David A. Goldfarb

Had a fine meal in the main dining room of Aquavit last night. Under chef Marcus Jernmark it continues to offer a mix of traditional nordic flavors presented in modernist ways. The two of us each ordered the four-course prix fixe, so we could try a variety of things--about half the menu. We let them know we would be sharing, so they brought us two clean plates with each course and put the dishes in the center to serve from. The main dining room is small, maybe 11 or 12 tables, and if some don't care for the decor, I think that may just be because of the way Scandanavian design has fulfilled such utilitarian functions in America, so if you eat at the Smörgås Chef restaurant at Scandanavia House, you feel a bit like you're in a school cafeteria or an airport food court, and at Aquavit you may be having a meeting at an advertising agency. I think the thing I liked most was the second amuse (the first being four cheesy gougeres)--a hot smoked salmon served in a clamped jar, so that it released a puff of smoke when opened before the waiter drizzled it with a cold white asparagus soup. Breads were a traditional rye crispbread, which I've been making a lot of lately myself, with fennel and sea salt, finger loaves of dense rye, and white sourdough rolls, which I didn't get around to. I should have had less of the crispbread. It's more filling than one thinks. We tried three infused Aquavits between us--horseradish, ramp, and fig & cardamom. The gravlax seems to be cut into triangular strips, reassembled with transglutaminase into a torchon, and delivered elegantly like an orange slice with a whole mustard and dill sauce. Also had the Picked and Spiced Herring, which was subtle, and might bring us back for the herring festival. The herring was like the horseradish infused aquavit, in that it revealed enough of the flavors that make it interesting, but not so much as to be overbearing or wipe out one's tastebuds for the rest of the meal. There are a couple of truffle dishes on the menu right now worth sampling. I particularly liked the corn and barley with shaved white truffle on top. There is also a "slow roasted" (seemed maybe sous vide and then charred actually) duck breast with foie gras, a thick black truffle and pumpernickel sauce, and tiny roasted turnips. We ordered the Vanilla Infused Pears and the Chocolate with Texture for dessert, both nicely done and interesting, but it was getting to be a bit too much food. We would have been fine with the selection of closing amuses, particularly the dulce de leche beignets and the tray of eight or so little bites of various sweets. All in all a good experience, and I'd add it to my nicer midtown lunch options.

Carl's Steaks--a Philly cheesesteak joint on E34th st. In Manhattan has five or six kinds of beer--all popular American brands--in those little 7oz. bottles.

I can't say why, but it invariably seems to be the case that cooling thoroughly and reheating improves a stew or braised dish, even compared to just cooking longer and slower. It also makes it easier to skim the fat. A little fat is okay, but too much feels greasy.

Tapping and listening works for me. I've never had underdone bread with this method. If it looks too dark, then it's overdone. Can't say I've encountered bread that was burned on the outside and raw inside, though I suppose it's possible at really high temperatures. I suppose rapping the bottom might be because the bottom is more dense with some kinds of bread, and if you bake in any kind of loaf pan, you've got to take it out to rap it. Also there's no risk of messing up the top, if you tap the bottom.

I haven't had any problems with overbeating with the Sideswipe beater either. If I want just to incorporate ingredients without further beating, I use a slower speed and turn it off when it's ready, just like I'd do with the standard beater.

I suppose that food coloring from 1963 could still have Red Dye No. 2, which may not have merited all the paranoia it caused, but which would be easy enough to avoid.

Maybe the first cup prepares the palate for the second. Perhaps you should befriend an accounting, real estate, or insurance firm in your neighborhood and collect the leftover coffee from them at the end of the day, leave it out overnight and warm it up in the microwave the next morning, and then after this spectacularly bad first cup the second cup will be even better.

Do you have grounds that stay in the grinder, drying out and getting stale, to be pushed out by the new grounds when you grind the next batch? I found this to be the case with my grinder, so now I keep a wooden skewer next to the grinder to dig the grounds out from the grinder spout for the last espresso I make in a batch. If you have a doser, that's also a place where coffee can sit, getting old between batches.

The good local place in Kihei, as I recall, is Da Kitchen, but it's been a few years.

I've made these several times-- http://www.gourmet.com/recipes/2000s/2008/06/hamburgerbuns --and recommend them highly. Also good for hot dog buns, lobster roll, parker house rolls, etc.

Another solution for the flat burger is to make them with a depression in the center.

Of course I post on eG and then google it later as the need arises.

