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canyouhearthelight · 3 years

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The Miys, Ch. 150

I think for the time being, I am going to quit calling myself ‘late’ posting as long as I get the chapter up on the right day of the week *facepalm*. Bc I am barely keeping ahead, much less remembering to queue things up.

I am so, so sorry about that....

Fair warning before anyone @s me: The French is a joke, so if I got it super wrong I am equally sorry to the degree of which it’s wrong.

Unless it’s obscene. Then I want to know so that I can laugh with you, and I am LEAVING IT.

As always, shouts out to @baelpenrose, @the-raven-fae, and @charlylimph-blog!

Heaving an enormous Dutch oven onto a burner, I turned on the heat low and started chopping vegetables. After the first celery stalk, I glanced up at Derek, who sat across from Maverick in our living room. The quarters were shaped differently, which had distressed Derek initially, but the addition of his favorite blankets to the sofa had helped. Currently, he was completely distracted from even Mac: staring off into space, his fingers flying and flicking with a feverish, almost convulsive movement.

Maverick glanced up at me with a smile before following my gaze. “Yep, the cyber siege continues. He’s doing well, from what Zach told me.”

“I thought he was only supposed to attack human-managed systems,” I grumbled, thinking back to the cold shower I had been subjected to that morning. Turning back to the vegetables, I made short work of the celery before taking my frustration out on the carrots. Scooping the diced vegetables into a bowl, I started measuring out paprika, sugar, salt, pepper, basil, and oregano into another bowl. “Where’s Sam, by the way?”

“On the way,” Maverick promised. “With Terran-style tomatoes, he swears. And Derek is only attacking systems we manage. When BioLab 2 was set up, we had to take over water management, to protect the lab from any sort of contamination.”

The knife in my hand, brandished at three cloves of garlic, clattered to the work surface. “Seriously?” I glared at the tap, suddenly suspicious.

“Probably get water from the console,” he winced, nodding briskly at Derek, who nodded in confirmation without stopping his tapping and flicking gestures.

Groaning, I shook my head and crushed the garlic, removed the skin, and started mincing. All that was left was to wait on the tomatoes from Sam. The garlic was potent enough, and I wanted to avoid cutting any onion until absolutely necessary since Derek was clearly parked for the duration.

I was saved about fifteen minutes later when Conor and Sam stopped at the door. Sam waved cheerfully and held up the requested vegetables while Conor removed his boots. A quick shuffle later for Sam to remove his own shoes, and both came to the food prep area - too small to be considered a proper kitchen - to greet me.

First, Conor gave me a big, smelly hug and a kiss on my hair. “Did you already slice the bread?”

“Ew, you gorilla!” I laughed. “And I haven’t sliced any bread yet, I wasn’t sure how long I had and I didn’t want it to get too stale.”

“They’re toasties, love.” He shook his head with a grin before swatting me on the butt. “No one cares if the bread was a bit stale before you started.”

Over his shoulder, Derek’s head bobbed side to side. “I think someone disagrees.” I looked meaningfully past him. To Conor’s credit, he looked sheepish.

Sam squeezed around and handed me the tomatoes and gave me a hug. “Thank you for making soup.”

“I know it’s our favorite,” I winked before shooing him out of the area. “Not enough room for more than one in the kitchen. Y’all go unwind out there, and make sure you warn Derek that I’m about to start cutting onions.”

As he held up his hands and jokingly scurried away, I turned to the stove and started cursing myself. I’d forgotten to start boiling water. Snagging a small saucepan, I got a carafe of water from the console and started rectifying that, tossing in a generous pinch of salt. Gently, I cut an X into the bottom of each tomato and set them aside before peeling and dicing the onion. Immediately, the onion, carrots, and celery went into a food processor. “Derek, I’m about to be loud,” I called softly before counting to ten to give him time to cover his ears or step into the corridor. A quick blitz later, the vegetables were perfectly between a mince and a puree.

A quick swizzle of oil went into the already-hot dutch oven before adding the mirepoix and giving it a quick stir. As if on cue, Tyche and Antoine breezed through the door, noses twitching.

