Chris Amirault

Good morning! Thanks! Not sure about the bourbon question. I think that you'd want to use a bourbon that's spicy and got a high alcohol content, like Henry McKenna, and not something softer and wheatier, and you'd still want a good 1/2 oz of something smoky. Give it a go and report back! Because we have several last minute "yes" RSVPs, and because we can't leave well enough alone, we're bumping up the menu a bit, adding my wife's flour tortillas along with the corn, doubling the punch recipe, and adding a few other things. Gotta head out to the stores for supplies and get cooking!

Here's the new machine; I'm staying up late because we had a drainage problem that lead to a wet kitchen floor, the last of several snafus requiring trips to stores, a jigsaw, Gorilla tape, and more. But ain't it bee-uteeful? So, some prep for tortillas. The corn is slaking; the onions are pickling. I also prepped the carnitas, shrimp, and tomatillo salsa. Here's the secret to my carnitas: note the label on the jar of fat: I came up with a solution to the problem of floating tomatillos: Here's the "high-end" equipment I use to blend the tomatillos etc. up after cooling -- and, no joke, it's a beast: I prepared the shrimp in the Sous Vide Supreme and used a couple of tricks. One is to rinse off the shells and make a very quick stock that you then reduce to a couple of tablespoons. It's rich, dark, and almost roasty, a great accompaniment to the shrimp in the bag: And here's a little shrimp cleaning trick I learned somewhere or another, a two-stroke deveining technique. Lay down some wet paper towel. Then, butterfly each shrimp to expose the vein: Using the point of the blade, poke the vein out and press it against the paper toweling, then pull the shrimp away. Works like a charm: All that prep plus dinner making (the red beans & rice, spiffed up with more trinity vegetables and some additional chorice), and it seemed a drink was in order. I've been making a lot of Old Fashioneds this year because I have had the benefit of some fine aged spirits that don't need a lot of tinkering. This one is a very slight tweak of the Oaxacan Old Fashioned by Phil Ward (Society member phlip): 2 1/2 oz Herradura añejo tequila dash Del Maguey Minero 1/2 oz demerara gum syrup 2 dashes Bittermens xocolatl bitters 1 dash Regan's orange bitters Stir with cracked ice; strain; orange peel rimmed and in. One more day of blogging, folks. Cheers!

She shares most of them, and we were in agreement about those two aspects. We also share a midcentury modern design aesthetic, which enables us to avoid most tussles over things like that. And I agree: I feel like this house was built for our family's life. I'll grab that tomorrow; it's easier to see in the daylight. I'll do the same for the dining room. Well, it was a trial, but.... It's in! The daily use ones are in the fridge; the ones in the bar are mostly sets that I ice down for group drinks as needed. Yes, a room that's not heated and that usually has lots of poorly insulated windows. Finishing up a long day of cooking with a wee dram of Rhum J.M Vieux 1997. A few pix are on the way.

On that first walk through the house, when I saw this built-in shelving, I thought... well, you'll see:

I thought I'd show a bit more of the cooking-related parts of the house. When we first viewed this place, I walked into the study and thought, "Cookbooks." There's a wall-to-window bookcase that neatly fits just about everything. In addition, I've roughly categorized them into the different units. Here's the cocktail section: Restaurant books & chefs on top, Americas below: Reference and food lit: Italian above, South Asian, Indian, & Middle Eastern below: French above, Chinese, Japanese, SE Asian below: Depleted baking section: Reference and collections of recipes: Reference, as well as Saveur and Edible Rhody collection:

Too late. Went to South Providence, just a few blocks from the old house, to pick up a few supplies. First stop Compare Foods: Lots of reasons to go there, but the main one is that they are the only reliable source in RI of a crucial punch ingredient, sour oranges: Next stop, Tropical Liquors, the only reliable source of the now-maligned Mexican Coke: Here's the haul from Compare: And here's the booze/Coke haul, from Tropical and the best liquor store in South Providence, Quisqueya:

Forgot to mention party drink final selection: Regent's Punch, egg nogg, and Cuba Libres. Shopping trip I'm taking now will include one crucial ingredient for the last item: Mexican Cokes.

