jhlurie

The lighting was actually already contrast enhanced. I know, because Jason and I sat at a computer and reviewed those shots after the BABBP. When we tried artificially enhancing the light more than what you see, the rest of the shot started looking washed out. The problem, I suppose, was that Ed's hat is shading his face, and he's already got pretty dark skin. Part of the dangers of candid, I guess, is that Ed was actually working and wasn't exactly going to take that hat. I think there might have been a few other shots taken a second or two away in each direction, but I think the one we are seeing is the only one which wasn't blurry (Ed moves fast for such a big guy).

Well, for one thing, they are candid, not posed shots. A different category altogether from most of the other shots discussed here. Even the food shots which were "arranged" were in natural light, with no tripod, and with little choice of the backdrop ( I know, since I was standing NEXT to Jason for most of these and suggested some of those shots and angles--although the execution is all him). So I think they deserve an analysis, of course (this hasn't been an appreciation thread as much as a "how can these shots be improved" topic), but we've got to keep in mind the differences between candid shots and posed ones. Ed Mitchell, for example, couldn't be moved one way or the other in that first shot, and even the camera angle could only have been changed slightly. P.S. - I ate the sandwich Ed is making in that picture.

To be honest, I actually find parts of this discussion a bit disturbing. To me it seems obvious why there were crowds, why New York tends to get attention as a center for all kinds of cuisine, why there's an eternal curiosity about new things, why a casual observer might see some childish and/or ignorant behavior while watching a line. Simple... it's numbers. Pure numbers. There are a LOT of people who live here. And also it's a group that, by it's very nature, is already very diverse--with a history of yes... let's admit it... assimilation. (Okay, Sam beat me to this argument, but it's worth restating) And in the nature of all things New York... the barbecue festival was completely forgotten a week later. That's another part of there being a lot of people, in a small space, with a lot going on. If it was a fixation, it was a very short lived one. Until next year's BABBP. As for the "BBQ capital" thing, I mostly get that it was an off-hand reference by Steven Shaw in his commentary to put the whole BABBP in perspective. If someone else actually said it at the event, I'm sure it was for similar purposes. I don't think it was stated as some serious goal. The very reason people were fascinated by Ed Mitchell was the realization that he's from a place, and a lifestyle, which represents barbecue, whereas Danny Meyer isn't. And even still, in the nature of the big populous city, it's a passing fancy--hopefully to be revisited next year, but perhaps not.

mktye, it seems to me that many kinds of light--a standard flash certainly--would indeed make that cake almost invisible. It seems to me that you actually could light it better with more natural light. You need some warm yellow light in there, not the blueish-white you might get otherwise. Also, again, this is from the standpoint of an ignoramus on most of these things, but I wonder if this is one case where you should be shooting against a black background instead of a white one. Someone who actually knows the science should pipe up here... it just seems to make sense to me.

I wonder... Walsh talks about stacked enchiladas. But I've been under the impression that those were a product of New Mexico and not of Texas. If I'm right in my recollection, does it still fall under the Tex-Mex umbrella? The "Mex" part, I suppose? Or are they their own thing?

Ah, how about the features and subsites of eGullet? RecipeGullet, Daily Gullet, JobGullet, eGullet Culinary Institute, eGullet Store, ImageGullet, and Forums? Rocco DiSpirito Just Embarasses Every Italian Friend

We really need to see if Steve wants to do a Q&A.

What would low-carb wine consist of? Water? And more water? With a purple crayon dipped in it for the Merlot?

Don't forget the relishes, barbecue sauces, soya sauces, and ketchups!

Folks, Because Boris' confirmation as the new blogger was a bit last minute, and because ImageGullet has been down until recently, naturally his start has been a bit slow. Can we please support him by keeping things relatively food related here--clustered, when possible, around his meals and his talk of whatever in his life surrounds that? Often there's the impression that we're just bidding time between foodblogger posts, but we've also got the rest of eGullet to play on if things get slow here. In fact, if some exciting food issue comes up here, but it's not directly related to the blogger, it's often wise to spin it off to a new thread elsewhere on eGullet--thus contributing to the entire site while keeping this as a nice intact document of Boris' week in food. Ask questions, push the blogger to explain, lay the base for those other lovely discussions and link to them elsewhere on the site--it's the beauty of these foodblogs that they can serve as such a great platform for all of that. But let's try and keep what goes on here distinct from a lot of what goes on in the Member Bios area. I'm not scolding or pointing fingers anywhere, it's just that the blogging process itself is already intimidating enough without your focus being spread out. It also, arguably, will make what promises to be a fascinating blog a bit easier to read end-to-end. If you have questions about any of this, you can PM me, or SobaAddict70, and we'd be happy to chat. BORIS - A suggestion. If you'd like, you can also utilize the eGullet RecipeGullet to help create an easier reference, going forward, for people to duplicate your recipes. It also does neat stuff like convert units between metric and US units, so that part of your audience can follow along. EDIT - Ah, Boris, as I typed this you came up with a beautiful entry. Hopefully you had time for dessert too. Do we get to hear about it?

I just saw on the news that Tommy John (a LONG time Yankee pitcher) is back in NY baseball. He's now the manager of the Staten Island Yankees. John, besides being a pretty darned good pitcher, is also famous for having an entire common type of surgery nicknamed after him. He was also a famous "trencher", once being quoted as quipping:

It's interesting that you say that bread stays better than tortillas. Now I'm NOT dealing with the good stuff, but that's rarely true with the varieties of corn-based, store-bought, tortillas we get in the United States Northeast. Even at room temperature (which admittedly is usually a bit cooler here).

Cheerwine? Oh... and Bourbon.

Yes, it is. We've got a whole forum where you can ask a number of expert people any (or all) of this stuff.

