Episode 2/Transcription

Ursula: Hello out there, Internet-land people, to the second not-really-a-podcast from Kevin and Ursula!
Kevin: Yeah, something like that. It's not really a podcast, but it's turning into one whether we like it or not, mostly.
Ursula: And we still don't have a name for this, although we may soon, or we may continue to be two idiots in the kitchen with a beagle, although that's really long, and then we had Two Idiots Eat In The Kitchen With A Beagle and then it got shortened to Two Idiots Eat A Beagle and... it just wouldn't go well.
Kevin: That's, no. Um, no, the PETA people wouldn't approve and quite frankly, the beagle? Not really that edible. Now, of course our regular visitor, a cat, has now come in to investigate and love on things, so...
Ursula: Yes, particularly the microphone, so if we get any cat-related static, blame the cat.
Kevin: Yes.
Ursula: It was also suggested, since we're discussing reader mail -- I guess it's mail --
*cat mewing*
Ursula: -- again, if you would like a cat, please contact us, that was Sammy in the background -- um, reader mail, that we conduct a beagle review whereas we try to feed some of the food to the beagle and see if the beagle will eat it. And this would be a good idea except that it's a beagle, so every single week would be, "And the beagle will eat it."
Kevin: Yeah, in the years I've had the beagle, the only thing that I have seen the beagle absolutely refuse to eat has been lettuce. So whether the beagle likes it or not is sort of a moot point, because unless it's a vegetable, the beagle is going to wrap his jaws around it and go after it, just, happily. He loves human food.
Ursula: And also we didn't want a really fat beagle at the end of it; beagles, like basset hounds and many of the other hound family, are prone to being grotesquely overweight, so it's -- we're trying to fend that off. He's not a fat beagle at the moment, but it could happen.
Kevin: Yes... like most of his kind, exceptionally sad especially when he doesn't have a food he thinks he should, so.
Ursula: Yes.
Kevin: Well, we'll see where it goes. This week we have, um, a lot of Indian food.
Ursula: Yes, this is the week of Indian food.
Kevin: Yeah, so the first thing I should mention is I have our rice cooker going right now steaming up some rice, it'll be done in just a little bit. If you do not have a rice cooker I really recommend getting one, they are so easy, I'm a recent convert to this --
Ursula: I bought one when I was trying to fend for myself, and they're really helpful for people who don't know how to cook, because rice is kinda scary, there's all that boiling in bags and putting in the pot and it's so easy to screw up the rice, whereas you get a rice cooker and you put -- they give you a little measuring cup, you put the measuring cup of rice in the thing and then you put the water up to the line and then you hit one button, there is only one button on the entire rice cooker, and then you go away for twenty minutes. It -- and the rice is perfect every time. I have to say, it's wonderful.
Kevin: Yeah, now, if you are in an office, I was doing this earlier this week, I got some of the little cups of microwavable minute rice, you throw it in the microwave for like a minute and out pops a little bowl of rice. And that's acceptable, but if you're at home or you just like to have rice a lot, I cannot recommend having a rice cooker highly enough.
Ursula: The reason this comes up is because the first dish we are reviewing, or I guess it might be the second one because we're still waiting for the rice to cook, is Kitchens of India's spinach with cottage cheese and sauce, which sounds kind of revolting, but it's called Palak Paneer and it's authentic Indian cuisine made in India.
Kevin: Yeah, and they--
Ursula: So it claims, anyway.
Kevin: Yeah, it's actually vacuum-sealed in a nice aluminum -- well, not aluminum, but in a metallic-looking package, it is shipped over from India, it is -- um, I had it earlier for lunch this week and I'm gonna say, I was very surprised at how it was. Now, while the rice is finishing--
Ursula: Where did we get this?
Kevin: I think we got that at our local grocery store. Also, our local natural food co-op, which carries a lot of things, odd things, carries it as well. And this says "just heat and eat". But I will say about this particular dish, it is -- you can basically dump it in a large coffee mug and reheat it...
Ursula: You do have to provide your own microwavable bowl, it is not...
Kevin: Yeah, it doesn't -- it isn't -- it doesn't come with a bowl or anything like that, it's a very flat package. So it, uh -- but in a pinch you can microwave it in a coffee mug, pour it over your rice or your bowl of rice or pour your rice into your coffee mug and have it that way. It being spinach it's very green, which I'm sure confused some of my co-workers as I'm getting mashed, you know, spinach with cheese lumps out of the microwave, but there you go. And we'll heat that up in just a few. The other item we have for today is Annie Chung's -- Annie Chun's Soup Bowl Hot and Sour. This is an actual in-the-bowl, add-water kind of dish -- let's see, what does Annie have in the package...
