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Bryan, point well taken. yes, most home cooks probably dont have that type of scale lying around, though there are a few (perhaps many) on egullet and in this forum that experiment for the sake of actually serving this to paying customers (i am certainly in this group, we're doing a deconstructed Mocha Cappichino which includes espresso caviar in the near future) and one of the main differences/pitfalls i see with home cooks is that they dont season enough in general, and with sphereification specifically, it seems that the actual taste is an afterthought to many. i just wanted to state that for the sake of anyone who hasnt thought about it yet. for those that are past that, im gald to here it too. Tonyy, no prob, i am left wondering if this guy brian from that tv show was any good as a chef. i hope so if i was mistaken for him. lol. and i see your email is disney chef, how long have you been there, which restaurant do you work in, i have a friend or two that cook for disney too. 100 posts, woo hoo !!!

tony, first off, i have never seen that TV show, but i know that i wasnt on it! lol, so, no im not brian. the name's Michael J. Zerinskas. secondly, i used a raw beet juice that was seasoned with S+P, and a 40% simple syrup to taste. the beet sphere at Alinea had a certain sweetness to it, almost sour cherry like, mine was close but not spot on, but a little fiddling will get there. while we're on the subject, from what i have been reading in this forum, you guys clearly dont seem to be seasoning your liquids enough prior to sphereification (sp?). i have read many ppsts where some one says, "ya looks cool but tastes just like ______." Season! thats the formost thouhgt. sphereification is an afterthought. When i first got my WillPowder materials i did a tea orb too, but seasoned with S+P, lemon zest, and steeped in peppermint. the flavor-combination was quite magical! and the shape was a bonus...$.02

when i do the caviar (and the ravioli for that matter) i place a fine mesh strainer IN the CaCl2 bath. then i drop the liquid containing alginate into that area, let them set a few seconds, giggle the strainer a bit, let them fully set up and then remove the strainer containing the now formed caviar. i then gently pour them into a fresh water bath with another fine mesh strainer in it and remove the caviar, lightly dy over a paper towel and remove to my serving vessel. as for hardware to make the caviar, i know its simple and i know ive said it before but this really works well. a melon baller! i use the small end and two spoonfulls is more than enough for one serving in a japanese soup spoon. and they are all uniform, and formed within 5-6seconds so it a good procedure for dinner service if you dont want to build unwieldy syringe contraptions... god bless tupperware...

ok, the fruits of yesterday's labor....Alinea's Verjus.Lemon thyme.Beet this worked nice, the flavors are near perfect except i think i needed to sweeten the beet juice a little more to mingle with the other flavors better. Note: i had the black plate laying around, normally id use white; and sorry i need a better camera... broken... another Grand Cru recreation in the books, next Moto's Liquid Center B-Day cake...

ok so i just got some good stuff from WillPowder. started messing around. Caviar is really easy, i just used a melon baller (which has a tiny air hole in the back of it) as a dropper and it worked great. Not all spheres were identical, but all products were spheres and none had "tails" of any sort. Beet Caviar with Lemon Thymne Foam This first try was in preparration for recreating Alinea's Ver jus with Lemon Thymne and Beet, ive already gotten down the large orb production, which will reside at the bottom at the bowl, the ver jus ice is solidifying in the freezer as we speak, which will cover the beet, and the lemon thymne foam is ready, which will top it all (for those of you that have not had Alinea's dish yet.) the flavors are spot on so far, the fianl product will be photographed later tonight, pictures up tomorrow. Note: doing the caviar in the manner described above is pretty quick and i would feel comfortable doing it during dinner service, it was that quick and consistant. Mangos are waiting in the fridge too....

yea this was one of the aspects we looked into on future menus, i finally got my graphic designer to get around to it. she (my wife) can be steadfast in her desgin. lol

here's what we do for customers at my personal chef service...the menu changes with what the customer wants but the overall is the same... comments are strongly encouraged....thanks

by the time you finish the drink, 8-10mins, everything is just finishing reacting so there is very little acid precipitate left in the glass. the acidity present to the taste really depeneds on what base you use. the cherry syrup had a nice acidity/sweetness, the drink was pleasant and if i didnt know what was in it/how it was done i woudnt suspect baking soda, there's no after taste. as for foam, i stress this greatly WIDE mouth glasses promote more reaction. i was disappointed in the wine glass becuase it dulled the reaction, but when i had been doing it all day in a collins glass as practise the foam was so vigorous (due to more air reaction) that sevral times it was close to overshooting the tip of the glass. lots of foam. a martini glass is even wider so i suspect the reaction would be even nicer.

