Jay Francis

I taught myself to cook in the early 80's by subscribing to Bon Appetit magazine. With each new arrival I would make every recipe I could during that month's period. These were the golden years for Bon Appetit and just to remind myself of how awesome a magazine it was, I kept all of my issues from 1983 through 1985 and still cook from them, refer to the monthly section on spirits, etc. These days, when I meet someone who is new to cooking, I recommend the same strategy but my magazine of recommendation is Fine Cooking. Just start at the beginning and make your way through the mag, and after a couple of months, you'll be amazed at the good food you'll be turning out in your kitchen. Cookbooks: The Tex-Mex Cookbook by Robb Walsh (disclaimer: I helped Robb with the research and recipe testing) The Daily Soup Cookbook (every recipe I've tried is a winner) Gaston Lenotre's abridged book on desserts and pastries The Dessert Lover's Cookbook by Sorosky The "Hot" series by Hugh Carpener (Hot Chicken, Hot Pasta, etc.) Chinese Cuisine Made Simple by Dorothy Huang

Has anyone discovered a good restaurant making authentic Zacahuil in Houston?

Speaking of terrific cookbooks that are not by a Celebrity Chef (I agree with the above article), and slightly off topic for this discussion (sorry), I have been going through The Daily Soup cookbook (available at Amazon, used copies are available for not very much cash, $3 the last time I looked) and it is wonderful. Haven't had a dud recipe yet. Back on topic though. As noted, I do agree with the article, caveat being de Laurentiis and Brown, both of whose books I find very worthwhile.

I have a wide range of measuring cups but tend to default to the OXO measuring cups where you can view the measures by looking down. I now own all of the sizes. They're wonderful. I use my Pyrex when I am heating milk in the microwave to make yogurt, or roux or custard. I also bought a set of metal measuring cups in 1/3, 1/2, 3/4 and 1 cup sizes which really are useful if doing a lot of mise en place for a recipe.

I have tasted the RR EVOO and it is good but not better than a multitude of others.

Hebert's Meats ( I went to the Richmond at 610 location near the Galleria) is carrying Poffenberger's Bellville Sausages and they are delish!

I'm actually more excited about a sign that I passed on White Oak just before Studewood. It said "Opening Soon. Fried Chicken and Soul Food." Wow, real fried chicken would be awesome. Back to the Pope. I'm concerned. 1. The name is dreadful. 'Twould be better just to name it "The Barbecue Place". Regardless of the history of the name, it makes me think of the smell of burning beaver fur. Or worse. It isn't Pope's fault but it's a strip club name, not a barbecue restaurant name and she should know better. 2. Will it be pit barbecue or will they use one of those god awful Southern Pride gas units? 3. Will she fancy it up with more expensive cuts of meat, making it not cost effective on a regular basis? 4. Is this just an excuse for her to present lots of sauces that she has created? 5. I, too, have never really enjoyed Pope's food. I admire what she is doing, and she is a real sweetheart (she shared samples of her favorite smoked salts with me years ago before the gourmet salt thing got going) but I seldom go to t'afia to eat.

Ah, Mexican breads. Steve, here in Houston we have a lot of panaderias. As much as I love bolillos, flavorwise they've never gotten to what Peter Reinhart would call spectacular bread flavor. They are what they are, I guess. And I think the reason is the flour that is used by the commercial bakers. Also, they probably let it rise too quickly by dumping an extra heaping of yeast into it. So, when you tackle bolillos in your home, here's a recommendation to use the King Arthur Bread Flour. I recently made some bread at home and then went down to our local, best panaderia to compare flavor. It had to be the flour. Having said that, you can find a bolillo recipe in Kennedy's "From My Mexican Kitchen". Though, all it really takes is 500 grams bread flour 320-350 ml water 2 tsp Kosher salt or 1.5 tsp regular salt 1 tbs sugar 1 tsp rapid rise yeast (SAF) You're looking for a tacky dough, not too wet, not too sticky I throw all into the bread machine to knead and rise on the dough cycle, then shape and bake in a steamed oven (see Peter Reinhart's baguette recipe in his "The Breadmakers Apprentice") at 500 then 450 F for 20 minutes.

