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Yeah, the Kyocera really isn't a mandoline. It's small and non-adjustable and doesn't do julienne or waffle-cuts. However, you can get the slicer and the julienne cutter for under forty bucks - that qualifies as "cheap" in my book. Since Nikki mentioned that she wanted to make thin slices fast I thought that the Kyocera might be of interest. For something more versatile the benriner-style gadget is probably a better choice.

Kyocera makes a plastic slicer with a ceramic blade that's razor-sharp. It's on the small side and doesn't have interchangeable blades. They make a separate julienne slicer which I haven't tried. Not as versatile as one with interchangeable blades, but there are fewer parts to get lost in the utensile drawer.

For anyone interested, I've been commissioned to translate 1994-1997 into English and I started this weekend. The translation is scheduled to be finished during the first week of November, although of course it's anyone's guess as to when it will be published... I'll keep the forum posted as to progress. Martin ← Thanks for the update, Martin. I'm looking forward to seeing this volume. This time I'll be patient and wait for the English edition.

I have one of the "armoire-style" fridges (a Kenmore) that I bought at Sears last year. The bottom freezer is nice, but the main reason I got it is for the width of the refridgerator section. There's a drawer running the full width of the compartment and the shelves can be adjusted to allow full-width storage as well. The LG model looks similar. The only downsides: The filtered water dispenser is inside the left-hand door rather than outside; No ice dispenser; You have to give the left-hand door a little push to make sure it seals (it has the swing-out center column attached). My old appliances have been very considerate. They have all died during the spring appliance sale at Sears. Two years ago it was the stove, last year the fridge, and this year the dishwasher died. I had to remove some tiles to get the old one out just as Brooks did. Now all I need is a sledgehammer to take care of the cabinets and walls.

Chefdg, I wasn't arguing with FG, just quibbling over terminology. There's clearly something about the sous vide treatment that differs from other cooking methods. I'm curious as to why the temperature is so hyper-critical (+/- 2 degrees?). Hopefully Nathan and FG will put together the eG tutorial at some point.

If the food is in a flexible container (e.g. plastic bag) the internal pressure will be the same as the ambient pressure. It would be more accurate to say that the air has been evacuated, rather than the contents being "under vacuum". When you hook the bag up to the vacuum-gadget machine it sucks the air out of the bag. But since the bag itself is flexible the pressure will equalize - you just have an absence of air inside the bag. If you use a rigid container (like a ball jar), it's possible to maintain a lower pressure inside the container. Not sure what happens when you heat it up though - wouldn't steam expansion just raise the pressure again? The Food Saver vacuum has an attachment for evacuating ball jars. Put a flat lid on the canning jar, then put the attachment over that and run the vacuum pump. When you achieve the vacuum you just remove the attachment and the lid stays in place (no ring required to hold it down). I'd think that if you heated it up the pressure would increase until the lid came loose. Time to call in the scientists.

smallworld, if you've got inside knowledge on the HTST method of coffee preparation, you should post more here. My brief visits to Japan were during the cool(ish) months of September and April, so I didn't know about the hot (HOT!) vending-machine coffee not being available year-round. Makes sense though. I felt particularly clever when I figured out that the RED buttons on the vending machines were for hot (HOT!) beverages and the BLUE ones were for cold... If you're not wearing gloves, learn to juggle fast. As for tempeh: it may be Indonesian, but some of the best tempeh I've eaten in a restaurant was in Kakegawa, Shizuoka prefecture ( a bit southwest of Tokyo). Well, it was really more of a bar than a restaurant, but the Indonesian food struck me as totally authentic (I lived in Jakarta as a child). Marinated in tamarind and grilled to perfection. Yum. Helen, do you eat out often? I don't mean "fine dining" necessarily (budget, kids, busy schedule and all that!), but do you go to neighborhood restaurants, or buy from street vendors? We've already seen the breadtruck.

What a great start to your blog, Helen. How cool that son2's HALF A GREEN BEAN has been immortalized on eGullet! Is that "the infamous vege shack over the road"? This is in Tokyo?? I hope you'll have time to post some pics of your kids' bentos. Do you get "creative" with them? (I've seen the thread Kristin started about bento)

Owen, have you tried any of the decaf beans from Sweet Maria's? I've been thinking of getting some. I have the Fresh Roast Plus tabletop roaster I purchased from them a few months ago. The sampling of (non-decaf) beans I got at that time were quite good, and the descriptions on their site about the decafs sounds intriguing. The Mexican Esmeralda could be nice as a mild after-dinner coffee. The African Highland blend sounds good too.

