bmdaniel

Coffee this morning (worst art yet) Have to go to Houston today for a quick business trip so probably no updates until after our dinner at Lucia this evening. Very excited about it - we've only been once, but it may have been our best restaurant meal in Dallas. I'll try to get everything posted before I go to bed tonight so I can get all caught up before we leave for Chicago (but no promises).

One of the worst things about moving from Houston to Dallas was the lack availability of good cocktails. In Houston, we were spoiled by Anvil, which I think is on par with any cocktail bar in the country. Compared to that, Dallas didn't even really have a place to get a decent drink. It's become less of an issue now that I am much stricter low-carb (and also led me to build out a much more comprehensive home bar) - still, it would be nice to have a good spot to go out for craft cocktails in Dallas. Recently a new bar opened up in Dallas called Cedar Social - I've heard good things about their cocktail program and have been looking forward to checking it out. Today I got the chance to swing by after work and have a couple of drinks. Started with the Belleview - this was a house drink with Death Door Gin, R&W apricot, house spiced dolin dry, and lemon juice. Very light and refreshing. They also had a menu section for drinks from other high-end cocktail bars (in addition to house drinks, punch bowls, and classic cocktails) - I tried a Faithful Scotsman from Death and Co, which I hadn't had before. Scotch, Matilde Peche, Cumin Syrup, lemon juice and pineapple juice - also very refreshing (suprisingly so for a scotch based drink). Very excited by my first trip here - quality, well-made cocktails in Dallas! Looking forward to coming back and exploring the menu further - based on this vist, highly recommend it to anyone interested in cocktails.

Okay, the kitchen. We really like the house we are renting right now, but not wild about the kitchen. It's galley style and just a bit too small. Also, there is no vent/exhaust to the outside, just a recirculating vent (what's the point?). I don't think we would ever live somewhere without a proper vent again. A couple of views on the whole thing (Apologize for the clutter - I married a packrat) The range and stove - serviceable but nothing special (with the fan as a glaring issue). Coffee Bar - you can see the espresso machine mentioned above. Also, you can only see one of the containers in this shot, but there's a blendtec I picked up at the SXSW sale (thanks eG) that I love (and use to make Nikki smoothies most mornings since she doesn't like coffee). Pantry shots Freezer shot - the whole middle shelf is taken up by Charles's food Couple of fridge pics - the white paper packages are the short ribs and lamb shanks from this week Sous vide station - I've got the SVM Fresh Meals bubbler heater, which I love. Kerry - the vacuum sealer is a Weston Pro - it's basically just a souped up foodsaver. In retrospect I regret getting it - I would've rather spent a bit more and gotten a chamber vac. That said, it's a pretty solid edge sealer.

I was wondering when you were going to mention Chicago plans. Schwa? Next? I think some would say Alinea, but we didn't have problems either time we went. Looking forward to seeing you enjoy your time here. Hit Alinea last September (had a babymoon in Chicago right before Charles was born) - our favorite restaurant meal ever. Reservations not terrible as long as you can plan in advance. Won't comment on the guesses!

Well, it was a Japanese purple potato (I forget the name - started with an M) - still, a mistake. Kitchen pictures incoming!

Realized I haven't said much about Chicago - as a little tease, I'll mention that our two dinner reservations are probably two of the three toughest we've ever gotten (went to El Bulli on our honeymoon in 09).

Last post for now (whew!) - still need to figure out when I'm going to get the kitchen pics up - too much to do! We went to Tei-An Soba House - Chef-Owner Teiichi Sakura started two very good, very succeful Japanese restaurants in Dallas (Teppo and Tei-Tei Robata Bar), but in 2007 gave them both up and went to Japan to study Soba at the Tsukiji Soba Academy. After he got back to Dallas, he opened Tei-An, obviously featuring excellent house made Soba along with a pretty wide array of other excellent Japanese items. Currently only 3 Dallas restaurants have 5 stars from the Dallas Morning News - the Mansion, Lucia, and Tei-An (I think critic Leslie Brenner has Dallas ratings in a bit of a mess, but hard to quibble at the top). We've had some spectacular dinners at Tei-An, so we were very excited to go today for lunch. Tempura Sampler - shrimp, purple potato, shisito peppers, shios leaf, enoki mushroom, and one other kind of mushroom I didn't catch - very well done Tempura dipping sauce, collection of flavored salts for tempura (Matcha, Truffle, and Sichuan Pepper), and 4 sauces for sushi (from left to right: spicy, olive?, ponzu, soy) Miso-braised brisket - excellent Purple potato gnocchi with gorgonzola sauce - wasn't a fan of this - texture was gummy and taste was too sweet for me Sushi sampler - Tuna, Salmon (oops, ate it before picture), Yellowtail, flathead and fatlip? Not sure on last two (in retrospect I may have been the victim of a verbal assault). Excellent quality on the fish Spicy Tuna Pressed Sushi - good but nothing amazing - probably shouldn't have ordered Curry Soba with Spicy Salmon Pressed Sushi - hearty and comforting (if perhaps inappropriate for 90+ degree dallas) Waitress ladling soba into soba cup Overall, the meal was only good, not great. It's possible we just didn't order well, but definitely wasn't a five star lunch. Still, one could do much worse.

