Chris Hennes

In the Charcuterie Index we've got an entry for this one: "My belly is soft, what do I do?" : and You may also want to peruse the Making Bacon topic: there is a ton of great info in there as well.

So, apparently me picking you to be in the top three is the kiss of death. I thought for a minute they were finally going to axe Leah. Damn. Well, this episode was head and shoulders better than last week's anyway.

Think of it like this: when you put something warmer than the freezer's air temperature into the freezer, the air surrounding your item warms up while the item cools down. If you put in a fan, you will take this warmer air and move it around, replacing it with the (presumably) colder air elsewhere in the freezer. The trick is, running a motor adds heat (through a couple of mechanisms), so just putting a fan into a regular freezer may or may not help: it will depend on a lot of factors.

I have an eat-in kitchen, and no idea what the heck I would do with a tray. Where are you taking all this food? It sounds like we are talking about fetching ingredients, etc. All of mine are in the kitchen already! I simply cannot think of a single instance in which I could use one.

I've never had, or even heard of, Mafé, until I saw this cook-off. But peanuts are now in season so I bought a big bag of them raw this weekend, along with some turnips, sweet potatoes, and green beans. I roughly followed the guidelines in previous posts, mostly just making it up as I went. I started by sauteeing a standard mirepoix until softened, then added a tablespoon or so of a commercial garam masala blend and got that cooking in the oil for a few minutes to toast the spices. Then I added pureed tomatoes and homemade chicken stock (one 14oz can of tomatoes and three cups of stock). I shelled and roasted a cup of peanuts and pureed them into peanut butter, then added in some of the heated mixture from the pot to loosen it up and make it blend easier. I added this into the pot along with a turnip, and ten minutes later a sweet potato, both cut into 1/2 in. dice. After another ten minutes I added a big handful of green beans, chopped to around 1 in (probably around 2 cups once chopped). Some salt and cayenne to taste, and simmered for another hour or so. This was the result: It was quite tasty, and had a very nice texture from the peanut butter (one cup of peanuts is quite a bit, and has some thickening power). Next time I will wait a little longer before adding the sweet potato, which was overcooked to my taste, but otherwise I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. I don't each much food from this corner of the world, and it's always fun to experiment with new things. I should note that I had originally intended to toss in some roasted chicken I had in the fridge, but in the end I didn't think it needed it. The root vegetables and beans give it plenty of body, and it really didn't feel like it lacked for a protein.

The Food Lover's Companion, alas, has nothing to say about the word pincé. Fortunately, however, the CIA's New Professional Chef does, in the section on brown sauce (Sauce Espagnole):

I generally "caramelize" tomato paste as a last step before adding liquid to the pan. So, for example, I will saute some whatever veg. are included until they are about ready, add tomato paste and cook for, I would say, 60-90 seconds, until the tomato paste is a bit darker, and then add in whatever liquid I am using (tomato puree, stock, whatever). I think the taste difference is pretty noticeable: the tomato paste sticks out less, if that makes any sense.

I love fresh water chestnuts. And actually, I have never had to throw any out for being grey inside, as far as I can recall. Do you have any tricks for peeling them, though? Man, that was pretty tedious, and I felt like I was wasting huge quantities of the good stuff when I trimmed them up.

I can't find my recipe at the moment, but it is very similar to this one by Jean-Georges Vongerichten and Mark Bittman. You will note that it has very little flour in it, which is the key. It is almost a chocolate sauce that hardens on the outside when it bakes. 1/2 cup unsalted butter 4 ounces bittersweet chocolate (use your favorite - this is the flavor!) 2 eggs 2 egg yolks 1/4 cup sugar 2 teaspoons flour Melt the butter and chocolate together until the chocolate is just melted: beat it until it is well-emulsified. Combine everything else except the flour thoroughly, and combine with the chocolate mixture. Briefly add the flour, just until combined. Pour into very well greased and floured molds or cake rings and bake at 450°F for 6-7 minutes, until the outside is just set. Remove from the oven and let them sit for ten minutes before unmolding. Serve immediately.

It may not be worth even trying for you: I like the way it tastes, even raw. If you don't, I'm not sure there's any point in keeping it around for cooking. There must be another brand out there that will suit your tastes.

I would use a "normal" cake recipe -- the molten chocolate cake recipes are specifically designed for that flowing liquid center and I'm not sure how well they would support a "filling". Honestly, though, until you have actually tried one and disliked it, you may have better luck sticking with the normal molten cake recipes. Because of the way they are designed, if you use a good chocolate I don't think there is anything to object to with the filling. It's not like a normal cake batter (at least, not the one I make). Edited to clarify.

I can't decide whether this season is atypically dull or if it was that last season atypically rocked. I think part of the problem is, all of these contestants have seen the previous seasons. They know what is going to get them booted early, and unfortunately that's going out on a limb and failing. Because nothing is cumulative there is no reason at all, ever, to make something awesome. You just have to do better than one other person. So you make things that are safe, that are clearly defensible, that don't have any real chance of failing. Because when you win, you get a fucking cookbook (well, OK, I'd take the Superbowl tickets!), but when you lose, you go home. So you play to not lose.

How confident are you in that spelling? In only ask because the Google Hive Mind has never heard of it, which is pretty unusual! Do you have any idea whether it is a drink, or a dessert, or a brand, or anything?

Hmm. Boneless "cardinal (chicken) wings" on steel skewers? Maybe with some kind of red sauce, paprika maybe? Seems appropriate .

