Rich and Strange Aeons

Steaming isn't for everything. Tried baby carrots and frozen broccoli, together. The broccoli was thawed, cooked, and eaten before I felt the carrots were sufficiently done, after 14 minutes. Vs. 90 seconds in the microwave sufficing to make carrots soft-crunchy and sweet.

Did potatoes again. Nothing much to report, it's pretty consistent. Dressed in Neufchatel cream cheese, then olive oil when the cheese wasn't melting and spreading well, plus black pepper, dill, and scallions.

Eggs. 6 eggs, put in after the water was boiling. I pulled 2 after 6 minutes for soft eggs, the rest after 9. The soft were a bit mixed: mostly set white and runny yolk, but a bit of runny white and set yolk, too. The contents did scoop out of the shell nicely. Also, I need 3 extra-large eggs for two slices of torn-up bread, 2 felt anemic. We used 2 when I was a kid, maybe my father was buying jumbo eggs, or I had less luxurious tastes.

The 9 minutes eggs were pretty much hard, but with central yolk that was deep gold in color and kind of like jelly in consistency, just what I wanted. And the one I peeled (rather than scooping out of) did peel relatively easily.

I suppose I should do 9 and 12 minute eggs from the same carton to make sure the color difference is due to cooking.

Relatedly: article on egg peelability, that found steaming or boiled (placed in hot water) the best, while boiled (eggs in cold water) fared poorly. I guess this matches: childhood eggs (hot start) didn't have a big peel problem; as an adult I switched to cold start eggs, and eventually also switched to eating by scooping.

So, what to steam? Frozen dim sum: yes. Potatoes: yes. Eggs: sure; not a huge quality different from hot-start eggs, but less splashing, and less time for the smaller amount of water to boil (though maybe more time steaming than boiling, so not sure there's a speed difference.) Vegetables: meh, not sure superior texture is worth the time, or (for leafy greens) picking green bits out of the steamer basket later.

Unrelated to steaming, I'd found a Papa John's coupon and got a pizza. It is not good. Even with my personal killer configuration of extra sauce, Italian sausage, and garlic (also salami this time), it's amazingly bland. The best thing was the garlic sauce that came with it, I'm told for dipping crusts into. That is good, though I used half the sauce on tonight's potatoes.

Unrelated to all that, lemon slices WILL turn moldy when left in a container in the fridge long enough.

Previous place didn't have a steamer. But I'd asked for a pasta colander, and was given a big metal one, with a built-in ring to rest on. So I improvised with that and a big pot. Cooking frozen dim sum took 20 minutes rather than the 10 on the package, but otherwise worked well. Tried broccoli too, and my friend was right, it is a different texture than microwaving. I'm not sure it's worth the time every day for broccoli.

Current place I asked for a colander and a steamer, though noting that they could overlap; I was given a rubber/silicone steamer, in the model of movable overlapping plates; I used to own a metal version of that, didn't use it much. I guess you could use it as a colander.

I first tried it with frozen potstickers, and held over a small pot. It fell into the pot once the silicone softened with heat. I tried covering with a lid, but the central handle of the steamer made that problematic. At any rate, it took like an hour to get them done. :( Also I ran out of water at one point.

Today I used the local big pot instead, with a better covering lid, to make a proper steam bath rather than a leaky steam column. Also went back to siu mai. Worked perfectly, don,e in 20 minutes. Then tried the potstickers again... maybe worked? After 20 minutes, when I cut one open, the filling was hot, good sign. But the texture was pretty soft, not sure if that's a permanent condition. Maybe it is: after eating some, I microwaved two survivors; filling hot again, still soft. Maybe it just doesn't become firm.