Even as the post went up, A was fairly sure he had identified the Blue Rock of Death. The good news it is not radio-active, the bad news is that it had nothing what-so-ever to do with a higher-than-might-be-usual concentration of nitrogen (fish poop) in the bottom of the tank. The rock would react with any water & kill anything living in proximity, especially in a closed system like a fish tank.
Which begs the question: what gets into people? Why sell a rock stating it is for a fish tank when it could not be? Did the person who sold it know it would kill everything? Maybe they 1) got screwed themselves & thought the universe would be a happier place if they passed it on 2) are just stoopid & said "shiny rock - that would look good in water". Or did they just pick it up somewhere think that it would be perfect for someone else's fish tank?
The rock itself is almost certainly Azurite. It was identified by a Ph.Ded physicist with experience growing carbon nano-tubes & working with crystals in a quest for a tunable laser. He identified the specimen by Googling for a blue rock that kills fish. I do not know what he Googled exactly because he claims not to remember.
Showing posts with label carbon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label carbon. Show all posts
Monday, October 5, 2009
Friday, April 3, 2009
The secret of flakey pastry
Trust me when I say I know flakey. I backed into my own barn (painted bright yellow) in the middle of the day while sober TWICE in one month. I saw the barn, but somehow forgot it was solid...? & that is just a small, recent example. I do flakey things with almost every breathe.
I think A's favorite must be the time I told Rick Smalley I was really sick of looking at all that bucky-sh*t & from now on if I found any magazines with C60 on the cover they were going straight into the recycling; A was interviewing for a job with Rick at the time. This turned out to be not such a bad thing actually. Rick's then-current wife had an I-cannot-believe-I-am-stuck-at-another-one-of-these-meet-&-greets look on her face most of the evening, but after I opened my mouth she perked up. I am sure A had mentioned why he was interviewing for this job, but it must have slipped my mind.
Now that my flakey credentials are established, let me pass along my recipe for flakey pastry. You can use it for empanadas or turnovers or you can roll it flat & use it for pie crusts (of the main course or dessert variety). Unlike most of my recipes, there will be some actual measurements involved. Please understand this means they are important, but it is still all mostly about proportion.
You will want a big mixing bowl with a wide opening (to work in) & another smaller bowl (for refrigerating the dough at the different stages). I like to mix in a ceramic bowl & refrigerate in a metal bowl, but that's me.
- in the large mixing bowl dry mix 3 cups of flour & of 1.5 teaspoons of sea salt (I think it matters but there are plenty who disagree). More flour than this will be unmanageable, so if you want 'more' you are better off making the dough twice.
- after these ingredients are well mixed (you can just keep spooning if through a sifter if you worry you will not be able to tell when the white grainy ingredient is well mixed into the white grainy ingredient), push it all into a mound in the bowl & make a small hollow in the center.
- add cold water to the empty center slowly. Stop, mix everything around a bit, make another hollow, add a bit more water, repeat (just like lather, rinse, repeat or faire mousser, rincer, répéter if you use salon brands). Ultimately it will about .75 cups of water, but in a humid climate it might be less; in a dry heat it will be more.
- during the repeats, slowly add 3.5 teaspoons of vinegar. I have always used a light (white wine or rice) vinegar, but someday I will use balsamic, just to see what happens.
- in a separate bowl, whisk 2 large egg yolks (or 3 medium or 4 small). Once all the water/vinegar has been absorbed by the flour/sea salt, mix the eggs in. The best way is with your clean, lightly floured hands. Keep a butter knife handy to scrape that sticky-eggy-goo back into the bowl every so often.
- it can be hard to see (it always looks not-quite-mixed), but you will be able to feel when it is well mixed. no really. Pat the dough into a ball shape & tip it into your refrigerator bowl (if you are changing bowls, which I really do recommend). Cover; you can use saran wrap or whatever & put in the fridge for not less than 30 minutes.
Now for the secret part. Earlier you should have taken one stick of unsalted butter & one stick of regular, lightly salted butter & put them on the counter to warm up. I should have mentioned this at the beginning but it is flakey pastry after all...
