coquus

I must admit that i'm one of her deserters. I don't know why, I used to watch her all the time, then one day the magic wasn't there anymore. Not that I watch any FN anymore, I really can't think of a show that I really watch on the FN, except Iron Chef. I still love Sara though, she is the most likeable person on the FN, alot in common with my own mother. It's ironic my mother's mother also reminded me of Julia. I really can't think of another program on there. Please FN, please keep her. She's one of the most well connected, knowledgable folks that you've got.

Perhaps the curing meats intro before this? I beleive it's on the right hand side if that helps, or maybe nearby a sopressata/salami recipe. Hell, I could probably find it quickly, and I'll be in town today, forget about it.

Ok, ok, i'm not going to take all the nice stuff back I said about Rachel, but she happened to be on today after I made my post, the cooking show this time. I watched for a minute because I was eating and was kind of late, so I noticed she was coming very close to cutting off her thumb when she was chopping zucchini for something or another, that's my biggest pet peeve. I don't care how or what you cook or how bad it is, please don't maim yourself in the process. And that's my problem with all these "foodies" who think they have something to share. Do you know why Jacques Pepin got his first show for PBS? Because he had KNIFE SKILLS.

As someone who loves to parody Rachael (and other FoodTV celebs).. I do watch her, and many of the others I dislike. No, I don't just criticize.. usually I'm just laughing my a** off.. Watching Rachael or Sandra Lee is like watching the Apprentice. I don't expect to learn anything I didn't pick up in business school, it is for pure entertainment value. Have you ever watch Mystery Science Theater 3000? If so, you will understand... ← Or maybe we're just TV food junkies that stay up till three or four or five in the morning to watch Tony or that episode of Cooking Under Fire. <7 5/8" [] This is a good discussion, I watch her 40 a day, but rarely agree with her selections. She's a happy girl, so I'd say she's good for the world, keep her. And whoa, instant mashers are good for some things, just not mashed potatoes IMHO.

Thanks in advance, Ryan. As a latecomer to the discussion about Dextrose/Glucose/Corn Sugar/Cerelose/Grape Sugar, I understand Glucose also inhibits growth of microorganisms in smaller amounts than Sucrose/Table Sugar, because it is a smaller there are more Dextrose molecules present in solution containing equal Dextrose and Sucrose, therefore they exert a greater osmotic pressure preserving the food. The limitation being that Dextrose isn't as soluble in water as Sucrose is, so a mixture is used, though I suspect this limitation has nothing to do with Sausage Making, and everything to do with Jam and Jellies.

My girl was getting upset at me for my spending time on here with my imaginary friends, and not with her so I feel I was unable to address this, so now I'll take a stab at it. For natural reasons, most of us humans eat to live and don't live to eat. We are able to detect a spectrum of flavors so as to differentiate nutrients instead of poison, i.e. live. Unfortunately, a certain poison (Martian?) has found us out and has infiltrated our food supply. And due to the carnivorous nature of our race, can and probably will cycle with us forever. Sure we (U.S. Gov't now, not human beings) have done things, but unfortunately I see it as too little too late, we should have been doing at least the level of testing we are before the first mad cow, banned the import of dead cows from europe, etc. Now the deer are infected too. It's not that we didn't know about it though there is much we don't, it's just pure laziness/red tape/free market worship that allowed this. While I know this, as a cook I do still eat the industrial ground beef when I taste for seasoning at work, and if i'm at parties, you know, i'm poor and a good ole boy so i'll eat it, etc. I just see a lack of understanding that reaches alot of levels about this disease and it's scary. I mean someone on here, eGullet, a virtual oasis from the ignorance, told me that there was no need to worry, the (second case) cow was a downer, and also not intended for human consumption, so there is still no danger. What? I didn't say to them, but am saying it now, what? That a second cow has had BSE long enough to be a downer means that it's in our food, I think the first was also a downer too? It's here and i'm not convinced that it will leave us, ever. I don't get worked up about having to eat beef however irrational, I still consider it more important that my meatloaf is seasoned properly. Now JohnL, I was thinking more about your post a bit more and realize now it may have been as a response to some others' posts on here so I was wrong to attack it initially and am all for the second part of that quote, Proceed.

Well, I did. Unfortunately, no final just Miami Down to 6 episode, so I was a bit disappointed that I stayed up for just one episode. It was late so maybe I was seeing things but that steak Katie put out looked pretty raw in the middle, and it seemed to me like she was doing play by play for the whole show.

The problem with that statement is that the math isn't known. Do I think that eating Kobe/Grass finished beef is safe, yes, I'll eat that for burgers, or grind my own. And Seattle, please clarify.