just a quick note for cdh, I found that Sodium Citrate is a bioproduct of the sodium bicarbonate and acid reaction, where the sodium ion links up with the H+ ion in the acid. so it would work for this, obviously. though i know understand how it can be used as a pH stabilizer...

understandable, the big house wines are not the greatest (the pink seems to be the best out of the bunch), but you could do alot worse when purchasing a $10 bottle of wine. alternately, im kinda glad to see if move, becuase, as stated above and in the press release, they're going to put more effort into the pacific rim label, which shows much more promise than big house.

skidude, sorry i dont mean to be whoring all your posts, but the final drink i did yesterday (the one in the video) tasted great, no trace of baking soda or the byproducts of the reaction. lemon juice/Cream of tartar converts nearly all of it and coupled with the alcohol and cherry syrup, there was no "chemical" taste at all. ok, thats my $.02.... but i would LOVE to know how Moto does it....

ok, the fruits of today's labors.... the final recipe... i made a sour cherry syrup from mascerated cherries and a little water. 3oz mix 1 oz of freshly squeezed lemon juice and 1/8tsp of Cream of Tartar into the cherry syrup, this goes into the glass (i didnt have a martini glass lying around, but the wine glass worked quite nice.) take 1/4tsp of baking soda and mix it with just enough water for it to dissolve (less than 1/2oz). then mix in 1-1.5oz vodka. this goes into the shot glass. pouring the contents of the shot glass into the martini glass slowly at first, then dump the remaining oz or so into there to get a nice vigorous foaming action. Conclusion: nice vigorous foaming for approx. 10-15seconds, followed by 2-3minutes of a very hard petillance, followed by 7-10minutes of light petillance. i wwas very happy with the results and it is dramatic enough given the right setting. a high class dinner party-yes. for your drunken aunts cocktail-no. a few notes i found along the way... -baking soda is not alcohol solluable -cherries are acidic, dont mix the baking soda in there -wide mouth glasses give a MUCH MORE vigorous initial foam, the wine glass gave a more sudued vigorous foam, followed by more hard petillance -when sipping, swirling the glass, this introduces more air, thus exciting the reaction heres a video clip: and heres a pic: note that the residue on the bottom was excess COT, i reduced the amount and it dissolved completely the second try with no residue and the residue in the shot glass was the baking soda (the second time around, mixing the BS in water first then alcohol, yielded no residue): if i were serving this, which i would consider: make a water/baking soda solution and the cherry syrup base before hand, then all u'd have to do is pour some voka in a shot glass, mix in the baking soda water and serve the two glasses. pretty easy actually, once i got the ratios down.

Bonny Doon has had a few changes recently...check this press release... http://www.bonnydoonvineyard.com/bdv/pr-Bi...rdinalSold.html i think this biggest thing to come out of all this is that thier Pacific Rim Wines are going to start taking a more center stage with an expanded line. and their chennin blanc and riesling is already quite good QPR.

the way i am thinking of this one, the allure of it would be mixing the two liquids (the one in the martini glass and the one in the shot glass) which are both clear and still and creating a vigorous reaction that catching the guests attention and continues to produce CO2 over a period of time, but yes charing a drink with CO2 would be a lot easiler.

ok im obsessed with getting this to work and i think i have the magic numbers... 1/2tsp baking soda mixed into 4oz water, put into a collins glass (i havent any martini glasses laying around), then i mixed 1/2oz lemon juice wuth 1/2 oz water, and 1/4tsp Cream of Tartar and out this into a tall shot glass. i start mixing this two slowly at first and then the last half oz or so i dump into the glass. by doing this your introducing more air more quickly so it foams load and big for 10-15 seconds, then the rest of the lemon juice that you poured slowly takes over so you get streams of bubbles and by the time that runs out, then the COT kicks in and lets out slow streams of bubbles over, well its been almost ten minutes now, and the cool part is that when you take a sip, it introduces more air and the reaction fizzes more. Nice. I will try this with some liquor latter to see if it still works well. and tastes good. i think one of the keys is to use a clear liquid so you can see more of the bubbles. ill take pics and maybe a video...well see

ok first impressions... i used simple lipton iced tea. dissolved 1/8th tsp cream of tartar in the 4oz iced tea, then dissolved 1/8th tsp baking soda in 10z water, mixed the two = not nearly enough fizz. dissolved 1/4 tsp COT in 4oz tea, then dissolved 1/4tsp baking soda in 1oz water, then mixed the two = takes a while for the reaction to take place, happens over time, but only leaves a slight petillance (like drinking Albarino or Vinho Verde), and quite frankly, was nothing special, the taste was fine, baking osda slightly detectable but with a more flavored liquor, u wouldnt notice. tried using lemon juice instead of COT (more H+ ions in lemon juice, should equal better comingling of substances, thus more or bigger co2 bubbles) This worked better in most cases, but the reaction took place quickly (within only a few seconds) and if i was paying $12 for a daiquiri, that wouldnt impress me much. cdh, when you did the citric acid how long was the fizz and what was the texture? it appears that we need to find an acid/collection of acids that provides a bunch of fizz with lasting fizz. im sticking with baking soda for the base becuase it can be mixed in a liquid without reaction, unlike baking powder.

