Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

Be still my beating heart as you have written about something that resonates so strongly in me. I grew up about 5 blocks from Angelo's in Flint and have been away from Michigan for over 13 years now yet my craving for a dog from Angelo's is incessant. I've had other coney's but Angelo's is still the king. Yes the sauce matters but so do the dogs themselves. Koegels are by far the best tasting hotdog I've ever eaten and as such I essentially won't eat any other brand. I'm thrilled that they are finally online and can order their sauce.

I will say a few positive things about Cutco: 1, the steel that they use is very tough so they do last forever, 2 they are built very well for what they are, 3 their serrated blades are superb, 4 their shears are quite possibly the best I've ever used - amazing.

However they have nothing on my beloved Shun knives. As said above you should put together the set of knives that does the work that you need. My cutting tools kit contains:
Shun 10" chefs
Shun 3 1/2" paring
Shun boning
F Dick 10" offset serrated
Cutco shears
That cost me about $350 and I haven't found any cooking task that I can't do with just the above.

Well on my planet a grilled cheese sandwich is a cheese sandwich and not a meat with cheese sandwich. So we don't put a protein on it and consider it a "grilled cheese" no matter how tasty the end result is. We also use a paninni press for maximum toasty effect.

My two faves are:

1) Some kind of Swiss, Gruyere is good, on potato bread, with thinly sliced lime juice picked red onions. It's like a "French Onion Soup" sandwich.

2) Brie, honey and strawberries on pressed croissant. My wife came up with this and while it sounds odd is just amazing.

The "tilt the glass" thing is over simplified. Pouring straight to the bottom of the glass will with many highly carbonated styles create more foam than beer in the glass. An initial tilt enables you to control the amount of head that you produce. That said head is a part of the aroma experience but some styles, such as Barleywine, Imperial Stout and Scotch Ale, produce almost no foam no matter how hard you try. That is why those styles are often put into a snifter to concentrate the aroma.

Anne is exactly what I was hoping FN would have the guts to do: give us a talented real working chef who is giving us a more advanced cooking show. She's as kooky as real chefs are and come across as a real person; not someone that was extruded from a "TV Personality" factory in Taiwan. Oh and not only does she look like she eats the food she makes, unlike Giada, I bet that she could beat the tar out of any FN personality except Mike Symon. My kinda gurl!

I am in fact a professional photographer and while I am not a food/still life specialist I do a bit of food photography. Making food look good in a photograph is surprisingly hard to do. Combine that with the fact that editors are constantly trying to make the images in their publications look different and new means that there are a lot of short lived trends in food imagery that don't really work but are transitional.

For the past few years we have seen loads of images of food with either a very bright/blown out background or very little area of focus, or both. As the "molecular gastronomy" trend as changed our thoughts of what food should look like I'm pretty sure that the editors are trying to stop romanticizing gazpacho and want to show it in a more modern/conceptual way. The short of it is that they don't want to get stuck repeating themselves and want the photos to match to way that their readers relate to the subject matter.

I think that they are missing the point of being a food lover: we are in love with our food and thus we are romantic. Regardless of our techniques and the ideas behind our food we want to swoon at our dish. I'm just now finishing a lovely Neapolitan pizza and when it came I just sat here looking at it as the window light struck it's balsamic reduction. That's what we do! Right? (www.protospizza.com They make a very nice pie)

So don't freak. Magazine photo editors are most likely not foodies even if they work for Gourmet. This trend will pass as we tell them that they have disconnected with the hearts and passion of their readers.

I used to want to smack the smirk off of Bobby's face. But in the last few years he has for some reason tamed down his New Yawk attitude and be come more personable. Now I don't mind him and do enjoy the Throwdown show for two reasons: 1) I often learn something from the challenged cook and 2) Bobby often goes down in flames. Yeah he does win from time to time but when he loses it's grand to see someone not TV famous show up Bobby.

Although he has branched out from his trusted blue corn, chipotle and mango salsa routine but he has nothing on Mario or Morimoto in terms of depth of skill and food knowledge/daring. Even Cat Cora and Mike Symon are pulling things out of their chefs hats that make Bobby look like the boring old chef who needs to step away from the tired classics.

Still although he's a bit jerky but boy can cook up a storm no doubt. But if I had my pick of an Iron Chef to cook for me he would be my last choice.

I have spoiled my wife with my fresh pasta. She doesn't want store bought dry pasta anymore. Get the pasta roller attachment for the Kitchenaid. You will be amazed. Making pasta is simple, cheap and for me the big difference is the texture - smooth and silky.

I'll take Mario as head Chef, Rick Bayless as Sous, Adria for color with Bourdain for play-by-play and let them all go to down. Resurrect the whole band that Miles Davis had for the "Kind Of Blue" sessions and just let them jam while we all sit on a mountain top in Aspen without any tourists on a perfect fall evening.

Sorry folks at Budweiser but what makes craft beer what it is comes down to two main things:

1) Creativity. Craft brewmasters don't try to come up with new recipes that are designed specifically to grab a certain market niche. They make them because they love to explore the world that beer brings us and they want to find new worlds of flavor and not new market share. The beers that the mega-breweries like Bud make are aimed at the largest and least adventurous segment of the populace. They are all nice, simple, uncomplicated and thus nearly flavorless.

2) They are brewers first and businesses second. Most great craft brewers started as impassioned home brewers and their love for making the beers that excite them so much also means that they are willing to have a smaller profit margin as their material costs tend to be much higher and they can't command the lower price the big guys can do to the vast quantities that they purchase.

Still if AB can make a beer that is a "gateway" beer for millions of Bud Light drinkers who can then gain a taste for the good stuff then all power to them.

Frying is like any cooking technique: if it does what you want, do it and do it right. I saute most of the time, pan fry occasionally but use my deep fryer about once a week. I saute in e.v. olive oil/butter/bacon grease/lard/toasted sesame oil/duck fat for flavor at lower heats, ghee and canola oil for high heat. Pan and deep frying is done here in canola oil. I'd use peanut oil but it's rather expensive here. Yeah, I have a lot of fats in the kitchen!

Favorite fried treats?

Slice tortillas and drop 'em in the deep fryer for the best chips. I make them often.

Saute fingerling potatoes in duck fat and garlic. Heaven!

Drop some shrimp into a very hot saute pan with toasted sesame oil and ghee for tender and crunchy Asian delights.

Wow. I pulled my copy of Steingarten's book just last night just for his thoughts on fries. How funky is THAT? I followed his instructions and my fries were superb - easily the best that I've ever done. The main difference between the instructions that I've used prior - Bourdain's - is that Joel wants you to blanch longer. Oh that and to fry them in horse fat which for obvious reasons wasn't going to happen. Still the 10 minute blanch was the ticket. Alton says 320deg for the blanch but frankly the 260deg blanch that Bourdain and Roubuchon suggest doesn't make for a greasy fry.

(Oh and they went perfect with my Slow Roast Jerk Chicken Wings and horseradish ranch dipping sauce!)