KennethT

ok... so I need help... what am I doing wrong? My first attempt used King Arthur "Italian style" flour - http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/...tyle-flour-3-lb I mixed about 2 cups of dry flour with about a half teaspoon of SAF instant yeast, then mixed with water for a 70% hydration by weight, but it looked a little dry, so I added a bit more water so it would all come together so probably a 72-73% hydration... This was mixed in a large stainless steel bowl, covered with plastic wrap and fermented at room temp overnight for probably about 15 hours or so... Then, I poured the extremely wet and sticky dough into a ziplock bag (poured is not exactly accurate - more like scooped handfuls of dough and slopped into the bag) and let sit in the refrigerator (about 37F) for 7 days.... On the day of baking, I put a large terracotta saucer upside down in my cold oven - then set the temp of my oven to about 250 to gently preheat the stone... then cranked the heat to 500-550F and let it sit for over an hour.... My oven thermometer which has a max of 500 was reading way off the scale... I took the dough out of the refrigerator probably about 2 hours before use... and when I had my mise complete (first trial was filetti style - cherry tomatoes, buffala mozzerella, basil, EVO, salt) put a crapload of AP flour on my work board.... scooped out a large handful of extremely wet/sticky dough (which stuck to the bag, my forearms, seemingly everywhere) and put on the pile of flour - I then dusted the top of the blob with a generous dusting of AP flour and gave the dough a couple of folds before I nudged/stretched it with my fingertips... For King Arthur to claim their flour makes an extensible dough is an understatement - if I would have sneezed, the dough would have ripped apart... Then quickly throwing on the toppings and slid it onto my stone with great difficulty - I'll definitely try the parchment paper trick next time!!! But, to my surprise, I did not find a soft pillowy crust as a result... instead, the outside of the crust was hard like a crusty breadstick, while the inside was soft-ish... Baking time was approx. 7 minutes.... What did I do wrong? Help!!!!!

I tried this method for the first time this evening... success!!! I tried it on a dish I do every few weeks - flank steak cooked 131F for about 36 hours - I find it's still a bit tough after 24, 36 hours is a bit better... Typically, I would remove from the bag, blot with paper towels, sprinkle with wondra flour, then sear in a smoking pan with grapeseed oil or peanut oil (high smoke point).... Tonight, I tried a medium hot pan (grapeseed oil was not smoking) and a 4% glucose wash.... I found out the hard way that less is more with this application as the first side was a little wet and splattered all over the place when it hit the medium-hot oil... but still, in very little time, I got great color and since the heat was lower, it didn't cook through more than 1mm or so... I was thinking about making a big jar of 4% wash that way I don't have to mix it fresh every time I need it... do you think I should refrigerate it after mixing or can I keep it sealed in the cupboard?

Pat O's hurricane is like cough syrup on steroids... yum.... Did you hang out by the flaming fountain??? Classic... It's a shame you were there in August after live crawfish season... while Acme is touristy and reknowned for their oysters (deservedly so), they have IMO the best boiled crawfish in the french quarter - great boil flavor, big, plump, juicy crawfish.... and I think I've sampled every crawfish in hte immediate area... I can't wait until next year's season starts!!!!

I agree with the concensus that behind the stovetop may not be the best place for the spices... I also keep my spices in the magnetic canisters - but I bought a 24 x 36" white board from staples and hung it on a wall in the corner... that way, I put just about all of my spices in there and i don't have to make choices! One thing I find about the canisters is that they tend to get a little sticky and hard to open sometimes... Some things I use a lot that you don't have up there are coriander and cumin, herbs de provence... and piment d'espelette... don't know what I'd do without it!! I guess it all has to do with whatever you use the most...

success!!!! I tried again using Dave's quick agar method (no freezing - just set in ice bath until set, then break up the curds and press through cheesecloth).. it worked great - I now have a pale greenish clear mint water that has a great mint aroma... A few things that I think helped: Vit C powder when pureeing the mint... plus I used a food processor rather than the blender - no, it didn't puree the mint as thoroughly, but the food processor didn't cook my mint while doing it... Tri - I think your idea of using gelatin is a great one - but one person who will be (hopefully) enjoying the mint water is vegetarian and while there technically wouldn't be any gelatin in the water, I don't know how much of a sticking point it would be if she knew that gelatin was used in the process... Thanks for the help! Ken Edited to correct my crappy grammar

John, thanks for the link... I had actually read those articles in the past, which sparked my idea for the clear mint liquid... I think my biggest problem is that the mint cooked in the blender and oxidized - the resulting brown liquid, while being minty, did have an oxidized note - you don't have that problem with OJ because there's already so many anti-oxidants in it... but thinking about it - if you cut up a bunch of mint and leave it out, what happens? It turns brown at the edges... like an apple...