“I smell food,” she announced, stalking into the kitchen. One look at the ingredients was all it took. “Ooooo you’re making the tomato soup.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “I am, and you know I don’t have room in here for spectators, unfortunately.” Arching an eyebrow, I pointed the spoon in my hand at the table.

She wasn’t having it. “One of these days, you’re going to show me how to make that. May as well be today.”

“Nice try, but I need some secrets. Besides, the longer I argue with you, the more likely the vegetables are going to scorch. Scoot!”

She scrunched her face at me but acquiesced. As I scooped the garlic into the pot, I heard her change topics. “How much longer is the stress test? My music keeps getting mixed up with Antoine’s. I don’t mind it, but…”

Antoine smiled softly and shook his head. “But it is quite a shock to expect classical music and instead her rock starts playing.”

Personally, I liked both, but still shuddered at what he was talking about. Carefully lowering three of the tomatoes into the now-boiling water, I glanced at the sauteing vegetables and gave them a quick stir to check. “We have about six more days before the repairs start, maybe four more after that?”

Conor sighed. “I wish we could ask if anything important was being hacked, not just annoying environmental controls.”

“Plants aren’t dead yet,” Sam pointed out, tipping his bottle of water toward Conor in a practiced gesture. Everyone laughed when, rather than being reassured, Conor leapt to his feet to check on his ‘babies’ in the room.

Cursing, I dipped the tomatoes out of the boiling water and dropped them immediately into an ice bath. A couple pokes with my trusty spoon showed they weren’t overcooked, thankfully. “None of my information for work has been acting up,” I admitted as I started peeling them. “But Pranav advised that more critical data would either go completely missing or not show any signs of infiltration. We won’t know until after the test is over.”

“Lovely,” Tyche drawled as she watched Conor fretting over the plants. “So it’s all or nothing.”

I shrugged and dumped the tomato paste - admittedly, from the console - into the pan of other vegetables. When I stirred, I was satisfied that the carrots, onion, and celery had cooked down to where they were soft. “In a weird way, it makes sense. They’re testing for catastrophic data breaches, which would pull everything down, or for data theft, which you wouldn’t want to leave traces of.”

The corner of Antoine’s mouth quirked up as I dropped three more tomatoes into the pan of boiling water. “No hidden boba tea this time, that is reassuring.”

Hands still moving without hesitation, Derek whipped his head toward Antoine, paused, and turned back to where he had been staring. Derek’s version of a glare.

“That was Charly,” I responded in unexpected unison with Maverick and Conor. I smirked while dumping the already-peeled tomatoes into the processor with another pinch of salt. “Seriously, Derek had nothing to do with that other than divine retribution.” I paused for a moment. “Although I do have to admit that the cold showers do seem to track with what Charly reported.”

That only got a shrug from Derek, which was as good as an admission.

The conversation shifted again - something Conor and Sam were working on in the aeroponics labs that I had already heard multiple details on, plus repetition. Tuning it out, I pulled out the last three tomatoes, dropped them in the ice bath, and took a platter with a loaf of bread, sliced cheese, and butter out to the table. “Mav, can you start setting up the sandwiches?”

He went to stand, but Tyche shooed him back down. “I got it. She may not let me help make the soup on this one, but I can prep a grilled cheese with the best.” Staring me in the eye, she started cutting slices from the loaf defiantly.

I just laughed it off. This was the only tomato soup either of us liked, and she had been chasing me for the recipe for ages. It had become a running joke at this point, so without hesitation, I moved back to the food prep area, peeled the remaining tomatoes, and gave another warning that I was going to be loud. Some more blitzing later, the now-pureed tomatoes went into the pan of veggies along with the spices I had already measured out, the juice from one lemon, and enough water to fill the pan three-quarters full. Leaving that to boil, I moved the boiling water off the stove and swapped it for a grill-pan.

“Sophie!” Conor cried from the armchair where he perched. “You’ve seen the plants we’re growing in the lab! Tell them we’ve managed a crop of roots!”

