Gregg
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Posts posted by Gregg
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We've used variations of ham glaze with coke and usually thought they were just fine. Have a friend who makes coke cake. I'm not a real cake eater, but it is very moist and seems to please everyone who needs a sugar fix more than I do. I do a brisket recipe a few times a year with Dr. Pepper that seems to always draw rave reviews and have also done a pork tenderloin marinated in Jarritos' Pina soda that turned out very well.
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That's not terrible, but sounds a little high. Probably ok if your rent is cheap and equipment leases are reasonable.
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Its like the old sage line... The French have two wine glasses on the table, a big one and a small one. The big one is for water.
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Alas, sometimes self medication simply isn't enough.
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Love the idea of the cooking classes, but might be worth looking at it more as a marketing strategy than a profit center. I'm assuming you would make a good profit at $100/head, but you will probably scare off a lot of potential repeat customers at that price point. You want to run a restaurant, not a cooking school, right? If you cut the price back to where you do just a little more than break even, but create a buzz, the word of mouth will spread. Make it an event, limit the number of people. If an "invitation" becomes a prize that people want it could be huge for you. Exclusivity sells. Do them on a night that is usually a lousy for service, but when people need to be there anyway to receive shipments, check orders or prepare menus.
Think carefully about not serving liquor, it's a major profit generator in a fine food environment. Talk to liquor distributors about wine with cutting edge names and labels, or even have them custom label for you with images that would appeal to your target market.
What about cross promotion with businesses outside the food and liquor industry? You mentioned a skater/punk sensibility. What appeals to that crowd (assuming they are your target market)? You could cater a "happy hour" at a tattoo shop or have a skate shop or bling shop come by your classes with their goods and a special discount for anyone in the class. You know the market, I don't, but you get the idea.
Have you projected what your food costs will be as a percentage of overall expenses (ie. can you afford to sell food at the price point you're trying to hit)?
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We (DW and I) sit at communal tables or at the bar of a nice restaurant quite often. The tables are better for us, the bars often attract single diners. Nothing wrong with that, but we like talking to other couples or groups more. We've had some of our most fun conversations with people we just met. You always at least have the food in common. On the other side I can usually predict our friends points of view, but it keeps you on your conversational toes to dine with people you don't know.
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We're also in the middle of eating up all the winter comfort food stored there, making room for spring. It's not like I'm going to get 50# of spring peas, darn it, but time to clear out the chicken pot pie filing (a use for stock Chris?) and chili. Did find two more bags of the richest turkey stock I've ever made. Yea! Also found veal demi glace I'd forgotten about and some baby turnips that still appear to be in good shape. Not as good as winning the lottery, but certainly going to help with dinner this week!
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Sushi?
dcarch
LOL...I was thinking "meat".
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Follow up: My wife said the cheap bottle we hit with the stick blender "tightened back up" and wasn't as good by the end of the evening. Knowing we wouldn't finish that bottle that night I had poured it from the blending pitcher back into the bottle, although I did not re-cork or seal the bottle in any way. Thought that was interesting.
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I also agree that it does make sense that you would need some water to do the pressure cooker method.
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My personal favorite, The Brick on Northern Exposure (best if Adam was cooking).
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Wine Wisdoms
in Wine
"With wine in hand, one reaches the happy state - where men are wise, women beautiful; and even one's children begin to look promising." Anon.
Presumably the food tastes better as well. In vino veritas.
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Tried the stick blender last night with spectacular results. A bottle of very inexpensive (like $9) Martini cab, poured one glass then the rest in a glass pitcher. Hit it with the blender. Amida0616 was right, you need to keep the blades near the surface. So much aeration that a froth formed, but immediately dissipated when the blender was shut off. Ran for 30 seconds, waited about a minute just because then poured a glass. DW and I both found a remarkable difference (the "hyperdecanted" glass was better). Still a little nervous about doing this with something like Colgin or Mouton, but probably going to make it standard issue for our normal quaffing selections.
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I live 1416 miles from the nearest In-N-Out Burger (from mapquest, no I didn't crawl there, not that I'm above such things). As many incredible, creative and purely delicious burgers as there are in between an animal style double-double is the only one that stirs thoughts of a pilgrimage.
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No local sources for me so Amazon fills the void. As JBailey said, lots of different size containers available. I try to find someone to split a gallon with. From Hudson Valley Foie Gras, its $35 + shipping. They have lots of smaller options, but I find them to be REALLY expensive.
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My name's Gregg and I'm (also) a cookbook addict. What I don't spend on cookbooks, or the new SVS, goes to the lumber yard for materials for new book shelves. Fortunately my wife still believes this is better for me than crack.
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Here we have a specimen with (anticlockwise) green onions, leek flower sauce, crispy fried shallots, lao gan ma black bean chilli oil, a drizzle of Sichuan pepper oil, white pepper, a puddle of soy sauce, and a healthy teaspoonful of duck fat.
There haven't been that many times that I actually wanted to lick my monitor (really!), but that sounds SOOOOOOO good. Stuck on the sweet side of the breakfast world here today. DD requested bananas Foster waffles to start Friday with. I'm on it.
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Lol...I'm a one handed, smash it on the counter, dump it in the bowl and sling the shell at the trash with a little tail of whites wiggling behind it kind of guy. My technique has room for refinement.
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I've done dark roux in the oven my whole life (blonde still gets the stove top since its such a quick process). I do it a little different than Alton Brown; 300* in a La Creuset dutch oven with the lid on. We usually like a combination of oil and a little butter, which is the reason for the slightly lower temperature. Whisk it every 15 minutes or so until it starts to get close to the color you want then take the lid off to make it easier to keep an eye on it at the end. It doesn't get any easier.
Slapping my forehead because I never really thought about making extra and keeping a jar in the fridge! Duh!!! Going to make a batch this morning just to have it on hand.
The Best Way to Cook a Thick Steak
in Cooking
Posted
I had standard, USDA choice, grocery store rib eyes cut to 1 3/4". Pulled them from the fridge about 30 minutes before starting to cook. I'm fairly certain the centers were still much cooler than the surface of the steaks, which is part of my standard technique because my family does not go beyond medium rare willingly and most prefer a warm red center. Anyway, followed Fat Guy's version of Ducasse's method pretty much to the letter in cast iron pans. The exceptions were that I kept the heat a little lower than true medium (whatever that is) and flipped the steaks a little more often, letting one surface of the steak cool slightly before returning it to the butter. The pan was apparently just cool enough to be below the burn point of the butter because it never did burn, but was high enough to generate a wonderful Maillard reaction. I did exchange it at mid-point just to be sure, but don't think it would have been necessary. The crust that developed was like nothing that has ever come off my stove before. A truly transcendent moment for me. I'm planning to try this with a Lobel's steak if my refinance is approved. Thanks Fat Guy!