David Ross

My friends down there, both in the business and food writers, are moving more and more to praising the restaurants off the strip away from the big casinos. They've seen more chefs leave positions at those places to open their own restaurants and it appears to be working really well. And I've also been told that Eater Las Vegas isn't very reliable as it's often written by folks living in the Midwest. So having said that, Sparrow + Wolf is a good restaurant run by Brian Howard who was on the strip formerly. And a new French restaurant, Partage. Probably not cheap but sure less than on the strip. My great friend, John Curtas, has spent years and years writing about Las Vegas and the food and dining scene. He recently brought back his eatinglv.com after a brief hiatus, and his current piece is "Downtown's Hidden Hispanic Gems." He's also an expert on the Asian restaurants which are experiencing more growth in Chinatown on Spring Mountain Road. John has kept his restaurant archive to go through, which has current and older reviews. You can check his Facebook page for other local food info. Lotus of Siam, the well-known Thai restaurant has moved to a new location and consistently has great food. I've had wonderful dishes there. And the local newspaper, the Review-Journal, has two food writers, Heidi and Al, who still focus on local dining in all price ranges. Whenever and wherever you go down there it's a great dining city.

For some reason I've gotten on this tart in a shortbread crust craze recently. This is a peach tart made with peaches some friends picked for me. It's a u-pick orchard and they didn't remember exactly the variety of peaches they picked, but there were red peaches and some small white ones in the mix. The topping is simply just some of the shortbread dough crumbled over the top. I took it to a dinner club last night that meets once a month. No peach tart leftovers so I guess they liked it.

Well this one is ironic. The first dish I did last night, a Grilled Halibut with Red Chile Sauce and a "Green" rice using some of the fire-roasted Hatch chiles I got last weekend. And when I went to look in my archives at eGullet to see if I had posted about the Red Chile Sauce before, I found another dish from the dinner thread back in 2014..... Red Chile Sauce, September 2018- Tenderloin with Red Chile Sauce, Mashed Potato and Roasted Poblano & Corn Salad- And I hope after all these years, the food photography skills have shown a little improvement.....

The annual Pear Brown Betty. This year made with D'Anjou pears and baked in individual dishes. It's based on a recipe that dates back to Colonial times. And while it's very simple, it's just about the best sweet I make this time of year. Diced pears are mixed with brown sugar and a little bit of cinnamon and nutmeg. Then fresh white breadcrumbs made from basic Wonder bread, then tossed with melted butter.

Since we really don't have any good Chinses restaurants in our area, I just make what I've got a taste for at home. Last night I made Chinese BBQ Pork Lo Mein to satisfy a craving for Chinese-American. But then I always make something that my family and friends would say is "adventurous" and probably not even try it thinking that bottled, pickled lettuce with a Chinese label is something that would make them ill. Their loss.

I'm trying some new huckleberry dishes this season, but nothing really unique. We don't mess with the natural beauty of the wild huckleberry up here. There are some reports that that the reason we're seeing bears coming into the towns in North Idaho and north of Spokane are because it's not an overly abundant crop this year. That's true to some degree since it's one of their biggest sources of food right now. Doesn't matter a lot to me since I don't venture up into the woods to pick them and face having to fend off bears. I go to the same family stall at the Farmer's Market every year and I let them bother with the bears up around Priest Lake. Well enough storytelling, this is a huckleberry tart, ice cream and compote. I didn't have luck with a pastry crust base because I rolled it to thin and the weight of the berries made the poor little thing fall apart. Not to worry I just made more with a shortbread crust. A little thick I suppose but you can never beat the flavor of fresh wild huckleberries.

Yes actually I'd love to have it. I've never made apple butter and it will be something new to try this season.

The Envy was brought over from New Zealand but we have only seen it in markets here for a few years. It's takes years to cultivate a new or different variety from stock and then go through all the process, regulation and state laws to get a number as they say for the apple. It's medium size and a good texture, not mealy or mushy yet sweet. I never ate many apples as an adult, but now, at age 60 and finding the Envy, I eat them regularly!

