Vadouvan
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Posts posted by Vadouvan
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For those who are wandering...
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Sup matt.
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Indeed my friend, Indeed.
Hey Philadining, what was that quote ?
"The belly by which all bellies shall be judged AKA pork creme brulee".....
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And I still contend the phrase "high end" is used at least as often as a descriptor of class and/or status as it is of quality. I found this use of the phrase in a recent novel, depicting a bar, amusing:
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...The place smelled of vomit and Lysol, something one got used to after a while, and the sweat of the old men who drank up their social security checks there in the afternoon. It was nighttime now, late night, the high-end crowd. Soon the place would be crowded with bartenders and waiters and cooks, come over after last call had been announced at more legitimate establishments.
Quoting bad authors who incorrectly use language still doesnt make your point.
Any bar that smells like vomit clearly isnt catering to a high end clientele or offering a high end experience. "A place where old men drink up thier social security checks in the afternoon"
It describes to a tee the "Pen and pencil" in Philadelphia and not the "Pegu Club" in Soho.
Just because it's in a "novel" is irrelevant and meaningless.
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A few of us had been eager to check this place out. Still might - but thanks for the heads-up anyway...
Uncle Phil, methinks we shall be dining elsewhere.
In fact I was invited to this dinner by "sean and jerry" whom I am well acquainted with.
Thankfully I declined because I am having a huge meal at RAE today.
Bigboss......when you say pork was devoid of salt and pepper, how is that possible ?
Dont you have to cure pork belly with a spice mix first a-la cafe Boulud ?
It is a bad bad bad move to steer people to a tasting menu without discussing the price especially if the final price may be way more than the people want to spend, furthermore, the fact that the restaurant owner knows you guys makes it unforgiveably egregious.
This statement....
"The owner’s wife greets us and says they’d like to cook for us. My understanding of this statement from years in the restaurant business is that you willfully and generously cook for your friends and/or other restaurant workers at minimal or no charge as a professional courtesy."
is absolutely correct.
So what happened is they took advantage of your freindship and basically took you to the cleaners, lame lame lame.
I am sure "sean and jerry" are pissed since they took a bus down to philly from NY to spend $90 to eat lame food in south philly when they could have stayed home and had dinner at Jean-Georges for the same price.
Hey Murkury, lets hear your side of the story.......tee hee.....
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Cantu's food was riddled with gimmickry and just ridiculous.
Printed sushi, burning sugar with lasers.
It was intersting to watch but killed any desire to eat at Moto.
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This thread is getting very odd. It seems that some people are somehow offended by the suggestion that there might exist beef in particular (has it simply been conceded that the fish offerings around here are pretty lousy?) of a level substantially better than what is available around here. The suggestion is that anyone who might from time to time prefer something better, and, yes, more expensive (even significantly) than what is available here must be simply be deluding himself into believing that it's better, or buying merely for status... (The last suggestion being particularly amusing; after all, when you're eating a steak for dinner in the privacy of your home, so many people are watching you, observing the brand steak that you purchased with jealousy. Sorry, the buying for "status" explanation isn't even remotely psychologically plausible when it comes to purchasing beef to be consumed at home for dinner.)
Agreed.
Welcome to Philadelphia, did you not know that when you find anything better outside the city, the wagons start circling and dont even dare mention the words New York.
The "are you secure enough to spend less" is ridiculous.
Most people debating the issue havent even tasted the product.
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High-end isnt a marketers nomenclature, "UPSCALE" is.
Reverse "snootiness" is just as pointless because it involves cynicism.
"High-end" is used in the context of the best or among the best, in this case quality.
Quality has a correlation to taste and your definition is far too narrow.
Mercedes Benz makes "High-end" cars which are clearly better than Toyotas for quantifiable reasons as opposed to "how much money you can get for them"
It only makes sense if we sublimate everything to it's basic terms.
Two Cars that get you where you are going.
Two steaks that fill you up when you are hungry.
THAT certainly is not what gastronomy is about.
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So why is everyone having a go at Gordon?
Is it because he is an english chef having a go in New York?
Is it because critics are using him as a way to make a name for themselves?
Is it because the American public believe he is just a celebrity chef because of Hells Kitchen ?When in fact, he has busted balls in alot of the best kitchens in England and France over the years?
Or is it because the food and service really is not that good?
Basic MBA program group dynamics and game theory ChefSimon.
