Jason Perlow

New Years Eve was lobster. Oh what a lobster. ******** Rachel: We bought a very large lobster (again). This time I stuffed it with a Ritz cracker based seafood stuffing (bits from the lobster's legs, chopped shrimp and bay scallops, a take off of Alton Brown's recipe - hint, have the store par cook it to kill the beast, and have them break the claws and cut it in half while they're at it!). We started with an appetizer of shrimp cocktail, and had sides of steamed baby broccoli (new at Han Ah Reum) and spinach souffle stuffed baked potatoes. *********

I've made horseradish mayo before, but there must be something about the processed aspect of Arby's. I think that you probably would need to give the mayo several weeks to mature in order to get that really smooth flavor, and I dont think you can achieve that fine processed texture at home that you can under manufacturing conditions.

You'll definitely improve the quality of your frozen chopped veggies if you vacuum seal them, like in a FoodSaver.

Stickey's is now doing Southern style breakfast. And it is yummy good. I'm not sure why I photographed this, for a minute I thought they were serving us milk in baby bottles. Rachel got fried eggs with beef hash, which is made from the leftover meat from the beef ribs. Excellent. The Piece de Resistance is without a doubt Dave Finkelstein's sour cream drop biscuits and sausage gravy, which some of you might remember from his old restaurant. Its absolutely MANDATORY that you order this. You can also get the biscuits as sandwiches with eggs and your choice of meat. If you are brave there is also the "Larry" sandwich, which has eggs plus bacon, ham, sausage, taylor ham and then hash browns on top. This is the Texas Slop omelette, which tastes much better than it sounds -- an omelette is stuffed with chili, onions, jalapenos and cheese, with sour cream on top. You can also order this combination as regular fried eggs, as "Huevos Incognitos" In addition to the special items above they have the standard breakfast fare, plus grits, and Texas Toast, which is a thick sliced French Toast.

I reserve my theft for only one particular condiment, and only because there's no way for me to buy any quantity of it -- Arby's Horsey Sauce. If you could buy it in a store or if the Arby's locations sold it in jars you could take home, I'd refrain from stealing them.

There's a lot of Recoltant Manipulant (RM) aka "grower" or "single estate" champagne produced in France, the problem is that most if it is not readily avaliable to the US market. If you live in a large city or are in the burbs with great big wine stores, you might be able to score some. Some of these estates are so small they may have less than 2 hectacres of arable land and produce less than 2000 cases a year. A "Big" RM may have a dozen hectacres to grow grapes. One of the houses I mentioned above, Egly Ouriet, is distinctive in that they make some unusual and varied stuff, such as a Non Dose (Zero Dosage, meaning no sugar added) which is very dry and excellent to match with caviar, a fantastic Blanc De Noir and a delicate Ambonnay Brut Rose. They also apparently make a 100 percent Pinot Meunier champagne Brut Les Vignes de Vrigny which is about as wacky esoteric in Champagnes as you can get -- Pinot Meunier is typically an accent grape in Champagne blends and very little of it is comparatively grown to Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. Egly has been getting a lot of accolades in the French press as one of the best boutique producers in Champagne and it is getting more and more distribution in the US. Others which may or may not be in your area that are nice -- Rene Geoffroy, Guy Larmandier, Larmandier-Bernier, Paul Goerge, Charles Cazenove, Demoiselle, Pierre Peters, Pierre Gimonnet, Gaston Chiquet. Again a lot of this has to do with your local distributor situation and what your wine store is capable of getting in. Sometimes an individual wine store with enough resources may decide to import a few dozen cases at a time. There are so many RMs in the Champagne region and more and more of them are being imported by individual importers in different cities, that you may have access to different ones in LA, San Francisco or Seattle than you do in New York. Terry Theise, for example, imports a good number of RMs and wine stores that buy from him carry the RMs he gets -- You can read his 2005 champagne catalog and newsletter here. Its a gread read and very informative. Frankly, I've never had a bad RM, and whenever I see a new one, I buy it sight unseen and completely unheard of just because of the coolness and uniqueness factor of trying a new champagne. They are cool wines to drink, no doubt about that -- and compared to the "great" houses you can get them frequently under $40 per bottle, sometimes under $30. Another cool thing I like about RMs is that because these guys are so small time, they don't have the resources to buy new oak barrels, because they are so expensive. So a lot of RM is aged in older barrels or even stainless steel. If you tend to be on the oak-averse side like myself, the RMs are a breath of fresh air compared to the big NM champagnes.