I winced. “Jury’s out… I’m not sure how aeroponic potatoes are going to turn out, but I can confirm they are in the process of finding out?”

Tyche’s knife fell to the table, and she moved her mouth silently in a very accurate imitation of a fish before managing to sputter. “Air-grown… potatoes?”

The confusion on Antoine’s face was painful to look at. He started to speak before stopping himself and instead pulling up his datapad, jotting a message, and flicking it out to the room.

When I read the message, the confusion was so clear that I hurt my sinuses snorting. Des pomme de terre en l’air? Pommes aeriennes? Talk about being lost in translation…. “Conor, Sam… I think Antoine has the perfect name for those if they work out. Just sayin’”

Tyche snorted and shook her head before handing me the platter, with a stack of perfectly buttered bread, two slices of cheese between every other slice of bread. The soup had just come to a simmer, so I was stirring intently and just nodded for her to start grilling sandwiches. Several appreciative sniffs and twenty minutes later, six bowls of soup and six matching sandwiches - three cut vertically and three cut diagonally, because it mattered and was not a battle I was willing to fight - hit the table. Tyche politely placed the salt cellar and a pepper grinder on the table, although the glare she dished out to the collected group promised strong retaliation to anyone who touched them.

I held up half of my grilled cheese in a mock-toast. “To soup night!”

“To air potato soup, soon!” Maverick offered up with a grin, only for everyone to echo his sentiment with the exception of Derek - who just held up half of his sandwich with one hand and tapped away with the other, not even relenting to eat.

Frankly, as long as he spared a hand to eat, I couldn’t bring myself to care. He took these tests very seriously, and generally only stopped when he was completely asleep.

Everyone dug in, but it was only after my first spoonful that I spoke up. “Considering how long it took to make sure the tomatoes wouldn’t be poisonous, I’m not sure the potatoes will be ready before we get to Von.”

Conor and Sam nodded, as did Tyche and Antoine, but Maverick stopped with his bowl halfway to his mouth. Setting it down gently, he angled his head. “What do you mean, poisonous?”

“They’re nightshades,” Conor told him, as calmly as if he was telling us that water was wet. “Tomatoes are the only edible berries of that family, and potatoes are the only edible tubers, so we have to be extra careful.”

Maverick’s eyes grew wide and turned toward his soup. Tyche just reached out and patted his hand. “You’ve eaten this soup for years, and you love tomatoes. They’re safe, I swear. And Sam won’t let Sophia near the new ones until he’s completely sure they’ll be okay to eat.”

Sam nodded, shoving a soup-covered wedge into his mouth. “We’re growing them in simulated Von-light, hoping that keeps the roots from creating chlorophyll. If we’re wrong, there’s a forty-three-point-six percent chance they won’t grow at all, ten-point-five percent chance they will give you a stomach ache, eighteen-point-four percent they won’t taste good, and twenty-seven-point-five percent they will taste good and be safe to eat at the same time.”

“Meaning they won’t kill you, you might get a tummy ache, but most likely for this generation, they just won’t grow,” Conor translated.

“Hang on,” I held up my spoon. “What kind of stomachache are we talking here?”

The mad botanists looked at each other and made a few thoughtful faces. Finally, Conor nodded and Sam spoke. “Unripe apples,” he stated flatly. “But just unripe apples.”

“Oh, that’s not too bad,” I shrugged and crunched into my sandwich.

Derek finished his half-sandwich and blindly reached for another. He had it halfway to his mouth before he looked at it and dropped it back to the plate in alarm. You would have thought it tried to bite him rather than vice versa.

Antoine shook his head and reached past the vertically cut sandwich Derek had dropped and delicately handed him a diagonally cut one. “Here you go, friend.”

Glaring at the sandwich like it may betray him, he bit it viciously before going back to the screen he could only see in his mind, seemingly satisfied that the sandwich would not change into the offending shape.

I told you, it matters.