- in a small clean bowl (a third bowl, maybe), mix the two sticks of butter together. By the time you are finished, it should be easy to scoop some butter on a spatula & spread it evenly. The two sticks will be slightly different in color & texture, so you can see when they are blended. Do not substitute anything for this butter; margarine oils will separate & your pastry will not flake. Do not use either two salted sticks (too salty) or two unsalted sticks (wrong texture). One of each, I mean it.
- remove the chilled dough from the fridge, flour your counter (or board, but it will need to be a big board) & roll as flat & square/rectangle as you can. Let it rest for a minute or two. Then spread about 1/3 of the butter across the surface. Let it rest & then fold the dough back on itself. DO NOT KNEAD. Lift back into bowl, cover & refrigerate for another 30+ minutes.
- roll out, rest, spread another 1/3, rest, & fold. Back in the fridge & repeat one last time.
- after the butter has all been spread, leave the dough in the refrigerator for at least one hour. Overnight is fine, too.
Now you can move forward in an ordinary way. You will need to roll it out flat again & cut to fit your pie pan or dumpling press or whatever. Stuff with whatever please you. I have stuffed small empanada-style shapes with our regular pizza topping (cheese tomato sauce & broccoli in our house) , I have made larger ones filled with left-over chicken/potato/carrot casserole. Whatever you use, be sure it is either already cooked OR the cooking time will be adequate. If you are making a pie crust, bake (filled with pie filling) 350F for 35-45 minutes. If you are making smaller stuffed pastries, cook (filled with stuffing) 350F for about 15-25 minutes.
The secret is, of course the butter & how it behaves when cooked. You need thin thin layers of butter to create the light flakey dough. If you knead the butter in, the dough will not separate into layers, making light flakes & you will not get the desired effect or taste. It is still good, just not as good.
I have never made this recipe with anything other than butter but I was once served it made with margarine. Not only did it not flake, but it was a denser dough & did not roll out as smoothly. As a result, although it was lower in calorie it took more to make the pastry shells. I am sure it was not a calorie-for-calorie match, but if you ARE going to eat something fattening, shouldn't it be the best something it can be? If you are avoiding butter because it is a meat meal, let me suggest you go with something else all-together.
//the day I took these photos I used a whole wheat flour. I do not usually, but I did not have as much regular flour as I thought. As a result the dough was not as elastic & it did not spread as thin or fold as easily as it usually does. The results tasted different, but flaked just fine.
I think A's favorite must be the time I told Rick Smalley I was really sick of looking at all that bucky-sh*t & from now on if I found any magazines with C60 on the cover they were going straight into the recycling; A was interviewing for a job with Rick at the time. This turned out to be not such a bad thing actually. Rick's then-current wife had an I-cannot-believe-I-am-stuck-at-another-one-of-these-meet-&-greets look on her face most of the evening, but after I opened my mouth she perked up. I am sure A had mentioned why he was interviewing for this job, but it must have slipped my mind.
Now that my flakey credentials are established, let me pass along my recipe for flakey pastry. You can use it for empanadas or turnovers or you can roll it flat & use it for pie crusts (of the main course or dessert variety). Unlike most of my recipes, there will be some actual measurements involved. Please understand this means they are important, but it is still all mostly about proportion.
You will want a big mixing bowl with a wide opening (to work in) & another smaller bowl (for refrigerating the dough at the different stages). I like to mix in a ceramic bowl & refrigerate in a metal bowl, but that's me.
- in the large mixing bowl dry mix 3 cups of flour & of 1.5 teaspoons of sea salt (I think it matters but there are plenty who disagree). More flour than this will be unmanageable, so if you want 'more' you are better off making the dough twice.
- after these ingredients are well mixed (you can just keep spooning if through a sifter if you worry you will not be able to tell when the white grainy ingredient is well mixed into the white grainy ingredient), push it all into a mound in the bowl & make a small hollow in the center.
