haresfur
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Posts posted by haresfur
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Well there is some for sale at the LCBO in Stoney Creek which isn't too far from home - perhaps I should break down and buy a bottle for experimental purposes. Anna would share it with me I'm sure.
Go for it. You owe it to your fan-base.
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I've thought about making a lampshade or sconce cover out of them to display near the home bar, but given I've never made a lampshade or sconce cover I allow them to continue cluttering my storage area, for the time being at least.
Dancing on the bar with a Carpano Antica lampshade on your head is the epitome of class.
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And you, haresfur?
That's the thing. My supply of bitters is pitiful, but I'm planning a resupply trip to the USA. Right now I have Peychaud's, Fee's Old Fashioned, Fee's Orange, and Regan's Orange. I probably use the Fee's Orange the least although I like them in some summer drinks and the 50:50 mix with Regan's is often nice. I use the Fee's Old Fashioned where Angostrua is called for, but would like to try the barrel aged.
Given the number of interesting bottles out there, I think I'll concentrate on the ones people use most, thus the question.
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Ok, 27 pages in... which are the top few bitters you consider important for your bar?
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Washington isn't known for great selection, either. You might consider Pasifique absinthe from Woodinville WA. Aside from that, pretty much anything you like to drink. Maybe Barbancourt 5* if you can't get it in BC.
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I was told by the fellow at the Tower Hill visitor centre that they put black wattle seeds in their damper and that they have medicinal properties (go there right now while the wattles are blooming - spectacular spot).
Gardening Australia said Oxalis should be cooked and I thought they said it was to remove the oxalic acid.
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I've made ginger infused vodka with candied ginger. I kept it in the freezer to keep the "heat". Didn't seem to add much sweetness. I'm sure you could do the same with fresh ginger, but the left over candied solids are nice put over fish and baked.
Aside from that I use Stones ginger wine where Canton is called for - for financial reasons. Doesn't solve the sweet problem but I can't bring myself to pay the price of vodka here.
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Cool. New to me.
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I can't recall much of note in Prosser for food, although my favourite Washington winery, Davenlore, is there (need to arrange ahead to visit). There is an ok brewpub in Sunnyside - Snipes Mountain. For food in the Yakima Valley your best bet may be Tri-Cities, not that they are a gastronomic Mecca. Sushi Ya is pretty good, considering the distance from the coast. Lots of chains and not too exciting Mexican. Ice Harbor Brewing has good beer, dive food, and a low-brow ambiance. I wasn't too fond of their other gastro pub location, but maybe it has changed. Atomic Ale has somewhat better food but not as good beer.
I have heard of wildly different experiences at the Tagaris winery restaurant. But if the weather is nice, sitting outside on the patio is worthwhile. If you have had your fill of wine the cocktails are decent. Chez Chas is a long time local standard. I never tried Blue Moon but it is supposed to be good. Anthony's at Columbia Point in Richland is a chain but ok sea food.
Oh yeah, I like the Thai at the King and I. Some things you don't see at other places.
Be sure to check out some of the older, funkier wineries in the Red Mountain area. Then grab a coffee at Indulgences in West Richland.
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Decided I'm not a big fan of rye - realize in retrospect I never have really cared for it. Hubby said he got instant heartburn from it. I switched to bourbon when I remixed my Manhattan and made hubby a negroni variation.
Put the rye away for a while but come back to it after you have your bourbon drinks nailed and are feeling in a bit of a rut. Nothing wrong with bourbon cocktails IMO but you may find rye adds a new dimension to keep you taste buds from getting jaded. There will be some adjustment of the other ingredients but I'm sure you will be better equipped to figure out how to get to something you like.
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Kids, and I mean high school and college kids, are demanding, messy, complaining, like to pull pranks on staff, and are generally a PITA. Add to it, as you yourself have stated previously, the fact that they don't tip well while running you ragged on top of it, most waiters won't knock themselves out for you.
