Marlene

It looks excellent. Those red knobs make a huge difference. Now for some red toe boards.. . . . .

No pot yet. So the pot roast will be on Friday. For some stupid reason, the kitchen store I sent hubby to didn't have any Le Cruset, go figure. I guess I'll have to make chocolate cake instead. Life is full of these little hardships.

Why not? What does the little one come in handy for anyway? I just thought it was cute.

I said oval, but I could live with round. There's a really cute 2 1/2 qt one but I'm thinking that will be too small.

Red matches my Irish temper I honestly don't care what colour but I am interested in whether or not 5 qts is the right size for this sort of thing.

Well I specified shape - oval and size I think I said 5 qts. too big too small? As far as colour goes I said I didn't care, but that red is pretty.

My husband is picking up a Le Cruset for me on the way home. He doesn't even ask anymore I bought a couple of these roasts since they were on sale, and I've had several PM's and emails with recipes, plus I need to find this book! I see pot roast as a regular occurance on my menu for a while.

Unless it's a separately ventillated room Gordon, it's not likely. Ruth Chris still has their smoking room but who knows for how long.

I never need to buy a new cookbook, but it doesn't stop me from buying them. Actually, I'd like to get more into braising and this book sounds like just the thing!

I picked up a lovely inside blade pot roast the other day. It's been quite a while since I made a pot roast, and the last time I recall I did it in my slow cooker. This one is a little big for the slow cooker as my slow cooker is round not oval,unless I cut it in half, which somehow seems wrong to me (I don't know why it does, but it does). So I'm looking for suggestions and recipes to try this a different way. Help me!

I'm going to Bymark for a private function on Friday. I've never actually been, so I'll report back

Not only that, but a number of eG members worked in that kitchen at the same time during Varmint's famous (or infamous) Pig Pickin. Dave the cook was a very happy guy..

Right, I'm ready to report. I have to confess, I'm a Keller school drop out. I made it about 3/4's of the way throught the process and then I just couldn't face it anymore. After a weekend from hell, a pinched nerve in my neck, juggling a conference call at six p.m. and one at 10:00 pm. and getting dinner and homework out of the way in the meantime, I just didn't have the strength. I really didn't. i'm afraid I'll never achieve the godhood of Keller, but I knew that anyway. Ok, here goes. One starts with a number of vegetables with a bottle of caberet sauvignon, reduced to the point where it's sort of like a glaze: when it's reduced, it almost looks like there's nothing left of the wine, until you remove the vegetables. The wine then gets strained into a bowl and set aside. Throw out the vegetables and herbs from the wine reduction. In the meantime, brown the beef in some oil, and prepare new vegetables and herbs, and cover them with a piece of cheesecloth. The beef goes on top of the cheesecloth and then gets covered with about 4 cups of beef stock. The whole thing goes in the oven to braise for a couple of hours. I actually braised mine for almost 4 hours because I found the meat wasn't tender enough at two hours and I had to go out. Once you take the braise out of the oven, remove the meat first, then the cheesecloth, then the vegetables. Now the straining fun begins. I strained the liquid twice using a fine mesh colander and a layer of cheesecloth. Then into a pot, bring the stock to a boil and skim off any fat. Strain it yet again into a bowl, and then strain once more over the beef that is now in an oven proof pot. Once it's cool, you can put the lid on and fall into bed. (I think I'm figuring out how I pinched the nerve in my neck) I left it in the fridge for three days. Today, I was supposed to heat it enough to liquify the stock, remove the meat, strain the liquid again and heat the beef and stock in the oven. In the meantime I was supposed to cook the potatoes and carrots separately with a bunch of herbs then let them cool and toss them into the beef and stock to heat. Somewhere in there, I think I was supposed to do something with pearl onions. Oh, and in my spare time, make the lardons. I thought about doing all that for oh, maybe 5 seconds. Instead, I scrubbed my little red potatoes and washed my baby carrots. Removed the beef from the stock, threw in the potatoes and carrots and simmered it until said potatoes and carrots were tender. I put the beef back in, and simmered a bit more until the beef heated up. In the meantime I made lardons. In a lousy attempt at plating, I arrived at this with a wonderfully fresh loaf of crusty bread that had just emerged from the bakery oven as we got there. It was not Keller's full recipe, but it was damn good. I apologize Mr. Keller, you're a better man than I'll ever be. I tried, I really did. I just could not face another round of straining if my life depended on it. Next time I'll try bourdain's recipe. It's gotta be easier.

