Norm Matthews

My son worked at a restaurant when he was in high school. The owner was rather tight. His Christmas party for the employees was required and they had to bring pot luck. His Christmas bonus to the employes was that each one got a lottery ticket and he said if anyone won anything they had to split it with him.

I made chili today.

When giving tips, generalities and catch phrases can be problematic, IMHO. Hot pan, cold fat is not a process to be used with teflon lined skillets.

The dairy here has un homogenized milk but I only got some once or twice. I prefer to have homogenized milk and cream in separate bottles.

Dinner tonight was marinated, skewered and grilled pork tenderloin over rice noodles with a dipping sauce and a cucumber, carrot, romaine and radish salad with just lime juice, olive oil and salt as a dressing.

I don't have a link. Maybe I was confused when the dairy said they couldn't then they could. Maybe it was them, not the USDA that changed.

I think I am correct in saying that here in the US it is nearly impossible to (legally) get unpasteurized milk from a commercial outlet. There is a dairy farm a couple miles from here that I get my milk and cream from. They are USDA inspected and licensed to sell to the public and only recently were able to sell small amounts of unpasteurized milk. I know a retired dairy farmer from New York that said he'd never ever drink unpasteurized milk from any cow that he had not raised himself and knew that cows health was sound but that was before the USDA had set up regulations to control how it is sold to the public. I believe that until quite recently is was even illegal to sell or import cheese made from unpasteurized milk.

Canola oil isn't bad for you. It is actually a very good oil for cooking. People who are afraid of it are probably influenced, either directly or indirectly, by an urban legend started several years ago. It said some awful but totally untrue things about it. I am surprised that no one sticks up for it around here. I am surprised but don't know if at myself for not understanding why it is so frowned upon even today or at some of the people who find reasons to dislike it on 'trumped up' charges.

What I keep out is in this hand thrown pottery vessel at the top of the burner knobs.

The kids are making the menu for the next week or more. Yesterday it was meatloaf with carrots, potatoes and Japanese eggplant. Pictures and recipe here: http://normmatthews.blogspot.com/

You don't want to leave fresh home made garlic and oil on the counter top for more than a couple hours or in the fridge for more than a couple days. http://www.stilltasty.com/fooditems/index/17236 Commercial garlic paste can last much longer. http://www.stilltasty.com/fooditems/index/17239

Anchovy paste adds great depth to salted foods.

I have three thermometers that I use for everything but not the same things. One is a laser thermometer by Maverick, a thermapen from thermaworks and a cheap digital thermometer with a probe that goes in the meat or bread with a digital readout that sits outside the oven and sound an alarm when the target temperature is reached. The last one is not any special brand and need replacing every six months or so but I like all three and would not want to be without any of them.

A chef once told me that if you salt food early on then it tastes seasoned. If you salt it afterward, it just tastes salted.

Read the recipe all the way through before you start. Measure everything out before you start cooking. Have all the cookware and utensils out and nearby. Most common mistake I think is trying to cook something in a skillet over too high heat. Some of the best cooks in the world don't use scales to measure, but know how much is the right amount from long experience and by tasting as they go.

I mash the cloves and large grain salt on the (rubber) cutting board with the side of my knife. It takes a few seconds. I have a marble mortar and pestle but never used it to grind up garlic.

The kind of orange you use make a big difference in the taste of the juice. I have one of those big monster squeezers, a smaller one from the 1950's and used to have a Braun rotary juicer. They all make good juice but if you use navel oranges, I find the taste of them watery and the juice from Valencia oranges much much better. I find that I liked the Braun best. It was quick and easy and the juice was a little better than the big lever squeezer because it was possible to exert enough pressure from the big one to extract some of the oils from the skin. But the biggest difference maker is to use the right kind of orange and use it when it is in season. PS edit. the Braun wore out and broke so I don't have it anymore and I moved to a smaller house and don't have counter space for the big juicer so now I use the smaller Juice-Matic? I think its called. The name is worn off from age and use.

