paulraphael

You just have to do it by feel. Once you figure it out, you can go by measurement if you always use the same flour ... at least if it's a consistent brand like KA. If you switch from bread flour to AP you'll need to reduce the liquid quite a bit. The higher protein content of bread flour soaks up much more water.

Yeah, a Western deba will absolutely handle any of the rough stuff. But they cost real knife money. The advantage of big dumb cleavers (truly the only advantage) is they're practically free. My main uses are beheading poultry (see above) and breaking open Kabocha squash. Which feels more like splitting wood than prepping food. Even my super thin Mac bread knife (also known as the watermelon sword) just wedges in those things.

I have a couple of big dumb cleavers. One is a $5 hunk of sheetmetal from Chinatown, the other a hand-me-down. I use them to cut anything that would be a bit too abusive for my biggest dumbest chef's knife. I learned my lesson when chopping through the neck bone of 20lb turkey many years ago. My German knife went straight in the mail to Dave Martell for repairs. For me the trouble with big cleavers is you need an appropriate cutting board—one you don't mind getting hacked up. That's one more big dumb thing to store, and it takes up more room than the cleaver.

Anyone had a chance to compare the Rationals to the high end consumer combi ovens (like Gaggenau)?

All else equal, buttermilk will make a fluffier, more delicate pancake. Because it's thicker than milk, so you can get a the same consistency with less flour. But it's not necessary. I think the basic tricks are 1) make the batter thick enough. It shouldn't flatten out and spread too much when it hits the pan. 2) make sure your leavening is ok. Baking powder expires. It may lose oomph even before it hits the expiry date. I use about 3g baking powder / 100g flour. That's about 1/2 tsp per cup. This is for non-buttermilk. If the baking powder seems dubious, use more. Edited to add: another common way to add fluff is to separate half or even all the eggs, and just mix the batter with the yolks. Whip the whites (generally to very soft peaks) and fold them in at the end. I used to do this fairly often but decided it wasn't worth it most of the time. There were easier ways to fluff things up.

That's interesting. It's certainly an unconventional take on braising, as Tom says. Traditionally it's in a 100% humidity environment.

I don't know how this would work without crisping the skin after the fact. Or without figuring out a process in a combi-oven or c-vap oven. Cooking crisp skin in a 100% humid environment (braising) uncrisps the skin. Does the Times recipe have you do a pseudo-braise ... with the lid off?

And cooking processes that rely on conduction with something stationary, like sautéing. I think you could argue that most cooking methods use a mix of of thermal processes, often with one of them dominating. But deep frying? That's pretty pure convection. I'm not sold on this "air frying" business. Just because two cooking methods use a roughly similar thermal transfer processes doesn't mean they're similar in ways that matter.

Here's the secret: pick it up with a side towel. It will finally make sense. I try to cultivate a habit of using a towel any time I grab a pan, just to avoid absentmindedly branding myself, so it's no trouble. That AC handle suddenly becomes comfortable, and more secure (less likely to slip or pivot) than any other handle I've used.

Even if you don't account for fraud, the organic rules are like the tax code—complex, illogical, full of compromises and loopholes. They're perfect fodder for savvy companies that want the labelling, but have no interest in the spirit of the law. There are some industrial farms churning out middling produce that earns the organic label. Meanwhile there are fanatically quality-conscious small farms selling great produce with no label, often because they can't afford the certification process. Funny story ... several years ago I ordered a bunch of lamb loins from a Pennsylvania farmer with a great reputation (I found his name on several Michelin-starred NYC restaurants). He asked me if I wanted organic or conventional. I asked the difference. He said "$4.50 a pound." As he explained it, it cost a small fortune to get land certified organic (they have to do lab tests of soil samples in several locations). He decided to pay for getting half his property certified, and putting a fence down the middle. Essentially the same pasture, same soil, same grass, same sheep. But the ones on that side of the fence cost more. He decided to pass the cost of certification on to the consumer. I ordered conventional.

Or you could send to Kyiv. A whole family could shelter behind it.

Yeah, looks like it. To confirm, see if the thought of dropping it on your toe arouses mild panic. The company makes smaller ones with the same construction. There are similar options by some other companies on webrestaurantstore.

