Spike L

Hey Chris, welcome to eGullet! I don't think I'll be trying this recipe any time soon, but wanted to say that I absolutely love your channel. I haven't been on here in a while, but I think this is the PERFECT place for sharing this kind of stuff - if we can somehow dig some of the posters I remember from a few years back who really geek out on Chinese food (Dejah? hzrt8w? Prawncrackers?) I bet we'd get some really interesting discussions. In terms of food geekery, I will never forget when origamicrane made siu yuk with 8 different denaturing agents to find out what made the crispiest skin - so you should be right at home here!

The first thing I thought of when seeing "red chicken" was the kho (caramel) style dishes from Vietnam, which are similar to Chinese red-braised dishes but not always long-simmered. In this specific case, ga kho gung (caramel chicken w/ginger), which doesn't always turn out deep red when cooked at home, but I've definitely been to restaurants where whatever they've done has ensured that it's come out a really deep red.

This popped up in a few news sources when it was being Kickstarted: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/scotfrank/solsource-cook-anything-under-the-sun Not sure what the equivalent BTU would be. But seems to take a different approach from the SunOven

I might be shooting in the dark here, but... maybe tapioca starch?

Arbutus has bar space too

The only one to mention THE most important tool. GOOD KNIVES!! ← I think that was implied within "good sharp cleaver".. no need for knives if you know how to use your cleaver

Tayyab's - Fieldgate St Gram Bangla - Brick Lane

Short drive out of Boulogne: http://www.lhostelleriedelariviere.fr/engl...la-riviere.html Stayed and ate there a few times a couple of years back, unless much has changed I had no complaints whatsoever, good food and good room

http://www.japanesefoodreport.com/2008/11/...in-chicken.html

I've found a surprising source of good pizza to be Olive on Hoxton St... just opposite Bacchus. Thin bases, good topping... and oddly only £3 for the basic margherita. I'd be intrigued to see what others make of it

Soseki: http://www.soseki.co.uk/ Made it in for the soft opening: excellent cooking, and, if the service has improved (waitresses were still not familiar with dishes etc.), an amazing all round experience. Maybe a little bit pricey compared to other similar offerings, but definitely worth a look. Set menus at £45/£50 with optional wine pairings, also £25 "quick" menu and "western" menu which just looked a little bit strange...

Does anyone have some good recommendations of how to take good care of your pestle and mortar? I have a Thai granite one, and never know whether washing it with soap will affect the flavour of what I next pound. At the moment I just wash it out with warm water and my hand...

How about St John's? Their group menus look incredible and start at £30 per head...

Can anyone shed any light on the practicality of this setup? http://www.youtube.com/user/chefbalcer

Just out of curiosity, what is your issue with the name? Alimentum is simply Latin for "food".. Anyway, I'm planning to visit next time I return to Cambridge - however, some of my friends have checked it out and gave a very positive account of it. The lunchtime menu was described as excellent value, especially seeing as you could easily spend the same amount on three vastly inferior courses at the bunch of chain restaurants at the Cambridge Leisure Centre (Nandos, Bella Italia and the other two). I'm glad to hear that Cambridge finally has somewhere decent to eat

Anyone able to make a comparison (quality wise) to Snazz Sichuan? I was impressed by Snazz Sichuan but not blown over, but seeing as I've enjoyed cooking from Fuschia Dunlop's books and after having seen the reviews I am sorely tempted, even if my wallet won't be too happy!

Benja, on Beak Street

Does anyone know if the 50% off food at Wild Honey runs for the whole of the week 2 July - 8 July or if it's just for the first night? I spoke to someone at Arbutus when eating there today and apparently the first week is the "soft opening" used as a dry run, then the full, proper opening being from the 9th. I'm more than happy to pay full price, but only when the kinks are all straightened out, but at 50% off I am more than happy to be a test subject!

