genarog

What recipe is my mother making? I never bought a cucumber pickle that tasted like what my mother used to make. They all seem too sweet, or too bland, or too acidic. I've never tried to make them myself, but now that she's visiting, and that I have cucumbers, garlic, and a jar, this may be the right time to try her recipe. I haven't made it yet, but this is what she told me: Get enough cucumbers so that they all stand up in the jar and don't move. Cut a tiny piece of both ends of each cucumber. Boil enough water with salt, and let it cool. Add a little bit of vinager and sugar. Pour over the cucumbers. Add two or three garlic heads after pressing them a little bit with my hands. Add peppercorns, fennel seeds, other seeds. Cover the jar with cheesecloth only so that the pickles can breath, and take it outside. They should be ready to eat in about a week. I'm sure she got this recipe from her mother. Does anyone have a similar recipe with more accurate measurements?

slkinsey: is the photo you posted from Patsy's East Harlem recent? I ended up going this weekend, and when I walked up every pizza I saw looked undercooked. I thought I was at the wrong place until I saw the coal oven two doors down. So I ordered my pizza well done, but it still came out soggy in the middle. The oven did a great job on the areas that were well done though. I didn't like the tomatoe sauce; it was a little too acidic.

Great info and videos! Thanks a lot.

I'm getting a few mail-order blocks of suhi-grade salmon and tuna and I would like to learn the technique to slice it properly. I don't have specialized knifes so I won't be able to replicate it , but maybe looking at a video I'll end up doing a decent job.

Wait a second. My dog is already eating skirt steak, short ribs, salmon, and drinking milk. Is she now eating pâté as well?

Because I doubt it's going to be good by itself, I would cook it - not sure which method - and then use it in a salad like you would use tuna.

I'm very surprised at the bad reviews. I've gone there once a year for the past six or seven years and had nothing but great meals. True, I often avoid secondi and stick to antipasti and primi where I think I get the most value. Same with Lupa, which I think is the best value in Batali's restaurants. I did have a mediocre meal at Casa Mono - I prefer Bar Jamon - and another one at B&B, and made the mistake of ordering secondi at my only visit to Del Posto which were mediocre but the rest of the meal was great. About the bread, I would have to see it myself, but it would take a lot of burning for me to pass on it.

Being a home cook I'm not that consistent with my sauces. Let's say I want to make bucatini all'amatriciana. It's possible that depending on how dry the sauce is the difference between bucatini and bucatini rigati is more significant than that between De Cecco's bucatini and Trader Joe's bucatini. Because different brands have slightly diffrent texture, it's possible that what's attributed to a brand is actually due to a particular combination of pasta and sauce. Having different shapes/textures on hand is always a good idea.

This is very interesting. I too wonder about De Cecco as that's what I buy for most of my dry pasta. If I had the patience and the time I would do the tasting myself. That's what I did with tomatoes and the results really surprised me. Now I don't have to overpay for D.O.P. which are probably not the same D.O.P. eaten in Italy when I can use Pomi or Muir Glen depending on what I want.

If I met that waitress I would ask her: Why are you giving me a straw with my glass of water? Isn't the glass clean? Why did you put ice in my glass of water? Can't you refill my glass of water without dropping ice cubes?

Here is an example using one of my favorite fast food places in NYC: Pommes Frites 1. How it's ordered (order food at a counter, stand and wait for it, then leave with it) At the counter 2. How it's made: High volume pre-prepared food, quickly assembled when ordered and quickly given to the customer First frying is done in advance. Second done when ordering. 3. Limited menu items Very limited... only fries. Large selection of toppings. 4. Cheap food but good value Very good value 5. No waitstaff/table service No waitstaff 6. Possibly having drive-through service No 7. Fast Food is made for quick consumption by the restaurant Yes 8. Fast Food is quickly consumed by the customer. In a Fast Food restaurant, the customer doesn't linger. The food is consumed quickly and then they leave. Yes 9. No eating utensils needed/Fast Food can be eaten out-of-hand - "A burger difficult to pick up and eat is not likely to be a FF burger" Customers are given a fork, but it's not really needed 10. Fast Food isn't determined by the food itself but by the restaurant selling it - the restaurant determines whether the food can be labeled as Fast Food through the food production/assembly, how it is sold and how it is consumed Place and food are both fast food 11. Fast Food is always served ready to carry (in a bag for "to go" orders - on a tray for dining in) The cone can be carried... 12. Fast Food is portable without general loss of quality Very portable. Fries are way too hot right off the frying pan anyway. 13. Generally speaking, Fast Food comes from a chain restaurant Not in this case 14. Fast Food is paid for up front when ordering Yes 15. Fast Food is generally not cooked to order Second frying is

I really like that picture from Patsy's East Harlem. Now I'll have to go try it.

It's not fair to expect from a pizzeria to sastisfy every customer's preference. How good could such place be anyway? What I want from a place I like is consistency. I shouldn't have to tell them that I want my neapolitan style pizza well done. They should know better. Otherwise, it just becomes a place I don't like and I move on the next one.

There are many types of pizza. Pizza by the pie is just one of them. Other types of pizza can be succesfully pre-cooked minutes or even a few hours before being served and then finished when serving. Of course cheese, if used at all, shoud be added at the end. Not only can pizza be fast food, it can also be good. Not anywhere near me, though.

Same experience couple of weeks ago at Zero Otto Nove. They have this amazing brick oven and are now serving undercooked, soggy pizza. I don't know if the guy who came from Italy to the pizzas is still there or not, but the results are way off from what was a great margherita pizza a year ago.