Thanks, Chufi and CDRF -- but it's not done yet! I'll be taking you right through the Night Before New Years Eve party. To that end, I have some shopping to do this morning. Breakfast is a slice of that heavenly pear cake and a mug of Ichiban Hojicha tea from Norbu, a dark roast grown in Shizuoka, Japan. The market I'll be going to is pretty interesting, so I'll take a few snaps. Then, today is a big prep day -- and the new dishwasher's coming! The new dishwasher's coming!!!

Just back from a nice night with friends (including Dave) at Cook & Brown Public House. I usually am behind this bar, but tonight I was on the other side: C&B has had a string of excellent reviews from both local and national critics (Tom Sietsma at the Washington Post; John Mariani of Esquire, who called C&B one of the 20 best new restaurants in the US). The man behind it all is Nemo Bolin, chef and owner with his wife Jenny: Nemo's cool, calm leadership, founded on extremely high expectations honed at Rubicon in SF and No. 9 Park in Boston, sets the tone in the kitchen: I've done a lot there in 2010: tore down the old bar, held workshops, took my wife out for a birthday dinner, worked soft and hard opening, shook and stirred a few hundred drinks, and spent more hours there than any other restaurant in the city. And I'm damned proud of that work, glad to be part of a team that strives for excellence and hits the mark consistently.

A few snaps from a quick dinner. I ate little as I was headed out and still full from the shellfish-a-thon. But I couldn't resist this pear cake -- recipe unknown right now: Turkey pot pie for dinner, made with Thanksgiving leftovers and Andrea's great pot pie crust: I was asked to make a cocktail before I hit the road, so I whipped up a couple of pisco sours for Andrea and her mom:

Today we're unveiling a major project here at the eGullet Society: the index for the justifiably famous, and famously unwieldy, Sous Vide topic. Along with our team of volunteers, I've been working on this for months, and we're presenting it to you for commentary in this beta topic. Whether you've been doing SV for years or don't know what the heck the fuss is about, I hope you'll go over to the topic and contribute your feedback there. On January 1, we'll close the revised index as well as the original SV topic, so that we can lock in that information resource and start a new discussion for a new decade. Please take a moment to snoop around over there and let me know what you think!

I know now why Dave Voila's handle is vice: off we went for meal #3, this time at Champlin's, a south coast institution: Very typical New England clam shack interior, complete with bins of plastic utensils and t-shirts for sale: The upper level is a restaurant, and the lower is a fish store, so we went downstairs while waiting for our, um, lunch... yeah, our lunch: Whelks for sale -- neither Dave nor I had seen those around very often: Our quest was for the whole belly fried clam, though, in service to the eG Foodblog, we also ordered a RI clam chowder (clear broth) and two stuffies (stuffed clams): Your correspondents regret to inform you that Champlin's underwhelmed. The stuffies had too much filler -- I hit one piece of clam before giving up -- and the chowder lacked both flavor and bivalve. But the biggest disappointment was the "whole belly clams," which may as well have been clam strips. This diminution of belly size has been a plague on the fried clam for years now, and evidence of dieting clams can be found from Essex to Watch Hill. What gives?!?

Oh, I forgot the best part of my oyster farm information. Virtually all oysters on the east coast come from one species: crassostrea virginica, or the American cupped oyster. However, oysters up and down the coast vary widely, due to seasons, temperature, location, depth, tide, and a host of other factors. If that sounds like terroir, you're right, hence the name coined for these environmental and seasonal effects on oysters: merroir.

Current party food list now includes: bacon candy (request by a family member) smoked & spiced nuts of some sort tuna, olive, & preserved lemon tapenade on crostini (tx Matt & Janet) deviled eggs (leaning Creole, though may have a few different ones) some sort of vegetable crudité selection salmon of some sort (mousse? smoked?) Finally, we're going to create a tortilla station. As I mentioned, I have about 48 more pounds of corn to use, as well as a bunch of prepared ingredients (carnitas, hot sauces). They're kid and adult friendly and, as far as I can tell, fine for those with celiac disease. We're still thinking though, so keep sending ideas my way.

What recipe do you use? I had some fantastic yeasted waffles yesterday morning that I posted about in the Waffle topic. Sorry this took so long: King Arthur Flour Cookbook.

