That One Thread About Nothing

[Solumina]

Wow Delk you really do have a...well...basic kitchen. I hope you find everything you need and good luck with the yummy treats.

[Duane]

What do you think would happen if Zombie remade Friday the 13th, or Nightmare on Elm Street?

[Delkaetre]

Solumina- I'm getting these things because my housemates have finally moved out.
My housemates left the place in a total sty, and I left the cooking implements I owned at the last place I lived before here.
Rather than buy new stuff and see it ruined, I survived with absolute basics. And now my housemates are gone for the summer, so I can have nice things again.

[honeythorn]

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

I lost my socks!

The washing machine probably swallowed them. Washers are the source of the sock vortex! :o

[Delkaetre]

The dough is now doing its half hour steaming. The steamer is a homemade contraption, unfortunately, and I think the dough was too runny, and there's a bit too much of every ingredient in there at the moment, but I can hope.

[Sir Canvas Corpsey]

Originally Posted by honeythorn

The washing machine probably swallowed them. Washers are the source of the sock vortex! :o

Home of the dreaded sock goblins! O^O

[Delkaetre]

Amazingly, the dough is just about the right consistency after steaming.
Unfortunately, it's got about the core temperature of your average pyroclastic flow. So I'll let it sit and cool for a bit and hopefully it won't go toooooo gummy to be of use.
The stuff is amazingly stretchy and gummy, though, so I just need it to stay sticky.

[honeythorn]

Apparantly Michael Jackson may be dead?

What exactly are you bringing to life in this steamer Delk?

[Malice In Wonderland]

Originally Posted by honeythorn

Apparantly Michael Jackson may be dead?

What exactly are you bringing to life in this steamer Delk?

He'll back back.
THRILLLEEEEEER.

[honeythorn]

Well he won't need any makeup this time! My nan had the VHS video of that. I used to watch it loads, along with Nightmare on Elm st, Mauseleom , Tales from the Crypt, From Beyond and a pile of other horror films all small children should be subjected to in their early years :-D

[Delkaetre]

It was to be mochi, rolled in desiccated coconut instead of caster sugar, with a proper anko filling.
I've eaten about half the dough in the process of making them, I've barely even started the tin of anko despite the recipe saying I'd need most of one tin, and I have discovered that mochi dough is some kind of supersubstance, capable of retaining its form, stretching impossibly, and sticking to anything that isn't greasy.
Except anko, which means that if the moisture from the anko gets in the dough while trying to close the balls with anko as the centre, it's impossble to close them.

Christ that stuff is evil.

But it's the first time I've actually made something totally from scratch (instead of putting something in a microwave, boiling some pasta, or suchlike) since I was about 14 and still had to do Home Economics at school.

[Duane]

I'm learning how to speak Albanian, Romanian, Mandarin Chinese, Japanese... and... something easy like Spanish.

[Solumina]

Originally Posted by Delkaetre

It was to be mochi, rolled in desiccated coconut instead of caster sugar, with a proper anko filling.
I've eaten about half the dough in the process of making them, I've barely even started the tin of anko despite the recipe saying I'd need most of one tin, and I have discovered that mochi dough is some kind of supersubstance, capable of retaining its form, stretching impossibly, and sticking to anything that isn't greasy.
Except anko, which means that if the moisture from the anko gets in the dough while trying to close the balls with anko as the centre, it's impossble to close them.

Christ that stuff is evil.

But it's the first time I've actually made something totally from scratch (instead of putting something in a microwave, boiling some pasta, or suchlike) since I was about 14 and still had to do Home Economics at school.

Sounds like a really fun mess, you should post the recipe so I can have some messy fun too

[Delkaetre]

I used this recipe - http://en.christinesrecipes.com/2009...hi-recipe.html
The coconut milk gives the dough itself an actual flavour, but I think it also thickens it quite a bit. As the dough was a bit thick and intractable, I think that next time I'll try using a slightly modified version of this recipe instead-
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbookaifuku
Modified, because I am not just putting a bowl of water in the microwave. I have a kettle if I need to heat my water, and it's less likely to behave in lively ways. Also, will continue to use desiccated coconut instead of corn starch to coat the anko.

