Chris Amirault

Last night I fried up the sausages using R&P's method, first searing them and then covering them for 6-7 minutes, all at medium. I used the instant read thermometer to get them to 150F and then they finished in a warm oven to 160F. Here they are in the pan: I served them with some homemade spaghetti and a pretty simple tomato sauce (bacon, onions, garlic sauteed a long while; crushed tomatoes, sage, bay, pinch of allspice and clove), which turned out really swell. The sausages were universally beloved -- "the best sausages I've ever had," said all of my guests. I agreed that they were great. Much of that was due, I now know, to some basic things that I'm going to repeat in the future: cutting the meat into smaller chunks (I'm going for 3/4" next time); seasoning the meat and letting it sit for a good while (overnight, next time) before grinding; keeping things cold, cold, cold; creating that "primary bind"; sauteing then covering; measuring the internal temperature for doneness; adding that ice cold liquid (I used a cotes du rhone). I also really, really like the R&P ratios. I did a bit of math to make it a bit more easy for me to figure out: R&P's ratios, makes five pounds of sausage 1.5 k meat : 750 g fat : 40 g kosher salt : 250 ml liquid R&P's ratios using 1 k meat as base, makes 3+ pounds of sausage 1 k meat : 500 g fat : 27 g salt : 170 ml liquid A few things I didn't do that I'm going to do next time: understuff them for better tying (notice that one sausage has popped its string off) and frying (I burst three of them); poke a few more needle holes in them to limit bursting; grinding to a less fine consistency (I would have preferred that, though my guests might not have done so); keep the saute pan dry (the juices limited the browning).

Bryan, you sure know what to do with your winter break, man.

Great stuff, Bryan. Over in the other thread you mentioned you chose the Foodsaver v1205 because of the extended vacuum and instant seal. Are you still glad you made that decision? What do those features provide?

I'll second what Andie wrote. The texture/absorption issue is more dependent on temperature than type of oil; you'll probably want the fat at 350F or a bit more, I'd think. The lard and butter are primarily flavor components, though adding a significant proportion of butter may cause your smoke point to be too low. And you'll provide your grandmother's recipe in RecipeGullet, yes? With lots of photos, of course? So we can all give it a go, yes?

Chris: Where did you get them in PVD? Cost? ← Hey K, I got 'em where you saw 'em: WF on N Main for $6/lb.

We had a very nice Christmas. I "helped" my folks with their gifts to me and my wife, so all in all we really scored. The final tally: this 11-piece Sitram Profisserie line at Bridge for $162; Ruhlman and Polcyn's absolutely fantastic Charcuterie; three Alford and Duguid books: Home Baking, Seductions of Rice, and Mangoes and Curry Leaves; Wolfert's new Cooking of Southwest France; Nathan's New American Cooking; Hamelman's Bread; some bannetons, linen, and proofing baskets from The San Francisco Baking Institute; and a titanic, thick baking stone from Golda's Kitchen. Oh, yeah, almost forgot (): as part of a joint anniversary/xmas gift (click here for explanation), StudioKitchen in the new year. Heh.

Bumpity-ump. I found a source here for these clams, which I've never had before. In a previous eG thread, folks mention cleaning out "the poo." Ahem. Anyone want to enlighten? What's "the poo"? Daniel, did you clean them, or just steam them like, well, steamers?

I got a Philips HR1358 IB second-hand, and it was a vast improvement on our old Braun IB. Click here for the Target.com link, where it's not available, but you'll get a sense of the design. The little chopping bowl is very handy, and the IB itself is excellent. Only four speeds, but I puree a lot and find it's perfect. One caveat: the frame for the base of the blender attachment (the part that will hit the bottom of your bowl or pot) is made of stainless steel, so you wouldn't want to use this one with anything non-stick.