They still exist? Really? I used to eat there all the time when I lived in D.C. about 15 years ago...

I seem to recall that on the field level, along the first base side--WAY down at the end--there's some kind of special area with some premium vendors. I recall getting some pretty decent Jamaican Beef Patties there, and there's also a sushi stand and a (very crowded) kosher cart. As for "near", I wonder if you could go to Arthur Avenue FIRST, pick up some food, and take it in. How draconian is Yankee Stadium security on this lately?

Great, and then face lawsuits from whatever bonehead feels he owns THAT name.

Yes, they do--although I think using them goes against the idea of keeping some water in the bag. For me, that's been the cause of the only serious rot I've ever seen inside these bad boys. The instructions on the packaging agrees with this--they talk about the fact that they bags inhibit moisture build up. To me, that means the reverse is true as well--any moisture you allow into the bag isn't going anywhere--so adding water is overkill (although I still have for herbs with intact roots--for example, cilantro--it seems to work for that). I'm pretty sure that the bags don't work the same way as the discs though. The package for the bags basically says it allows the gasses released by ripening out through the bag. My memory of the packaging for the discs is that it actually metabolizes the ethylene, whereas the bags just vent it. The discs never really seemed to work for me anyway. I think they require a nice airtight crisper drawer.

Round? Or overly smiley, even in the face of his team having a sub-.500 season? Although you wouldn't know it from their last week of playing. Of course, the subway series with the Yankees is coming up now, and Mike and the boys may want to break out the hard alcohol instead of the champagne....

"Normal" is a loaded term, because these days there are more than two grades of Olive Oil easily available. I couldn't pinpoint the ideal use for each of them, but as I said, the so-called "Light" version supposedly has a higher smoke point, and that makes it much easier to cook with. In fact, if you look at the bottles lined up in the store, some of the Americanized bottles of the "light " variety (there's "extra light" too--I'm not positive if its the same) say stuff like "best for cooking and baking", the normal "virgin" says something like "ideal for sauteing", and the extra virgin says something like "for marinades and dressing". I'm estimating these, because I'm going from memory, but I went shopping a day or two ago and bought olive oil and that's what I recall. In Italy (or even in the right stores in the U.S., I'm sure) I think there are even MORE grades of Olive Oil, but I'm looking at it from an American non-gourmet supermarket angle here. Wait... click here, where Carapelli, a commonly available American supermarket brand tries to explain, although they seem to fudge a bit with their "levels" (They have both a "Premium Extra Virgin" and an "Extra Virgin" level, but no normal "Virgin"? They have a "Mild" instead of "Pure" 2nd Pressing?)

Less Virgins were sacrificed? Seriously, from what I recall the Extra Virgin Oil is cold pressed, from the first pressing, with extremely low acidity. Virgin has higher acidity but is other the same. "Light" Olive Oil has less of the distinctive taste and a higher smoke-point, and thus is frequently better for actual cooking. That's about the extent of my knowledge. Linda LaRose (fifi) tells a humorous story here about some guy who's roux sucked because he used Extra Virgin Olive Oil in it., thinking it was better. Sure it's better. On a salad.

Well, logically that would have to be Paul then.

I just don't get it. Best I can figure out - "native Americans" invented the cooking technique. Spanish explorers came up with the original word. And lest we forget - pigs (the current haute cuisine of BBQ) came from Asia and Europe Well this is exactly the point, isn't it? It's not only irrelevent in some ways, it's also fraught with peril of further acrimony and myth creation. I have no doubt--none at all--that Elie and Walsh's picture of African slaves cooking barbecue while white slave owners looked on is probably pretty accurate, just as I have no doubt that the BQ ranch (be it real or imaginary) had no real role in the affair. Elie and Walsh are right to clear the air on this, although it's probably wrong to talk about this as if it's proof of origin. And obviously it's dangerous to try and take some kind of historical justice TOO far, because then the line will eventually form up behind you with other claims.

For years White Castle did very little but expand. Then, at some point a few years back, all the W.C.'s in White Castle's own original home state, Kansas (and most of Missouri), got closed. So they aren't exactly bullet-proof. Of course what do I know? I'm sitting in an area with 69 White Castle locations (according to their website) within 50 miles of me. Harold & Kumar don't have to drive very far to find a White Castle in New Jersey, no matter what the trailers for that movie seem to say...

Like white culture, black culture isn't necessarily immune from appropriating, assimilating and claiming credit for things. I suppose at this point there isn't an equally determined Native American standing behind Mr. Elie and Mr. Walsh, pushing and challenging their claims the way Elie (who's black) and Walsh (who's white) are pushing and challenging the established notions that cowboys invented barbecue, or something silly like that. I mean it even comes on "BBQ sauce" packages with rope lassos and stuff drawn on it! The cowboys MUST have created it, right? Although in this case it's at least possible that the appropriation is more the word than the actual techniques, since the products of the barbacoa seem to be described more as roasting (although the distinctions probably get pretty thin around this point--no matter what it's definitely an open structure being used as an oven). It's possible that some portion of the slave population had a pit stop on some island and copied what they saw there. It's also possible that the slavers themselves were the ones who did the copying and simply made the slaves do it--and that knowledge continued with them when they were distributed across North America. It's ALSO possible that the idea of cooking in a pit is so universal that the slaves were perfectly familiar with it and just started using a similar word--as they were forced into appropriating a lot of Spanish, English, Dutch, and French words for things they already knew. Really... how can well tell from the scraps of information we have? Really, if the issue is contemporary ownership and not historical, this all becomes kind of moot. Does anyone really benefit, for example, by knowing who exactly created the first note of music which had some Jazz-like quality to it? Probably not. The same is likely true here.