I bought a British L&P today at lunchtime. I can taste a world of difference between it and the American one, the flavor is much more complex. Interesting note, though. According to the British label, there aren't any chili peppers (these are listed in the American version). But the heat from the British Worcestershire sauce sure indicates to me that there are chilis. It just doesn't taste like the same heat one would get from black pepper. Well, it could be white pepper but I'm not sure. I have a gut feeling that there are chilis in the British one, too, just not listed. At any rate, white pepper is not listed either. The British sauce, I've been glugging out of it all day, is really delicious. I am now addicted.

Looks like I need to track down some British L&P!

I never took much notice of Worcestershire sauce, but over the last few days, I have re-discovered it and really enjoy the flavor. The one marketed here in the US lists corn syrup as its second ingredient. I was curious to know if anyone has ever come across a recipe that would allow me to make and ferment my own, substituting sugar for the corn syrup. But that also makes me wonder if Lee and Perrin's in the UK or other countries do not use corn syrup?

I say, stick with quesadilla (little cheese). Empanada implies "breaded" since "empanar" is incorporated into the word. I recently assisted at a cooking class in whch the filling was solely epazote leaves and a melty cheese. Delicious! The best quesadillas I have ever had were blue corn, flor de calabaza ones outside the entrance of the ruins near Tlaxcala.

I seem to have difficulty when it is time to make my slash marks on by batards and baguettes. I think the problem is the moistness of the dough. Assuming sharp knife, and either wetted or floured to help it travel across the dough, it still seems that when I make my slashes the blade pulls the dough forward causing it to deflate. Here are my questions: After making the slashes do most of you put your bread right into the oven or do you let it rise some more? Any suggestions on how to make a cleaner slash, some method that works for you?

The most worthless book that I ever had was the cookbook for the Heaven on Eleven cajun-Lousiana style restaurant in Chicago. All of the recipes were, I am guessing, the restaurant recipes but just downsized for the home cook. Thus you had all of the spice and herb requirements in measures of 1/8 teaspoon.

I have bought the "As Seen on TV" Ove-Glove twice now. Each time, I returned it as it does a miserable job of protecting one against high temperatures, removing pans from the oven. The best glove that I have found to date is the Williams Sonoma glove that has the cloth exterior and the woven terry-cloth like interior.

Re: Shun Knives Well, when you volunteer to assist at Sur La Table cooking classes you get to try a lot of good stuff. The Shun Knife is superb. In my kitchen, though, day to day, I default to a Dexter Russell Chinese Cleaver for just about everything ( I think Alton would be proud of the fact that it is a multi-tasker). I got it many years ago for about $30 in a Chinese restaurant supply and it's available through Amazon. When I am teaching a cooking class in my home, I bring out my Global Chef's knife for the ooh, ahh factor. Also, my Kevlar hand protecting glove. When I returned my Rachael Ray endorsed Furi knife sharpener, I went up to the Chef's Choice electric sharpener and use that to do my sharpening. I am a big fan of using cast iron for all high heat applications. In respect to attractiveness, I really like the look of the Mario Batalli product line, but it also is made by Copco and I am suspicious of it. Anyone have any experience with the Batalli endorsed product line?

There's a cookbook writer out of San Antonio, Jim Peyton, whose cookbooks are relatively unknown, though he often writes for Fine Cooking magazine, but are wonderful, and worth tracking down. He's a favorite of mine. Mexican proper, Bayless, Martinez or Kennedy. I default to Bayless first, Kennedy for more complicated things, and Martinez for Oaxaca and Veracruz style food. If wanting to go over to the 'dark side' [Tex-Mex ], I had the pleasure of recipe testing and helping research Robb Walsh's The Tex-Mex Cookbook and can vouch for the recipes. I'm especially proud of the tamale recipe that was developed for the book, as it allows one to make smaller batches of tamales, so as not to be so overwhelming. Two other awesome books, if you can track them down are 'Mexico The Beautiful Cookbook' and (out of print but fabulous) 'The Mexican Gourmet' by Yzabal. Oh yeah, one more while I'm thinking of it. Quintana's book on food for Mexican festivals and feasts. And if you have any specific questions associated with Tex-Mex, don't hesitate to email me with your questions.

