first year culinary student, leaning towards coffee shops and bakeries...um...i do stuff with things?
From Montgomery, Alabama. Fried chicken, collard greens, macaroni and cheese. This place is incredibly boring and culinarily speaking unsophisticated. don't think for a moment that this is some "simple yet delicious, made with love" BS. down here it's all about cheap and fast. people eat like cattle, with no appreciation for taste, plating or effort.
why not do apple chunks(or slices or whatever) in a blueberry sauce? maybe like a blueberry compote, or something a little thicker?
That dude looks like if wolverine was somebody's dad.
Gonna be totally honest with you, i feel like not only would i always avoid a "marked down beef" section, but i would probably just go ahead and entirely avoid any store that would have such a thing.
That being said, maybe it was marked down because it was just a shitty cut?
I'm pretty sure that honor would have to go to, in some form or another, the mongolians, who ate raw beef or horsemeat toppped with a raw egg. This tradition continues with steak tartare today.
don't do global. god, no. I can't tell you how many globals i've seen with the first half-inch broken off. Tojiro knives are really good, but they're verrrry hard to sharpen. MAC knives are super awesome, but pricey. chefknivestogo.com is a really good resource, they're pretty good about answering questions and stuff too.
Carrots, maybe sweet potatoes. rutabagas, beets, turnips, too. Anything really tough, so a really, really sharp knife can shine through.
Totally read that headline as "BJ & Cannoli ice cream."
go to your local lowes or home depot and get a bernz-o-matic. i've never worked in a restaurant without at least one of these.
well, there could be a number of issues. Firstly, make sure you're using good quality stock...broth will NOT work. neither will base. Secondly, be patient. I know the food shows always show a sauce reducing in 5 minutes, but it'll take a solid hot minute...you have to remember, your home range is nowhere near as powerful as the ranges we use in restaurants. Also, you have to have a LOT. it won't start to thicken until like 90 percent of the water has evaporated from it. For a red wine reduction we use at work, we start with five liters, and end up with like 4 cups. Thirdly, if it's a butter-thickened sauce, it'll take a pretty good amount of butter to get it to a "saucy" consistency. Also be mindful of how you're adding the butter. dumping it all in at once will most likely simply cause the sauce to break. instead, add the butter one pat at a time, whisking until it's dissolved before you add any more butter. If you'd like to show me the recipe, i might be able to give you some more specific advice.
how has nobody mentioned lembas bread yet? seriously, if it's good enough for elves, it's good enough for me.
Deep-fry them and toss them in Frank's Red Hot?
I guess if you had to, you could cook it sous vide? you might try covering the stuff in olive oil, and roasting it low and slow in a tightly covered pan. that MIGHT work, but i'm pretty sure what you'll end up with is gonna be bitter, dried out garlic.
we do a pretty awesome rocky road ice cream at work that we call "drunk driving"--it's a standard rocky road, but made with spicy candied pecans, and rum.
Good, ban it. I hate foie gras because it encourages culinary laziness...instead of having to coax flavors out of ingredients through skillful preparation and cooking, chefs can just slap some foie gras on and call it a day. laziness.
So, a couple of things from a chef. Firstly,no matter how hard you try to be anonymous, we know you're a critic. it's a thing. Two, we would never, ever, EVERRRRR comp a meal for a critic. Three, as far as doing the best job possible, typically we'd make sure the front of house manager, or whoever is the senior-most, and most knowledgeable server, is with them basically throughout the entire meal. As for the Cooking side of things, when we get critics typically the exec chef comes on line and makes their dishes--or as many as he can himself, and delivers it to them. We try to keep up appearances, and act like we don't know what they're here for.
We serve an oxtails ragout with seared scallops that sells extremely well down here in Alabama. And believe me, the Oxtails ragout is the best part of the meal.
I don't have a problem with a lengthy description. I want the description to sell the food. People should be able to "taste" the food just by reading the menu description. To me, that's better than the growing "minimalist menu" trend--I don't like reading "Skirt Steak, with Marriott Butter and Garlic Herb Butter." The biggest problem with things like this is that it requires an extremely knowledgeable serving staff, and most restaurants just don't have that.
