nickrey

As most have said, adding something complementary to your base that has been cooked with no salt is probably the best fix. Another approach is to manipulate the balances of other flavour ingredients in the food. Consider the food as a balance between sweet, sour, salty, piquant/hot (and bitter, but this probably doesn't apply to this particular soup). Your soup is too heavy on the salt component for your taste. You can adjust this by adding sweetness, sourness, and/or hotness to correct the imbalance. The overall volume of the flavour profile will increase (ie. it will be more flavourful or tasty) but the balance will fit your preferences better.

It seems that saba is vincotto under another name.

I had a Zyliss and used to cut myself regularly so much so that I got myself a protective glove. Got a Benriner and the problem went away. I now seldom wear the glove because it is so effective. I never do waffle cuts so it's not an issue.

Thanks for the feedback, looking forward to more. With my rice cooker set up, I always run my mixer tap with a thermometer under it until it reaches the correct temperature (or actually a few degrees higher to counter the drop that occurs when I add the cooler meat). You can then add your meat to the cooker and fill it up to the correct level with the already appropriately heated water. Saves a lot of time.

Well, don't keep us in suspense! What is it like?

Try contacting Marycarmen Aguilera at Fireworks foods to see if she will ship to Asia from Australia.

I just couldn't read through all this thread without thinking of music. Composers do "variations on a theme." They do "improvisations." Jazz, in particular, takes these concepts and moves them forward. Listening to jazz, you can identify common musical phrases but then the music takes you to an unexpected place using complex variations. If the music is not integrated and played by a more than competent musician, it can sound forced and discordant. This is the same sort of feeling I get when trying "MG" or similar food by people who don't understand the requirement to create a balanced, self contained, product. If you are talking about teasing simple but complete structures from complex processes in a hitherto unrealised fashion how about calling it "emergent cuisine?" This would be a realised version of "emerging cuisine" and captures the forward motion and discovery that people have talked about here.

You most likely need a sharp and/or sour taste to round out the flavour profile. Lemon juice was mentioned above but I'd probably go for sour cream/creme fraiche added just before serving and stirred through. You could also add some mustard to the dish to give both sharp and hot.

My place for one

I spotted another copy on Saturday. Just to be sure, I had another look at it and my opinion is still the same. I agree with johung; it is food porn with lovely pictures rather than a recipe book that would interest most here.

You can get special tape that seals the vacuum around a fine probe thermometer and measure core temperature that way. On the other hand, some of our more technically minded contributors (thank you Nathan M) have calculated the time taken given the conductivity of the meat for the centre to reach the target temperature. As a consequence, we do not use probe thermometers but rather use time in the cooker as our guide. Moreover unlike conventional cooking, where the cooking temperature far exceeds the target temperature, in sous-vide cookery you typically use the target temperature or just slightly higher. In this way, the risk of overcooking disappears; although that having been said there appear to be some additional changes that happen to the texture of the meat if you leave it in too long.

I second Chris' suggestion to use it for an added umami hit at the end of cooking. I use ground dried shiitake mushrooms that are kept in a container -- no need to freshly grind them each time, just keep the powder cool and dry.

With the Sous Vide Magic and a rice cooker, this is easy Mitch. If people are interested in safety, you cannot go past Douglas Baldwin's sous vide guide. He runs through all the temperature and time combinations for different thicknesses of foods being cooked. I've been looking enviously at the sous vide supreme but do not know when it is going to come to us in Australia or what the cost is going to be. According to the publicity blurbs, Heston Blumenthal has used it in his experimental kitchen and considers it as good as the professional models. It doesn't have a circulator but judging from what people have measured in terms of temperature with similar set ups, this is not really a consideration unless you cram the device full of things to cook. Even then, the sous vide supreme has a neat little rack into which you can load your food to keep it separate. I use my SVM plus rice cooker all the time. The meat is exceptional. Even with casseroles, I now do the sauce and vegetables separately and then add the sous-vide cooked meat at the end. The texture is different from what you'd expect so it adds another level of interest into the final product.

I don't know about Melbourne but I've found someone in Sydney who I can trust with my Japanese knives. Give Leigh a call at Chef's Armoury. He runs a service via registered post that you should be able to use.

Others may have liked your excellent summary of deconstruction a la Derrida but this one sounds like the history of philosophy encompassed in a short sentence Let's not forget that semantics is bound by the structure in which it is encased, which is the language, culture and traditions within which it is written. Now consider dishes as being embodied in a language, a culture, and a tradition. Deconstruct the dish to its basic elements, respect the language, culture, and traditions without being slaves to them; then reconstruct while retaining all the elements except the dogmatism and you have the essence of "deconstructed" gastronomy. For people from the culture, this removal of dogmatism means that they will often be surprised, sometimes entranced and, if they are traditionalists, more often than not offended. Cooks who concentrate solely on the ingredients are really missing the point.