For hamburgers and meatloaf, I prefer ground. Fresh ground is better tasting. For ham salad, though, for instance, I like it better when it's minced.

One more thing about oils for frying and smoke point: Every time an oil is heated, it breaks down somewhat and the smoke point is lowered. How ever high the initial smoke point is, it isn't as high the next time it is reheated. I have noticed a fishy smell with canola oil after it has been used about 3 or 4 times and has who-know-what contaminants in it. By then it needs to be discarded and replaced with fresh oil anyway. Other people must have a better sense of taste than I do because even though I can detect that off-smell in old oil, I can't taste it transferred to food as long as they are not put in oil that has not heated up enough and so absorbs the oil in excess, or unless the oil has been used way too many times. Saturated fats will stand up to multiple uses better than unsaturated fats, FWIW.

That's true. Too much food in a saute and it will not brown properly. But Extra V. olive oil is not the best oil to use for sauteing in any case. I was talking about the difference of smoke points in pure olive oil, peanut oil, refined corn oil, soybean oil, etc, all of which are 410 and safflower oil which is only 40º higher. Not a real significant amount of heat difference. If you want to factor in extremes then there will always be exceptions to the general concepts. Avocado oil, Rice Bran oil and Almond oil are the exotic extremes that will be different and will stand the highest heat before starting to break down.

I don't know anything about Modernist Cuisine but i can't imagine cooking anything at or above smoke point of common oils. Unless they commonly use exotic oils with unusually high smoke points and the item is very small and spends a very short time in the oil, it will be burnt on the outside by the time it is cooked sufficiently on the inside. When it comes to sauteing, the bottom of the pan at the burner gets hotter than 400 degrees but the cook is not paying attention to the food if the food and the oil in the pan get that hot. Sometimes you get the pan so hot the oil smokes but then you immediately add the food and the temperature drops, otherwise the food will taste of burnt oil. I used Canola oil as an example of an oil that was neutral flavored. if you don't like it, use something else. It was just to make a point about other oils that do add flavor. PS Mario Batali uses a common grade of olive oil for frying. He said he uses olive oil for all cooking. I guess it is a matter of preference, custom and taste and picking the right oil for the right kind of use.

PS rendered bacon fat is a staple with good ol' Southern cooks like my mom. Wilted lettuce (either leaf lettuce or spinach) with hot bacon oil is the best.

When it comes to cooking and frying with oil, smoke point is kind of a moot point. Pure olive oil and peanut oil both smoke at 410 while safflower and cottonseed oil smoke at 450. Rapeseed (canola) smokes at 440 approx. all those temperatures are too high for frying anyway. It is taste that is important and heat destroys the flavor complexities in fine olive oil and its too expensive to waste in a fryer or skillet anyway. I use canola oil for most cooking because I generally want a neutral tasting oil and olive oil as a general purpose salad oil. Butter, vegetable margarine and lard all are useful in baking. Blends with butter raise the melt point when that is important. If you want the flavor of butter in your pan fried food, use a blend with peanut or calnola or use clarified butter so it isn't in danger of burning the milk solids. As for diet purposes, all fat is about equal in terms of calories. It is the saturated fats and the trans fats (hydrogenated fats) that you need to be concerned about if you are worried about cholesterol. Even then new research isn't so upset about health and some saturated fats. No one disputes the bad health issues associated with hydrogenated fats. edited to correct spelling

Please explain what you mean when you say you turn your wet starter into a firm one and I have never heard of making a levain from a yeasty starter either, much less doing it in 8 hours, but if a wet starter gets thoroughly chilled, you need to bring it back to room temperature and feed it again before using it. One feeding will do unless it has been more that a couple of weeks. You should be able to tell when its ready. If you made a dough ( firm starter?) then it will be ready to go once it has warmed up and risen. It should last at least a couple of days in the fridge.

Not a very good picture today but dinner was gluten free. Notes on dinner at site listed below. http://normmatthews.blogspot.com/