Enough people repeat the same phrase, it actually becomes "fact" as opposed to another "opinion"
While there is some element of truth that the food isnt as creative and "Wow" effect as the "established New York Standards".....remember some of these people saying the werent "wowed" were "wowed" a few years ago by cubes of deep fried mayonnaise.
So it's all relative,I wouldnt take it too personally or as an affront based on the fact that he is English and/or a "celebrity chef".
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A friend is happy with the pork he's bought from Country Time Farm of Hamburg, PA but I don't know how it compares with Niman Ranch, for eg. They sell retail at the Phoenixville Market on Saturdays.
Country time is way better than Niman.
They are still small enough to care about the attention to detail.
I would usually call Paul and Ellen on monday before the slaughtering and tell them what parts I want. That is for wholesale accounts however, as a consumer, find where they sell it fresh. Great flavor and texture.
i find this double deep frying method quite intriguing. kind of the opposite of sous vide AND it has the advantage that we don't have to worry quite as much about food safety. would this work for old meat as well? vegetables that have gone off?Hey Biggiesmalls, I hope you know I was joking, deep frying twice is the opposite of ceviche...
So where would you recommend looking, V?Reading Terminal on tuesday and wednesday and have them pick the ones under the ice or put away in the walk-in.
Seafood purveyors as most retailers of perishables work on the principle of what we in the bullshit exposure industry call FIFO.
"First In, First Out"
Translation : the stuff on display aint the best cuz "last-in" is fresher.
Someone has to buy the bad fish...
Is it you ?
Fact is the more knowledgeable you appear the less retailers try to pull the cashmere over your eyes.
Smell the feesh always.
Ask if anything of better quality is in house or came in recently.
Let your nose be your guide.
Speaking of Nose.
Dibruno does actually sell decent fish but if they put it under ice instead of on top of it, it would look better. The strong odor in the store does them a dis-service because it gives the impression the fish is fishy. I think they just simply should empty out the display case every evening and restock it with new ice everyday and washing the drainage system with 2% bleach solution daily.
The fish isnt actually bad, the drainage system just need work I think.
The prices however...not so great.
RTM with wise selection is still cheaper.
I feel like with the exceptions of Claudio, talluto, esposito, dibruno,perhaps a few others... the italian market just sells off goods, especially all that produce on the street which should be used for compost.
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And why are people so surprised that the companies that run both restaurant supply and retail operations offer lower quality product to the retail customers? For starters, most consumers aren't as demanding as most professional chefs at better restaurants are; for another thing, most restaurant diners would be pretty disappointed to shell out beaucoup bucks for a grand meal out at a top-notch restaurant only to be served something no better in quality than what they would serve at home themselves. Ippolito's seafood may be less consistently high quality than what Samuels & Son sells to restaurants, but even on off days it's probably better than what's on offer at Acme. Same goes for Esposito's vis-a-vis the supermarkets.
People are suprised because pushing products you know very well is extremely poor quality/borderline unsafe to eat into other marketing channels because retail customers as a whole arent as discerning is unethical and greedy. It's one thing if you are a wholesaler to sell to restaurants and grocery stores but when you open your own retail store to sell what mainstream grocers deem below the quality they seek for thier retail customers, that is Ubershady.
The comparison analogy of food at home VS food at a restaurant does not work, Home cooking has additional issues of creativity and technical execution, this is a simple issue of quality index.
Ippolito's stuff isnt "less consistently high quality", it is "consistently poor quality" and they have far more off days than actually sell pristine seafood. I would date the fish there to 10 to 12 days old and in most case, unless you are deep frying it twice, I would look for better fish.
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Are the blue foot chickens available through D'Artagnan for a reasonable $21 for a 3.25-4 lb chicken the ones you're talking about (are they from California)?
Yes they are from a farm in California.
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We know about Browne's, they make Lobel's prices seem like KMart, the quality is good but thier retail prices amount to gouging plus the shipping charges are absurd.
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Yes the Poulet Bleu is an attempt at Bresse......
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A couple of months ago we decided to see if there was anything to the "air chilled" chicken fad, so we got a Bell & Evans air chilled chicken from Whole Foods and roasted it as usual. There was absolutely no comparison with the Eberly birds we were used to. The texture was actually pretty good but in the taste department not satisfying at all.
Dave......air chilling is actually just a processing method that reduces water retention.
You still have to find an air chilled poulet that has been fed a good diet so it tastes good.