Tiki cocktails - went for old classics, Mai Tais pre-dinner, Zombie after. Mai Tai Ingredients (err - plus orange curacao, plus appleton rum) I made myself Trader Vic's traditional with Smith and Cross as the Jamaican rum: Lime Juice Orange Curacao Orgeat Simple Syrup St. James Ambre Martinique Rum Smith and Cross Jamaican Rum Smith and Cross really takes over here - it's an interesting drink, but I think something less assertive is probably better (Nicole was not a fan at all). I made Nicole a Surf Room Mai Tai: Lime Juice Lemon Juice Orange Juice Pineapple Juice Orgeat Simple Syrup Lemon Hart 151 Demarara Flor De Cana 4 This was a hit (first time I have made it) - didn't get a picture, but it looked almost identical to the above without the spent lime shells. After dinner I made myself a Zombie, using the Aku-Aku club recipe which is new to Beachbum Berry Remixed - it has all the same ingredients as the original Zombie, but with the proportions rejiggered a bit: Grapefruit Juice Lime Juice Zombie Mix (equal parts grenadine, orange curacao, falernum, pernod) Cinnamon syrup Angostura Lemon Hart 151 Mount Gay Eclipse (used this as a gold Puerto Rican Style) This was spectacular (although I wished I had a white grapefruit). Didn't get a picture unfortunately, but not really much to look at.

Belated pics of last night's dinner - got a few prep photos this time. Final menu ended up being lamb shanks SV at 141F for 60H, mughal curry sauce from Modernist Cuisine, cashew halvah from modernist cuisine, faux parathas, and jasmine rice. Back to Saturday morning - Lamb shanks from Central Market Vacuum sealed In the SVM to swim until Monday night Pressure cooking on the left - raw almonds, cashews, and poppy seeds - 1 hour at 15 psi; sauteeing on the right - shallots, ginger, garlic, serrano chili (subbed for birds eye which I can never find). In the oven below are spices toasting - mace, cumin, cardamom, cinnamon, black pepper, clove (and probably something else I'm forgetting) Off-camera - blend the nuts into paste in the blendtec; add raisins, water, and the shallot mixture and puree - season to taste with lime juice and salt. Okay, admit I got a bit lazy here. Rest of the prep: Cashew halvah - 100 grams of roasted unsalted cashews, 30 grams of tapioca maltodextrin, salt to taste - blend in blendtec - voila! Pretty tasty cashew powder Parathas - Took store bought frozen puff pastry, sprinkled with sliced scallions, folded over and cooked in a pan with butter. Shanks - Take out of bag, dry with paper towel, hit with Iwatani torch Rice just jasmine rice on the stovetop. Dinner shots: Shank, sitting on sauce, sprinkled with cashew halvah - shank was excellent, highly recommend that time-temperature combo. Sauce was strange, but good - very thick and rich. Parathas surprisingly good considering what they were - probably a little too thick, inside was pretty gooey. I would recommend this method if you want something quick and easy.

Matt - Glad you asked on orgeat! I mostly just used the procedure Sam outlined here, with some minor modification due to circumstance. This probably doesn't need step-by-step pictures, but what the hell, I have them Soak the raw, peeled almonds for an hour or so and dump in blender Blend up - at this point you are supposed to let it sit for an hour or two, but Charles decided to go to sleep on my chest and then I had a short rib debacle, so it ended up soaking overnight in the fridge Next day, strain through cheesecloth; wring out all the juice you can. (You can do this multiple times, reinfusing the solids each time, but I figured after a 24 hour soak, good enough). Resulting almond juice Combine with equal parts sugar (I used a mix of regular and demarara), heat gently until combined - cool, and you have acheived orgeat. Has a very nice, pure almond favor (I didn't add any brandy or orange flower water).

