Barefoot Contessa!

leahyl

Hi does anyone watch Barefoot Contessa on digital? (UKTV Food) I love her recipes but since she's american she measures everything in cups! I've tried looking on the net for the equivalent measurement in ozs or grams or whatever but it's different measurement for different foods - like if it's flour it's one measurement and if it's say milk it's a another measurement.

Can anyone clear this up for me cos i wanna try some of her recipes! They are YUM!

Thanks!

Alun

leahyl wrote: »

Hi does anyone watch Barefoot Contessa on digital? (UKTV Food) I love her recipes but since she's american she measures everything in cups! I've tried looking on the net for the equivalent measurement in ozs or grams or whatever but it's different measurement for different foods - like if it's flour it's one measurement and if it's say milk it's a another measurement.

That's because a cup is a VOLUME measurement, so the best way is to stick with that concept rather than trying to convert everything to weights for different ingredients.

It's actually quite a sensible measurement system for many kinds of recipes and in some countries, like Sweden, they often quote quantities of solid ingredients in recipes in dl. or decilitres (100ml). It also echoes the way a lot of cooks work anyway, I very rarely measure anything personally, and go by the (perceived) volume of things.

A standard American cup is 240ml BTW.

Magic Monkey

Here's a site to convert most ingredients from cups to grams. You can buy a set of graduated measuring cups in most good kitchen supply stores. I resorted to using them for U.S. recipes as it was too time-consuming to convert every ingredient in a recipe to grams.

tscul32

anyone think she uses a scary amount of salt??

Abi

tscul32 wrote: »

anyone think she uses a scary amount of salt??

She uses a scary amount of everything

Sugar.. cream.. shes a woman after my own stomach. She does nothing by halves!

Snowie

tscul32 wrote: »

anyone think she uses a scary amount of salt??

scarey is it any wonder the way she is butter and
oil in to everything she cooks her food is soooooooo greasy...

I don't like her food... I think shes a crap cook and well her food isnt healthy or exciting, its more just rich home cooking....

olaola

Snow-Monkey wrote: »

scarey is it any wonder the way she is butter and
oil in to everything she cooks her food is soooooooo greasy...

I don't like her food... I think shes a crap cook and well her food isnt healthy or exciting, its more just rich home cooking....

All she seems to make are bloody SANDWICHES! There is nothing that she makes that I have any interest in re-creating. It's just a show that's on until Market Kitchen starts

peepeep

this woman is commonly known in my house as Fat Knacker. she is morbidly obese and watching her cook i'm not surprised. she uses butter in anymost EVERYTHING, and is overly-fond of cream, salt, cheese and cakes.

i once heard her say that the best way to cook vegetables is to boil them and then fry them in butter. sweet jesus.

my rule is: if you want to look like her, use her recipes. if not, don't!

SeekUp

Abigayle wrote: »

She uses a scary amount of everything

Sugar.. cream.. shes a woman after my own stomach. She does nothing by halves!

Yes, she does overdo it with the butter . . . but she makes a lot of her dishes for dinner parties and to share with friends . . . so it's not as if everything is eaten by one person! Granted, you probably shouldn't have it every night, but if someone invites me over for some rich home cooking, I'm definitely not going to say no!!

Snowie

olaola wrote: »

All she seems to make are bloody SANDWICHES! There is nothing that she makes that I have any interest in re-creating. It's just a show that's on until Market Kitchen starts

true tho I'm not mad on that show for some reason its ok some times... If i watch anything its saturday kitchen with james martin, his cooking is great and he gets some really cool chefs on tho the hairy biker's from newcastle chefs are brilliant , Jamie Olivier and rick stein and the Indian dude who opened a restaurant over here would be the chefs i would watch a lot of...

Munster Gal

Most of the food she makes looks great but I'm not sure how it would taste. She seems to use way too much vinegar/lemon juice in her dressings and I'd say she overseasons alot of her food. Maybe she should have stayed in the White House!

tscul32

One of my favourite epsiodes is where she makes some linguine lemon prawn dish. Cooks it up, puts it in a serving dish and by the time it reaches the table, all the prawns have grown tails - I mean is that a neat trick or what??

Funny, I do watch it a bit, but never have the inclination to make anything she does. There's lots of cream and butter and rich stuff, but a lot of that is cheffie stuff anyway, have seen others use as much depending on the recipe, but I just can't get past the salt. She says 'you don't need too much salt in this cos the bacon and parmesan are already salted' - so she only puts in a huge heaped teaspoon into a dish for 4 people!! Maybe I've just been doing salt free dinners for small kids for too long, but how has she not poisoned herself yet...

Snowie

what kind of name is bare foot ?

Malari

olaola wrote: »

All she seems to make are bloody SANDWICHES! There is nothing that she makes that I have any interest in re-creating. It's just a show that's on until Market Kitchen starts

What this person said ^

Plus every fricking thing she makes she proclaims as "fun"

olaola

I used to think that the opening credits said 'Barefoot Contessa... In a garden' :pac:

The Hill Billy

Snow-Monkey wrote: »

what kind of name is bare foot ?

It is probably taken from the movie "Barefoot Contessa" starring Humphrey Bogart & Ava Gardner.

toodelies

hi there,

i was in tesco last friday and found a little measuring jug in there for 99c that measures exclusively in cups.. i had the same problem, lots of recipes use it but didn't know how much it was. hope that helps!

leahyl

toodelies wrote: »

hi there,

i was in tesco last friday and found a little measuring jug in there for 99c that measures exclusively in cups.. i had the same problem, lots of recipes use it but didn't know how much it was. hope that helps!

Thanks Toodelies your are one of the few that actually answered the question i was asking LOL

Yes everyone i do realise that Ina practically makes salads out of butter (!) but i'm not gonna be cooking these recipes every day - there are just some i like OK?! ha!

I hadn't looked at this thread for days and look at what it's become.....ha:p

Malari

leahyl wrote: »

Thanks Toodelies your are one of the few that actually answered the question i was asking LOL

OK, to make up for my initial scathing post, here is a conversion table that may be useful: http://www.jsward.com/cooking/conversion.shtml

Degag

She used to own a shop called the Barefoot Contessa, she often goes in there during an episode.

Whatever about her, Geoffery is very annoying!