I really hate this sort of behavior. I don't care if I'm statistically undesirable; if I pay the same money, I should in turn receive the same product. While my tab is generally not large, the percentage is equal if not greater than that of the people around me.
I agree that it is inappropriate to give poor service to someone based on generalities and stereotypes. College kids, women, race, it doesn't matter. It also becomes a self-fullfilling prophecy (see the OP's question). You give lousy service to someone because of their age, they don't tip well, then you think the poor tip is because of their age. This is one place the whole system breaks down - the payment for value is so vague that you can't tell if the poor tip is due to a cheap customer or to poor service. And a lot of people would rather blame someone else than look at their behavior.
I am eternally greatful to a waiter in a nice restaurant in Toronto when I just out of Uni, working temporarily in the company's head office and living on a per diem. He was helpful and treated me with kindess in a relaxed fashion in spite of (or because of) my cluelessness. I knew enough to tip resonably (probably not to the level deserved) but he gave me a good nudge along my life journey.
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If it holds liquid and you like the look, it's a fine cocktail glass.
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French 75 with pear cider instead of champagne. The pear clearly comes through. A bit sweet for my taste but it was a hit.
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I'm so behind - I need to come back over a few weeks so I can savour everything. I made a brave attempt at your Moroccan veggies over quinoa this week and it was good but probably not as good as yours. I promise to practice more. I bought my quinoa at Bendido Wholefoods and it was from Tasmania, which I thought was great. Is yours from there or from S. America?
I think savory oats (what I call goat meal) sounds brilliant. I'm not big on sweet first thing in the morning.
I measured my rice cooker cup after learning the hard way that it isn't a standard "cup". I'm pretty sure it was 330 ml. But now I just fill the bowl to the 1 cup mark and add water until it is just a bit over the 2 cup mark and it turns out fine. I figure the fuzzy logic should work for its living.
Thanks again for the sensory overload.
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I think Sam is on the right track. Controlled experiments with simplified combinations of ingredients (as you started with your tests) would be enlightening. Possible causes I can think of are:
- differential extraction of the clorophyl in the basil or some compounds in the lemon juice due to the less polar ethanol than the more polar water. Try leaving out one or the other (using citric acid as Sam suggested). But if the alcohol increases the extraction of the clorophyl, wouldn't the vodka drink be darker, not the other way around? Oh, Sam already said that.
- pH effects since the alcohol could muck with the hydrogen ion activity (maybe the acid, H+, is bound to the -OH of the ethanol). Seems unlikely to me because that is a fair bit of lemon juice. You could try mixing without the lemon and then adding it or citric acid by drops and look for a colour change. Can you make the colour match by adding more acid to the alcoholic one?
- oxidation effects. Try letting the drinks sit for a couple of hours and see if they look the same. Maybe one is oxidizing more rapidly. This could also be affected by the metal shaker. Even if steel is very inert it could catalzye the reactions.
- spectral effects. The alcohol might just shift the way the coloured compounds absorb & re-emit light. Does the effect look the same in day light and other light sources? I suppose borrowing a spectrophotometer is out of the question.
I think the first thing would be to establish for sure if it is the basil or the lemon that is causing the effect. Either that or say stuff it and use Goslings rum
- Dr haresfur, PhD
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Finally caught up on your fantastic blog. Wow. All I can say is I feel like such a bogan.
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Thanks those all look interesting. Although I hate the Soul Mama website. Embrasse is definitely on my list to check out at some point, if not this trip. Thanks.
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You asked about environmental factors so I'll steer away from animal quality of life issues, although when it comes to wild food, sustainability is an environmental issue IMO.
The topic is timely for me, because I have been considering eating more pork and less beef/lamb to save the planet. In Australia and probably in most countries, the majority of greenhouse gas production from farming is on-farm production, not in the "food miles". Some of that is the fuel and fertilizer use but most is the methane and N2O production - largely in the intestinal system in the ruminants. Swine produce a lot less greenhouse gas. I think that climate change is the biggest environmental danger we face.