I've never used bechamel in my lasagne...I keep it pretty simple--pasta, ricotta, pasta, meat sauce, pasta, ricotta, pasta, meat sauce, pasta, cheese(i usually do a parmesan crust, i like that nice crunch)
I buy the cheapest food I can--store brand, no brand, you name it. I've been known to buy steak from the dollar store, even...I might be a chef, but at home I gotta have food to survive, so I eat pretty barebones--usually just rice, a little bit of vegetable and meat of some variety, and maybe a bit of yogurt or salsa or something, and some bread.
A couple of suggestions....
Submerge it in hot water?
Hit it with a blowtorch(carefully)?
get a flat-head screwdriver and hammer and chip it away?
Accidentally used standard paprika in a steak rub calling for sweet paprika a couple nights ago...I sold like 5 of them before one got sent back and i realized my mistake--it was spicier than all hell(there was also some cayenne in the rub, but that shouldn't have made it THIS spicy). trouble was, I had already made like 2 gallons of the stuff...
speaking as a chef, we have to make dishes that appeal to the broadest audience, and different people have different ideas of what "spicy" means...Just because you suckled on a habanero doesn't mean that the guy at the next table can handle a jalapeno...My advice is to explain to the server that you like your food REALLY spicy, and advise the chef not to hold back on your dish.
use them for stock or sauces, as part of your mirepoix. they go nicely with parsnips, if you have any. If you're fond of braised short ribs, add leeks to your mirepoix for that.
So, i kinda want to try some new ingredients, and i'm curious about some other cities/states' "local foods." Around here(Alabama) we have awesome conecuh sausage(pretty much the best sausage ever), fudge farms pork and Bulger Creek farms goat cheese, as well as Wickles, a spicy thick cut bread-and-butter pickle. Oakview Farms has some really awesome stone-ground grits, too. what are your favorite local foods?
So I'm looking at buying a pair of de buyers to replace a couple of worn out skillets. I've seen them at Williams-sonoma, and they look cool, and feel great, but does anybody have any experience cooking with them? How do you season them? How non-stick are they, really? Does heat seem to distribute evenly?
So i'm planning a vacation to new york city in the summer, and i'm wondering where I should eat when i'm there...last time i was there I ate at Ma Peche(i think that's how it's spelled) and the Park Bistro, outside of chelsea market. I think for the most part I'm gonna spend most of my time in manhattan, but if there's something great in another area i might take a day trip. Does anyone have any recommendations for a food? I'd like one really nice place(as much as $100 per person) plus maybe a couple difference casual/downscale ideas, and some bars. anyone have any good ideas?
So, I've been trying to "candy" fruit, specifically strawberries, for a while now. I tried building a simple syrup mixture(4 parts sugar to 1 part water), reducing it down to soft-ball stage, then cooking the strawberries in the mix until it reaches hard-crack stage. All this does, though, is draw out all the moisture from the strawberries, leaving a limp, pale thing, with no hard shell or anything...although it DOES leave a great-tasting strawberry syrup. What am i doing wrong here? does anyone have any experience here? I once made candied orange segments in this manner, and it worked perfectly, but strawberries seem to behave differently.
No, i mean like, seriously. I like to leave photograzing open in a tab for occaisional browsing, but i don't like that every so often, at random, my computer starts yelling at me about some random crap.
Really, it's pretty annoying. it's been going on for a while, and I really don't like visiting sites that resort to such annoying tactics. Any chance we're gonna cut these out any time soon? Same goes for the mouse-over ads, and the flash-based "pop-ups." I get that we all have bills to pay, but it's pretty ridiculous.
So I ran across this article in Mother Jones-
http://motherjones.com/environment/2011/10/food-industry-monopoly-occupy-wall-street
It's pretty important to read, it's talking about the link between foodies and the occupy wall street movement. If you've never heard of monsanto, this article is a must-read. If you don't know exactly how many companies your grocery store or local restaurant scene buys from, this article is a must-read. Even if you keep up with these stories, this is still a great article--it condenses a lot of information, and organizes things to show exactly how corporate greed and special interests are screwing over not just foodies, but also their employees, and people trying to feed their families.
