Cooking food from home

There are 130 replies in this Thread which has previously been viewed 13,006 times. The latest Post (November 4, 2025 at 2:33 PM) was by Rice.

    Quote from serafina

    As I had no jalapeño pepper, I used half a teaspoon of ají molido but I guess any hot spice will work. I also adjusted quantities since I was alone and my eggplant was less than half than the recipe called for. I have to say that I must increase the spice quantity compared to the recipes I am finding online, when cooking Indian food. Either my spices are not good quality or they are old. Or maybe the recipes published online are for milder palates.

    Thanks for the recipe. Your results look great.
    I use Argentina ají molido almost everyday. It is an interesting unique spice, plus found everywhere. Though I do not consider it a hot picante spice. I like spicy recipes, but am not fanatic. From USA, a small shaker of cayenne (not this size) and a dangerous ghost pepper spice are lasting me a few years.

    In the verduleria there are small ají picante (I think they are really Serrano) which are better when they are green which also seem the most common. Too occasional to be reliable. I dried the good ones on the sunny days, and low oven (5-10 minutes on, off and repeat ). We now have plenty stored in jars.


    Interesting recent NYT https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/20…&smid=url-share

    I am not versed on hot spices, either. I find it hard to understand how much of the fresh one should I use whenever a recipe calls for it. It was also a frustrating experience to ask for advice to the Peruvians that manage the local verdulerías.
    I got my hands burnt on two occasions while cleaning it and the burning sensation is also delayed. The first time it happened I had a hard time understanding it was from the chile I had cleaned 1-2 hours before. I got scared it was something else as my fingers started burning and tingling. So I’ll pass!
    There are several articles on chiles around the internet but I cannot identify them properly when I go grocery shopping. I’ll stick to the hot spices I have in the cupboard.
    Some are Indians and some are locals.

    Dried ají picante is fine for my taste, as I am not looking forward to having my tastebuds burned.

    Time to have ready some cold soup to snack on for the summer.

    Today I tried fennel cream from this recipe, with a few adaptations to make it vegan. It tastes delicious! I also replaced half onion with some green onions, as I was unable to find shallots (which I think are nicer than onion for cold soup). I also replaced butter with EVO since I wanted to make it vegan and skipped the heavy cream. Fennel is low calories, so if you take away the heavy cream it is much healthier.


    I have seen other variants with no heavy cream but a pinch of nutmeg and turmeric, soup instead of cream (no blender is used), a potato instead of flour to make it creamier etc.


    en_v_ healthy cream of fennel soup healthy detox recipe wihout heavy cream just 4 basic ingredients by tastycorner. jpg
    Quote from serafina

    use tofu occasionally, usually to replace cheese in Indian recipes such as Palak Paneer. However, tofu has become quite expensive here, so I am limiting my tofu purchase! I find it in dieteticas, some even sell smoked tofu.

    serafina I was in the Coto and bought a block of Tofu. It is the first time I've seen in one of the main hyper/supermarkets. Still double the price of what it would cost in US. Nice to have convenient compared to my usual search for which dietetica has when I need. It is available for online ordering too, so easy to track that it is in stock.

    Coto Digital: Tu super a un click

    aficionado , thanks for the tip! $ 4.035,00 is not bad if you can buy it with a Coto discount of 15% or better yet with a 25% off promo when paying with Mercadopago on Fridays!

    My local dietetica has the Soyarroz Tofu for 3550 pesos and I can take advantage of 15% or 20% off on certain days with my cards - I see they now have it for 4100 pesos, which makes it even more expensive than Coto (but it's 450 grams vs. 320 g)! However, lately they haven't had it in stock, just the more expensive one, Soyana.


    Soyarroz Tofu Tradicional 450gr
    Quote from serafina

    25% off promo when paying with Mercadopago on Fridays!

    Exactly what I did. A monthly restock of many things coordinated with the ML 25%. Though that deal is over now as of this week unless they enact again.

    The LaNación usually has 20% one Wednesday per month. Not this January though. That has been our monthly restock deal for the past few years. With no limit to the amount saved.

    This is the Hummus recipe we follow most of the time. I say “follow” only because it is so short, plus easy to remember without having to open the cookbook which the recipe describes, named Jerusalem which I have as well. Most other published recipes are very similar. All the ingredients are common in Argentina, with only tahini needing some extra effort to source but then used for whatever else later. Easy math to make a half batch, and can use even less tahini.

    Hummus from ‘Jerusalem’ Recipe (Gift Recipe)
    There’s a lot of unattended prep time in this recipe from Yotam Ottolenghi for hummus, which was featured in The Times in 2013 The unusual yet helpful addition…
    cooking.nytimes.com