budrichard

Most people have never eaten true Szechuan food. The chiles are not for eating. A lot are needed to provide the correct taste and heat. Most restaurant reviwers are just journalists that a newspaper editor decided to make a critic. The only really good and authentic Szechuan restaurant i have eaten at in the US is http://www.laoszechuan.com . The 'Chef's Special Dry chile Chicken' has a LOT of chiles and a great dry coating. The heat is reasonable and the flavor great. Find another restaurant.-Dick

I seriously doubt that your shrimp were either wild or fresh(not previously frozen). Most tiger shrimp are farmed in Southeast Asia in fresh water. Because they are a fresh water/frozen product they are all mushy when compared to a fresh shrimp. We use Gulf of Mexico fresh shrimp from a vendor we trust. The shrimp have not been frozen and are crisp in texture and great tasting. They are also more expensive. -Dick

40 years ago, no problem, they all tasted the same. Today with all the carcinogens around cities I would not eat a city squirrel but you also cannot shoot or harvest a city squirrel because of firearms laws. So the question is moot! Squirrels harvested from farm oak groves still taste the same as they did 40 years ago. We just had squirrel stew last week.-Dick

Sub Zero has the worst reliability of any brand. I put in two Kitchenaid/Amana Bottom Freezer units.-Dick

The quick answer to your question is 'NO'. I was brought up on Deli's in Boston and Long Island. I haven't tried every Deli in the Chicago-Milwaukee area but almost everyone. Good Deli is expensive. Most of what i see is frozen lox, thin sliced corn beef to hide the fact that it's tough and non descript pickles, cream cheeses and bagels, soups and the like. Once I found Russ & Daughters out of New York, my problems were solved. Only problem is that the FedEx rates are getting very high for Next Day. I suppose as people moved west they forgot the particulars of real Deli, like fresh whipped cream cheese in a many flavors, sour and half sour pickles, smoked salmon as well as lox from around the world. Our last order included a side of 'belly' lox made the way it was 80 years ago. A trifle salty, a little goes a long way but so heavenly mild and fatty, almost indescribable. I hope someone will bring good Deli but I would not bet on it. -Dick

In Wisconsin branded beer glasses especially for the German brews are everywhere in taverns, same for Illinois. Stella came in a branded glass and pitcher at one location. Guiness is always served in branded pints. In fact there are so many glass giveaways for home purchase that we have all sorts of branded glasses. -Dick

The bonito flakes if top quality and made from bonito (not the ones that comes in little packets) can be used to make a 'Primary' and then a 'Secondary' dashi. The Kombu could be used for both as long as you don't boil the water with the Kombu in it. after that, throw it away. I do use the used kombu for decoration. -Dick

John's Live Poultry in Chicago has a couple of locations. I use the one on Fullerton. Everything from chickens to pigeons(squab?) is available. Before Thanksgiving, a large cart extends out the doors full of live turkeys. The poultry is purchased from local farmers and I see no difference between this source and any other interms of health risks. In fact since you can pick out your own bird and verify that it is healthy, it is a better bird. The turkeys we have had are much better than a fresh store purchased bird that is minimally processed. Rabbits are also available and they are excellent. Many of the store rabbits are now coming frozen from China! Bring a cooler with ice to chill down your bird for the trip home and then be ready to soak in very cold water. You can call ahead and pick up your bird chilled during Thanksgiving but i prefer to pick out my own.-Dick

I'm not sure Ruffini is Professional or 2.5mm thick copper. Copper less than 2 mm is used for service, be sure of what you have before damaging it. The best Professional copper cookware is Falk Culinair http://www.falkculinair.com . I have a complete set and it is great. It is literally indestructable and with the brushed finish i don't worry about polishing it. The only downside is that the larger pieces are heavy. -Dick

From top to bottom: Wusthof 32cm Slicing knife Hamono double sided Shiraki Yanagi Commercial Sashimi knife

