stupid but quick question

[kaigou]

vegetarian = no eggs = no bread ... correct?

is this generally a hard-and-fast rule, enough to consider it a pretty safe assumption?


ETA: apparently the unclear part above is my expectation that bread contains eggs. Yes, as a matter of fact, bread can contain eggs -- pretty much my entire repertoire of bread-recipes all contain at least one egg. (Some of them contain two eggs, even, and some even have milk.) This is not to say I've never made bread without eggs -- I have -- but I don't much care for the texture or the reluctant timbre of the bread when working with it. With eggs, the bread is considerably silkier/smoother, and just more pleasant and easy to work with; thus it's not a headache to let it rise six times and really become amazingly-melty. Or shorter version: bread can contain eggs.

ETA the 2nd: I suppose it might've been less confusing if I'd asked about, say, angel food cake... for which my grandmother's recipe uses the whites of like a dozen eggs. I rarely make it, though, because I hate wasting a dozen egg yolks, but I'm never quite sure what to do with them...

Comments

Another use for egg yolks

[kathmandu]

I make avgholemono broth with egg yolks. 2 cups chicken bouillon, heat to boiling. In a mixing bowl, put three egg yolks and lightly mix them with a fork. Begin adding the hot bouillon a few drops at a time, stirring constantly, so as not to shock the yolks. The idea is to expose the eggs to near-boiling temperatures without thickening the proteins. Continue gradually add the bouillon, stirring constantly, until it is all incorporated. Add lemon juice to taste, sprinkle with black pepper, and drink.

The classic version has chicken shreds and cooked rice in it too, but I'm not fond of rice and chicken is too much trouble to mess with for the little bit that would go in one serving. This is yummy, tangy, provides protein, and is very simple to make.

I would be interested to hear sometime about your family's vegetable dishes: what all did you make to have twice as many veggie dishes as people at holiday gatherings, and how did you manage the logistics of cooking and prepping them all?

[kaigou]

That sounds yummy (and we always have chicken, thanks to me, and rice, thanks to CP). Must try that sometime...

Veggies, well. For starters, I never got to be a kitchen-commandant myself; I was always under the command of a grandmother, my mother, or my father. So I really don't know how we ended up with that many dishes. But I do know that a fair number of them were made ahead of time. Pickling was frequently involved, or near-pickling, like three-bean salad, a perennial favorite. Plenty of other things are cold, but not pickled, like Waldorf salad, I think it is, and of course there's potato salad (but that actually wasn't that common). Squash was often cooked ahead of time and set out in a bowl as a cold, if cooked, dish. Baking, well, a lot of dishes bake at generally the same or near-same temperatures -- like sweet potatoes with raisins, and stuffing, and whatever else. I just recall that when the oven didn't have a turkey or ham, it usually had at least five dishes of various things. Plus all four eyes on the stove were going full-blast, if we were at my paternal grandparents, that is (if it wasn't pickled, they boiled it, sheesh, until it was merely a limp memory of its once-veggie self).

My father's parents had a huge garden, and canned an incredible amount every year (remnants of the Great Depression, I suspect, to never have an empty pantry again). During the summer, this meant day-before was spent picking vegetables til our fingers fell off (what else are grandkids for?) and wintertime, you just went across the way to the cold storage and brought back an armful of mason jars.

My mother's parents didn't have a garden, but my grandmother effectively cooked similar things -- she just used either canned goods, or things that had been canned and given to her. (She did do some canning, but mostly of figs, and not in such huge quantities.)

Honestly, I don't know how my parents managed it. From the sounds coming from the kitchen, it seemed like it was always a very close call as to whether we'd have just two salads, some bread, and a turkey... and sometimes even the turkey seemed in danger. Like the year my still-young sister turned the oven off while fiddling with the knobs. Two hours later... OH NOES.

I think the phrase we're looking for is "controlled chaos".