CheGuevara

hold on a second - in the past 5 years we have seen a lot of "innovation" in cooking techniques, certainly a lot more vis-a-vis the past. while hindering innovation is certainly inconsitent with the evolution of an art form, don't forget billions of people have been cooking for thousands of years, and that is why we have flavour combinations and "traditional" recipes which work and are hardly ever improved on. you will never evolve if you don't respect tradition. i've laways said - it is certainly not me who will make a better bolognese sauce than millions of palates over hundreds of years in bologna. -che

of all the different cuts of beef and offal we eat, chimichurri is only used with chorizos (sausages). certainly don't go using it on a nice piece of meat. in argentina the quality - especially the flavour - of the beef is so good we never put anyting other than salt on it.

If you can make it to Yorkshire there's always Pennine Tea And Coffee. I've only tried ISI models - if you intend using it for hot and cold foams I'd recommend getting either their Gourment or Thermo Whip model. The basic ISI cream whipper is more prone to valve blockage (and comes with a big 'not suitable for espumas' warning in the instruction booklet). ← brilliant - ordered from pennine the thermo one...will be with me tomorrow. already have some recipes on my mind i want to try with...some week-end fun! -che

this things are a waste of money - absolutely useless. it will slice, but not properly and certainly not nearly thin enough for any good hams. -che

i'll take a picture with more time - but i bought mine for 140EUR - it is very small yet cuts ham wafer thin in a breeze. i use it almost daily - partly because i always have a few bit of charcuterie in the fridge - at the moment it's bresaola, parma, coppa and hungarian salami. it's a joy...would find it hard living without it. -che

Here is my recipe - being Argentine i must highlight that ours is the original version....similar to the dulce de leche debate. * Quantities in proportion Dry 45 Fresh parsley 15 Orégano 20 Fresh garlic 13 Sweet Páprika 4 Thyme 2 Hot páprika or cayenne 1 Salt & Pepper Wet 45 Olive oil 30 Red wine vinegar 25 Warm water Optional ingredients - not for me though: Pepper – finely chopped Spring onion - finely chopped Red wine Preparing the Chimichurri: Finely chop the parsley and garlic. Combine all the ingredients and let it rest for at least for a few hours before eating - preferably a day or two. -che

serve them with some grilled chorizo...

thanks a lot - sent you a PM with my email. -che

does anyone know where i can get an isi cream whipper? i've only found one place online, but was looking to buy it offline - all the catering supply stores i've looked at (hansen's, dentons, nisbets) only show the kesing whipper on their online shop. anyone know if here in the UK it is preferable to go with Kising? essentially is it the same as an isi? thanks. -che

i think one of the best ways to falvour the crisp taste of rhubarb is through a jelly. 1lb of rhubarb - the redder the better 40gr sugar 6gr natural (unflavoured) gelatin roughly cut the rhubarb and place in a saucapan with the sugar and roughly 20-30ml of water. place over medium heat and stew until the rhubarb has completely broken up - 10-15min. strain through a mesh sieve or cheesecloth - make sure you don't pass the pulp through the sieve as all you want is a clear pink liquid - you should make roughly 250ml of it. taste the rhubarb juice - at this point you can increase the sugar level if you want - ensuring it is completely dissolved. (i like a very sharp rhubarb flavour, more true to its nature, than excessively sweetening it) dissolve the gelatin in 250ml water and mix with the 250ml of rhubarb juice. (you can decrease the qty of water if you prefer) pour into molds and set overnight. by using rounded molds you can achieve a nice and simple presenation. when serving, dip the molds into hot water for a few seconds, this will release the jelly, invert onto a white plate and serve. enjoy it with some good single or double cream on the side - a shortbread cookie also workd well. -che

you're right, the reber one seems more reassuring. thanks for the info - i might pick on up this week - if i do ill report back. (ill do so in the UK forum). been searching for water baths - foud clifton but haven't seen any pricing yet. -che

BryanZ, can you tell me what vac pack machine and water bath you bought? want to see if i can find anything similar here in the UK. thanks - and your pea experiment looks very good. -che

basil, helena & potjie - thank you very much for the info - it is extremely helpful, especially as examples are very similar with respect to cost ratios. -che

this is the type of information i am after - industry metrics which i can't get a hold of easily outside. do you know what the average food wastage is, or is that built into your food cost? i'm not really looking for business plan software - i run a business so am quite familiar with business plans and the day to day realities of a business and its employees. i'm just missing some of the assumptions to build a model, which require industry knowledge. helena - i'll probably email you when i have some specific questions i have (thanks for offering). at the moment i'm wondering what the unknowns are... ie - where is the balance in the menu size to minimize food wastage when sales are low/growing. if we ever go ahead with this plan - then i will stop toying with the idea and take it seriously when you put your financial model together - where did you get your assumptions from? -che