Hypermodern seems a more useful term in the context of cultural history as well. "Avant garde" generally refers to a movement in the early- to mid-20th century focused on a group of artists seeking to break from the restraints of late 19th and turn-of-the-century cultural practices: the Surrealists, the Dadaists, the Futurists, etc. There are a bunch of different reasons why Adria et al aren't really avant garde in that sense, even if they borrow from some avant garde techniques (see above). However, they do seem to be hypermodern, in the sense that they are taking some of the tenets of high modernism to their extremes. Trying to find and express the essence of an ingredient, for example, seems to have a logical connection to the modernist's eschewing ornament and seeking a thing's essential meaning. "Hypermodern" does seem to miss a few things, imho; someone around here ought to coin a new phrase....

Elie I have a question about your gratin preparation that I thought about when I was finishing my daube. Is that dish Corningware or some other heat-resistant glass? It seems to be. I ask because your description of the finished dish suggests that the potatoes on the top were "the best" -- and thus that internal creamy, cheesy perfection was not achieved. I can also see some liquid on the bottom of the pan; the directions indicate that the liquid should be "nearly absorbed." I'm being so nit-picky because I found that the very last stage of my daube didn't go as perfectly as I'd hoped, and I believe that the guilty party was a "copper" baking dish that I had found at a yard sale (but had never inspected while using my reading glasses -- I just kicked its faux ass into the garbage can ). It never heated up properly and thus wasn't a good dish for the final blast of heat. I'm wondering the same about this baking dish of yours. I certainly think that the daube I made required the right pot (in my case, a battle-worn Le Cruset big boy) and its success during the six-hour, 250F braising relied at least partly on that. I wonder if the same might have happened with your gratin -- and if it is something worth considering with SW French cooking generally. I certainly feel that I need a good non-covered baking dish for final, high-heat finishing in the oven, and I'm not sure what that would be exactly. Perhaps, Paula, you can weigh in on this? Seems apropos given the book on which you're now working!

I would heat them in a low oven, like 275-300 F, on a rack. That way, if possible, any oil can drip out, and you want to heat them for 10-15 minutes, until they are good and sizzling. That may crisp up the edges at least. snip Edit: Oh, I thought of something else... If you are heating them in a gas oven, they are less likely to crisp up. Something about how the combusion of natural gas creates water vapor. Use an electric oven, convection if possible, like a toaster oven, for drier heat. ← Also, if you turn the oven up to 325-350, you'll be closer to the temperature you'd want the oil to be at if you were refrying them. If you are stuck with a gas oven, you can always crank it to 450 or so and keep the door cracked open.

I've already started obsessing about Ruhlman and Polcyn's Charcuterie, in particular, about rigging some smoking contraption in which to place the links and slabs I'm planning.

"[L]ike eating the ocean": a great phrase. It's what I think of when I get a particularly good oyster. Since it's still 2005, I'm adding one more to the list. Last night, after I had navigated a minivan down to NYC where I gave the in-laws a four-mile walking tour of downtown (Chinatown, Little Italy, Soho/Noho, Greenwich Village, East Village, and the Lower East Side), we decided that we were sufficiently well exercised to hit Katz's. I got (what else?) a fantastic pastrami sandwich to split with my wife, and also a frank and some fries. As always, there is no better eating experience in the world for me, and introducing my wife and her family to it was wonderful. Plus -- who knew? -- baby Bebe loves half-sours!

It was pretty good, Adam. The Bourdain recipe is deceptively simple, in both a good way (it's a complex spoonful of soup when done) and a bad way (instructions). As we all know, cod is a pretty resiliently fleshed fish, and the fibers that add such wonderful body to this rustic soup don't get sieved easily. It took me a good hour-plus to sieve the vegetables and flesh through the chinois; I had to keep stopping to pull out small bones, unclog the pores of the chinois, and ponder the ethics of telling people that a few tiny bits of knuckle flesh from my hand had been shredded into the final mix. (I went with "No.")