I think the reputation comes from the emphasis on fast. Spanish tapas are a great example of emphasis on food. And while available in the US, you really have to do your home work to find it as it's not available on every corner.

Another issue for me with fast food is how far I can travel with it. Can I pick it up, then walk 5 blocks, and then eat it, with no significant loss of quality? If I like my burger medium rare, then the traditional hamburger bun will become soggy. So unfortunately the only solution I have is to eat it at the restaurant or cook it myself.

I don't doubt this, and it makes sense in a way. I don't know if I noticed McDonalds in Rome but they wouldn't surprise me. But here I was in Bologna, where I went basically for the food, and where in two days I ate the best food in my life, and there was a McDonalds in the middle of the city. Not that Bologna is that small, and it has a significant student population, but still, to me, it amounted to a sacrilege.

Funny we were walking in Bologna near Piazza Maggiore and we were stunned to come across a McDonald's. Who could eat there? Hopefully not the locals. I meant to say places who don't spend millions of dollars in advertising...

I think that from the list, only Gyro and Falafel are widely available in the US, at least in NYC. When I need fast food that's what I seek. If for instance I wanted fried baccala at fast-food cost I wouldn't know where to find it in NYC. In order for food to be good you need that people actually care about its quality. Countries where fast food is good have usually been preparing their food the same way for centuries. If a place is bad, it will only sell to tourists. Many places that are in business here wouldn't be in Europe.

Arancini Pane e Panelle Baccalà fritto Gyro Falafel Choripan

There are many examples of fast food being good food, primarily outside of the US. A burger is bad food if quality is lost just so that it can be served faster. Pre-cooked burgers are bad food to me. However, if someone could prepare a pre-cooked burger so that no quality was lost, then I wouldn't consider it bad food. By quality I mean texture and taste. Bread of course has a lot to do with it; I don't find a hamburger bun to be a good match for a hamburger.

As Mark mentioned up in the thread skirt steak - I can confirm this at least with the type I get 7 out of 10 times - is not tough, does not need tenderizing, and is so buttery that to me is much closer to prime rib than it is to flank steak. If you do the classic resting and slicing, and if the meat is tougher, then cutting against the grain is required. However, the way I eat - which is right off the grill pan - my priority is to eat it while the meat is juicy and worm and for that I have a very short window of time. So I don't want to expose the long side of the steak. I would cut on the short side of the steak even if I was doing it with the grain. I usually eat one steak while the next one is cooking, which is about 3 minutes.

Skirt Steak: The best cut of meat With prime rib-eye at less than $9 a lb at Costco, why would I pay $9 a lb for skirt steak? Because it tastes like nothing else. And taking into account that about 30% of the time the skirt steak I get is inedible, I may be paying more like $13 a lb. Still worth every penny. I think the flavor of skirt stake comes out best when searing it. Grilled - I mean barbequed - is still quite good, but still not as good as seared. If I were to grill it, I would buy it with the skin on and then take the skin off after cooking. For searing it, I want it with the skin off. I usually have my butcher take care of this, but it's very easy to do at home as well. I pat the meat dry and throw it on a hot cast-iron grill. I use a double-burner grill by Lodge. I like skirt steak between rare and medium-rare. While cooking time depends on the thickness of each piece, it’s usually between 1 and 3 minutes on one side and between 30 seconds and 1 minute on the other. I only condiment the meat with salt. I wait until each side is seared before salting that side of the meat. I read a lot about resting meat before eating it, but my taste buds tell me otherwise. I like how the juices redistribute in my mouth and I'm willing to sacrifice some of the juices on the cutting board or on my plate. So I go at it right away. My two favorite foods are meat and bread, and they are even better when combined. Too bad tomatoes are not in season right now. That's what I usually eat when I'm done with the meat. They just need olive oil and salt. Unless I have any bread left I drink the leftover juices right off the bowl. No photos of that, sorry. My only problem with skirt steak - other than what my doctor would tell me about the amount of fat in it - is the inconsistence of its quality. I have no idea why. I don't know whether it’s a fresh versus frozen thing or whether it depends on the breed. All I know is that I've tried skirt steak from many butchers and supermarkets, and I can go one day and get a great piece and go next day to the same place and get one that's inedible. Color doesn't mean much. Sometimes smell doesn’t mean much either. I recall 4 or 5 years ago the skirt steak at Western Beef was consistently great for about a year, and it only cost $2.49 a lb. Oh well, prices went up and quality down. What do I mean with inedible? Well I think there are 3 grades of skirt steak: A) Buttery It melts in your mouth. It's the best meat in the world. B) Chewy I call it inedible. Usually my dog takes care of it. Too bad I paid $9 a lb for it. If this happens to you in your first try, do give it another chance. C) Everything in the middle Most of the time is closer to A) fortunatelly As I haven't been able to estimate quality before eating, it's all about luck for me. If someone has this figured out, let me know.

Just to stay on topic - and it's my fault as I didn't provide details - when I said that I didn't know what I was doing I was more in line with the "IMHO, better would be to work on your meat mincing (US English: grinding) and cold mixing technique - as explained in 'Charcuterie'. That way, you should be able to make a more succulent sausage naturally!" suggestion. Also, I'm pretty sure I'm terrible at stuffing; this will be an issue when I start making salami and want to avoid air pockets. But I do weigh ingredients in grams and know the maximum I can use of each before they become harmful. I also know for a fact that I as well as millions of other people have eaten dozens or even hundreds of fresh sausages containing these ingredients in our lifes. I may eat anywhere between 10lbs and 20lbs a year... I'll take my chances. Thanks for the suggestions and keep them coming; the goal here is a better tasting sausage.