sigma

I don't see the reason for your odd rants, your accusations about my age, your requests for pictures (of what?) If they are nickel, great, they are nickel. I am only speaking from my experience trying to help by suggesting that somebody look other than at skillets when considering copper since they were never really made for high level cooking other than in the dining room.

Yours are probably tin. Nickel hasn't really been a popular lining metal, and if you got them in France in the '80s then they were tin. I think it is great stuff. Both tin and stainless linings have advantages. Stainless won't melt, tin doesn't stick. Some people are partisans, I am not. The melting feature of tin is what kept it from being widely used in skillets. Tin has a low melt point, too low for hot cooking in most instances, so those pans were carbon steel and now, in most good restaurants, mainly nonstick.

Post pics of what?

I will attempt one more time to be clear. If you look at the Dehillerin site you will see no skillets in the tin lined copper range. There is a reason for this. When the French batterie de cuisine evolved copper was not used for skillets except for table presentation, hence my reference to crepes suzette. Now that you can get stainless lined copper, you can get stainless lined copper skillets, but as I said before, they are a historical oddity which didn't exist and has never found use outside of interior design. Nothing wrong with that, but nothing right either. It isn't a great material for a skillet since it is very sticky and responds quickly to temperature change, like placing a cold piece of meat in a hot pan. Better off use carbon steel or cast iron, or nonstick. All avoid the pitfalls of the copper skillet, the pan that never was and probably should not be.

OK, that's a nice story. I remember Dehillerin in those days and using those pots in those restaurants. I was just suggesting that if somebody were to buy a single piece of copper it shouldn't be an oddity like a skillet which never had much use outside of crepes suzette. Likewise, I wouldn't suggest a button down shirt with French cuffs or vegetarian bacon, even though they can be had.

FWIW, a copper skillet is kind of an oddity. Other than as table serving pieces, they were never used, and not really much made. They are kind of a sign of the guy who buys things in a set. The reason, of course, is that as copper became a cookware material, it was lined with tin, and the temperatures you would find being used in a skillet really aren't conducive to tin, which melts. When you started to see cuprinox then you saw more skillets, but it is almost unheard of outside the world of fancy kitchen decoration. Copper, anyway, is best on its natural environment, which is on a coup de feu rather than on gas or electric. That is where you get the best use of the material and avoid its pitfalls. Just my .02 with a little history built in. If I were to get one copper pan I'd probably get a casserole so that it can double as a nice way to bring food to the table for festive occasions.

Should I avoid the dish regardless of place? No, I think it is a nice dish, and it is a great experience. If you expect, perhaps demand, that your duck breast is sous vide to a certain temperature and plated with tweezers you will be disappointed. The duck is cooked nearly raw, then kept warm and finished by pouring over a nearly hot sauce, so the cooking isn't going to be thermoplongeur correct. It is a dish of great intensity, though, and worthwhile.

It's a mistake to judge the dish based on what you would "expect at a starred restaurant" when the method of preparation, the seasoning, really the whole idea is totally distinct from what a starred restaurant would do today given the current context of fine dining. It's a great version of canard a la presse, which may not be a great version of duck for a lot of people. Likewise, the one at Alinea/Next might be a great duck dish for many people, for from acquaintances I have who went to that Paris meal, it was described as a horrible version of the dish. Historical dishes are really all context less enjoyment, IMO.

Tour d'Argent is very touristy and a great quality version of the dish.

I had a similar problem early on with my MVS-31, but this was some years ago and I can't remember what it was. I do remember that we had a repair guy out and it took him about 30 seconds to fix the problem.

There are several opinions on this in the main Brussel Sprouts thread here: http://forums.egullet.org/topic/110467-brussels-sprouts/?hl=%2Bbrussel

Yeah. Totally agree. The lack of mess is great, also the lack of space for storage.

Sous vide confit is nice. It's a pretty simple concept, and it works well. It doesn't age as well as real confit, and while it is true as nathanm likes to say that very few people these days have had real confit to know the difference, the difference is there. As with all things. Better or not? Who knows.