These are all helpful suggestions. It was pointed out to me via PM that the only reason my pizza stuck was because I am in the middle of trying to sell my house and now of course I have to clean the oven, which is exactly when the next showing will appear. Because it just works that way And there's no doubt that it was just another sign of the kind of day I had yesterday. I think I'm going to go back to making my dough in the breadmaker. I'm at least familiar with that and it's always worked for me. (always as in 3 times). I am also going to find a pizza peel. In the meantime, I have an oven to clean.

Exactly, although I suspect the shipping charges from the UK to Canada might be a touch prohibitive

yes do, but I haven't been able to find one as of yet!

Oh that sounds like a good idea! I am using a splatter screen wrapped in parchment paper (based on a golden tip by Anna N) and it's worked well for me every time until tonight.

So, ever since my blog, I've learned how to make pizza from scratch using a pizza stone etc. I've managed to do this successfully everytime since then until tonight. Normally, I make the dough in my bread maker, roll it out, wrap my splatter screen with parchment paper and build my pizza on that, and then slide it onto the stone that has been preheating in the oven. Works great. Until tonight. Today I bought pre made dough from the bakery around the corner. Rolled the dough out on a floured surface. Wrapped my splatter screen in parchment paper and sprinkled it with cornmeal. Build the pizza, and went to slide it onto the stone. Disaster. It stuck to the parchment paper. By the time I got it off my "peel" and onto the stone, it was a misshapen, mass of sauce, dough and toppings, looking raher lopsided, while half of the stuff ended up on the oven floor. I have no clue why it stuck. It never has before. The only variable in this time as opposed to the last 4 times I've done this is that I didn't make my own dough. Oh and also, just because that's the kind of day I've been having. Which may mean the gods were just annoyed with me over all and decided to curse my pizza. So now I'm wondering if one of those pizza trays with the holes in them, would work on a pizza stone? I could build a nice little pizza in the tray, stick it on the stone and not have to worry about tranferring from peel to stone. I suppose though, that I should really figure out why it stuck in the first place.

I'm not so sure about that. What I'm seeing here, is that most of us who do the cooking, shopping planning are cooking for someone else. Yes we eat too, but the triumph of the shopping, planning cooking stage is seeing how much everyone else enjoys our labours of love, because that's what cooking is for us, a labour of love. I like to eat as much as the next person. But I sure don't put the same kind of effort into planning, shopping cooking for myself as I do when I know I'll be cooking for others.

Dave the Cook also offers up interesting experiments in the microwave

I have the Maverick Dual probe remote thermometer and I swear by mine. I've been using it well over a year now and I use it to or three times a week. I don't actually stick mine in liquid, but I use it on the BBQ and in the oven. The remote piece comes with me everywhere I go in the house and so far, it's always been accurate.

I would say planning, cooking and then eating. The only variable to that is the pleasure I get from someone enjoying what I've cooked.

Having mastered my fear of deep frying, I find I'm pulling out the deep fryer more and more these days. Indeed, I reprised fried chicken the other night. Tonight I did frozen french fries and well, they just aren't the same. I now have a mandoline and a deep fryer. Potatoes are cheap. (I'm not yet sure I won't slice my fingers off with the mandoline), I'm ready to tackle fresh made french fries. But how? In a recent conversation, someone mentioned to me that they needed to be soaked, then fried twice. It sounds like a lot of work to me for a few fried potatoes. Enlighten me please!

tonight will be brownies that have just come out of the oven. There's potential here for a brownie sundae.

When the beef is done braising, there's probably still going to be a lot of liquid left. Even after straining and skimming, I had what looked more like beef soup than stew so I reduced the liquid down quite far to more of a sauce consistency. Either way though, you'll love it. ← Marlene - That is up to you really. You can certainly reduce your cooking liquid further if you want before serving. I personally do. Make sure you taste it as you go because by reducing obviously, you are also concentrating the flavors, you might not necessarily want a sauce that is too strong. Another way of giving it a sauce consistency is by adding butter to it at the very end and emulsifying it with an immersion blender (remove the meat first!!!). It will give it a richer texture but I personally don't like to do that for this dish. I like adding a touch of reduced balsamic vinegar to the final product just to give it a rounder flavor and deeper color. ← I think I will reduce it. I also like the sounds of finishing it with a bit of reduced balsamic vinegar.