paulraphael

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.

I think that's why we make pan sauces. They're the ultimate clean-as-you-go invention. Yeah, sure, they're also tasty. yeah, that's how I deal with the sink also. Definitely true. I only use bowls when I need something huge (and then it's tall -profile mixing bowls). Otherwise it's takeout containers, for small stuff, or square ziplock and gladware containers for medium stuff. These are my favorites ... they're not only great for leftovers, but they're the most efficient shape of all for mise. They fit right up against each other without wasted space. They're also easier to sweep food into from the cutting board, without sending half of it onto the floor.

I don't have one either. I don't even think they're much help to the cooking process, unless you have one of the commercial machines that sounds like a jet taking off and works just as fast. Regular dishwashers hold your stuff prisoner for nearly an hour. I'm going to need that stuff! It takes 10 seconds to wash something in the sink.

sure, same here. But with meals simple enough to let me get away with this, I don't find it takes much effort to keep the place clean. My comments apply more to the knock-down, drag-out multicourse bouts that can turn into disasters if you lose control of the kitchen.

I've been using quats (quaternary ammonium compounds). bought a gallon jug from the resto store; a capful in a quart of water makes a working solution. It's odorless, doesn't corrode knives or eat sponges (as bleach can) and doesn't need to be rinsed. The stuff I got also has a wetting agent in it, so when you use it as a final rinse for glassware it doesn't leave spots. My only hesitation is that quats are among the sanitizers that leave residue (unlike bleach). The residue itself isn't harmful, but there's some evidence that leaving low-concentrations of the stuff around can eventually breed bacteria that are resistant to it. I don't know how serious a concern this is, but at least one organization has recommended against dish soaps and hand cleaners containing triclosan for this same reason. So I'm open to finding a better solution. If I were just cooking for myself, or a few people with strong constitutions, I might dispense with sanitizer entirely. But I got in the habit of using it when I started throwing bigger dinner parties and underground events. Someone at the table could be immune-compromized, or pregnant, or god knows what. Best to be paranoid.

Yeah, that's what my butcher's gotten for me. Emma Hearst is a chef right around the corner, and she's getting him to be the NYC distributor. If there's better grass-fed beef to be had, I'd like to know about it ... this stuff beats the pants off of everything I see here at the farmers' markets.

Working clean ... my holiest grail and pettest peave. It's how I know who's good and who's not; who's helping and who's banished. The rest of my life looks like a Superfund site, but I'm OCD in the kitchen. First tip: start clean. Organize up front. If your kitchen is also playroom, office, warehouse, and kitsch museum, you've lost the race before the gun. Get the crap out. Don't squander precious surface. Second tip: learn excellent board management. This alone can distinguish cooks trained by world class chefs from ones raised by wolves. It means keep your prep space clean and organized. Have your cleaned food ready and in order. Have your mise containers ready and in order. Stop and plan how you'll use every section of the cutting board. After each task, stop and clean the board. Don't let vegetable ends, peels, crumbs, and puddles accumulate. This is a running theme: stop and clean. Bad cooks think they don't have time to clean; good cooks know they don't have time not to. Third tip: keep your sink clean, so you can keep everything else clean. If you have multiple sinks, then organize them like restaurant dishwashing sinks: an empty one for scraping, one filled with hot soap water, one filled with cold, clean, sanitizing rinse. If you have one sink or two, do your best, but always keep one empty and clean. Use it to clean every pan and utensile the minute you're done with it. The sink, your surfaces, and your tools need to be ready to go all the time. This lets you keep to your schedule; you won't hit a wall because the pan or knife or widget you need is at the bottom of a pile, caked with squid effluent. That theme again: stop, clean. Fourth tip: have a pile of side towels ready. Or two piles. You need dry ones for grabbing hot pans, and one or two soaked with sanitizing solution so you can wipe down your knives and boards and prep surfaces constantly. Change out the wet ones often. If you can work like this, you will FLY. Doesn't matter if you're scatterbrained, klutzy with a knife, or walking with a limp. I'd much rather work with a meticulous newbie who takes 5 minutes to dice an onion than a ninja master who leaves a trail of destruction. Slow is fast. (Fast is faster, but only if it's clean and fast ...)

I'd assumed southern Cal ... I looked again and the ranches are in central and south central ... Cholame and San Simeon. No idea about their irrigation practices, but I know the grass is green and snow-free.

Another possible approach: take advantage of the honey's properties, and develop a moist, chewy cookie. I haven't done this, but I've created cookie recipes that use other hygroscopic or moisture-retaining ingredients. They not only last a long time, but in some cases get better with age (up to a week or so).

Now that you mention it, I think the CI proportions are different from the ones I settled on. When I first did it with their proportions, I got a very soft, wet dough that was easy to handle ... but I didn't get much change in the final result. So I adjusted ... the proportions I posted give a typical dough texture, but much less moisture in the final crust (which explains the crispness and also the shrinkage). I think the CI technique is popular because it makes dough easier to handle. It also reduces the chance that you'll develop gluten and get a tough crust. However, decent pastry technique makes both these points irrelevent. I experimented with the concept to see if alcohol could give any other benefits, like crispness.

In most cases I find KarenDW's method best ... not just because it's labor-free, but because there's a lot of flavor in the stems. I almost never bother with a tea bag or cheesecloth. Either I toss in the sprigs, or tie them up as a bouquet garni. I only ever strip the leaves if they're going to be part of the presentation.