If I had to choose between running water and a vegetable peeler, I’m not sure which one I’d pick.
Anyhow, here’s last night’s discovery:
We already knew that slivers of parmesan cheese taste better than slices. Thinner = more flavorful.
Certain people are not reliable with a paring knife. For necessary thinness.
Vegetable peelers are designed for shaving slivers.
It works! Block of Parmesan + Vegetable Peeler = Fluffy Pile of Parmesan Slivers. Fast. And then it is so easy to pretend to be generous to the cheese vultures, because each 1” x 2″ sliver is only a minuscule portion of your cheese pile.
Some discoveries are too good not to share. Now returning to the regularly scheduled Not A Cooking Blog.
As I peel very few things and as I was forced to rely on bottled water to brush my teeth when I was traveling through Bolivia, I think I would take water over a potato peeler.
I peel a lot. I know that in theory I could learn to use a paring knife to do all these jobs. But so far that skill eludes me. In contrast, the water . . . it all just depends on the inconvenience level. Probably in my decrepitude, I’d cave and vote water though, and just tell the family they had to live without peeled items.
Actually, I would have to have a peeler in certain circumstances. My husband’s parents peel everything – including pears (???) – but do not have a potato peeler. When we visit (fortunately, he has gone alone for the past two years), we do all the cooking because they are in crummy shape. Probably their meanness taking its toll. For Christmas two years ago, we gave them a decent chef’s knife, not because we worried about them but because we wanted decent equipment to work with when we were there. And I packed my potato peeler to take with me. Even though my husband prefers unpeeled apples in his pie and unpeeled potatoes for mashed, his mom insists I peel everything. “He likes them peeled,” she tells me. Even though he doesn’t.
I just pack my own knife. Though I bring little knife sharpeners as house-guest gifts. I think I’m the Johnny Appleseed of knife sharpeners.