The Food & Drink Thread

[ShiraNoMai]

Baking sweets is SO much fun, though! I have many fond memories baking and making sweets with my grandmother as a child. It's fun to follow a recipe and watch as your thing you prepared come to life in the oven!

There's also just a certain special taste to making things from scratch like that. After all the labor of assembling everything correctly, rewarding yourself with its fruits just tastes absolutely exquisite.

[ShiraNoMai]

Bumping this to share this absolutely mind-fuckery of a food item

Yes, this is ice cream.

[Mr EliteL]

For a second I thought it was horrible false advertising in that someone bought ice cream with that image on the top, only to get actual fried chicken. But...but it's ice cream made to LOOK like fried chicken. Get out of here!

[Frank]

I'm going to post a picture of the Steak I made last week...



I marinated it in a Japanese BBQ sauce for about 7 hours. Then I salted it and left it out for a half hour. Grilled it up to a Medium Rare... Next time I want it Rare... but it was still a great steak!

[Moonface]

I'm not enough of a food buff to tell by looking at it, but what type of steak is that @Frank?
It does look really good though. If the photo had had other stuff on the plate like veggies and whatnot I'd have probably thought you were sharing a picture of a steak served at a restaurant if I didn't read any of the context first.

[Frank]

Thanks bud! Steaks are my specialty for sure. I've been told by people who used to frequent Vegas steakhouses that my steaks are as good as, if not better, than what they sever.

That specific steak I believe was a bone-in ribeye, which is my favorite cut. I've also learned what to look for, as far as marbeling goes.  The secret to a good steak is even cooking, and quality meat.

[ShiraNoMai]

Yeah that looks fucking sick man. And marinated in a Japanese-style BBQ sauce? Ugh.

[Moonface]

That specific steak I believe was a bone-in ribeye, which is my favorite cut. I've also learned what to look for, as far as marbeling goes.  The secret to a good steak is even cooking, and quality meat.

Not sure if I've ever had that cut of steak before.
As far as marbling goes, I have no idea about any of that besides vaguely knowing what it looks like. But as for what to specifically look for or what purpose it even has, I haven't a clue.

[Frank]

Next time you have steak, I highly recommend a bone-in ribeye. Hands down my favorite cut!

This article I found should help with identifying proper marbeling.

https://www.crowdcow.com/blog/the-basics...=1&bfsrc=7

Basically, the more even fat distribution between the actual meat, is what you're looking for. Not big sections of fat surrounding the meat, but fat actually intertwined into the meat.

[Moonface]

Ah, I see. Normally I just try to find steaks that don't have wide strands of fat going through them because that stuff is always just chewy and bleh. I've also never really tried different cuts of steak; normally I always pick sirloin. XD

Is there any particular steakhouse restaurant that you prefer going to the most @Frank, or anyone else who reads this and wants to answer? I've been to a few different places but it's been so long since I went to any of them I'm trying to remember how the steak was at each of them. I know Longhorn and Texas Roadhouse both do really good steaks I find.

[ShiraNoMai]

I've been meaning to try out the best way to cook a steak after watching Kenji do it



The next time I happen to buy a good piece of steak, I shall try it out

[Frank]

@Moonface I'm Honestly really picky with Steaks eaten out. More expensive and usually not as good as the ones I make at home.

The last decent steak I had out, that was a franchise vs an independent steak house, was probably Longhorn Steakhouse. I went with the bone-in Ribeye.

@ShiraNoMai Just finished watching that video... I think I'm going to have to try that out! Not with a Tomahawk though. Those are way to expensive

[Moonface]

Here's a question for everyone that I'm interested in hearing answers to:

What do you tend to eat for Christmas/New Years? I know in England the tradition for Christmas tends to be a turkey roast dinner, but for my family we usually would do a different meat like lamb or beef because my parents think turkey is (rightfully) overrated. The US is a whole different beast when it comes to Christmas though I find since the turkey dinner is for Thanksgiving, which leaves a stupidly large range of options available for Christmas. I can't actually remember what meals I've had on any previous Christmas's I've spent here in the US because of that.

As for New Year, I myself like to do a little spread of finger foods like cocktail sausages, pickled onions, crisps, sausage rolls, sandwiches, etc. since that event is like a celebration so a regular meal just feels out of place to me for that day.

[Mr EliteL]

Turkey's fine although I have had some that's been crap, although usually isn't at Christmas but during the year (why does my mum continue to buy turkey steaks when I keep telling her I dislike it??), so the turkey I've usually had for Christmas has been good. Although not a definite meat we have for Xmas depending on what stock levels are like. Had chicken and ham before, possibly others. Whoo. Sausages are usually on the plate though, as pigs in blankets or bare sausages. I refuse most pigs in blankets though, after a mishap of bad tummy causing me to have some days off work once.

[Moonface]

Turkey's fine although I have had some that's been crap, although usually isn't at Christmas but during the year (why does my mum continue to buy turkey steaks when I keep telling her I dislike it??), so the turkey I've usually had for Christmas has been good. Although not a definite meat we have for Xmas depending on what stock levels are like.

$10 says she buys them because she finds them in the discounted food section. If she's buying them at full price for you when you don't want them though then that's silly. I can understand how eating that garbage would make turkey at Christmas seem like a dream in comparison though. 
On the subject of turkey, if you've never had it and have a means to do so, try out smoked turkey. That shit in a sandwich is godly and I've only had the opportunity to have it like one time I think. Would've been more but the BBQ joint I got it from closed down during Covid.