Alright - got a lot of stuff coming down the pipe - coffee first. Here's the set-up (minus the Mazzer Mini grinder I didn't want to move): Until I can justify plopping down $2,000 on this, I am using an aeropress. I highly recommend this little device - for $25 you can make pretty high-quality "espresso". I think I mentioned before I'm brewing Klatch FTO Espresso right now; I rotate through a group of roasters usually - klatch, counter culture, stumptown, and my favorite, espresso vivace. I also like Texas roaster Cuvee Coffee, which I'll pick up if I'm almost out of coffee and I am somewhere I can get it fresh. I don't know if this is interesting but I thought I'd demo the aeropress technique - feel free to skip! Heat water and pre-warm cup; I have a nice little kettle from Adagio (the UtiliTEA), which lets you dial in a temperature (it just turns off when it hits it) - I shoot for 175-180. Put together the aeropress with one of the paper filters. Pre-wet the paper filter - I can't decide if this does anything, but I've seen several sources recommend it and it's not much trouble Grind the coffee - I send a handful of beans down first to clear out the stale coffee oils from the last batch, then use two spoonfuls of coffee (spoon comes with the aeropress) - comes out to about 23-25 grams of coffee. The aeropress has handy markings on the side that show you how much water to add based on how many scoops of coffee - I always use two for myself, but if I'm making one for someone else I do 4 and just split it in half. Put the coffee in the aeropress, and fill with water to the right little circle - let it sit 10 seconds Stir with the handy little stir stick for 10 seconds - the shape of it ensures that it won't hit the filter (smart!) Let it sit another 10 seconds then plunge For cappuccino/latte steam milk; I use a little cusiinart espresso machine that doesn't make good espresso but can steam milk fine (it'll be in the soon upcoming kitchen pictures). I like a pretty short cappuccino, just a bit more milk than coffee. For clean-up the coffee/filter puck can be ejected straight into the trash, then you just give it a rinse and you're done. Voila! (Maybe a snail?)

Breakfast this morning was at Good 2 Go Taco - they serve non-traditional breakfast and lunch tacos. Good 2 Go first opened in a eco-friendly gas station in Dallas and fairly recently moved into their own location. They share the building with Cultivar Coffee, a local roaster who just opened their first retail store/coffee bar. Cultivar Coffee Bottled drinks Menu - today they had 7 suggested tacos or you can build your own. Their trademark taco is called the Paris, Texas and has steak, spinach, egg, and charred tomato hollandaise (we didn't get that today). Nicole and I split 3 (and Charles ate a good amount of egg, ham, and chorizo) - Honey Bear - Honey Bacon with egg and goat cheese Ham I Am - Apricot glazed ham with egg and asparagus Hangover Cure - Smashed cheesy potatoes and chorizo Salsas - green especially is very good I also had a breve cortado from Cultivar - their latte art is slightly better than mine (but less fun)

Quick morning update - dinner went well, pictures forthcoming. Interestingly the 60hr lamb shanks (done for the most part alongside the short ribs) were amazing, so the short rib mystery is even stranger. I took pictures detailing my whole coffee process this morning, so you'll have to wait on those to see my rorshach today (I couldn't come up with anything, so I'm going to need some help). Bad storms here in Dallas early this morning - couldn't get back to sleep so I did some prep for dinner. Plan is modernist pea and carrot risotto (I'm trying their pressure cooked approach) - need to figure out sides; what's left is potatoes (was going to make an Indian potato dish but ran out of steam), that yellow summer squash, and cucumber (Plus I have some mint and parsley, leftover cashew "halvah", and I think some of the mughal curry sauce). Potato + risotto is pretty starchy, but I'd hate to waste them (we have dinner out tomorrow night at one of our favorite places) - any ideas (not a big deal to run by the store and grab something as necessary)? Since I'm up, I thought I'd go out for breakfast tacos this morning - hopefully I can convince Nikki and Charles to wake up and join me.

I think Franklin (the one time I had it), was as good as anything I've had - the problem with barbecue is that there is so much variability, even within the same establishment. For example, I've had brisket at Lockhart Smokehouse in Dallas that is as good as what I had at Franklin (or what I've had in Lockhart proper), but on average, it is not quite on that level. I agree with the comments that Snow's brisket (again, only had it once) was of that caliber as well, everything else mediocre.

We had a great meal here on our honeymoon in 09 - besides the food which was excellent, we were struck by how warm the service was; probably the most personal (in a good way) that we have had at a high-end fine dining restaurant (perhaps tied with Cracco on the same trip, so perhaps it is just an Italian thing).

Lunch today at Commissary, a fairly new restaurant from John Tesar (who made his name at the Mansion, one of Dallas's best restaurants, and subsequently has had a number of false starts - here's a blog post with a bit of background: http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/cityofate/2010/08/tesar.php). The focus on burgers but at night have a number of dinner specials (which you can maybe read on the board if you squint, but probably not). They also have a separate restaurant within a restaurant "The Table", which is a prix-fixe communal tasting dinner, complete with canapes, cheese cart, candy cart, etc. We had chips, guacamole, and salsa to start - nothing earth shattering, but the chips were freshly fried (didn't get a picture until it was mostly gone): I had "The Rib", a short rib sandwich with collard greens and horesradish mayo - this was the best thing I tried (fries could have been a bit crispier though). Nicole had pork belly sliders - these had some kind of apricot jam on them. The pork belly was good, but the whole thing was a little too sweet/rich. Didn't try these, but co-workers had a tandoori burger (lamb patty with tzatkiki in a pita) and a bacon cheeseburger Also split some tempura avocado with a spicy mayo which was pretty well done All in all, good but not great lunch.

