ChrisTaylor

I don't really like Bloody Marys. Something about the tomato juice.Reminds me, I guess, of heavily processed tomato soup. So, naturally, when some celery bitters arrived on my doorstep I just had to make a Bloody Mary. I used Scrappy's celery bitters, Habanero Shrub, Worcestershire sauce, a bit of horseradish sauce, a little bit of lemon juice, some ground pepper, Tanqueray and V8. It's okay ... I guess. Any suggestions on making a better one or is this beverage doomed to failure by its very nature?

Two multipacks of Scrappy's bitters: I now I have 50mL bottles of their aromatic, orange, grapefruit, lime, lavender, chocolate, celery and cardamom offerings. Wondering if I want or need anything else, bitters-wise: I have a fair whack of the Fee and Bitter Truth/Bitterman range (not terribly keen to purchase more of the latter--I like them but they're stupidly expensive in Australia) range, plus Peychaud's, Angostura and Regan's Orange.

I guess that depends on the knowledge and interest your friends have. I'd probably keep that sort of thing to a minimum--at least when starting out--and sound people out to see if there's any interest in including that kind of thing in future sessions.

Made another Black Rider, this time with Patron Reposado. The agave flavour still dominates and I don't think Patron is brilliant either but this was a superior drink to last night's version. Now it's a Red Light from beta cocktails. 1 1/3 oz each of Grand Marnier and Bols Genever stirred/strained with 1/3 oz Underberg. I don't know what to think of this one.

- to cook both the skin and meat perfectly. See also Heston Blumenthal's Perfection episode about duck. - to make two dishes. Using Chang's Momofuku book as an example, purely because it's on my mind at the moment, you could make the pork belly for ramen and the pork rinds. - to cave to the wishes of the glutenfreeorganicveganlowgilowcarblowsalthighquackeryhealthbullshitcommunist mob.

Talk about pot luck. It's like someone has upended half a dozen grocery bags into a stock pot and parked it on the stove for a couple of hours.

I'm not sure if this is at its best with cheap Monte Alban mezcal. Reckon cutting it with some silver or reposado tequila would work?

I made this. Well, kind of. I used Illy liqueur because I couldn't be fucked Aeropressing 15 mL of coffee after a 13 hour work day. And, too, I don't have any Tom so I used Old Raj. It still works, altho' I suspect it's a fair whack sweeter (thanks to the Illy) than the real deal. Oh yeah, I don't have any cardamom bitters so I used Regan's orange.

I'm starting to horde bottles in this shipping container I've buried in the backyard just in case the zombies arrive.

Just saying, Rafa, but it seems the Turkey that's exported is still 101. At least, the Australian stuff is.

Moon Dog's Mummy Have a Bite Toffee Apple Amber Ale. It's aged for a couple months in Calvados barrels. Interesting. Glad it's a 330mL bottle. Boozy, tho'. I suspect a dangerous lunatic might do a riff on the car bomb theme with this and Laird's.

I like my spirits gendered.

I like Bernheim's wheat whiskey. It's labelled as a wheat whiskey as opposed to a bourbon, altho' the ratio of wheat to corn isn't hugely different from Maker's Mark (51:49 as opposed to 49:51). EDIT As for rye, I'm rather fond of Whistlepig. You could also attempt to get your hands on the Van Winkle rye. Or, if you're prepared to play fast and loose with the definition of American whiskey and include whiskies made in the American style, you could look at some of the ryes made abroad. There's one made down here (still only sold as a white spirit, but it's a 100% rye) and another made in the Netherlands, I think. Bourbon? I'd angle to show two contrasting styles of bourbon. Maybe something fairly sweet like Russell's and something wheaty like Booker Noe's. As for interesting whiskies, I believe a couple of stills in the States are making scotch-style male whiskies.

Shave them and use them in a salad. Or use it in pork meatballs (really). If you have access to a smoker or can ghetto rig a smoker (wok + al foil + lid + etc trickery) you could smoke them. That's always nice.

Filipinos and South Africans grill them. I haven't done it, but I reckon you'd want to steam or braise them first--similar prep to if you were planning to deep fry them for dim sum applications. I guess if you wanted to go down the South African road you could dust them with a peri peri seasoning (say, ground up bird's eye chillies, a bit of salt, a bit of pepper, maybe some tomato and lemon powder if you've got either one on hand) prior to grilling.

Er, I'd just use potatoes. Maybe, I guess, you could angle for something with a robust, earthy flavour. Ideally with a waxy texture. You might even want to try a couple of different kinds to provide the variety pack quality that Yotam was aiming for. Won't be the same ... but it's not like turnips or sweet potatoes or whatever else are that close to Jerusalem artichokes in terms of flavour, either. And we know you can get them. Of course, a case could be made for parnsips. Different, yeah, but there's that sweetness to them that J.Chokes have but potatoes lack. Roots for thought.

Another rye beer. This time it's Bear Republic's Hop Rod Rye Specialty Ale. I don't like it as much as the Sierra Nevada one. It's pretty good, I mean, but sometimes when a beer's hop, hop, hoppy that's all it is. A bit one dimensional.