- add cold water to the empty center slowly. Stop, mix everything around a bit, make another hollow, add a bit more water, repeat (just like lather, rinse, repeat or faire mousser, rincer, répéter if you use salon brands). Ultimately it will about .75 cups of water, but in a humid climate it might be less; in a dry heat it will be more.
- during the repeats, slowly add 3.5 teaspoons of vinegar. I have always used a light (white wine or rice) vinegar, but someday I will use balsamic, just to see what happens.
- in a separate bowl, whisk 2 large egg yolks (or 3 medium or 4 small). Once all the water/vinegar has been absorbed by the flour/sea salt, mix the eggs in. The best way is with your clean, lightly floured hands. Keep a butter knife handy to scrape that sticky-eggy-goo back into the bowl every so often.- it can be hard to see (it always looks not-quite-mixed), but you will be able to feel when it is well mixed. no really. Pat the dough into a ball shape & tip it into your refrigerator bowl (if you are changing bowls, which I really do recommend). Cover; you can use saran wrap or whatever & put in the fridge for not less than 30 minutes.
Now for the secret part. Earlier you should have taken one stick of unsalted butter & one stick of regular, lightly salted butter & put them on the counter to warm up. I should have mentioned this at the beginning but it is flakey pastry after all...
- in a small clean bowl (a third bowl, maybe), mix the two sticks of butter together. By the time you are finished, it should be easy to scoop some butter on a spatula & spread it evenly. The two sticks will be slightly different in color & texture, so you can see when they are blended. Do not substitute anything for this butter; margarine oils will separate & your pastry will not flake. Do not use either two salted sticks (too salty) or two unsalted sticks (wrong texture). One of each, I mean it.
- remove the chilled dough from the fridge, flour your counter (or board, but it will need to be a big board) & roll as flat & square/rectangle as you can. Let it rest for a minute or two. Then spread about 1/3 of the butter across the surface. Let it rest & then fold the dough back on itself. DO NOT KNEAD. Lift back into bowl, cover & refrigerate for another 30+ minutes.
- roll out, rest, spread another 1/3, rest, & fold. Back in the fridge & repeat one last time.- after the butter has all been spread, leave the dough in the refrigerator for at least one hour. Overnight is fine, too.
Now you can move forward in an ordinary way. You will need to roll it out flat again & cut to fit your pie pan or dumpling press or whatever. Stuff with whatever please you. I have stuffed small empanada-style shapes with our regular pizza topping (cheese tomato sauce & broccoli in our house) , I have made larger ones filled with left-over chicken/potato/carrot casserole. Whatever you use, be sure it is either already cooked OR the cooking time will be adequate. If you are making a pie crust, bake (filled with pie filling) 350F for 35-45 minutes. If you are making smaller stuffed pastries, cook (filled with stuffing) 350F for about 15-25 minutes.
The secret is, of course the butter & how it behaves when cooked. You need thin thin layers of butter to create the light flakey dough. If you knead the butter in, the dough will not separate into layers, making light flakes & you will not get the desired effect or taste. It is still good, just not as good.
I have never made this recipe with anything other than butter but I was once served it made with margarine. Not only did it not flake, but it was a denser dough & did not roll out as smoothly. As a result, although it was lower in calorie it took more to make the pastry shells. I am sure it was not a calorie-for-calorie match, but if you ARE going to eat something fattening, shouldn't it be the best something it can be? If you are avoiding butter because it is a meat meal, let me suggest you go with something else all-together.//the day I took these photos I used a whole wheat flour. I do not usually, but I did not have as much regular flour as I thought. As a result the dough was not as elastic & it did not spread as thin or fold as easily as it usually does. The results tasted different, but flaked just fine.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Shine on, you crazy carbon
When we met, A was finishing up a PhD. I do not know much about his thesis. I do know about the equipment he used to do his research, at least I know what it was called: a diamond anvil cell. It was years before the diamond part of this registered.
Later, when we went shopping for my engagement ring, I began to have a clue. I had seen his electronics shopping technique. He rifled through the NY papers (we lived further north in those days), or the Bergen County Register to find advertised prices lower than was available at the Wiz, a Circuit City/Best Buy type warehouse that would not be beat price-wise (I swear the radio ads screamed "Nobody beats the Wiz") & would give you the difference +10% if you could find it lower elsewhere. As a rule, he made a profit on birthday & holiday gifts (which is how some family&friends have come to say "A beats the Wiz").