A Maillard reaction won't happen in either a pressure cooker or a more traditional stock pot without higher temperature heat applied in a process such as frying or roasting. The best way to get the effect is to roast the chicken bones to brown them before you complete the cooking in the pressure cooker. With the onions, you can brown them in the pressure cooker (using it as a frypan) prior to adding the other ingedients or simply do them in a separate frypan and then add them to the other ingredients prior to cooking. If you want heaps of flavour, try roasting the carrots as well.

I looked at a copy I found at Borders Carlton (Melbourne, Australia), and it certainly is a physically large book. On first impressions, I thought, "Wow! This is amazing." It is a stunning looking production. But browsing through it, I found it to be disappointing, especially at the price. There seemed to be a lot of filler in terms of photographs of Thai street markets, and as for the recipes, many of them looked similar to those that can be found in his (brilliant and essential imho) book, "Thai Food". There was even a chapter on "Chinatown", and the recipes in there are ones that you'll find in many other books. Keep in mind, this is just a first impression from me. I would recommend anyone thinking of buying the book (especially online) should check it out first before committing to a purchase. If the book was in a smaller format and at a cheaper price, then I think it would be better value. My first impression was much the same, that's why I didn't buy it when I saw it a few weeks ago.

Cookbooks are quite expensive here but when I said "large format" I meant something to the effect of "fancy coffee-table picture book." You wouldn't have this one in your kitchen slopping fish sauce over it.

When I was at the Sydney International Food Festival Chef's Showcase on 10-11 November, they had managed to secure a number of copies, which sold out pretty quickly. As David was there to sign them, some people received an added bonus. The booksellers said it was due to be released publicly in a few weeks. The publishers website says 26th October. From memory (I didn't buy a copy), it is a larger format hardcover with a recommended retail price of A$100. As we are rapidly moving towards parity with the US dollar, you could read that as US$100, plus postage. It is published by Penguin Australia (see this link).

My thinking is that it is a protective mechanism for the unborn baby. Pregnant women seem to detect off flavours much more readily than most people, indicating that they will avoid foods which are potentially dangerous to the child. In fact most seem to do it by smell before they actually eat the food, in answer to the question of when it finishes, my experience (not personal you will understand) is that sometimes it does not disappear at all but becomes part of that person. Seems almost like pregnancy triggered supertasters (I wonder if it is the same mechanism?)

Look up "achaars/achars" on the web, they are Indian pickles made with oil rather than vinegar. Regarding your question of home made or commercial, the answer is both. The oils are used throughout the process and are present in the final product, which typically matures for an amount of time before consumption. From the Indian recipes, I'd have to say in answer to your original question that, yes, oils can be used in pickling very successfully.

When I was fifteen years old a friend's mother who ran a catering business recommended a set of cooking books to me with the phrase "they're really good for men who cook as they tell you why you do things, not just what to do." Accepting the advice, I purchased all eighteen Cordon Bleu monthly cookery course volumes (plus two additional extra volumes) at a rate of one per month. The UK price was 1 pound per volume; I don't remember what the Australian equivalent was. Each went through four lessons (the first volume contained elements such as grilling, roasting, making stocks, cooking casseroles and making pastry). I worked through all elements of eighteen volumes sequentially (one volume per month). I still have the books and, perhaps more importantly, all the basic and advanced skills that I taught myself from books thirty-six years ago. Suppose that goes some way towards explaining my obsession with cooking principles and techniques.

Indian pickles use oil all the time as an ingredient. Of course, they are also much more salty than we would consider normal in more traditional western cooking and as such this may counter any possible negative effects.

A variant on a theme I've made before. Will get it right one day.... Bought some lovely fresh ocean trout today and cooked it sous vide in olive oil for 8 minutes at 68 degree Celsius. Served on a bed of deep fried baby spinach. Accompanied by a cream, onion and wine reduction foam. Topped by salmon roe and finely sliced spring onions. Served with triple cooked chips. Trying to get the whole seaweed, ocean foam thing going but using red rather than white onion spoilt the effect. Next time it will be white onion.

Fireworks Foods has already been mentioned as a possibility. I have actually ordered from them and the service is very good: prompt delivery, really nice products, and much cheaper than the other alternatives. They are a good source for pre-made tortillas if you want those as well. They also stock locally made chilli sauces if that is something you could use. They've been having a bit of trouble with their e-commerce software recently so you may need to email or phone through your order.