Slightly off topic, but if you're willing to sacrifice the restaurant experience in favour of top-notch fish, Atari-Ya on James St is a little sushi bar run by the people who supply much of the sashimi grade fish to London's restaurants. I won't say anything more other than to go check it out

These guys obviously haven't been hungover enough to understand that the perfect bacon butty must be made with fried bacon. Surprising really, seeing as they're students... For me the route to the best bacon butty is to not compromise whatsoever on ingredients. Top bacon, top bread, good ketchup (or HP/Brown sauce if you're that way inclined) - tasty, excellent breakfast. And yes, with some lettuce and tomato it gets kicked up to a BLT if needed

Hah, finally realised why this was confusing me so much - this is in the NY forum, not a general forum =) Just to put things into a more international perspective - most high-end restaurants over this side of the ocean don't seem to have this horrible struggle to make ends meet. It doesn't make sense to me, as I know for a fact that a lot of business/management types are every bit as sharp in NY as they are over here, and in many cases not bound by tradition and a lot more willing to try new methods in the name of providing cutting edge experiences (and of course, making more money). Many new high end restaurants over here have done very well since their opening, maybe due to the fact that new restaurants here receive high exposure due to England's distinct type of celebrity culture (!), or maybe because many chefs only seem to start restaurants if they can bill themselves as "[insert famous chef with successful restaurant]'s protege/successor". Or maybe the NY market is way too saturated, with a much smaller pool of very highly discerning customers and with the next tier down of customers prefering to eat at the next tier down of restaurants, as it is less risky and also cheaper ...thoughts?

I think I saw a takoyaki grill at the little Japanese supermarket just off Regent Street - it's the back of the block that has the Apple store on, on the square. I believe the street you take to get there is Hanover Street. IF you can't find it let me know

Last night: Ma-po tofu Stirfried broccoli with garlic

Where are you getting the figure for food cost accounting for 50% of dish price? If we're talking really high end restaurants, remember that these places have wholesale arrangements with restaurant distributors, who can generally offer extremely high quality at prices probably in the same bracket as a supermarket. I've talked to people working in much lower-end restaurants (with lower end prices) and their food cost sometimes only just scrapes 10% of a dish; when you scale everything up I find it hard to believe that high end restaurants would let it go up to 50%, they'd simply raise the prices instead! Secondly, as mentioned above - drinks. When you consider the price of a bottle of water at a high end restaurant, let alone alcohol... the markup on that is incredible. While many of us here may excercise restraint when ordering drinks due to the price, remember that high-end restaurants often have people with more money than sense who are more than happy to pay over the odds for the priveledge of drinking a wine that doesn't cost all that much per bottle at said restaurants. Add this to the fact that almost no-one will go for a meal without some sort of liquid, and you already have recouped a fair amount of per-cover cost from the second any drink is ordered Thirdly, prestige - I don't know what the situation in NY is, but over here in London you can pretty much be guaranteed that if a restaurant is "rated" and/or a celebrity haunt, you won't be getting a reservation any time this month, or, for that matter, for a few months. Multiply that by the fact that most places run an early and a late cover, plus the fact that they often have an ajoining bar, and you have full house guaranteed until the restaurant falls out of favour. And that's just dinner. Lunch is also a moneyspinner, as many places run a lunch menu (often offering "cheaper" dishes, which would also reflect less ingredient cost) which will again pack the place out every day, again possibly for two sets of covers. Finally, some places run continuously from lunch through to dinner just to get additional covers throughout the day, which when you look at it all adds up to a staggering amount of money So... honestly, I think that high end restaurants, if anything, are more likely to be making a lot of money, even more so than middle to lower end establishments. At the end of the day restaurants are businesses, so if they collapse then some really crappy management is going on. No-one really invests millions into something without expecting a return unless they're crazy or bizarrely altruistic

Honestly, get a rice cooker that can make congee (I'm personally on the Zojirushi bandwagon). Sure, it's not as nice as if it were slow cooked, but it only takes an hour and the results are more than edible, especially if you make it from a flavoured stock base and put tasty things in it.