Chris Amirault

Interesting experiment last night: I rubbed a stainless bowl with the cut side of a clove of garlic, added a couple of tablespoons of lemon, and then whisked in some olive oil. There was a very stable emulsion to which I added salt, pepper, and minced shallot. I was surprised at two things. First, the amount of garlic "oil" that rubbed onto the stainless steel was pretty minimal, but it was enough to provide the needed emulsifying effect. Second, I couldn't taste the garlic at all.

I think that the adjective "healthy" here denotes portion size (big).

I'll say it: steak tartare.

Been fiddling a bit with this variation on the "Margarita Castaneda," which now has a bit more kick to it: 3 oz añejo tequila (Sauza Commemorativo) 1 oz lime juice 1 oz grapefruit juice 1/2 oz Cointreau 1/2 oz grenadine pinch salt pinch roasted Thai chile pepper

We've been very happy with this one from Golda's Kitchen.

Eggs often appear in savory dishes with "curry" sauces. Last week, I made Charmaine Solomon's a great recipe for an Indonesian egg curry from her Complete Asian Cookbook.

Thanks, Elie and Johnny. Sometimes feety can be reet-petite-y. I'm probably just projecting, but that woman on the left looks verrrry familiar.

What does the "PC" stand for in Loblaws PC organics line?

Food Processor Method for Rendering Fat & Lard I've been using fifi's lard rendering technique for a while now, and it works like a charm. However, when I was writing up the topic on emulsions, I started thinking that the techniques of emulsions as they apply, say, to a soufflé, could be useful in rendering animal fat. (I later spied this technique in Paula Wolfert's Cooking of SW France. Doh!) Fifi points out that adding water can help nudge the rendering along. Given that, I thought, what if you create an emulsion with skin or fat and then beat in some water? By doing that, you'd create an emulsion where the fat molecules are sitting right next to a bunch of water molecules; stick that in a 220F (105C) oven, and when the water heats to boil and steams, it should render the fat very quickly. This would also enable you to keep the fat at a low temperature, which insures the highest quality fat. The method works like a charm, and it's particularly useful if you want to get the most out of duck or chicken skin and don't want cracklin's (or gribenes) to snack on at the end. When making duck confit, for example, you'll want to get every little bit of fat from that skin. The next time you are skinning chicken breasts, save the skin, and you'll have some easy, wonderful schmaltz on hand later! Method 1. Preheat the oven to 220F/105C. 2. Chop your animal fat or skin roughly. (It's a messy business, and the combination of dull knife, greasy hands, and slippery skin or fat is very dangerous.) 3. Place the fat or skin into a food processor and turn it on. Let it run for a minute or two, pulsing and scraping to make sure that you're chopping up the skin or fat as finely as possible. 4. With the motor running, pour in some cold water, about 1/2-1c (100-200ml) to form the emulsion. It should take only a few seconds for the fat to absorb the water and make a foamy fat frosting. 5. Shut off the food processor and scrape the emulsion into a thick pot that can go in the oven. (A cast iron dutch oven is perfect for this purpose.) Place the pot into the oven. 6. Every 10-15 minutes check the pot and break up the emulsion with a wooden spoon. When all of the emulsion has rendered into clear fat, there will be a tough raft on the top of the proteins that remain. 7. Gently strain the fat from the pot into a clean glass jar and store in the fridge indefinitely. Keywords: Easy, Food Processor ( RG1947 )

I just grabbed a bottle of Da Rosario black truffle oil just to see what's what. "Black Perigord Truffle Flavoring" is listed as the only ingredient with olive oil. Am I correct in assuming that this ingredient did not come from truffles? It isn't listed as an artificial flavoring -- though I'm certainly likely to be naive about what food labels can get away with these days. BTW, it does have a medicinal smell atop the truffle odor, but not anything as strong as turpentine. Results in mashed potatoes later this week, I think.

What have you found out there? Can you share it with us?

