paulraphael

In other news, I've been looking into the use of trimoline in ice creams, and am finding it in sorbets, presumeably for its ability to prevent sugar crystalization, and also possibly for other effects on texture (glucose syrup can add body; trimoline probably does the same). Some recipes use sugar in three forms: sucrose as the main sweetener, trimoline for its effects on texture, and glucose to keep the sweetness under control while keeping the level of solids high enough. Michael Laiskonis says he uses trimoline for up to 10% of the total sugar. It's possible that using more causes textural problems like gumminess.

Since WS is so maddeningly expensive, I use gift certificates to buy things I can't get elsewhere (I really like their microfiber dish towels), olive oils (if they have them open to sample), or things that might break (WS offers an endless warranty).

That's certainly interesting. I bet it's going to attract a lot of attention, primarily because almost all previous studies find weight gain or loss to be identical in calorie-controlled trials of anything. PubMed does list a couple of other studies that suggest some weird weight gain potential from fructose itself ... which implicates honey and fruit juice alongside soda. At any rate, there are bound to be a bunch of followup studies and attempts to duplicate these results, so I'll keep my eyes out. It's important to note that these rats were fed diets where sugar syrups made up a high percentage of their daily calories. A very different circumstance from eating the ocassional dessert with a few grams corn syrup.

The color of a pan used on the stovetop doesn't actually effect the browning of the food. Raw cast iron browns more efficiently because there's no enamel layer slowing heat conduction. Browning effectiveness is determined by the heat capacity of the pan (very high in a heavy slab of iron) and the the conductivity of the material (medium low for cast iron, lower for enameled cast iron). In the oven, pan color increases the absorbtion of ratiant heat, so you will get more browning ... but it's the color of the outside of the pan, not the inside, that matters. This is why dark, nonstick sheet pans tend to overbrown cookies on the bottom, and why polished aluminum tends to underbrown them.

Interesting. Suggests my paranoia isn't completely misplaced. For whatever it's worth, I haven't had any cracks from doing it slowly on the stovetop.

Raw cast iron is better, but enameled is good enough. The difference is that enamel is an insulator, so a comparably hot enameled pan will brown the meat a bit more slowly. In practice I don't find it to be a big deal ... you won't notice any difference in the final dish. One thing I do, more out of paranoya than anything else: when preheating an enameled pan to searing temps, I go slowly. Get it hot on a lowish flame for a while, then turn the heat all the way up and give it a few minutes to preheat. Considering that cast iron is only a moderately good conductor, and that enamel is brittle, I'm afraid of cracking the enamel from fast, uneven heating.

Seems like every big suburban supermarket has a deep freeze full of the stuff. Here Google only reveals a few industrial places that sell it in bulk. Anyone know of a grocery or sea food retailer that will sell a few pounds?

I think I figured out the solution, and it will be genuine carbonation. Easier than the fake variety and easier than I thought.

This is because the goal in baking is generally not to have the most radiant heat absorption possible, but the amount that gives a similar level of browning on the parts of the food in contact with the pan and the parts in contact with the air. Dark colored pans will brown faster than the air; you'll have bread or cakes that are darker on the sides and bottom than on the top. Brightly polished metal will brown more slowly than the air; you'll see the opposite result. Light but unpolished metal (which describes most professional bakeware) generally comes closest to even browning. Insulating the sides of cake pans is for the purpose of a flatter top, as you suggested. It will also give you less browning on the sides, but presumeably no one cares much, if the cake will be frosted. I've found dark (black steel) pans to give the best results with tarts; in this case crisping the bottom without overcooking the top can be a challenge.

Maybe I need dinner guests with more interesting saliva. I did find one reference to someone doing what I'm trying to do, but it involves liquid C02. Seems like a more reasonable project in a commercial environment (my brief flirtation with LN2 ice cream at home turned into a spectacular waste of time and ebay resources).

I forgot about that place, thanks. something like this looks promising. I think I want to go with glass instead of plastic; I find that fine powders often stick to the sides of my plastic containers. Maybe because of static. For labels maybe one of those label makers, or else graphic arts tape and a sharpie (and my serial killer handwriting).

Those look cool but I need much smaller ones. I don't stuck that kind of quantity of any of that stuff (and if I did, I'd have a different storage problem altogether).