That's got to be a problem with any double-sided griddle. Any coating ... non-stick or even just seasoning ... is going to burn off the side facing the fire. I wouldn't want to be in a room with that much incinerating teflon.

I have one of the heavy griddles by King Chef (2 burner, 7 gauge). It's huge (covers 2 burners on a big domestic or actual commercial range) and quite heavy. The carbon steel surface is perfect ... durable, seasons easily, and nothing sticks to it. It does not heat very evenly. 3/16" is pretty thick for steel, but not thick enough to spread head efficiently several inches. So for pancakes, you have to learn how it heats, and work within those limitations. Either don't take advantage of the full surface area, or don't expect photoshoot-perfect evenness. One approach that works is is using the center portion (between the burners) for keeping things warm rather than for cooking. You still have enough surface for 4 big pancakes at once. I would not get a nonstick griddle. The surface is too short-lived (I don't care if it has a lifetime warrantee or if you baby it ... if you cook at griddle temperatures, it will lose its stick resistance over time). My ideal material would be 3/8" aluminum. You can actually season the surface of bare aluminum if you want. You won't get a durable finish, but it works. And it would warp. But you'd get much better heat distribution, with no weight penalty.

I'm so sorry. What a humiliating defeat.

@Btbyrd, this is interesting. So many pro cooks seem to raving about induction. But I can't imagine them liking it if their ranges had all these problems. Do you think they're using better technology in the high-end commercial market? (it looks like mostly high-end kitchens adopting it right now)

Looks like you can listen right on the Heritage Radio site.

A couple of old kitchen habits it took me years to kick ... Tempering egg yolks when making a creme anglaise or custard or French ice cream. There is no point to this. I spent a long time trying to rationalize this step, since every pastry chef on earth repeats it. I came up with nothing. So now I throw the yolks in with all the other cold ingredients and just heat until it thickens. Preheating pans when doing things like sweating onions. You're not browning them, so why bother? When I make something like tomato sauce now, I use the sauce pan as my prep container. Diced onions go right into the cold pan. Add olive oil, cook on medium-ish heat until they've softened up.

When my grandmother died in 2005, part of my inheritance was an unopened bottle of Wooster sauce. 10 oz size. It followed me across town when I moved in with my girlfriend. We finally finished it a year or so ago. And I like the stuff!

Not sure if this was mentioned upthread ... Dave Arnold hosted one of the Precision Oven's engineers on his podcast last year. Discussion is interesting, and includes explanations / remedies for some of the oven's problems. They also get into the history and technology of combi ovens and c-vap ovens. Dave considers the APO the Muhammed Ali of reheating pancakes and fried food.

Buttermilk was one of those ingredients that I never used because I never had it around (you can usually only buy it by the quart, and I've needed that much). Then I discovered powdered buttermilk—and now I never don't have it. Does this matter for fried chicken? I still have no idea. But it has revolutionized my pancake making.

If I don't need to tame the enzymes, I just give a light whack with a knife or bench scraper. Just enough to crack the shell so it slips off. Not a fan of smashing. I find the traditional technique of smash and rock-chop-to-death isn't any faster than just mincing, and doesn't give much control or consistency. So I'll often treat garlic just like a little onion. With a sharp knife you could also get slices as thin as Paulie's but in a fraction the time. I've just haven't yet needed transparent garlic slices.

Kinda related to this tip ... sometimes I blanche or briefly steam garlic cloves. I do it for some concoctions where the raw garlic gets pulverized by a machine, and I want to cut the pungency a bit. The brief heat partially deactivates the enzymes that make all the harsh sulphur compounds. As a bonus, the shells slip off pretty easily after you do this. I've been doing this for the chana masala I like to make (has a lot of pulverized garlic). I don't find it necessary when making a vinaigrette with a stick blender. It's also handy if you ever want to put a garlic clove into a sous-vide bag. Completely raw garlic risks turning the whole meal into a tire fire, but a little preheat can tame it nicely.

I think the question is if typical pressure cookers constitute a sealed environment ... they use a relief valve to maintain pressure. It might be more of a hybrid kind of environment. It likely has to do with why Dave and Nils got significantly different blind taste test results with stocks made in different types of cooker (the winner being a type that maintained a true sealed environment). I'd assumed the difference has to do with aromatics getting out, but it makes more sense if it's about boiling vs. not boiling.

Sourdough apple pancake.