The Hersch

It is? Sarnie, perhaps.

I wouldn't mind if "Amazing Grace" were never sung again.

After reading this discussion, I heard a bottle of green Chartreuse whistle at me from a shelf at my spirits-monger the other day, so I bought it. I don't believe I had ever tasted the stuff before, and I certainly wasn't aware that it's 110 proof and a serious butt-kicker. And beautiful. Anyway, over the course of the last four days, I've had about six Last Word cocktails, mixed as prescribed: 1-1-1-1. The maraschino was Luxardo, and the gin varied between Gordon's and Junipero. I think fancy gin in this cocktail is probably a waste of money. Anyway: This Cocktail Is Superb. I fell in love instantly. This may be the greatest cocktail ever devised, with the obvious exception of the martini. It is so elegant and balanced, so cool and invigorating, so complex and intriguing, and packs such a wallop with it. Wow. This may indeed be the last word.

Well, just because they said they didn't have it doesn't mean they didn't, of course. When I was there a couple of weeks back, I saw the guanciale in the window of the salumi counter, with a small "Guanciale" sign, but when I told the woman working the counter that I wanted some guanciale, her response was essentially "huh?". She made a real hash of it when cutting it, too. Ah well. As to Balducci's: I don't know why it would be impossible for them if it's possible for Dean and Deluca, and for Dean Gold at Dino. I love Balducci's for some things, but their deli counter isn't one of them. Back in Sutton Place Gourmet days, they used to carry a beautiful dry-cured pancetta (from Italy, I think). Balducci's only carries this wet American crap masquerading as pancetta, which is certainly not worth what they charge for it. As to the Virginia-cured pork jowl mentioned back in November, while I really like this stuff (hey, it's salt-cured pork jowl, what's not to like?) it is utterly unlike guanciale. It's intensely salty and has none of the subtlety of the Italian-style stuff.

Usinger is good. But I think even better is the Bavaria Sausage company in Madison Wisconsin. Seriously good Würste. Visit their WEBSITE.

I discovered a couple of weeks ago that Dean & Deluca in Georgetown carries guanciale. Expensive at $17/lb, and the woman working the counter didn't have a clue as to how to handle it, but it's good. She didn't know where it came from, but I saw some other stuff marked Salumeria Biellese, so it's probably from there.

Use raw lardo instead of cooked bacon.

Is that your gear, slkinsey? That's a beautiful cocktail shaker. Is the top silver? Pewter? Does it have a story?

And how about with Italian "tipo 00" flour?

I found exactly the cocktail glasses I had sought for years when I was in Italy last year (although the glasses are German). Here is a tiny image: At least I'm pretty sure this is an image of these glasses. It's the Schott-Zwiesel Banquet pattern "cocktail bowl", and I love them. They're nice and small and short, and have gently curved sides instead of being the straight, severe V shape. They were, I think, 30 euros for six. I have, of course, broken one of them, and I need more than five. But I can't find them anywhere in the US. I find other pieces in the Banquet pattern, but not the cocktail bowl. Must I go back to Como to find more? I've found an etailer in the UK that carries them and will ship to the US (look HERE), but the shipping charge is 45 pounds sterling, which may be fair enough but is an awful lot. Anybody seen these in the US?

Lunch yesterday was a corned beef and bacon sandwich, with dijon mustard, vidalia onion, pretty decent hothouse tomato, and Trader Joe's mayonnaise on rye.

The Hugh Laurie/Stephen Fry Jeeves and Wooster series was deeply wonderful, so you're wrong there. And Jeeves was a gentleman's personal gentleman, not a butler.

Papas de sarrabulho in Porto, which is made of ... um...coagulated..er...pig's...uh...blood. It wasn't all that disgusting, actually, but sits upon the stomach like a weight of lead.

I like a brand of canned chicken broth that has a very stupid name, but is surprisingly good: Health Valley. They have various permutations of low sodium, low fat, fat-free, no salt added, what have you. Widely available.

Well, though, a spatchcocked chicken is practically whole. It's all in one piece, anyway. I find this by far the best way to get an evenly cooked chicken with a beautiful skin: Cut out the backbone (i.e., spatchcock). Put under the broiler (as close as possible) skin side down for about ten minutes. Remove, and set the oven rack for roasting, turning the oven temperature to 425F. Turn the chicken over, skin side up, and rub butter all over every bit of skin. Liberally salt the skin and sprinkle with freshly ground black pepper. Return to the oven for about thirty-five minutes for a modest-sized chicken (3 1/2 to 4 pounds). Baste once or twice. Beautiful, especially if you start with a really good chicken. For a larger bird, partly cutting through the flesh at the two leg joints and where the wing joins the body will help even out the cooking time. I take the above procedure from a Julia & Jacques program.

