A couple of equipment notes:
- I am in the process of calibrating my oven. I bought an oven thermometer, and set my oven to 320 to start tonight (the recipe called for 350). The temp shot all the way up to 400, so I opened the door for a few minutes, and turned the temp down to 300, figurin it to be about 50 degrees off. Periodically during the baking process. I looked at the thermometer, and adjusted the temp as needed. I figured this would be reasonably safe with this partiucular dish, since the turkey suasage was already thoroughly browned before adding it, and nothing else carried a particularly high risk of contamination. I had no trouble with the ziti not being hot enough (I checked it with a meat thermometer as soon as I pulled it out), but the readings I got during the process kept tracking exactly with the set temperature. So, has anyone ever heard of an oven that heats up to higher than the set temp at first? This would make sense to me, as it would help account for the initial opening of the door, but it seems a little sophistacated for most ovens.
- When grating a lot of cheese, a food processor is a must-have. Thanks, Mom and Dad! It took us a long time to get to using it, but I am officially declaring it indispensable.
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4 comments:
My mom says that's not real baked ziti. ;D
We make the sauce first. Brown the meat with some chopped onion and garlic, add the crushed tomatoes, Italian seasoning, and fresh basil. Shredded mozarella works much better as the topping. Mix ricotta cheese with grated parmesan and mozarella, an egg, salt and pepper, and a bit of nutmeg and then mix that with the noodles.
That sounds good, I'll try it next time. I've never worked with ricotta cheese before. Anything special I need to know?
I can't think of any special considerations for ricotta. We're partial to the Polly-O whole milk variety. The parmesan and mozarella should help thicken it up so it has less of a yogurt consistency.
For the oven question, yes, it's normal for an oven (or anything with a relatively cheap thermostat) to overshoot the target temperature. It will then set a kind of sinusoidal oscillation around the target temperature. It's not really too big a deal, as long as you don't open the oven too much or too long. Let your oven come to temperature and check the oven thermometer through the window, rather than opening it. After a few checks over the course of a half hour or so you should know the calibration offset that you need to use.
That's the same reason Alton likes his remote probe thermometers so much: no need to open the oven.
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