ryanj

Freeze it raw, individual pieces wrapped very tightly in plastic wrap. Thaw it out slowly in the fridge a day before you are ready to use it again. It will be better than cooking and freezing it.

You can buy this one or any other CO2 charged device. Also, whipping a stable element or puree with xantham gum works well; 2 grams xantham to 240 grams liquid, make sure they are chilled. A little soy lecithin mixed with a hot or cold liquid and buzzed with a stick blender also work.

I'll concur with the 45-60 minute cooking time. As for ingredients, classic stocks should be made up of 100% H2O, 50% bones and trimmings (soaked), 20% aromatics (only onions and celery in fish stock, carrots can give it an orange hue), acid and herbs. I use white wine for my acid; thyme, peppercorns and bay leaves for my herbs. Fish stock won't come out gelatinous with this method, and reducing it on its own does give it a hint of bitterness to me. Never bring it to a boil, but a low one-to-two-bubble-per-second-simmer is ideal. Now onto the eyes. There is a Spanish chef, who's name escapes me, who was doing demonstrations regarding the eyeballs of fish. He has been using them to thicken sauces. They really won't make that much difference by leaving them in clarity-wise, and the benefit they give for thickening the amount of stock someone makes at any one time is negligible. He did use a lot of eyes.

Frozen fries are more consistent, on the whole. They crisp better, you don't have to hover over a line cook to watch them wash out enough starch, blanch them at the correct temperature and time, etc. Sugar content varies throughout the year in potatoes, i.e., starch, therefore you will have a different product as the months pass. I have always cut and blanched fries in the restaurants I work in, but it is a monitoring game throughout the months. However, I am not opposed to frozen, and I can back this up with the flavor of McDonald's fries from the beef fat days. The frying medium and temperature of the French Fry is almost as important as the fry itself.

Probably referring to "LE repetoire de cuise." Great book to keep in the back pocket. Old School. Look for it at used book stores(where I got mine) or amazon. Probably not available readily in regular stores.

1. Alinea - Forward thinking without be overly molecular, as opposed to popular thought. Do the tour. 2. TRU/Trotter's - two tried and true classics in Chicago, TRU is a little more cutting edge than Trotter's, but Charlie gets some amazing, you-won't-find-anywhere-else products in his back door. 3. Blackbird - Cannot speak about this with his new chef de cuisine, from WD-50, but it was divine when I have eaten there in the past. Not a huge fan of the atmosphere however, which probably keeps it from a four star. 4. 160blue - Martial is a great chef. Love the space, and probably the best service I have received in a restaurant. 5. Gibson's/Harry Caray's/Chop House/Gene and Georgetti's, etc. - A Chicago steakhouse experience is a must have, those four are probably the most Chicago like. Luger's is a different element than Chicago's places of meat. They all serve a good steak, with flair and servers with robust, grumbly personalities, and their sides are huge, but still good.

First, I would probably post this in the restaurant life forum, but here is a list to get you started: Lettuce Entertain You, Chicago Cenitaire, Chicago Myriad Restaurant Group, NYC Hugo's Gibson's Restaurant Group, Chicago Bobby Flay's Group, NYC Mario Batali's Group, NYC Michael Mina's Group, San Francisco Kimpton Group, NYC HC Restaurant Group, Chicago BR Gueast, NYC China Grill Management, NYC Starr Restaurant Group, Philadelphia Tom Collichio's Restaurant Group, NYC Charlie Palmer's Restaurant Group, NYC Todd English's Restaurant Group, Boston Wolfgang Puck's Restaurant Group, LA Emeril Lagasse's Restaurant Group, New Orleans Seth Woods Restaurant Group, Boston Barbara Lynch's Restaurant Group, Boston Ken Oringer's Restaurants, Boston Marche, Red Light, Gioco, Opera, Carnaval, Jerry Kleiner's Group, Chicago Dinex Group, NYC These groups have all opened multiple restaurants of varying calibur, most finer dining to fine dining. I don't have links to their webstites, but a google search should pop all of them up.

Making lardons is pretty simple. I prefer a smoked slab bacon, but it does not have to be smoked. Cube a slab of bacon. Place in a sauce pot and cover with water. Cook over medium heat. Once the water evaporates, let the fat render away. Save the fat for frying your croutons.

I agree pricing is out of whack here. Working in Chicago, Boston and now New York, the price it costs my girlfriend and I to eat out a a so-called "neighborhood" restaurant is a bit eyepopping. In Chicago, for example, we would expect to have an average check in the $80-$100 range, and between the two of us would have at least four drinks. It was hard to do in Boston, less a few favorites along the line. But here in New York, going out is not as easily done for $100. Usually, our check tends to be upwards of $130 for similar experiences that have been had in Chicago and in Boston for $110-$120. The food and atmosphere are pretty similar, however, apps and especially drinks are the two items I feel restaurants really mark up on. Now, I do understand the difference in rent between here, Boston and Chicago, which explains it partly. For instance, one restaurant I worked at paid $3400 per month, 2000 sf, in a hip neighborhood in Chicago. Fast forward to Boston, our rent was $9000, 2000 sf, in the restaurant row of the city (not Newbury St.) Here in NYC, a Soho, Village or otherwise prime location can easily cost $14000-$20000 for a comparable space. Restaurants have to make money.