As an Enigneer with background in metalurgy, A long time custom Knife Collector and amatuer chef, I purchased my first sashimi knife about 20 years ago from a commercial Japanese supply house in the US. It is a laminate with a hard steel core and soft steel outer. This makes it much easier to sharpen. It can attain a razor edge, fairly quickly. It will discolor/rust if not kept oiled but after 20 years, no problems. Wanting a true honyagi for many years, i surveyed the Japanese knife commercial market and found that i could spend over $2000USD for a top quality knife from a commercial supply house in the US. I contacted Murray Carter who was making knives in Japan at the time and asked him to act as a broker for an artizen made Honyagi sashimi knife with ebony/ivory handle and scabbard. Murray had one made for me by Kenichi Shiraki from Hitachi 1 White Steel. Cost was $3000USD delivered. Murray makes this type of knife but understood that I wanted one from a top Japanese maker. These knives are rare in the West and are used only by the purchaser and have to be valued by the user. This knife is an excellent performer as well as a stunning knife cosmetically. A Sushiya will probably get one of these at some time in career and it will stay with him always. They start out at 33cm and wear down. 33cm is quite long, so i like 27 to 30 cm as I probably won't wear it down much. Certainly the price is not for everyone but there are many good Japanese makers at a lower price point. This smith http://www.shop.niimi.okayama.jp/kajiya/en/index_e.html makes as good a knife as anyone. I have met him personally and have one of his Yanagibabocho AS (double-edged) 27cm. It is the sharpest knife i own. Since it is double sided and not a mirror polished like a yanagi, it has some drag while cutting raw fish for Sushi/Sashimi. I currently have a traditional Yanagi with Ivory/Ebony on order from him. For a first time Japanese knife user, I would purchase a commercial laminate blade with honoki wood handle. Learn how to correctly sharpen and care for the blade as well as how to correctly use. After gaining some experience, purchase a higher grade knife that may be slightly sharper but will have more hand work. I believe that the top Japanese knives rarely make it out of Japan because of the expense and maybe the Japanese don't believe Westerners are worthy. BTW- For normal kitchen cutlery, i have an extensive collection of Wusthof learning long ago that most of the custom knives available may cut extremely well but the hodgepodge of blade shapes and handles makes going from one style of knife to the next difficult. The wusthof traditional handle knives all feel the same and the blades all cut with the same shaprness. To view the entire line of Wusthof knives, you need to acquire a full set of catalogs as what is generally listed on sites is short blades for smaller stature individuals. -Dick

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To ANSWER your query, I always use a superior Chicken stock for final service. MY shark fins are soaked overnight in water with the addition of a little white Chinese vinegar. Then they are rinsed and steamed in superior stock with ginger slices for about 30 minutes depending on the size of the fins. Add to soup with whatever else you want. Shark fins add texture, not much flavor. If you use shreds, you may not be getting shark. Whole fins are expensive and hard to find. The bigger they are the more they cost. -Dick

This site sells only Mikawa Organic Mirin with salt. http://www.qualitynaturalfoods.com/recipes2.html The addition of salt in alcohol containing Mirin and Chinese Wines for cooking is due to US Alcohol laws. If salt added, the product is not classified as an alcoholic beverage and subsequently. easier to import, sell and cheaper. I purchase my Chinese wine as an alcoholic beverage and it is hard to find in the US. I did purchase some Mikawa Organic Mirin and found that the label did not say salt and it was in fact salt free when tasted. I promptly called the source back and he looked at the 55gal drum and there was no salt listed. This source is the prime importer for Mikawa Organic Mirin and previously told me that it all contained salt now. I ordered a gallon. I suspect when the drum is gone, the next one will be salt unless that drum somehow made it through customs. BTW, the Mikawa Organic Mirin, produced by a small manufacturer is exquisite. I won't use anything else now.-Dick

Sun Wa is not a Korean BBQ as the food is already Q'd or more correctly slow cooked becuase I don't think they use coals and you don't Q it yourself. The duck is amazing which we always take a whole one home with us when in the area. More Chinese/Vietnamese than Korean. -Dick

"Is there any way I can come close to recreating what I ate over the summer?" No. -Dick

I installed a Franke 'Manor House' sink. Commercial grade and the biggest Franke makes. An excellent product, industructable. We use Falk Culinair copper which is very heavyweight. The Falk doesn't dent the Franke and vice versa. We use a Franke arched faucet with seperate spray to avoid common problems with the spray/faucet. -Dick

My son and I went to san soo gap san yesterday. Hole in the table for the grill, big hood over the table, great spicy soup and nicely seasoned meats. A very good selection of condiments and Kim Chee. Oriental Brewery beer. Not quite as spicey as Gin go Gae but I don't think that Gin go Gae is in business anymore. Our first experience 20 years ago at Gin go Gae left both my wife and i a little queasey from the spice and the garlic. We split a six pack in short order beauase of the heat! san soo gap san is open 24 hours/day and I reccamend it. -Dick

While probably out of date, Frank Schoonmaker's book of German wine is a classic. Hornickel's ' The Great Wines of Europe' is another. Many of the multitude of vineyards names and appelations that one sees today did not exist 40 years ago and the wines were simply sold under generic names. The outstanding vineyards are listed in these books. -Dick

