Chris Amirault

I pulled out "My Knife, My Pot" to give Thorne's choice a bit more context: As you can see, it's no simple choice, knife versus pot. If you can get a hold of the book, do: the essay is one of his best. ETA: The entire copyrighted article is available here.

Great report. I wonder if that tonarelli had finely ground coconut powder, which you can use as a thickener in other liquids like stock. You get the coconut component but in a liquid that has other properties (like a collagen mouthfeel). As you reflect back on the meal, do you have a sense of where this cuisine of convergence may be heading next? Though a lot of the influences seem broadly "Asian," there are others at work, especially in Samuelsson's dish, which (not surprisingly) bears the marks of north African cuisines: a flour-based savory with nuts and pomegranate. Also, most of those dishes were beautiful without seeming to be creations of culinary art. I don't know if that's an effect of the banquet-style plating or not, but it feels relaxed and confident.

When I think of the items that No One Else Can Use or Clean, they're all knives. Um, and my wok. Hrm.

I just spent a while looking but I can't find anything specifically about monkfish. The one section that seems relatively useful is this (p 211): With meat, resting allows not only for finishing cooking the interior but also for slight cooling, during which "the meat structure becomes firmer and more resistant to deformation, and its water-holding capacity increases." I think it may be as simple as that, actually: resting allows for slight cooling.

Yep -- quoting Thorne. Right. You grabbed those first and they're on the way to the cabin. Knives or pots, Susan? Which is it?

Last thing on a RI New York system weiner too (after mustard, chili sauce, and raw onions).

Contrarians! Thorne requires one or the other. Assume you got the other stuff out just fine: cookbooks are boxed up in a trailer; bread bowls are in fur storage in Duluth. Knives or pots, people?

In his terrific book, Pot on the Fire, John Thorne declares that the world of cooks can be split into two camps: Your house is burning. The kids, pets, photographs, and personal papers are all secure, and the kitchen is the only room you can enter. You've got a few prized cookbooks under one arm. What do you grab with the other? Pot or knife?

Sophisticated systems to track products from farm or feedlot to consumption have long part of the fantasies of food responsibility writers like Michael Pollan. Today, Gourmet Retailer is featuring an article on Canada's "produce traceability initiative": The initiative has its own website, producetraceability.org, listing the seven step action plan. What other sorts of initiatives are out there? What is needed?

Nation's Restaurant News had an article on the effects of the economy on restaurants here:

Makes sense to me. After all, rapidly running cold (34F say) water is probably just as cold as a still icebath, especially one with inadequate ice, once the warm stuff goes in there and starts heating up the water.

Hmm..... Spun-dry spuds aren't very dry, and they aren't evenly dry. I always dry them with kitchen towels until they're moisture-free. Maybe that's part of the problem? If you are dying for crispness, maybe moving toward shoestrings is worth it. And, Pam, what's this I see about red potatoes? Can you get them big enough for nice long spears? And does the interior turn into that mealy texture you get from the russets?

My problem was mold. I suppose someone with a more Popeye-like physique could get the belly rolled tightly enough for my basement and its lil bugs, but I couldn't. Along with less stress, making stresa allows me to hang the bellies for a lot longer, which gives a more pronounced cured flavor.

There are several discussions of pancetta in the Ruhlman/Polcyn Charcuterie topics, initiated by Ron Kaplan here, and most recently with yours truly here. I'm a convert to stresa, and can't see any reason to go back to the roll. I also think that the tips in Paul Bertolli's Cooking by Hand are work checking out, particularly concerning the curing spices.

Damn. I wonder what happened. Any thoughts?

Sounds good. Will you also be procuring some smoked or salted pork of note?

Remember that I live in RI, where unemployment is 10% and rising; the state budget gap is about as big as California's in terms of percent of total budget. And Providence is one of the poorest cities in the US. I think that, in this economic climate, eating out period is one of the first things that people cut. That's certainly what folks are telling me about their places, whether they're cheap or not.

And then there's rhum agricole. And then there's overproof rums. And then there's....

In this topic, New Yorkers have been discussing the effects of the recession on the Manhattan restaurant business, about which the NY Times's Frank Bruni today opined. Amid Bruni's pithy details involving special meal deals and FOH staff exhaling when he walks through the door, no one went on the record with any real candor about the scary realities of the economic situation, save perhaps for Fabio Trabocchi claiming declines in the city's high-end restaurants running at a stomach-flipping 40%. Here's the venerable Alfred Portale: Not very reassuring. I live in Providence, and everyone in the industry I talk to here is reporting tough times now and ahead. One friend who works in the kitchen at one high-visibility concept restaurant recently got let go in a third blood-letting at the place, and several similar places are looking downright ghostly all week, even on weekend nights. At two Asian restaurants I frequent regularly, the owners reported significant declines -- save for the recent lunar new year. However, I had a conversation with the owner/operator of a Vietnamese restaurant today that got me thinking about who's being affected and why. He agreed that business was really slow, but he also talked quite a bit about the benefits of having a family-operated establishment: when times are tough he can skip a paycheck or three, something that several other places on the same street couldn't do (including a long-time neighborhood institution and a three-month-old Thai joint). They're shuttered; he's hanging in there. His place is along a moderately busy suburban street, not in the prime downtown or College Hill real estate sector, so he doesn't have to worry about killer rent or mortgage payments. And he's got reliable, built-in staffing flexibility: he's out front and his brother is out back, and the family pitches in if the restaurant is busy (or on college break). There are certain commonalities about the business of running a restaurant -- product management, utilities costs, etc. -- but there are other differences that seem to be making a big difference in this economic climate. What are you seeing in your neck of the woods, either as a pro in the industry or a customer? What restaurant business models seem to be making it through the storm? Who got shuttered, and why?

More on the Milk Punch. Sick, I chose to nurse myself back to health using Brugal anejo rum, Chalfonte cognac, and cane juice syrup. Still sick, but much happier about it.

Vile? What does that mean? I think you may have grabbed a bad bottle, sir.

No scientist here, but I'd suggest separating the sauce elements from the proteins, heating the sauce thoroughly and independently on the stovetop, and then reheating the meat gently in the sauce.

When I get some fresh ones, I peel 'em and soak 'em in water in the fridge shortly after getting them. They don't last forever; after a few days they lose their sweet crispness.

Once you've cooked it you can certainly keep it in a cold fridge for a few days.

I have never made a ham before so I'm not a good person to ask. However, in my conversations with ham makers they've all said that they inject brine. Damned things are just too big.