HKDave

Last thing you want to do, maybe, but it's the first thing I want to do. I can't sleep for hours after quitting time. Might as well have a cold one and chill out. Late night bars are used to greasy cooks coming in after midnight, and in my experience, they treat us well. A major unsung benefit of pro cooking is how good a cold beer tastes after a shift. Nothing like it.

Have you tried Puddifoot? http://www.puddifoot.com/

Andrea Nguyen's 'Into the Vietnamese Kitchen' Ann Le's 'The Little Saigon Cookbook'

I've had this happen. It comes from the sodium nitrite in the pink salt not penetrating fully. Three possible solutions: - Use a longer cure time (you did a longer cure than the recipe, but your brisket was also bigger than the recipe, so it probably needed the extra time), or - Inject some brine at the start, or - Just cut the thick part of the brisket in half when placing it in the brine so the cure can penetrate more easily.

Oiled kraft paper (plain brown) lunch bags work for en papillote, too.

Previous thread: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=29173&st=0&

It's not shoulder/chuck. It's sirloin: http://www.beeffoodservice.com/Cuts/Info.aspx?Code=42 It doesn't look like it needs to be broken down further. In the photo it looks like you've got the top muscle of the Top Sirloin Butt sub-primal. Nice marbling. It can be cut across the grain into steaks, which is what usually happens to this cut in restaurants. If you do this, it'll be slightly chewier than strip loin or rib eye. You could braise it but that would be a waste; there are cheaper cuts that are better for braising. I'd roast it. You could use the AB prime rib technique, but I like to sear first, then go to 225-250F oven. That way you won't have to wonder how much the temperature will rise during the final sear - because you won't need to do one. If you're worried about getting too much cooking between the sear and the time the oven drops to 250F, just pull the roast out and leave the oven door open for a minute (or pan sear, then go straight to 250F oven).

Ummm, what's so Keller-esque about this sandwich? It's just a BELTCH - bacon, egg, lettuce, tomato and cheese. First time I remember having one was at Glady's Snack Bar in Vancouver in the 70's, and it still occasionally appears on the menu at other restaurants in that town (currently, it's at Paul's Omelettery). Great sandwich, but not original by any stretch.

would grinding the seasonings with the meat have any effect on if the meat would become crumbly or not? ← Not directly. But when seasonings are added after grinding, you've got to mix them into the ground meat, and I've had problems with emulsification from this step. Now I always season before grinding. Not sure if the benefit comes from less handling of the ground meat, or from less exposure of ground meat to room temperature, but it works for me. whiffle, are you using an spiral-feed stuffer (like a KitchenAid or Porkert) or a piston stuffer (like a Grizzly or Northern Tool)? The latter are more forgiving than the former for avoiding emulsification. If you do have a spiral-feed stuffer, maybe try hand-stuffing a couple of test sausages and see if they have a better texture than the ones that go through the machine.

I agree, use cure #1 (=salt with 6.25% sodium nitrite) in this case. Cure #2 additionally contains 4% sodium nitrate, which as Derek says, breaks down more slowly into nitrite, and as such is used in long-cured goods. It's of little benefit here. A foie torchon isn't really being cured; the main purpose of the #1 in this recipe is to keep the rosy colour, not to preserve the meat for storage. The recipe will work fine without any #1 but the liver won't be as pink. If an American recipe doesn't specify what type of pink curing salt they're talking about, it's usually #1. Curing salt #2 is always identified as such in recipes, because using the wrong kind of cure on long cured/uncooked goods can result in botulism. The two are not interchangeable. 'Sel Rose' pink curing salt is, confusingly, another animal altogether. It's a mixture of salt and potassium nitrate (saltpeter), usually from France. I don't know the ratio but from what I've seen it's used in amounts similar to the above curing salts (1t for 5lbs of meat). Chemically it's not the same as either #1 or #2 - it contains no fast-acting nitrite, and potassium nitrate acts like sodium nitrate in that it breaks down to nitrite slowly- and for this reason I'd be reluctant to use it. For what it's worth, potassium nitrate is banned in the USA in cooked foods and is only allowed in very small quantities in dry-cured foods.