Last night's dinner pictures - apologize that things got a little crazy and so not a ton of prep photos. Boston Club Punch - This was a big hit! Caprese salad - simple but great ingredients made a great starter Ad Hoc Stroganoff with sauteed porcini and morel - sadly without short ribs Nicole's blueberry, peach, ginger cobbler pre- and post- bake; delicious with Haagen Daz 5 Vanilla Didn't get a pic of the garlic bread (but nothing too exciting to look at anyways). Nicole wants me to disclaim again that I ended up taking these pictures, explaining their substandard quality. Off to lunch soon - hoping to join Nicole and Charlie for hamburgers, but work may interfere.

I would echo that but for Dallas. I actually grew up in Houston, and moved back there after college - just came to Dallas 3 years ago for a job. Not wild about Dallas overall, but it would be a lot worse if there wasn't a Central Market! It's to the point now that when we think about buying a house here, proximity to CM is a major criteria.

Ended up trying the roasted garlic compound butter - spread it on thick slices of lightly pre-toasted sourdough and then gave another quick trip to the oven- came out very well. Should have made more!

Plan for tonight's dinner is modernist Indian - Making the Mughal Curry lamb shanks from Modernist Cuisine, with cashew halvah. Lamb shanks went into the bath saturday morning (hopefully they don't meet the same fate as the short ribs). Sauce is fairly straightforward, will pull that together after work tonight, and cashew halvah is just a matter of blending roasted cashews with tapioca maltodextrin, so hopefully pretty easy (I've never used maltodextrin so it will be interesting). For other sides, was planning on jasmine rice, a Madhur Jeffrey onion and garlic crusted potato recipe, and parathas. I could use some help on the parathas - MC suggested a shortcut version made out of two pieces of puff pastry pressed together and fried. Has anyone tried anything like that (I bought the puff pastry yesterday, so I am committed, but could use some advice)? Also planning on making some tiki classics tonight - need to finish up the orgeat (was supposed to do yesterday, but dinner and baby intervened, so the ground almonds are getting an extra long infusion) and make a very small batch of cinnamon syrup.

My breakfast this morning: Open to suggestions on the art - maybe an alligator grabbing a ball (you have to turn your head a little)? Dinner was a qualified success - everything came out really well except the star attraction, the short ribs. I've made SV short ribs several times before and they've always been great, but last night's just tasted dry and overcooked (they were edible with plenty of the sauce, but barely). They weren't very pink either (did them at 140F), I'm wondering if there was a temp issue? I checked the bath with two different thermometers, everything agreed so very odd. Any ideas? Tonight's dinner includes 60 hour lamb shanks at the same temp, so it will be interesting to see how they come out (more on this in a bit). Pictures from last night forthcoming.

Oops, noticed I didn't post the exotic fruit picture above (although those are some pretty interesting melons). Here you go:

Kind of last minute, but any recommendations on garlic bread technique? I was thinking about roasting some garlic in the oven, making a compound butter with it, then topping toasted bread with it - any better ideas?

Rest of the dinner plan for tonight: Caprese Salad Beef Stroganoff (adapted from Ad Hoc cookbook, using 72hr short ribs) Garlic Bread Blueberry-Peach-Ginger Cobbler (Nikki is adapting the Ad Hoc blueberry cobbler recipe - I cannot bake to save my life) with vanilla ice cream Caprese is just slice and serve, short ribs are finishing up in the Sous Vide Magic (went in Thursday night) and I think Nicole is getting the cobbler crust ready as I type. Hopefully it's not too crazy (company coming in about 2 hours).

Okay - dinner plan for tonight is to have a few friends over, so I thought I'd take the opportunity to make a punch (next few nights will probably just be the three of us, and Charles hasn't started drinking his share yet). Settled on the Boston Club Punch from Punch Made the punch base after we got back from Central Market - Full cast of characters Making the oleo-sacchrum with microplaned orange peel and sugar Added pineapple and muddled Juiced the oranges and added to oleo-sacchrum to dissolve Strained the whole thing through a chinoise, pressing to get all the jucies out Resulting orange-pineapple-sugar juice Added 3.5 oz raspberry syrup (made up of 3 oz seedless black raspberry jam, 0.5 oz of hot water, pushed through chinoise), 1 oz armagnac, 1 oz kirsch, 0.5 oz lemon hart 151, 0.5 oz orange curacao and a pint of white wine (a nice, inexpensive fruity white from Novy called four mile creek). This base is cooling down in the fridge - to serve, just need to add ice, a buttle of champagne (Mumm Brut), and a liter of seltzer (which I made up last night for the sloe gin fizz). I'll post a picture of the finished product later.