My favorite eating apple is the Envy. Sometimes hard to find even here in Apple country and a little higher in price than say a red delicious. The golden delicious seems to be the best apple for my Tarte Tatin

The "Rave" is one of our newer apple varities in Washington, It's also the first apple of our season, just now starting to show up in the local markets. These apples come from Stemilt Farms in Wenatchee, the main apple growing region in Washington. They were created by cross of the Honeycrisp and the MonArk from Arkansas. They have a good texture and are what I'd describe as sweet yet pretty tart. Not my type of eating apple but I think would go well in any baked apple dish.

Looks like the perfect batter coating, nice and crisp and not too heavy.

Thanks. These happen to be the "extra-small" Yaquina Bay Oysters from the Oregon Coast. I prefer the "petites" but they are hard to come by. I also like the little Kumamoto's from Puget Sound. I only fry them for maybe 2 minutes, just long enough to turn golden and set the crispy crust. The interior is still moist and juicy.

I've had a craving for some fried oysters for a few weeks, so last night I tried a new recipe for the coating. I never batter oysters before frying, but sometimes a dip in egg wash and then a dry coating. It's the dry coating I usually change up. This time the wet mix was evaporated milk, egg and salt, pepper and tabasco. The evaporated milk helps thin the egg and I think added a little flavor. Then the dry mix was cake flour and yellow cornmeal. I've never used cake flour but it gave a delicate yet crispy texture to the fried oysters. I had some Roasted Potato Caesar Salad left over so that's the side dish, and at the base of the oysters homemade mayonnaise. We've been making some delicious summer salads at our Cook-Off here: https://forums.egullet.org/topic/157028-eg-cook-off-79-resurrecting-and-rethinking-summer-salads-summer-food’s-unpopular-kid/?page=2&tab=comments#comment-2166578

Well yesterday the plan was to make my summer version of a potato salad. I've been making this potato salad for about 15 years. I created it by accident really when some some friends were planning a big summer outdoor party. I remember thinking potato salad but how could I do it different? It's just small potatoes, red, fingerling or baby Yukon golds that I boil until tender and chill. Then I make homemade mayonnaise using a Greek olive oil because it has a peppery flavor and is more fragrant than other olive oils and the mayonnaise has this vibrant yellow color. Then in goes some diced red pepper, Kalamata or other good olive, (sometimes I use little French nicoise olives or dry-cured black olives), chives or green onions, capers and little haricot vert green beans. We don't usually see fresh haricot vert in the markets so the frozen ones work pretty well. But then I started thinking, what about using those little baby Yukon Golds that I roasted under a chicken the night before? I know, it doesn't sound right to roast a chicken in the oven when it's 103 outside, but I was craving roast chicken and potatoes. I had a lot of roasted potatoes left over and they had roasted in all those delicious chicken juices and fat. And instead of making homemade mayonnaise, (or using bottled mayonnaise), I thought I might try the leftover Caesar Salad dressing from the Grilled Caesar I did a few days back. Oh and some of the oregano I have growing out of control in a planter on the back porch. So to be trendy I'll call it a Roast Potato Summer Salad. Much different from the traditional potato salad but a delicious alternative.

I get mine from our local DeLeon foods, a combination grocery and café. And by the way the most authentic Mexican food in our region. These are photos from last year's chile roast

The annual Hatch chile roast up here is next weekend. I go every year, but last year bought a bag of the "mild" roasted chilies and they were anything but. I better taste them first this year. It's quite the scene seeing them hoist up box after box and dump them into the rotating fryer. It sort of looks like a big round bingo ball drum. The aroma is fantastic.

It's hard to say which Robuchon you've tasted in one of his restaurants is your favorite. Yes, the potato dish is every bit as sumptuous as you would imagine, but the one that first came to mind when I heard of his passing is this langoustine dish served at L'Atelier at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. I've had it a few times on different occasions with different chefs in the kitchen just a few feet from the counter and it's always been consistently excellent. It's fried with basil and a small swish of pesto.

I have a classic edition dated 1984 that's tattered and the cover and dust jacket are long gone. But I refer to it often as I love not only the feel of a hard cover book and looking at the photos, but I don't find the same reference in online sources. For example, a specific classic ingredient or technique. It was a gift from some folks I worked with many years ago in a business unrelated to food and cooking but they new it was my passion.