LBF uses Eberly's chicken.
Bell and Evans like Niman Ranch is one of those entities that started with good intentions but have gotten far too big to uphold the original mission statement.
For a truly tasty airchilled chicken, what you want are dem canadian birds.
http://www.giannonepoultry.com/
Hit me up if you need one, I buy it by the case.
The california bluefoot chickens are much tastier than the Eberly's.
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but if we all went went vegetarian, v, (no fish either) that would pretty much kill the sous vide thing
Not at all Mr president. tons of vegetables benefit from being cooked sous-vida-loca.
Peeled Chantenay carrots with green Cardamon Pods and one vanilla bean, tiny bit of grapessed oil and salt cooked SV 85C 2 hrs, cooled and caramelized with butter are about the best things I have ever tasted.
Also baby Fennel bulbs in the spring with Tarragon and elderflower syrup.
Good sheet.
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QUOTE(Vadouvan @ Jan 18 2007, 06:43 PM)
The minimum age of 95 % of the fish in reading terminal market is 6 days old, I sent samples to a lab to date the fish by bacterial growth.
Bacterial growth is necessarily bad, just depends on parts per million, remember we are eating dead animals.
Vadouvan, have you ever checked out fish from other purveyors? In particular, Ippolito.
I usually buy fish at Ippolito’s. They’re very responsive to preorders when I have a special need, say for never frozen wild fish for gravlaz. OTOH, if I query a counterman about the date of something like mussels, I get a blank response. And I must say, my experiences are mixed. One day I’ll get the most wonderful mussels, those next week? Acceptable. Shrimp? Ditto. When I can't make it there my coop carries a limited variety of fish from Ippolito/Samuels. Or I select carefully, usually only whole fish, at RTM.
Meat? as I eat so much less of it these days, I’m seriously annoyed when it doesn’t justify its sat fat! I had some really good Waygu beef from D’Angelo some time back. A couple merely acceptable standing ribs (special ordered aged prime, supposedly) from Ochs. I’ve gotten beef from them for YEARS, and I can say they’re not what they used to be. When I shop for my daily/solo cooking, I do shop Ochs or WF, depending on my route for the day. I’ve only used Giunta for beef once (shortribs), so I won’t judge them yet.
My coop carries Esposito’s meats. In the past I have shopped at 9th St. They are my very, very last resort. First, it is my impression that they do not carry the anitbiotic and hormone free meats. Second, I don’t really like their meat that much.
Mottmott
By the was I meant " Bacterial growth *isnt* neccessarily bad ".
Regarding your Ippolito's Issues, everyone has deduced that Ippolito's is the retail arm of Samuel's and Sons and Samuels and Sons is regarded as the best seafood purveyor.
Samuel's is actually the largest seafood purveyor, who the best is is open to discussion and your relationship to the salesperson and what restaurant you are.
The Samuels-Ippolito connection by conventional wisdom would seem a positive thing but in fact my personal opinion is the opposite, I suspect that lower quality product is passed on from Samuels to Ippolitos based on examining the quality of the product in both places.
Case and point:
Consider your Mussel example.
Asking the date of mussels is a question that the government has already decided consumers should know without asking. each *BAG* of Mussels shoul by law have a tag showing harvest date and source, this applies to all mollusks and bivalves I think.
Part of the reason is it makes the forensic backtracking of shellfish borne pathogens traceable to the source.
This is the specific reason you should never buy loose mussels.
Samuels doesnt sell loose mussels so they must be breaking open bags and selling them, there is no reason to do that unless you want to move aging mussels since 1lb bags of mussels(with tags) are sold to the public.
D'angelo's is overrated and isnt clean enough for the cult status it has, Esposito's restaurant arm sells better meat than it's retail store, Wells on Delaware ave probably has the best *true* dry aged meat. As for hormone free,antibiotic blah blah, it's a catch 22 because those who sell it like th fresh food farmstand in RTM freeze it which kills most of the texture plus a lot of it is in medium grade single cryovac which sucks for long term freezing cause it ruptures easily.
Isnt vegetarianism looking more attractive ?
Hell no.
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Gordy.
Opening another can of worms I see......
