sharksoup

Pulling a very dated thread forward! I've been trying unsuccessfully to track down a copy of this supplement, which I received back in 2006 as part of my subscription, but have since lost it and moved houses. I messaged with Ruch Reichl about 3 years ago and she wasn't able to send me one. Have looked on ebay and not finding. Any tips would be welcome! I loved reading it and there are several essays in there that I still think of regularly. I'd even be happy with a PDF scan or the like. Many thanks.

Can anyone help me in using my le creuset dutch oven as a crock pot/slow cooker? I am curious about cooking times and temperatures - for example if a recipe geared for a slow cooker says "18 hours on low", how would I equate that to using my le creuset dutch oven in terms of oven temperature and cooking time? Will the overall results be similar or very different? I had read somewhere that the non-tight fitting lids of most slow cookers actually contributed to the excellent results. So given that the LC lids are so heavy and tight, I wasn't sure whether the cooking effects would be the same or not. Thanks for the help.

Any recommendations for a great place to have a drink in the neighborhood prior to dining at 'Cesca? A wine bar perhaps? A hip hotel to have a nice martini?

We ate at Les Halles last night and while the food was pretty good, our server couldn't have cared any less about our table, despite the fact that we were ordering lots of dishes to try and multiple bottles of $60 wine. Oh well.

Any feedback on 'Cesca since Chef Valenti recently departed? My wife and I were considering going there for an anniversary dinner in a couple of weeks but now we are second guessing.

So how does an inexperienced grasshopper like myself know whether the seemlingly fatty pork shoulder they selected is 70/30 meat-fat or 80/20 meat-fat without grinding/stuffing/cooking a whole batch and then feeling the disappointment associated with the incorrect proportion if I guessed wrong??

I used the larger sized plate of the two that came with my KitchenAid stand mixer meat grinder attachment. In hindsight, the meat in the cooked sausage had a very fine texture almost mincemeat texture to it so I can see where it might have been ground too fine. I did chill the meat quite a bit as recommended prior to grinding, but I do recall that towards the end of the grinding process the meat was not coming through the plates too cleanly; it seemed to be backed up a bit and bulging out, so maybe it was getting ground too finely.

Just tried my hand for the first time last weekend at home sausage making. I made a recipe from Paul Kirk's "Championship Barbecue" book. It's called Beginners Chilli Sausage, and it's basically ground pork shoulder seasoned with chilli powders and other spices. I started with 3.5 lbs of pork shoulder that was quite fatty as I cubed it and ground it. However the resulting sausage after cooking was rather dry. I grilled the sausage no differently than I've ever grilled any purchased sausages so I think I can safely rule out the cooking process as causing the dryness. I know there are a lot of guidelines about the proper fat content for making proper sausage (about one-third), but I've read a number of recipes like Paul Kirk's and others that use just pork butt (as I did) with no additional fat. How do you know if the pork you are using is fatty enough to produce the right moisture and texture? Does the amount of mixing/kneading you do to the meat prior to stuffing it affect the final moisture? Because I donned a pair of rubber gloves and really mixed it well. Thanks for any tips.

I'm headed for Paris in two weeks, and I keep seeing references to Patricia Wells' book Food Lovers Guide to Paris. But as best I can tell it was published in 1999, and I cannot find anything from her more current. Would you still recommend this, or is there a book more recent you'd recommend instead? Thanks.

Hmmmm.

True public interest or shameful self-promotion?? My curiosity piqued, I linked to your suggested site and read the review of the movie Sideways. The author of this review, "Les Combettes", just happens to mention a CDR that they drank recently, which is the exact same wine that "Carema" reviews in this Wine forum, a few threads down the page, complete with the same suggested food pairing with lamb shank or oxtail, as well as references to "the shop". "Les Combettes" also penned the self-proclaimed "good stuff" about chickens and wine. For the record, your review of Sideways was at best meandering and unintelligble, and at worst, reeks of writing under the influence of an illicit haze.

What's with the Robert Parker points? Craig, usually you are so good with using real words to describe wine.

From movie Sixteen Candles: Long Duk Dong: Very clever dinner. Appetizing food fit neatly into interesting round pie. Mike Baker: It's a quiche. Long Duk Dong: How do you spell? Grandpa Fred: Well you don't spell it, son, you eat it! My response: Well you don't store it (Champagne), son, you drink it!

"whyknow" is the wine buyer at the retail store he plugs in the opening post of this thread.

My wife and I tried Hai Woon Dae tonight and loved it. We shared the BBQ combo which was probably enough food for 4. Question - the large beef bone that comes with the short ribs - how is that used? I wasn't sure whether to grill it and eat the marrow, or use it to clean our grill grate as I saw others doing, or what...