Shalmanese

I use it to temper the flavors of a dish that needs it. It's a little bit sour, a little bit pungent. It goes it pretty much every spice rub I make that needs a bit of brightness. For example, I made a simple grilled corn rubbed with a sumac compound butter and people proclaimed it the best corn they'd ever had.

That's an excellent description of how I also do things.

For a typical meal, when you're preparing the mise en place, do you carefully separate each and every component into it's own separate bowl or do you leave everything in little piles on the chopping board? I'm very much a board prepper. Things will be chopped and just shoved to the side, if there's no longer room on the board, I'll stop prepping and start cooking. Whenever I do big meals, I'll switch to bowls but for a simple, casual home dinner, it always seemed too precious and "cheffy" to have everything arranged in neat little bowls. Keeping things on the board means I can take an instant glance and know what needs to be done next. Whenever I use bowls, I have a disturbing tendancy to forget critical components of a dish because that bowl has been shoved to the side somewhere. Also, board prep can help me time and pace my meal. For example, I usually don't start chopping garlic until the mirepoix is in the pan. The amount of time it takes for me to mince garlic is usually how long it takes for the vegetables to soften. I have to admit, one downside to prepping on the board is that you occasionally find yourself tucked into some tiny corner of the board, dealing with some large unwieldy thing. So, are you a bowl prepper or a board prepper?

I've found the microwave is the best way to reheat a braise, especially one with delicate vegetables thrown in the end like frozen peas. You want to bring it up to temp as quick as possible with the minimum amount of violence. Microwaves can heat the interior of a piece of meat whereas stovetop reheating requires conduction to fully warm large chunks of meat. My method is to heat it until the bowl is steaming but not boiling, stir, then repeat. Never let it reach a boil or you get gummy residue on the side of the bowl.

I just realized as I was taking inventory of all my vinegars that, even though I have 13 different kinds of vinegar, I actually don't own a white wine, red wine or distilled vinegar anymore. When I ran out, I never bothered to get more.

oxtail beef shank short ribs flanken steak flank steak ox cheek lamb shank leg of lamb lamb breast chicken cornish game hen squid mussels clams

As a community of foodies, it's understood that we're not like normal people. But of all the various ways we go to absurd extremes, in what way do you most deviate from the normal person? In what ways are you completely indifferent? I'll start: Most: Vinegars: The average person might have white wine, red wine & balsamic on hand but I own about 20 different vinegars at any one time. Whenever I see a vinegar I've never heard of, I'll generally pick one up. I just bought one today from a scandinavian food store that I don't even know what it is. I'm guessing it's a malt vinegar and it smells pretty delicious. Grains: I've pretty much raided the Whole Foods bulk section for nearly every type of grain & bean. Rice & pasta get boring after a while so it's always fun to sub in some pearl barley or red rice. Fruit: I really, really love fruit. During the summer, I'll occasionally buy up to 10lbs of fruit and then sit at my computer and munch through the entire lot by the end of the day. Friends who have seen me do this say it scares them. Least: Pots & Pans: I hate having a lot of different pots & pans rattling around, they take up space and they're a pain to manage. I get by with a few (albeit high quality) pieces. Condiments: I go to other people's houses and I'm amazed at the stunning number of condiments they have in their fridge. I've only recently started stocking mayo, before that, about the only reliable condiment you would find in my fridge is mustard.

