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From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Middle eastern/ israeli/ halal style food. Kofta... falafel... gyro/shwarma... I get it on the street all the time but it just seems like alchemy to me.

From A Hamburger Today

White Diamond, a Vintage Slider Emporium in Linden, New Jersey

WHITE DIAMOND!!! My parents are from north jersey and my dad used to take me to the Clark White Diamond and the similar White Rose in Roselle. These are seriously the greatest. Man, what a blast from the past. Love this blog...

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From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Middle eastern/ israeli/ halal style food. Kofta... falafel... gyro/shwarma... I get it on the street all the time but it just seems like alchemy to me.

From A Hamburger Today

White Diamond, a Vintage Slider Emporium in Linden, New Jersey

WHITE DIAMOND!!! My parents are from north jersey and my dad used to take me to the Clark White Diamond and the similar White Rose in Roselle. These are seriously the greatest. Man, what a blast from the past. Love this blog...

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'The Asian Grill'

the best I've got is the time I was grilling onions and they fell through the grates. so many fell through, and they were covered in oil... pretty epic flare up and ensuing mess... sigh...

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: ''Wichcraft'

crabcake, greens, spicy remoulade... heaven...

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'On the Line'

i love barely grilled tuna encrusted with sesame seeds and dipped in mayo mixed with sriracha, soy, sesame and mirin. Yum!

And shrimp scampi will always be one of my favorite things.

From Serious Eats

Today Serious Eats Is One!

I seriously don't remember life without Serious Eats... Happy Birthday!

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: Vegetarian Suppers

Aloo Chole (Indian Chickpea and Potato dish). Done right, it's incredible. Aloo Chole. Wow.

From Serious Eats

A Halloween Candy Hierarchy: What's Your Favorite Trick or Treat?

I am from the sour candy generation, so one of my favorites was Sourpatch Kids. But they didn't come before:

Mounds
Raisinets
Whoppers
Three Musketeers
Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
M&M's(This I'll qualify. Though I'm a dark chocolate guy and don't love M&M's, as a kid I loved the idea that in my bag of candy was ANOTHER bag with MORE candy.)

From Talk

Myths in the Kitchen

How about the use of the word "caramelize" to mean "brown"?

Everyone is caramelizing everything nowadays. Caramelization refers to the oxidation of sugar, so since onions have a lot of sugar, we can get away with the use of that word.

Because it's become common usage, it's not like it bothers me, but while sugars can caramelize, proteins undergo maillard reactions when they brown.

In the salted, seared steak example, the great thing about salting a steak and letting it sit before cooking it is that the salt draws out water from the flesh and with the water comes dissolved amino acids, which, when exposed to heat, undergo maillard reactions and become delicious and brown.

With onions, breaking the cell walls allows enzymes in different parts of different cells in the onion to intermingle, creating gases that, when they meet the water in your eyes, create sulfuric acid. Ouch. The best way to protect yourself is to protect your eyes, refrigerate the onion and use a sharp knife. This minimizes exposure to and intermingling of the chemicals.

And the story of the flame and the onion is if you put the flame near the onion, it creates convection currents, and the fumes from the onion move with the air toward the flame and when they reach it they are incinerated. I'm not sure how well it works or how exactly to position oneself to minimize exposure, but it's worth a try.

From Serious Eats

Weekend Book Giveaway: 'The Elements of Cooking'

I think that cooking is about love; love for food, love for the people that will be eating the food, and love for the process. Creativity in the kitchen is such an important part in so many of our lives. Whether we use recipes or not, the process marries inherent creativity with something that is a necessity for life. It's like nothing else. We don't have creative breathing and we can also survive without music or literature (though I'm not sure I'd want to). It's about elevating something that is so primal (like breathing) to something that is full of creative possibility; the joy being that it can be as simple or complex as we want (like Mozart and Shakespeare, or like Kelly Clarkson and Dave Berry).

That being said, to me the most important element of the actual cooking process for me is heat. You can be endlessly creative, but you're never going to get anywhere if you can't manage heat. Imagine searing meat with a pan that isn't hot enough, or burning a dish, or letting something milk based boil so that it separates. Without control of heat, cooking is always hit or miss, even if the ingredients are fresh and well prepared.

