Abra

Thanks for the in-depth food safety lessons, dougal and klkruger! Dougal - that nitrite-free bacon doesn't really taste like "bacon" to me, since it's lacking the cured flavor. It can be good, but i think it's more like a good smoked fatty pork in flavor.

Wow, I have a jar that looks almost like that of your shaoxing. I've had it for about, oh, 7-8 years without opening it, only got it because it's cool-looking. The shaoxing I actually use comes in a bottle with a screwtop. Now I'm wondering if I should crack that crock open? It says Shuang Jia Fan on the front label, and has that same red ribbon.

Thanks so much for the recipe, Kerry. I had to laugh at the 1/2 tsp of sriracha. Does sriracha come in amounts that tiny? I'd probably sextuple that. I'll be the one to ask what I'm sure everyone's dying to know, the story of Kira. Is she your birth daughter? Can she communicate with you in some way? is it possible that she'll "catch up" and be telling you off about the yogurt some day?

Cool, I didn't know you were a doctor doctor as well as a chocolate doctor. And a remote and watery part of the world really appeals to me - this should be a great blog. And please do show us how you do the Vietnamese thighs, as I'm another one that would like to make them.

A great way to ship stuff like brownies, simple cakes, and bar cookies is to bake them in a foil 8x8 pan, frost or decorate right in the pan, and don't cut it at all. Just ship the whole pan, and when cut into by the lucky recipient it'll be nice and fresh and tidy.

I think you should post some of the recipes here, that way lots of people will be enticed into trying them.

Last night my husband and I were thrilled to be treated to a dinner of Bombay street food. Worm@work's parents are visiting from Mumbai, and both are formidable cooks, as is w@w herself. Mr. w@w distinguished himself in the cocktail department, while we were mainly notable for the amount we ate, and our extensive finger-licking. As much Indian food as I've eaten in my life, these dishes were completely different, all vegetarian, all reflecting the fine art of turning humble and inexpensive ingredients into delectable treats, not to mention serving them on the street in massive quantities. We began with a drink of kokum juice sprinkled with chat masala, and some lightly spicy little fried plaintain chips. The contrast between the sweet juice, the slightly sulfurous salt in the masala, and the crisp chips perfectly set the stage for the dishes to come, which were all about textural contrast. Next up was an amazing little bite called Pani Puri, which is an impossibly fragile crispy little puffball filled with potatoes, boiled mung beans, crispy chick peas, and the fine noodles called sev, then topped with date and tamarind chutney, cilantro chutney, or sweetened yogurt, and submerged in water flavored with mint, green chillies & spices. The trick then is to pop the whole little puri into your mouth before it drips all over you. My apologies for this and a couple of the other photos - the light was dim and comfortable, and I really needed to send a little submersible lens into the heart of the puri to do this one justice. Next up was Ragda Patties, which are spiced potato patties served in a white pea curry sauce. Well, they're not exactly white, and it's not exactly a curry as we think of curry in the US, more like a pease porridge pancake, or something. The name may not translate easily, but the flavors sure did. It was gentle, comforting food that I immediately wanted to have for breakfast. This is the photo that does the least justice to the dish This is Dabeli, fluffy buns stuffed with a mixture of potatoes, onions, spices, pomegranate, grapes & masala peanuts. I wish I'd composed this little sandwich so the fruit showed better, but you'll just have to imagine little bursts of red grape and pomegranate seed exploding in each bite of crisp toast, crunchy peanut, and smooth spicy potato. Yes, fluffy white bread, otherwise known as pau, is a part of Bombay street cuisine. I was totally amazed by this idea alone, not to mention the idea of a fluffy white bread potato sandwich, Indian-style. Being a quick learner, I was totally ready for Vada Pau - spiced garlic mashed potatoes fried in a chick pea flour batter and served inside a bun with the most delicious garlic chutney I've ever eaten. This was a dry chutney made of a ton of garlic ground and then fried with coconut and chick pea bits to form a pile of intensely flavored crisp, golden crumbs. Two fluffy white bread potato sandwiches, yowza! I couldn't resist having seconds of this one, which I came to regret shortly, when we had Pau Bhaji, a spicy mixed-vegetable dish served with bread for dipping. Traditionally a way to use up leftover vegetables, this had a mysterious and haunting sweetness that I still haven't identified. I'd need to eat a lot more of it to be sure exactly what it was. A lot more! How did we manage room for dessert? But who in her right mind could refuse Kulfi. This creamy, frozen dessert made with milk and flavored with saffron, almonds & pistachio was the only thing on the menu that I've had before. But I've never had it like this, with a silken, sticky texture and absolutely no iciness. Just a smooth and slippery saffron sweetness sliding down your throat. I think my s key must be stuck! All I can say is if anyone offers to feed you Bombay street food, take them up on it without hesitation and hurry to their house as fast as you can. It manages to be comforting and familiar and excitingly different all at once. And don't be surprised if if you see me on the Breakfast thread posting that I've taken to eating spicy Indian potato sandwiches in the early morning hours!