I think that's a very important point. Virtually all the champagne sold on the market is NM or MA/CM, with -most- of the so-called "great champagne houses" making unremarkable wine or even stuff that is outright nasty (aka Veuve Cliquot "agent orange") -- how many Deutz, Nicolas Feuillattes and Bollingers and Pol Rogers are there in a sea of crap like Dom Perignon, M&C, Mumm, Roederer and Veuve Cliquot and Tattinger and so on and so on? Not many. Sure, the RMs are making amazing stuff, but the only people buying it is foodie wine dorks like us. So little of it is getting into the country, comparatively. Why do you think is this happening to Pac NW wines Jon? Not that its necessarily a good metric, but certainly the Wine Spectator speeds and feeds are way up there on many of these wines, particularly the Argyle. YES! YES! YES!

I hate to say it Moosh, but I really -like- those glasses. What's wrong with them? They're festive and they are useful. Perhaps not for use in formal dining situations, but if you have friends over for a party and want to make up a couple of margaritas, daquiris or pina coladas, what's wrong with them? As long as something has some utility you can't call it a bad gift. Now, on the other hand, I recieved THIS from a close friend for the holidays. An electronic wine cooler? C'mon. Talk about totally useless.

I'm not saying I'm going to stop drinking French wine, or wine of non-US origin Jack, or that others should either. God knows I buy a ton of Italians and Spanish and German, and Chilean and Australian and even South African and Israeli wines and certainly my share of Recoltant Manipulant champagnes and Burgundies and Bordeaux and dessert Semillons and Banyuls. I'm certainly not going to pour my good Burgundy down the toilet because the French government and French media will inevitably do and say things that are offensive to me and my own principles or my own unpopular political bent. But when given the opportunity, I'll drink an American wine because as an American, I think its the correct and patriotic thing to do -- just as I'd buy American-made cheeses and American farmed goods if the opportunity is there. I don't think being patriotic and a consumer of domestic goods is endemically war-causing. That's asinine.

I had a chance to sample the wine only once. I was in the hotel bar of a major New Orleans hotel back in '03 when I was invited in with the wine buyer to sample the entire Dom Perignon line with the DP rep. I had two glasses of the Rose... everything else was totally unremarkable. But at that price... Oy. I agree that Champagne is a wine that should be drank all the time -- not just for special occasions. It also matches very well with the kind of cuisine I eat a lot of.

I don't see a problem with that at all. Of course, some American wineries are foreign-owned. But that's another topic. ← I've been known to have a bottle of Gruet NV here and there. At the very least it makes a decent Mimosa, at its (relatively) budget price.

Did this whole paragraph not rub anyone else here the wrong way? And does using Dom Perignon, probably the most bling and unremarkable of Champagnes also come across as somewhat unresearched? I'll bite, though. Dom Perignon does make one exceptional wine, their vintage Rose- -- which at $300+ per bottle is quite bling, yes siree. If given a choice between vintage Dom and Argyle's sparkler, I'll pick the Argyle. Or if under duress I'll swallow my pride and open a bottle of that Egly Ouriet or Billecart.

I will agree that American sparkling wines, on the whole, with few exceptions, dollar for dollar, cannot match their French counterparts, Brad. However, some of us drink American wine on the principle of supporting our native wine industry. Even if I have to pay slightly more for an American sparkler, such as the Argyle for example (which really isn't that expensive a wine if you buy it by the case) I'll do it, because at the end of the day I'd rather an American winemaker get my dollars than a French one. If its unavoidable and the opportunity is good, and for the lack of a good American alternative I'll drink a French wine. But I don't have to like doing it. If i have to go through the trouble to seek out those few and far between American sparkling wines that rival those of France I will and I do -- because I feel I have a duty to support our native vinoculture. I don't expect others to behave in the same way but -I- will do my part.