Potato peels contain vanillin*, the stuff that makes vanilla smell and taste like, well, vanilla. There's only a trace of it, but maybe enough that it could contribute to the "chocolate" impression. Isn't vanilla a common ingredient in prepared chocolates? So does oak. Might explain how wines can pick up a vanilla nose.

Jinmyo, I love weird fungus! Someone (I'm not going to plow through umpteen pages to see who) mentioned the fork as providing "scale" to the picture. My first impulse was to recommend cropping out everything but he plated food and a bit of the reflected "mysterious stuff". After reading that comment, my thought is to leave the fork in the shot, but move it closer to the plate. As to the reflections, some have called them "distracting", or something to that effect - I would lean towards tweaking the camera angle to improve the "mysterious" feeling of the reflections. The out-of-focus reflections cause the plate to "float" above the table, and they provide a sense of context. Don't crop them out, refine them!

Well, this topic has come close to being derailed. Yikes On the photo-related front: One thing that I especially enjoy in Ellen Shapiro's photos is the limited depth-of field. (translation: blah blah blah GINGER) What I mean is that the "subject" is clearly in focus, while the foreground/background is attractively fuzzy. The EXIF data, so generously contributed, indicates a small f-stop was used. Again, "blah blah blah". Seriously, what this means is that the exposure and focus controls on your camera make a difference , and this is understandably baffling to anyone who isn't immersed in the whole photo-hobbiest/professional-experience. A second thing I love is the reflection (window & wine glass?) in Jinmyo's photo. Adds a sense of ambiance to the scene. BTW, who plated that dish? Was the food airlifted in by aliens? Finally, the white-cake photos could be improved by moving the light source to the side. Someone (was it Linda?) suggested shooting from an angle. It's actually the light-source that needs to be moved: raking across the face of the cake will reveal the texture of the "crumb".

You really should give them a try. It's probably the easiest, fastest yeasted bread you can make, and soooo good warm out of the oven. You can keep the dough in the fridge for several days and bake as needed. "Baking with Julia" has a good recipe. I'm with Neil on this one. Pita is way easy to make, and it's great fun to watch them puff up and do their little dance as they bake. Plus you've got total control over the ingredients / toppings. I like sesame. The pitas need to be reasonably round and even in thickness. It should be about the thickness of your earlobe after it rises, but I don't think the thickness is really critical. You need to let them rest for a few minutes after you've rolled them out. Be sure to cover them with a damp towel; dried-out pita won't puff. The oven needs to be hot, and using a pizza stone or cast-iron griddle helps. I usually spritz them with a little water just before closing the oven door. After they puff and are just starting to brown, toss them in a clean paper bag and let them steam for a few minutes - that way they have a chance to collapse slowly rather than getting gummy or overly crisp. Making pita is easier than describing the process.

Knicke, I can "do" caffeine, at least early in the day, but I'd love to be able to drink good-tasting coffee after dinner without worrying about the consequences..... The article you linked to mentions the possibility of cross-breeding the naturally-decaf wild arabica plants with commercial varieties. they don't say much about their taste, but it sounds like the yield would be too low for commercial use: I wonder how long it will be before we see the "naturally decaf" beans. Will this take years?

Hi Boris, Congratulations (I think ) on being "tagged". Don't be intimidated by having to follow the prolific Dr. Jones' blog - we're all ready for the calm after the storm.... I would love to hear about where you shop for food. I have this quaint notion that Europeans still buy bread from the village baker, cheese at the local cheese shop, meat from the butcher shop, vegetables from the green-grocer, etc., etc. If you tell us that you do all your shopping at the local super-KMart, I shall be most disillusioned! It's well after midnight your time, so I imagine you've long since gone to bed. Thank you for "volunteering" to share your culinary life with us! p.s. - If writing in English becomes too much of a strain, just post pictures of your cook-top. It looks awesome. "Incontournable" indeed!

I emailed CMC to ask whether the Sichuan peppercorns they sell have been heat-treated. They didn't know about that, but they attribute the freshness to the fact that their current supply arrives vacuum-packed, unlike the ones from other suppliers. Maybe the net result of (possible) heat-treating plus proper handling adds up to an overall superior product. All I know is that the pepper I got from CMC is fresher than anything I've found at the Asian market in Cleveland. I was in San Francisco in April - traipsed up and down Stockton searching for Sichuan pepper to no avail. I hope that Gary's right about the new supply beginning to show up....