Spectacular, Annie!

Wow, Dejah, where've you been? Nice to see you back. Chris, I'm on board. In fact, lop yuk has been on my list since you wrote about it last year. I was just, uhm, waiting for Fall...yeah, that's it! But now if you're tweaking, I'll have to procrastinate a little more until you get yours to perfection (although I have to say that last year's looked perfect to me).

Gfron, I echo the sentiments already expressed - those are striking. They remind me that I need to learn how to do sugar. D90, I don't think you can really call yourself a rookie. You finshed that cake really beautifully. Lorna, gorgeous. How are Honeycrisps in pie, not too juicy? That's my current favorite eating apple. This is Toby's Buttermilk Chocolate Fudge Cake finished with Scharffen Berger's Deep Chocolate Glaze. I used the 99% unsweetened SB for the cake, and the 62% SB semisweet for the glaze. It was very wham! pow! chocolate, better the second day when the acidity of the chocolate seemed a bit tamer and the fruitier notes emerged more. Very adult, and needs to be served with whipped cream to lighten the experience.

I sure wish there were pecan wood here in WA, but apple and cherry are the best I can do. The ribs were quite dark, it's true, but delicious. The cherry smoke is quite a subtle, sweet smoke that I really like.

So yesterday I did my rib trials. I used spare ribs, and made three different versions. 1) Kansas City Spareribs These are a previous favorite of ours. I made them just as written, no brine, rubbed overnight. 2) Sweet and Smoky Ribs with Bourbon Barbecue Sauce. I deviated a bit from this recipe. The ribs are meant to marinate in bourbon for a while, but I wanted to brine them, so I added the bourbon to a salt, hot sauce, and sugar brine. They brined for 2 hours. I also tweaked the sauce a tiny bit because I only had blackstrap molasses, where the recipe calls for light molasses. I subbed some very dark Quebecois maple syrup - I was afraid it might be too sweet, but it turned out to be a delicious substitution. 3) The recipe from Serious Pig posted above somewhere in this thread (search isn't working right now) that contains juniper berries. I brined first with salt, sugar, hot sauce, and vinegar, then followed the recipe as written. So all of these went on the smoker using mainly cherry wood with a bit of hickory. I kept the temperature between 200-225 the whole time, except for one brief excursion over 300 when I was on the phone for a few minutes. And the damned things cooked way fast! By 3 1/2 hours the brined ribs were almost falling off the bone, an effect I didn't really want. The unbrined ones stayed more intact. I wrapped tham in foil, gave them a spritz of apple juice concentrate cut with cider vinegar, and put them in a hot but turned off oven, where they rested for a couple of hours. Except for the falling off the bone part, they were all gorgeous, pink and juicy throughout, and looked pretty much like all of the pictures above, so I didn't take any more. I'd invited my guests for a tasting, so their job was to choose the recipe that I'll make next week for Chufi's party. A really long silence descended on the table. People would eat one sort, then another, then a third, then start over again, saying all the while how hard it was to choose. In the end I dragged it out of them. The Serious Pig recipe is exceptionally delicious and different, but it came in third here because I want to make a typical rib style for this party, and that one's quite sophisticated. The Kansas City ribs almost won, being so classically delicious. But in the end, it was the Bourbon Ribs that got the nod, because they're really killer, and just slightly different, so they're interesting and familiar all in one. The bottom line is, though, that you really can't go wrong with any of these recipes. Next time I need to either brine for less time, or keep the smoker even lower, so as to keep the meat more intact. I served them with a simple coleslaw, some beautiful greens sauteed with home-cured pancetta, and made a skillet cornbread with more of the pancetta and some fresh corn and cheese crumbles added. Such tough duty, recipe testing.