You're right. It's worth it. And it certainly sounds like you're overwhelmed. I can relate, between writing my dissertation and starting a new (paying!) job, I definitely try to find time to cook. I admit that we eat a lot of relatively quick meals (like blueberry pancakes tonight), and I'm not going around making Cassoulet on a regular basis, but even a half hour cooking and cleaning the kitchen is cathartic. For me it is definitely NOT a contributor to stress, it's a relief from it.

I admit, I'm not that familiar with this situation: what's been going on? Were low grape prices causing growers to put in more profitable crops?

I'll second this—I'm a fan of Goya's Extra Virgin for a lot of applications, and it is cheap enough that you definitely don't need to be stingy with it.

Shame I don't have any recipe for "Roasted Cardinals"!! I'm leaning towards nachos, maybe some brats, and plenty of beer.

Weak, weak, and double weak. Too many cooks, not enough time to see the food, and crappy way to get eliminated. I had Jeff pegged as final four. Guess not... On the bright side, not a single inane remark from The Brit.

I made stock in my pressure cooker (actually a 23qt pressure canner) last week and it turned out very well. I basically followed KennethT's method, using about 10 pounds of bones and 2 pounds of feet, plus two carrots, an onion, and two celery stalks. It turned out very well: not crystal clear, but not any cloudier than my typical stovetop stock. Unfortunately, I had the opposite problem you guys are talking about: my pressure canner is by far the largest pot I own, and I had it 2/3 full: I could not keep all the stock I ended up with for want of containers!

I did not inject any brine, I just did a standard "soak-method" brine, estimating at half a day per pound. I actually brined for eleven days for this big hunk, and I think 15 would have been more appropriate (see here for info on the hog). This may have been affected by the temperatures involved, and/or the large temperature swings, but I don't know that for a fact. I pulled it out at 150°F because that's what the recipe said to do. I let it rest for a half hour before cutting into it, at which time is was 152°F at the core. Considering the size, it was probably not fully rested at that point, but I needed it to cool down faster so I cut it into chunks (it was getting late, I wanted to get it packed up and into the freezer). I don't know how much overshoot I would have gotten if I had let it fully rest, but the oven temp was only 200°F, so probably not too much. No proof of that, of course.

This week I made the Hearty Tuscan Bean Stew from the March 2008 Issue (Here if you have online access.). I followed the recipe pretty closely, subbing in homemade chicken stock for the canned stuff and guanciale for the pancetta, but otherwise leaving this one alone. I used some gigantic Rancho Gordo Runner Cannelini beans, which were terrific for this, though they increased the cooking time a bit. Overall this is a very full-flavored, nuanced stew: one of the best versions of this dish I have ever had. I highly recommend whipping up a batch of this if it's cold where you are. And it's pretty economical to boot!

And pecan season is upon us once again! Got to start it off right, and that means pecan pie... this week I used the recipe from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Pie and Pastry Bible. Her secrets, as mentioned above, are using Lyle's Golden Syrup instead of corn syrup, and using unrefined brown sugar (I used a dark Muscavado) in place of regular brown sugar. I amuse myself by arranging the pecans in concentric circles on the crust (the Cook's Illustrated Vodka Crust, in this case): The other reason I like this recipe is the ratio of pecans to filling is high because it's really more of a tart than a pie. Here's what's left by the time I remembered to take a photo:

American-Style Brown-Sugar–Glazed Holiday Ham (1st ed., pp.93–94) Well, I've managed to make a ham without killing myself. As I mentioned up-topic, I could not fit the brining ham in my refrigerator: a quick look at my brining vessel makes the reason obvious: The outside temperature was generally between 30°F and 50°F, so just a bit on the warm side (my refrigerator is generally in the 35°F to 40°F range). The uncured ham weighed in at 23 lbs: it has a lot of thermal mass, so will not respond quickly to temperature changes. Here it is out of the freezer: My strategy was to first off, double the amount of brine (Ruhlman calls for one gallon, I made up two). Secondly, I added a couple of ice packs and covered it with plastic wrap: Finally, 8 hours out of every day, I put it in the chest freezer in my garage (set temp is -5°F). This brought the temperature down to between 20°F and 25°F (still mostly liquid due to the salt). The highest brine temperature I recorded over the ten day curing process was 41°F, or about the temperature of my refrigerator, so I felt pretty good about this strategy (OK, it wasn't great for the freezer, but that freezer is pretty full, I don't thing I had much effect on the stuff in it). After removing it from the brine it gets a quick rinse: In then into the refrigerator for 24 hours: The next morning I put it into the smoker at 200°F: It smoked for 12 hours: here it is partway through— After twelve hours it was still about ten degrees too low (around 140°F), so I pulled it out of the smoker and put in the oven, set to 200°F: About two hours later it finally reached 150°F and I pulled it out: Overall the ham is very good. I skipped Ruhlman's mustard glaze because I suspected this ham was going to take a lot longer than his to cook, and I didn't want the sugar to burn. This was probably a good call: I actually made the glaze later and brushed it on before reheating, which worked very well. The brine penetration was pretty good, but not perfect; there were still some spots internally that were not quite seasoned enough. My ham was much larger than what Ruhlman quotes as the weight of his: I'm not sure what gives there, since the hog was average sized, so I'm not sure his half-day-per-pound rule of thumb was adequate for this behemoth. Now I just have to figure out what to do with a 20 lb ham.

I think that sous vide is probably the best way to squeeze the minimal pork flavor out of this cut. As weinoo suggests, it's not a very flavorful cut, but a quick brine and then cooking it to a relatively low temperature sous vide is my preferred way of handling it as well (of course with a quick sear after cooking). I sometimes skip the brine and just salt it before bagging it up, which is a pretty good substitute for so thin a piece of meat; it doesn't take long for the salt to penetrate (though it also doesn't take long to come up to temp).