As good as the issue was, they did not go into detail about any of the steakhouses in town. Even though Chicago Magazine said they preferred New York steakhouses over Chicago's a while back (which, by the way, Peter Luger just got knocked down to two stars recently in the Times,) Chicago is still the beef capital of the U.S. (sorry Texas.) The classics like Gene and Georgettis, Gibson's, Morton's, Chop House and Harry Caray's received no mention in the issue. The rest I found very interesting and a good read, especially the whole pig and Polish section.

The Art of Peruvian Cuisine and Peru Mucho Gusto are two both very nice cookbooks. The second one is in the style of the el bulli book, w/o the cd rom. It is a collaboration from a variety of Peru's chefs. The Art is also a collaboration work so to speak and a little more approachable. Those are two of my Peruvian favorites. There is a colorful Brazilian cookbook I had that I forget the name of, but it is readily available in bookstores. I haven't seen that many Argentinian books, except for ones that have been brought back from that country, which are also only in Spanish. Douglas Rodriguez has a few books out that also aren't that bad. They are a little more fusion and focus on the islands more however.

The A/C and the lights are the first two things a restauranteur or manager will touch when he walks in the door. The A/C is tricky because it must be adjusted all day. During the day, while we are closed, I don't even turn it on. About a half hour before opening, we flick it on. An empty room cools very fast and gets chilly quickly. As bodies file in for dinner, their body heat raises the temp in the room. The more that come in during a short period, the thermostat goes way out of whack Now, depending where the majority people are situated is going to affect the temperature in their area, but perhaps not the temperature next to the thermostat. Walking through a partially crowded room, you will be able to notice a difference in temperatures in different areas. Me, I'm in the kitchen, so its always freaking hot. The lights call for constant adjustment as the sun sets. As the sun goes down, a more romantic setting is usually wanted, so they begin to turn the lights down as evening sets.

Also, canning is a good option. Place in the sterilized jars, boil to seal, woolah(sp.?)

Lunch - $300 at A'telier Robuchon in NYC. An experience not to forget, but probably a one time thing unless someone else foots the bill. Dinner - Babbo. $700. There were 5 of us, two bottles of wine, and two and a half courses each, sin dessert. Once again, a bit of a disappointment, however, I've heard it can be over the top good, or over the top bad at Babbo, depending on your evening of choice.

When I've made passion fruit creme brulee, I always use my standard creme brulee base and substitute passion fruit puree for some of the cream. I will sometimes up the sugar a bit as well. I think my recipe looked something like this = 3 qt. cream, 1 qt passion fruit puree, 1 Vanilla Bean, 3 1/2 - 4 C. sugar, 30 egg yolks. Good Luck.

It also wouldn't be a bad idea to reduce the wine a bit and then mix it with a little more acid. It will hold a better emulsification and intensify the flavor.

While at Gibson's and Hugo's Frog Bar in Chicago, it was a nightly event for at least one or two celebs to pop in. Billy Joel (he even played the piano in the lounge), Michael Jordan and the rest of the Bulls squad, pretty much every athlete in every sport, Presidents Clinton and Bush, Jr., Jack Nicholson, Billy Corgan, Sinatra and the rest of the Rat Pack, Vince Vaughn, ...................................countless more.

You can also treat it like arborio. I have made "quinottos" in this way, although I usually add some fresh corn to add a little starch to the mix. Start with onion, garlic and butter, sweat, add corn, sweat, add WELL rinsed quinoa, toast, stock of choice(corn stock works well), stir and cook until tender. This is usually about a twenty minute process.

Wow, John. Amazing trip and photos. I actually go the opportunity to cook with Enrique Oliveras of Pujol at MAS in Chicago a few years back while I was sous chef there. He did a guest chef menu with us and his food was spot on amazing. Very creative use of Mexican food food luxury ingredients.

I definitely agree that the level of food sophistication here in Boston is not equal to some of the other larger cities; New York, Chicago, LA, San Fran. Not to say this is a bad thing. However, God bless her, Barbara Lynch is in the paper every day because she is one of the few chefs making waves in this city. Ken Oringer as well. But Toro was done five years ago in Chicago as Avec, Same with the Butcher Shop. Boston, to me, seems a half a step behind the curve of food revolutions. The sheer amount of restaurants here, which probably only numbers 2,500, equaled with the amount of seasoned and professional servers and cooks, I think, takes Boston down a little. Moving here from Chicago, I found it easier to staff a restaurant than in Boston. To hire one server, we will go through 50-60 applications before we find a qualified one with a little wine and food knowledge. I have heard the same things from managers and chefs at other restaurants here. Chicago has 8,000 restaurants, NYC 20,000. You just seem to have a deeper labor pool in cities like those.

Here is a selfless plug for myself and my restaurant, but MASA in the South End is great. I am the new chef here, three months removed from Chicago. I just changed 80% of the brunch menu two weeks ago. Here is also a link to Boston brunch listings for your considerations. http://www.bostonusa.com/images/admin/logo...pagelisting.htm

You can also get it at Harry Caray's. I believe they have a filet, new york and ribeye from Bill Kurtis.

We also called check your plates for hot women walking into our kitchen. And at many restaurants I've worked, chopped parsley is called mota, Spanish slang for marijuana.

To take away the bitter taste, roast them until they puff, scrape out all the seeds and soak in hot water for ten minutes. If you didn't take out the seeds, this is probably the cause of your bitterness. I use the water it soaks in often and never have the bitter problem.

Opening guess for the next chef, Eric Aubriot. Perhaps Martial Nougier from 160 Blue. Both are Frenchies, both are in difficult situations right now with 160 still in the air a little bit.