I find the term meathead offensive. The evidence points away from processed soy products, sugar, and grains (vegan staples) and towards naturally raised meats, eggs, and dairy products, combined with lots of vegetables and some fruit nuts and seeds.
Meathead implies these optimal dietary choices are stupid. I've been avoiding the vegan threads all month, but this headline is too much.
I LOVE Breck, so indulge me a few more suggestions:
Burke and Reily's Irish Pub is a great locals bar for a pint. The food is awful. Drink at Burke and Reily's, eat elsewhere.
Rasta Pasta on Main St. is a Jamaican inspired pasta restaurant that's inexpensive and very good. The sundried tomato salad dressing and the restaurant's namesake dish (with jerk chicken and green onions) is the way to go.
For an overpriced, but wonderful happy hour, the resort restaurant off of the gondola at peak 7 (not 8 or 9-it's packed over in those joints) has a beautiful balcony overlooking Mt. Baldy and very good, if overpriced, appetizers.
If you're willing to stop in Frisco on the way to Breck, the place to go is Prost-a German biergarden with outstanding sausages in traditional and more colorado-y (read: bison, elk, etc.) styles. Very casual.
Also in Frisco: fine dining in a beautiful log cabin nestled at the foot of a mountain (Mt. Royal, I think) is the Blue Spruce Inn. Wonderful steak, duck, etc.
Have fun! Wish I were in Breck =)
I grew up in Colorado, worked in Breck for some time, and family has a place there as well. It's an awesome town. Restaurants are very hit and miss.
Quandry grill by Maggie Pond has a great view and the best happy hour deals in town. Fatty's is a local legend for pizza and beer. Hearthstone is a good recommendation for fine dining, as is the Blue River Bistro (they often have live music at the bistro). The Breckenridge Brewery is fine (and the beer is good), but it's a tourist magnet (trap?) and you'll wait longer than you'll want to for a noisy table at the height of ski season.
Empire Burger in the La Cima Mall is the best inexpensive burgers in town. There's no conventional fast food to speak of in Breck, fyi. My Thai in La Cima is a decent Asian option in a town with few of them. I always liked Windy City Pizza by City Market for delivery pie.
You say you're staying close to the resort, but if you're willing to trek a few minutes over to Keystone, the best fine dining experience in Summit County (and I'm not sure it's close) is Der Fondue Chessel at the top of Keystone Mountain. You take a gondola up, and the Swiss Raclette dinner at the top is excellent, with views you can't get anywhere else. Pricey and inconvenient, but if you're not from the area, it's an experience you won't forget.
Just made this tonight. It's a good recipe-fast, very flavorful. Used green curry paste over red b/c that's what I had on hand. Still excellent.
My one quibble with the recipe is the simmer/shred method of cooking the chicken meat. Simmering white meat chicken in broth and shredding it resulted in dry, not especially flavorful meat, even though I watched the chicken like a hawk in an effort to avoid overcooking it. If I make this again, I might use chicken thighs that would be less prone to drying out with the simmer method, or broil/saute chunks of white meat chicken instead.
Every time Rachael Ray says "EVOO", and THEN says, "extra virgin olive oil." Drives me nuts! Why bother with a cutesy acronym if you're just going to define it every single freakin' time.
Rachael Ray annoys the bejesus out of me.
with fried eggs and crispy potatoes...yum
w/brussels sprouts
Fried in a pan, then with over easy eggs fried in grease, dip bacon in yolk
Pepperoni, onions, green peppers.
cubed and sauteed with brussels sprouts
Fat free cheese is a crime against humanity and its purveyors should be tried at The Hague.
I started laying off the bagged shredded cheese when I read that they add wood pulp (cellulose) to the cheese. http://www.sargento.com/our-company/faq/#q7
Just buy a block of cheese, realize fat is not the enemy, shred, eat. Keep calm and eat real food.
Cheap Chinese takeout! As the oatmeal says, the tasty firestorm perfectly salvages the MSG goodness.
Please keep your evangelism off my bacon.
Took more like 30 minutes to get fully crisp. Tossed the potatoes in a mix of ghee and bacon fat. OH WOW. Kenji strikes again. Some of the best potatoes I've had in any form or context.
Excellent recipe. As a Colorado ex-pat living in Ohio, good tasting green chili has been darn hard to find out here. This recipe tastes very similar to the best green chilis I've had in Denver.