oh good call, that'd be nice, i wish my new shipment of sodium alginate and cacl2 would get here already going to runto the kitchen to try the cream of tartar mix.

ok, forget this peroxide, i didnt get the reaction, but i found something that would work better and i know is food safe, cream of tartar as an acid, single acting baking powder as a base. NaHCO3 + KHC4H4O6 ----> KNaC4H4O6 + H2O + CO2 this only stipulation that i find is that you want a baking powder that does not contain sodium alluminum sulfate, although this is food safe, if my chemistry knkowledge serves me well it will create and alluminum precipitate, which wouldnt be good for a mixed drink, and needs to be heated slightly to make convert in entirely. so heres what im thinking, find the right proportions of cream of tartar and baking powder (baking soda can also be used, but you would need a little more cream of tartar, because all baking powder is is baking soda with a little cream o TT added in.) and then serving options as follows: 1,) have the mixed powders( COT and baking powder) residing at the bottom of the glass, pour the liquid in (eh...) 2.)Have the drink (daiquiri) mixed with the cream of tartar in a martini glass and serve it with a shot glass of flavorful (non acidic) liquid with baking soda mixed in it and have the guest mix it in before consuming

yea, hmm, im going to email an old chem professor of mine to find out the products, then once i know what kind of base to use, recipe testing will ensue.... and do you have any idea if this takes place over time or all at once?

gotcha, i would be leaning toward the baking soda. didnt my mother tell me not to drink hydrogen peroxide when i was a kid? diluted highly it might be ok, though. a ttrip down the block to walgreens and beverly's homebrew is in order. one more question, i havent had this drink at Moto, but am merely thinking of this possible uses of such a presentation, so if i were to do this like a daquari, would the reacton take place over the course of say 15mins, while the customer is drinking it, or does it progress faster, for presentation purpose only? ....ok i have to just get to testing this i guess....

interesting...a few questions. i have some sodium citrate lying around here from Will Powder ( http://www.willpowder.net/citrate.html ) would that work as my acid? if not i can find a food grade citric acid easily, but what kind of base would i be looking for, any suggestions? thanks

With my wife and I's crazy schedule, we cant get back to Moto for a few months, so I decided to recreate a few of our favorite dishes in the little free time i do have around here. "Ceasar Salad," "Dounut Soup," and if my sodium alginate/calcium chloride ever gets here ill whip up some liquid center b-day cake as well as a few other dishes. hmm, wonder where i could score some liquid nitrogen to make those "Pancakes" I had last time i was there...anyway, heres a few pics followed by a brief description of the process...btw, chef cantu, i have to say they taste nearly exact like yours., consider it a grand cru compliment... Ceasar Salad Romaine lettuce, liquified, seasoned, frozen, and scraped into a granita, accompanied with classic housemade ceasar dressing, and a parmasean crudite. Dounut Soup Krispy Kremes, liquified, then fortifed with a dounut stock, and confection sweetened cream, gently warmed. Look for more pics soon, next up, lquid center b-day cake, potato links, etc...

Chef Cantu does a LOT with CO2 and the like, id put your question in this thread... http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?act=ST&f=36&t=35595 chef cantu is a egullet member and readdily talks about his amazing food and drinks. very nice guy

hmm, "pricing guides." What exactly do you mean, elaborate and we will are do our best.

2001 Marques de Caceres Rioja Crianza burgundy in color, fading to ruby around the edge, very clear, yet deep. The nose offers blackberry, spice, and baked plum aromas, with a hint of oakiness, and an undefined sweet not that was intriging. The taste offers the same flavors, that are well balanced along with very supple tannins, drink now. nice finish offering a little heat and more and more spice as the wine opens up in the glass. Allow this an hour or so to open up. Overall, this wine is a little more than single dimensional, the sweet hint in the background being intriging enough for me to want to dive into the reserva and gran reserva bottlings. its kind of like tasting tomatoes bought from the grocery and then one from the garden, that one bright star sending you back looking for more. 2001 was a good year for Rioja and i suspect the delineated bottlings to offer great value and more consentration of that "hint of greatness."