[gntvazct] commemorative honey

honey famously supposedly has extremely long shelf life.  package or repackage honey into very sturdy containers for long-term storage.  what containers are good for thousands of years?  plastic turns brittle.  rubber gaskets likely also go bad.

this is similar to old wine, sometimes also commemorative, so perhaps glass and cork is the right answer.

label (in a sturdy way) such a container marking a good event.  perhaps eat the honey later to commemorate the good times.

inspired by eating honey from the 1970s.  it tasted different from today's honey.  did the flavor change over time or did it start out that way?

[bcjntjgr] refreezing ice cream sandwiches

the common type of ice cream sandwich can be completely thawed then refrozen with little or no degradation of texture or flavor.  what is going on that it avoids what happens to normal ice cream?

[pciwmemo] caffeine spice

typical sci-fi universe: humans dominate.  (explanation behind the scenes: because prosthetics to make actors into aliens is expensive and time-consuming.)

explained in universe: Earth is the only place in the universe where coffee grows.  the species that controls the coffee controls the universe.

this is of course a parody of spice in Dune, which itself was inspired by crude oil.  parody Mentat Mantra (original author unknown):

It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion.
It is by the beans of Java the thoughts acquire speed,
The hands acquire shaking,
The shaking becomes a warning.
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion.

[jakhvnen] cube rule of sushi

Twitter user Phosphatide popularized the cube rule of food identification.

the cube rule identifies food with starch forming a tube around a filling as "sushi", but Phosphatide appears to be Japanese (based on the language of his or her tweets).  together, this is curious because sushi with rice on the outside is rare in Japan.  (the inside-out style was supposedly invented to appease Americans who are weirded out by the sight of seaweed (nori), so it was hidden inside the roll.  Japanese are not weirded out by seaweed.  seaweed, whether on the inside or the outside, is an essential structural component of maki-sushi.)

the explanation for this curiosity is that Phosphatide was only the illustrator.  the original description of the rule was text or speech by "Brandon".  Brandon is presumably American, and Phosphatide was presumably familiar enough with American-style sushi to illustrate it (as a cube).

alternatively, it could be argued that the rice on the outside of American-style sushi is not structural starch, and perhaps Phosphatide had in mind traditional sushi with nori as its structural starch on the outside.  nori is probably mostly composed of some carbohydrate polymer, arguably starch.  the rice on the inside of traditional sushi is like the french fries in a french fry sandwich (chip butty).

given this, American-style sushi, which presumably Brandon had in mind when inventing the label "sushi", is a salad.  two wrongs made a right: Brandon thought the rice on the outside was structural; Phosphatide thought Brandon was referring to nori as the starch on the outside.

[wipavyvt] flour dog

replace the cornbread around a corn dog with a different quick bread.  surely this has been done already, perhaps by people who don't like cornbread.  is there a name for this food?

maybe pigs in a blanket, klobasnek, sausage roll.

[nqmtuzvi] macrowave

what would it be like to cook with a microwave oven much more powerful than a normal consumer device?

using an electric stove power outlet, it would probably not be too difficult to draw 3x power.

can exhaust heat (from cooling microwave electronics) be harnessed?  microwave ovens are supposedly about 50% efficient.  maybe for warming water, always useful for cooking.

[mlwziqrw] Maillard pasta

Pasta is starchy so presents an opportunity to induce the tasty Maillard reaction.  What dishes do this?

Traditional pasta with sauce does not.

Broiling, pan-frying.  I think deep frying does not work because the Maillard reaction requires oxygen.

Is it not too commonly done because of the additional effort required?

Inspired by fried rice: rice is also starchy; frying it causes Maillard.

[esdctggg] Mushroom pizza

There are many types of mushrooms.  Only one type gets commonly used on pizza.  Try others.

[cyejsonm] Gluten-free soy-free soy sauce / tamari

Dissolve monosodium glutamate (MSG) (Ajinomoto) powder and table salt into water.  What amounts of each substance should be used to mimic the concentrations of sodium and glutamate present in regular soy sauce?

[xxobyyfq] Manchester cheese / Muenster United

If Worcester is pronounced Wuster (similarly Gloucester, Leicester), Manchester ought to be pronounced Muenster like the cheese.

Start an urban legend that that's where the cheese originated, but the spelling was changed to get people to pronounce the name of the city correctly.

[igpmbijs] Pairing wines with Pringles aromas

When drinking wine out of an empty Pringles can, which wines go well with which Pringles flavors?

[lnnykmvg] Banana ice cream

Mix some banana pieces into ice cream.  (Or cheat further and just mix banana flavor into ice cream.)

The traditional banana split has an awkward shape, with the cylindrical banana an unstable base for ice cream and toppings stacked on it, with the whole thing threatening to roll when attacked with a spoon.

One might need to mix the banana pieces in only shortly before serving, in the style of Cold Stone Creamery, because letting the banana freeze might make it too hard to eat.

One could incorporate many traditional banana split toppings into the ice cream also, but it further loses nice visual presentation.

Banana splits were invented during a previous variety of bananas (Gros Michel), before that variety was wiped out due to monoculture and replaced with Cavendish.  How did the banana change affect banana splits?