ChrisTaylor

Hope some of you see this before it's too late. I was at Aldi today and spotted a special on the following (all Coolabah brand): * mini spits (rated up to 8kg, spit itself is battery powered) - ~$50 * 4 burner gas BBQs - ~$170 * gas-powered smoker (think the American style BBQ that's hard to find at a reasonable price here) - $200 I came out with a smoker and spit. Testing the spit tonight with a duck.

If someone is really salty, why not soak it for a little while in water?

Didn't think of it like that. Good point. Too, keep the phone number of the local Domino's handy.

It's not the quantity that's the issue so much as the variety. One degustation won't be a problem. Come back when you're doing, say, a dozen or more in the space of a week, averaging 20 courses a day of very rich or at least very complex food. After day four or so, that gets a bit much. Enjoy yourself. Altho' I've learnt--and this is a personal thing, as I can't and don't drink a lot of alcohol--that I can't do matching wines. For a course or two, sure. But no more.

I've only cooked 'fan' fillets. It's a lean meat. A nice meat but very lean. I wouldn't be too shocked if, in attempting to roast the beast whole, you wound up with a great lump of warm, emu-flavoured biltong. I'd be nervous about cooking a 1-2 kilogram roast. A whole bird, though? Jesus. There's no chance you can use, say, a BBQ and cook emu steaks, is there? I get that, 'hey, look at that whole emu strapped up over the fire' is maybe part of what your friend wants but I strongly suspect the result from roasting it will be shit. Steaks, however, particularly if you take it a step further and provide a lot of bread rolls, condiments and extra fillings (salad, etc) could be awesome. Just don't take them beyond medium rare. As with Skippy and Bambi, it dries out something awful. Even if the layer of fat on the skin is palatable, it won't stop a large piece of meat from drying out.

That works. Thanks.

Started a small wine collection -- a mixture of Australian, French and New Zealand, mostly. Hoping to age them for 2-10 years. 2008 Devil's Rock Pinot Noir 2007 Guigal Cotes du Rhone 2007 Domaine Mazurd La Grande Bellane Valreas Cotes du Rhone Villages 2007 Domaine La Fourmente Nature Cotes du Rhone Villages 2005 Chateau Rousselle Cru Bourgeois 2009 Domaine des Escaravailles La Ponce Rasteau 2009 Lafite Rothschild Barons de Rothschild Collection Speciale Reserve Bordeaux 2009 Greywacke Wild Sauvignon 2009 Chateau Bizard Serre de Courrent Coteaux du Tricastin 2008 Amancaya Malbec Cabernet Sauvignon 2008 Warrabilla Reserve Durif 2009 Scotchmans Hill Pinot Noir 2008 Waipara Hills Pinot Noir (one of my favourite pinot noirs)

Cracked open the savoury volume of Laduree and made the spiced loin of lamb with apricots and roasted almonds. Very nice.

I was at the bottle-o today perusing the rose section. I like rose. At least, when I've had it at restaurants, I've liked rose. Never bought a bottle, though. What struck me was that most of the stuff was 1-2 years old. And that the labelling suggested you drink it within 1-2 years. The implication was that I really shouldn't be buying rose with a view to aging it (even for, say, 5 years). Simple question: why not?

I've just started a small wine collection--nothing terribly expensive, but a mix of things I enjoy. Mostly reds from Australia and France, with a few oddities thrown in. Anyway. There's a matter of storage. I don't have a cellar or basement. My house, however, is cool--it has to hit about 40*C outside before I feel the need to even glance in the direction of the air conditioner (of course, when it falls below 15*C outside the house is an ice box). Does it really matter where I set up a little wine rack? Would, say, the inside of a cupboard (i.e. away from light) be superior to the corner of my living room? Are the short-term variations in room temperature caused by heating/air con a problem?

You know you've bought very fresh prawns when, hours after purchase, when you're going through the motions of peeling their thoraxes and slipping out their poop chutes, the legs and antennae are still twitching. Luckily I didn't have some Palahniuk Survivoresque gross out moment of a prawn flipping and wiggling in my hands to get away from the Global.