I don't doubt you know what you're talking about, but for what it's worth when I was a very young lad living in Germany in 1959-1960, we got blood oranges that were labeled "moro". I don't remember how red the flesh was, but they were intensely flavorful, explosively really, and on the tart side. "Moro" may have been more a brand than a variety, though...I don't know. That's all I can remember. It was decades before any type of blood orange started showing up in markets in the eastern US. I think it was probably in the mid-nineties that I first found blood oranges in the Washington area, and they were intensely flavored and wonderful, with sort of streaky red in the flesh. More recently, the blood oranges I find are very dark red, comparatively anemic in flavor, and deficient in juiciness. I guess these are the modern "moro" variety.

For those of you somewhere near Washington DC, Calvert-Woodley now carries Regan's Orange Bitters, although last I checked they have only the smaller-sized bottle. They also, I believe, still carry Collins organge bitters, and I find it mind-boggling that I used to think that that's what orange bitters were all about. That stuff is nasty.

I have a couple of Sitram saucepans; I guess they're the "Profiserie" variety, although I certainly don't remember that name being used when I bought them about five or six years ago. They're very good pans, and I haven't regretted getting them, but one thing that's very annoying about them is the shape of their lips. When I wash one by hand in the sink, the shape, angle, size, whatever of the lip makes it a dead cert that when I turn the thing over to rinse the bottom under running water a great stream of said water is deflected upward all over the front of me. Anyone else have this problem? I've actually gotten myself so wet this way that I've had to change clothes. Just another reason to throw them in the dishwasher, I suppose, but sometimes you want to use the pan again right away. I see that the "Cybernox" stuff is greatly disparaged by slkinsey in the Q&A to his course, but he never says why he thinks they're "useless crap" (at least not that I can see). I have the 9 1/2 and 11 inch frying pans and I totally love them. I use them for a number of tasks such as stir-frying, pan-frying, and braising (non-tall things), and they're my absolute go-to for risotto. The surface is so smooth that my wooden spatula just effortlessly glides across it in risotto making; it's really a joy.

I see this error in online forums like this one all the time, and it's no big deal, as most who post in such places are not professional writers, but I would expect better of the BBC. A palette is the board a painter holds and mixes colors on, and by extension the range of colors used. The roof of the mouth, and by extension the sense of taste, is the palate.

The really important distinction is that the stuff made in Scotland is always spelled whisky while the Irish and American stuff is almost always spelled whiskey .

What didn't seem right to me about this is that the various pieces of Galileo get three spots, Palena and its Cafe get two, but only one for Restaurant Eve. Surely the difference at Eve is at least as pronounced as at Palena. I suppose the hard limit of 100 might have something to do with it, although I didn't bother to count.

That would be Buon Italia, which, as I mentioned upthread, will ship to you anywhere in the US. Since posting that, I discovered another online source HERE. This link takes you right to the guanciale, but poke around the site; they have lots of great stuff. The guanciale is produced by Volpi in St. Louis. Volpi has their own website OVER HERE, but I can't find anything about their guanciale on their site, and the site is really annoying. Anyway, I ordered a three-pound hunk of Volpi guanciale from Ingredients Gourmet (the only way they offer it), and it's superb. At approximately $8 a pound, it would be a bargain if it weren't for the shipping costs. If you get some, ignore the warning on the label that it must be cooked; it's really great raw.

I brought salumi through US customs when returning from my last trip to Italy, in May. The trick is not to tell them about it. I'm not sure what would happen if you got caught. Probably not much beyond confiscation, but who knows. I don't know of any source for guanciale in the Washington area, but you can get it shipped to your door. BUON ITALIA in New York (in Chelsea Market) sells magnificent, glorious guanciale. My guess is that they get it from Biellese Brothers, but I've never asked them. Their shipping charges are slightly astronomical, but you'll love the guanciale. I suppose you might also get Biellese Brothers to ship to you, but I think they're more geared to shipping to other businesses. There's certainly no handy ordering option on their rudimentary WEBSITE.

Some may find this hard to credit, but Gallo vermouth is actually quite good for cooking, and not bad in a martini, either. And it's cheap even for vermouth.

Moors and Christians.