Ursula: And to their credit, it is an eco-friendly bowl made out of cornstarch, so -- and this is a hundred percent recycled cardboard, so we give Annie Chun's credit for having the biodegradable bowl that will not sit in the landfill for the next twenty years.
Kevin: I just heard the rice cooker finish.
Ursula: Okay, excellent.
Kevin: So, in the package we have the hot'n'sour soup base, we have what is becoming very common in this sort of thing which is real noodles in a plastic bag and not just freeze-dried noodle brick.
Ursula: This is similar to the kind we had last time only a different brand, I think.
Kevin: Yup. So let's see, "Place noodles in bowl and pour a cup of hot water over the noodles to soften and loosen." This is a little more complicated.
Ursula: I will say -- wait, wait, do I need hot water for that?
Kevin: I believe hot tap water is acceptable for this.
Ursula: Better be.
Kevin: Yep.
Ursula: *wrestling with package* Open, damnable thing! ...you want to pause it and check to see if it's staticky?
Kevin: Okay.
*several seconds of dead air*
Ursula: I'm gonna nuke the water for this, because our tap water takes an eternity to heat up.
Kevin: Yeah, that's always acceptable. Now, in my office when I've done similar dishes like that, yeah, the hot water just... hot-waters right up. Uh, hopefully this week we've eliminated any static problems, so--
Ursula: But it's possible some will kick in 'cause I just started the microwave. [Transcriber's note: the static from the microwave is now a thing of the past.]
Kevin: Yeah.
Ursula: In which case we apologize.
Kevin: We do. So let's see, you're gonna need the lid next. "Using lid, drain noodles."
Ursula: Yes.
Kevin: Yes.
Ursula: All right. Well, while we wait for the water to heat, let us address one of the other things that we prepared several times now, the--
Kevin: Let's see, this is Patak's Original Korma Curry cooking sauce from Tastes of India.
Ursula: This is a more advanced dish. This requires you actually, like, make food and then put the premade sauce over it, so this isn't just stick in the microwave and nuke, but it's a really good premade sauce.
Kevin: Yeah, what I like about this is I can go and I can get either a raw chicken or, you know, some of the precooked stuff, just chop it up, brown it a little bit in the -- in a frypan, pour this sauce over it, while it's simmering make the rice, and then essentially just pour the sauce with the chicken over the rice and it's a meal, and it's absolutely delicious.
Ursula: The korma curry has -- I don't know what the spices are on, if you're not familiar with it it's this thick yellow sauce that is frankly incredibly disgusting-looking, it looks like baby puke, but that said, it's got like fennel or something in it so there's almost a anise taste to it, which sounds revolting as a savory but it's actually really delicious and kind of complex, so I recommend it highly. It's easy to find the sauce. It is suitable for vegetarians and gluten-free--
Kevin: That's if you don't add something like, uh--
Ursula: Chicken.
Kevin: Or fish or a meat. You could do it very easily with vegetables.
Ursula: We've done it with vegetables.
Kevin: Yup.
Ursula: It's really quite good. I cannot however recommend the Butter Chicken sauce made by the same people, because while the korma curry sauce is complex and tasty, the butter chicken was basically... slightly Indian sloppy joes. It was tomato-y and... bland.
Kevin: Yeah, it was not something to write home about, it was not restaurant-quality or homemade quality butter chicken. This korma curry I would expect to have -- actually, this is, it's a restaurant curry, restaurant-quality sauce, I was very impressed with it. So there's that. All right, you've got the hot water.
Ursula: I have the hot water. I have the eco-friendly bowl. I am applying one to the other.
Kevin: All right. And you use that to "soften and loosen" the noodles at this point.
Ursula: How long do I soften and loosen?
Kevin: I have no idea.
Ursula: The package doesn't say?
Kevin: It doesn't actually say, and then "Using lid, drain water from noodles." So here's the lid, I'm gonna walk across the kitchen, this'll take a minute. *from across kitchen* So, there we go, softening and loosening.
Ursula: It's not soft or loose, so I think it needs to sit for a minute.
Kevin: It might need to sit for a minute. Well, while you're doing that, why don't we -- why don't you microwave this?
Ursula: Yes, now the palak paneer.
Kevin: Yes. So, while she's getting the palak paneer ready, it's a very thin container, which is kinda cool, it's--
Ursula: Open, damn you!
Kevin: It can be a little tricky to get open.
