Store bought just as good or better than homemade...

[Harpy Eagle]

What foods have you found to be just as good or maybe better bought than you can make yourself.

Two come to mind...

The first is Gyoza, I do make my own and they are damn good, but I cannot say they are better than the frozen ones we by at the Asian Market. So quick and easy to just pull them out of the freezer and steam them. And they are a time consuming thing to make by hand.

The other is puffed pastry. Again, takes a good amount of time and effort and I am not sure anyone can ever tell when I do it myself or use the Pillsbury puffed pastry.

So, anything you all find just as good from the store as you can make yourself?

 

[wamose]

What foods have you found to be just as good or maybe better bought than you can make yourself.

Two come to mind...

The first is Gyoza, I do make my own and they are damn good, but I cannot say they are better than the frozen ones we by at the Asian Market. So quick and easy to just pull them out of the freezer and steam them. And they are a time consuming thing to make by hand.

The other is puffed pastry. Again, takes a good amount of time and effort and I am not sure anyone can ever tell when I do it myself or use the Pillsbury puffed pastry.

So, anything you all find just as good from the store as you can make yourself?

Coincidentally, I'm in the process of jarring tomatoes right now and there's no store bought tomatoes than can even compare to them. But you never know. Some people freak out over 25 cent, little Debby's chemical, honey buns. For me, most home made stuff is better.

 

[Polishprince]

Beer tastes better straight from the store as opposed to making it yourself

 

[1srelluc]

The ones that get me are canned potatoes.....WTF?

Yeah, it says potatoes on the can and there's even a picture of potatoes on it but I never tasted potatoes like that otherwise.

The big thing for me is canned beans. If I want say, white bean soup, I think the canned Hanover Great Northerns work much better.

 

[TNHarley]

Balsamic vinegar and grape seed reduction.
Its easy to make it good, but that stuff at walmart is perfection.

 

[JohnDB]

I never have found store bought to taste better than what I can make.

This includes puff pastry or dumplings.

But I'm also a formally trained chef who can make literally anything.
Some things you just have to make yourself to understand the difference.

Homemade Danish are a completely different thing than anything you can purchase in the USA. The butter, cardamom, and richness make this actually a complete breakfast....the store bought taste like snack cakes....not a breakfast.

People actually buy balsamic Reduction?
It's a thing?
Real balsamic is syrup to begin with. It comes out of the casks that way and is diluted for bottling. Sigh. You buy balsamic based upon viscosity and not the price tag....although high end good balsamic can cost as much as an expensive bottle of wine $2k-4k and up. But there's a REASON they sell it in dark glass bottles and it's not so much to protect it from the stores fluorescent lights as it is to hide the fact you are buying crap.

Of course convenience foods save time. It's much quicker and easier to buy sauage in casings than to stuff them yourselves....but what are they really putting in them? And if you actually taste something scratch made by someone who knows what they are doing and not an internet chef who learned from youtube videoes the reason why these things are popular becomes readily apparent.

Sure, I can buy raw corned beef. Or I can cure brisket myself. One taste of good real corned beef makes you spit out the store bought.

 

[Harpy Eagle]

This includes puff pastry or dumplings.

But I'm also a formally trained chef who can make literally anything.
Some things you just have to make yourself to understand the difference.

I learned to make gyoza while in Okinawa by a local friend's wife. I understand the difference, but I am betting you never tried the frozen ones made in Japan and sold here.

 

[JohnDB]

I learned to make gyoza while in Okinawa by a local friend's wife. I understand the difference, but I am betting you never tried the frozen ones made in Japan and sold here.

I'm not that big on Japanese cuisine....some things are ok....just not all. And usually just once in a while.
Most of the time I use Japanese food for various fusion cuisines.

I have a very definite style to what I do. Heavy Italian with French, Spanish, and German overtones to everything. Well, Austrian too because I like to bake and they were always the bakers of Europe. The German sausages cannot be beat no matter how hard I try....I can get close but they have had decades of practice and some equipment I cannot reproduce. (They keep secrets) But even with my failings I make the stuff at grocery stores taste like crap.

 

[JohnDB]

Speaking of which....
I do miss some things about NYC. I could get literally anything there with a minimum of hassle. I could crank out my own pasta or just buy it from the Italians cranking it out. Not really much difference if you knew who wasn't cutting it with cheap flours and was using eggs instead of water. Same thing with Asian noodles or wonton wrappers or even egg rolls/spring rolls. Them ladies could out wrap me every day of the week. Tight and sinkers every time and at least three times my speed.

These days buying them frozen is the ONLY access I have. Even Chinese food restaurants use frozen. I miss those days.

Fresh killed poultry....fagetaboutit.....that's gone. Ducks. Chickens, geese or turkeys....any kind you want straight from the farm and delivered with ALL parts bagged and tagged. Fish so fresh you can't tell it arrived by smelling it wafting through the kitchen.
Nothing like a bagel hot out of the brick deck oven either. Scooped up with a literal snow shovel from the hardware store and dumped into huge totes because they are making them in batches so large there's no other way.

Just saying....some things I miss. The masses of people, crime, pollution, and grime from the streets? Nope.