I did a batch of fresh sausage with Berkshire earlier this year, using shoulder supplemented with additional fat to hit 33% fat, and it turned out fine. If you're getting emulsification issues, they're probably more related to the grinding and stuffing process than the fact that it's Berkshire. You shouldn't need to go to panadas and the like to make a pork sausage. - Are you using firm fat? - Are you keeping everything very cold through the whole stuffing and grinding process? - Are you grinding too fine? - Are you mixing seasonings into the ground meat, or grinding the seasonings and meat together? - What equipment are you using for stuffing?

I'd second that; not just well-written but also great photography. It's a good 'about' book in addition to being a 'how-to' book. You can often find old Time-Life cookbooks in Salvation Army stores and there are copies of "The Cooking of China" on eBay (at the moment) for under $2. If you can get it with the companion spiral-bound recipe booklet, even better. I second or third the recommendation of Dunlop's "Land of Plenty"; it's the standard on Sichuan cooking.

It would be unusual for any restaurant to 'thaw to order' because most of the dishes you list can be cooked from scratch in a restaurant setting faster than they could be thawed. Flatiron is from the shoulder. It doesn't need to be marinated but shouldn't be cooked past medium rare - or at most medium - or it will start to get tough. It can be grilled with the same proviso.

They're not.

DeLonghi bought Kenwood in 2001, and they now sell the Kenwood stand mixers in North America under the DeLonghi name. The mixers are still sold under the Kenwood name in the UK, Australia and Hong Kong. I've used KitchenAids (regular and so-called 'commercial' models) and Kenwoods, and vastly prefer the latter. They just seem a heck of a lot more durable. Only noticeable downside is that they are noisier. Fun fact: Kenwood was founded in 1947 by a guy named... Ken Wood.

Typically in blog posts if you go to the end of the post there mgiht be something called a "permalink" that you can click on for specific post URL. In Austin's blog you can get the specific URL by clicking on the hypertexted date given at the bottom of the post. ← In the upper right-hand corner of every post there's a Post #. Left-click on it, and a box will open with a cut-and-paste-able link direct to the post. You have to allow scripting in your browser for this to work.

Enjoy Thailand, Keith. And watch what you say around short-tempered Irish chefs to avoid future head-slappings...

Long thread here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=18720&hl= Basically, the higher price/quality grades of Chinese-style light soy sauce (the most widely-used variety) are natural brewed from real soybeans, and don't have additives. Quality light soy should contain water, a significant proportion of soybeans (like 20% or so), less wheat than soy, and salt. Cheaper grades may use less soybeans, or substitute soy products, and aren't 100% naturally brewed, and often contain additives. Many brands make multiple grades so you do have to check the labels. Usually the 'Gold Label' grades from major brands (Pearl River Bridge, Amoy, Lee Kum Kee) are 100% naturally brewed. I'm talking about Chinese soy sauce here. Japanese soy sauce almost always contains more wheat than soybean. There certainly are subtle differences between brands and qualities, and major differences between types (light/dark, or Chinese/Japanese). The Wikipedia entry cited above contains some errors, but does show the various types and where they're made. Your question about how you might use different soy sauces isn't one that's possible to answer properly in a short post, but in a nutshell: in Chinese cooking, light soy sauce is the standard seasoning. Dark soy is used where you want additional colour or sweetness, and then is often used in addition to, rather than instead of, light soy.

Not exactly. Olive oil: 74% monounsaturated, 9% polyunsaturated, 14% saturated fat. Duck fat: 49% monounsaturated, 13% polyunsaturated, 33% saturated fat. Duck fat does have less saturated fat than butter, but it contains about 91mg/100g cholesterol (similar to butter), vs zero for olive oil. I like duck fat as much the next cook but I don't use it because it's healthy. I use it because it's delicious.

I recently got given a 600w Braun. I think this same model is sold as 500w in the US. Seems absurdly powerful for the task, and works like a charm. 2yr warranty. The lowest speed is all I use for puree-ing soups, but the higher speeds are useful in the mini-processor attachment (which I thought I'd never use, but I do). The 'anti-splash' shaped cowling over the blades really does work. I wanted a Bamix - I've used one in restaurants before - but they're more than 3x the price of the Braun locally, need to be special ordered from Switzerland, have a worse warranty and no local repair centre. Now that I'm using the Braun, I don't think I'd need anything better. I would have liked a stainless shaft model but they're not sold here, and it turns out the plastic shaft works just fine. Nice piece of equipment.