That being said, I'm not that big on pork, except for bacon. I try to eat less meat and more vegetarian food, already.
We had some interesting discussions of sustainability in the Aussie fish&chips thread. I'm not against eating wild meat but I don't think we can use that to replace agriculture to any significant degree.
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If someone orders a vegetarian pasta and gets a load of bacon in it, sure, that is a mistake. How do you know who's mistake it was? Maybe someone grabbed the wrong pasta for another person and took it to the wrong table. It happens. To summarily decide that a server doesn't deserve any tip based on a mistake like that says more about you. I chalk it up to some sort of elitist attitude.
There are mistakes and mistakes. I think a diner should be sympathetic but it isn't their responsibility to second guess the cause of a restaurant's problems. How is that elitist?
I had a similar experience as a young poor student. Took my vegetarian girl friend to a restaurant, checked with the waiter that a dish is (or could be served as - I forget exactly) vegetarian. She was served a dish with meat slices in it. We sent it back and the waiter brought the replacement - the same dish with most of the meat picked out, except for the pieces overlooked at the bottom of the plate where she discovered them while eating. Maybe not the waiter's "mistake"??? I don't care - he is our contact with the kitchen, and responsible for our service. He should have been aware of what was going on, he is the one who should be providing a proper fix for the problem once he was informed. And if it wasn't his problem he should engage management to fix the problem and smooth ruffled feathers.
Oh, and I did tip, anyway. There are few circumstances I can think of where I wouldn't leave a tip.
I think the OP asked a reasonable question that should be taken at face value. If I was seated at a table with water dripping on it I would ask to be moved. If that didn't happen, I'd probably walk out. He has reason to be annoyed if his order isn't taken in reasonable time - particularly if it is clear the place isn't that busy or that others are getting much better service.
Under the North American system, shouldn't the tip should reflect the service? It sucks for the waiter and it sucks for the customer. But overall if the service is good the waiter will do ok. Why else would the dollar value be higher at a fancy place than at a diner? Perhaps if a good waiter is working in a place that is so poorly managed that they can't present a quality meal, then they should look for work elsewhere.
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I made the Tacoma Screw for my niece. You could sub grenadine for the Cassis and skip the float. And, yes, the name is sophomoric.
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Having a vegetarian visitor and am wondering if anyone has ideas for eating in Melbourne. Probably going for weekend lunch before or dinner after footy at either Etiad or MCG (won't be able to see my Kangas). So we won't be dressed to the nines.
Dairy/eggs are ok, doesn't have to be vegan. And a place that serves meat but has a decent selection of non-meat dishes would do.
Thanks for any suggestions.
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Either some non-citrus "adult" drink because my DB tends to prefer the sours and I often follow along if I'm getting out the shaker, or I use it as a chance to try new recipes or work on new ideas.
I'm not adverse to sticking to wine, though.
Right now, it's a cocktail with Wild Turkey rye, Maraschino, demarara simple, and Fees Old Fashioned bitters built on rocks. Too sweet, I guess I'd better add more rye...
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Dreary day and I had the oven on so I thought I'd do a very loose interpretation of the Smoking Bishop:
pierce about a dozen cloves into the skin of a small orange, place in a bowl and put in the oven with whatever else you are doing and roast until the skin is slightly brown and the orange is getting soft. Muddle the orange in a bowl with 3 teaspoons demerara sugar. Place the orange in a pan with 1 stick cinnamon, 8 oz merlot, 4 oz ruby port, and 1 oz Campari. Heat and strain into a large mug. Grate nutmeg on top.
I think next time I'd do 50:50 wine:port. The Campari is a pretty interesting sub for grapefruit.
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Fine-tuning a genever toddy for the bar at which I'll be working, and I'm curious to know if anyone out there has recipes for such a thing.
Did this turn out?
The greatest food quotes ever
in Food Media & Arts
Posted
A friend of my parents said:
"I don't make love to 14 year old girls and I don't drink beaujolais nouveau."
- Bruce McDonald