So, yesterday, I tried to make a clear mint liquid using agar filtration. The resulting 'consomme' which came from the dripping agar puck was "clear" but it was also brown!!! It has an intense mint smell... I think one problem started when I was pureeing the mint in the blender - I think the speed of the blender actually cooked the mint a bit - because when I went to strain the liquid it was quite warm... but the mint puree was a dark green color... To mix with the agar, I heated the agar with a small quantity of boiling water, then, when dissolved, I mixed this hot water/agar mix into my strained warm mint liquid. Then put into a plastic bag and froze.... After frozen, I put the pieces into a strainer lined with cheesecloth and waited - about an hour later, I checked it, and what was dripping out was a clear brown liquid... by now, all dripping has stopped and I'm left with a dark green sludge in the strainer, and clear brown mint liquid... I guess the mint liquid oxidized... should I have added some VitC powder or something to my puree to keep it from oxidizing? What else could I have done to prevent this?? I'm still figuring out how to post the pics here - but there's a folder in the ImageGullet with them...

Thanks... are they intended to be eaten raw, or slightly cooked? Also, what are they supposed to taste like?

I recently got a gift of some greek caper leaves, packed in brine... the question is - what to do with them? I haven't tasted them yet, but I gather they taste like capers, but there's a bitterness to them... Any ideas?

I've seen different types of butters (salted, unsalted, goat's milk butter) etc... or lardo that's been infused with rosemary, then whipped and piped into the dish... or olive oil with olives pureed into the oil...

I like the idea of a somewhat varied menu... plus, I think the idea of a steak tasting is fantastic - so people can compare a grass-fed to standard or wagyu or maybe even different aging times - which I know can be logistically difficult, but with computerized inventory management, I don't see why it couldn't be manageable....

I was thinking about serving a little Iberico ham for a friend's birthday coming up in a few days... what's the best way to serve it? I know that Robuchon does it on grilled bread with a fine dice of tomato and microbasil... but I don't think that that's traditional... Is it more traditional to grill the bread slices, then rub a tomato over the surface? Any other ideas?

I also like striped bass, but another good one is black bass... I actually find that it is better SV than any other method because it is so easy to overcook... I think I did it at 117F the last time and it came out great - moist, flaked perfectly... I think you can usually get it at the Lobster Place for $8.99pp....

Interesting... back in a thread from 2005, WD said that it was a cold set product and that they mix, extrude, then set in refrig overnight and poach the next day... 646522 is his eGullet name.... here's what he wrote back then: And then later that day: I wonder if he's still doing it that way, or doing it differently now, more than 4 years later.... ETA to try to make the quotes more obvious...

My first two experiments with Ajimoto Activa transglutaminase GS are complete - one a complete success, the other an utter failure... Experiment number one is Frankenduck... I took 2 pekin duck breasts, removed the skin/fat from each, and completely removed all tendons, ligaments, connective tissue and tenderloins.... once the removal was complete, I brushed on my slurry (1:4 by weight) and glued the 2 reconstructed breasts together with the detendoned tenderloins, then glued one piece of skin with most of the fat sliced away on top. Wrapped tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight... The result, when sliced across the breast, the seams are invisible and it is impossible to tell that this was ever 2 pieces of meat! Even the fat/skin glued on perfectly... what a great product.... The failure was an attempt at the now infamous shrimp noodles... I was planning on pureeing shrimp, run through a tamis, then combine with the slurry and flatten the paste between 2 sheets of plastic wrap... then, when bonded, i would cut the "noodles" with a knife - like making fettucine by hand from a sheet of dough... the problem was that the shrimp didn't bond - so the next day, I took off the plastic wrap only to find that my paste is still, well... pastey.... In defense of the TG, I didn't weigh howmuch shrimp I had, or how much slurry I added to the shrimp - I did it by eye... also, the slurry was the left-over slurry from the duck which had sat in the refrig. for about 24 hours prior to shrimp... basically, I did the duck one evening, and put the remainder of the slurry into the refrig... the next evening, I checked outthe duck and was so pleased I said "what else can I glue???"... after searching the freezer and refrigerator, the only protein I had readily available was the shrimp... it thought about doing a shrimp steak or other Frankenshrimp idea... but just decided to puree it and try the noodles... So anyway, there are a couple of areas for error here... I'll try it again with fresh TG and measured weights to have a better trial...

