Indirect Heat

I think if you really sit and think about poutine for too long, it becomes reasonably obvious that it's an appalling concoction, and the foie gras poutine from Au Pied de Cochon even more so. That said, poutine is pretty delicious...

I've never really thought as home cooking as a money saver. Really, it's almost always cheaper to buy some canned or frozen crap. But if you compare equivalent quality food, then it makes much more sense to home cook. Most prepared foods are kinda nasty. It's simply not possible to buy as good stuff as you can make at home...

How long before we have a KitchenAid consumer-rated computer-guided 30 W laser cutter?

I think generally speaking "slippery slope" arguments are considered a type of formal logical error. After all, slippery slope arguments cut both ways. While you can say, "First they came for my foie gras, then they came for my burger." you can also say, "First they force fed geese, then they stapled them to a wall and assaulted them with wiffle bats". Or whatever. That said, I don't find anything particularly distasteful about the treatment of ducks and geese for foie gras. I think this problem can be solved by educating the public. Sadly, I'm not sure the public is interested in being educated.

I recently cubed a leg of lamb for lamb kebabs. Unlike when I cook a whole leg of lamb and leave the fat on, I cut a lot of the fat off (otherwise I would have had cubes on skewers that were more or less entirely fat. I ended up with a pretty large pile of lamb fat, and I felt pretty bad tossing it. I still feel bad. Could I have rendered it to make lamb lard? What do folks do with leftover lamb fat?

Meh, by African standards, ground beef is a "ridiculous luxury good for the overprivileged". It's all relative. I count myself as pretty solidly in the middle class in America. I drive a 13 year old car. I rent my house. And yet, once a year I treat myself to a dish with foie gras in it (pumpkin soup). Foie gras is a luxury good. So is a dry-aged steak. But for the overprivileged? Anyway, if anyone can point me towards a *real* petition that's supportive of American foie producers, I'd be delighted to sign.

Reasoning? Fear, mostly. I hoped the molasses would help mellow anything in the miso that was objectionable in the dessert. Second time out, I think I'll be more bold and do miso by itself. I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks!

I used David Lebovitz' panna cotta recipe: http://www.davidlebovitz.com/archives/2009/04/perfect_panna_cotta.html I added in 4 tsp of white miso, and subbed out a bit of sugar for molasses. Though the amount of molasses I added was miniscule, it really dominated the flavour. I'd like something less hamhanded. Next time I'll try it either without the molasses, or with very little molasses. Perhaps drop it out entirely, and add a nut extract to balance the miso? Dunno. I served it with a blackberry compote, blackberries, port, lime juice, sugar and pomegranate juice. Thoughts?

Inniskillin is probably the mostly widely available icewine that is of a decent quality. They make quite a few different types of icewine that range in quality from quite good to sublime.

We tend to put all leftover meat into ramen broth with noodles and leftover veggies: http://indirectheat.blogspot.com/2010/01/ramen.html But for lamb... I would think gnawing on that sucker cold would make a pretty delicious lunch...

Make sure you have the foie gras poutine and the pumpkin soup at Au Pied de Cochon. Delish.

My inspiration is a miso "cheesecake" served at Providence in Los Angeles. It was really good. http://indirectheat.blogspot.com/2009/08/providence.html I think I will try adding a bit of miso to a vanilla panna cotta, serve with sessame and a raspberry compote, but I think I may delay this project for an evening we're not having guests... Thanks for the suggestions.

I'm thinking of making a miso-flavoured panna cotta for dinner tomorrow night, but I'm not finding anything online to guide my flavours. Any suggestions? Just add white miso to taste to a panna cotta base? Will that require something else to balance the flavour? And I'm thinking of serving a raspberry compote with it. That should balance well, right? Thoughts?

We really enjoyed The House when we were there in January: http://www.thehse.com/