therippa

Yeah, that's what I was doing originally...I guess I was getting a little overzealous with removing the upper claw

I blanch them for about 2 minutes before removing the meat to vacuum seal...maybe I should try removing it after the come out of the water bath?

Here's a question I hope you guys have an answer to, because for once google doesn't. When I make lobster I remove the meat from the shell so I can sous vide it with butter. I know how to crack the claw with the back of a knife (cleaver in my case) to get the meat out, but there is always the tendon from the part of the claw that moves stuck in the meat, and I have to dig at it with a knife to get it out. Is there some trick to easily and cleanly removing this that I'm missing?

You can reuse the butter...I save the leg meat and butter to make a lobster omelette for myself the next morning

My mom's beef stroganoff... cube and brown 1lb of sirloin steak in a dutch oven mix together: 2 cans cream of mushroom soup 1 3/4 cans worth of milk 1 pack Lipton beef onion soup mix 1 can drained mushrooms add meat and bake 350 for 2 1/2 to 3 hours, serve over egg noodles Thomas Keller fondly mentions a recipe like this in ad hoc.

Regarding the steak, listen to what e_monster said. As for lobster, I've done this a few times and found this blog posting to be a great guide...make sure you blanch the lobster first so it pulls out of the shell easily... http://www.alcoholian.com/?p=2300

Oh, this is awesome. I've been fighting with my right-handed wusthof fish spatula ever since I bought it. This looks awesome, I just ordered one...but you gave the link for the right handed model, here's the one for people like us... http://www.amazon.com/LamsonSharp-Chef%C2%BFs-Slotted-Turner-left-hand/dp/B0006GT586/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1268288351&sr=1-1

I second annachan's suggestions of Chouchou and Amelie. Escargot and great wine, how can you go wrong?

My input for cocktails, try Bourbon & Branch or Alembic. If going to B&B, be sure to make reservations so you can sit in the main room. If not, use the passowrd "Books" to get into the library (it's styled after a speakeasy and they won't let you in without a password)

Oh, and one more Nopa - http://www.nopasf.com/

Off the top of my head, when people come here to visit me these are places I usually take them... Cha-cha-cha on Haight St. - Best tapas and sangria in the city (you must order the cajun shrimp, deep fried new potatoes, and mushrooms) - http://www.cha3.com Firefly - Sunday-Thursday prix fixe menu $35 for 3 courses, menu changes weekly, http://www.fireflyrestaurant.com/menu.html Foreign Cinema - pretty well known but worth going to - http://www.foreigncinema.com Chapeau! - wonderful french place - http://www.chapeausf.com/

FYI: Serious Eats put up their Sous Vide primer today... http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/03/how-to-sous-vide-steak.html

I imagine the suckling pigs get shipped vacuum sealed anyway...most sub-primal cuts are shipped that way to stores. You could just ask them to not take it out of the bag.

Pedro, You should do the pig for your next dinner party just so you can say you did it -Jason

This is just the latest show of force by the ABC of California. For instance, there are a couple of clubs here in San Francisco that do live music and are 18 and over...the deal is, if they want to serve booze, they also have to serve food and the food sales have to count for at least 50% of their revenue. Of course, at these kind of places that's almost impossible to accomplish, and all the ABC is doing by fining/shutting these places down is stopping people aged 18-20 from hearing live music. I think it really comes down to the budget crisis here, and the state is willing to do ANYTHING to raise a little money.

I found this - http://www.sousvidecooking.org/foie-gras-cooked-sous-vide-58-degrees-during-47-minutes/ That's more for a torchon preparation though. I have to say however, sous vide isn't the solution for everything, and I couldn't imagine preparing seared foie gras any way other than slicing, chilling in the freezer for 5 minutes, and pan searing on a rocket-hot dry skillet 45 seconds each side. ...and I would imagine a torch would melt a hole through it.

I impulsed purchased a foodsaver V3825 at costco last week to replace the reynolds hand pump system I was using. To be honest, I feel like I got a better vacuum with the reynolds. Costco has a pretty awesome return policy, so I'm going to use it a couple more times and make the decision whether or not to keep it.

Behold, 72-hour short ribs (135f)

Here's the sous vide segment for those living outside of England (the content is blocked on youtube) trojan hog Pretty insane. The best part is when he serves it with the sausage at the end.

Ok, so right now I've got beautiful short ribs sous-viding for the next 72 hours. All the short rib recipes I'm familiar with use their braising liquid as a sauce, naturally. Since I get to take advantage of the meat being served medium rare, do you guys have any suggestions on how to finish it off? I was just thinking of making a wine/veal stock reduction, but I'm sure there is something more interesting that can be done.

I made this last Sunday, I used a 12" skillet and a chicken about the same size and everything seemed to fit in fine for me. I agree with you on the bird, the flavor and browning was "meh"...good, but not great. I'm surprised he doesn't suggest brining it, that would help in the flavor department. This is pretty much the same recipe/method for the simple roasted chicken in Bouchon.

Ever since they aired that diet episode of Good Eats last month I've been having a smoothie every morning (and bought a vita-mix, and like everyone said it's one of those things that you regret not doing earlier after using it the first time). I've been using the ratio from his show... 2 parts berries (frozen from costco - raspberry, blackberry, marionberry) 1 part "yellow" fruit (frozen from costco again - pineapple, mango, melon) 1 part soy milk 1 part acai or pomegranate 1 part banana If I have some carrots laying around I usually throw in a little bit of that too. Delicious!

Sharing a freezer with two other roommates is exactly why I often resort to using store bought broths/stocks...homemade stocks shouldn't have to fight frozen Trader Joe's burritos for freezer space!

7-11 hot dog with their chili sauce and cheese

My boning knife gets used pretty regularly, and since I bought my cleaver I've been using the weight advantage of it for various things (using the spine to crack lobster claws for instance, way easier than using the spine of a chef's knife)