I heartily agree with Sandy's statement that "...the relationship between price and quality is nonlinear". Since I haven't had Lobel's, it would be presumptious of me to say it's not worth the price, but when their steaks are priced at two to three times as much as the prime dry extra-aged steaks at Harry Ochs (before shipping costs are figured) I have difficulty fathoming how Lobel's could taste two or three times better.The relationship between price and quality is linear if you addd "intergrity" (of the butcher not the meat) to the equation.
Prime dry extra aged isnt neccesarily better, in fact there are 3 grades of prime beef.
Lobel's sells (High prime) which is significantly better than Harry Ochs meat.....I have had both.
Lobels is however way more expensive.
The minimum age of 95 % of the fish in reading terminal market is 6 days old, I sent samples to a lab to date the fish by bacterial growth.
Bacterial growth is necessarily bad, just depends on parts per million, remember we are eating dead animals.
sashimi grade tunaThere is no such thing as sashimi grade tuna, it's either fresh or being sold cheaper because it's going bad. The japanese only use fresh tuna.
if you become a regular, they will hang and dry age small amounts of meat you have paid for in their refrigerator -- your riskRisky indeed, dry aging requires its own *dedicated* chamber with control of temp and more importantly humidity. Without precise humidity control, it's just old meat hanging in the refrigerator and isnt "dry aging".
The meat also picks up other odors in the refrigerator......no bueno.
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Pan I meant 75 in a manner of speaking not exactly 75.
Bryan i misunderstood, you mean in terms of trendy jumping on bandwagons like fennel pollen and cocoa nibs of past years, my point is it,s aready being used and it just follows a trend of using traditional ethnic names for basic ingredients outside the western context..........such as "Shiro Dashi" which Kinch at Manresa uses And I am certain I tasted in pumpkin soup at the first Gilt.
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Ketjap manis is the new condiment of '07.
Cmon BryanZ, you of all people should know Ketjap Manis is the same exact condiment as Indonesian Sweet Soy which has been used for the last 75 years.
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Bigboss
The Michelin Guide no longer has any credibility because not only are they hypocrites, the only people who care about it are japanese and chinese tourists seeking the western perception of refinement that is why there is a Taillevent-Robuchon restaurant in Japan.
Michelin never gave 3 stars to any restaurant in it's first review in europe but for some reason, they gave it to a whole bunch of places in Ny just to legitimize and appease the American audience by competing with Zagat which by the way is the ultimate bullshit index.
Strangely after NYC, they went to California solely because they could review French laundry.....i am not saying those places may not deserve it but creating new rules as you go vaporises any claims of structure or eveness that they claim.
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Phil.
I think you are right, I thought Morales's food was the best in Philly at the time but again it wasnt cutting edge on the scope of places like Moto/Alinea, it was a clever amalgalm of technique fusing Adria with Boulud.
Most people's issue with Salt wasnt with the cuisine or the chef, it was with the owner and the perception that he had burned bridges by being an anonymous food critic at philly mag but in fact the places he gave lukewarm reviews like susanna foo didnt really deserve much better. The same people who said the food at salt was "salty" raved about the tasteless quail at pumpkin.
At the end of the day, all these discussions mean nothing because we are not operating on equal planes of flavor perception and thus any comment about any restaurants food (unless phil, Shacke,Percy and William-jefferson-Lundstrom agree) is meaningless. That being said the conversations should continue because that is what the forum was created for.
Speaking of tasting, I have decided to go ahead with that pseudo scientific olive oil tasting in 3 weeks courtesy of Dibruno, downtown cheese and Armando Manni.
I need 7 volunteers.
PM me, you will be picked based on the answer to this question.
Which is saltier ?
bottarga or serrano ham.
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Holly if melograno or Radicchio got a liquor license tommorow, all those people waiting outside for an hour with wine bottles in hand would be dining elsewhere.
They would not be anywhere as busy.
I guess my point is if we were to devise a ratio of two reasons why people go to BYO's...
1. Absolutely stupendous food that one will wait for..........for hours without a reservation.
2. good enough (but mediocre in the bigger picture) food coupled with serious wine savings.
It is My cotention that the sucess of those restaurants is based on 2 and not 1.
just my opinion.
"James" Restaurant
in Pennsylvania: Dining
Posted · Edited by Vadouvan (log)
It looks like I have to work a little later than planned tonight so we decided to go for dinner next wednesday, I will let you know how it is .
Its a forum for honest discussion, considering how they felt decieved (thier opinion not mine) they should be able to discuss the dynamics, let's continue to reserve sanitized bullshit reviews for chowhound.