I'd like to thank everyone here for turning my wife and me on to Allegretti... we went last night, and it was excellent, both for the price, and regardless of price. I know it's summertime, and restaurants are typically less full, but including ours, there were 7 tables occupied all evening... such a shame - I really hope this place can survive this! Here's what we had: Grilled quail: It was perfectly cooked - nice and charred on the outside and rare on the inside - just the way it should be, IMO... it came with a lovely salad of cucumber and shaved celery witha yogurt dressing... Prawns on a stick (not the actual name): here, there were 3 shrimp (all perfectly cooked) on a rosemary spear, served with a variety of baby vegetables in a sauce I don't remember what was in it - but it was delicious and addictive. Tagliatelle with shrimp, octopus, calamari, etc... the octopus was maybe the most tender I've ever had.. and all other items cooked perfectly as well - I'm sure they must have cooked all seafood items separately and combined at the end... pasta was nicely al dente, with another addictive sauce Branzino with stuffed calamari- I feel a bit like a broken record, but the fish and calamari were both perfectly cooked - the fish was juicy, flaky, and the skin was nice a crisp... the calamari tender with a very tasty stuff, I don't happen to remember - but I remember it was great too.... All together with a lovely $32 rose from Provence.... We will definitely be returning here!

I bought 10 pounds of the same thing from CajunGrocer a while ago... I found the same problem - many of the shrimp have thin shells, or rough shells and are pretty hard to peel... Once I finish this amount, I don't knowif I'd get them again... they do have a nice shrimpy taste to them, though...

Yep... I actually got unbelievably lucky... my wife and I had talked about going back to UPN one last time before the rumored close - we were debating going this weekend or next... turned out we had some time on Sunday and decided to head down there around 7:30... turned out, we were the last people on line when thye came out and said that after us, they were to run out of dough!!! What crazy insane luck is that! I had to have that filetti one more time - and it was good to be able to finally convince my wife, who prior to this said the margherita was her favorite... now it's a tie... I hope Motorino can get that same dough -I loved his dough!!!

BKF is good, but I've found that a much easier solution to getting rid of the polymerized fat on hte inside is to fill the pan with water, dump in a bunch of baking soda, and let boil for 10-20 minutes.... Comes out factory clean with virtually no elbow grease... plus, the baking soda residue gets all over the stovetop, which when you wipe it away cleans that too... hehe... I don't know if this is ok with non-stick though...

I've been writing to one of the USA sales managers of Ajiusa and am ANXIOUSLY awaiting my samples... he has given me some pointers in addition to what is on the website: This is what he said: "Because ACTIVA is a live enzyme, it is affected by both oxygen and moisture. For this reason, ACTIVA is packed in a sealed foil pouch lined with its own oxygen barrier layer. The shelf you can obtain, once opened, will depend upon how long the bag remains open and under what conditions. We recommend opening the bag and taking out what you intend to use and then closing it immediately. If you have the capability, I generally recommend heat sealing and place in a vacuum bag and keeping it in the freezer. This will give you the longest shelf life. Six months is possible, three months for sure." Also, in a different email, he wrote: "Here are a couple of quick pointers on the use of the ingredient. Please, first and foremost, remember the enzyme will experience oxidation in the presence of air. When you receive the samples - don't open the pouches along the "tear lines" in the top of the 100 g pack, take pair of scissors and cut the corner of the bag at an angle - just enough to pour out the volume that you want to work with. Then with the remaining material - fold the mylar bag opening over a couple of times - and seal it with a paperclip or binder clip. If you have a small cryovac machine - you could vacuum the open sample before placing it back in to the freezer. An even better option is to heat seal the open pouches. These small samples have an oxygen absorber capsule in the bag - whereas the commercial 1 Kg Bags have an oxygen absorbing film separating the ACTIVA from the oxygen absorber. I only mention this to make you aware if you use the entire 100g sample at one time, you must be aware not to pour the oxygen capsule into your vessel of the substrate (beef, fish, pork, etc….)." Edited to add more content