This is overly reductive. Your comment is based on the idea that there is a quantitative difference in goodness between the outcomes, when it really breaks down to preferences at a given time. It's easy to wax poetic about keeping the "texture and taste of the initial ingredient," though you are mistaken in thinking you are preserving texture when you are simply choosing a different alteration, and to hold that as a standard. One could just as easily go on about preserving the taste of the dish in question, and since a lot of the great ones, the bourgignons, the daubes etc tend to be, well, muddied, then the sous vide versions can be dismissed as pale imitators. Really, it is better to think of them as having different strengths, which is why different methods are chosen, and not just when somebody wants shredded meat. That is really understanding your ingredients, your history and how to combine the two.

Pressure cookers are faster and the sauces tend to be richer because of the better extraction at slightly higher temperature and the ability to use less moistening liquid. On the downside, they court stringiness a lot of the time, and the flavors tend to be a little muddled. Also, while when done well the sauces are quite clear, they can get murky as the vegetables and bones are breaking down quickly. Sous vide allows you to have interesting textures, but it takes a longer time and, and this is just personal, it tends to lack a bit of the nuance of flavor that traditionally cooked food has. A friend, who is a Michelin starred chef, remarked that you can cook a bird sous vide perfectly, but the truth is that the best part of a bird are the little burned crusties that you get when you roast one on a spit. The same goes for braises, there are little nubs and bits of soft, caramelized fat that make some dishes shine. Traditional has what you would imagine. Familiar tastes you can coax into great richness, but also the loss of a lot of aromatics and an underlying dryness. Take the best you can from each.

Each has its own strengths and weaknesses. A combination on one plate is really nice a lot of the time.

Interesting. I find the broth with the ravioli to be perfection in liquid form and I love the texture of the vegetable merguez, though I have had it far fewer times than the ravioli dish, the July garden being so seasonal. Wonderful restaurant and great to go to over and over and to see the seasons flow.

Sorry, but no. It isn't a matter of whether it's really close to touching or not, it is a matter of technique, and the technique with a yanagiba necessitates touching the board in a certain way with each cut. Ignorance and knowledge aren't the same thing, much as some people might like them to be, and equating them is one of the things that brings down the level of this board. But if you are not convinced, think about it this way. If the knife never touches the board, and the fish is soft and non-acidic, then when do sushi chefs sharpen their knives every night? But if it makes you feel better to know than not to, just watch this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKnhOGc68YY&list=PL8FA659765DC4698E or this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCz2RkmtWYM&list=PL8FA659765DC4698E

Boycotters, in general, are hilarious. I think it would be difficult to find a more hypocritical group of people in this world.

More than one.

pig snouts are pretty good when prepared well. eyeballs are not.

I'm with dcarch. DH has a favorite knife which he keeps urging me to use...it's so much better than the one I use, he says. BUT I can't handle the handle. It's just too big for my hand and that's that. I like my own two knives. And I don't want to switch. You're right about letting her try some knives, but that's already been done at my place and the homes of a couple of friends, plus I'm comparing knives to those that she has and which she finds acceptable. In a way, this choice is an educated guess, but this knife is not available in any local stores I've visited. If it's not acceptable, I can return it or perhaps use it myself. What I really want to know is if this is a decent knife, perhaps comparable in quality to Victorinox blades. I think Sur La Table has those Wusthof knives. They are in plastic near the knife area, usually on a spinning stand, if my memory serves me.

This would be true if you had "tamale dollars" burning a hole in your pocket, but since you don't, or I don't think you do, the argument doesn't hold water as a one for one substitution. Also, it is not my responsibility to support a corrupt system based mainly on rent seeking just because it costs me more to do so. I'm not taking from your legal tamale vendor, and neither is the underground tamale vendor.

Just because something is a law does not mean it isn't stupid. Tri2Cook, you are basically using the same reasoning a parent uses when they say "it's because I said so."

Rabbit shoulders have little meat, but it is some of the best meat around. The livers and kidneys are also wonderful. The legs are OK and the saddles almost not worth eating. Rabbit rillettes with a lot of rosemary are quite nice.