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Badfinger

Idle Food - Cooking!

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You might try Starbucks' herbal cinnamon chai - the actual tea, not the latte or whatever. It's basically like steeping red hots. We don't sell much of it but it's pretty good!

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You might have had an herbal tea rather than "actual" tea? I got a box of India Spice tea through a promotion years ago, and it does not contain any tea leaves but it was really good. Lots of cinnamon and cardamom and stuff, and then some black pepper to give it some spice. Not to shill one company or anything, but I liked it and it sounds similar.

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I smoked ribs, turkey thighs, and potatoes on my propane barbecue. The ribs aren't the most tender, but the taste can't be beat.

 

90tuxJJ.jpg

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You might have had an herbal tea rather than "actual" tea? I got a box of India Spice tea through a promotion years ago, and it does not contain any tea leaves but it was really good. Lots of cinnamon and cardamom and stuff, and then some black pepper to give it some spice. Not to shill one company or anything, but I liked it and it sounds similar.

 

Badfinger: it's possible! I don't know what cardomom is and I don't typically like ginger, but that doesn't mean I hate it in everything. Suppose it wouldn't hurt to order one box and see how it goes. Problem is every time I try tea on a whim I kind of hate it, except for that one time in South Korea... HERE'S HOPIN'.

 

You might try Starbucks' herbal cinnamon chai - the actual tea, not the latte or whatever. It's basically like steeping red hots. We don't sell much of it but it's pretty good!

 

Haha I recently gave up coffee so I could save money (and be a little healthier, but mostly to save money, if I'm honest), so I'd rather not go back to Starbucks! D:

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Haha I recently gave up coffee so I could save money (and be a little healthier, but mostly to save money, if I'm honest), so I'd rather not go back to Starbucks! D:

 

Haha, I understand! Cinnamon chai tea is just herbs in a pouch, but if going back to starbucks is going to make you want to drink coffee, then probably best to just stay away. The only reason I recommend it at all is because I work there, and it's the only kind of herbal chai I have any firsthand experience with. There are likely dozens and dozens of other varieties.

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Badfinger: it's possible! I don't know what cardomom is and I don't typically like ginger, but that doesn't mean I hate it in everything. Suppose it wouldn't hurt to order one box and see how it goes. Problem is every time I try tea on a whim I kind of hate it, except for that one time in South Korea... HERE'S HOPIN'.

 

 

Haha I recently gave up coffee so I could save money (and be a little healthier, but mostly to save money, if I'm honest), so I'd rather not go back to Starbucks! D:

 

I realize a single box of tea is not a giant commitment, but there are a bunch of tea makers that will also send/give you samples if you wanna go down that route. I was gonna message you the Yogi Tea sampler thing, but the Indian Spice isn't part of their promo right now.

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Regarding cooking with a cinnamon stick, if you're going to try and do this yourself, it can take quite a long time to get any decent amount of flavor out of the sticks. When we make an alcoholic drink called Hot Apple Pie, it takes several hours sitting just below the boiling point of alcohol to get any real cinnamon flavor.

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I feel like I'm hearing this more and more, especially from little old ladies. Is it common for people to not use salt at all when they cook? I just had a conversation with someone who didn't think they even had salt in their house. Seasoning your food before you grill it isn't giving you high sodium! If your granddad had hypertension, the way you make sure not to follow in his footsteps is don't eat bacon and toast slathered in salted butter for breakfast, processed lunch meat every day for lunch, and a casserole with canned cream of mushroom for dinner. How do people bake without salt? It's a necessary chemical component!

 

It's so weird.   It's so weird.

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I feel like I'm hearing this more and more, especially from little old ladies. Is it common for people to not use salt at all when they cook? I just had a conversation with someone who didn't think they even had salt in their house. Seasoning your food before you grill it isn't giving you high sodium! If your granddad had hypertension, the way you make sure not to follow in his footsteps is don't eat bacon and toast slathered in salted butter for breakfast, processed lunch meat every day for lunch, and a casserole with canned cream of mushroom for dinner. How do people bake without salt? It's a necessary chemical component!

It's so weird. It's so weird.

Heyyy, welcome to my number one cooking pet peeve.

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I feel like I'm hearing this more and more, especially from little old ladies. Is it common for people to not use salt at all when they cook? I just had a conversation with someone who didn't think they even had salt in their house. Seasoning your food before you grill it isn't giving you high sodium! If your granddad had hypertension, the way you make sure not to follow in his footsteps is don't eat bacon and toast slathered in salted butter for breakfast, processed lunch meat every day for lunch, and a casserole with canned cream of mushroom for dinner. How do people bake without salt? It's a necessary chemical component!