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#the miys #found family #humans are weird #science fiction #aliens #apocalypse #humans are space orcs #humans are space fae #earth is space australia #post apocalypse #post post apocalypse #original science fiction #original sci fi #original writing

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arcanalogue · 5 years

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Death and the Maiden, Cooking Edition: Pomegranate Tiramisu

Fahwad Khan, IMPERMANENT (THE POMEGRANATE SKULL) 2014

Pardon the long post, but I just don’t know where else to go with this. And even in terms of recipe posts it will be annoying because there’s the dreaded backstory — but I’m sharing in honor a friend who passed away, so I guess if you feel terrific about skimming past all that to get to a cake recipe one minute faster, no one can ever question your commitment to gastronomy.

So here’s the deal. Back in 2011 I was hosting a monthly variety show that featured numerous components: film, live music, burlesque, PowerPoint presentations, arts & crafts, really ANYTHING.

My friend Cas Marino wanted in on the action; he was a performer, but he was so much more than that. He was performing life, quite vividly; he was a cancer survivor who’d never stopped transforming. He played serious dramatic roles in productions all over New York City, he was happy to dive into a drag revue, he would host salons and get-togethers in his Midtown apartment, and on top of everything else, he was working on a blog called “The Food Daddy,” which was entertaining to read even if you couldn’t cook. As you’ll see below, everything he touched became infused with his humor and personality.

He’d appeared in a number of my shows, usually in drag inspired by that night’s theme. Here he is on the night we read excerpts from Elsa Lanchester’s then-out-of-print memoir.

Here he is, drinking milk right out of the carton on the night we did a whole show about the trope in fiction about women who transform into cats. (I’m telling you, dear reader, I was truly living my best life as a producer!)

This was all in a lovely professional downtown establishment, so naturally I was interested in bending every possible rule past the breaking point. So when Cas asked if he could make food for my entire audience, I said YES... and then went to inform the venue so they could explain why it was completely against the rules. (In this instance, they had their own cafe on-site that was strictly kosher, and they could not risk confusion or contamination with outside food.)

I don’t recall exactly how we pulled it off, but Cas began showing up at my events armed with enough food to serve 75 people (the theater’s capacity). Do you realize how incredible that is, reader? Sometimes we’d sell out, but sometimes we’d only have 15 folks in the audience, half of them comps. Cas believed in me so hard, he planned for a sold-out show every time. He would have been offended if we ran out of kibble with even one person left to feed.

The food was always on theme, so when I did a show about America’s First Ladies, he combined vintage recipes from Barbara Bush and Rosalynn Carter to make Bipartisan Buffalo Chicken Sliders, which he served dressed as Eve, the original “first lady,” mostly naked and covered in vines.

As you’ll read below, he agonized over the perfect thing to serve at our “Death and the Maiden” show. At one point, it was going to be mini-eclairs filled with pomegranate cream and tipped with an almond fingernail. He finally settled on this original tiramisu recipe that knocked us all COMPLETELY OUT. And I ate the leftovers out of my fridge for days, because letting even one serving go to waste felt like a desecration.

Look, I’m telling you he could COOK. He once described his culinary style to me as “tragically indulgent.” His fantasy (like so many others at the time) was to parlay his food blog into an actual cookbook someday.

Sadly, Cas did not live to fulfill this particular dream. In 2014 his cancer returned, and he faded away right before our eyes. From his hospital bed, he wrote me: “I have to survive this just to write about it and do a one-man show where I cook and feed and we all laugh and sob and go ‘Mmmmm that's fucking good’ and it just becomes a big audience/artist participation evening of sharing where I am the only one who gets to talk.”

That same year, I managed to recreate his Pomegranate Tiramisu and serve it to friends as my birthday cake; for a couple years afterward, I would look the recipe up on his website and fantasize about making it again. The ingredients weren’t cheap, and it required more kitchen space than I had in NYC.

And then the worst thing happened: at some point after Cas’s death, the domain expired and his blog went 404, and ONLY THEN did I realize I hadn’t scribbled it down anywhere. People say “the internet is forever,” but hell... even Tumblr users know differently.