Different people in this thread seem to be using "developing your palate" to mean different things. Are you asking for the ability to talk more knowledgeably about food? The ability to appreciate better what your eating? The ability to discern two closely related flavors? Here are some random tips I've culled over the years: Tasting blind is a sucker's game: Occasionally, I'll be tasting a sauce or marinade or something and be asked how it was made and I usually have no clue. I might pick up some soy, maybe some sweetness. But on reality tv shows where they have blind taste competitions, even professional chefs do embarrasingly low (on the order of 20% for simple foods). Don't be ashamed if you can't pick out flavors blind, it's more of a party trick than anything else. Instead, know what flavors you're tasting beforehand and try to pick those out. Try and find the "DNA" of the dish: For classic dishes, there's a reason why they became popular. Some combinations just work well together. When your tasting, try and hone in on the platonic ideal of the dish. What is this dish trying to express & how well is it doing it. Take chicken fried steak to pick an example completely out of the air. The goal is to start with a tough piece of meat and make it palatable. At the same time, it also wants to provide a crust that gives a satisfing crunch. Once you understand these two things about CFS, you can approach a dish with context. Approach food from a critical angle: For every plate you eat, ask the question: How would this dish taste better. Start from the basics and work progressively up in requirements: Is the dish properly seasoned? Is the acid/sweet ratio correct? Are the things meant to be crisp & the things meant to be soft, soft? Does any one flavor dominate and overwhelm the dish? Are the temperatures correct? Is it coaxing the maximum amount of flavor from each ingredient? Do the flavor combinations work harmoniously or are they in conflict? Is it presented correctly? Do adhoc, sloppy-blind taste tests. Even avid foodies don't test nearly as much as makes sense. Buy an organic pineapple and a conventional pineapple, taste them side by side, can you tell a difference? How does cheap supermarket chicken compare to the free range kind in a chicken pot pie? The idea is not to demand absolute scientific purity, just that you get in the mindset of testing your assumptions when convenient. I don't think I have an especially poor palate but for some dishes in which foodies swear a high quality ingredient makes a difference, I couldn't tell if you held a gun to my head. My general rule is that unless something makes up over 30% of the flavor of a dish, you can generally afford to go one or two levels down and not notice a huge difference. Taste as you cook: I've never been much of a restaurant person so educating my palate usually involves me making the thing from scratch. The first time I make something, I'll usually pull it apart and do a long winded, technical version. That allows me to understand the progression of a dish as it cooks. Once I'm familiar with what I'm making, I can streamline the recipe and only taste at much longer intervals. Bullshit with confidence: Nobody knows how anyone else tastes things so even people with admittedly much better palates than me harbor a deep seated insecurity that maybe they're missing something crucial. As long as you're willing to wield your confidence when you discuss food, people will usually agree with you for fear of looking stupid.

They do have a shallow screwtop but it's not the best lid in the world. It can occasionally take a bit of fiddling to find the thread. Also, these jars have the unfortunate property of shaking off a fine mist of spice every time you open them. Make sure you're standing over what your about to season before opening.

I'm only putting stuff up there that I go through at a rapid clip so I'm not too worried. A good test would be if they lose potency, they don't deserve to be up there. The Herb de Provence has been replaced by Cumin Powder which I was temporarily out of. Upon consideration, the whole star anise, sel gris & sumac would probably be the first to go, replaced with pimenton, Klink's dry rub & Oregano. Still tinkering with the setup...

I just moved into a new apartment and probably my favorite feature is an ikea magnetic backsplash we installed behind the stove. The backsplash has room for 12 magnetic spice jars so I had to make some tough decisions. Currently, I have (from left to right): Top row Sumac Homemade Curry Powder Cayenne Pepper Ancho Chilli Powder Homemade Five Spice Powder Szechuan Peppercorn Powder Bottom Row Whole Cinnamon/Nutmeg Whole Star Anise Bay Leaves Herbs de Provence Sel Gris Red Pepper Flakes It's a combination of things I know I use a lot of & things I want to start using more. In addition, I've taken up an entire draw with probably another 40 spices in it. Space is always at a premium so what do you keep easily at hand and what do you relegate to a more out of the way part of the kitchen?

Did anyone else find it a bit disconcerting when Keller was talking about how there was a recession and he wanted to move to more affordable dishes and then produced what ultimately was wagyu drowned in truffles?

I just bought a package yesterday at the farmer's market. Rubbed them with cumin, szechuan peppercorn, dried chillis, S&P. Put it in a 300F oven for 2 hours, let it cool down a bit and then crisped them up in a pan in the rendered lamb fat. Served it with saffron rice & tzatziki sauce. First impressions were that they reminded me of chinese roast pork, except with lamb. The crisp skin on the lamb was some of the best I'd ever had but you need to serve this hot otherwise the lamb fat congeals unpleasantly in your mouth. Definitely need to serve this with something that cuts the richness otherwise it's just too much. One curious thing was that when it came time to crisp up, the lamb didn't sizzle as it hit the pan. It was a bit disconcerting and I couldn't rely on sound like I normally do to tell me when to flip. Edit: Now I need to find a reliable source for them. They're delicious but farmers market lamb ribs costs as much as supermarket rib eye which makes them very much a special occasion type of food.

Always taste a soup before sieving. If you think it doesn't need sieving, don't. For me, I'll almost always sieve, I hate the fibrous texture in what would otherwise be an elegant soup.

I would budget a bottle of wine per person. It's always disappointing to run out of sangria and it goes down surprisingly smooth. A bottle per seems like it would leave everyone happy.

My friends are challenging me to create a palatable cocktail that involves fish sauce. The only other rule is that it can't be a riff on a Bloody Mary of any kind, that would be too easy. It's open book, I'm allowed to consult any source I want as they don't believe it can be done. As an initial thought, I'm thinking Rye & Vermouth would play off the funkiness of it and possibly some pineapple juice or lemongrass syrup to bring some SE Asianess to it. Really, I have no idea though. Any suggestions?