Ursula: Oh, wow, it's like freeze-dried astronaut food.
Kevin: Yeah, except it's a liquid in there! So there's a bowl right there by the... thing, there you go. That's the one I used, I rinsed the rice in.
Ursula: Oh, okay.
Kevin: So.
Ursula: We need new Tupperware, man, this stuff's getting all crusty and weird.
Kevin: Yeah, I agree, it's on the list. The list of things to do someday when we've got lots and lots of disposable income.
Ursula: Oh, wow, good, another food that looks absolutely revolting!
Kevin: That's what I was saying, it looks pretty revolting and at first I looked at it and I said, man, somebody's gonna think I threw up into a cup, into the mug, and microwaved it. Because it's, it's -- I mean, it's mashed spinach in a sauce, so it's pretty...
Ursula: Smells kind of like a health food store, you know when you walk into a health food store and there's that weird smell that's kind of like hippies and brewer's yeast? That's kind of what this smells like a little.
Kevin: Yeah, but--
Ursula: Only a little greener.
Kevin: It doesn't taste like that.
Ursula: When was the last time you ate hippie in brewer's yeast, dear?
Kevin: I, I... you've got me on that one. You -- you do indeed have me on that one.
Ursula: I mean, I ate some pretty gnarly shit in college, but...
Kevin: Hippies in brewer's yeast is right out.
Ursula: Okay, this -- this...
Kevin: It's -- yeah, that's fine enough.
Ursula: How long do I...
Kevin: Let me look. You, um, "Cut pouch, empty contents into a microwave dish, heat on high for one to two minutes and serve hot."
Ursula: One and a half minutes it is.
Kevin: All right, we will need bowls and rice, let me get that, so--
Ursula: You get that while I assess the Annie Chun's noodles for soft and looseness.
Kevin: Soft and looseness, all right.
Ursula: You know, I really wish they wouldn't use the phrases you generally apply to stool, 'cause it's not... appetizing. You okay?
Kevin: Yeah, I'm fine, it's just, you know, the bowl's hot.
Ursula: Please note, rice comes out of rice cooker hot.
Kevin: Thank you.
Ursula: *smugly* That was for the listeners, not you. You already learned that.
Kevin: *clatters silverware* And a couple bowls for this... *more clattering* ...oh, yeah. Yeah, you can tell we're really high-tech here and we've got the fancy fancy kitchen, and we're doing a lotta set-up work here -- I think the only setup I did this week was getting the recording equipment ready and putting the -- and making sure we weren't getting any weird staticky stuff. Here's the instructions on that.
Ursula: You also prepared the rice. The rice is nothing to sneeze at.
Kevin: Okay, I did, I did prepare the rice.
Ursula: Okay, "Add soup base and toppings to noodles"... but then add more water?
Kevin: Yeah, well, you've drained all the water out, right?
Ursula: Yeah...
Kevin: Well, there you go.
Ursula: No, but then you have to add more water. This is like water roulette.
Kevin: Fair.
Ursula: All right, the thing that just came out of the soup base is this weird little square cake that looks kinda like... I'm, I'm sort of -- it looks like one of those little powder things you -- that are starting to replace dishwasher powder, that you stick in the thing, the little bricks, and then... the dishwasher...
Kevin: Actually, it looks like astronaut ice cream with -- here, give me that for a second -- astronaut ice cream with vegetables embedded in it.
Ursula: Okay, where's the topping?
Kevin: Actually, it's pretty much freeze-dried --
Ursula: --all right, there's the topping--
Kevin: --yeah, astronaut ice cream, except it's soup base, it's like a miso soup base, but... Neat.
Ursula: I will also note now they do not give you an easy access to the soup base, so you need a sharp object with which to open it.
Kevin: Wait, wait, here's a little tiny notch on the side -- no, it's not, I think you just dented it. Did you dent it, or is there supposed to be a notch there and it's just not there? Um... I'm lost. Yeah, okay.
Ursula: I have a sharp object!
Kevin: All right, I'm standing back.
Ursula: I am a tool-user! Fear my tool-using. ...I hope I'm supposed to be adding this now.
Kevin: Uh, yeah, yeah. Now the -- wow.
Ursula: You know, I realize we're spending a lot of time talking about feces on this show, and you're probably not really interested in hearing about it, but man, the hot and sour soup base looks like...
Kevin: Tar?
Ursula: Well, it's dark brown and -- yeah.
Kevin: You know what it's reminding me of, actually, is bean paste. It's reminding me of bean paste. This is, I think, what raw black bean paste sorta looks like.