I spent a few more years being very depressed about this, imagining the recipe was lost forever, but it turns out someone had managed to preserve the blog’s contents, and at long last it fell back into my hands. BACK FROM THE DEAD! Not unlike the Bride of Frankenstein herself.

So I’m going to let Cas take it from here, dear reader. Thank you for letting me bring him back to life for a just few minutes, performing for you, feeding you. Knowing that would’ve meant everything to him. From one of his last messages to me: “I have no designs on sainthood. But I know I still have shit to accomplish in this world, even if not a physical member of it.”

Knock ‘em dead, Cas!

“The Food Daddy” - Pomegranate Tiramisu

This recipe was created by me to fit the bill for the recent “Meet the Lady” performance (which, if you’ve not heard or read, is a monthly variety show that really rather defies description), titled “Death and the Maiden”.

I toiled with possible ideas that had to do with death and maidens, figuring most easily that a “death by chocolate” offering would at least use one of the title words. Then lady fingers came into the thought process because, well, if you dismembered a maiden you’d have two byproducts: death, most notably, and lady parts — including, but not limited to, her fingers.

Lady fingers naturally led to Tiramisu fantasies, but I didn’t want to go the traditional route. And after discussing it and brainstorming, I got smacked in the back of the head with the realization that the mythical Persephone — a maiden — kidnapped as she was by Hades — who, by way of his being the god of the underworld, was death its very self in semi-human form — ate nothing but pomegranate seeds during her detainment in hell.

If this doesn’t spell fucking dessert, I don’t know what does.

Herewith, my scaled-down recipe (in scope, not in structure or composition; I doubt you’ll need to serve 75 people with yours, though even at half-size this will serve a small army). You can pare it down even further if you feel such need, or instead of making it into one big sheet cake, assemble several smaller ones (I found this worked BEAUTIFULLY in loaf pans) and send them straight to the freezer for future enjoyment.

A few other flexible considerations: I made mine in a full-size deep steam table pan for presentation and food service purposes. These things measure roughly 20 x 10 x 3.5”, but you can use the smaller (12 x 9 x 2.5”) disposable aluminum half-pans for this recipe, or as stated above, any other configuration of sizes that suit your needs. If you want to unmold it and slice it after freezing, line your pans first with cellophane wrap. After just a minute or two out of the ice box, you’ll be able to lift it out of the pan (perhaps with the help of a hungry friend) by the ends of the cellophane, place it on a cutting board, and have at it. Tres artistique, even weighing in as mine did at about eight pounds. This last conclusion required me getting on the scale both with and without the final dessert in my arms and subtracting the first weight from the laden number, which could have been quite a site, as I generally refuse to step on a scale until I’ve removed every last stitch of clothing including my socks, and spit out any spare saliva and shaved every last facial hair so NOTHING will add even a bazillionth of an ounce to my readout, lest I suffer a deep fit of depression. And being depressed when you’re holding what turns out to be 8 pounds of really good cake is a recipe for emotion-eating disaster. But I staved off the need to feel slimmer than normal in light of the facts that (a) I was mid-movie shoot that week, and thus had to maintain a larger-than-usual mane of face-hair for my role; (b) spitting near food meant for others would be gross; (c) being naked around the same food would be even grosser; and (d) the tile floor in my bathroom could be a bit chilly, so why risk taking off my socks?

Socks, spitting, scanty clothing — nothing could have made this less enjoyable. The audience that night devoured what was served to them, and all but attacked the leftovers on the way out of the theater. I had sent samples of this creation to my usual team of taste-testers for input as part of the development process, and perhaps the most poignant and fitting critique came from my dear Mom who, just having started a new diet regimen, had the following to say during our brief check-in on the phone:

“Hello. This is your mother. Fuck Weight Watchers, and Fuck You.”

I love you, Mom. And not just because you loved this surprising new take on an old favorite.