So, a question for any of you folks that garden/farm: I'm looking for some kind of self-pollinating semi-dwarf fruit tree, either cherry, peach or apple. I have a pretty small yard, so i really can't have more than one tree, or anything larger than a dwarf tree. Any advice would be appreciated, thanks!
Hey! so, question. I've mentioned before my burgeoning chef-ness, and i may have mentioned my rarely-used English degree, but now I'm thinking I want to combine the two. So here's my question to all the Serious Eats writers out there--how did you get started here? How can I get in on this?
So, I found some suuuuuuper cheap ribeye cuts at the dollar tree(yes, you read that correctly. the dollar tree now sells ribeye cuts...or maybe i should say "ribeye" cuts, since i'm pretty sure it's not actually ribeye...Anyway, whatever it is, its' 3.5 oz. for $1. To put it mildly, I do not have high hopes for these steaks. Still, i bought 4, because...i mean, hey, a buck for a steak. The question now is....what the hell am i going to do with these things? they came vacuum sealed, and are about the size of pre-frozen hamburger patties(seriously), and full of nasty looking fat and connective tissue.
Any thoughts? I'm already considering steak sandwiches and fajitas, but i was wondering if the internet had a better idea?
So i went to the Dekalb International Market, and I got some Pink Koku rice, mainly because the name sounded funny and made me giggle. I realize now that this is not an effective strategy when it comes to grocery purchasing. ANYWAY, i tried googling it, and found no information about it at all. It's pretty short-grained, like arborio rice or sushi rice, and in no way pink. does anyone know anything to do with the stuff?
so it's like this...i'm wanting to make mousse, but i don't really know what's in it. is there any information, or websites or anything, that talk about how to make mousses?
So it's like this....it's about time for a new pair of work shoes; i work in a restaurant kitchen, and as such, need non-skid shoes. trouble is, i'd really like something that's...i don't know, a little different. most non-skid shoes only come in the most basic of designs, though--black, lace up plain-jane affairs. does anyone know of any interesting or cool-looking non-skid shoes? thanks!
So, it's like this...i work as a line cook, and at this restaurant, we serve a couple sandwiches, cut in diagonals. the bread knife i've been using, i decided today, simply isn't cutting it anymore. So, i was wondering if anyone could recommend a good, cheap bread knife--I use a komachi bread knife at home, so if i don't hear any better suggestions, i'll probably just pick up another one of those, as i've been very happy with it.
So, a friend has asked me to make a cake for her, and i'm using a french buttercream frosting, which only uses egg yolks. This means i'll be stuck with a lot of leftover egg whites, but I really don't much know what to do with them...Meringues came to mind, but that's about it. Any other ideas?
http://www.cutleryandmore.com/tojiro-dp-damascus/damascus-chefs-knife-p115457
I'm in the market for a new knife, and from what i've seen around the internet, this line of knives seems to be known as affordable, quality blades. But I figured it would be better to ask around here--has anyone used this knife? or any of the longer/shorter versions of this knife, or the forged version of this knife? if so, what are you thoughts on it? bear in mind that i'm a prep cook for a major hotel, so my knives see a LOT of use six days a week...how do you think it would hold up under these conditions? i'm specifically interested in how well the blade holds up. also, how's the weight? is it too heavy? in an eight hour day, i might spend five of those hours chopping various vegetables and meats, so it's pretty much vital to have a light-weight, comfortable knife, so as not to strain my wrist or hurt myself.
if anyone has any opinions on these knives, i'd love to hear them-Thanks!
so it's like this. I'm taking my advanced baking class this semester at school, and one of the big topics for this class is using sour mashes and sour mixes to make bread. pretty much every sour starter they provide has a recipe accompanying it, save for one; it's labeled as "yogurt sour," and consists of a few ounces of yogurt, a slightly smaller amount of skim milk, and a little bit of bread flour. I made up a batch, as it's a very simple recipe, and it's almost ready for use(you have to let it sit for 2-5 days, but i'm not too sure how to bake with it. does anyone have any experience with this? i may just try adding it to my stock white bread recipe and see what happens.