Picked up these two new Southern books in the past couple weeks: Michael Hudman's Collards & Carbonara, which is exactly what it sounds like, and John Currence's Pickles, Pigs & Whiskey. The title of the latter was almost enough to sell me on the book. Both I initially heard about after purchasing Edward Lee's Smoke & Pickles, which I liked a lot. Both of these books are perhaps slightly more refined than Lee's. Not as authentic as Donald Link's, perhaps (or, at least, more willing to play fast and loose with tradition), but similar in style (a few multi-element recipes, numerous recipes for homemade versions of commercial products such as Duke's [altho' he doesn't frown up the store-bought stuff], occasionally very precise instructions, an assumption that you're familiar with most of the ingredients he is using, etc). Lee's book had a home cooking feel to it. These books have some home style dishes but also a few that are clearly restaurant-style dishes. I've yet to cook anything from either book but like the look of almost everything on every page. Pickles, Pigs & Whiskey has a slightly unusual layout: it's set out by technique (kind of) rather than ingredient. So pork or chicken, for instance, is spread through the entire book rather than put into one chapter.

This is interesting. I like it. Me too. It's interesting how so little coffee liqueur can tame the fernet, at least in my experience. I'm thinking of joining this combo to an eau de vie in a cocktail, the way that eau de vie is sometimes paired with espresso postprandially. I made it again with the addition of a dash of Bitter Truth chocolate mole bitters. Still tossing up whether I want to go down the rum or gin route with the spirits. Might even take a leaf from Johnny Cash's book and add a half ounce worth of Spanish brandy ... Possibilities. EDIT Hey, I just added some Spanish brandy. I'm not sure if this works. It seems to emphasise the coffee/dark chocolate notes of the drink. What I've got so far: 1.5 oz Fernet Branca 0.5 oz Illy coffee liqueur 0.5 oz Spanish brandy dash Bitter Truth chocolate mole bitters Could do with an orange twist, perhaps.

I've used both. I prefer Cointreau. EDIT I'd also suggest cutting the Appleton with a rum that has some funk to it. Smith & Cross or Inner Circle.

I havent decided on the approach for the wings or the legs yet. I was thinking of deboning the thighs and glueing them together with the skin sides facing out. I would Sous vide them @ 145F but for the breast i prefer 140F. Do you have a link or pictures of this deboned, fried wing? Are they cooked first, then bone removed? About the glue, I have used it a few times for various meats, But a few times I had less then stellar results with the bond strength, and was wondering if pre brining would have any effect on the bond. I dont use any acidic ingredients, I use a simple 4-5% salt solution. I may add 2% sugar, but undecided. In order of steps you prep the wings by: - removing the tips - parking in a dry cure (sugar and salt) - cooking sous vide - deboning while still warm - dusting with potato starch - shallow- or deep-frying

I contemplating introducing it to, say, gin.

This is interesting. I like it.

I cooked a lot of turkey sous vide in the lead up to Christmas last year. I wanted to present turkey in two or three different ways. I found turkey is a funny bird to cook sous vide. It can be very good. It can also be uninteresting.Things I liked: - The 'roast turkey w/ gravy' recipe in Modernist Cuisine. Essentially a turkey wing that is parked in a cure for a while, cooked sous vide, boned out, dusted with potato starch and seared quickly. I went so far as to deep fry it. This recipe was simple and the results were excellent. If you're buying turkey wings specifically for this recipe, which is what I did, you want the fore part of the wing (i.e. the part with two bones). It's a lot easier to bone this part out. Also, don't ever never not ever skip out the bit that tells you to lop off the wing tips before cooking the wings. Don't even think of that shortcut. For the gravy I used the simpler recipe in Modernist Cuisine at Home. I used random turkey bones, the turkey carcass, off-cuts from my trial run of a few dishes and some chicken whatsits to make the stock (a double stock, really). - The breasts are a funny one. I brined, parked in the bath and deep-fried. I found a slightly higher temperature--I think I cooked at 62--superior to the widely suggested 60. Just something with the texture. Hard to pinpoint. I haven't tried it yet--it's on the cards for this year's trial runs--but I reckon you could inject some of your turkey stock into it. I did not experiment with gluing anything together so I cannot help you there. - The legs I initially parked in a smoker after cooking sous vide. Wasn't a big fan of the result. What I ended up doing was a riff on boerwors: roughy equal parts pork (I think I used cheek, but it might well have been belly) and turkey leg meat plus some speck. Seasoned w/ allspice and coriander and all the usual boerwors baggage. I think the result was okay. I reckon next time I would avoid cooking the sausages sous vide and then deep-frying them. The result just simply inferior to just pan-frying them on a low heat (possibly due to the slightly crumbly texture of boerwors). If your idea of stuffing is the kind that has force meat mixed through it, you could take a similar approach.

I think the cheap brandy worked. I mean, it's not like the two Spanish brandies sold at Dan Murphy's are expensive and refined. As for the mezcal, well, mine isn't exactly a $100 bottle. It was fairly close to what I make with actual Spanish brandy, really. So I think your substitute will be fine.