And now you expect us to hunt for it? Well, it is nightime. you lazy bastard. egullet *never* sleeps. I can't believe it. Only here would there be thread about snipe that is really about snipe. Snipe hunting is one of the oldest jokes among Southern Men that I know about. It is also a very long story-This link does a pretty good job of explaining it-The Snipe Hunt I have also, many times, hunted snipe for real, They are, in fact, good to eat and hard as hell to shoot as you are doing it (usually) in pretty thick woods. I thought that Colestove was pulling our legs, what do I know? I'm just a dumb old cracker and ought to know my place here amoung all of you sophisticated city folk. Note to the PC-sensitive - Brooks can freely use the term "cracker". He's earned it. Seriously, there have been so many eGullet conversations that i value deeply. I found this site last year when searching Google for "el Bulli". The firs hit was this rather odd discussion. Burrito foam? I've since discovered that people are obsessed with sichuan pepper or paprika. My kinda folks.

I bought a similar one at Costco a few weeks ago. Mine is stainless and has the gas burner in place of the charcoal box shown. There's a small cast iron box for wood chips that sits directly avbove the burner. The starter on the gas burner is the best I've used - it lights on the first "click" every time. The range of temperature control is pretty good, but it's hard to maintain temps below 200, so the super-long smoke may be a problem. I've had trouble locating a good source for wood chips. I'd love to try cherry or apple but all I can find is mequite.

You can get uncured pork belly from Niman Ranch. They sell it with and without the rind. Kind of pricey, but I've been tempted to try it.

That's an interesting comparison, but there's one glaring omission: what recipe did they use for the margarita? Let's hope they didn't use one of those prefab margarita mixes.

point of order How many ingredients can we use use from non-Costco (or other big-box) sources before we get disqualified? If we have to use Costco ingredients exclusively this could be a real challenge. Last night I smoked some spare ribs (purchased from Costco) in my Smokey Mountain smoker ( purchased from Costco), rubbed with Spanish smoked paprika and sichuan peppercorns. Now, I'm pretty sure that Costco doesn't sell sichuan pepper, and if they carry paprika it's probably sold in twenty-pound cans. Back me up, Ronnie, I think that the Spice House stuff is likely to be superior. One eGullet recipe I can think of could easily be made with all-Costco ingredients: Gigantic bag o' onions? check. Nice fresh butter (imported from France, no less)? check. Good quality port wine? I think we can do the official recipeGullet Onion Confit, or the quick version thereof. I'll confess to having better luck with Schneich's instant gratification version of onion confit. Admittedly, my crock-pot sux. Oh, and we could try doing a baked brie. Has anyone noticed that the baby brie at Costco is made in PA, but the package is imported from France?

Ron, I remembered the "exquisite" grade from the eG thread - I'd forgotten that you're the one who started it. I ordered some of that as well as the Spanish smoked. Haven't had a chance to try it yet (just arrived two days ago), but the color and fragrance are amazing. The Spice Shop catalog mentions that the "exquisite" stuff is produced by a very small operation that may not be able to stay in business. Here's their description. Maybe eGullet can play a roll in finding them the market they need to keep producing this stuff.

I ordered some sichuan peppercorns from CMC. Thank you, Elie, for bringing them to our attention. The first indication I had that the spice was fresh was the aroma eminating from the box (appropriately, they packed my order in a Lingham's Hot Sauce carton. ). I could smell the hu-chiao even before I opened the shipping carton. They are fragrant, tongue-numbing, wonderful - better by far than the stale stuff I found at the asian market.

Ted, did you mean volume vs. weight (e.g. tablespoons vs. grams)? mdouch, thanks for the background info on the translation (and welcome to eGullet ). I second Ted's interest in an English translation of "Los Postres de El Bulli", to which I would add volume II of the El Bulli series (1994-1997). I purchased the first volume before the translated edition was announced. I wound up purchasing the English edition when it came out. My ability to read Spanish fell somewhat short of expectations. Oh, and Mac users, if you were wondering about the "works on Mac" reference, check here. All is well!

I've ordered from their web site a couple of times. I got some fennel pollen (inspired by Ted Nicely's "abstraction") and it's really wonderful. They have a nice selection of vanilla beans, and their paprika is awesome. I'm cooking some ribs rubbed with the Spanish smoked paprika right now. Just be sure to go to THEspicehouse.com. Leave out the "the" and you'll get another kind of web site. EDIT: typo/braino