So sad but he leaves a legacy that will last forever. I'm fortunate to have met Chef Robuchon twice while attending food events in Las Vegas and I was able to personally have him sign two of his cookbooks for me. I've posted the photos here before. He was very gracious and quite pleased that I would actually travel so far to have him sign these cookbooks, especially "Simply French" with Patricia Wells. It was really the first cookbook that introduced American Chefs and home cooks to his legendary potato dish.

This one had 3 slices and I used butter lettuce and roma tomatoes. I break the bacon slices in half to fit them into the sandwich. I used bottled mayonnaise but if I have homemade on hand it's far better.

Thanks. I slice the tomato really thin and I've found a good 12-grain bread that I prefer. Any bacon will do, but I have a brand that does Applewood smoked so that's my preference on this sandwich.

We've been creating some delicious summer salads in our Cook-Off, https://forums.egullet.org/topic/157028-eg-cook-off-79-resurrecting-and-rethinking-summer-salads-summer-food’s-unpopular-kid/?page=2&tab=comments#comment-2165615. On Friday I did a Grilled Caesar Salad, but had plenty of dressing left over so on Saturday I made my Classic Caesar. But due to my horrible laziness, I didn't want to spend time cutting the bread into cubes to make homemade croutons. So I just tore into the bread and voila, a new type of crouton, (at least for me), and one that has a much better texture. Grilled Caesar- Classic Caesar-

I never liked a BLT sandwich when I was a kid. I think I could take each element separately, but for some reason I didn't like mayo, tomato and lettuce on the same sandwich. But with many foods I refused as a kid, my palate has either paled or is more enhanced with age. In any case, now I make a BLT for breakfast about once a week.

I've been going to the same family farm stand at our local Farmer's Market for years to buy my wild huckleberries. This is the first of the seasons harvest. They ripened early due to our hot weather the past two weeks, but the family tells me they hope we'll see huckleberries into the first week of September. The 83 year-old Grandfather of the family picks them in the mountains around Priest Lake in Northern Idaho, about a 90 minute drive from Spokane. They are average size right now but possess they unmistakable tart yet sweet flavor and a perfume that I've never been able to describe very well. $48 per gallon bag is a good price right now. They typically sell for at least $50 per gallon and in the past 10 years I've seen them as high as $65 per gallon. I've got some professional Chef friends in other states who would gladly pay well over $100 per gallon if they could find someone to ship them fresh huckleberries. These were picked yesterday and only hold up in the fridge for about 3 days so they don't travel far distances very well. But they do freeze well and hold their flavor. Just not the flavor of a fresh wild huckleberry pie.....

I've been making my version of Caesar salad for years, but it was only yesterday that I decided to grill the romaine and make it a true "summer" salad. I've grilled lettuce before, just never dressed with my traditional take on Caesar salad. I make homemade croutons starting with whatever loaf of bread looks good in the bakery. I try a softer loaf like French or Italian and cut big size croutons. The ones in a bag are too puny. After I cut the croutons I put them in the oven to dry out and start to crisp. I like a softer bread for croutons because they soak up the copious amounts of melted butter and garlic olive oil that I drench them with before baking them a second time in the oven to crisp them. The dressing is: 1 1/2 cups garlic olive oil, (just olive oil to which I add many cloves of grated garlic) 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice 1 2oz. can flat anchovies, chopped, (and add the oil in the can to the dressing) 1 tbsp. Dijon mustard, (I used to use dry mustard, but the Dijon has much more flavor) 2 tbsp. Worcestershire (a LOT of Worcestershire) 2 tsp. chopped capers 1 coddled egg (I take risks with eggs, coddling it just barely sets the white) Fresh oregano Fresh chives Salt and plenty of cracked black pepper When I make a regular Caesar I use both romaine and butter lettuce. This time just romaine, cut in half, brushed with olive oil and grilled about 3 minutes to get a bit of char and smokey flavor. I've started to thinly shave the cheese because I think it's a more delicate texture than grated cheese and blends better into the dressing. I used parmesan this time, but prefer the stronger tang of Asiago.