2 pounds for a shrimp boil (Old Bay in beer with a squirt of lemon just before serving) tonight as an app for a gumbo. Suck 'em, peel 'em, eat 'em. Magnificent.

Jeniac42, I think I've figured out a few things about that KA sausage attachment. I made a big batch of Italian sausages using the proportions in Ruhlman and Polcyn's Charcuterie and seasonings (1T each of sage, oregano, fennel, and red pepper flakes). The instructions in that book are outstanding; if the rest of that Christmas present is that good, I'm going to be a happy camper. Some useful tips from R&P: cube your meat in fairly small chunks (1/2-3/4" or so) so that they feed easily; season the meat after cubing and let it sit for a good while (1-2 hours at least, a day if you'd like) before grinding; place the bowl for the ground meat in another bowl of ice. Go buy it, seriously. So a few photos. Here's the pork in the freezer chillin': I also kept all of the grinder attachments, the cup of wine, and the KA mixing bowl in there until I used them: Here are the Whole Foods casings that I mentioned up thread. It's a bit pricey compared to the salt-packed ones, but they're already rinsed and ready to go: KA ready to go. I hadn't used an ice water bath before, but it's a great idea : I then ground the meat with the smaller grind plate: Next, I mixed the meat for a minute with the paddle, then added 1c of red wine (first time for that) and mixed again to get to the "primary bind." Hadn't ever done that before, either. I was getting a bit worried about the meat warming up, so I don't have any stuffing images. However, I found that switching to the larger grind plate for stuffing was a major step. I had never thought to do that before, and it seems obvious to me now. Just as important, I found that it really was crucial to apply a good deal of pressure when feeding the meat into the grinding attachment; otherwise, the consistency of the meat in the links was too fine for my taste. The final results: I think that we're going to be making calzones on Wed, giving those links a couple of days to blend.

I made the daube of beef, Gascony style for Christmas dinner last night, and it was fantastic. It's multi-day dish, and it requires quite a bit of work and attention. But it was fantastic, a joy to make and the highlight of the evening.

I made soup de poisson from the Les Halles Cookbook with a cod frame. My grandfather was a Gloucester fisherman and hauled thousands of these majestic fish into his boat off Georges Bank. Thought it'd be worth memorializing him before he went into the pot, so:

Badump. Snooping around here thinking about drinks to go with rillettes and saw the posts about the French 75. When I was travelling in Cognac years ago, I had a variation on that theme (I think), cognac and ginger ale. A nice drink if the ginger ale isn't too sweet.

Cut back a bit: here's the final menu: rillettes crudités et cornichons soupe de poisson frisée aux lardons daube gratin dauphinois tarte tatin

I agree with Chufi: all sounds great to me! We've got eight for Christmas Dinner, including three who will have arrived at 4:30 pm after a day-long travel extravaganza starting from rural northwestern Montana. So we're doing a homey bistro style meal using primarily Bourdain's Les Halle Cookbook and the Saveur Authentic French book. rillettes crudites gougeres soupe de poisson frisée aux lardons boeuf bourguignon or daube (haven't decided) gratin dauphinois perhaps something verde, non? tart tatin

YEAH!! You go, Pam!!

White Newfoundlanders on one side, white Mainers on the other, and I had never even heard of the thing until I started reading about food in college. This is not to say that there aren't family equivalents that would horrify you, Sandy.

Photos came through -- and are -- fine, Nathan P! Interesting idea, too. Might give it a go for this Sunday's dinner....

Eden, they look great! Do you have the recipe? I can tell that RecipeGullet is itchin' to have your version! Elie, I've been having great luck with natural casings that my butcher at Whole Foods has. They have been pre-cleaned and come inserted with a segment of red plastic tubing that makes inserting them onto the sausage stuffer very easy. I haven't had to desalt, rinse, soak, or enzyme 'em, and they've been pretty simple to work with. No odor either. They don't put them out front, of course (insert Whole Foods joke here), but any WF that makes their own sausages probably has them.