There's much buzz about Walmart starting to carry organic food here in the US, but I'm noticing trends in lots of directions at some of the large chain stores in New England. Up until about four or five months ago, the supermarkets at which we regularly shopped for staple items (Shaw's and Stop n Shop) were carrying a pretty decent array of natural and/or organic meats; I'd usually bring home some lamb, beef, or chicken along with the laundry detergent and bulk onions. Now most of those items have disappeared from their special little case to be replaced with lousy home replacement meal items ("blackened chicken" and that sort of thing), and they're hard to find elsewhere in the store. Meanwhile, the egg selection has exploded to include every variation on size, natural, organic, omega-3, local, free-range, "happy chickens" -- you name it. What's going on at your local supermarket chain? (ETA: Not just in the U.S., btw.) Can you find more organic, natural, local products on the shelves? What sorts of things are appearing or disappearing?

"Zazerac"? Is that a typo? Or a variant of Sazerac?

Used to carry them consistently throughout the season.

When I had long hair down my back, I started putting it up after I saw one of them in a dish I had just served to a guest.

That sounds like a workable adaptation, jeniac42! Take lots of photos and let us know how it turns out.

Thanks, Mar Calpena and tmcook! I would certainly say that it's possible I was slightly rooked, but I wouldn't say that the quality was bad. Quite the opposite: it was remarkable, all save that one bite! The morning I describe above, I really got the full flavor of Barcelona as a tourist destination as the sun rose over the Ramblas: prostitutes beating up johns, getting cruised by a kid coming down from a long night on something or other, and the hordes of service workers trudging through them to get to work in the tourist shops. Don't get me wrong: I loved Barcelona utterly. But those graffiti artists are onto something.

I'm not seeing an outpouring of support for this practice here, which suggests to me that, at least around here, it's not an unqualified smash as PR. Seriously, what's the point of it? To increase the name recognition of the chef? To increase "hospitality"? Aren't waitstaff supposed to do that? The only good conversation I've ever had with a chef was with George Germon at Al Forno. Late one night at the end of a shift, he visited my table and eventually sat down for a few minutes while we talked about a restaurant that he had closed (Lucky's) and the cassoulet that had been on the menu. A few weeks later, it was back on the menu. Other than that, it's just a wincefest every time.

I was out at a thoroughly mediocre drinks-n-apps place last week, and over comes the chef, toodling around miserably like she's Ricardo Montalban with a hangover welcoming us to Fantasy Island. "How is everything?" she asked through her grimace. "Great!" I lied, with half of my Sysco fries shivering on the plate next to a banal half-burger. She lied right back, "Glad you're here!" The whole dance made me feel crappy, and I can't imagine she enjoyed it either. Yet off she trudged, face stuck on "happy-making," to another table. Why do chefs have to parade in the FOH at any joint charging more than $10pp? Don't we all -- customers, chefs, waitstaff, you name it -- want to give this empty, pathetic ballet a rest already?

Keep it. It's a food mill, which you can use to puree lots of things. The different-sized holes are particularly nice. ETA: Like he said.

Cracked open one of my new cookbooks this week, James Oseland's Cradle of Flavor, and before the evening was up I had a stain on his great Javanese fried rice recipe. Virtually every book in my library has grease spatter on one page or dough between two others. When a guest was over a few days ago, she spied my utterly destroyed, held together with tape copy of Charmaine Solomon's Complete Asian Cookbook and expressed shock that I could take such poor care of my books. Honestly, I find the schmutz a tribute to their success. What about you? Do you keep your cookbooks neat and clean? Or like me do you paint 'em with whatever's for dinner?

I had the WF peeled shrimp the other day -- can't recall the price. They were labeled fresh and wild, and they seemed pretty damned good to me.

I'd be afraid of it. Not for health reasons, necessarily. Do report, please, on preparation method, texture, and taste. Science demands a simple method to preserve the, er, unique flavor profile.

Go to Bar Pinoxto early, sit down with some cava, and let them serve you whatever they want to serve you. (ETA: Especially the baby clams and eggs.) While you're walking around, check out these places. There are fantastic food shops right near where you're staying.

I'm pretty sure no one here is insisting that people should buy rice cookers, insanely expensive or no. But, if you make rice a lot, have the counter space and outlets, and have a few dollars left over from your allowance, these are good options. One feature on the Zojirushi that I particularly like is the handle, which seems a bit silly at first. However, when eating a rice meal with a lot of sides (like a classic Thai meal), it's great to keep dipping into the plugged-in rice cooker that's keeping the rice perfect (another great feature) and have that perfect rice throughout the meal, instead of having it grow increasingly cold and tough.