60 Lady Finger cookies

4 Cups Pomegranate juice

1-½ Cups plus 2 Tbsp. sugar

1 Packet unflavored gelatin

4 Egg whites

1 tsp. Cream of Tartar

1 Cup Mascarpone cheese

3 Cups Crème Fraiche

1 Tbsp. Corn starch

¼ Cup water (or as needed)

½ Cup sliced almonds

¼ Cup Pomegranate seeds (or dried sweetened cranberries)

(Reserve 6 Lady Fingers for garnish.)

In a saucepan, mix pomegranate juice with 1-½ cups sugar, and sprinkle gelatin on top. Stir or whisk until gelatin is dissolved with no lumps remaining. Bring mixture to boil over medium-high heat, stirring constantly until sugar and gelatin are fully dissolved. Reduce heat to medium-low and continue to boil, stirring often, for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and set saucepan into a larger bowl filled with cold water. Stir frequently and change cold water bath often, allowing juice reduction to cool as close to room temperature as possible.

In the bowl of a stand mixer or with electric beaters, whip egg whites with cream of tartar until stiff. Remove to a separate, clean mixing bowl (preferably chilled in the freezer) and set aside.

In stand mixer or large mixing bowl with electric beaters, mix mascarpone with 1-½ cups of cooled juice reduction until well blended. Beat on medium-high for one minute. Add 1 cup of the crème fraiche and blend until smooth. Finally, fold in beaten egg whites, half at a time, just until fully incorporated.

Assembling the tiramisu: Here’s where Food Daddy starts getting anal (but this works easiest, so just shut up and do as I say. Love you!). On your prep surface, set your plate or bowl of unpackaged lady fingers (you don’t want to be messing with cellophane and plastic bags and such mid-project here); next to that, set your remaining juice reduction; and next to that, set your cake pan.

Working from left to right (or for my Hebrew or dyslexic foodies, right to left), dip a lady finger lightly in the juice by placing it on the liquid’s surface, flipping it over with your fingers, then removing it by hand and placing it in the cake pan. Working quickly, repeat this process, building a tightly packed layer of side-by-side, row-by-row, lightly soaked lady fingers on the bottom of the pan. Nobody will see the inside of the tiramisu in its entirety, so if to make a uniform layer with few gaps you need to rip a finger here or stuff a finger there, I won’t tell a soul if you have to be a bit forceful or creative.

Spoon half of the pomegranate mousse mixture over the bottom layer of lady fingers. Using the back of a spoon or a rubber spatula, spread the mixture evenly. Lift the pan and drop it gently a few times on your work surface, just to make sure all the gaps are filled and big air bubbles are removed.

Repeat with a second layer of dipped lady fingers, and then a second layer of pomegranate mousse, again tamping pan to release air bubbles and distribute the filling evenly. Top with one final layer of dipped lady fingers.

Spread the top with the remaining 2 cups of crème fraiche, tamp pan to settle the layers, and set aside.

Pour remaining juice mixture into a measuring cup, and add enough of the water, if needed, to make 1 cup of liquid. Return to saucepan, and stir in the corn starch and the remaining 2 Tbsp. of sugar until starch is dissolved. Place pan over medium-high heat, and bring to a boil to thicken. Remove from heat.

In a food processor or with a cutting board and knife, coarsely chop the almonds and the fruit, then add the reserved lady fingers and pulse (or chop and crumble) until the whole thing looks like somebody pawed at a poor helpless berry-nut muffin until there were no big chunks left.

Sprinkle the crumb mixture evenly over the top of the tiramisu. Drizzle with the pomegranate syrup mixture.

Chill tiramisu at least 2 hours in refrigerator before serving. For overnight storage or longer, cover with cellophane wrap gently pressed against the top surface.

This will “cure” and the flavors will blend and the whole combination really pull together if left refrigerated for two days. For storage beyond that or to deal with leftovers, this freezes BEAUTIFULLY. Just allow to come to room temperature before serving, or enjoy it “semi freddo” by removing from freezer and slicing wide, inch-thick slices, laying each on its side on individual serving plates and eating it cold and firm. A dollop of additional crème fraiche and a sprinkling of chopped almonds (did I hear someone say “mint sprig”?) sure would make this anything but a “leftover” dessert.