The whole premise of the original article is without true understanding! "Trying to make champagne someplace other than the Champagne region of France is a bit like preaching abstinence on the set of a porn film—it's an exercise in futility" Champagne can only be produced in the Champagne region of France. The rest is all sparking wine be it Cava, Sekt, , Asti (awful stuff), or Korbel"Champagne"( we all know the story). Where ever an agricultural product is produced, the product takes on a different set of charachteristics due to the clime and soil and one can never get the same taste. Comparing which is 'better' is a really fruitless exercise. One can say what one enjoys more but that is often due to what one taste buds first experienced. My first expereinces were with the European wines in the 1960's and that is what my taste buds like but there are some very good sparklers from around the world.-Dick

Philipponnat reps do it when they show older vintages of Clos des Goisses at tastings. Generally, just about a half hour to allow the wine to open up. Additionally, Moët recommends decanting its demi-sec. Don't know if it's still there, but the decanting recommendation used to be on its website. Now you've heard. Jim ← Things are often not quite what one always thinks. Since no specific reference was supplied, I went to the source. I could not find a reference on Moet's website for decanting. My question to Philipponnat: "Your website states , "Clos des Goisses deserves to be put into a decanter. With in the ample curves of a ewer, it reaches its full potential as a fine wine: aromatic power, finesse and voluptuousness." Do you really mean to reccammend decanting a Champagne and lose all the mousse? I have never heard of decanting a Champagne, even an old bottle. Please let me know if this is true and how do you decant or do you mean to slowly pour into a decanter as you would fill bottles bigger than Magnums. Thank you." Reply by email: "Dear Sir, If you value the effervescence above all, do not decant it, of course. However, if you are after taste, such champagnes do benefit from oxygenation, which is why careful and slow pouring into a decanter 5-10 minutes before serving is a good idea, but certainly not mandatory for enjoying Clos des Goisses. Be careful not to create to much turmoil so as to lose as little mousse as possible. Approx. 1/3 of the gas will be lost in the process. Clos des Goisses needs it because when we release it it is recently disgorged (still in want of oxygen) and has spent 10 years on the lees (which are “reductive” hence a further want for oxygen). If the bottle has been disgorged for more than 2 or 3 years, do not do it. Enjoy your Clos des Goisses Wishing you a happy New Year. Charles Philipponnat" So, there are times to decant for recently disgorged and times not to decant for older disgorged bottles. Also significant is the decanting method, slow. Since about 1/3 of the effervescense is lost, for those of us that value bubbles, do not decant. 5 to 10 minutes is the reccamended time, not a half hour. We have had a number of parties that we have given where I tell the servers not to fill glasses with Champagne in anticipation of service because they will lose mousse if not immedialtely consumed while sitting. I think i will continue to to minimize bubble loss!-Dick

I first ate at the Berghoff when women were not allowed in the Stand Up Bar! Every Friday we had lunch there and had the fish sandwich and a beer. This was preperation for the train ride home. The train I took home in the evening had a Bar Car and left at 5:15. If you wanted a seat in the Bar Car, you needed to arrive at 4:30pm. Otherwise you could purchase a beer in the Bar Car and take it back to another car or bring a beer from the Station. I will certainly miss the place!-Dick

And some of them, at least, will go to a bit of length to take some of them back out or to soften the wine. At Philipponnat, they decant their top wine (Clos des Goisses). Take from that what you will...but like most absolutist statements, the one above is at least subject to question. Now, that being said, I don't decant Champagne myself. But I do sometimes serve big younger wines in the same glasses I use for white Burg. Jim ← Please supply a reference that documents the decanting of Philipponnat before service. Champagnes for bottles bigger than Magnums are decanted in to the bigger bottles from standard bottles. I have NEVER heard of a house that decants its wine befpre service. -Dick

ABSOLUTELY NOT! The Champagne houses go to great lengths to put bubbles in thier wine. Anyone that thinks that Champagne tastes better without bubbles mistaken. Even old Champagnes would suffer from decanting as the aeration would kill anything left. -Dick

Oysters are like any other food product, there are different varities and they taste differently depending on where they were raised. Better to concentrate on purchashing top quality fresh oysters from a reputable source and enjoying them and learn which oyster and provider you like the best. Oysters fished in the US MUST have a label providing the harvest date and location of harvest. This must be available for the purchaser to view. If it is not, do not purchase the oyster. We purchase mostly 'WinterPoints' from Browne Trading. The quality is impeccable and the taste sublime. They are not treated or pastuerised. -Dick