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You guys made me hungry! So i went CoCo ichibanya curry house

@Susanwusan from Sonoko's book. I also found a video of her making the curry brick for you

Everything contributes to the whole, star anise would especially be missed. That being said just leave them out they are both not easy to substitute for. Hopefully you'll still have that Japanese taste!

Highly recommend using the S&B if you can find it. Japanese curry spice mix has a particular taste that's not similar to Indian! Shouldn't be to hard to source!

I've made the recipe from her book and really like it!

Both are fun to browse as well!

If you ever make it up north both K&L Hollywood and Wine House in west LA have both Green and Yellow

Really great pictures!

Would tallow work in place of oil in making chili crisp? I imagine it would work for popovers. I believe there are a few recipes in Calum Franklin's excellent book The Pie Room that use tallow, I'll have to double check when I get home

I like dried mint in Mexican meatballs, recipes often call for fresh but good quality dried works well / better imo

I would personally cut the Coppa from the pork butt for a pork roast but since the butt is out maybe a heritage breed pork loin might be less lean and still give you that 1 muscle you are looking for. I hope you get a better answer, can't think of anything that matches exactly.

Yes, absolutly

I think the solids that are missing might be the hazelnuts. That looks like a white chocolate version of Nutella or am I reading that label wrong?

I'm not a pastry chef but my first thought would be to use glucose instead of the rich sugar syrup and that might help with the emulsification. Another option might be to add some letcithin as the emulsifier. Good Luck!

I think you wouldn't be surprised to find out most large American butter producers don't like to do it because it slows things down unlike adding a couple % extra butterfat for a 'European' butter which is pretty trivial. Vermont Creamery started doing it the slow way back in 1998 so they didn't have to change anything. Thankfully cultured butter isn't as hard to find as it used to be! https://www.vermontcreamery.com/collections/cultured-butter 86% Vermont Creamery butter (I used to see it retailed more but now it seems to be going more to restaurants) I can get it locally at Farmshop, if I ask because they use it in the bakery. https://www.murrayscheese.com/dp/vermont-creamery-lightly-salted-chef-roll

For me anytime I'm going to / want to really taste the butter I try to get a good cultured butter, around here Frentel is the best flavor / price before you start to get diminishing returns. Extra fat helps when you are doing anything rolled out from pie dough to croissants. I like good French butter in Chocolate chip cookies and Brioche not necessarily for the extra fat but for the better butter flavor. Vermont Creamery is a good one as well especially if you can get the 86% 1 lb butter roll. If you switch to solid fat like lard depending on the recipe you might want to add 18-20% of the butter weight in water so you don't throw off the hydration of the recipe.

when in doubt, temp it i don't bake cakes enough to tell you the temp to look for but someone here might have a guesstimate

Nothing says it's time to grill like Manu Chau on the speaker! I love Jazz to to lean towards the young lions coming up, especially Kamasi Washington as well as his side project 'Dinner Party'. Most of the members of the informal collective that he belongs to (West Coast Get Down) came up in Los Angeles HS Jazz programs are pretty fantastic. Also Thundercat & Flying Lotus (related to Alice Coletrain btw). Tons of Rock en Espanol as well

I always assume baking is with out a fan unless it is specified

I don't think cake flour has corn starch in it but when you replace it it is typical to replace some of the flour with cornstarch to reduce the protein content as an example: https://www.thekitchn.com/the-easy-way-to-make-cake-flour-substitute-baking-tips-from-the-kitchn-44521#

Yes that is correct. You'll find the silk give you way more flavor than the cobs do but yes I use it all not to be wasteful.

I find using the corn silk as well makes the best stock

I have an Italian Acacia honey from Italy, that might fit the bill mild but flavorful. I've had some great Tupelo honey from the Savannah Bee Company, they tend to be on the pricey side but their honey is consistently excellent.

just very aromatic, I don't recall the price just that is wasn't enough to make me wince lol

Wait until you try the bay leaf! I have the Sicilian brand (I've mentioned it before elsewhere) it's pretty amazing. I've always disliked dried oregano but you are right this really tastes much better than any other I've tried as well