#death and the maiden #pomegranate #tiramisu #recipes #cooking #cas marino

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moonette-wolfsong · 6 years

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Don’t use bees wax to wrap anything hot:

This seems like no brainer until you are suddenly required to leave the house on short notice with a hot pie still cooling, have inside pets that could be tempted and no idea when you get back so sticking it back in the oven isn’t a solution. This resulted in the bees wax sticking to the glass pie dish in a bad way. Trying to peel the wrap off resulted in the wrap coming off with wax being left behind.

I’m pretty sure I ended up sticking it in the microwave, crossing my fingers and hoping at that point. Which I think did the trick in allowing me to get the wrap off although it was awhile ago so I don’t remember the details. However I’m pretty sure I would have remembered if the wrap had stuck to the pastry covered pie. However I have no idea what would have happened to an unset iced cake or something. (I actually haven’t even tried to wrap a iced cake with the wraps, set or not. We normally use reusable storage containers.)

So long story short, try to only wrap hot things in bees wax wrap once they have cooled down.

Other potential solutions to this problem:

Silicone food cover/lid: If the pie hadn’t raised above the lip of the pie dish then one of our silicone covers could have been the perfect short term solution until the pie had cooled down or to keep flies off food. While also keeping the food easily accessiable since it’s so quick and easy to take on and off eg. for a picnic or if you want to dish up part of the pie then quickly cover it and leave it to cool while you eat dinner.

The silicone does keep the heat in however which could be a good or bad thing depending on the situation.

Also I said the silicone covers are a short term solution earlier since our family really isn’t a fan of using silicone covers in the fridge or freezer. Because there are so many of us, we are a big fan of stacking expecially in the fridge. However a silicone covering container means we can’t stack which means we can loss a lot of space.

Also the covers work by being wider then the container they’re covering which isn’t so great when trying to be space saving. Also if you pull up on the covers they stick however if you bump them from the side they come off very easily. Which is a big problem in a fridge that is generally really full. Since we are often shifting stacked items around to reach things so it’s very easy to bump the silicone cover askew.

Mainly my family is becoming a big fan of using covers in the microwave by reheating in food in bowls. The covers also work for covering our most commonly used rectangular glass storage containers which is nice because we prefer not to microwave the plastic lid both for health reasons and because it can distort the lid.

The silicone covers generally have a knob handle that makes pushing them up easy. They do tend to collect water however so best to put them upside down on a water proof kitchen bench or sink rather then the kitchen table. Best not to put them down so they stick as this can create a bit of a mess and can be a tad difficult to get off since it seals. Lift from the edge not the handle in that case.

When washing up they can be stacked like a plate. I recomend that if you try to always keep the back of the cover, non sticky side, pointed towards the items around it. Eg. We tend to keep the sticky side pointed /away/ from the dishwasher wall or breadboards just in case. The veins on our silicone ‘leaf’ cover come in handy here by helping it not stick to everything. Stacking plates in front the cover on the draining board, with the cover leaning with it’s veined back against the breadboards has been working well for me so far.

I haven’t spotted any issues with dishwashing them and I haven’t tried washing and drying a few of them together so I don’t know how badly they stick together. I would suggest separating them a bit with dishwashing ‘just in case’ but feel free to experiment. Perhaps via testing it out via the draining board when washing up first.

Storing silicone covers, so first rule of silicone. It’s a dust magnet. Which isn’t to bad once you know how to handle it appropriately. Personally we store our covers on top of our cooking pots. We turn the lids of the cooking pots upside down then place the covers on the pot lids facing down. This helps prevent dust. Our bigger covers tend to have big nob handles which means the covers can get a little high and wonky when stacking but we tend to stack the small covers seperatly on a small saucepan so this isn’t a big deal with the few covers we have.

I unfortunately don’t know how annoying this would be if storing over in use cooking pots. We have two sets of cooking pots, since the first set doesn’t work on the induction stove but is still used for fridge storage sometimes. (It means we are rarely searching for a cooking pot that is in use in the fridge which is nice, although it does still happen.)