But our marathon march through the diamond district was like nothing I had been through before.
I had few but specific requirements in an engagement ring. I have small, strong, broad hands & a large ring would only emphasize their lack of elegance. Even when I still had an office job, I worked with my hands. The summer we shopped, I grew my first tomatoes on the balcony of our New Jersey apartment overlooking the parking lot. I knit for years before I ever met A. I needed a cut & setting that would not catch, or worse cut, long fragile fibers, & that would be easy to clean. I did not want a ring I could not wear while living my life. & for whatever reason, I wanted a diamond solitaire. Which diamond was immaterial to me.
A delivered. He tortured jewelers throughout NYC. They would turn to me for relief: what did the young lady want? Something sparkley. & not to have to think too much (this along with being able to spend the entire day in jammies remains my lifetime . Also I would like to keep as many of my teeth as possible). I was useless to them & happy to hand the whole decision off.
The following year, my mother & I attended a knitting conference & the story of my ring (& it's knitting friendly design) made the rounds. I learned how rare true happiness is with this particular piece of jewelry. My aunt had the stone from her ring made into a ring for her husband; it caught on everything, including her children's skin & spent most of it's life in a box in her dresser. At least two close friends have confided they actually dislike their engagement ring. One from day one but "there was no way I was giving it back" & the other after the stone fell out of fashion. I still love my ring, I still wear my ring (but not I admit when shoveling out the horse stalls).
This past spring I decided the time had come to acquire a pair of grown-up formal earrings. The traditional standby of gold knots had become too young & frankly too conservative for those few occasions when I do 'dress-up'. Diamonds again.
A looked himself & then brought me in for the final consult: I really am a pain the ass when it comes to this not-thinking thing. Also, I have the attention span a site hound, any motion out of the corner of my eye & I am OFF. I am delighted with the earring he bought me.
I will never ever have a chair at 'the big rock table', but this lucky chance of a diamond expert in the house means my little rocks are quality.
I had few but specific requirements in an engagement ring. I have small, strong, broad hands & a large ring would only emphasize their lack of elegance. Even when I still had an office job, I worked with my hands. The summer we shopped, I grew my first tomatoes on the balcony of our New Jersey apartment overlooking the parking lot. I knit for years before I ever met A. I needed a cut & setting that would not catch, or worse cut, long fragile fibers, & that would be easy to clean. I did not want a ring I could not wear while living my life. & for whatever reason, I wanted a diamond solitaire. Which diamond was immaterial to me.
A delivered. He tortured jewelers throughout NYC. They would turn to me for relief: what did the young lady want? Something sparkley. & not to have to think too much (this along with being able to spend the entire day in jammies remains my lifetime . Also I would like to keep as many of my teeth as possible). I was useless to them & happy to hand the whole decision off.
The following year, my mother & I attended a knitting conference & the story of my ring (& it's knitting friendly design) made the rounds. I learned how rare true happiness is with this particular piece of jewelry. My aunt had the stone from her ring made into a ring for her husband; it caught on everything, including her children's skin & spent most of it's life in a box in her dresser. At least two close friends have confided they actually dislike their engagement ring. One from day one but "there was no way I was giving it back" & the other after the stone fell out of fashion. I still love my ring, I still wear my ring (but not I admit when shoveling out the horse stalls).
This past spring I decided the time had come to acquire a pair of grown-up formal earrings. The traditional standby of gold knots had become too young & frankly too conservative for those few occasions when I do 'dress-up'. Diamonds again.
A looked himself & then brought me in for the final consult: I really am a pain the ass when it comes to this not-thinking thing. Also, I have the attention span a site hound, any motion out of the corner of my eye & I am OFF. I am delighted with the earring he bought me.
I will never ever have a chair at 'the big rock table', but this lucky chance of a diamond expert in the house means my little rocks are quality.
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