Chris Hennes

I don't find the taste of the egg to be particularly prominent, it's primarily a textural element. The cheese and cured pork are providing the bulk of the flavor, IMO.

No disagreement at all: my objection is in uncooked or barely-cooked applications. I personally use vermouth in place of white wine when it's going to be cooked even when I have the white wine, because I like it better much of the time. I've never seen the Worcestershire/soy sub recommended, where is that from?

In my opinion, any application where the wine is uncooked, or only cooked to a low temperature: for example, marinades that rely on white wine. I don't think any of us would argue that the taste of white wine is more than superficially similar to the taste of vermouth in their uncooked state. While I am sure there are examples of uncooked applications where it might still taste good, to pretend that it's an equivalent substitution strikes me as, well... BS. I keep coming back to the example that spurred this topic on: epazote. For those not familiar with the stuff, let me try to concoct an equivalent example. Imagine a recipe for "pesto genovese" that suggested that if you can't find basil, you can use cilantro instead. Cilantro has a very strong flavor. So does basil. And they are both green and leafy! But who would argue this is a reasonable substitution? If you can't get basil, you simply don't make pesto genovese, it's as simple as that.

There is no caveat there, no "except in this or that case." Simple, literal "an excellent substitute." Not even an "adequate" substitute! "Excellent"! And of course it works sometimes: a beurre blanc is actually quite good with vermouth. But to simply state that you can make the substitution at any time is crazy.

So because some people don't know what an ingredient tastes like, it must not matter that replacing changes the taste of the final recipe? I refuse to buy into that. If there is no reasonable substitute, don't choose an unreasonable one! As an example of this kind of unreasonable substitution: Load of crap, if you ask me. There are a few rare circumstances where vermouth can be used to good effect, though of course it will dramatically change the taste of the final product. But she presents it like you can go ahead and do it whenever you want! The fact of the matter is, sometimes you have to accept that if you can't find the ingredient, you can't make the dish.

I maintain that recommending cilantro as a substitute for epazote is BS, pure and simple. Naturally there is a "reason": to sell more cookbooks! I think it's misleading, and I don't think you should do it. And I certainly don't expect all my cookbooks to include things like "half teaspoon of salt (unless you have hypertension, then omit it, it's all the same)". People on restrictive diets are a separate case: if you are writing a cookbook specifically for them, by all means, substitute away! But don't go telling us that it's OK to substitute things willy-nilly and hell you won't be able to taste the difference anyway.

KD1191, that's a substitution I don't have a problem with. I've had several mayonnaise cakes that were just fine: in cakes that don't rely on butter as a primary flavor, using mayo instead of eggs and oil makes sense and works fine.

How about a sample recipe? How are we supposed to evaluate?

Polvorones Sevillanos from Fiesta at Rick's. Seriously, four ingredients: flour, sugar, cinnamon, and lard. A beautiful thing!

Polvorones Sevillanos (Seville-Style "Sandy" Shortbread Cookies) (pp. 320–321) These cookies have four ingredients in them, so it's absolutely critical that you use the best quality you can get your hands on. In particular, the two main flavors are from the cinnamon (I used Rancho Gordo Canela) and the lard (yes, lard, and I used fresh-rendered from my local mercado). The instructions called for mixing everything by hand: I'm lazy, so I asked Bayless via Twitter if I could use the stand mixer: his reply was "Barely. Too much mixing chgs texture." So of course I went ahead with it. I dunno if I totally ruined them or what, but the texture is surreal, the simply dissolve into nothing in your mouth. They are very fragile, so it could be that I overmixed them. But the flavor! Fresh lard, toasted flour, and RG canela (... a LOT of canela), all came through clear as day, and they were delicious. There is nothing subtle about these cookies: they better be your last course, you will be tasting that cinnamon all night. My wife wasn't so sure what she thought of them: she says they are "good, but in a novelty sort of way. You couldn't eat a whole lot of them." So I only ate a half dozen before I called it quits. Isn't there some kind of scientific research that says that lard is good for you? Here are to two flours side-by-side: the beige one has been toasted. They don't brown when you bake them: Finally, coated in powdered sugar:

I can't have Oreo cookies in my house. I will and have eaten entire packages in a single sitting. Dipped in milk, regular variety only, please. You can keep your doublestuff golden cakester whatever-the-heck-they-are. And I better not catch you with any damn Hydrox!! Any other Oreo fans?

I keep hearing good things about these deep-fried oreos. Still, I'm scared. Are these the regular, of the doublestuff?

I just made cookies whose only fat was lard. There is no substitute.

To me this suggests that the pan size is not the culprit: if the pan were too large you'd expect the cake to be overdone, not underdone. So if it's not the pan size, and it's not the ingredients... have you checked the oven's temperature recently? Is it possible that it's not heating up properly anymore?

Camarónes a la Diabla (Devilish Shrimp) (pp. 136–137) kalypso has previously posted about a riff on this recipe. I made is almost entirely as written, though Bayless suggests Tamazula hot sauce, and I used Valentina. The hot sauce makes up a very large percentage of the final sauce, so choose... wisely. I really enjoyed the final dish, though I must admit to slightly overcooking the shrimp: I had my burner turned all the way up, but they just weren't searing fast enough. Maybe next time I'll break out the wok. Actually, from the photo, it looks like Rick might do these on the grill... or maybe he just keeps them warm there while serving? Hard to say based on one picture.