I have a new soapbox and it has to do with Celebrity Chefs who market products that don't deliver. Rachael Ray. I can't begin to tell you what a good feeling I had when I saw Rachael Ray's high price EVOO (god, I hate that stupid acronym) go into the clearance mark-down section at xxx. While we're on Rachael Ray, I bought the Furi knife sharpener that she endorses. A few weeks into owning it, and not really being very happy with its performance, I read a review of manual sharpeners that confirmed what I had suspected, that it wasn't the best for the money. And, her silly oval pan that she developed to cook long pasta and fish better. Seems more like a stove-top inconvenience to me. And I must qualify that statement by acknowledging that, for non-sticks, I am a huge fan of Anolon that markets it for her. If the Italians had felt a need for this, they would have invented it already I'm sure. Rick Bayless, who is a hero of mine, is working in conjunction with Copco and has come out with a product line for casseroles (cazuelas), cast iron enamelled fry pans, queso fundido warmers, etc. I got to try several of these recently when I assisted in a cooking class featuring his products and recipes. These products are beautiful to look at, But they aren't Le Creuset. There was burning on the bottoms, and I was the person responsible for doing the clean-up so I wasn't too happy. The queso fundido warmer, well, there just wasn't a way to keep the bottom layer of the cheese from burning. Pretty to look at but not very kitchen friendly, my opinion. Slightly off topic, has anyone seen the Enchiladas Suizas, How to Make video by him at the Sur La Table website? Enchiladas Suizas with roasted tomatoes instead of tomatillos? What's that all about? Alton Brown, another hero. Here's a guy whose endorsement means something. I own his set of measures, his salt cellar and they both are great additions to my kitchen. I've never been a big fan of Emeril's cookware, preferring plain old Lodge (or garage sale finds) cast iron, and Anolon for my non-stick. I am intrigued by his cast iron smoker though. I own the Cameron smoker and it works wonderfully, so I haven't had a need to try Emeril's. I'm curious about it though. It is thicker, being cast iron, than the stainless steel Cameron. I wonder how the extra energy to heat it up affects its serviceability?

Fried chicken in all its greasy goodness is wonderful, but it would still be fun to figger out someway to get rid of the extra oil. Fingers crossed. I just had an idea though. What if one could have a welder build a stainless basket that had a center adapter for a Cuisinart? The Cuisinart Lexan can probably handle the hot oil and you would get a great centrifuge from the powerful motor. I think I will talk to my welder-neighbor today. Jay

I would love to try this at home but having paid upwards of $500 for my wonderful Vita-Mix, well, it isn't going to happen. I investigated both the Vita-Mix and the Blendtec when I started shopping for my blender. I kept reading in reviews that the Blendtec was super noisy. I had an opportunity to test both out at separate local demos at Costco. To test them I brought the most difficult thing I could think of....roasted and skinned cacao beans. Could the high speed and heat of the blenders turn the cacao into a smooth chocolate liquor? That was the question. Well, I can confirm to you that the Blendtec was painfully loud. You would really want to wear hearing protection with this unit. It was that bad. The Vita-Mix was quieter. I really like it. I made peanut butter just this morning with it, 24 ounces of dry roasted unsalted peanuts and 3 tbs of olive oil. It took 3 minutes. If you are wondering about the cacao experiment, well, the Vita-Mix does have an overheat thermistor, so it will shut off when the motor overheats, which was the case with the cacao. The Blendtec doesn't, but it did a lousy job of making the chocolate liquor. Since then I had the luck to find a Champion juicer at a second hand store for $15, which is the way I make my chocolate now. I save the blender for the things it is best suited for.