Ursula: Also, if you lick your finger after you have touched the astronaut-food-cake-looking thing, it's extremely salty.
Kevin: No, that's -- that wasn't the astronaut cake, that was the soup base.
Ursula: Whatever the heck it was.
Kevin: Wow, that's, um -- yeah, I need a blood pressure pill after that, 'cause that's pretty intense.
Ursula: Okay, then "Add one to one and a quarter cups of water." *runs tap*
Kevin: Meanwhile, the rice is done and --
Ursula: -- the palak paneer is beeping angrily.
Kevin: Yep. Let's see, I think I used the jasmine rice this time. The nice thing about a rice cooker? You can buy bulk rice and you're using like a quarter cup, so a one-pound container of fairly traded rice costs... nothing, and you'll get several uses out of it. And if you have a favorite bulk rice, it really takes the difficulty out of it; the most difficult thing in the whole preparation of rice with a rice cooker is rinsing the rice so that it doesn't get too staticky -- uh, too sticky.
Ursula: I thought we were rinsing it to take the bran off the rice so that it was tastier.
Kevin: No, it's mostly to remove the starch, these days, 'cause there's no bran left on rice anymore where it's processed and... thing. *pause* All right.
Ursula: All right, we have our rice, I am bringing out the palak paneer. It's got to taste better than it looks because there isn't another option.
Kevin: It smells fantastic now. Like something actually out of an Indian restaurant.
Ursula: Yes. Slightly less hippie and brewer's yeast, slightly more Indian restaurant.
Kevin: Yes. Now, one difference that you will get between what you would actually get in an Indian restaurant and this one is when you actually get to the cheese, the cheese is not as firm. It's much more like tofu than the firmer cheese you might be used to if you've had palak paneer in a restaurant.
Ursula: You know, that's not bad.
Kevin: Mm-mm.
Ursula: It's not quite good Indian restaurant quality, but it's Indian buffet lunch quality.
Kevin: And it's reasonably cheap.
Ursula: Yeah, how much were those?
Kevin: I don't remember. And since grocery stores don't -- very few grocery stores, at least major chains, go through and individually price produce, they just scan it these days, I have no way of knowing without looking it up on the internet. That may be a follow-up post.
Ursula: I will say the korma curry sauce which we recommended earlier runs about $3.99, I want to say? But you can frequently get it on sale.
Kevin: And with a side dish, we've managed to feed a family of four with one jar of the korma curry. So what do you think of the cheese bits?
Ursula: I'm endeavoring -- I'm about to try a cheese bit.
Kevin: Okay.
Ursula: It tasted like nothing. The cheese bit was sort of a brief textural element in a sea of spinach; it wasn't bad, it just tasted like the spinach. There wasn't a distinct... presence to the chunks of cheese.
Kevin: Which is the -- is very typical of a paneer; what I found a little distracting was I'm used to a firmer cheese. And that may just be an artifact of it being packaged and shipped across an ocean before it gets here.
Ursula: Nevertheless, it's not bad. I will eat this. I'm not sure if I'd seek this out for lunch, but... I might. I could see this as an entree with a couple of side dishes; we frequently grill naan bread and --
Kevin: Yeah.
Ursula: I could see it going well as a side with the naan.
Kevin: Yep. Uh, keep talking, I'm going to get the Annie Chun's out.
Ursula: Well, this seems like a moment to address something that has come up -- we actually had reader mail, or at least reader tweets, after our last podcast, so we would like to address that. First of all, my accent is from Minnesota. I lived there for ten years, I didn't grow up there so it's not a very strong accent, I don't sound like I'm in Fargo, I hope, but -- well, I did kinda grow up there, I mean I was in college there and then I lived there from about seventeen to twenty-seven which arguably were very formative years of my life, but -- anyway, yes, I can do the "ya, you betcha, oh, dere's a ting, don'cha know?", but I try not to, except in times of special celebration.
Kevin: *ahem* Or stress.
Ursula: Okay, maybe occasionally during stress. 
Kevin: Yeah.
Ursula: The other bit of reader mail -- we have been informed by one of our friends that Cheemo brand pierogies, which we recommended last time, are in fact the toxic waste of the frozen pierogi world, that there are far better frozen pierogies out there for your consumption. This may be true, we don't know, we clearly are going to have to do more research in the frozen pierogi world in order to bring you up-to-the-date information about whether or not Cheemo is toxic waste.
Kevin: Right. That being said, I still recommend the Cheemo as an entry-level pierogi, easy to get -- 
Ursula: -- three bucks a box --
Kevin: -- three bucks a box --
Ursula: -- it'll feed a family of four --
Kevin: -- easily. All right, so I've got the Annie Chun's in front of me, and the brick of...