Did I mention I love food?

From Talk

What seemingly basic ingredient can you simply not bear?

I can't stand tomatoes or green peppers. My mom's side of the family is Italian, so these two dislikes were particularly difficult growing up(sausage & peppers, peppers and eggs, tomato salad, caprese salad...) I've only recently come around on red peppers. And cooked tomato things like sauce and ketchup are fine by me. Raw tomatoes, though, are horrifying to me and seem always to be added to otherwise perfectly good things in order to "enhance" them; e.g. guacamole, spinach and artichoke dip (garnish), black bean soup (garnish), fajitas and burritos (you didn't tell me there'd be pico de gallo!!)...

i hate raw tomatoes...

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Eat This!'

I live in massachusetts but much of my family lives in New Jersey. When I'm down there, I've been known to drive out to Philly to get a cheese steak from Pat's... "Whiz Wit"

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'The Perfect Scoop'

This is a really really tough question, and Ben and Jerry's Dublin Mudslide is amazing, but I would have to say that the ice cream to end all ice cream is a flavor entitled KGB from Ben and Bill's Chocolate Emporium in Oak Bluffs, MA on the island of Martha's Vineyard. It's a mix of Kahlua, Grand Marnier and Baily's Irish Cream. It's so rich and creamy, the alcohol is still just a tad present and the mix of flavors is just perfect. It's incredibly decadent and with a few sprinkles/jimmies/whatever you call them, the contrast of textures makes for a truly transcendent ice cream experience.

From A Hamburger Today

White Diamond, a Vintage Slider Emporium in Linden, New Jersey

Sadly, White Diamond in Linden appears to be closed. There is a paper "CLOSED" sign in the window, the listed phone number rings unanswered, and the restaurant was closed and locked when visited last week on two separate days for lunch and dinner. Very sad - I only had the chance to eat there once, but excellent burgers.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Thank you for participating, and congratulations to our winners:

Catrona_sweeps
amylou61
mr guy
amaLosAngeles
nsord33

Winners have been notified by email and also appears on our Contest Winners page.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

It's a tie: Thai or Japanese sushi. Both rate high around here!

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

i wish i knew how to make chinese..shrimp lo mein

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I would love to learn how to make some really spicy Thai dishes.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I live Thai food and would love to be able to make it myself.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I'm hoping to learn to cook Turkish cuisine next - my son and daughter-in-law will be stationed there for the next two years so I'll have access to native ingredients.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I would love to learn how to cook Japanese food at home.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I would love to learn ..

1. Authentic Mexican Cuisine.

2. Authentic Chinese Cuisine

3. Authetic Louisiana Gumbo!

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I would like to learn more about Vietnamese cooking.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I would love to learn how to cook chinese food

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

My son and his family are living in Cambodia and I would like to learn how to cook their cuisine.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I'd like to learn to cook vegetarian Thai food

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Learning how to cook Indian cuisine -- both Southern (no meat) and Northern (with meat) -- like people in India do. Most Indian restaurants here just don't offer food that captures that same wonderful taste experience.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I'd love to learn how to make Turkish cuisine.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Well, I'd like to be able to cook all types of cuisine at home, but if had to pick a favorite, it'd be Chinese food. That is mostly due to the fact that I havn't really been exposed to many "exotic" cuisines like Indian or thai.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Persian, Indian, Japanese, Korean, French... I don't know how I can choose just one.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

I'd like to learn how to cook authentic Mexican. Not tex-mex but real Mexican.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Would love to learn how to cook Indian food, preferably Vegetarian and Vegan dishes, because I've learned to appreciate the cuisine through good friends and would love to recreate some of my favorite dishes, learn some new ones, and eventually get the point where I can improvise with spices and other ingredients to come up with entirely new dishes and combinations.

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: 'Modern Spice'

Defiantly Indian food --but specifically vegetarian Indian food--I'm trying to get my husband to eat less meat.

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