wingding

Me no Steve,me wingding.But anyway,preheat the oven to 500,squeeze the juice and seeds out of th e tomatoes,& reserve juices,not seeds.Lay the tomatoes close together face down in a low pan-fill the pan completely,but do not layer the tomatoes.Add some of the juices to the pan,and slick the tomatoes with a little olive oil.Roast until the tomatoes just begin to char a little-15-20 minutes.Chop them up,and use in any stove top sauce where you want a rich,sweet,intense tomato sauce as your base.Good with smoky pork products!

Depalos' often imports Bitto and Formaggi di Fossa,two fairly rare in N.Y.cheeses worth trying.

Bucatini all'amatriciana,made with canned{Redpack rules!}tomatoes roasted at high heat,then cooked stove top with garlic and guanciale.Thanks to Zuni Cafe cookbook for the tomato technique,it rocks...Plus braised treviso with olives.

Many years ago,I was listening to some forgotten food show on the radio,and heard this method of steaming mussels,which turned out to be wonderful;I've used it ever since[the flavoring is up to you-I like 'em simple and plain].Tightly pack mussels,standing up,hinge side down in a heavy pot.Add a little liquid to the bottom of the pot,and simmer,covered, for a few minutes-the mussel juice will wash over themselves,and they will cook in their own juice.Simple and delicious[if the mussels are good to begin with].

300ish...plus many scraps of paper.and assorted notebooks from places that I've worked,here and there.The funny thing is,I never cook very often from recipes at this point...just use them for ideas,a sense of time and place, people &countries that I've never known,or visited a few times,a sense of the person who wrote them,...and great pictures!

Elizabeth;No need for fancy equipment-you can line a half or quarter sheet pan with parchment paper,and pour the pate into it.Be careful-you are working with hot liquid sugar.Let it set for at least 8 hours without moving it around,on a level surface.You can cut squares with a ruler and a knife,or punch shapes out with a metal cutter.

I think that you can sell people on relatively unusual flavor combinations if you have an innate 'good sense' of how to combine them in an accessible manner.My two best selling desserts for the past month use goat cheese,figs,and olive oil gelato,but they are presented in a down to earth way-I don't torture the food to death into something unrecognizable,and people find it approchable,and are willing to try it.I found the new combinations of textures in the Spanish books intriguing,but try to transfer them into something more simple...some of the things that I tried,for the hell of it,like croquant made from cake,ultimately seemed like conceptual exercises that weren't worth the effort.

Murrays' and Dipalos',that's it....

I've been reading Christine Ferber's book ,'Mes Confitures'and she usually recommends using a liquid derived from cooking and draining tart apples as a starter for many jams,making use of their high pectin content.Some pectin powder sold in France is referred to as apple pectin,so I'd assume that it is derived from apples!

If you have the time,jump on a train[or hijack a car]and go to Zachy's in Scarsdale[1/2 hour trip].It's worth the trip.

Michael,if this is useful to you-take a medium ripe banana or two,put em in a robot coupe.Strain,and spread the puree very thinly and evenly on silpat.Dry out in a low oven-you will have beautiful,shape-able pieces of crispy banana.

Agreed that 19 isn't what it used to be,and I've recently been dealing with much older employees who don't seem to recognize what professional behavior is.But I don't begrudge kids for not knowing what Babbo is,or using frozen cheese[at first].It's all a matter of exposure.Getting kids to go beyond their little world,to read and travel[even around the city that they live in!]is important,and often an uphill battle...

I've worked in some kitchens with kids from c-cap...and hey! give em a break,it takes a while[months!] to get into the swing of things.They get plopped into a busy,crowded kitchen,where it's hard for any beginner to focus.Where were most of us at 19?

First pound a nail through the 3 eyes.Drain out the water.Put the coconut in a 350ish oven on a pan until it cracks in a few places.Remove from the oven and give it a hock with a hammer.This should make peeling the outer shell off pretty easy.The trick is to try and keep the broken up pieces large-then you can peel off the inner shell with a vegetable peeler.

I love Australian Vogue Food & Travel also-there's something very luxurious,but light about the look of all the food.Also I'd give credit to M*rtha Stewart,for finding and using some great stylists and photographers in her magazine.When they've done specials on a particular fruit or grain,the photos and layouts were just stunning-I hope that they will be published as a book someday.I also have enjoyed the Saveur Cooks French,Italian,American series-the food shots combined with the pictures of the places and people that they originate from are very appealing.

Scared??It's food,one meal,for christsakes.The country is on the brink of going to war,for very questionable reasons,all kinds of crap is going on.Are you going to be drawn and quartered if the meal isn't top notch?Try to enjoy yourself,no matter what.As an aside,it seems that Chez Panisse rises and falls with who is the second in command-I don't know who's there now,but everything changes,and good ingredients without someone who handles them well are only halfway there....

I rarely have time to make it to the upper left side,and Fairway...but I had the best meat loaf samwich EVER at Mitchell Londons' Upstairs last week!Simple,moist,and tasty.

Rolls warm,biscuits freshly made,baguettes and such,room temp.My biggest bread service peeve is the server who keeps coming by with a variety of breads,asking me to choose a piece,interrupting conversation at the table continually.Give the table a small basket with a variety of breads,and leave us alone!

I wanted to like Dinner Rush,but found it to be a mob wannabe,cliche ridden,badly written movie,with one of the most annoying musical scores in memory.Nice cinematography,fairly realistic restaurant scenes-but not a good movie.

About 8 years ago,I spent 2 weeks on the island of Pantellaria,with a friend who lived there and her boyfriend[who grew up there].We ate at home mostly-lots of Very fresh fish,and it was a revelation.Flounder,shrimp,sea urchin-fish with couscous.And he made great pizza,in an oven outside,facing the sea.Also,my 9 course fish lunch on the Amalfi coast-especially good were gamberoni dressed with a little balsamic ,pasta with colatura and incredible tomatoes,salt crusted fish.This winter,boar ragu with polenta in Arrezo.There's some...

The chicken liver and baccala bruschetti[2 separate offerings] are a great light meal with a glass of wine.The desserts are good too-apple fritters with caramel ice cream!

Brik is Tunisian in origin.The classic version is tuna and an egg,chilis,etc.,wrapped in the brik dough,and fried.Very delicious!

Many middle sized restaurants in N.Y will not offer more than $35K a year for the pastry chef position.This figure hasn't budged for the past 5 years.This may be an economic necessity,given proportional dessert sales and the cost of running a business in Manhattan,but it's hardly encouraging when you're a few years down the road.In my experience,the actual number of people who have graduated culinary school and stayed in restaurants for more than 6 MONTHS is pretty miniscule.

Thanks again for the help.Steve.Have you ever used a sabayon base in the profi?

If Pastry Arts is putting this figure forth,they haven't talked to all the pastry chefs working in small and medium sized restaurants around the country.A true average would yield different results,I think..