Kent Wang

According to Imperial Tours Jean Georges received the highest Zagat rating, though the guide went to press before Sens opened. Bloomberg does report that Michelin has plans for Shanghai.

OK, you know that you can open a crab easily without a mallet by just prying up the genital flap (or whatever it's called), right? When my (Chinese) mom went to a crab house in Baltimore with her American coworkers they were astounded by this trick. What exactly is the mustard anyway? Is it brains? Sheena, have you had the Lays crab flavored potato chips? I recall having those a decade ago when I was living in Baltimore. Tasted just like Old Bay.

Just tried it. Tastes pretty good.

Does it make much of a difference to use 100% agave tequila when making a margarita or other mixed drink? I've been using Sauza Anejo Commerativo (which is not 100% agave) but I'm wondering if maybe a silver will be more versatile for mixing.

I've read that both Michelin and Zagat have released their guides for Shanghai, yet can find very little information about the ratings. A blogger posted on April 7, 2006 that the Michelin guide has been published for Shanghai. World Travel Guide states that Sens is "Shanghai’s first three-star Michelin star restaurant". This was about all I could find. I want to know which other restaurants received Michelin stars and high Zagat ratings and if those guides only covered the Western restaurants.

My mom once taught me how to do this in a microwave but I forgot. It only works with smaller portions of course, like no more than 3 eggs. Any tips? I think the trick was to heat up the water to near boiling before folding in with the eggs and then finishing in the microwave for about five minutes.

Gotta plug this again.

I like the idea of printing up a menu or list. Can you share a few so I can get an idea of which drinks to include, how verbose to make the descriptions, etc.?

I should add that this is only Vya vs M&R. Haven't done a side-by-side with any of the others yet. On another note, is tasting vermouth by itself a worthwhile test of how it would combine in a cocktail? Maybe I should be tasting Manhattans instead.

i was curious about this matter and found a concise, informative article by The Washington Post.

I think it's a terrific idea. Kudos to you!

I haven't had much opportunity to frequent the bars in Austin yet. I'm looking for a place that has a well-crafted cocktail menu -- and not one filled with those day-glow, super-sweet, fruity "martinis". Something like New York's Pegu Club but, you know, in Austin. I've been to the Driskill's bar. It's quite expensive and though they don't really have much a cocktail menu, they do have an extensive whiskey, tequila and rum list. The atmosphere, of course, is lovely though perhaps too formal and stuffy for certain occasions.

I want to know more about what standards they're talking about.

You two are right about pairing with fruits. It mixes well with Pama pomegranate liquer (which someone has commented tastes more like cranberry than pomegranate).

As an Austinite and fan of David Bull's food, I, too, am eagerly awaiting this episode.

I did a side-by-side with Vya sweet and Martini & Rossi. The Vya is overwhelmingly sweet while the M&R has more of a herbal character. M&R is the winner for me, regardless of cost.

You don't let your dining companions begin eating until you have photographed their dish.

Does Rachael Ray say E-V-O-O or just evoo? I've taken to saying the latter though I have never seen her show.

Interesting stuff. We're discussing similar stuff in the Anti-Brining thread about salting and dry-aging poultry and pork. Has anyone had any horror stories of their meat succumbing to rot? Other than the matter of excessive moisture loss, maybe pre-salting before drying can help fend off bacterial growth? Worth it?

I should also add that pre-salting and drying makes it much much easier to achieve a great crispy crust. I suppose if you're a master chef and can always get the roasting times perfect this won't matter much to you, but for the rest of us this is certainly another major advantage of pre-salting. There's not much discussion on the matter of pre- versus post-salting, though of course this thread is about beef and not poultry. Nearly everyone is doing post-salting under the idea that pre-salting will draw out too much moisture. Then again, many of these people are drying for 3-7 days. The entire matter of dry-aging poultry and pork seems underexplored and deserving of more experimentation. I just picked up some more quail so I hope to have another round of results up in a week.

I'd like to try that too. Is there a thread on dry aging beef? I only found one with two posts in it. My major concern with drying without salt is the higher chance of spoilage.

Maybe the distribution channels for bars don't even carry the 1.75 L bottles at all?

I only buy 1.75 L bottles of liquor whenever possible but the bottles are rather unwieldy. My bar cabinet is quickly running out of room. However, every bar that I've been to only have the standard 750 mL or 1 L bottles. Considering how much volume a bar goes through are they actually paying the higher cost for the smaller bottles or do they order the big bottles and simply refill the small bottles at the bar with them?

I put rosemary under the skin of the bird before pre-salting, and the meat (especially the breast meat) was thoroughly infused. Shiitakes would work just as well, I'd imagine. Dried porcinis would be even better. Wow. I am totally going to try that next time. ← Do you remove the herbs before roasting? Otherwise, don't you get a Frankenstein-looking bird? Infusing with brines seems easier though of course you'll have to endure the disadvantages of the brining process.

This time I experimented with duck breasts. I purchased a whole duck from Central Market and cut off the two breast pieces. One breast I pre-salted and left to dry on a rack for 48 hours. The other piece I brined for 24 hours, removed from the brine, thoroughly patted dry, pre-salted and left to dry for another 24 hours. The two breasts after 48 hours. Left is pre-salted only, right is brined than pre-salted. The difference in appearance was significant with the pre-salted being much darker in color. I roasted and left to rest for 10 minutes before cutting open. The difference in appearance was much more stark in person. The brined piece was much whiter around the edges and distinctively red and bloody in the center. The pre-salted piece tasted much better, a tiny bit on the dry side but much more preferable to the brined piece. The brined piece was very wet and bloody. After I finished eating, the entire plate was covered with bloody red juices. While the brined piece was more moist, the juices were watery, lacked flavor and instead tasted more of blood than meat -- and poultry blood is not appetizing in the way blood from a steak can be. The pre-salted breast also had a more complex, developed taste and the darker color of the meat looked more appropriate for duck -- the brined piece looked too white and too much like chicken. This experiment returned some very surprising results. I did not expect the two pieces to turn out much differently as they were both subject to pre-salting and drying. The wetness of the brined piece, even after a day of drying shows just how powerful brining is. The brining process made the breast piece much less susceptible to subsequent drying. I suspect that if I had dried the brined piece a full 48 hours it still would've been much wetter than a piece dried for the same period of time without brining beforehand. I believe that I can decisively conclude that pre-salting results in a better product than brining for poultry. I agree with the above posters that brining only results in a watery bird, not a juicy one. The added liquid, if anything, only leaves blood uncooked, resulting in an undesirable flavor. Pre-salting and drying, on the other hand, is effective at developing a richer flavor and color, though at the cost of some juicyness. I still want to try this experiment with a control group so I can see just how much moisture is removed by pre-salting. I also plan to try this with pork chops once the vendor at the farmers market is back in stock.