My father used to experiment with all different methods of making ribs in the oven--in a rack over a pan of water, tented, in water, covered pan, foil wrapped, etc.--finished under the broiler usually. I usually do a dry rub overnight and either stovetop smoke in the wok, or bake at a low temperature wrapped in parchment and finish under the broiler with some homemade BBQ sauce that uses mainly butter, Worchestershire sauce, garlic, paprika, cayenne, and a little liquid smoke (if I don't do the stovetop smoking) and this and that, depending on what I'm after.

"Hand held banana slicer" Handy when you don't have access to the bench-mounted pneumatic banana slicer.

Holly--One reason you may want to shoot RAW is access to more convenient tools for non-destructive editing, which is particularly useful when you can't control the light. Personally, I like a less saturated look, but if you like more color saturation, it's easy enough to bump it up, presuming you are starting from a reasonably accurate white balance and exposure. RAW lets you adjust the white balance easily after the fact on a calibrated monitor, if you have one, without losing any information in the original file. Exposure you need to get right when you're shooting. Look at the histogram display to make sure you're not clipping your highlights or letting the shadows get blocked up. If you can see both ends of the curve, you'll have room to adjust the exposure later.

Point of the post?--just suggesting how to avoid using flash in a dark restaurant. Point of the photo?--the chef is a friend; that's one of his signature dishes; and it was the last time he was making it in that restaurant.

Visited Co. a couple of weeks ago for the first time as well, and I liked it. There were about 10 people at our table, so I think we ordered something like 9 different pizzas, and I tried most of them, all interesting, and I recall an artichoke app that was memorable. The "Popeye" was nice with big leaves of fresh spinach.

I don't own a crockpot, but braising seems like a fairly well established and venerable method of cooking. I do it in the oven or on the stovetop, but I don't think it takes much more skill than using a crockpot.

Chicken consomme? Well, you could start with a basic veloute by adding a roux, and that is useful on various poultry dishes or vegetables or in casseroles. Add mushrooms and you have another variation. Reduce it to 10% its original volume to make a glaze that adds richness to braised poultry dishes, stews, and soups. Saute root vegetables in a small amount of stock and reduce to a glaze for glazed carrots, turnips, parsnips, etc. Use the consomme as a base for any creamed vegetable soup or chowder. Of course any clear soup can use chicken stock. Use it as part of the liquid with clam juice in a white clam sauce. Think of any savory dish where you might use water and ask whether it might be made more interesting with the addition of stock. For instance you can make rice with half water/half consomme, or you could use it in a tomato sauce for a poultry dish. I just regard stock as a staple ingredient like salt or flour.

Still working on that 20+ year old bottle of Wright's Liquid Smoke... Running a bit low, actually. I might have to buy some more in the next decade.

I'm happy with my La Spaziale Mini Vivaldi II, but if you have plumbing in place, a better bet may be a used two-group machine, which you might find for around $1500.

I use it in all kinds of sauces, braised dishes, and such. Freeze it flat in Ziploc bags and then you can partially defrost it in the microwave and break off pieces as needed. You can also shelve bags of different stocks, consommes, and sauces like this on end like books in the freezer.

I also fry and find it works best with yesterday's rice. Lately I've been dicing up some Chinese bacon and rendering it in the wok, then frying the rice in bacon fat with the bacon bits.

At the beginning, the scum seems to be blood and fat. After a few strainings if the stock is clear and the film that forms on top is clear, then I suspect that is just gelatin cooling at the top of the pot. I stir it back in rather than skimming it off, if it is clear, and it doesn't seem to cloud the stock. If it's a stock that is hard to clarify, like veal stock, then it is probably throwing off denatured proteins and some fat as suggested above, and that I skim off.

Interestingly, the Italian-Americans at our local pizzeria in Queens, New York, generally refer to what they sell as "pies" and not as "pizzas" or even "pizza pies." I'll ask for a "medium pizza, half plain, half pepperoni and mushrooms," and the guy behind the counter will confirm, "medium pie,..." I'd chalk that up to assimilationism from two or three generations ago, when they started calling tomato sauce "red gravy" or "Sunday gravy," because that's what working-class Americans called any kind of sauce at the time. I remember the first time I heard an old Italian guy from Brooklyn talking about the family dinners they made when he was growing up with "gravy" on everything, and I thought it really strange that they were having brown sauce on their pasta, fried fish, etc.