I'm lying in bed after just having finished reading jayrayner's book "The man who ate the world" when it strikes me that I'm bored with food. I ate at a couple of fancy restaurants a few weeks ago. Everything was competently prepared, pleasant flavors, unmemorable. I've cooked at least 3 multi-course dinner for my friends over the few months. The food was well executed, the flavors were on point, everyone raved about it, even I couldn't find much fault with some of the dishes but they were ultimately unmemorable. I've been trying some new authentic, down scale, home style eateries. The flavors are bold, pronounced, confident and dull. It didn't used to be this way, I used to get excited about food. I used to cook something and put it in my mouth and it would be a revelation. Worlds of new flavor would open up, I would get something on point and I would finally see what everyone else was raving about. I remember when I used to take photographs of my food so that I could document what I had been making and keep a record of my progress. I've never been much of a restaurant person but back then, restaurants still had the capability of satisfying me profoundly. In fact, I can still remember the exact last meal that truly captivated me. It was a broth of pork neck bones, first rubbed with miso and roasted in the oven, then subtly infused with ginger, garlic, chillis, szechuan peppercorns and spring onions. Some quickly cooked noodles and a few garnishes of cilantro. The entire dish was improvised on the spot and deeply, soulfully satisfying. But that was over 6 months ago. Since then, not a single thing strikes me as memorable. Beef tastes like beef, lamb tastes like lamb, every flavor I eat is one I've eaten before a thousand times. Even the new is new in the same old way all new things are new, not the new newness I knew before. The distressing thing is, I'm only 24, I still have entire vistas of food lying in front of me. I feel like I'm in this rut and I have no idea how to get out of it, whether I'm even capable of getting out of it. I'm hoping that some of you can tell me some personal stories of something similar happening to you and what you did to fix it. None of the obvious things seem to be working.

Also, I found Pollan's cook-it-yourself diet remarkably facile and, to me, that was the most irritating part of the piece.

Several people are missing the larger theme of the article. It's not claiming that cooking is going away, it's that it's turning into a hobby rather than an essential life skill. One of the hallmarks of a hobby is that the people who participate in it become more extreme, not less. So the thriving internet food culture and people who cook obsessively are perfectly compatible with his piece. That food is becoming a hobby akin to sewing or handmaking furniture is something that's been discussed many times before, including by myself on egullet several years ago. What Pollan really wants to look at is why, unlike other hobbies, people who are not participants in it still enjoy watching other people perform it.

Would a pastry show necessarily be as telegenic? It seems like most pastry is very relaxed and methodical but when disaster strikes, it's usually in a way that there's no real recourse. With a cooking show, you can sense that someone is struggling because they're frantic and you can see their attempts to get back on track, whether successful or not. With pastry, all you would see is a chef walk into the kitchen in the morning only to discover the starter is dead and then sit twiddling their thumbs for the next hour, knowing they're going home because there's not enough time to proof another loaf.

One thing that was never clear to me was the logistics of serving. Do all chefs finish at the same time (which is what the show suggests with chefs constantly calling out the time remaining) or is it staggered (which would be logical). Such a big deal was made of Suzanne Tracht's dish standing around too long that it must have been a staggered plating yet nothing in the show ever hints at that. Also, for the quickfire, it's quite obvious that every contestant finishes at the same time and yet judging can seem quite lengthy. Is there any concern that those who are judged last will be unduly disadvantaged?

It seems almost cheaper just to render it from ducks than pay $75 for 30 lbs. I get easily 1lb of fat per duck plus, you get duck breasts and duck legs & duck stock (not to mention duck liver, duck gizzards & duck hearts) from the deal. If you want to run a special on braised duck leg tacos, I guarantee you would sell out within an hour. The breasts, they freeze well and it's a great thing to whip out whenever guests drop by.

Of these, I would say only the Bellini, Blood & Sand & Bloody Mary count as classic cocktails. Of course, if we want to go with stuff that's far more obscure, there are many more M cocktails.

You have the cornerstone Martini & Manhattan. The classic summertime trio of the Mojito, Mint Julep & Margarita, not forgetting the Mai Tai. It seems like an abnormally large amount of great cocktails start with M. Is there any other letter that can rival it?

The French Laundry Cookbook includes examples of "quick" sauces (which take around 3 hours of stove time to prepare FWIW) which involve repeated searing and deglazing of meat scraps/bones.