We will agree to disagree then.

I cannot agree with this on principle. American wineries are certainly capable of producing sparkling wines as good and as complex as a grower Champagne. I know, I've tasted them. Have you tried the pinot-heavy Argyle Extended Tirage, for example? As far as I am concerned that's as good as any RM vintage blanc de noir as I have ever had. Argyle's Rose sparkling wine -- which albeit is very hard to get -- is at least as good as say, the Egly Ouriet Ambonnay Rose, which is as serious as rose champagnes get. I'm not saying that there are many examples of this kind of American methode champanoise or even if they are comparable values to say, a really good $40 RM. But to say that good sparkling wines do not exist to rival anything in France is ideological poppycock (please substitute a more colorful metaphor here). The wines exist, you just might have to go through a lot of trouble to find them, however. This is inevitably going to change, especially with the stuff coming from Oregon and Washington State and the increasing demand for quality domestic sparkling wine.

You know, I'm fairly sure he was talking about his Vita Mix, his $5000 Italian cappucino machine, his Rational Combi ovens, and his induction burner stove.

You make it, typically with a brick chocolate brand called Ibarra or Abuelita. You can buy it at Mexican groceries. They key is to add the hot milk into a blender with the hard chocolate and whiz it up until it gets nice and foamy. Personally, I prefer to make my Latin-American hot chocolate with stuff of Colombian origin, like Corona, which you can usually get in the same bodegas. We've discussed it previously: Perfect Hot Chocolate

I'll second this notion. UP at its peak with Rocco was one of the best and most creative restaurants in the country IMO. ← I totally, totally agree. Irregardless of his annoying media persona, the guy knows how to cook. He could certainly redeem his current prima donna image and his culinary career quite easily if he were to have another sustained success in the back of the house in a challenging fine dining environment. If Rocco wants to be a superstar he has to show he is still capable to putting out consistently good food -- not preening his looks and chatting with fawning women. He should seek to emulate someone like Mario Batali, who still busts his ass in the kichen each and every day.

Interesting. I haven't heard of that yet, but if its true, I'm not sure any of us could truly justify the cost of buying All Clad anymore.

I agree Abra. One of the most memorable things about my six months in Israel during 1990 was the morning romp in the Tel Aviv shuk and playing backgammon (Shesh Besh) with arabs and drinking fresh squeezed orange juice. Those Jaffa oranges are exquisite, as are the grapefruits, which are renowned all over Europe, particularly in Italy.

For Dim Sum, you want to go on a Sunday. That ensures a fresh batch of whatever you are getting and lots of turnover. I wouldn't go for Dim Sum on a weekday. That's just asking for trouble.

The Falafel flavor of Bissli is like crack. The BBQ one is really good too. I particularly like the orange haired character on the Bissli bag. He looks like the love child of Carrot Top (the comedian, not the eG member) and Butthead.

Poche's Tasso and Chaurice and Andouille is certainly not very hot at all. We used a good amount of it in a jambalaya recently and without adding extra cajun/creole seasoning to the dish, the entire casserole of it was very well balanced in flavor.

I guess you were safe eating King Crab, considering virtually of that which is delivered to this coast is frozen. I was talking to an owner of a local seafood restaurant yesterday, and he told me Fulton wasn't making any deliveries on Monday.

Heh. I know that Kowloon joint mentioned in the article. It's one of a number of restaurants along that stretch of Rte. 1 housed in outrageously over-the-top buildings. Check out the Tiki Madness of Kowloon! ← Ah. A classic Polynesian-style American Chinese restaurant. Talk about a real friendly dinosaur. We have a restaurant very similar to that in Queens, thats been in existence since 1953 -- King Yum. I wasn't aware any other east coast Polynesian-style restaurant actually predated it or was still in operation. That Kowloon looks like a real time warp, I'll have to make a pilgrimage to it someday. King Yum has the distinction of ultimate convenience to the Jewish customer, since it is less than half a block away from the local Synagogue, the Hillcrest Jewish Center.