Currently we mostly use the small covers for heating in the microwave. We have started to use the big ones for covering containers on the counter sometimes which may become more popular. As for the fridge containers we now tend to use bees wax instead if we have to.

If you were catering for an event, juggling a lid, plate and serving yourself could be a bit tricky since finding space to put the lid or plate down may be difficult. Also as I mentioned the lid can get a big wet and make a mess. I also don’t think I’d trust the silicone cover to stay on while traveling unless perhaps somebody held the container in their lap the whole way. So I would want the containers to have a proper lid regardless. We have yet to try this however it’s just speculation since I’ve been involved with a few events. However despite the potential downside the ease of taking the lids on and off as well as the lack of dispossiable cling wrap still makes this an appealing idea.

Overall however as long as the food is below the lip of the container it can be a nice short term storage solution to have for keeping off flies etc or good for microwaving.

There is also a bunch of cooking containers with lids these days. Which means you know you won’t need cling wrap or an alternative solution even before you start cooking.

Decor Thermoglass, highly recomend: I only have some rectangular glass oven containers with non oven safe plastic lid with silicone seal. There is also a pie dish option in this range.

There containers are really nice and stackable with is awesome for us. Particually when bulk cooking. I’m a tad upset the Decor Match Ups we usually use for food storage aren’t oven safe since then we’d only need one set of containers. Since some of the container sizes are very similar.

However the Thermoglass containers have handles which is great for cooking but not as space friendly. If you’re single or a small family this may not be a big hassle for you, unless you have a small fridge. However fridge space is a constant hassle for us. So we stick to the unhandled Match Up containers most of the time. Also the lack of handles make the Match Ups more lunch box friendly for those of us who use glass containers. (The Match Ups are the current favourite container in our house.)

Another great thing about these containers is that you can fill multiple small containers instead of one big one. This means that as containers are emptied they are removed from the fridge so you have more fridge space faster then if you were using one big container. Plus as I mentioned they’re stackable so they automatically take up less space then a cling wrap covered baking dish that you can’t really stack on top of, from the beginning anyway.

Also if you have someone with different food requirements you can cook multiple meals or versions of the meal at once simply via using multiple smaller containers instead of one big baking dish which can be super useful. We tend to cook one medium dish and two small dishes. One of the small dishes can then be used to cook a gluten free dish, for example.

Others I HAVEN’T tried but you could consider:

Decor Thermostone, I haven’t tried these but they are from the same brand as the Thermoglass containers.

Onyx airtight glass container stainless steel lid containers: I haven’t tried but want to or wanted to (the lack of handle is off putting). These are completely oven safe containers with a glass container and a metal lid with silicone seal. They don’t have handles unfortunately since they are designed as oven safe storage containers rather then just as oven containers. Which is good for storage but bad because you really don’t want to drop something hot.

Also they are expensive and don’t come in many sizes yet so they didn’t really suit my purposes which was to obtain enough non plastic food containers to suit the needs of an entire family in a fairly short span of time. Decor Match Ups have a plastic lid and weren’t cheap but they did suit my needs.

I initially wanted to buy Onyx glass with metal lid containers as a storage container however we primarily use /small/ storage containers and this company only has big containers in this range so far. Also I have far to many containers already and don’t need any more so my desire for this range has slipped a lot.

If I was rebuilding my collection from scratch however I might buy some of these however Match Ups work together so well because they all /fit/ together. Really Match Ups have ruined me for other brands. Plus the price for these containers is a bit much.

Really I’d love to see this brand grow to be a bit more versatile. Right now however it doesn’t suit my needs and I already have to many containers and these aren’t designed to stack in neatly with my current containers so I’d need to find somewhere else to put them. I’m already trying to fit two kitchens in one right now in a very literal sense. So this is a would (really) like but it really, really doesn’t fit right now and must continually remind myself that it doesn’t actually suit my needs kind of thing. (Love the idea however, I want it but don’t need it. It’s annoying.)

#tips #bees wax wraps #silicone #silicone food covers #review #for later #need to come back to this

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