Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

I buy the TJ's Kansas City sauce whenever I'm there. I'm not much of a BBQ sauce lover, but this is the one for me. Also, it doesn't have HFCS in it, a definite plus in our book.

@simon: If carbs are what make people fat, then the Asians would be the fattest race in the world, followed by the Italians and the French. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Asians eat noodles and white rice all the time, yet they're some of the thinnest people out there.

Take it from someone who lost 30 pounds in 8 months: the best way to do it is to count your calories and eat less than what your body requires for you to maintain your weight. A good way to increase your metabolism, and to increase the caloric deficit needed, is to increase the amount of calories burned, not just the calories ingested (by exercising).

You can also make better choices during your business meals. Order a poached egg with a side of fruit, or a multigrain bagel with light cream cheese instead of an omelet, fried eggs, or a breakfast sandwich. For lunch, you don't have to limit yourself to a salad, either. You can order lean meats (buffalo instead of beef, baked/poached fish instead of pan cooked with butter, or baked chicken instead of fried) with healthy sides. This will help you keep your business breakfast/lunches sensible. If you want to splurge, go ahead! Just take half of it home and eat it as your dinner or lunch the next day.

I see they use farm-raised salmon. Any sushi place that doesn't use wild-caught isn't worth mentioning.

I don't mean to be a snob about it, but farm-raised salmon is horrible for the environment and isn't very healthy, either.

The Double-Down is only 540 calories for the original recipe, not bad for a lunch if you combine it with mashed potatoes and a no-calorie drink (such as water, diet soda, or unsweetened Iced Tea).

Ah, the flavors of my youth! Still, to this day, I prefer a grilled cheese made with American cheese (Kraft is my favorite sliced American cheese product). I like the subtleties and delicacy of making a gourmet grilled cheese with real cheeses, but the comfort factor is just not there without the good-ol American cheese product. Add a bit of bacon and all is good in the world!

My one complaint is the sun/heat. If I can sit in a cool, shaded location I'll sit outside. Otherwise, I want to be inside with the AC on full blast.

I use my immersion blender with the whisk attachment (I'm lazy like that). Also, I don't use a double boiler, as the blender beats the sauce onto the walls if I use a wide dish.

I do mine in a measuring cup with the following recipe:

1 egg yolk
2 tsp lemon juice
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1/8 tsp salt
1/2 stick of butter, melted in the microwave (on 20% power) in another measuring cup

Basically, I start with everything but the butter in the measuring cup and then I dip it a bowl with hot water (around 190 degrees) for 20 seconds and then beat the egg for about 45-60 seconds (this will allow the egg yolk to thicken nicely).

After this, I proceed to pour the still-warm butter into the measuring cup with the beaten mixture one drop at a time (I start by dripping in two drops a second for the first two minutes, then I can speed up the dripping). This allows the sauce to emulsify rather nicely.

If you're worried about the sauce not emulsifying, you can add 1/16th of a tsp of mustard powder to the mix. You won't be able to taste it but it will really help with the emulsion.

I've been using the same cast iron pan for about 10 years now and it's never seen a drop of soap since I brought it home and washed it before seasoning it. I take care of it the Alton Brown way:

After use, I will scrub the pan with kosher salt and a paper towel. If the pan has cooled too much and there are some stubborn spots, I'll pour a half cup of water into the pan after I've re-heated it and, basically, deglaze it. I then proceed to dry and re-oil the pan slightly with vegetable oil before storing. Seems to work really well.

I just tried them this weekend. Maybe I got lucky because mine tasted like they had just come out from under the broiler. The three that I got just happened to have a lot of meat on them, too (not like the middle one in your picture, that looks like it barely has any meat on that bone!). The smoke was there, but not overwhelming, and they weren't as salty as I expected them to be. Other than the regular BK BBQ sauce (which I hadn't had since I was 10, and for good reason), I found no fault in them. Admittedly, my sample size is quite small, but they tasted very good without the addition of the BK sauce.

I do have to complain about the price, tho. Paying a buck a rib(let) is a bit pricey! That's almost what I expect to pay at a fast food restaurant (Chili's, Applebees, TGI Fridays) with a big plate of fries. Hell, you can go to Golden Corral and get all-you-can-eat ribs for about $10!

Funny you should post this today. I was watching an episode of Unwrapped (from the Food Network) that I had on my DVR for a few weeks and they talked about the McDonald's fries. The episode was from 2008, I believe, and was all about fried stuff.

Anyway, they show the whole process, from cleaning the 'taters, to cutting them, to blanching them, to frying them, to freezing them. You could've just seen it on TV rather than do "research", LOL.

Good recipe. My wife was asking me about freezing potatoes to make our own fries and I told her that they would become mushy after cooking if we just cut them up and froze them. It never occurred to me that I could blanch them BEFORE freezing them. Guess I'll be doing this from now on and saving myself the money from purchasing pre-cut potatoes that I can then just throw in the oven.

I've been cooking pasta in a medium-sized pot (say 4-6 quarts) with enough water to barely cover the pasta (say, about 3-4 quarts) for years. That's how my (Puerto Rican) grandmother taught me and that's what I've always done. I like the fact that the water is starchier and thus makes for a starchier pasta that sticks to the sauce better. I always thought that having less water to heat made it come back to a boil faster (that's what my grandma told me and it makes sense) and so that's the reason she used to use a smaller pot with less water (we also snap long noodles like spaghetti in half anyway).

I submitted my burger, but only after having tons of problems with their software rejecting my entry due to a "bad word." After a half hour, it turned out to be the word "heart" in my description (as in my burger "isn't for the feint of heart"). Anywho, my Border Burger (with jack cheese, bacon, fried jalapenos, guacamole, and a few secret ingredients) has been submitted.