On Tue 28 Jul 2009 10:04:04p, dsi1 told us...

> Wayne Boatwright wrote:
>> On Tue 28 Jul 2009 07:48:33p, dsi1 told us...
>>
>>> Wayne Boatwright wrote:
>>>
>>
>> Yes, for biscuits and pie crusts I can do that, but there are other
>> recipes that require more precision.
>>
>
> Well, if I was a bit more organized and cooked more and used recipes, a
> digital scale would be a great tool. I'm cooking a chicken right now and
> I'm using one of those digital meat thermometer thingies that my wife
> got me, it's a great tool too!
>

For most cooking, if I use a recipe it's for a jumping off point. I
eyeball most things, especially seasonings. However, much of baking is a
fairly precise chemical balance of ingredients and I either weigh or
measure carefully all meaningful ingredients to produce the desired
results. The amounts of flour, sugar, eggs, fat, liquid, etc., are
formulated to a precise balance. I find that pastries and yeast doughs
allow for far more variances. The only digintal thermometer I have is of
the "instant read" type, but it's indispensible for many applications
including testing breads for doneness.

Having said that, when I've developed and tweaked a recipe to exactly my
liking, I enter the ingredients and amounts in a recipe database so that I
can reproduce it again exactly.

--
Wayne Boatwright
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Anybody who believes that the way to a man's heart is through his
stomach flunked geography. Robert Byrne