I was particularly impressed with the "back heat" this recipe provided; that slow burn that creeps into the back of your throat as you eat. That's a huge part of any grade A chili (red or green), and this recipe nails it. Also, do not give into any temptation to use a cut of pork other than shoulder here. The fat and the slow breakdown of the connective tissue give the stew a terrific unctuous body that I don't think you could replicate with loin or chops (like my low fat zealot mother would surely try-love you mom)
Roasting the peppers individually over the flame was a little time-consuming; I'm tempted to try the broiler for everything next time, but the flavor was so good that I don't want to chance it.
Recipes like this are why I love this site. Keep up the great work Kenji/SE!
Waffle crisp....where is waffle crisp....
There's a BBQ restaurant near the front that had great rib tips (at least 4 years ago).
Pumpkin pie!!! Hot pumpkin pie grosses me out (texture's too loose and custardy for me I think). But chill it down cold with real whipped cream (Homer Simpson drool)
Update: So, shaking for 2 minutes may not reduce the absolute temp of the drink all that much, but it did get the ice shards that I've been after. And while the shaker got cold after 20 seconds, by about a minute of shaking, the shaker had visible frost all over. So there's something extra shaking is doing, if not dropping the temp of the drink all that much.
Filtered ice also improved the flavor a bit, but a side-by-side comparison with our tap ice remains to be done.
I again tried keeping more vermouth in, and that just doesn't do it for me. Maybe a better vermouth and orange bitters with lemon twist someday, but with the cheap martini-rossi stuff, I think the in-and-out method is enough for me.
Call me biased, but I'd love to see this problem get food lab treatment; anyone could point to the sloppiness of my methodology here.
I think what you want is Kenji's take on nacho cheese: http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/09/cheese-sauce-for-cheese-fries-and-nachos.html
The work was inspired, I think, by the separation problem you mention. There's a note for a spicier version which I think you could easily doctor to get a queso you'd love.
Thanks all for the great replies. The French Culinary Institute stuff was quite illuminating to me. In the interests of science, I have 2 trays of filtered water freezing to make martinis tomorrow night. I'll try shaking one with a full shaker of ice (as opposed to 1/2 shaker like I use now).
And the disparity between the FCI stuff and the clearly well-informed ESNY & Texas Monkey means of my two martinis tomorrow night, one gets a full 2 minutes of shaking, and the other gets about 20 seconds.
Either way, I still get 2 martinis =)
Hi all,
Heading to Chicago for a conference in about a month. Staying at the hilton garden inn on State and Grand, very close to the magnificent mile.
I won't have a car and would like to find some decent local places within walking distance. Inexpensive is better (grad student budget). Any recommendations welcome. Pubs, pizza places, hole-in-the walls, whatever.
Thanks Chicagoans!
I unabashedly love a dry gin martini. Beefeater, with a bleu cheese olive if you got it. When done well, it's ice cold, with just a couple small shards of ice floating on top, a perfectly clean and cool reminder of all that is civilized in this world.
Here's my problem: I want to make my favorite cocktail at home. I think I'm close. I follow the classic Alton Brown martini recipe. 0.5 oz of dry vermouth go into a shaker with ice. Swirl vigorously to coat the ice, and pour out the excess vermouth. Pour in 2.5 oz beefeater gin. I've both stirred and shaken, and this distinction doesn't seem to make any difference. Pour out over a frozen/not frozen (again, the distinction hasn't seemed to matter) martini glass with a single olive in the bottom, and consume.
Here's the thing: my martini always tastes a little better in a good bar. Cleaner, colder, nicer somehow. I've made a dozen or more martinis this week (rough life, I know), and can't seem to get it right, nor find a solution online. I'm no bartender, so I assume there is knowledge that eludes me on the making of a good martini.
Barkeeps/martini enthusiasts of the world, I implore you: how do you make a top shelf, bar-quality dry gin martini? Is the answer the ice? Mine are whole cubes, which don't seem to shard easily. Is it that my shaker is a strainer shaker, rather than a Boston shaker? Is it that my brand of vermouth isn't the industry standard in bars? I use martini rossi because it's available. Am I missing something entirely? This cocktail is fast becoming my white whale, and ain't nobody got time to chase white whales if it can be avoided. Any tips much appreciated. Thanks!
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Does Herrod's still do their wonderful tea? It was a highlight of our trip (about 17 years ago!)