Yeah, the measure-everything-carefully-then-lock-and-walk-away style of cooking needs a bit of mental adjustment, but that's also why I like the Instant Pot, because most of the cookbook recipes get all of those details right.

After making a dozen recipes in it (and after plenty of reading, here and elsewhere), I have enough sense of how it works to create my own recipes that work well. In a couple months, I'll likely be pushing it to its limits, which is my perverse idea of fun.

As for your pork-belly-porridge: did you not tell your kids that that's what tiger-hunters need so they have more stamina than the tiger? Find a few tiger-molds, fill them with pork-belly-jelly and have fun decorating them. If the kids STILL don't believe you, you can show them this authoritative response :-)

A cooking rut, where my every instinct just seems wrong? Yabetcha, and one solution that worked well for me was to confess my rut to a female friend. Her solution was exactly half of what I was angling for: have us cook together, but using her cooking instincts instead of mine.

It was genuinely interesting to see where my problems lay: ignoring the wrong parts of recipes and making habitual, wrong choices of substitutions. It turned into a very interesting session because she was occasionally guilty of the same charges.

The bottom line? Both she and I had started doing just a few things wrong (over-sauteing, underseasoning ...). The quick collaboration got both of us back on track and deepened our (platonic, dammit...) friendship.

Another way out of problems like that would be to select a masterful cooking author and get your therapy there. A quick rub from Harold McGhee's "On Food and Cooking" will cure most elemental mistakes, but you have to know what page to open it to.

Both vinegars, plus the ascorbic acid, are cutting the holes. You're not killing anyone, but the now-present aluminium salts don't taste nice and won't do anybody any good.

The Club House marinade sounds fine. Anything with non-acidic ingredients would not be near as good a marinade.

Another responder mentions parchment-lined foil, which I believe is made from waxed parchment. That would be one solution to your problem, but you could also just lay waxed paper across the pork before covering the pan. If you also cook the pan covered, just leave the waxed paper there and brush or blow its dust off when done cooking.

Clootie dumpling is wonderful. Pay attention to the thick layer of flour you sprinkle on the cloot (a standard dishcloth) before dumping the dumpling in the middle and wrapping it up: the flour forms the glorious chewy skin. Here's a good recipe:

http://foodanddrink.scotsman.com/food...

If there are children (or childlike people) around, be sure to also add small sharp metal gifts to bring mystery as to whether the evening will end well or not :-)

If you're lucky enough to have leftovers come breakfast, fry bacon and then fry slices of clootie dumpling in the bacon fat.

For a truly spectacular dinner dessert, take a slice of fried clootie dumpling, top with a scoop of ice cream, then flambe the whole thing with hot liquor.

You can't go wrong with David Chang's ramen recipe; he explains what he is doing in enough detail that you can debug what isn't right the first couple times you make them (mine were still plenty edible in the meantime, but lacked that "spring").

I also dove into various online sources, but I can highly recommend "Japanese Soul Cooking" for solid information about ramen and dozens of other sorta-newfangled dishes

https://www.amazon.com/Japanese-Soul-...

And then of course there's the well-known ramen-cooking video guide titled "Tampopo," which is remarkable for having FAR more sex in it than any other cooking guide I know of.

But all that said, I would love recommendations for a more focused and technical ramen-making book. Anyone?

Assuming that by "Insta Pot" you mean Instant Pot (instead of "Insta Pot" being some actual knockoff brand, for all I know), try googling "best instant pot recipes" and take it from there. Here's one result of that particular search:

http://www.pressurecookrecipes.com/ea...

(Don't miss the New York Cheesecake recipe!)

I've been cooking with my Zojirushi rice cooker for many years, and recently also with the very capable (and similar to Instant Pot format) $40 Aroma rice cooker for a couple years, and I'm finding my Instant Pot and a charcoal grill almost capable of replacing an entire kitchen.

Here's one result of searching for "instant pot vegetarian recipes":

https://www.buzzfeed.com/whitneyjeffe...

Here's a good link to right here on Chowhound:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&r...

It might be the best soup-making appliance ever:

http://www.onecrazyhouse.com/instant-...

For inspiration, here's an excellent Thai green curry:

http://www.pressurecookrecipes.com/in...

And this old gal has some good things to say:

https://thisoldgal.com/10-easy-instan...

My best advice, though, is to try 5-10 very different recipes to get the idea of how it does what it does, get your creative juices flowing, and strike out with your own ideas. Bon appetit!

Fresh-made garlic 'n salt 'n rosemary paste, liberally rubbed into the butterflied leg which then gets tied back up and seared on all sides before roasting to 125F internal, is purty close to Heaven. I brine mine beforehand with garlic 'n rosemary in there too, but you don't have time for that, and it's not crucial.

There's nothing wrong with your "Texas Mojo" so throw some of that in while you're at it. Once it's prepped and tied up for the oven, any time you let it sit at room temperature before cooking can only improve it.

My entire family blames how my life turned out on the French au pair (named Marie France, no less) who lived with us for a month when I was twelve. Charged to feed us breakfast, she fed us buttered baguettes with shaved bitter chocolate, yum, in her bathrobe, yum...

I, on the other hand, think of the au pair experience as one of my defining moments. She not only taught me previously-unimagined things, but also how to make excellent omelettes. (She also looked like Leslie Caron, sigh...)

Strong recommendation: buy the Instant Pot. I have a same-format Aroma $30 knockoff that serves fine, but as Spinal Tap would say, the Instant Pot "goes to eleven."

Coming back to basics, the pressure-cooking ability knocks spots off my beloved Zojirushi in terms of quality of rice.