Ursula: Astronaut... flavors...
Kevin: ...astronaut vegetable, was still pretty solid on top of things, probably could have gotten away with that, so I'm stirring it up, but the onion aroma coming out of it, uh, very very pungent, it is obvious there are onions of some sort in there. So I'm gonna stir this up -- ooh look! There is a chunk of mushroom that is recognizably mushroom this time around.
Ursula: This is an improvement over whatever the heck it is we had last time.
Kevin: And so... it's definitely got the sour... ooh, the mushroom reconstituted well. There's no question that that was mushroom, both in texture and flavor.
Ursula: This is kind of hard to eat with a spoon. The noodles are -- they're udon noodles and they just don't wanna go on a spoon.
Kevin: Is that... tofu skin? That might be fried tofu skin.
Ursula: Such a shame when they skin the tofu. Those poor tofu beasts, having been stampeded off the cliff, then they are killed for their hides.
Kevin: Okay, I'm going to be bad, I'm going to use the fork from my paneer to grab some noodles.
Ursula: Unlike last week's review, this does not come with your own utensils.
Kevin: And we will mention when it comes with its own utensils, because sometimes that's just fascinating to see.
Ursula: Because it did not come with its own utensils and I continue trying to eat it off a spoon, I have just dumped hot and sour udon all over myself.
Kevin: It's not that hot because she's not screaming from the scalding.
Ursula: Let me point out that this is why, as some readers had suggested we should do a camera podcast -- it's not gonna happen, guys.
Kevin: I'm definitely getting the sour in this.
Ursula: This is pretty bland.
Kevin: Yeah. Well, after the paneer...
Ursula: I've had instant hot and sour soup before, we've done that a couple of times, and we'll have to do a review of that one, that is by-god hot and sour soup with the little... bits, the -- you know, the little thingies, and the little things that -- the shreds of yellow in the dark brown that look kind of like...
Kevin: The egg?
Ursula: Sure, let's go with egg! Yes. It is genuine hot and sour soup. This is just... broth that maybe thought it was hot and sourish.
Kevin: The vegetables have had a lot of the flavor freeze-dried out of them; the mushroom is picking some of that up, the mushroom at least is... The vegetables I will say again are recognizably vegetables, they have a -- some of them actually have a little bit of crunch still to them, they are not cardboard... bits.
Ursula: Nevertheless for $3.69 I wouldn't buy this for a regular lunch.
Kevin: No, not -- I certainly wouldn't...
Ursula: Annie Chun's Hot and Sour Soup gets the too-expensive-for-the-money for us.
Kevin: Mm-hmm.
Ursula: If you could get 'em in bulk for you know like maybe two bucks, they're not bad, it'd be a lunch if you didn't really care, but it's basically a glorified cup-o-noodles, it's -- the texture is better than a standard cup-o-noodles but the taste isn't that much more impressive.
Kevin: Yeah, the -- I will go with a lot less salt now that it's been reconstituted, though.
Ursula: I'm going back to the paneer. The paneer, despite its appearance, is actually pretty tasty.
Kevin: Mm-hm. So I think that will probably wrap us up for this week.
Ursula: Yes, so, to recap. Palak paneer, definitely -- pretty good.
Kevin: Mm-hm.
Ursula: I mean not, you know, absolutely fantastic, but pretty good.
Kevin: And that's the Kitchens of India Palak Paneer, we give that one... a thumbs up?
Ursula: We really need a rating scale.
Kevin: Yeah, we do.
Ursula: Write us with suggestions for a rating scale.
Kevin: Absolutely.
Ursula: I would give this one a solid medioc--a medium. 
Kevin: Mm-hm.
Ursula: Perhaps not mediocre, but medium. The Annie Chun's is definitely a no.
Kevin: Yeah.
Ursula: That is a... it's not bad, but don't waste your money.
Kevin: I suppose that--
Ursula: And the korma curry cooking sauce is a definite thumbs up--
Kevin: Oh, thumbs up on that, absolutely.
Ursula: For the more advanced, uh, practitioner, where the butter chicken is a definite thumbs down, again for the more advanced practitioner.
Kevin: And that, I guess, will wrap us up for this week.
Ursula: Yes! Send us your questions, your comments, your... verbal abuse! We're still just amazed that anyone listens.
Kevin: Yeah, pretty much. And... that's a wrap for this week!
Ursula: Tune in next time.
Kevin: Next time.
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