OT as hell: ready meals

simonk wrote:

I bow to your superior scientific knowledge. How do they make that
inside-out Baked Alaska, then? I thought that was done in the MW
because it was the only way of cooking the meringue inside before the
ice cream outside melted. Or is that another Urban Miff?

Yebbut MW ready meals aren't plated - they're in plastic or board tubs.
Flattish tubs, now I think about it, so yeah, that would make sense.

 

TOG@toil, ,

Umm, baked alaska has the ice cream on the inside...

I know what you're getting at though. The example I gave assumed a
food which was fairly uniform in terms of its composition - chicken
curry is a watery, oily goop that (I expect) absorbs microwaves fairly
uniformly, at least when liquid.

An example of something heating up in the middle and staying cool
outside would be a fruit pie - dry pastry doesn't absorb microwaves
anywhere near as well as waterier, sugarier fruit compote. So the
relatively transparent (to microwaves) pastry allows the filling to get
hot very quickly, while the pie feels barely warm to the touch on the
outside (flaky pastry is probably a good thermal insulator too, rather
like loft insulation, but less chewy). Anyone who came round for a
mince pie before christmas will have discovered this to their cost.

An analogy here with visible light is your dad's old cortina parked in
the sun. The windows of the car are cool to touch because they let the
light through, but when you sit on the black vinyl seats in your
swimming trunks ...

I sometimes make chilli etc. and freeze it in plastic bags. That
always ends up as a near-sphere, which is a right arse to get defrosted
in the microwave.

 

message

I buy ASDA "good for you" range, at last count they were 6 for either 4 or
five quid. You can probably guess what they are like for that price.

I only eat them at work when I am on nights as they are better than a donner
kebab and I have no cooking equipment at work just a microwave.

Overall slightly better than sandwiches every day and at least they are warm
when its blowing a gale.

 

Put the plastic bag in a Flora margarine tub or something until the
contents have frozen, then you can remove the tub and be left with a
disc-shaped frozen lump, which makes much more efficient use of your
freezer space.

 

On 12 Jan 2007 06:49:27 -0800, TOG@toil,

Not one I've ever heard, but it certainly wouldn't be true. The only
way you could try to mimic this would be to put some shielding all
round the edge and bottom wher you've got Ice cream and leave just the
meringue top open, but I doubt if that'd work either.

Anyway, given your job, I'm astonished at your lack of knowledge in
this area - just try it, FFS, it's not rocket science.

--
_______
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Suet keeps forever, thobbut. One nice thing to do with dumplings of any
variety: add the zest and juice of a lemon, rather than using water to mix
them. Yum.

Ali

 

Lack of artificial treatment as well, I think - organic bananas seem to stay
good for far longer than ordinary ones.

Ali

 

Ah. Doh.

If I was making that, though, I'd just make a meringue and then lob
some ice cream around it...

Guessing here because I've never heard of it, but still, the frozen ice
cream on the outside presumably lets more microwave energy through to
the liquid egg and sugar centre than it absorbs itself. Frozen ready
meals, or chilli, or whatever, are frozen right through, eventually
warm up and melt on the outside, and this molten layer then shields the
inside.

 

Hm. How hot do you have your fat?

Ali

 

Salivating? I'm bloody starving! <heads for kitchen>

The jelly is rather fine on hot toast, too.

Ali

 

Alison Hopkins says...

<jiggles oversized tummy>

About body temperature

 

Do international drug smuggler cum used bike dealers normally have an
in depth knowledge of microwaves then?

--
Krusty
www.MuddyStuff.co.uk
Off-Road Classifieds

'02 MV Senna '03 Tiger 955i '96 Tiger '79 Fantic Hiro 250

 

<snort>

--
Krusty
www.MuddyStuff.co.uk
Off-Road Classifieds

'02 MV Senna '03 Tiger 955i '96 Tiger '79 Fantic Hiro 250

 

I've eaten live clams, still wriggling. Does that count as eww?

Ali

 

I was waiting for *someone* to take that feed line. <snort>

Ali

 

Alison Hopkins says...

 

"In support of "Aunt Bessie's"."

The Yorkshire Puddings cases filled with good quality meat that's been
stewing all day with lots of wonderful goodies added takes a lot to
beat.