Arne, you mean you can turn Shel's downstairs espresso bar office into a cow barn, then make me a kitchen? Totally cool! Believe me, if we really do remodel, as opposed to move, I'll be calling on you.

Dorie, will you say more about how he does the black sesame eclairs? Black sesame is one of my all-time favorite dessert flavors.

Wow, Ron, that is semi-miraculous to be able to keep such a low temp - you weren't using the gas at all? It's the miracle of the coals and the fishes. Mark - the processor produced a superior dog.

I can't remember whan I last had a good bagel, but this page is definitely engendering bagel lust! Kim, if you take a picture of that criss-cross slash the next time you make sandwich bread, I promise to learn how to spell "pretty." It's a lovely look.

Marlene, didn't you actually use the dreaded mesquite the first time, or am I losing my marbles? That spritz sounds great for ribs, was it about equal parts of each? Has anyone tried these bourbon smoked ribs?

Welcome to bacon-makin', NYCMike. It's never pedestrian to the folks here, and yours looks delectable!

Yes, I'm thinking of pre-rubbing one batch, brining another, and I'm not sure what for the third. Ron, it's interesting that you brine for 6 hours, and Col Klink suggests "at least an hour," making it sound like a short brine is best. Naked is not on my list, actually. There's also going to be pulled pork made by Della, so I want these to contrast both to that and the brisket. We're hoping to show Chufi how outdoor summer American meat is done.

On Wednesday I'm going to do some rib trials for a party for Chufi at the end of the month. I'd asked the guests to bring ribs, whoever was the rib expert, but when "buying them from Jones BBQ" was the best answer I could get, I figured it's time to become a rib expert myself. I've read through this whole thread 3 times, taken notes, and just want to see whether any new and brilliant ideas are out there before I get started. Has anyone got additional words of wisdom and succulence? I'll be using my offset smoker with cherry wood, and maybe a bit of hickory for added flavor. I love Col Klink's rub and =Mark's sauce, so those will definitely be included in the trial, as will the St. Louis style recipe from Epicurious linked to above. I've made that before, and it is indeed delicious. I've never brined ribs, although I brine lots of other stuff, so I'll be trying some with brine and some without. For the actual party I'll be putting Col Klink's rub on and serving =Mark's sauce with some smoked brisket, so now that I think of it, I might want to make the ribs have a decidedly different flavor scheme.

I'd go out today and buy a cow barn if I could have a kitchen like #3!

That Def Lepard thing is too funny - I hope Dan sees that! How did you get that prerry pattern on the top of your loaf, Kim? Actually, on closer examination, the shaping of the sides has a pattern too. Can you tell us how you formed your loaf? Beautiful garlic bread, McDuff.

Mmm, that lomo recipe sounds wonderful. Did you crush the fennel seed or leave it whole? Sweet or hot pimenton? And you used the cure #2, not pink salt, right?

Carolyn, I don't know about Thanksgiving, but last year I did leave the nuts and spices in the vin, supposedly for a couple more months. In the event I forgot all about the fact that I'd never strained it, and when I went to serve some about 8 months later, it had nasty bitter overtones and I had to dump that bottle. It really can get too tannic, but because I was sloppy, I don't know how long that takes.

Welcome, Wurst Case! Mark, that crisped guanciale looks great. How hot was your smoker on the smoked guanciale attempt? It looks kind of melty, as if it had been up over 160 for at least some of the time.