Holly Moore

Does the Aviary approach detract from the end product? Does it improve it? Since no one has had one yet, we don't know. If one trusts that Grant Achatz is not one to put out a lesser product for the sake of science there is no reason to believe he will start now. Aviary is simply adding a bit of fun, showmanship and, for some, surprise to the cocktail. That is a good thing.

HOST'S NOTE: This discussion has been split off from the Old Fashioned topic. Aviary's Old Fashioned (YouTube link)

From my experience in casting for non-food reality television, participants are screened - medically, psychologically and socially. The production team knew what they wrought. They wanted drama, tension and tears. Gives the participants "dimension." Similarly there are many ways the production team can influence results without overtly telling the judges whom to eliminate.

There was a note at the end of the show stating that the producers in consultation with Bravo had discussed the elimination with the judges. My read is that anyone with an iota of restaurant kitchen experience wanted Seth gone ASAP both for participant safety and Seth's emotional stability. The producers and Bravo on the other hand wanted the drama of train wreck after train wreck. Seth seems more Hell's Kitchen fodder than the typical Top Chef participant.

Agree on the interesting line-up, but not really Top Chef All Stars. Sort of like Major League Baseball fielding an All Star game with the No. 1 players at each position sitting on the bench.

My guess is they pulled the truck away at the end to attempt "drama." The whole series struck me as finagled. If the cities visited are half as bureaucratic as Philadelphia, there would have been all sorts of licensing and parking hassles. Wish Grill 'Em All had stopped by Philadelphia on the way home. Those looked like great burgers and fries.

At the hotel school a one term course in meats/butchering was required. I'm guessing most culinary schools nowadays offer at least some butcher training. This probably wouldn't qualify you to butcher in a butcher shop, but might get you in the door as an apprentice. And it would provide a broader skill set - worth considering since fewer and fewer places do their own butchering. I'm not sure how many supermarkets are doing true butchering nowadays. If so they are probably unionized and there may be an apprentice program available. Other than that, there is the old-fashioned way. Get a job with a slaughter house or processor, start off sweeping floors or shoveling guts, and work your way through the hierarchy. Outside of the slaughter houses and processors, the craft of butchering in local shops has pretty much vanished. My favorite butcher here in Philadelphia has gone from breaking down sides of beef to slicing/sawing cryovac sections. Breaks my heart. He could charge admission for a display of his knife work.

Dumbest ending ever.

Not sure if this suits your purpose. I use a Tamrac Holster. It holds a digital SLR with a large wide angle zoom lens. Mine is all black. They make similar models with suede trim.

Huh? Not sure what Captain Obvious has been snorting and no idea what is being implied, but I received a bunch of solid advice - kinda the purpose of this thread.

Exposed, I am. Of what, I don't know.

That's why I fessed up to having access to the raw jpg. The original file is too big to upload to eGullet. I looked through the approaches taken here with the pic and then took a second stab. The info from the thread was a big help in pointing me in the right direction - or at least a more right direction.

Thanks all. I tried again in Photoshop, starting from a copy of the raw data in jpg format. I selected curves and used the preset "lighten" option and then went to color balance and stepped down the blue and stepped up the red - both just a little bit.

Nice on the white. How did you do it?

I'm still learning the D90, but believe it is possible. The settings show white balance as auto. Will pull out the manual tomorrow and see what else I can do. As to Faststone Viewer I'm not seeing what that can do for me. Before getting Photoshop I used Photoshop Elements for a number of years. I also have a first level understanding of Photoshop - know levels, hue, saturation and such. What happens though is that I can't figure out how to get rid of the blue on white plates using Photoshop without screwing up the rest of the picture. The support forums say to take care of it in Raw, but the raw images are so big that they eat up major disk space - especially since I save one untouched pic, one edited pic at high quality pixel level and one cut down to 75 dpi and to 300-600 pixels wide for the web. I may be looking for an easy solution where there is none.

Bells and whistle that won't mean anything until McDonald's brings back the quality, service and cleanliness of Ray Krok's era. Today's product is so different and so bad compared to what came fresh off the grill way back when.

Tuna carpaccio shot outside at dusk with no flash using Nikon D90 with Nikkor 17-35 f/2.8 lens as a jpg. Polished a bit using photoshop curves - auto. So how do I get the plate back to white or shoot it so the plate never picks up blue tint?

Outstanding, thanks.

First time I've heard the distinction, "savory chef." Is that a pastry chef thing?

One of the highlights for me was seeing Hung Huynh back in action easily doing the work of two.

Earlier today, RuthBourdain tweeted,

Moderator guy boasted, "We going to have the craziest, most outrageous truck stop ever." Haven't there just been two other "truck stops" in the history of the show?

I checked the menu. The ingredients are listed with each dish so it is not exactly proprietary information. As long as the names aren't copied I don't see how there is basis for a law suit. I put in two years for Burger King Corp. doing regional marketing for NYC. If I open a restaurant selling a broiled burger, topped with lettuce, tomato, onion, mayo and pickle, can Burger King sue me as long as I don't call it a Whopper? What if I added french fries, shakes and soda? I also Googled LT Burger. With the exception of articles about the law suit, in the first few pages at least, Google was not confused - it only presented info on LT and not BLT.

I think Bourdain gets sheer pleasure out of doing that to everyone. In last week's episode Angelo told of, as a kid, pasting chef's pictures on his wall and worshiping them. I like to think that Bourdain, an unforgiving god, was one of the chefs.

In Who's Menu Is It? the New York Times reports on a lawsuit brought by BLT against LT Burger in Sag Harbor. BLT alleges LT Burger owner Laurent Tourondel, who helped open BLT, among other grievances, has copied much of BLTs menu. The article cites examples some similar, some kinda weak. But that's besides the point. What next? Manna v Mana? White Castle v. Royal Castle? Texas Wieners v Texas Wieners? What is the damage? Will city workers helicopter to Sag Harbor for lunch? I can't see savvy New Yorkers being confused with BLT and LT Burger. Did LT steal a proprietary recipe in serving a burger without a bun? Tis a ridiculous law suit. Maybe Tourondel should counter sue for the return of his initials.