In my everday cooking sage is really underutilized. The only dish I can think of with sage that I’ve prepared during the last couple of years is potato gnocchi. So this was indeed the most likely candidate for experimentation in this month’s TGRWT #21. Potato gnocchi are one of those dishes that I suddenly feel a craving for, and I make it every now and then. When I get things right the gnocchi have a very light texture which fits nice with the melted butter and cheese. This time I decided to incorporate the peanuts into the gnocchi and apart from that stick to the original recipe.

While cooking I tried to chew some peanuts with a sage leaf, and this was a quite remarkable experience. The roasted peanut flavors blended into the sage, and the sensation was stronger than what is usually the case from the previous TGRWT rounds. When tasting sage by itself it will actually remind me of peanuts and vice versa. The last time I had a similar strong sensation was when combining roasted cauliflower with a cocoa agar gel.
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An updated version of “Texture – A hydrocolloid recipe collection” is now available for download (version 2.3). The longer I work on this, the more I realize that it will never really “finish” – there’s always more to add. And believe me – my todo list is still quite long (and I even have some feedback which I haven’t had time to incorporate yet). But I thought that since it’s more than a year since the last update, it was about time to share with you the things that have been changed. Major changes and updates include:

Pictures: This is the biggest visual change! Some recipes are now equipped with pictures which may give you an idea of the texture AND they indicate that the recipe has indeed been tested. But I need your help to add more pictures to the recipe collection (please follow the link to read more about how you can contribute pictures)! And of course - a big thanks to those of you who have already contributed your pictures!

Recipes: Recipes have been added and the total number is about 310 now. I’m getting a little more picky now with regards to which recipes I add. Ideally each new recipe added now should illustrate something new.

I should mention that I’m very grateful for feedback from readers and users of this recipe collection. Thank you very much with helping me improve the document! If you find typos, wish to comment on something or have suggestions on how to improve the collection, please do not hesitate to write me an email at webmaster (at) khymos (.) org or just write a comment in the field below.

Please head over to the download page for the links.

It’s been a couple of months since the last round of “They go really well together” where food bloggers around the world explore food pairings based on similarities in their aroma profiles. The similarity is not based on the concentrations of the aroma components, but rather the odor impact of the components to the overall aroma (and in case you wondered: impact does vary with concentration, but it varies even more with the detection threshold). In other words, what this food pairing does is to point at two foods (which often may seem quite different) and say that these actually have something in common. And because of that it could be worthwhile to try and use them together when cooking. The 21st round of TGRWT is hosted by Greg over at Humbling attemts at creativity, and the foods to pair are sage and roasted peanuts. Head over to his announcement post for more details on how to participate. The deadline is June 1, so there is plenty of time for some creative cooking the next couple of weeks! If you’re not yet familiar with TGRWT you may want to have a look at some of the previous TGRWT rounds.