and the husks don't actually make it into the product, that will reduce the amount of contamination as well.

HOWEVER

after reading this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottonseed_oil and following the Gossypol link, I'd have serious questions about consuming cottonseed oil at all. It sounds like it's not really fit for human consumption without some serious post-processing.

Finally, I have to say though that debating the health implications of which oil you use to deep fry your food is kinda like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. You've got bigger health concerns going on.

no, there's no fat in them. It's essentially soy sauce, but made with coconut instead of soy beans. This is the brand I have:

http://www.coconutsecret.com/aminos2.html

In fact, now that I think about it, it's the only brand I've ever seen.

I have to agree with username26 for the most part. In fact that was my first thought upon seeing this.

BUT

I could see a situation where you have your supplies staged in the "drawer", and having them behind the workspace is actually desirable if you need to access them often while working. In that case, pulling out and re-closing a drawer over and over while you work would be a hassle.

I want to see something scientific(-ish) to look at whether or not decanting and/or letting reds "breathe" by various methods actually improves their taste, or if this is just a well-propagated myth. I'm thinking a double-blind taste test comparing a wine (or three) after in these different conditions:

-Straight from the bottle (well, poured and then immediately consumed, not STRAIGHT from the bottle...)
-Uncorked and let sit open for X minutes
-Decanted and let sit for X minutes
-Run through a Vinturi (or similar) aerating device.

Something like that anyway.

I know people swear up and down that it helps to go through these extra steps, but I suspect that in at least some cases it's just a bunch of hoo-ha.