Jean-Francois - most circulators have an 'auto-tune' function - you just have to read the manual to find out how to initiate it. Once you run the auto-tune (the process takes about an hour, usually), the circulator will set the P, I and D values, along with some other values, into memory that work best for the situation it was tuned with. These values tell the heater how much power and how fast to react to any changes in the system - like adding a cold piece of chicken. Changing anything, liek the water volume, insulation of the vessel, covered vs uncovered, etc. will necessitate changing these values since it will affect how fast the volume of water heats and cools. For instance, let's say you have a heavily insulated vessel that is covered to minimize evaporation... well, evaporation is a cooling process, so the less water that evaporates, the less heat the system needs to keep it at the same temperature. If you take the cover off, you get more evaporation, more cooling, hence the heater has to run with more power to keep the temperature of the system stable. I guess the bottom line is to read the manual and find out how to turn on the auto-tune function with your circulator. If, for some reason, yours doesn't have an autotune, then I suggest reading a bit about how to set the PID values and play around with it to get it to work properly. There's tons of information on the internet and I think somewhere in this thread about how to tune your PID system. Maybe you want to try a search in this thread for "autotune" or "tune" or something..... Hope this helps...

The issue is the effect of time on the tuning parameters of the controller. When I put my 1KW circulator in the regular 10 liter bath, it responds quickly in a 0.4 degree F range. When I mount it in a large poly cooler (~50 liters) it is much slower and reset functions cause greater over and under shoot. There is no problem heating a million liter bath, if your insulation is adequate. Paul ← Paul - yes, of course the same 1KW of power will take much longer to heat 5X the volume of water, and that mass of water will take much longer to cool - so it's slower to respond in general. However, if tuned properly, your circulator should not overshoot or undershoot much more than normal. Do you autotune it each time you change bath sizes? In theory, every time a parameter changes, (i.e. the bath size changes, or you add insulation to the bath, or you decide to cover it when it was tuned uncovered, etc., ) you should re-tune your circulator parameters, otherwise, it will use the same parameters for all situations, which is not a good fit. Or, if you constantly alternate between a couple of situations, you should autotune each and copy down the settings. That way, when you change situations, you can just enter in the new settings as opposed to running a lengthy autotune every time.

Time is mostly dependent on thickness of the package... if you look in the first 10 pages or so of the main Sous Vide page, there is a chart that correlates time to thickness. Also, you can see Douglas Baldwin's website for that info also... you can find his site with a google search for his name and sous vide. Just make sure the package isn't thicker than 4 inches - because it takes so long for the inside to come up to temperature that it wouldn't be safe. Personally, I like veal loin on the medium rare side - so I would SV it at like 128F to 130F... or so... but if you have eggs in your meatball mixture, you may want to cook it at 131F for at least 89 minutes after the time it reaches full temp in the center so that you get rid of any salmonella/listeria that may be lurking around...

hmmm.. I have no problems with ziplock bags leaking.. just don't use the zipper ones.. the ones with the double seal work great... It's actually pretty easy to get all the air out - just dip the open bag in a big pot of water and the water pushes the extra air out... close the seal while the water is up to the top of the bag. I used to use a Food Saver for everything, but now I never use it - I'm on a ziplock only diet... so far I find it works great - dare I say better than the food saver.. no problems with liquids in the bags, etc... actually, I still use the food saver for high temp stuff - because I'm not 100% on the plastic leachingness of the ziplocks at higher temps.. I've recently emailed SC Johnson about this - I'm curious about their response - I'm assuming it'll be a bunch of CYA-type stuff - like "they aren't intended for that type of service".... we'll see... I'll post something if I hear anything interesting.

Very interesting... I could be completely off-base, but it seems like the high vacuum could be boiling the osmatic fluid in the muscle cells, rupturing the cell wall... during cooking, some liquid is escaping the cell, moistening the meat, but making it dry inside... so, to the tongue it tastes dry and mushy.... I wonder what the test results would be if comparing a zip-lock bag with the air squeezed out? Many restaurants in NYC previously approved to do SV are now running into problems where some inspectors will not allow them to use their vacuum machines... in these cases, it's common for them to use zip-lock bags instead... I know one chef who is so happy with the zip-lock bags that even if he was allowed to use his vacuum machine, he may stick with the zip-locks... the only problem is the added cost...