Why not think of stuff you'd get on a chartcuterie/pickle platter? i.e. cured meats, maybe some pickled vegetables, etc. Of course, you could just stick with what I do in restaurants with damn near all breads--a heart attack inducing quantity of expensive French butter. That works. Mmm ... salty death.

As above ... altho' I'll add there are maybe a couple of beasts where the flavour imparted by age isn't desireable. Baby goat is vastly superior to grandma/pa goat.

Today I'm going all 'surf and turf'--a nice piece of t-bone and some prawns.

Revisiting the Laphroaig 18 with my new Glencairns. I'm not sure if it's just that I'm new to trying to seriously identify aroma and flavour compounds, but all that I'm hit with is burning coals. The strong medicinal qualities of the 10 just aren't coming through for me.

Sticking close to home this evening with a dram of Hellyer's Road pinot noir-finished variant. Vastly superior to their original, semi-peated and peated variants ... not because it's holy-shit-amazing (like the 8 year old Smith's Angaston I stumbled across) but because it's different. The wine barrel finish is very obvious--it's there in the colour, it's there in the nose (there's a yeasty sort of unbaked bread smell ... as well as the obvious red wine note). Creamy texture. The finish is that of a young whisky. Would I buy a replacement bottle when I eventually finish this, like I'd happily do with Talisker/Lagavulin/Abelour cask strength/etc? Too early to say. So far, this and the Smith's (which was produced, sadly, in a very limited run) are the only Australian whiskies I've truly enjoyed. Yet to sample Sullivan's Cove (bought a 150mL bottle), tho', or the offerings from Bakery Hill. I've heard good things. The youth of the majority of our whiskies (the Smith's is the oldest I know of--by far) is a real killer, as is the price/avaliability.

I've seen it. iirc someone--an Oliver or a Ramsay, maybe--recommends it in some book, somewhere on my shelf. I did attempt it with equal parts waxy potatoes (Desiree) and floury (maybe Sebagos). The 'problem' came about with the fact that two kinds of potatoes are going to take a different amount of time to cook. If I was to attempt it again I'd maybe use two small saucepans and cook them on their own.

I spend a fair bit of money buying coffees in the morning. Mostly because it's convinient and because even if it's mediocre, it's superior to what I can make at home using supermarket-grade coffee and a cheap French press. I'm uneducated when it comes to DIYing coffee. I'm not entirely sure what I want. All I know is ... I'm not fixated on a powered machine--I'm open to suggestions of any 'genre' of coffee brewing device. I take my coffee strong and black (locally and all, I order a long black) and unsweetened--devices such as milk frothers, etc aren't something I want. In short, so long as it makes the kind of coffee I drink, I don't care about anything else--it's not even a 'bonus'. I don't want to have to piss fart around too much in the morning--I'm prepared to downgrade from awesome coffee to very good coffee if it saves a whole lot of work. This applies to the cleaning regime, too. Having to disasseble and cleanse a Meccano kit on a regular basis isn't my idea of fun. I'll be buying freshly ground coffee once or twice a week from a good, local shop (I may look into grinding my own in the future ... but baby steps). I don't have a set budget in mind as, tbh, I don't know how much things cost--keep it in the double or triple figures, tho'. A stove top device, while I've consumed excellent coffee made in such a thing, isn't ideal--my stove is just too angry and I'd rather not start the morning burning the ever living shit out of myself or melting a plastic handle.

A friend of mine has just moved into a new house. He's seemingly ripping the guts out of the kitchen and replacing all the tired old shit with quality gear--new sink, new stove, etc. Anyway. The stove. He's been looking at http://www.lacanche.com/ and wants to know if they're any good. Honestly, I've no idea at all about good quality or even bad quality stoves--my knowledge is limited to knowing that the no name thing installed in my current rental is horrid. Any thoughts? Opinions? Recommendations of superior alternatives?

