paulraphael

I got they bags and they look great. Don't anticipate any durability problems. But they're coarser than I'd been led to believe. The 250 micron bag is barely finer than my chinois (it filters out some additional stuff but doesn't visibly improve clarity). The 100 micron bag provides some clarification but not a lot. I've ordered a 50 micron bag to try out. $13 for a pair, free shipping. Very good ebay seller ... I'll be able to try them all the way down to 1 micron for about the price of one authentic superbag. By the way, I'm most impressed by how easy they are to clean. I was worried that this would be a major catch. I find it easier than cleaning a chinois, since the fabric is much thinner and less textured than the mesh on the metal strainers.

Post mortems, anyone? Hits: -Great big free range turkey from Bo Bo farms in New York, poached and roasted -Madeira sauce made with duck coulis -Stuffing made from mixed wild mushrooms browned in duck fat, ground duck leg, toasted almonds, dried cherries -Apple tart with many layers of thinly sliced apples and cardamom, cognac vanilla ice cream Misses: -sunchoke and fennel puree. I meant to puree celeriac, but couldn't find any at the last minute. Guests liked this; I thought it tasted like burned milk. Maybe I don't like sunchokes?

I'm going to banish the duck press from my kitchen, because how can I trust people not to use it for cracking quail's eggs or filleting hamachi?

Trying to keep it down to earth this year. I've delegated a couple of dishes so there will be time to sleep in and screw off on the internet (like now!) -crudite (someone else will make!) -roasted butternut squash and garlic soup -poached and roasted turkey (a free range, half-heritage bird from bo bo) -stuffing with duck, wild mushrooms, almonds, and dried cherries -madeira sauce made with duck coulis -celeriac and sunchoke purée -a green vegetable (someone else will make!) -apple "mille feuille" tart with cardamom -cognac vanilla ice cream -mystery dessert (someone else will make!)

If you're shopping for a chef's knife, especially one with a thin profile that will wedge less in hard veggies, check out the Togiharu knives from Korin. This is a house brand, not available elsewhere. In the entry level line in that link, you can get a gyuto in the $60 to $90 range that will outperform anything by Shun or Global. The steel is very good and the blade geometry is much thinner than anything offered by those other companies. It's also easy to sharpen compared with some other knives.Their higher end lines offer similar geometry, but in steels that have better edge retention. (that descriptiption suggests the blades are carbon stell, but they're a stainless alloy) Korin's having a holiday sale right now. If you live in or near NYC, stop in for a drool fest.

Why, what's the superbag made of? The industrial filters come in quite a few materials. One of type I bought is nylon, the other is polysester. Both are monofilament. Polypropylene is also available. I assumed the superbag would be one of these materials. If the ones I got turn out to have a short lifespan, they'll at least let me test the concept for cheap.

Forget OXO ... get a Japanese Benriner cutter. Under $50, often under $30, and they will outperform anything else on the market, by a lot. Only caveat is that they're less adjustable than the expensive euro models. I think there are a few different models available; maybe someone who's used a few can offer pointers.

Well, there's a line of un-clearness that you never want to cross. It leads to a greasy, muddy mouthfeel. This happens when very small protein particles get bound up with emulsified fats. You may be able to fix it with some kind of filtration (gelatin, agar, something physical that's finer than a chinois) but I don't know if the result will be ideal. I agree that anything below that level is just about esthetics, and may not matter. However, I'm never making stock for a single purpose. I make a pile of for many uses. I'm happier if it looks good enough for the uses that highlight it.

That's exactly what I was talking about. Copying dishes is lame. I don't even like to do it at home! But there are only a handful of chefs in the world who are putting menus together based even largely on techniques they've invented. And, of course, what they're doing is exciting, so a lot of people copy them, even when their ultimate goal is to be the same kind of pioneer. What I think has given molecular gastronomy a bad name (besides the bad name) is people copying techniques without understanding the vision behind them ... they take the superficial aspects of someone's cuisine but are unable to justify to their diners and critics why they've done so. They're all about surface, not substance.

Someone clever at the Cooking Issues website suggested that the superbag might actually be a repackaged (and marked up) industrial filter. I did some searches and found similar filter bags all over the place; I ended up scoring a pair of 100 micron bags and a pair of 250 micron bags on ebay for a total of $27, shipped. No way of knowing if these are as good as the haute cuisine variety, but it seemed like a good way to dip my big toes and test the concept. I'll let you know how it goes. And ... to answer my own question, the Superbag people say that 400 microns is just a bit finer than a standard chinois. So 250 microns is for significantly finer filtration, and 100 microns is for clarification.

This is about the right amount of bubbling: bloop ... bloop ... bloop ... the bottom end of what you might call a simmer. it's hard to take the temp of stock, because the gradient between the bottom and the top of a big pot can easily be 30 degrees or more.

you'd have to find a way to control all the other variables for this experiment to show anything.