 

It's so weird.   It's so weird.

 

I've never heard this from anyone, but if I did, I think it would shake me to my core.

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I think it's incredibly common for people to not season their food while cooking, especially white Americans. I know my parents didn't season much of the food we ate growing up. Any flavors usually came from sauces/dressings/marinades, unless they were making "ethnic foods" like fajitas or tacos and used those premade seasonings for those things.

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Badfinger: it's possible! I don't know what cardomom is and I don't typically like ginger, but that doesn't mean I hate it in everything. Suppose it wouldn't hurt to order one box and see how it goes. Problem is every time I try tea on a whim I kind of hate it, except for that one time in South Korea... HERE'S HOPIN'.

 

Bori-cha?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roasted_barley_tea

 

That is the most common tea in South Korea (some of us replace drinking water with it almost completely) so I'm just taking a stab at it.

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Can it be easily flavored with cinnamon? (I mean, I would assume so, cinnamon is a pretty powerful flavor in general.)

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I don't remember well enough to say. I just remember the name that was given to me and I remember loving the taste.

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I'll ask my mom (thanks Kamiya (lol site trying to correct this into kamikaze)) about cinnamon based Korean drinks and get a list of plausible candinates.

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Heyyy, welcome to my number one cooking pet peeve.

Me too. It really is. Salt your food! This isn't the restaurant trick where they add 3 Tbsp of butter to everything. This is a fundamental component of cooking things.

 

I don't have salt in my cupboard.

Me either, it's in a salt cellar on my counter!

 

I think it's incredibly common for people to not season their food while cooking, especially white Americans. I know my parents didn't season much of the food we ate growing up. Any flavors usually came from sauces/dressings/marinades, unless they were making "ethnic foods" like fajitas or tacos and used those premade seasonings for those things.

 

I would consider marinated food seasoned. If you are cooking something with ground beef and it goes into the pot and then things are added on top, that's seasoned to me. I personally would probably salt the ground beef and taste it before going with other seasoning (depending on how salty the dish is) but I wouldn't look askance at not doing that.

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I also agree that marinating/saucing/dressings(especially using dressings as marinade) are seasonings. They were fairly good about seasoning most meats appropriately. Their hamburgers/meatloafs are ludicrously unseasoned, and vegetable dishes rarely have anything going on at all though.

I mean I forgive them, because they were accommodating 2 picky children who disliked strong flavors. (I had very serious taco seasoning preferences for a very long time that they, bless them, caved to.) They don't season their mashed potatoes very well either. I hope now that me & my sister are out of the house they add more spices and seasonings to things. I think they would be much happier.

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I feel like I'm hearing this more and more, especially from little old ladies. Is it common for people to not use salt at all when they cook? I just had a conversation with someone who didn't think they even had salt in their house. Seasoning your food before you grill it isn't giving you high sodium! If your granddad had hypertension, the way you make sure not to follow in his footsteps is don't eat bacon and toast slathered in salted butter for breakfast, processed lunch meat every day for lunch, and a casserole with canned cream of mushroom for dinner. How do people bake without salt? It's a necessary chemical component!

 

It's so weird.   It's so weird.

 

I grew up with a father who had high blood pressure, so salt was used fairly sparingly. These days I do use it, but usually not that much simply because everything tastes way too salty to me in general. I throw a bit more on steak than I do most things, but still a lot less than my other cooking friend did.

 

Edit: That reminds me, I was thinking of getting a salt plate for finishing off Sous Vide steak. My aforementioned friend had one and I really enjoyed using it. Anyone have any opinions?

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My mom hardly uses salt by itself because most Chinese cooking already has generous amounts of soy sauce (or some other similarly salty substance).  I really only use it when making things that I didn't learn from her.  I have one shaker that contains a mix of salt and white pepper that I use a ton though.

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Me either, it's in a salt cellar on my counter!

I don't have salt in my part of the kitchen! My roommate has some, but I only use it when I'm baking. The rest of my food is unsalted!

Also I eat a lot of salads

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Wait, people don't use salt? Do you all not use pepper either? Stuff tastes so bland without it!

 

 

Also I eat a lot of salads

 

I eat a lot of salad, but that still gets covered in salt, pepper and olive oil. Those 3 things go into practically everything I make.

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I drop my salt intake every now and then and after a few weeks you realise that processed foods have a whole lot of salt in them.
That said, my friend asked me how i made such tasty food one day, and my two word answer was "good seasoning".

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