Broken English

A sweatshop on American soil, makes me wonder how they get away with it.

I've never enjoyed brown rice for some reason, something about the flavor does nothing for me. I can imagine this would be convenient if you were cooking for one, but expensive and pointless otherwise.

Completely agreed.

I can cope with, even come to like, kids that are well behaved. But one crying baby or screaming toddler ruins it for everyone. Being a parent obviously comes with more than a few sacrifices, and going out is one of them as far as I see it. Let the flak rain down haha.

Had my trial at Centro a week and a half ago, all good. I start Monday, six days a week for about twelve hours a day, so I'm going to be busy. I think I'll do the winter there and maybe look for something else come summer next year, seeing as I now realize my visa is for two years. Maybe somewhere MG inspired next time around.

Screaming kids make my blood boil. In my view, if you have children under about 7 then you should either get a babysitter or refrain from going out. I can go either way on the waiters coming by the table too often/not enough issue. In a perfect world, they would make enough passes by the table to gauge from the body language/eye contact whether they need to stop. I mentioned this one in another thread, but the practice I seem to have only encountered in the US, of not waiting until the starters are finished before bringing mains to the table. Basically, my options are either eat from two plates, or let the main go cold while I finish the first course.

It just depends on how much you want to spend for an experience that probably won't happen in London again. It's a pretty hefty price, but seeing as I missed per se because it was closed when I was in NY, I'd probably do it. Still, the price seems a little ridiculous.

I wouldn't trust it personally. As others have mentioned, the bag can contain an unpleasant smell, so I think you're better off re-doing the cryovac and adding seasoning and stuff anyway.

I would say that the chocolate is overheated, but I'm not sure how given your method. Hope you can get it sorted.

How smooth do you want the finished ganache? I'd suggest that if you want it smooth then reduce apple juice and use it to deglaze the caramel, and add this to the ganache to get the desired apple caramel flavour.

31F is about 0C right? In which case I'd say it's fine. I wouldn't have a worry, I know of restaurants that used to defrost stuff overnight, which would be room temp the next morning. It was fine, although the practice is far from ideal.

Yeah, I've never even heard the name. That said, the Melbourne dining scene was never anything I had a great deal of knowledge about, apart from the bigger names. Plus, I was still at school in 2004 I just thought that in the following years, I'd have read/heard about it.

How about working a classic flavour combination into clear layered jellies, indistinguishable, until you dig in with the spoon. Tomato, basil, mozzarella for instance?

I am firmly of the view that with this dish, caramel is the only way to go. Yes, it's messy, but that's kind of the beauty of the dish.

I love ricotta, that version of tomato salad is pretty similar to a lunch salad we served a while back at my last job, except we used regular basil pesto. It's amazingly delicious, and I blame you for giving me severe ricotta cravings right now.

I had never even heard of it until a few weeks ago when I was crawling through past "50 Best Restaurants" lists, and was amazed to find it in there multiple years. I thought it was very strange I'd never so much as heard of it, considering it was ranked at #20 in 2004.

I think Mark Best (Marque) had this on his menu at one stage (he also has the Arpege egg at various times). I never had it, but I'm pretty sure it's served hot. In The Man Who Ate the World, Jay Rayner describes the Arpege dish briefly as 'cooked tableside in a bubbling sweet sour caramel', so again, I'd imagine it's hot.

Looks and sounds amazing. I can't wait to go back to MW, it was extraordinary last time. I hope he gets his third star, he sure deserves it.

Personally I fear the consequenses if I started an intensive red wine diet. I've already stopped opening my mail, for fear of it being my liver handing in its two week notice Sounds quite interesting though, in all seriousness.

The "Bad News" is always implied, regardless. You really don't get it though, do you? Most people don't want to be preached at, it doesn't matter what your intentions are. This is how Christians got their bad reputation in the first place ... well, one of the reasons, among the wars, executions of the innocent because they were "posessed by satan" and the crap about the eternal damnation of sections of society. Anyway, we're now way off topic.

That's the problem though, it doesn't matter how benign your intentions, religion is malignant. Most people don't want to hear whatever salvation is being spewed forth by the righteous on that particular day. If I came around and preached to you about atheism and the Good News about the rise of logic and rationality, would you like it? I'd say not. Religious beliefs belong in churches. Nowhere else.