I don't think that's in McGee. High temps bring the meat up to temperature faster (of course). And high temps above the boiling point cause more evaporative moisture loss (not relevent in steaming or in traditional confit). But as far as how much the muscle fibers contract, I doubt you'll see real differences between meat that's brought up to X temperature in 20 minutes vs. 20 hours. There will be other major differences ... like how much collagen is broken down, and various kinds of enzyme activity. But that's not the same thing.

A friend who's been a waitress for years (including a long stint as a cocktail waitress at a hotel bar that adds gratuity for everyone) has always been under the impression that the added tip is NOT obligatory. The customer still has the discretion to pay less (or more). Paying nothing without having said anythin, strikes me as a major breech of etiquette ... but so does calling the cops on customers who are already pissed, for a charge that may not even be enforceable.

What theory is that? It's a new one on me. I've never heard that muscles contract more or lose more moisture when heated quickly vs. heated slowly. Their final temperature seems to determine how much they contract and dry out. I can't comment on fat absorption. No experience at all making confit.

Somewhere in the middle. I don't like bukets of insipid sauce. But I don't like dribbles of oil-paint consistency hyper-reduced sauces, either. I want intensity, an appropriate texture that's still in the realm of liquid, and enough of it to moisten every bite.

I don't necessarily think copying other people is bad, if the copying is used a point of departure. We all learn from each other, build on each other's ideas. I might phrase the suggestion, "if you're going to copy someone, make sure you actually understand what they're doing, so don't mimic the superficial stuff while missing the point."

I'm a bit skeptical. I don't think you should be able to call this process true dry aging. The bags may be moisture-permeable, but the rate of moisture transfer is going to be very, very low compared with open hanging. Kind of like the difference between wearing a gore-tex jacket and wearing nothing. Maybe should be called moist aging? Maybe this can give good or even great results, but I don't trust the "scientific" article cited on the product page .. it reads like an ad and is in a trade journal, not a scientific one.

I would drink this! It's actually a pretty common bubble tea/pearl milk tea combo at Hong Kong & Taiwanese tea houses and it's surprisingly not bad. Really? the times I've had tea out of a cup with even the slightest coffee residue, it's made me want to gag. I've always been amazed by the way the flavors fight it out.

I've been using my big darkroom trays for this, but you're right, those bus tubs are the bomb. I need to pick up a couple.

They're a lot cheaper than a halfway decent chinois ... No thoughts on the ideal mesh size for straining stock?

coffee, cream, and tea.

Adam, I'm happy to read your comments here. I've had a lot of thoughts on this topic but haven't been able to test them, since I don't actively cook in any of the styles in question, and haven't had the chance to make pilgrimages to El Buli or Alinea or any other places on the vanguard. So my critiques have been from the sidelines, and usually take the form of noticing when definitions or descriptions or arguments don't make any sense. Your argument makes a lot of sense. So thanks again. One distinction that I think needs to be made more often: a cooking style vs. chef's larger vision. A problem I see with most of the labels (including the M word) is that it puts chefs like Adria and Achatz into much too small a box. People casually see these chefs as being about technology, tricks and spectacle. Test tubes and gadgets. This is a very superficial and limiting look at chefs who I think are about exploring and reinventing the frontiers of cooking. The gadgets are incidental; they're hardly the point. Adria invents a new style every season; Achatz evolves his steadily. Both like to retire dishes and whole techniques once they become familiar. So in this sense, both chefs are working against the idea of an established style. They are both about forward motion and discovery. To name their cuisines with something that ties them to a particular technology, or even a particular esthetic, is limiting and I think misses the point dramatically. Avant garde is lousy, pretentious term. Especially if you're forced to apply it to yourself. But it describes these chefs much better than anything like the M word. Maybe we can find something less cringe-inducing that says the same thing.

Any more thoughts on this? I'm interested in a superbag for clarifying stocks. I would only be interested in consomée-like clarity if there was no flavor penalty (which seems doubtful). What would be the ideal mesh size if you want stock as clear as possible without losing significant flavor? I figure for extreme clarity I can use gelatin or agar clafification ... or get another superbag.

Another thought on mise en place: if your chef's knife is sharp, then you can do your prep many hours in advance with most foods. By sharp I don't mean "out of the box" sharp or "I just whacked it a few times on a steel" sharp. I mean sharp like, your Japanese fish butcher friend and your Kaeseki chef friend will bow to you when they examine your edges. This requires a certain facility with waterstones, and a certain willingness to learn more delicate cutting techniques. The payoff is that cut food doesn't lose its freshness. You'll be able to thinly slice apples or pears, and they will not turn brown ... not today. You'll be able to mince chives a day in advance (not that you ever would, but it's cool knowing you have that superpower). There are limits: basil is still a pain in the ass, and I prefer to not cut protein any sooner than necessary. This opens up all kinds of possibilities for using your time better. For instance, a couple of weeks ago I did prep for a bunch of pizzas, sealed up the mise in containers in the fridge, went to the climbing gym with friends, and then came back with them to make dinner. I had even brunoised shallots for the salad in advance. This meant I could spend more time relaxing and drinking wine (and keeping things clean) and less time making messes.