gfweb

So how was Kenji's FC, Patrick?

I saw that cheesesteak fest notice. Might be good if the steaks are prepared a la minute. If not it'll be like the dreck at the ballpark.

Velveeta and ro-tel is the official version of queso dip. Chef-y variations weaken it. Like when a serious restaurant does their take on a cheesesteak...always crappy.

Myoglobin is what makes meat juices red. You can call it anything you want but the red is myoglobin.

Myoglobin

Ate at the relocated Avalon in West Chester tonight. Nice place with a number of rooms and a bar. Meager wine list, but at least one can order beer or a cocktail. Pretty big place, but the different rooms keep it fairly intimate. There was live music but it was unobtrusive...took a while before I figured it wasn't recorded...70s and 80s pop covers that were done well....almost couldn't tell it wasn't Hall and Oates. Fall in Philadelphia...timely in a cliched way. Food is sort of the same, but more clearly Italian, with a bigger pasta section...but with less care in presentation. Large portions. There are steaks available. I had a hanger steak which was a little under-cooked, but still OK.Broccoli rabe was OK. Fingerling potatoes (which I love) were mealy and tasted like dirt (wouldn't be served in my house). My companion had chicken marsala which was served in a bowlish dish atop mashed potatoes and awash in a brownish gravy. He said it was OK. It looked like slop. To their credit they still have cheese and charcuterie as appetizers that the discerning can order instead of dessert. Will I be back? Maybe. But I will order carefully.

I'm still thinking smoked cod and melon... with smoked salt. The cod:melon ratio is key. Guessing...I'd say one big flake of cod to a 50% sized piece of honeydew or a 75% piece of cantaloupe

Not as easy as it looks. I used chicken breast as a substitute for fish (chicken of the sea?) for experimentation. Sliced yukon golds nearly as thin as potato chips, stacked them, and punched out discs with an apple corer. Salted the filet of chicken layered the scales on the oiled paper placed the chicken on it and sauteed on the parchment. Every time the chicken overcooked before the potatoes browned. High heat, low heat...whatever. Perhaps the potatoes in the video were soaked in bicarb to enhance the Maillard rxn prior to cooking They also didn't adhere well to the meat. They wouldn't stand up to cutting with a knife. Perhaps they should spend some time in the fridge to get stickier.

I think the fat in the cheese enhances the chili flavor

Smoked cod and melon?

I've been told that for sales to be decent Americans expect volumetric recipes. New techniques aren't as much his gig as is proper application of older techniques

And smoked fish would stand up to a somewhat sweet sauce...

The trick, I think, is to make it still clearly cod, but taste dessertish. As opposed to just hiding a bit of cod in a cheesecake or something (duh). Frying as suggested above lets you play with sort of sweet sauces and introduce the dessert element.

Fascinating. At $1.25 per soda it isn't cheap. I'm not a Keurig convert. Coffee is too costly and too slow. This seems worse.

Plenty of putzes on food TV

BBQ flank steak sandwich

It looks like each store has about three times the employees that a larger out of state liquor store would have. A big enough voting block to make them worth appeasing by a certain party. PA LCB (liquor control board) knows that if they overstaff they have a better chance of survival.

Not enough of them, poor selection, inconvenient hours, expensive. What's to like? http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20150927_Why_wine_lovers_don_t_love_Pa__State_Stores.html

Yeah. I've done that. Kevlar glove will make up for inattentiveness. Mine is in the drawer mostly, like yours

Something to be said for experimentation. For $12 you can get three lbs of meat and test 1 lb at 135, 140 and 145 F each. Or whatever you choose. Brining may help for higher temps

Too much tile. Way too much tile

I've done both. Its better here. Welcome.

Oh yeah. LM is a favorite. Unfussy food prepared authentically. Amazing how it changes from quiet weeknights to raucous weekends.

Went to Junto recently. Nice meal in general. Four of us did the tasting menu. It was served "tapas style" ie all on one plate that was passed around. This worked fine for some dishes and not at all for others. For example the egg yolk ravioli had a single raviolo sitting on a pile of salady things. How do you divide that among 4 people? And the sea bass was in a nice broth in a big tureen of sorts. On my plate it was a skim of broth with a piece of fish. All of it tasted good but for some of it, the presentation wasn't up to par. Kind of pissed me off actually. Pricewise it was a good deal ~$60 per person for the tasting menu which was a good amount of food and nicely done. I'd just rather not have a family style service.

Opinionated, yes. But he bases his opinions on research not just accepting what has always been done. A breath of fresh air.