Ahh, the best reality cooking show I never got to see, I doubt I'm staying up until three to catch the final, so. . . Katie sounds like the best choice, I hope she works out for him. At which of his seventeen restaurants will she be working?

jlurie, or jon?, I'm happy to hear Tony is at least getting paid, it would be a shame otherwise. Hopefully Jack will turn out to be at least half as much the man, the promo certainly doesn't catch me, but it's Fox, and they know better than I who their target audience is, so I'll suspend judgement. As for Gordon, he deserves that hatemail. If he doesn't think that fat people can handle the heat why did he have Jimmy on the show, from day one he said that Jimmy was too bulky for the work. I've seen chefs as big as him really hustle however, so in my opinion the point is moot, however, I doubt people would tune in to watch me deliver subtle encouragements and helpful advice. The only one I would like to see with their own restaurant right now is Jessica, not that she'd know what to do with it, she's just the only one I even care for anymore. But that doesn't matter, she gets the boot on Monday, j/k, I don't know anything like that.

Back in March/April I looked everywhere in Buffalo without any luck, but then found Morton's Tender Cure/Sugar Cure at Agway in Allegany, it's probably where you least expect it, also at Reid's Food Barn in Olean. You can order insta cure #1 online, but I found the amount of instacure I would have to buy was excessive, it's probably a more economical way however. Also, do not click on the above link, popups, and no sight to be found except eBay pointer, Polack, check your link.

Ryan, could you look for me in the sausage making section of this book, and find the name of the book he references on sausage making, somewhere in the text of the descriptions, please, it would save me a trip to the library. I really enjoyed his book, in particular the second half, and have made york ham, smoked canadian bacon, smoked ham shoulder, and blood puddings. Unfortunately it was march when I read this book, so I haven't made any of the salami, lomo, etc. because of a lack of a low temp. drying chamber. I probably will try this sometime in the fall when the weather allows though so it would be nice to see what this other book is all about beforehand. Also, It's been touched on, but does anyone have any definitive answers as to if or how prosciutto, etc. stays pink in the center without the use of sodium nitrate/nitrite, potassium nitrate, etc?

Ahh, ha, ha, I saw the trailer, that s**t looks stupid, and, I might add, a bit more like Melrose Place than a situational comedy. Last night I saw the whiney one, Andy, leave, and then big boy Jimmy. At least there weren't any surprises, well except Gordon's mouth got a bit more ugly, which I didn't think was possible, it seems to be infecting the others a bit too.

I guess it's just my thinking that foodbourne illness is not going to kill me or anyone in my restaurant, because I taste, practise fifo, and make small enough quantities where I turn them over. I'm personally worried about carcinogens, metal oxides, or hormonal imbalances, etc. It's probably mistaken thinking because, as you point out, there are still source issues with my food. I would still like to think those green onions were pre-sliced. How did so many of them get exposed to hepatitis, which I would suppose had to come from the dirt of the farm then, i.e animal waste? And how does the hepatitis survive rinsing, is it inside the onion, or living off of it? I'm glad that your college alumni are worried about getting people sick bavila, and I hope they take a proactive role in preventing this. I totally agree with Ninjai too, lots of things can be tought, and lots of things need teaching to get across. That blacklight trick was pretty cool, right? The right path should be made the easier. What I would like is for the right path to be more clear first, that's why I started this topic and thanks for your contributions so far. I was hoping to draw more of a broad map of where we are. I guess that is why I originally posted this to the comments section, I wanted to separate the discussions to keep them focused. I do see where you all are taking it, and it's my fault for wanting to go everywhere at once I suppose. Ok, enough with the whining, I'm really interested in what Anzu has to say. Does anyone want to quantify the effects of each type of food bourne illness? I'll share what I beleive. I think that Hepatitis C basically cuts your lifespan by ten years or twenty by messing up the liver which is normally the most regenerative organ in the body. The one time I got sick from food was questionable sushi, the little corner place decided to start selling peices on an all you can eat buffet, I puked my brains out a while later. And it wasn't from eating too much, everyone else I was there with puked too. I personally haven't known anybody to get it worse than that? The e-coli thing that happened in Maryland a few years back was scary, and even though lots of Marylanders are scary raw ground beef eating freaks, I still ate my burgers well for a while though because permanent kidney damage is a horrible thing. I don't even eat burgers out anymore because of bovine spongiform encephalitis, which is so freaky very few people even understand that it cannot be killed by cooking with temperatures even remotely used for cooking food. And it basically infects your brain and eats it until you go crazy and die, albeit 15 years down the road. Then there is salmonella, which has mutated to an antibiotic resistant strain, that gives people the flu for about a week, and is found in greatest numbers under the skin of chicken, but also in most reptiles and amphibians as well. There is probably some truth in this somewhere, but like I said at the outset it's what I believe, now you are free to shoot at it.

