rickster

Generally recipes mean unsalted pistachios. If you have a Trader Joe's nearby, they sell unsalted.

I have that book and also Mexico One Plate at a Time. I think your perception of Authentic Mexican is correct, but it does seem to me that Bayless simplified his approach in his later books that most people here seem to be referencing.

Seems more likely to me that abogado and advocaat are from the Latin advocatus.

Shrimp Risotto. I've adapted a lobster risotto recipe from Todd English's Olives cookbok to use shrimp and the shrimp stock would be perfect for it or any other shrimp or shellfish risotto recipe.

At home, I generally use loose leaf tea. I use a Bodum glass teapot with the center press, which I highly recommend, although it is not the most traditional looking pot: Bodum Teapot

If you factor this tear into the way you cut the croissant dough into individual pieces, wouldn't this just affect one of them? I wouldn't worry about it too much. Remember, you're going to cut through all the lamination layers anyway for each croissant.

My mom, who is British and my dad, who spent several years there used to make these once in a while. I don't have a recipe, but I can only describe the ones they made as a thick large crepe. No leavening, as you mentioned, but the proportion of flour to liquid must be higher than for a crepe. There's actually a pancake house chain here in Illinois that makes a pretty good replica, but they call it a 49er flapjack.

Reading this made a light bulb go off. I packed some pizzelles with some other homemade cookies last Christmas to give as gifts and they went soggy. I couldn't figure out why, when the pizzelles I kept for myself wrapped in plastic wrap were fine. Obviously it was the moisture from the other cookies inthe sealed tin.

For baking books, Bugat and Healy have a French cookie book (not sure if it's still in print) and another book might be Kaffeehaus by Rick Rodgers, which does a lot of Austro Hungarian pastries, cookies, crepes, etc. I always thought pain aux raisin was made with a laminated dough, but I'm sure it could be adapted to brioche.

Mario on the show in the 9/21 NY Magazine: "The central implicit conceit of the program, in a way, is that the idea of Batali and Gwyneth’s touring the Prado with Ferran Adrià isn’t a trumped-up, made-for-TV fiction: It’s a kind of a vérité window into how he really lives. Batali knows that the show, for this reason and others, isn’t going to be everyone’s cup of tea. That his critics will find it infuriating, and that others may see the spectacle as meandering, pointless, painfully self-indulgent. “My worry is, how many times can you watch me eating something and saying, ‘Boy, that’s good,’ before you say, ‘Fuck you! I’m not tasting the shit!,’ ” he frets. “That there’s no real payoff for the customer other than saying, ‘Hey, they’re having a great time, this is a great show.’ The blogs that hate it are gonna be like, ‘Who the fuck cares that he’s eating with Gwyneth Paltrow, she’s a vegan anyway,’ or whatever.”"

Even in the Manchego visit, I thought Bittman said something like " if you've seen one cheese production process, you've seen them all, it just comes down to the ingredients". Not a good way to introduce a 10 minute segment on the production process to make Manchego. It was just a bizarre show.

Saw the first episode and thought it was a mess. Not much cooking and not much art/culture either, just a bunch of people riding around in their Mercedes inanely chatting. The low point being Don Quixote and Sancho Panza showing up. Personally, I would give the Spanish woman her own show and drop the other three. Here's hoping the next episode improves.

My King Arthur Flour Cookie Book suggests using it as an alternative to baking powder in their decorator cookies which have a fair amount of butter. Seemed to turn out OK, although not that noticeably crisper than with baking powder

I like the pastry and sugar shows as well, but as they do more and more of them, I wish they could find a broader pool of contestants. The same people seem to keep competing. Is there not one else qualified or are they too busy to take the time to do it?

A couple of food websites have reported that the show has been renewed for 13 episodes. The mussels show is an odd one. Its shows up on my Tivo schedule as well, but was not part of the original list of shows.

Based on my one time buying it, it was probably $6 per chop

I think one of the principles of the show, for better or worse, is that you're supposed to go to the website for the details on any recipe. I'm pretty sure she used ground up fennel seed, not pollen to coat the chops. My one attempt at long term brining of pork ended up giving it a hammy flavor, not surprising since I guess it was partially cured.

Born in Liverpool, grew up in Australia.

Right. I thought this was pretty funny since it didn't look like they were cooked with her secret technique of pressing the pan on top since they were still pink. The pan was just lying by the side of the grill. The show is much improved. it would have been nice to see her suggest some alternatives to morels, Meyer lemons and favas since these can be expensive and are pretty seasonal.

To cut down on the oil, I've made similar versions by taking the sliced eggplant and putting the slices on a silpat lined baking sheet, drizzling them with olive oil and baking in a 400 degree oven for 20-30 minutes. I then proceed with the layering and baking as in the above recipes. I've also experimented with adding layers of thinly sliced cooked mushrooms and Italian sausage, which also works well.

The sponge looks like a genoise or something similar divided into three portions, two are colored and you then spread in a pan in sections to create the color pattern. The outside raised brown pattern looks like a special pan was used. Not sure what more to add without more specific questions.

I want to like this show and in episode 2 I thought the tics were less noticeable (or annoying), but: She gave no idea how long to cook this lamb. She said put it in the oven for 20 minutes at 425. OK, then what? Did she flip it after 20 minutes or was the total cooking time 20 minutes? She never said. She never gave any idea how to bake the crisp as to time and temp The only restaurant "secret" I guess I got out of this episode was not to throw out the lamb bones. This show seems less about cooking than attitude.

I just bought this book and made the Struan bread last weekend and it turned out awful. Fine rise and texture, but something was off in the flavor and it was way too salty for my taste. I'm putting down the off flavor to my use of soymilk, which I have never used in bread. I will probably try another recipe this weekend.

I'm an occasional user of Fage and just went through 2 containers of 0% fat product and noticed no difference vs. the Greek sourced version. I've only ever used the plain yogurt, either 2% or 0%. It's posible the plant was having some start up problems and inconsistent product for a while.

What about the carrots? Are they consistently the same variety/source? Just a guess that maybe certain varieties, or the way they're treated causes a reaction with the ingredients.