jsmeeker

My guess is that Las Vegas has a much, much higher concentration of visitors with money to blow than L.A. For it to work in L.A., the places would have to be largely supported by locals. It's not really that way in Vegas. The dining there has become another attraction, along with the shows, the casinos, etc.

I made FINALLY made it to Roscoe's. Went t there Wednesday for lunch. It was pretty damn good. (wow.. can't believe I asked about this almost a YEAR ago)

The Charlie Trotter place is the one I would look most forward too. The original CUT opened at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills. I can cehck that place out whenever I want to. (hell, I could check it out tonight). Morel's has a location in L.A. as well. Plus, I always say I will avoid steak joints when I travel since Dallas has so many good ones. Sushi Samba sounds familiair. I may have been to one 9or seen one). Either in Dallas or in L.A.

So, what's the score on the dining scene at Palazzo? Is everything there even open yet? last I heard, there was stil a lot of work going on at the hotel, even after it was officially opened. Any place look interesting or have the potential to be great? I see Emeril has a place there (Table 10). I think Mario Batali has some sort of Italian steak joint as well. What else??

I haven't been to New York in years and years, and really, even when I did visit, it was for very brief visits. And I was much younger. San Fran? I haven't done lots of "high end" dining there either, even if I ahve been there every year for the past four years. So, it's kind of hard for me to compare Las Vegas to those two cities. Btu I'll say this.. I LOVE the dining scene in Las Vegas. It's one of the main reasons I like going back over and over. Lots and lots of great restaurants. All closely located to eachother. And all of them are very accessible. I'm sure it's FAR tougher to get a seat at the New York City L'Atelier de Joel Rubochon than it is at the Las Vegas one, for example. And I'm pretty sure the quality at the Vegas one matches the NYC one.

I shall drink Negroni's while watching TC 4 and savor a Last Word while reading Tony' blog.

I spotted chicken feet (fresh, on a foam tray in plastic) in a local Hispanic/Mexican supermarket a while back. The first thing that popped into my head was that I should buy some for making chicken stock. Glad to see others do the same thing. Next time I make some stock, I'll go there and pick up some feet, toss a few in the pot, and freeze the rest for next time.

The Slanted Door is crazy, crazy popular. Always busy. Can be tough to get a table there. If you like cocktails, I urge you to check out the bar. Really fantastic work going on there.

Dallas is a big driving town. No matter where you live, you'll still wind up needing to drive places. That said, I agree the Knox-Henderson area down to Uptown gives you easy access to a lot of great restaurants. And you'll still drive. Walking a few blocks in Dallas isn't like walking a few blocks in another city. It's just really not usually that pedestrian friendly. But don't let that scare you off. You should come down here. To give you an idea, I think the area at Knox and McKinney is awesome. Has three great dining experiences all within 2 blocks. Abacus, La Duni, and Wild About Harry's. It covers the range from high end down to cheap. And to make it even better, there is an Apple Store right in the middle of it all. Icing on the cake!

I've got a question about amount of dough an how large (as in inches of diameter) of a pizza I should expect from. My pizzas are typically pretty puny looking. When sliced, the slices looking a little silly. I made one last night, but didn't take pics. I have one portion of dough left, so when I try this time, I'll take pics. I *THINK* the problem is that my dough isn't relaxed enough. It's doesn't want to stretch easily, and when it does, it tends to snap back. I make the dough a day in advance. Then it goes in the fridge for close to 24 hours before I actually make a pizza. Pull out the dough, divide it into portions, form one into a ball, then let it rest for at least an hour before shaping. Do I need to give it MORE time to relax? I suspect the second portion will work better if I were to make it today, since it will have been about 48 hours since the dough was actually made. But back to the ounces to inches thing. Lets say I wanted a 12" pizza. I think that might be the biggest I could make given the size of my peel. How much dough do I need? I like the crust to be thin,, New York style.

A friend of mine tipped me off to that. Tre was the chef de cuisine at one of Kent Rathbun's restaurants in Dallas. ← Yeah Abacus. I checked out their website right after Tre made his untimely departure. I was really rooting for him. ← Maybe slightly unfortuneate for those of in Dallas who were fans of his work at Abacus, but I feel it's going to work out well for Tre. I dined at Abacus twice last year, both times at the chef's table. Tre was running the kitchen both times. On the most recent visit, back in mid-November, he stopped by and said hello. Nice guy. I wish him well, and am looking forward to his next restaurant gig in Dallas. ← Do you know where he went? ← right now, he is basically "cashing in" on his fame. He has being doing some cooking demos/classes for a local grocery store, and will be spending some of his time working as a private chef for private events. Let me dry to dig up some more details on that from the food blog at the Dallas Morning News' website Edit: http://eats.beloblog.com/archives/2007/12/tre_speaks.html

No vodka?? If you are looking for one, get Tito's Handmade (from Texas) if you can. Pretty sure it's available in L.A. Some of my L.A. friends buy it.

