Catkin

My partner and I loved this salad. I used rice bran oil instead of vegetable and added a touch of sugar. I also toasted my almonds in a dry frying pan before adding them to the salad, it makes a whole lot a difference to flavour. It's best not to add the dressing to the salad until right before serving. Just lovely!

I could not find anywhere in the supermarkets over here, easy cook rice that came with a sachet of seasoning powder. What we do have are a few rice packets that come with rice already flavoured. So I decided to use easy cook long grain and wild rice that came plain and add my own seasoning. Not knowing what flavour seasoning comes with your rice over there I used black pepper, sage, celery salt and lemon peel. I also sauteed onions and mushrooms before adding all the other ingredients. Yummy, but I think I will have to tinker with the seasoning I used to get it spot on. Shame I couldn't make it as you guys do though!

Yup, these hit the spot alright! I've never made pretzels before but find good store bought ones are not always easy to find, they are often too salty for me. I like the fact that these are very slightly sweet. I brushed butter on mine when cooked and dipped them in cinnamon sugar. My first 8 pretzels looked more like knot buns when they came out because I hadn't rolled the dough long and thin enough, but by the last 4, I had got the hang of it. Will be making these again!

I wasn't sure what kind of chillies you guys used and the only jar of chillies I could get here was a jar of birds eye chillies, but the jar said suitable for mexican dishes so I guessed it would be ok. They came whole and I chopped them up worrying that it would make the beef too spicy for my liking, but I wanted to stick to the recipe as much as possible for a fair review. Luckily I did because the meat came out tender and just the right kind of spicy for me! I will definitely make this again.

I read a short story in the summer by Bill Crider about a sheriff who loves peach ice cream. His description of the ice cream was so good, it made me want to try some. Alas, as we don't have easily available such the huge variety of flavours over here as you lucky guys in the US have, I would have to make one. I halved the quantity but must admit I used less sugar than the recipe called for. A half quantity of sugar is 350 grams but I used 250 grams of sugar. The only other change I made was to use nectarines as we don't grow peaches over here and have to import them. As a consequence they do not have quite the same depth of flavour and are often disappointing. Nectarines are also imported but seem to be more consistent in quality. The ice cream wasn't quite as strongly flavoured as perhaps I'd have liked but it was still cool, creamy and unctuous. Yum!

I made this recipe because of the rave reviews. I've just eaten it and it's overpoweringly sweet. I can only think that maybe restaurant coleslaws over here are not as sweet as in American restaurants. I did expect a sweet coleslaw, but just not one as sweet as this. I tried the dressing before I mixed it in with the salad and it was so sweet it I would almost have been able to use it as a dessert sauce. I decided to add half the quantity of all the other ingredients again to try and temper the sugar and used that, but it was still too sweet for both my partner and me. I will try the recipe again and use much less sugar as so many other reviewers have done, then I am sure, it will be a five star for me as I did like the consistency of the dressing very much. I am so very sorry though, because as the recipe stands, it was not for us at all.