I have some ginger that started out similar to yours rooted and producing some nice leaves, in a little pot. So, yes, it is easy to grow ginger. My wife recently brought home a huge bag of ginger from our local farmer's market, several pounds for a cost of about $1. I went to Joy of Cooking and found the recipe for making crystallized ginger and did so successfully. The hard part was peeling the ginger. Normally I use a spoon to scrape the skin off, but this time, since it was so cheap, I just sliced off the peel and didn't worry about the waste, that ended up in the compost pile. Jay

I have been dreaming of finding some method of extracting all of the oil that one can from fried chicken without taking away from the crispy crust goodness. Any ideas? It occurred to me that if there were such a thing as a stainless steel salad spinner, or some sort of centrifuging device that could handle heat, that would work great. Does anyone have any ideas? Jy

I notice that you are in the U.K. but, fingers crossed, the Breadman Ultimate, by I believe, Welbilt, will not disappoint you. I own three. Years ago, I attended a breadmaking class in which the teacher, talking about bread machines gave instructions on how to make bread in one and then finished by saying, "Then, remove your loaf and throw it away because bread machines are rubbish." He was very wrong, but it was a year or so before I discovered this. We were visiting a friend in Kendal, Lake District, and woke up to wonderful bread every morning. I got her recipe and used it to great success. The trick is to weigh your ingredients. So I bought a Breadman Ultimate, loved it, decided to upgrade to the Williams Sonoma one with a stainless steel exterior (simply for esthetics). So I had two. Then, I came across a Breadman Ultimate in a second hand store for $15 (retail price $99) so I had to get it and now I have three. Mostly I use Mabel's recipe, or, the recipe for bread with oats, raisins and nuts on the back of the King Arthur bread flour bag. But, I have successfully used it to knead dough for specialty breads and pizza dough. Here follows Mabel's recipe that got me started and some old notes to a friend from a few years back 310 ml water from the hot water tap 1 teaspoon Kosher salt if you have it or 3/4 teaspoon regular salt (salt should not come in contact with yeast, which is why the salt is added to the water, and the yeast is added on top of the flour later on) 1 1/2 tablespoon nonfat dry milk powder ( to help the bread last longer) 15 grams of butter (to help with the rising and to add moisure) 1 tablespoon sugar (to help with the rising) *The hot water is to quickly dissolve the dry ingredients and to soften the butter To the liquid, poured on top, not mixed in add: 425 grams bread flour Make a small well in the center of the flour and add: 1 teaspoon Red Star Active Dry Yeast, Fleischmann's Rapidrise Yeast, or SAF Perfectrise Yeast. Don't be tempted to add more than 1 teaspoon. Notes: Yeast is a very interesting product. If it sits in the grocery store too long, or gets hot sitting in the store room, it can be ruined. So, I have always bought my yeast at the same store in the small packets. However, Irene picked up a jar of Red Star for me and I have used it successfully, keeping it in the refrigerator for several months now. The new rapidrise yeasts are different variation on yeast, which allows the yeast to be bound to a molasses in smaller crystal structures at lower temperature, so less yeast dies during the manufacturing. The reason it is called rapidrise is because more live yeast is available in a teaspoon, so it feeds and grows quicker than traditional yeast. Because of the extra yeast, you can add it dry to most recipes. That is, if the grocery store didn't kill it by improperly storing it. I have never had success with the fresh yeast which I bought at the grocery stores and I now only use rapidrise types of dry yeast. Why metric measures? More accurate than saying "three or four cups of flour". Also, there is a certain moisture that you want to your dough, if the dough is too wet, too much carbon dioxide will escape and the bread will be flat, if the dough is too dry, the proteins in gluten will not develop properly. It should be tacky to the touch. Of course if you are making ciabatta or other non sandwich breads, they may be much wetter. But, that is the fun of making bread, figuring out how everything works. Once you master the simplest sandwich bread, you'll probably just use the machine for mixing dough and then baking the bread in the oven. Jay

Although not DVD's, I have found some terrific video clips on YouTube. I had begun my search looking for instructions for making masala dosa and had come across many cooking sites

Correction. Capocetti