My review of Alinea ... again, it's long, so apologies for that. Hope you enjoy ... I arrived with a little unease. I always get this way before dining at high end places I’ve never been, it seems to be a reaction to the excitement and anticipation, and after going through the Alinea cookbook, and reading ‘Life, On The Line’, it only compounded the slight nervousness I was feeling. I needn’t have worried, the wait staff are able to put you at ease quickly through their semi-cheeky remarks, and pretty soon, the only thoughts related to the wonders that were to emerge from the kitchen. To start, the table decoration of a miniature herb garden is placed on the table, along with a tongue in cheek comment of “no grazing, you’ll need that later on”, which was a good indication of what was to follow, and showed the deftness of the waiters in putting you at ease, allowing you to relax and ‘just go with it’. The choices of sparkling waters were presented, and I ended up going with the recommendation of one that was really briny, yet refreshing. An unorthodox choice, to be sure, but it worked well with food, and cleaned the palate nicely with the mildly salty and earthy mineral flavour. Okay, so describing bubbly water in that much detail may seem a little pretentious, but it was so different that I figured it was worth a mention. Steelhead roe with watermelon and cucumber was a perfect balance of flavours, the sweetness and saltiness playing off each other brilliantly. The ethereal texture of watermelon mousse and the purity of the watermelon distillation added greatly to the clarity and depth of the dish, with the refreshing crunch of the cucumber and the gentle popping of the roe adding great textural elements. The dish was matched to a sake with subtle flavours that worked well with the dish. The next course, served nestled in the clutches of the slightly sinister looking tentacles of the ‘squid’, and impaled on a warm vanilla bean skewer, was Hamachi tempura with pineapple salt and banana. The greaseless tempura and rich oily fish was accented nicely with the sweetness of the fruits and the vanilla aroma added another sensory dimension, heightening the sweetness. Four ‘courses’ arrived at once, sitting upon a log of driftwood, nestled in seaweed, and comprised of oyster leaf, scallop with white ale foam, little neck clam with Australian black truffle and champagne, and a razor clam with carrot, soy and daikon. Of the four, the scallop and razor clam were memorable, the little neck clam and oyster leaf were merely okay. Tasty enough, but they didn’t really stand up to the razor clam or the scallop. I thought it was kind of odd that this was four separate courses, though I guess that it is probably only done this way for clarity on the menu. Labelled as yuba, shrimp, miso, togarashi, the next course is a definite highlight. The crispy fried bean curd is wrapped with sweet and tender shrimp (or prawn, if you’re from my neck of the woods) and sits in a crater filled with a miso emulsion. The emulsion is hands down the best mayo I’ve ever had, and the sweetness of the shrimp was a great foil for the earthy miso. I had to restrain myself from tonguing the crater; I just didn’t want to miss out on any available skerrick of that miso emulsion. Sweet corn, served in three parts (yes, that three layered bowl) was a little hit and miss, mostly due to me not being a huge fan of the liquorice that was served as part of the first layer with a cold corn parfait and gooseberry, though the flavours worked well together despite my indifference to the strong aniseed flavour. This course was accompanied by a stern yet totally playful ‘no peeking’ from the waiter, who later came across to remove the first tier to reveal grilled baby corn, roasted tomatillo seed and crispy corn kernels, which was easily the best of the three, with a pleasant smokiness accentuated by the deep flavour of the roasted tomatillo and crispy texture of the kernels. The third tier was revealed to contain a corn broth made from the husks, with chanterelle mushroom and confit pork belly. The pork belly added a nice richness, but the broth was a little too subtle and underseasoned to have the impact that I was expecting. It was then that I was presented with the tool that would ultimately destroy my attractive centrepiece, a pair of surgical style scissors. I couldn’t help but grin as they were placed on the table, much to the confusion of the waiter, to whom I had to explain that the course that I had at Moto two nights previous where I was presented a miniature rake and shovel as cutlery. It seemed that Chicago was conspiring to try and get me to revise my unabashed hatred of participating in gardening. The dish consisted of the best gazpacho it has ever been my pleasure to consume, with heirloom tomato and nitro frozen goats cheese. I went at the herb garden like the mad pruner and made short work of it, then used the gazpacho to dress the herbs and combine all the elements. It was a great piece of audience participation, and the flavour was simply mindblowing. One of the definite highlights of the night The scene of ‘the table with no centrepiece’ is short lived. A moment later comes a tomato pasta sheet, draped over another unique service piece, accompanied by the explanation of ‘we like edible decorations here, so this one will come into play soon’. I can see the next course coming from a mile away, mostly because I was the first to sit in the dining room, so I know that the single antenna that’s headed out of the kitchen must be for me. Red snapper, seared as rare as tuna, with mango, bergamot and juniper is impaled on there. It’s quite a disconcerting experience, to eat without cutlery in a restaurant of this calibre, but it’s clear to me that’s exactly the point, to push you a little out of your comfort zone, but also to break down the pretension that can exist in high end restaurants. I love the combination of fruit and fish, and this course is no different. I guess at this point, you’re tired of reading longish paragraphs on each course, so I’ll try and condense the next few for brevity, if nothing else. Wild mushrooms with pine nut cream and a red wine mushroom jus is rich, nutty and earthy. It is a great showcase of the different flavours and textures of different wild mushrooms. The famous ‘hot potato, cold potato’ is every bit as good as everything I’d read about it … truffle, butter, potato … who could hate that? It’s rich, smooth and luxurious, with the hot and cold contrast adding to the rich mouthfeel, and the wax bowl and pin presentation is a perfect vehicle for a course that amounts to little more than a shot. An omage to Escoffier, consisting of lamb loin, sauce choron and pomme de terre noisette is a beautiful rendition of a classic, and comes complete with an antique style plate and wine glass to accompany it. It just goes to show that no matter how many unusual chemicals and techniques you apply to the food, you still need to know how to cook the basics flawlessly, and clearly they can. I don’t think the ‘Black Truffle Explosion’ needs much more commentary than a creative profanity. I was so tempted to ask for another one of these, and when I mentioned this to the waiter, he laughed and said that in exchange for wages, he just took home twenty of these per shift. At last, that pasta sheet that’s been hanging around the table is called into use, in a DIY cannelloni with braised short rib, olive, black garlic, blackberry and about 4 other items whose identity escapes me. The unconventional combination of rich fatty beef, blackberry and olive works a treat, though it’s never something that’d cross my mind. Well, okay, beef and olive makes logical sense, but blackberry wouldn’t have been something I’d have thought of. The last savoury course of octopus with eggplant and a wasabi onion broth is a nice course, and although the wasabi is a little understated, the rich octopus flavour and eggplant married perfectly. It’s good, but not memorable compared to some of the dishes that have preceded it. Yuzu snow is a refreshing lead in to the dessert courses, the first of which is a plate of jellies. Labelled as ‘peach, jasmine, basil, balsamic’, it is a very complex array of flavours, all of which are described by the waiter, yet I can recall very few of the twelve or so cubes that make up the miniature city map that makes up the plate, so it’s more a case of ‘mix and match’ than a clear identification of the flavours before me. In saying that, I can’t recall a single jelly flavour that clashed with another, so while complex, the dish is very carefully planned to allow harmony of all the components. A plastic tube containing wonderfully fragrant lemongrass syrup with thai basil and finger lime is plugged with a piece of dragonfruit. One is instructed to suck on one end to break the seal, sending the liquid and finally the piece of dragonfruit into the mouth. I managed to almost send the fruit through the back of my throat, after grossly misjudging the suction required. Still, it was very refreshing. Nitro frozen chocolate mousse with a good ten flavours ranging from the conventional banana to the seemingly absurd red pepper concludes the meal. This course is a good three times the size of the largest course that has preceded it, so it is a little out of place in that regard, but the childish part of me never tires of breathing like a dragon after every bite. It’s a good finish to a meal that after which I felt sated, but not overly so, which is a great relief after some of the meals I’ve eaten of this length in the past (I’m looking at you Bilson’s). The wine pairings I had opted to partake in were well thought out, and generously poured, after they realised I’m probably a borderline alcoholic, who always likes something nice to sip on. The sommelier assigned to my table was incredibly knowledgeable, which is what you’d expect in a three star, but was also able to discuss wine and it’s characteristics on whatever level appealed to you, without appearing as condescending, yet still being incredibly informative. The other thing which struck me was how at WD-50 and Moto, sometimes the pourings were slightly out of step with the courses (at one stage at WD-50, the accompanying wine didn’t arrive until ¾ of the way through the course), yet at Alinea, the food went to the waiters station and waited for a minute if the pouring was running slightly behind schedule, so that the wine was always there, waiting for the food. It’s a small detail, but it is one of those things that count in a restaurant of that standard. To finish up I had a latte, which unfortunately was burnt and quite bitter, and then got a brief tour of the kitchen, which was starting to heat up at this point, being that I started my meal at 5.15, and was now finishing just after 8pm, which unfortunately is right in the middle of service. Unfortunately, I could see Chef Achatz was busy, and I didn’t ask to pull him away (from all I’ve read about him, he’s intensely focused, and his demeanour did nothing to change my impression), but the waiter, sensing my interest, kindly offered to see if he would sign my menu, which he did happily. I guess it confirmed to me that Alinea is more than a meal, which is something I had discovered in all the high end meals I had while in the US. Admittedly, I had stacked the deck, with Masa, WD-50, Moto and Alinea in my reservations, but that was precisely the point of my time in these restaurants; to experience something I could only get at Marque and perhaps Gastro Park in Sydney, and as good as they are, even those seem tame in comparison now.

I get your point, but religion seems to go a step further because of how infiltrated it has become in society. The choice of what food to serve is a restaurant's and chef's perogative, but when you start overtly introducing religion into the place, it takes it a step too far in my view, and starts to alienate people based on reasons other than the food on offer.

That misses the point as far as I can see. The question as I interpret it is "does religion have a place in restaurants?" In a place where the ideal is to make customers feel welcome and at ease, the introduction of any religion is bound to alienate a proportion of people. Practice whatever you want at home, but it has no place in a restaurant.

I am yet to find this mystical bowl of 'perfect pho' that is often described. The dozen or so times I've had it to date, it's just been mediocre, yet I keep going and ordering it in search of the perfect dish. I hope to have my epiphany moment at some stage; where is the place to find the best pho in Toronto?