Toxoplasmosis, isn't that what you get from that. Aids ridden, junky Tommy got that in Trainspotting because he was in the flat with the kitten that never had it's litter box changed for three weeks. I wonder how that gets in food, spores? Pam R-The reason that the medic didn't contact the health department is that here in the US, medic's are probably paid by that hotel, not the government, so you should have reported your illness to the health department directly if you wanted retribution. Hepatitis C is a special case scenario, in the case you mention, if your facts are straight about washing the onions, there was nothing that the Chile's worker could have done to prevent it's spread anyhow, the virus was (claimed to be) in the onions from Mexico. Were they pre sliced onions, that's probably why. I think that all the best practises in the world don't make up for a little pride in our work. Do you think that any slop chain restaurant worker cares about what they serve? I don't, and if they do they aren't happy serving the slop. I'd rather take my chances at the independants, not to say I'm not picky about things, I look for dirt, and believe it's there, but I'm still slightly more likely to never come back if I have a poorly cooked or presented meal the first time than if food i've enjoyed many times before makes me sick. I'm never going to be giving the chef the twenty questions about how closely he follows the health codes, but if I catch them feeding me something they wouldn't gladly eat, shame on them. I suppose i've wasted enough time on here with what I didn't want to talk about.

Nah, Tadd was not Kerry, but Kerry was a judge, and a contestant before (first incarnation ICA) and got beat by I don't remember, I don't think it was Todd, but maybe, I really don't remember. I thought both contestants gave it to us pretty good yesterday, I thought Todd got hammered on the originality, and Mario should have been punished more in taste for the lambchop, what was he thinking? I don't know how much cheese I can eat with ice cream though, so it probably was right. Gotta love Steingarten, "this dough is soo soft", "yeah, makes you think he could have made the last one less like shoe leather."

I was really looking for a new Heading for the Society, something like Beyond Food Safety. While I do agree with the response that if integrity is ingrained in the culture of the cook, he or she is more likely to act responsibly, I am really reserving my time for discussion of more importance than me spending a night on the toilet not really a discussion of ways to get sick, but more on this later. Maybe Food that Kills would be a better title.

Just in awe of the lack of response this topic gets. I thought for sure we'd be up and running by now, must be too far down the page for most of the users to notice. Sigh. Does anyone work at a place that composts? I worked at one for a bit, but they are out of business now. This was a pretty big, old, and hippy Ithaca, NY(pop.:50K) and they were one of two restaurants that composted, the other being the famous cooperatively owned vegetarian place. This was two years ago, pretty sad really.

conger eel battle, no?

It's funny that nobody has mentioned Morimoto's use of this product/method in the Iron Chef. I don't recall it ever being mentioned on the program, I thought folks just always squirted seafood puree out of bags into boiling water that turn into beautiful noodle dishes over there. Neat stuff, thanks for bringing this to the top. Pretty much eliminates the need for butchers twine I guess, I'd like a pound to play with.

According to Harold McGee, people start losing their taste in their forties, all three judges are there, I dunno .

That may be true, but I was just giving everyone a way that works for me. As a point of fact, call it what you will but my whipped cream/cream cheese (still in stainless) is still holding fine, and does not taste like the fridge (or cream cheese).

The only thing I'd dispute you on there is the Romano, Parm, here in the states the supermarket versions are insipid.

Can't believe I forgot to mention Copeland Marks's fabulous books of which I have read only Korean, but recently acquired another and am looking forward to it. Also Bread Alone, by Daniel Leader.

I don't have the hard and fast rules others have, except when it comes to eggs. I almost always buy organic eggs at the co-op (no, no the coop, as in chicken coop). As for the rest I like to think I'm very economical, but sometimes splurge on organic dairy/beef, chicken/eggs, veggies, and more recently pork. Often the clerk rings the veggies up as the normal brand anyway, and I pretend I don't see. I always splurge on ice cream when I buy it, but rarely an all out Ben&Jerry's splurge. Where I fall off the wagon is at the asian supermarket, where there are like ten cheaper mirins I will notoriously buy the kikoman. I buy the most expensive oyster sauce, biggest shrimp, and most expensive coconut milk I can find. It's almost knee jerk. I have found some cheaper fish sauce and chili sauces to my liking, but I still wouldn't use them for salads.