IndyRob

I'm thinking that the core temp at this point is less important than the outside temps. The evil things are attacking from the outside. At two hours, you're probably okay based on my reading, but it's bumping up against the line.

I like Bourdain, but couldn't find the quote. Instead, I'll just virtually point to the baking and spices aisle of any supermarket and say "Pointless? I don't think so." Better cooks than any of us from all ethnicities have drawn down the stocks of those aisles over many years. The best ingredients? No. Pointless? No, not that either.

That's even more interesting because it's nearly the perfect middle ground between sous vide and the Joy of Cooking method that involves warming the steak to room temp before searing it. Does the steak tub directly in a liquid, or in a plastic bag?

That's interesting. I wonder if it comes from sous vide or from something like parcooking bratwurst in beer and onions.

Well, I really did mean pointless. There is no benficial use for dried basil or rosemary. That's not true in my experience. At least for basil. In fact, in a pizza sauce I notice much more taste effect from dried basil versus fresh basil. Especially freshly dried basil. Fresh basil is less about taste and more about smell.

Chives. Although I take issue with 'pointless' versus, say, 'inferior'.

Well, this was in the context of statements from food critic-types, so it wasn't really about everyday dining. But it's still an interesting question. MC itself is not likely to directly affect everyday dining much overall (for price reasons alone). Perhaps it will pressure people like Alton Brown to address sous vide or something. But the question that this brought up in my head is "How can we measure the impact on everyday cooking?". eG is probably pretty bad as a representative sample. I have some anecdotal evidence that brining, for instance, is seeing some penetration into homes around Thankgiving time. But what about sous vide? I don't think I've ever heard a reference to it from a non-media, non-foodie person.

I think it might be fair to say that there is starting to be a trend away from being conspicuously modernist. I don't think any of the solid techniques will go away. Instead they'll just stay in the background as fryolators always have. I don't think we'll see a lot of new WD-50 type concepts. It's like the early '80s when personal computers were becoming popular. Computer store signs using computery MICR fonts were de riguer. Just being compuerized was cool in and of itself. Before long, we had proper fonts and everyone was trying to see how many they could use on a single page. Finally we came (generally) to use fonts more wisely and tastefully. And the devices today are very fashionable in a mainstream way, despite being packed with more high tech geekery than most people would've ever dreamed possible.

Well, to be fair, I think that a year's collection of National Geographic magazines are frightfully heavy. The sort of heavy that makes one astounded by the extent of the force of gravity. I believe articles have been written that propose that their combined weight threatens to crush the Earth's crust.

Ok, so you're saying that it may not be inferior, but it will be cheaper? I'm not finding a problem there. If no one notices the difference between a gelled pepper puree and a slice of pepper stuffed inside an olive, is that a problem? With nano-moleculo-blaisology we won't need to make tradeoffs. And we won't need to stay tethered to abstract concepts like olives, or cows.

Well, sure, but there are also a lot of people doing crossword puzzles or knitting socks, but they're really just keeping their minds or fingers busy. But you're proceeding on the assumption that 'replicator food' will be cheaper and therefore inferior when in fact it could be vastly superior regardless of cost.

Traditional furniture craftsmen are nearly extinct. There's no money in it. 50% of the price is in showroom space, commissions - the cost of selling. I'd like to think that the average person could avoid those showroom charges and commission a custom piece of furniture designed specifically for their space, but that's not the reality.

25 years ago I was actively researching and experimenting with artifical intelligence, and despite Watson winning Jeopardy, it really hasn't advanced much since that time. Whatever advancements have been made have been far outstripped by things like Wikipedia that feature a lot of real intelligence. We have sequenced several genomes, but have we solved them? Not really. We've gotten some valuable clues, but we really haven't put the whole picture together. In the meantime, the advances are more about genetic modifications which are more akin to artificial food than VR or AI. We really don't have a lack of information, we have a challenge in organizing and understanding it all.

