Mallet

I use a 1000X followed by a 4000X waterstone about once a month for everything (chef, paring, and my big scary cleaver looking thing I got in China for cheap), interspersed with some touchups on the 4000X. I never got the hang nor have felt the need to learn how to use a steel properly.

Scotch: Bruichladdich 15 year old Highland Park 12 Laphroaig 10 Cognac: Otard 55 Rémy XO Rémy VSOP Liqueurs: Poires-William Crême de Cassis

I've been using onyl fresh pumkins as well. I've had good results with the "Rouge vif d'Étampes" variety. The only problem is that they are huge, so in addition to pie we had pumpkin soup for a few days, plus some leftover purée for the freezer ! edited: I hear blue hubbard is a fantastic variety as well.

It could allow them to churn outmore of the stuff by having a shorter production cycle....

While it may be illegal to distill alcohol in the US and Canada, it is perfectly legal to buy a good quality still. Sears sells a line of "water distillers" which (I believe) are actually NZ-made alcohol distillers: Still Spirits Everyone in Cape Breton has one... edit: link added

I would also recommend Cortland and Northern Spy as some of my favourite baking apples (Russets are also really good). If you're finding that you need to add alot more water than the recipe specifies, it is most likely because you did not work the fat into the flour enough. The fat coats the flour, effectively moisture-proofing it. It also prevents gluten from forming, which would make your dough tough.

I just moved here from Halifax, and wanted to say that I am finding this board very useful. Keep it coming! Perhaps off topic a bit, but where does one get good pork in Kingston (pref. organic)? There's good beef at the Farmer's market, and organic free-range chicken pops up here and there, but I haven't yet found a good pork source. Thanks, Martin

I don't worry so much about the actual slaughter bit (which from what I gather is relatively quick and painless across the board) as much as I consider the way animals lived their lives. Factory raised animals generally lead miserable lives, and that is where the real lack of respect for the food we eat is apparent. At home, we have managed to almost completely cut factory raised meat out of our diet (on a student budget, which mean that a roast organic free-range chicken is good for 10 portions in various incarnations ). By the way, I would highly recommend The River Cottage Meat Book by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall as a reference on the ethics associated with eating meat.

After canning and waiting about 48 hours, the jelly actually did set. Success!

Well I tried to make the jelly yesterday with peels from about 5 or 6 lbs of apples. It did taste a bit watery at first but the addition of sugar fixed all of that. I think pectin might indeed be necessary (it's on the recipe linked above) because I didn't add any and the jelly didn't set. Definitely something worth perfecting! edited: I also added the cores and seeds from the apples

Re: flour types. In "Simple Italian Cooking" Mario Batali recommends blending 80% cake flour and 20% all purpose flour to approximate 00 flour when making fresh pasta (he also mentions a protein content of between 8 and 11 %).

I just came back from France (visit girfriend's family), and spent a day in Beaujolais, touring the crus and generally getting some sort of education on wine. Apart gaining some respect for Beaujolais (I previously didn't really know or care much about it, probably because the stuff I got in Halifax sucked), the trip further reinforced the seeming voodoo that is terroir for me. I never realized how small winemaking regions can be. From one cru to the next is literally be a stone's throw away, and the wines really do taste different! Magic .

I'd like to make a couple apple pies to freeze for later since they are plentiful and cheap now, but I always though it a bit wasteful to throw away all that apple peel. I'd like to make some sort of apple peel jelly, since it is naturally high in pectin and such. Any ideas on how I could do it?

I am in Paris now, having just returned from Belle-Île. As promised, the only local artisanal cheese I could find was some chèvre, which was truly excellent, I might add. By some twist of fate, the artisan in question knew my father from a choir exchange between france and Halifax, NS. Small world. More later, Martin

D'oh! I just left Brittany (Belle-Île-en-Mer) but didn't find any langoustines. That'll learn me not to check eGullet everyday when visiting someplace for the first time . We did eat some 'araignées', which are much like canadian Snow Crab, only less so as well as the requisite crêpes, hydromel etc... Now, off to Lyon!

This was basically my lunch on Saturday. I was in the middle of making goat pot-stickers (definitely not ghetto) and suddenly started craving food. any food. fry scraggly bits of goat cook pasta add 1 can heinz tomato soup + some milk sprinkle with parmesan wolf down, and feel much shame...

I checked again for some more info, and don't have much to add to Daniel's comments except that you could cook a much bigger pig (around 40-50 kg) if you expect to serve around 100. In this case the cooking will increase to about 10 hours. You could have two fires (one on each side of the animal, so as to be cooking with indirect heat) which should be made with either hardwood or charcoal. Try to have the fires hotter at the ends, because the rump and shoulders take a bit longer to cook than the middle. The idea is to not let the skin crackle until the very end of the process, when you increase the fire and start turning more often. When preparing the pig you can slash the skin every 1-2 in. perpendicular to the backbone, which will allow some fat to render and baste the meat as it rotates. For seasoning, you could also rub olive oil all over the pig and season simply with salt and pepper. edited: I didn't notice that you already specified the size of the pig.

I definitely think that spit-roasting is the way to go. The River Cottage Meat Book has a big section devoted to this very topic. I don't have it in front of me right now, but I believe it was roasted with two fires on either side of the animal (no fire below) on a rotating spit for several hours. I'll report back when I have more info. when's the wedding?

I had my first lunch at Fid today. Definitely something I'd do again! The food was excellent as always, and it was surprisingly affordable (around $15 for an appetizer plus a main course). Admittedly the portions were small but I still left feeling full. I haven't made it out to the Queen of Cups yet, but I really want to. Khadija, it's a small world indeed!

I believe you are referring to Takeru "Tsunami" Kobayashi . From a CNN article published shortly after winning his fifth nathan's hot dog eating contest: "At 150 pounds, Kobayashi weighs half of what some of his competitors weigh. He also holds records for eating 17.7 pounds of cow brains, 20 pounds of noodles and 20 pounds of rice balls." Apparently he's quite a star in Japan.

looks like carswell beat me to it! I like the "envoie au chinois" as a possibility for "envoie au chenage", but I'm not sure it's right in this case. The recipe is for pork with lemon confit, why would one add the peel and then strain it out?

1) yes, this is wildflower honey 2) veal stock 3) I think it was maybe "feuilles" (leaves) and not "fleurs"(flower) 4) coriander seed, i.e: freshly ground coriander 5) blanche 2X (why? I don't know) 6) chantal was right on torréfier, in this case the process of dry-roasting the leaves 7) Reduce spirits by half. The only thing that really fits here is the wine, so my guess is that you reduce it separately. 8)anuisonner => assaisonner (to season) 9)I don't remember this word, but I take it to mean something like "season immediately before expediting" I think réduire 1/3 would mean reduce by 1/3. once you do it though, you'll probably be able to tell if it needs further reduction. The julienne of lemon peel is added along with the juice + honey. Another possibility (I do not favour this one) is that somehow spiritueux refers to the honey plus lemon juive, in which case you would reduce that by half and then add the lemon peel. Hope this helps.

It might be easier to decypher with some more context. At the risk of revealing your hard-won recipe, maybe you could just post the whole thing (maybe with little stars next to the things that seem ambiguous)?

I misread the title of this cookoff as "Composted Salads" .