weinoo

Do you have a reference for that? I see a lot of stuff he's involved in (including patent trolling, evidently). I might have glossed over that one.

Kinda looks like some sort of shrimp decapitator.

Right. And it is farmed salmon which makes up a large percentage of what gets cured and smoked and sold as Nova, Gaspé, et al. That stuff is oily as hell.

This was my prep station... Downstairs at Aquavit (the groundbreaking Nordic restaurant here in NYC), at the time helmed by the great chef Marcus Jernmark, currently of Frantzén in Stockholm. See all those little anchovy like fish at the bottom left? They were the least of what was inside these day-boat diver scallops, dived off the coast of Maine. There were also all sorts of little crabs, so a little grit was par for the course. They got rinsed.

Scallops - rinse them off once out of the shell. clams - I like to soak in a bowl of cold, sea-salted water barely to cover, for an hour or two. Some use cornmeal. I once shucked 240 diver scallops for an event. You wouldn’t believe the stuff inside the shells.

Sure looks as if there’s some fat in that salmon. I’m no scientist, but I wonder if the % of fat increases in any given piece of salmon after it has been cured and cold-smoked?

AHA - this is where I fall short! NO No NO! Okay, go ahead. Well, in the restaurant business, focusing on just a few ingredients can lead to consistency, which as any great chef will tell you, is what she wants out of her kitchen. Maybe people order that same sausage or margharita pizza (or sometimes sausage on only half the pie!) because that's what they like? Some people even go back to the same pizza place again and again; after trying others that suck.

Any time I open a package of sliced smoked salmon, nova, Gaspé, whatever you want to call the smoked product (but not lox), and whether that product has been hand sliced at Russ & Daughters or commercially vacuum packed, it's loaded with oil. As a matter of fact, perusing most of the cold-smoked products on this page, the fat content in the various salmon products seems to be anywhere from 30 - 50%.

Removing a vacuum pack from the fridge for 30 minutes ahead of time allows the slices to separate more easily. Don't have that much experience with salmon this way...moreso with different types of jamón.

Good perspective.

Chirashi night. Poached wild gulf shrimp, ikura, avo, gari. Nice to be able to throw this together - prepping the toppings and the sides while the rice cooks.

That looks good...I hope it has even more to offer than:

Hmmmm - I think they were called chopped steaks or chopped sirloin steaks (as opposed to hamburger steaks) and were on most every diner and coffee shop menu. The ones run through a tenderizing machine were possibly called minute steaks.

Host's note: this discussion was split from Yuan Longping (1930 - 2021), Father of Hybrid Rice" dies. Brilliant stuff. Which brings me to another point and that discussion of Modernist Pizza. Imagine if Nathan and all his scientists used their brains for something as important as this?

See, Hennes already has a jump on it... Though I think you need to lay off the coffee, @Chris Hennes.

What do they know?

Here's the thing...I'm very happy that people are excited about buying this book. In my situation, vis-a-vis pizza, I feel that the pizza I make here is as good as it's gonna get; that is, it's good enough for the people I feed...and me. I don't want it to be any better - then I might have to feed more people. If I really want better pizza, I walk up the block, or around the corner, or hop in the car and go somewhere else in the city. Also, I feel the pizza books, and bread books with dedicated pizza sections (we're talking dozens of books here) I already own, and the other stuff about pizza I have read, and all the pizza I have eaten in various places, have done a good job helping me to understand the fundamentals. There are 4 or 5 basic ingredients in dough, and there really are only a few basic toppings that matter. Once again, in my opinion. How much more fundamental does it need to be? I really can't wait to see what the 1000 recipes offer. I won't buy the books to find out; I'm hoping @Chris Hennes will post them one at a time as he makes them. With pictures. Or even videos.

Interesting; one of the reasons to toss potatoes with the vinegar soon after cooking (i.e. while still hot) when making potato salad, is because of how well they absorb the vinegar taste. I wonder if actually adding vinegar to the cooking water would bump that up even more.

This is the nail on the head, in my opinion. It goes hand in hand with consistency. All the knowledge in the world is great (though perhaps some of it ought be put to better use), but if you make pizza once a week or once a month, I don't care how many books you read. Understanding of the equipment you're actually using, the ingredients you're using, and even the temperature and humidity of your cooking environment is going to be a lot more useful than why the first caveman made pizza.

One thing you might do is cancel that subscription (good luck with that!) And then, under a different email address, they have special deals for $4 a month (I think) for full digital access (which lasts a year, I think).

I mean, like @Duvel makes some damn good looking pies, in my opinion (though, ahem - some of the toppings - oy!...). Is his pizza gonna be that much better because he's now been taught the theory of pizza? Or will it get better, as he said, by investing in a better oven?

I think that depends; sometimes the telling of the theory of something is just plain boring and useless to all but a select few.

We're cousins?

i think if one's aim is to master any art, one ought work with a master; say with Gabrielle Bonci. Or Jim Lahey. Or Anthony Mangieri. Nancy Silverton. Or at da Michelle. Patsy's. etc. We can learn lots from books, but nothing like watching the hands of a master.

I'm waiting for Modernist Carrot.