They make small ones? Are they clear and airtight?

Lately, many of us have experienced a multiplication of white powders in the pantry ... xanthan gum, locust bean gum, pectin, agar, dextrose, tapioca maltodextrin, isomalt, other refined starches, sugars, enzymes ... You gotta put them somewhere. Mine are mostly in plastic bags sitting in a darkroom tray on a pantry shelf. I'm wondering if anyone's come up with a better solution. Legible labels are key ... most of these things are practically indestinguishable from each other.

I should have added that it's going to be wet to begin with, so something besides moisture needs to release the gas.

Any thoughts on a chemical that would make bubbles on contact with saliva? I'm trying to figure out how to make something seem carbonated when it can't be. Already investigated pop rocks ... aparently they have C02 embedded in small bubbles in the candy grains ... not something that will work for me.

Seems to depend on the oven. Commercial convection ovens work fine with very little space around the pans; my home oven (conventional) needs a lot of space or heat is uneven and hard to predict. Some of this is because of impaired air circulation, and some is about keeping food away from hot spots near the oven walls

Your stock should be fine ... what matters is how concentrated the gelatin is in the final dish you prepare with it. You just need to make sure that your final sauce isn't over-reduced. Check by sponing a bit of your final sauce or jus onto a room temperature plate. Check the consistency after a few seconds. If it's gluey, you've gone too far and need to cut it with liquid and maybe also fat.

Veal bones contribute more gelatin, and a more neutral flavor. The flavor of veal sits in the background more than the more assertive flavor of beef. If you can't get veal bones, there are some alternatives that can be good even if not identical. You can use beef bones without much meat on them, and get additional gelatin from fairly neutral sources like pig's feet, chicken feet, chicken or turkey wings, or even packaged gelatin.

Saltshaker.net maintains a pretty exhaustive list. Some are just listed under "New York City" ... you might have to contact the individual supper clubs to find out exactly where.

The stick blender is fine most of the time, but some extra virgin olive oils (especially very flavorful, unrefined ones) can turn bitter when overworked. If you're using one of these, you want to avoid the machines. Whether you're using a machine or not, it's probably a good idea to combine the water-based ingredients and the emulsifying ingredients before adding the oil. You want to make sure you end up with an oil-in-water emulsion and not the reverse. Aioli and mayo should be creamy, not greasy.

Yes, precise, although one thing I like about Laiskonis' esthetic is the mix of precision and imprecision ... something I didn't get when I fist started assembling things. He'll plate a dessert with a mix of perfectly geometric shapes and chaotic, organic ones. Some of the deliberate imprecision takes the form of saucing and garnishing (sauce may be applied perfectly, even with a template, but crumbled nuts will just get tossed in a heap). And sometimes it will take the form of a specific element, like the sponge cake he makes in a cup in the microwave; he tears off amorphous, sea-creature looking blobs and uses them like a tuile on top of a geometric arrangement.

Whose results? Whenever i've seen fish filleted by someone with good deba skills, the cut flesh is as smooth as glass. I've never seen similar results with western technique. Maybe it's possible, but not common. You certainly don't see examples of it in that how-to-fillet fish website.

The "don't cut a silpat" rule seems like corporate paranoya. My silpats are a full sheet pad cut in half. I've seen this approach in commercial kitchens too. I'm surprised to hear about all the cleaning and discoloration problems. I wouldn't a silpat for anything besides tuiles, chocolate work, etc.. Mine rarely even see the oven. Parchment works so much better for baked goods (the silpat is too strong an insulator). For roasting ... why would you bother? It's a lot easier to clean a sheet pan than a greasy silpat.

Picture quality isn't great, but here you can can a sense of the fundamental difference between the European and Japanese techniques. Final sea bream fillets from filleting-fish.com: And final sea bream fillets from Ittasan 18: Ittasan is definitely slowing things down a lot for the camera. Nevertheless, someone with similar skills will be faster with a western fillet knife. It's just a faster technique. Which is why Western techniques (or similar ones) are ubiquitous in high volume places like fish butcheries. Even in places like the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo. But the results are never as clean. Is this important? For fish eaten raw, very much so. For lightly cooked fish, it makes a difference. Chefs debate if it makes any difference when fish is fully cooked.