A friend of mine tipped me off to that. Tre was the chef de cuisine at one of Kent Rathbun's restaurants in Dallas. ← Yeah Abacus. I checked out their website right after Tre made his untimely departure. I was really rooting for him. ← Maybe slightly unfortuneate for those of in Dallas who were fans of his work at Abacus, but I feel it's going to work out well for Tre. I dined at Abacus twice last year, both times at the chef's table. Tre was running the kitchen both times. On the most recent visit, back in mid-November, he stopped by and said hello. Nice guy. I wish him well, and am looking forward to his next restaurant gig in Dallas.

I like the 3-2-1 ratio for sours 3 parts spirit 2 parts for the sweet 1 part for the sour Lots of good cocktails seems to fit into this formula.

I love fried chicken. Started to make it at home after watching an episode of "Good Eats". Chicken was cut into thighs and legs. Wings were removed, but weren't cooked (saved for the stock pot). His method also involved removing the breast meat from the caracass to yield two boneless breasts. Gives you a carcass to make stock, plus you get pieces that have no bone (some people don't like meat with a bone in it) Soak pieces in buttermilk overnight. A poultry season is made with salt, paprika, and cayenne pepper (I think that's all that is in there). Drain pieces. Shake on poultry seasoning. The dredge in flour. Shallow pan fry it (cast iron skillet). Crisco is used for the fat. This has become my normal, standard method. A got a copy of Cook's Country in the mail for free one day. It had a fried chicken recipe. It called for a simple brine (maybe an hour). When it was fried, it was done in a taller pot (I used my LeCrueset) that was covered during a portion of the cooking time. Also, peanut oil was called for in that recipe. This works out well, too. I've done some mixing up of the two, as well. Soak in butter milk, poultry shake, dredge like Alton's, but then cook it like "Cooks". I've also experimented with a double dredge. Pesonally, I think the double dregde version had too much coating. It yielded a very thick, hard shell. Still good. But just maybe a bit too much. I need to experiment more with getting more spice into my chicken. I LOVE Popeye's chicken and would really like to get something close to that. I think the next step is to add some hot sauce to the buttermilk soak. And to crak up the spice in the poultry shake.

A friend of mine tipped me off to that. Tre was the chef de cuisine at one of Kent Rathbun's restaurants in Dallas.

so, has anyone visited a Starbucks since this big training event? Any differences?

The Tipperary from the Savoy (apparently via Hugo Ensslin) is as follows: How did Maraschino get subbed in for vermouth? Also, sounds overly sweet. ← Don't really know. If you watch the video, you'll seee how she talks about varations. She suggests she will explain them all, but never does. Maybe we have to wait for a future episode??

thanks very much for the insight.

I have all of that at home. Except my Chartreuse is green one, not yellow. Do you think it would work OK with the green? (the egg yolk is an interesting twist. I know that whites in sours is "common") ← Green is significantly more intense, so if you give it a try and don't like it, don't rule it, just grab some yellow and try again. Also, with the green you may want to reduce the chartreuse slightly. ← thanks for the tip. I am new to Chartreuse , and so far have only used it to make The Last Word (really, the reason I picked up a bottle). I was watching Alberta Straub's video podcast, and she had a drink that used Chartreuse with whiskey. Called the Tipperary. Could be a winner for St. Patrick's day. ← Tipperary is a pretty decent drink, donno how Ms. Straub makes them, but I like them as such: 2 oz Irish whiskey, 1 oz or a little less of red vermouth, stir and strain into glass rinsed with Chartreuse. I think this is from Joy of Mixology. Some older recipes call for equal parts. No. ← just re-watched the podcast.. what she made was 1 1/2 ounce Irish Whiskey (Tillamore Dew ) 3/4 ounce Chartreuse splash Maraschino liqueur dash of Regans Orange Bitters stir. stain into cocktail glass. garnish with a lemon twist. She mentioned there were other variations and said she would reveal them later in the program, but never did. You can watch it here.. http://www.onnetworks.com/videos/cocktails...e-fly/tipperary So, I am not sure if that is right or not. I don't have irish whiskey at home. But I do have scotch (JW Black) and some bourbon. Wonder how it would work using that instead of the Irish??

Are any pictures available?

I think Paula Deen took some pages out of the Emeril playbook. Over time, her "character" has developed. Like Emeril, her earlier stuff is different than her most recent stuff, and I also detect the difference when Paula is in front of a live crowd vs. just being on a set alone, or on a set with a just a guest ot two and with only crew off camera.

I think this is just the company-owned stores. Franchise owners can choose to close or stay open and I know one local one is staying open. They are open longer hours than many others because they have a drive-thru and cater to commuters who leave very early in the morning. ← it is company owned stores. As far as the automated espresso machines, Holly. When were they introduced? Was it after Howard Shultz left the company?

Yes.. Yours will close. And yours too.. http://www.starbucks.com/aboutus/pressdesc.asp?id=833 Little surprised I didn't see this already in this forum. Will this help the troubled franchise? Do you even CARE? Will the streets of the United States be littered with people unable to get their "fix"?

I don't think any of this is any real news to anyone that has followed the Iron Chef series for any amount of time.