so tim - does this mean that if i have negative cashflow, i could potentially end up with a restaurant into infinity? that would be something! restaurant business is a funny thing at times - whenever the subject of a restaurant opening by anyone outside the industry is brought up, the usual skeptical comments abound. even bourdain makes the point in kitchen confidential. i agree with matthew, most people tend to view the failures and not the successes - do start-ups generally fail? in most cases, in most industries. not just restaurants. somewhere i think that what differs between the restaurant industry and others is that it is infinitely more logical and natural for outsiders to have vast knowledge on it. what other industry do people taste three times a day for every day of their life; are able to visit markets, grow their own produce, cook, etc. None. when i got into the food industry i arrived - in many cases - with more knowledge about produce than the chefs i sold to. so, while i agree the story of the good home cook wanting to open a restaurant might ring alarm bells for failure - i don't think insiders enjoy having debutants know so much about their trade. have i served 100 covers in one night - no, but i know i haven't, and i know i don't have that experience. do i need it to be successful with a restaurant venture - it is certainly not essential. what helena says i believe is true - a restaurant like any other business needs to market its product/service correctly, and follow with good financial mgmt. what might it be the case that many people get into the restaurant trade because it seems accessible, like opening a bed & breakfast in the french countryside - and then fail because they lack fundamental business skills? the comment from mandarin about people with the romantic dream who have no idea of what it really entails to run a restaurant is a sign of an unconcious investor, rather than any measure on the difficulty or skills required to successfully open and run a place. you really have to be an idiot if you think a restaurant runs itself. likewise you have to be an idiot if you can't see a chef taking the piss on food costings. my guess is more restaurants would do succeed if they were better run from a financial standpoint, or at least do much better. that however, is an ignorant assumption. -che

Does that chef have a name? ← he does - no longer cooking professionally though...philip britten. -che

A friend of mine and I are toying with the idea of a restaurant - althoguh we can easily put a financial model together to evaluate the feasibility of it, neither of us have any experience and would thus overlook some of the underlying assumptions which might not be immediately obvious to us. Does anyone have access to a model which they could share? The actual numbers are not really critical, but rather the cost assumptions - primarily labour and food cost vs. planned menu and sales. It would be immensly appreciated. Thanks. -che

Michael posts frequently in the forums. One of the most active threads for the past month has been the one in the Cooking Forum based on his book Charcuterie. He posts there fairly often. It's worth checking out. ← wow - i just stopped by a bookshop on my way home from work and picked up this book! i had no idea who tyhe authors were. i couldn't help buying it as over a month ago three of us made some saucisson and chorizo at home, then again yesterday we made a few other trials. so far they've come out very well - especially considering we made them as a by-product of some argentine sausages (made with a mix of beef and pork) we were making for this summer's bbqs. yesterday's were made especially as charcuterie - so the results should be much better - 100% pure pork. next on the list will be some bresaola and coppa...both of which are in this book. -che

Wow!! I think I'm terrified. "Buttery Taste That's Pink" kind of says it all. I also am pleased to know that the shocking pink substance in that container is good for me-- just look at all of those healthy vitamins! A truly epic entry. I like durian, but that one does look... past its prime. Gee, thanks for getting my morning of to an appetizing start. Or something. ;> -J. ← it is scary to think there is a market for that in the US. reminds me of the fruit roll-ups with tatoo ads a few years back, so kids could unwrap them, stick them on their face, tatoo themselves and then eat the roll-up. better to steer thoughts somewhere else. -che

i make my morel sauce with rieslilng...must say the recipe was given to me by a fantastic UK chef. butter, shallots, morels, stock, riesling....sieve, cream and a touch of cayenne. served with veal or rabbit it is something else.

Unfair - as total outlay is more like four or five quid, esp given you'd have to buy a decent sized block of butter, not just a scrape. Not convined by tinned tomatoes on toast - the problem is all that juice tends to soak into the toast and make it soggy. Maybe it'll work with a fried slice? Beans on toast maybe - important to use cheap and nasty margarine. Doesn't taste quite the same with propah butter (same logic applies to bacon butties) Actually for cheap tastes I'd nominate 49p McDonalds hamburgers when they have them on special cheapo offer. Four for two quid Mmmm... Teenage hanging-around-in-the-shopping-centre nostalgia. Yes slightly controversial I know but then again I think I'm the only person who know who desperate wanted to go and buy a McD's hamburger after reading Fast Food Nation... J ← i actually was dying for mc donald's after watching "super size me". -che

if you know your way around london you can find intersting and "hard to find" products in many places - also, the people who import them are few and far between. years ago when the first store opened in highbury the prices were not cheap, but the store was genuine, different from anything else - now it seems she succumbed to the tastes of the ladies who lunch. buying a piece of cheese at la fromagerie is like shopping for fabric at liberty's. many of you probably know of Peck in Milano - by far one of the best food shops in the world if not the best, in my opinion...expensive yes, but not overly - however the quality of the food, its presentation, and the knowledge and skill of the staff are second to none. they are all professionals working in there (some of the butchers used to own their own shops) and have been working there for years. last time i was there i saw a guy cut up an entire wheel of parmesan in 1/2kg chunks in about 15 min - a show in itself. i go there sporadically, and every time one of the brothers who owns it is always there, walking around making sure everything is as it should. quite a difference from la fromagerie. wgallois - someone told me about this ethiopian place in shepherd's bush...it must be this one...they said it was fantastic. -che

If I paid four times the amount La Fromagerie charged, I'd be bankrupt. The quality is marvellous, but the mark-up is beyond insulting. ← there you go - la fromagerie is a great example of the london dining scene - although the product can be good, the whole experience is over processed, over marketed, just over done...so it is no longer a traditional cheese shop with fantastic product, but rather an absurdly expensive, pretentious, modern boutique, with a good product an unknowledgeable staff - the result: poor value for money. -che

raj - i feel your pain...a good meal decently priced is very hard to find. I don't think this is exclusive to London, neither to the mid-range restuarant (although you are right it is more evident here); rather it is commonplace in large cosmopolitan cities which don't have a particularly deep food culture. I'd go further and say that without strong home cooking traditions, it is very difficult for a city to develop a range of eatieries where the value for money is good. -che

not really east london (islington), but certainly on the fringes and well worth it is steve hatt - probably one of the best fishmongers in london. they're on essex road.