I'd be surprised if enough chicken-tasting juices were being removed from the bird through dilution to really matter: I'm not convinced that the flavor of a chicken is concentrated in the intracellular liquid, and my experience certainly does not echo yours regarding the flavor dilution. Adding salt is known to improve our tastebuds' ability to discern flavors, it's a fundamentally different mechanism than concentrating flavors by removing water. Fixing oversalting is straightforward enough, just use a less-saturated salt solution. In fact, I'd argue that is far easier to do than getting a dry rub right.

I don't quite follow your reasoning here: we add salt in modest quantities to enhance our ability to perceive flavors. I don't see how the salt is "diluting the natural flavors": in my experience, it enhances them. It doesn't mask the natural flavors any more than just cooking the food does. A bit of fond never bothered me one bit, even if it does "dilute the natural flavors."

With the smoothtop I've gotten pretty adept at sliding the pans on and off the heat to regulate temperature: sometimes I don't even bother to turn the heat down, if I know I'm going to just turn it back up. And talk about easy to clean! Seriously, it's not like I've never used gas; I just think the advantages are overblown. Any smoothtop, electric resistance or induction, blows a home gas range (including those fancy wannabe pro models) out of the water, in a home-cooking setting. And don't get me started on those pathetic "wok burners" they include in some of them. 22k BTUs? Not even close to useful, I complain about my 65k burner not putting out enough heat.

This is the first I've heard of this: so pouring a soda over colder ice makes it fizz more? Is it something like less CO2 can stay dissolved at colder temps?

Ceviche de Hongos (Mushroom Ceviche) (p. 153) I tried to approach this with an open mind, but the fact of the matter is that I don't really care for raw mushrooms. And sure enough, I didn't really care for them in this application either. At the moment the only decent-looking mushrooms in the stores here were oysters and cremini: the shiitake looked like crap, so I didn't use them. Texturally, if you like raw mushrooms you won't have a problem here, the marinade doesn't change them that much. But holy lime juice, batman. I have this problem with a lot of traditional ceviches, though, so maybe it's just me: all I taste is the lime, the other ingredients are completely obscured. Any raw-mushroom-lovers out there willing to give this a try and hopefully give it more of a fair chance?

Full disclosure: I like Kraft Mac & Cheese (in particular the spiral variety). So, if Kraft wants to give me a free box of some new variety, I'm going to take them up on the offer. In this weekend's paper there was such a coupon, so today for lunch I had Kraft's new "Cheddar Explosion" variety. From the box: Here is the packaging in all it's explosion-tastic glory: So again, in the interest of full disclosure: I never prepare the spiral variety according to the package directions. For starters, I actually use the "classic" proportions of milk and butter, which results in a much higher fat sauce. Second, I discard about 1/3 of the pasta, but use the full amount of sauce. So by Kraft's definition I was already eating "cheddar explosion." In theory, this stuff should be right up my alley. But—and I realize this throws all sense of fair comparison out the window—for this review I followed the package instructions to the letter, using all of the pasta, and not cranking up the quantity of butter. My basic verdict: needs more butter! Now, before you think I've gone all Paula Dean on you: in the old days, the spiral variety called for three tablespoons of margarine per box. This newfangled stuff calls for 1/2 tablespoon of butter. I have no idea if they actually changed the formula for the cheez to compensate, or if they just figured no one would notice. But there is at least some historical justification for the sextupling of the butter quantity in the preparation. Point two: the larger spirals hold more cheez, and that's good, to a point. My usual technique for the regular spirals results in a very over-sauced pasta, but that was the whole point, and I was OK with it. With these larger spirals the sauce is actually attached to pasta, decreasing the sauce-to-pasta ratio: maybe my Italian friends would appreciate this shift, but I'm not sold. Last, and this may be related to the lack of butter, it had a sort of odd metallic/minerally aftertaste that lingered for a while after I finished it. I don't recall this from the original product, but I can't imagine they are actually using a different sauce here, so presumably it's just in the preparation. I think I'll stick with my modified preparation of the original Spirals.

I sympathise with cookbook authors, I really do. You try to make your book appeal to a larger audience, so you have to use ingredients that everyone can get. Which means that even though your recipe calls for epazote (very hard to find in the US), you suggest... well, what tastes like epazote? At ALL? That would be precisely nothing, the flavor is totally unique. So, something that is green, then! Like cilantro. Yeah, right, what a crap substitution. Better to leave it out. Believe me, if you've ever tasted epazote, you understand how ridiculous it is to use cilantro in its place. Or what about those "and to make this lower fat, substitute the butter with applesauce." Say WHAT? What crazy suggested substitutions have you seen?

What do you hate about your electric? I've got an electric smoothtop and you couldn't pay me to replace it with gas.

Camarónes a la Mexicana con Aguacate (Avacado-Dressed Shrimp a la Mexicana) (p. 146) These were good, but not mind-blowing. The ingredients were simple and the flavors familiar: mostly lime and cilantro, white onion and tomato. Sort of like a salsa with shrimp in it, and thickened with avacado (whose flavor is lost, but the texture is nice). The flavors here just don't "pop" the way yesterday's Cóctel de Camarón did.

Picked up a bottle of that Del Maguey Mezcal Crema de Mezcal when I was in SFO earlier this month, but hadn't had a chance to play until tonight. I started out just making a margarita, but cutting way back on the cointreau (the Crema has agave syrup in it). I'm not sure what the appropriate proportions wound up being, there was a bit of trial and error. Very interesting margarita, but not so sure it's a keeper.