Reignking

And Eugene guessed fish sauce in the curry, and got it wrong, so something's up.

They are currently clogging up my DVR. I've been watching Made In Spain when I need a fix.

I'm finally close to finishing my initial order. When I get home, I need to see what I had bought previously. I've had them in a ziploc for a year+, and they have remained fine (no drying out).

Quickfire: no one named water! The sushi dish was uglier to look at than Hung's Smurf Village. At least that would've had some blue in it, for the other team. Huit-la-coche is the bluest thing that I could come up with, but using an ocean theme was a good idea, just boringly executed. I'm glad the episode went 75 minutes last night; I've been saying it needs to go longer, especially in the beginning. I didn't even notice until I flipped the Daily Show on and it was in the middle of it. As an aside, Tom C is in Atlanta right now, opening up Craft and Craftbar. He was doing radio interviews this morning.

Chef Lenny Robinson of Les Fleur De Lis Cafe is now at the helm of Peasant Bistro. ← I had a feeling that might be the answer; and I never made it to The Tasting Room. Richard Blais' FLIP opened last night. That's two restaurants I'll need to be trying after work, now...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitchen_nightmares Lela's Pomona, California Nov. 21, 2007 An epilogue noted the restaurant closed five months after taping was completed when the owner could not meet her debts. 20 episodes, 3-4 failures.

I just received this email: As you may have been aware, we recently closed our Sandy Springs location due to conditions that were out of our control. We are thrilled to announce that we have resolved these issues and that effective today, Thursday, December 4th, our Sandy Springs location has re-opened!

Ironically, I realized that I used way too much salt (although still proportionally correct with the sugar) in the cure I'm doing right now. I checked it this morning -- 36 hours -- and it still needed more time. I'll go the 48 hours; I'm hoping that Ruhlman is correct that time is more important than quantity. I've accidentally gone too long before, and the result was too salty.

Thanks for the reminder about the boneheaded move Jeff made. That was incredibly dumb. What a di lido head (chef).

Last week's loser blog on Bravo's web site (can't find it now, as it has been replaced by this week's loser's blog).

I misread it, too. My first post started this topic off, when I caught this Today Show one morning; in it, Jeff's roll had sumac. I can't recall that being mentioned once last night. This show really needs to be 90 minutes. There is too much being edited out. For example, last week's loser Richard actually made a good dish (sweet potatoes) but that was never shown so that we would think he was a total buffoon and deserved to go. On the contrary, he expected the guy who couldn't roast potatoes to leave because he didn't do one thing right.

I started some new gravlax last night, and the book reminded me that it isn't the amount of salt that's important, but the time in which the fish is cured. So, you could cut corners by limiting the amount of salt.

I've been a slave to Foodman's Pastrami-spiced graxlax, but in the spirit of using leftovers from Thanksgiving, chrisamirault's usage of pine and my wanting to experiment and be a bit more seasonal, I am going to try something different for a small party Friday night. My thoughts are cloves & nutmeg (I nixed cinnamon), along with leftover herbs of thyme, rosemary, and parsley. Since I don't have a smoker, but I have some wood chips in the back of the closet, I may include those to see if they impart any flavor, along with a splash of vanilla-infused bourbon.

I thought the soup challenge was great, but there was no reason to trick them 10 minutes in. As for having to use microwaves...eh. It's a show, and they have to force them to become creative to see if they can work around these limitations. Otherwise, they would probably produce things they've done a million times, instead of taking a risk.

I made cranberry sauce for the first time last week, and I was successful in letting it gel in the "normal" cranberry sauce can. If I hadn't told people, they wouldn't have known the difference until they tasted it. It wasn't bouncy, but it gelled well enough to fool people. I used this recipe.

After seeing the Hot Brown Throwdown with Bobby Flay earlier this year, and wanting one for a while, I made them Friday morning -- they were a huge hit. Quite easy, too; fry some bacon up while making a mornay sauce, slice some tomato, and toast the bread before putting it all together.

I'll be making biscuits from a recipe I got from the Woodlands Inn in Summerville SC, using buttermilk, butter, cheddar and fresh thyme.

Yes, it is (Thompson's BBQ) -- quite the non-descript shopping center on Cobb Parkway, with an Olive Garden out front. I think it is really good; I always stick to the sausage, though. And the prices can't be beat, especially compared to what bbq chains like to charge for ribs. They use tomato-based sauces, and have a good Brunswick stew. They even smoke bologna, which I had never seen. Dave, I tend to skim over restaurants I'm not familiar with -- or I would've seen the O4W explanation!

O4W? Famous Dave's BBQ, with 3 locations in Atlanta, is leaving town. I think that may be the 3rd BBQ chain in the last year to leave; one other was Smokey Bones, and I can't recall the third. I'd rather patronize the local guys at half the price, anyway.

Yeah, they could've eliminated Jill for that disgusting hot dog she made. I think it was wrapped in rice paper and lettuce?

I can't even recall if they have had foreign chefs before. It isn't as if they said "You know, we finally got a female winner last year, so now we need to fill the foreign quota."

I've got a simple question. I bought some fresh cranberries yesterday (for cranberry-infused vodka) and was surprised to see that the cranberries aren't juicy. When I squeezed it, it broke apart to show me some white flesh, and no juice. Are cranberries not juicy (like a raspberry or blueberry)?

Maybe Robert Irvine could "return"

Too funny: ",South Carolina Last Spotted: 2008-10-08 18:15:35 Spotted by Hamburglar" Chomp!

The Cook's Warehouse in Atlanta will be having a book signing: Midtown 11/17/2008 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM FREE