While I think our early goals would be aimed at reliably reproducing, say, the perfect Kobe steak, once accomplished, there'd be no need remain true to anything authentic and we'd drift away from tradition and down paths guided only by our whims. The end result would be dishes far removed from anything that ever existed naturally. I don't look for virtual reality to beat artificial food in the short term since we really know a lot more about mimicking meat growing processes than what makes the sense of taste work. The former is more mechanical than the latter, which includes a lot of cognitive psychology/neurology.

I see it either leading to the end of cuisine or a headlong dive into a hedonistic wonderland. On the one hand, once you can have anything you want, any time you want, how could food remain special? But then, with a nearly infinite range of culinary special effects, the people who today are sneaking Pop Rocks into desserts will acquire a new and fearsome arsenal of the bizarre.

I'm actually with you on this, but just to play the devil's advocate, I think it could be said that learning to cook with the God given senses is an act of self improvement - and the results are a direct reflection of your talents. It's the difference between inner aspirations of excellence, versus coldly calculated methods to eliminate mistakes. A statue of David could be created with a computer controlled 5 axis milling machine, but could such a process create a Michelangelo?

I was a little surprised to see a story on MC posted on slashdot.org. I was more surprised to read the comments and not find any flamewars. That's quite an accomplishment for a personality associated with Microsoft (slashdot is a very Linux oriented nerd news site).

This is what exactly what Bourdain was talking about - dining being an act of submission - that I alluded to earlier. But I think that unless we limit the conversation to a particular type of resto, we're not going to get anywhere. Probably 8 out of 10 chefs would really love to put their best efforts into satisfying, say, a vegan client - well, maybe, once. But it would only make financial sense for maybe one of those 10 chefs.

I'm a little surprised that posting those two options so close to each other didn't cause some sort of matter/anti-matter annihilation.

In (I think) the Sous Vide Eggs thread I speculated that some cooking techniques that are passed down to us were developed because they rely on visual cues rather than kitchen timers or other gadgets. Cooking in water is well suited to this because boiling water (altitude notwithstanding) is a pretty exact temperature. So I suspect this is about timing. But the question that comes to mind is, since adding 1 cup (or whatever) of cold water is specified, is the beginning volume of water specified as well? For this to work on any level it seems as though it would have to be. Assuming we started with, say, a couple of quarts of water, I doubt that one cup of cold water would have enough impact to justify the term 'quench' (although I have a pretty vivid mental picture of that term left over from my high school metal shop classes).

This could be the best Food Network show of this type yet. The celebs just stuck to what they were there to do. My only complaint is the same one I have with other shows like Masterchef or even Top Chef. They start out with too many people to cover in a single episode. Make two episodes or a two-hour premier.

Ok, you got me. DVR set, expectations muted. I saw Bobby on The Today Show pimping this thing. Why can't NBC pull talent from Bravo? Well, we'll see I guess....

Bourdain comes to my mind now. He said that cooking is an act of domination, and dining is an act of ultimate submission. He's proven his commitment to the submissive angle by eating warthog anus and African dirt-cooked egg.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it's all about heat distribution. When I look at the picture of the two loaves, the left sides of each are amazingly similar. Given that, I want to rule proofing out. Yes, there may have been a difference in proofing, but why did they both behave the same on the left side, and so radically different on the right? Oven location has already been implicated, so I say let's go with that as the primary suspect. I think the next step has to be a controlled study with the same dough batches, the same proofing, the same everything. I'm homing in on my baguettes in a similar way. Once you're getting a good result (which it certainly appears you are), you have to tip-toe around in a methodical fashion to find the path to perfection. And one of the most amazing truths I found from the internet is that no one can ever give you advice suited to the oven you're using. Or in the way you're using it.

There's Rick Bayless' Mexico - One Plate at a Time. It's not currently on my DYR's radar though. It looks like some episodes will air on CreateTV in April. Or you can go to the website and order DVDs.