So it's like this. I live in Alabama, and I'm trying to entice a friend to come visit, but i hit a stumbling block when i tried to explain the food. I want to give a better explanation than "um...you know, grits and collards and stuff," but i also don't want to only give them the really weird side of things. I'm having a hard time explaining the "key points" of southern cooking (for example, if i were to talk about "italian" cuisine, I'd probably talk about wine, bread, pasta, tomatoes, cheeses, etc. if i were talking about asian food, I would bring up vegetables, soy proteins, noodles and tea).
So, since i have a new job that pays a little more than my last, i decided I'm going to treat myself to a new kitchen gizmo, an ice cream maker. trouble is, i don't have THAT much money extra, and even if i did, i really don't know what constitutes a "good" ice cream maker. Ideally, I'd like to keep it under $100, and i'd like it to be able to make gelato and sorbet as well. it doesn't have to be big; in fact, a smaller machine would probably be ideal, as i don't have much counter space or freezer space, and even if i did, i really dont' need that much ice cream hanging around my house. can anyone reccomend a good ice cream maker?
So, it's like this...growing up, we were predominantly a chicken and steak family, as my mother didn't like fish. occasionally we'd have salmon or tuna, but that was about it. But now that i'm all grown up, and possessed of a job that allows me to shop at the sort of grocery stores that rich folks shop at, I'd really like to expand my knowledge of fish; i'm a culinary arts student who probably couldn't fill his hands with fish names, and i figure that's a shame. for reference, I like Tuna and Salmon(but who doesnt?), tilapia is OK(in every restaurant i've ever worked, it's been the stock "for picky eaters" dish)...the only fish i've tried that i really love is rainbow trout. Can anyone recommend any breed of fish to look for? any good books/websites that discuss this topic?
thanks!
So it's like this...sometimes I read about an ingredient i'd like to try, but the stores around here suck. like, they're just god-awful. ain't got nothin'. So i've decided maybe the place to look is online. But i don't quite know where to look. I've tried amazon, and they're kinda hit-and-miss, but does anyone know of a good website to buy ingredients from?
So, i bake a lot. and usually I use Hershey's Dutch cocoa, because I feel like Dutch cocoa imparts a better flavor, and that's the only brand of dutch cocoa being sold at the stores i can afford to shop at(that means, the one across town where there's no AC and on every aisle at least two lights are out). but I've been wondering, what are some of the better brands of dutch cocoa? what does it contribute? in the end, does it matter? will paying $10 for some fancy foreign brand give me a better product, in the end, than the $3 tin of hershey's stuff?
So i was in NYC over the weekend, and on saturday, got to get lunch at momofuku(or ma peche, whichever it was at the time). anyway, my sister and i both ate from the prixe fixe menu, and at the end of it, we were presented with what looked like two tiny pie crusts and two...jellies of some variety(they had the same color as cheesecake, though). the music was a little loud, so i couldn't hear what the server said when he presented them. does anyone happen to know just what it was i was putting in my mouth?
Ok, here's what's up. tonight at work i was asked to find a specific recipe for pickled red onions. boss-man says it's online, but i have yet to find the recipe. so, i've turned it over to you. does anywhere know where i can find the Ad Hoc recipe for Pickled red onions?
Ok, this is weird, i know, but does anyone know what "peliq" is? this may not be the correct spelling--i heard it tonight, when my boss said to me "instead of chicken stock, use peliq--no wait nevermind use chicken stock." i've tried googling every spelling variation i could think of, but nada. does anyone have any idea what the hell this crazed honky is talking about?
so now that induction burners are down to the point where i could afford one, i'd love to get one for my house. trouble is, there's tons of them on the market, and i don't know enough about them to know which is best--does it even matter? is there really anything like a "best" induction burner? and for clarification, i guess by "best," i really mean one that has the widest temperature range, as well as general quality of construction. thanks!
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True story--I once worked under a KM who called the stuff "whore sauce."