I bought two Glenfarclas 15 gift packs--a full-sized bottle of the 15 year old plus minis of the 21 and 25 year old expressions. One pack for me. One for my girlfriend's father. Just poured the contents of the 25 year old mini into a tumbler and ... wow.' Judging by the bottling date on this mini, the contents were distilled maybe 9 months and a week prior to my birth (shudders at the mental images involved with that, er, time frame ... but also somewhat amused at the idea this stuff could've been distilled on the same day I was conceived). I've never had whisky that old. The oldest, until now, would've been 18 years for whisky, 19-20 for wine. Which is odd, really, as being so young I guess there are so many products readily avaliable--many of which that aren't insanely expensive (i.e. like trying to find a whisky older than you when you're in your late 30s)--that are older than me. There's a certain magical quality added to each sip of this 50mL bottle of whisky. When I get some more shelf space, I'm going to have to spring for the full-sized bottle of Glenfarclas 25.

The Ardbeg Uigwhatever--the cask strength Ardbeg with the name that sounds like something you'd cough up on a particularly rough morning--is nice. I like Ardbeg 10 (I've yet to sample the 17 that arrived on my doorstep today) but I think it's gutsier brother is superior. Obviously you want to dilute it a little with some water. I'm currently exploring what's avaliable from the Islay region from lesser known distilleries or distilleries that have mostly contributed their whiskies to blends in the past, instead of marketing single malts--Bowmore and Coal Ila seem like a good starting point. Anyway. Today I sampled two: the Laphroaig 18. It's been a while since I've had a bottle of 10 kicking around, so I can't make a direct comparison, but it seems that the extra 8 years in the cask mellows the most ... untamed of whiskies. It's no pushover--it's not at all a dram I'd give to someone still dabbling their toes in the great sea of whisky--but it's a little friendlier. In fact, I have a sneaking suspicion I'll end up liking it more than the 10. I also sampled (moving away from single malt altogether, but staying with quality whisk(e)y) Woodford Reserve bourbon. The only other bourbons I'd had before were the Wild Turkey standard and rye variants and Maker's Mark. It's a step above Turkey and Mark, that's for sure. Not a life-changing drop, but I can see bourbon gradually occupying a larger amount of my shelf space in the future.

For someone living locally: yes. For someone living in Zimbabwe: not an option.

I ended up settling on two gifts: one for Christmas, the other for taking me on for a month. Glenfarclas 15 comes bundled with minis of the 20 and 25 year old expressions. Nice gift presentation. As for the second, I'm going with my original idea: Lagavulin 16. Laphroaig would be a shit idea, but having had a few drams of the Lagavulin since I first bought a bottle for myself a week-ish ago, I think it's accessible enough. Certainly more accessible than, say, Ardbeg or Talisker.

Sipping on my first dram from one of my new bottles, the Ardbeg Uigeadail. This is a damn sexy whisky. For some reason I expected something far more ... intense. Maybe I just remember Ardbeg 10 all wrong--it's been a long time since I've had it--but this, to me, is a very accessible example of Islay. More accessible than Lagavulin, even (which is obviously far easier for the non-Islay fiend to enjoy than the lovably barbaric Laphroaig 10). Curious to see how it stacks up against the Ardbeg 17, Coal Ila and Bowmore. I have a sneaking suspicion I'm going to like them all ... but Uigeadail is the kind of special that deserves all the awards that've been thrown its way.

At the moments I don't have any one 'favourite'. It depends on the mood. Sometimes the 'holy shit, this is whisky, it's not messing around' quality of Laphroaig 10 is exactly what I want. My go-to dram is probably Talisker 10 ... but I also like Glenfiddich (12 and 15). I recently purchased Lagavulin 16 and Aberlour A'bunadh. I like them both ... but haven't had them long enough to know whether the appeal is as lasting as the Talisker. Outside of Scotland, I really like the Bushmills 10 (not so much the Black Bush, tho'). I've also recently ordered a few more--Ardbeg 17 (I like the 10), Laphroaig 18, Talisker 1996 Distiller's Edition, Auchentoshan Valinch and Glenfarclas 15 (bundled with minis of the 21 and 25). Expecting big things.