Weather plans and food

Since a nor'easter is on its way, with the usual high winds, shrieking rain, possible sleet and snow and wintry mix, where M and Ms and peanuts and raisins fall all over you, it's a good time to be thinking about cooking.

And I'm happy to report that the cast iron pans are proving to be as good as promised.  They are beginning to be really nonstick, and give a lovely browning and flavor that Teflon just doesn't.

I've been faithfully scrubbing all three pans with kosher salt, and coating with oil and so on, and they're responding now very nicely. At this point I only need to wipe out the pan with a paper towel, leave it with a film of oil, and it's good to go for next time. Definitely worth the trouble of working with them at first.

So here's a cheese omelet, turned over from each side and see that lovely netting of browning.  Served with a toasted hot biscuit and a glass of Merlot, Yellowtail, if you wondered,  nice supper while I peruse cookbooks.

This omelet was a quick meal because I couldn't think what to cook. Two eggs, some milk, fresh ground white pepper, pinch of nutmeg, pinch of kosher salt, even smaller pinch of cumin, extra sharp cheddar grated in, and that was it.  Really good.  

I have a batch of bread dough rising at the moment, and that will bake this evening, warming the house as it goes. Tomorrow I'll probably make yogurt and maybe more soup or something. We'll see.
 
Currently I have boxes of cookbooks to go through and pick what I'd like before putting a lot of them onto Freecycle, to continue helping to disperse Karen's household.  These book are all in mint condition. 

She was a collector rather than a cook, though she did love the food I gave her in her last weeks, carefully chosen to be very digestible and easy to swallow, nice soups, that kind of thing. she was a foodie who appreciated flavor and ingredients but didn't actually cook!  

So passing on her cookbooks is nice, since they're in beautiful condition, unopened, and many are classics.  I'm hanging onto The Joy of Cooking, latest edition, though, and a couple of Marthas, and the original Moosewood books. But others I'll peruse then pass on.  There are, at last count at least ten more boxes, after all the boxes I already processed..however, I have found collectors of cookbooks who will be thrilled to take them.  

And as one freecycling person said, who took a bag of brand new, still with labels attached, clothes, to donate to a parish in Trenton, and a huge bag of bears, they will be presents now, just as they were probably going to be if she'd had the chance.  The freecycler is buying gift boxes so that the people who get them really get a nice boxed present, rather than a handout.  I like this.

Three New Friends. Cast Iron Ones 6WS

Finally, I found cast iron pans which are 1. handled long enough for me to get two hands on, so as to lift the thing, 2. small enough for all the above to apply, and wheee 3. in a set.

So here they are.  I've done the oiling and baking thing to season them, even though they claimed to be pre seasoned.  A likely story. I tried a test omelette and some of it came up, some of it stuck.  So after getting the rest of the egg off, I did the seasoning thing.

I believe you have to develop a relationship with these things.  Also to patiently get the seasoning up to par before it's really working. All this I have taken into account.  Before I ceremonially dumped my old rocky nonstick skillet that was the right size for a lot of things but didn't have much else to recommend it.

Anyone with experience of these things, especially about foods that do particularly well in them, please chime in.  In six words, would be a bonus!