However, the next project is Florentine biscuits. http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/c...orentines.html
I need to get a decent baking tray and wire rack to cool things on, as I didn't pick them up at tesco yesterday. Still, affordable enough and it's not like flour, cream, almonds and mixed peel will cost me much.

One lesson from the mochi- 2ltr mixing bowl instead of 1ltr mixing bowl. It was a bit small.

[Saya]

Cirque du Soleil was the coolest fucking thing I've ever seen. I'd say more but I'm tired, dumb with amazement and unable to process that much awesomeness.

Hehe, and the flying man kinda looked like Rocky Horror. It was a good night full of half naked men with amazing physique doing death defying stunts ^_^

[Duane]

Is Russian a hard language to learn?

[voodoowitchdr]

Hey Duane you handsome Mofo!

[Duane]

Hey, fellow handsome people.

[Onyx]

Originally Posted by Duane

Is Russian a hard language to learn?

That isn't a fair question. How are you planning on learning and how old are you? If you're planning on spending time in Russia then it would be a lot easier. As for just learning from some learning system, then I'd say it is one of the harder ones as, unlike Spanish, German or Italian, you don't find many similarities in English. I found the whole Rosetta Stone package on torrent once, maybe you could DL the Russian portion and give it a try before investing in classes or programs to learn more.

I know I'd like to learn more German so that I'd understand more than every 3rd or 4th word in a lot of the songs I listen to . That and Italian, 'cause well, I'm Italian with dual citizenship (have to track down birth certs from grandparents and put through paperwork to claim it) and would love to move there some day.

[Duane]

Well... I figured I would start with phrases and small stuff like that, than after a while maybe live in Russia for a while. Just repeat this process over and over spend time in Romania, time in Albania, a bit in Germany... maybe some time in China, then some in Japan. Oh, I'm 19 almost 20, and am using wikitravel to learn the basics suppose it'll take 15-20 years before I made the progress I want to make.

I'm figuring in guitar skills, Drawing skills, and writing skills... oh and acting skills too. Yeah, Duane's going to become a renaissance man... eh semi renaissance man.

[Onyx]

Originally Posted by Duane

Well... I figured I would start with phrases and small stuff like that, than after a while maybe live in Russia for a while. Just repeat this process over and over spend time in Romania, time in Albania, a bit in Germany... maybe some time in China, then some in Japan. Oh, I'm 19 almost 20, and am using wikitravel to learn the basics suppose it'll take 15-20 years before I made the progress I want to make.

I'm figuring in guitar skills, Drawing skills, and writing skills... oh and acting skills too. Yeah, Duane's going to become a renaissance man... eh semi renaissance man.

Probably pretty hard then. Learning new languages gets harder as you get older. Also, from how well you write in English, I'm assuming it is your primary language and it doesn't have much in common with with Russian. Though, really, nothing does. We phrase everything backasswards compared to the rest of the world. Even then, you'll find a lot of of similarities in languages like Italian and Spanish (Both Romantic, descendant from Latin) and German. Biggest examples that come to mind are from German, which I know a very little (In reality I've forgotten more than I remember). House->Haus, hand is either straight up hand our hund, can't remember.

[Onyx]

Originally Posted by Onyx

Probably pretty hard then. Learning new languages gets harder as you get older. Also, from how well you write in English, I'm assuming it is your primary language and it doesn't have much in common with with Russian. Though, really, nothing does. We phrase everything backasswards compared to the rest of the world. Even then, you'll find a lot of of similarities in languages like Italian and Spanish (Both Romantic, descendant from Latin) and German. Biggest examples that come to mind are from German, which I know a very little (In reality I've forgotten more than I remember). House->Haus, hand is either straight up hand our hund, can't remember.

O ya, check out Rosetta Stone. I know there's a lot of hype out there about it but it seems good. I can't give it the Onyx stamp of approval, what little that's worth, because I didn't use it much. However, the few words I learned of Italian from it in a matter of minutes stuck. And this was years ago.

[Duane]

Cool, the harder the better.

[SiouxsiePernova]

You should probably focus on learning one language at a time.

[Beowulf]

There is a Sisters Of Mercy interview (first interview in 12 years) in this months `Classic Rock` magazine !!!.

http://www.classicrockmagazine.com/

I found my copy in the local WH Smiths !!!.