u/Friluftsliv_Roy

Traditionally the eggplant is deep fried. But I was able to make it just by sauteing it over high heat, followed by making the pan sauce over low heat and it turned out great.

After the flip when I cook it second side, the blueberries melt a little and leave deposits on the pan. Not a problem per se since i cooked multiple pancakes without anything sticking. But the eggs at the end got a little blueberry hue on the white part!

I know some people prefer to cook the pancakes as is and then top it off with the blueberries (my preferred method tbh) but my gf likes them cooked in. What method do you prefer?

Seared the salmon first and then prepared the curry in the same pan, adding the salmon back later.

I see a lot of posts about how difficult it is to cook eggs on stainless steel, how a tablespoon of butter is essential to slidey eggs, leidenfrost is too hot etc.

I had some of these misconceptions myself but recently I've discovered it's ever so easy to get slidey eggs on stainless steel if you follow the correct process.

It's nothing new, used for centuries by Chinese cooks on carbon steel woks. It's called the Long Yao (hot pan cold oil) method. The video link here explains in detail how it works.

https://youtu.be/3gbwfBs2eqg?is=3vnvBLLgz-tBJLot

Although the video is focused on carbon steel pans, the same method works great on stainless steel as well.

How i do it on a 8" stainless steel pan is:

1. Pre heat on medium on small burner for 5 minutes until pan temp reads about 180-200F. My IR thermometer reads it about half of the accrual temp. So at that point if I add oil it'll read 360-400F. The water bead test/ leidenfrost effect also works at around this temperature.

2. I add about half a teaspoon of canola oil to the pan and swirl it around until the pan is coated with a thin even layer. I also turn the heat off at this point and let it start cooling down to a surface temperature of about 300F. If you do not wait for it to cool a bit, the egg whites will become crispy fried. (which may be how some people like it)

3. This is when I add another half teaspoon of fresh canola oil to the pan and crack an egg into it immediately.

4. After the egg sets a bit, maybe in 30-45 seconds you can shake the pan slightly to get it to slide. At this point I use a fish spatula to turn it over for over easy eggs.

I will add a caveat here: butter is easier to cook eggs in and is my preferred approach but I found the above while trying to make dairy free eggs for my gf who can't have regular butter and one time we were camping in the wilderness without easy access to vegan butter when I discovered how easy the above process is.

Also, if you use butter in step3, you won't even need to shake the pan in step4. It'll slide as soon as you tilt the pan a little bit. (The second egg that I made after this was for myself with about 1/4 tsp of kerrygold butter added)

Please note that the "flash seasoning" from step 2 does not create any polymerized layer of oil on the stainless steel surface. It's pretty easy to clean up afterwards. Just dawn dish soap and scotch brite blue scrubbys work great for me.

I clean up my pans the exact same way, cook the same kind of stuff with similar cooking techniques, but two different brands behave slightly different.

The Henkel saute pan in the first picture is brand new, used only once, cleaned and dried 3 times (1 time before use, 2 times after). It seems to retain a slight splotchy faint brown discoloration.

The T-Fal saute pan on the right is several months old, has been used and cleaned dozens of times and is almost spotless with no noticeable discoloration.

Is this due to quality issues with the type of stainless steel being used or some other reason I'm not aware of?

Also, I know it's a visual thing only that does not impact cooking performance, but I'm just curious why they behave differently under the same conditions.

(Both are part of 3ply stainless steel sets sold by Costco and are almost identically priced).

I made some coconut rice for the first time ever today, but after it was done (turned out great), there was a thin layer of stuck burnt on rice at the bottom of the pan.

Soaked in soapy water for a couple of hours and then most of the stuff came off easily with a silicone paddle. I followed up with a diluted vinegar soak after which it was almost perfectly clean.

But I'm wondering why it stuck. This was my first time using coconut milk to cook rice. I'm guessing temperature should be lower during the initial boil and also maybe stirring the pot while boiling might have helped. Once it was covered and simmering at low heat I don't think it would stick.

Looking for comments/advice from folks with more experience in cooking coconut rice on stainless steel pan.

I'm trying to buy a gift from Amazon.IN for my Mom (belated mother's day) and I keep getting a payu api error "Some problem occurred".

I'm using a US credit card that does not charge fees for foreign transactions and I've used this same card successfully in India a few months back.

Anyone else had success in buying stuff from Amazon.in lately?