I haven't attended any others schools in Thailand. A cook friend of mine just enrolled in the 'master classes' at this place: http://www.thaicookeryschool.com/ but he hasn't started there yet. If you p.m. me in a couple of weeks I can tell you how that went for him.

I took a gourmetthailand.course, and I don't recommend it at all. It's overpriced; the so-called 'school' is a crumbling wreck; the 'classroom' is the kitchen of an always-empty restaurant run out of someone's house. I saw the chef/owner (who has nothing to do with the school, other than that he spends a lot of time propping up the bar, answers the e-mail and pockets the cash) in the kitchen for maybe 15 minutes in the entire 5 weeks I was there. The recipes are repetitive and the whole course could be 1/2 as long without missing much. I've attended real culinary school before, but this place is nothing of the kind. The website is, to be kind, rather misleading. When I was there, I was working on cracked cutting boards with rags as kitchen towels. Half the kitchen equipment didn't work. The chef's wife had disconnected the walk-in freezer by getting someone to remove the compressor (without asking the chef) because they couldn't afford the electricity, while the chef bought a Paco-Jet, maybe the only one in Thailand, that he didn't need and didn't use. He was so worried about it being stolen that he kept it in his office; the ever-rotating staff of illegal Burmese or Laotian (not sure, but they weren't Thai and they weren't legal so they weren't talking) workers there were energetically plundering the kitchens of anything they could steal . At the same time, the place didn't have a functioning blender. Or food processor. Or dishwasher. The dishwasher had obviously been broken for months, if not years; despite this I was told the repair guy would be coming to fix it 'soon'. You'll find you're the only student. I was the only student while I was there; and the student before me was the only student while he was there. He was a Cordon Bleu chef, and he thought the place was a complete fraud. If you want another opinion, PM me and I can put you in touch with him. I know chefs that attended this place several years ago and they spoke highly of it back then (which is why I went there), but that was then and this is now. Maybe this was a real school and restaurant at some point. But the previous instructors are long gone, the place is falling apart and the chef/owner seems more interested in the next bottle of '100 Pipers' whiskey than anything to do with cooking or teaching.

At home I use 1/2 size stainless hotel pans and sheet pans in the oven, polycarb 1/6 and 1/9 pans for mise and leftovers, and plastic Cambros for stocks and the like. Cheap, available worldwide, easy to clean, stackable, durable.

Nice report. If you don't like the steelhead caviar, just tell them to leave it off and I'll be by to pick it up later! What was that dish that looks bacon-and-egglike? I think there's a caption missing.

I don't think riveting is easier than spot-welding; in manufacturing the opposite is usually considered the case. It looks to me like rivets are used on pot handles mainly in situations where spot welding isn't practical. I've heard that one reason All-Clad say riveting is a good idea is that is that it's not easy to spot-weld to tri-ply so they don't have that option, but I don't know enough about that material to know if this is the case. But All-Clad and some similar brands use forged or cast handles which aren't easy to spot-weld. I'm pretty sure they rivet because, with the materials they use, welding won't work. Ditto for aluminum pots; they usually have steel handles and it's not easy to weld steel to aluminum, and welding aluminum to aluminum is a more expensive process than welding steel. Plus if the pot is anodized, you would have to remove the anodizing before welding. So these are also usually riveted. But if you have stamped stainless handles and a one-ply-sided stainless pot, spot welding is the cheapest, most effective and most sanitary way to go. I can't see any reason to use rivets in that construction, and most brands don't. I remember the guarantee on welded a pot I got years ago (Paderno? Lagostina? I can't remember) saying that if you put spot-welded handles in a very hot oven, the welds can fail. I've never seen this happen and it hasn't stopped me from putting pots in ovens. I've had riveted pot handles work loose but I've never had a welded one fail. Let's see what the engineer says; I'm just a production guy.