Then we drove south to South Kingstown, home of Matunuck Oyster Farm and Bar: Perry Raso, the man behind the entire project, walked us through the basics of his operation (and, full disclosure, comped us the food): Check out the google map here with satellite imaging on, and you can see the oyster lines in the salt pond that we saw out our window: Perry has about 12 million oysters growing in there, which he ships all over the east coast. (Here's the math: ~100 lines; ~100 bags/line; ~1200 oysters/bag.) They are part of a coop with 5 other area oyster farmers, whose products are usually available at the bar: Today, however, the storm prevented us from sampling an array -- which, given the high quality of the oysters both raw and Rockefeller, was not a problem in the least. They were briny, slightly sweet, and meaty, just delicious:

Dave and I started off our morning at one of the many independently owned and operated restaurants that are all over RI: Oatley's of North Kingstown: It's hard to make out in the photo, but the center of the building includes a drive-through gap, where, when the weather is nice, you can get a few NY system weiners and a coffee milk without leaving your car. Breakfast (#2 for me) was a great bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich on an English muffin; Dave went with whole wheat toast. We split an order of jonnycakes that were only ok. Fortified, we hit the road.

Uploading pictures of our south coast trip, and wanted to share this snap of

Quick food update. Last night we had leftovers: broiled polenta (note to self: Silpats don't like the broiler for long stretches), daube, broccoli with vinaigrette, and Dorie Greenspan's 4 Star Bread Pudding. This morning, a cup of Diablo and a bowl of Raisin Bran, a product to which I have a complicated relationship; read this Daily Gullet piece from a few years ago for details. And now, off to meet vice (Dave Viola) and start a chilly Rhody road trip. Brrr!

We're very excited to announce the beta version of an index to this sous vide topic. As stated in the beta header: We hope that the terrific members who have contributed so much to this topic and to sous vide cooking with appreciate this recognition of their efforts, which will allow those unable to wade through thousands of post easy access to their recipes, rigs, discussions, and determinations.

Good morning. Today we're unveiling a major project here at the eGullet Society: the index for the justifiably famous, and famously unwieldy, Sous Vide topic. Along with our team of volunteers, I've been working on this for months, and we're presenting it to you for commentary in this beta topic. Whether you've been doing SV for years or don't know what the heck the fuss is about, I hope you'll go over to the topic and contribute your feedback there. On January 1, we'll close the revised index as well as the original SV topic, so that we can lock in that information resource and start a new discussion for a new decade. Please take a moment to snoop around over there and let me know what you think!

Sorry to hear it, Tim. When you're out from under the weather, lets connect?

Interesting. Ratios? What a great idea! Being a lousy electrician too, I'll suggest it to the FIL. Here's an eGullet-friendly link to it. If you click on that, anything you buy during that online session at Amazon will generate a donation at no cost to you!

Dave, I haven't seen the McCarthy's there since I cleared him out. I'll ask Dennis next time, though. Erin, meatballs are an interesting idea -- another item I already have in the freezer!

The Kilpatrick the Brave has been this year's holiday cocktail project, and I've settled on the following: 2 oz Redbreast Irish whiskey 3/4 oz orange rosemary simple syrup 1/2 oz McCarthy's Oregon Single Malt Whiskey 1/4 oz Fernet Branca dash Bitter Truth Jerry Thomas Own Decanter bitters Stir; strain; garnish with a pinched rosemary sprig poked through an orange peel that you've twisted over the drink. It's a rich, haunting drink, along the lines of a Widow's Kiss, something that I hoped my mother-in-law especially would appreciate. (She's my most family's eager cocktail recipient, by far, and she does.) A few notes. I am head over heels in love with McCarthy's Oregon Single Malt Whiskey, which are an attempt by the superstar distillers at Clear Creek to make a US whiskey using scotch principles. It's creamy, smoky, and downright luscious. I bought the only two bottles of the stuff I've been able to find in RI -- different labels, and thus different bottlings/expressions, I believe. If anyone has more information, I'm all ears. The orange rosemary syrup is a 2:1 (sugar to water) syrup that's steeped in the peel of a couple of oranges and a good handful of fresh rosemary. I've done a klutzy candy job on the peels that were leftover; not sure what I'll do with those.