Broken English

I should add I've never used the slurry technique, so the grey streak may be avoided by using this method. I'm not sure.

Activa should be stored in the freezer, even the one you're using, store it in a sealed container. The grey seam is normal, you have to really use as little as possible to avoid having a thick, grey line through the meat. Using a fine tea sieve works well As for the bonding, I find it works better if you cook the product while under vacuum, as the glue works faster at a higher temperature, so it's perfect for sous vide where the vacuum helps retain the shape. At work we were using it to create a ballotine of the belly pieces of cod, and while it looked great, the glue stopped the natural flakiness of the fish and gave it a composite texture, which I wasn't a fan of. Hope this is of some help.

Looks like some of the episodes are on youtube (beef episode, most of the egg episode). It looks like it's also available over peer-to-peer services like bittorrent. I'm using a torrent.

That was a great story. I'd never thought about it, but it makes a lot of sense it'd be targeted by organised crime and dodgy characters. The part I didn't quite get is why the Chinese truffle species is inferior, the story just said the truffles are crap because they're harvested whenever they're found, not when they're ripe, and that has nothing to do with the actual truffle, just poor farming.

When I went last year the Prestige menu was introduced as "Gordon's signature dishes" (so that one wouldn't change much obviously), and we were also presented with a seasonal a la carte, and a five course "menu of the day", I haven't had a look through the current menus, but I guess they must recycle tried and tested dishes through. I remember reading once that Gordon said something like "half the dishes are old ones, the other half are new, which may then become regular fixtures". Maybe it was in the 3 Star book. I assume Heston gets away with it because his dishes are much more involved, and because of the huge demand for tables. If I was lucky enough to get a table, I'd be making a request for Bacon and Egg ice cream.

Another interesting episode, his custard doneness technique is genius.

I'm downloading episode two as I speak.

It may well be a disorder, whether or not he has it is another matter.

That' the way it works with celebrities. They have 'disorders', regular people are just thieves. It's a cop out in my book.

I'm just dreading a new Gordon Ramsay series now, the bad jokes are going to be out of control. Seriously though, I can't understand why anyone high profile would bother with it, it's not like the twenty quid he "saved" each time is going to hurt his bank balance, money worries or not. He's far better off than most people who manage to pay for their groceries.

It is an interesting read, but I found it a little dry and very hard to follow at times, with all the people named and the sheer weight of history (I'm bad with names though, so that's probably the cause of my confusion and constant page flicking to remind myself who was who). It did give a good insight to the man behind all the food-media hype and chef-worship, though I like the Achatz memoir much more, because of the fact that it's written from Achatz's perspective (I don't know if he employed a ghost writer or not), which makes for a much smoother read.

I don't get the massive vegetarian discussion in this thread. From what I gather, he's basically speaking from his experience of being invited to eat with a local family, and basically being gracious and thankful for whatever they serve. It has nothing to do with when you are paying for a meal, more when you are a guest in someone's home. It's more along the lines of "hey, I don't want to offend someone who has taken the time and effort to create a meal for me, so even if I morally detest meat, I should just be a good guest and eat it". There are several interviews he's given where he's illustrated his point much better than he did in this piece though, I will admit. What I don't entirely understand is his link to religion, but I assume that comes from the wide vegetarian culture of India (since that's the example he cites), and the fact that religion is so entwined with the culture that it is pretty much undistinguishable. My contempt for religion makes me find this point a little weird, though I suppose in many third-world communities where a wider, westernised education is scarce, most people stick to the teachings religiously, so to speak. It's a great book though. His chapters on Justo Thomas, Food Porn and David Chang are worth the price alone. It allows us to see a much more mellow Bourdain, and how travelling for ten years has changed his perspective on a lot of issues he raised in Kitchen Confidential, and firmed up his beliefs on others.

PSI doesn't make much sense in relation to vacuum levels. 1300 psi would be 89 bar - that would be more of a pressure chamber I'm not sure, I'm just used to reading the number, I don't really pay any attention to the unit of measurement.

I was just going to post about their facebook. If I lived in Chicago I could have eaten there quite a bit, I seem to have a knack for being on facebook when they post their updates.

Hmmh. The video doesn't explain too much, of course. But I have some questions. First of all, what kind of vacuum machine were you using? Second, when you say you pulled vacuum to 1300, what is that in terms of percent vacuum, which is what I'm used to? As to what kind of the stabilizer or additive might be used to stabilize the caramel, I suppose you could try xanthan gum, agar-agar, or maybe even gelatin. The overall effect was certainly a tour de force, but there are many questions left. Good luck! It is a chamber vacuum, and I think the 1300 is PSI. No idea about percentage. It was only because it looked so simple that I thought it didn't need any more explanation, and I'd just be able to recreate it. Keith, I suspected there may be an invert sugar involved, thanks. James.

Yeah it's something like $400 for the food isn't it? Nuts! I think I'd rather save a bit and do Yasuda $450 when I was there in August, that's not including $120 for the Wagyu and Truffle upsell, or $60 for the truffle ice cream (I didn't get that one).

One word of advice, if you do go to a restaurant to ask if you can stage, please pronounce it properly (st-ah-ge). It will increase your chances tenfold.

Masa is amazing but prices are in the stratosphere. I'd love to head to Yasuda next time around though.

So you don't want it to set as a foam which you can then reheat and serve warm? That's what I assumed from reading the first post. If not, I'd just use gelatine, the warm foams I've made using it are very stable and can be very stiff yet soft, depending on the amount of gelatine and the N2O charge.

I haven't tried Xanthan, as I don't have any. It looked the most promising out of the possibilities beyond agar, so I was kind of hoping to hear from someone that it would definitely work before purchasing some. In the Khymos guide, I don't think that any of the Xanthan recipes use an N2O canister. Have you tried this, or has anyone else? Best, Alan Sorry for the misunderstanding, I meant using Xanthan in conjunction with the Agar to help stabilise the foam. I haven't tried it, but I would think it would assist in the foam holding for longer.

Have you tried thickening the liquid with Xanthan to help it hold while it sets?

I know this isn't in MC, but I figured this is probably the best place to ask the question without creating a new thread. In the program 'Heston's Fishy Feast', Heston Blumenthal creates an edible coral reef by pulling vacuum on what he describes as a 'sugar mixed with seaweed'. I have tried and tried with this, and I can simply not get it to set, even with a caramel made in a dry pan. I pulled vacuum as far as the machine at work would let me (just below 1300) and even with the dry caramel, it bubbled (nowhere near the extent that his did though), but was too warm to set, even after holding vacuum for several minutes. Would he be using sugar other than sucrose, or would there be a stabiliser or additive of some sort in there? Link is

It was quite a good show, and I like how they played a bit on how ucomfortable Heston seems at times around a camera, like when he stuffed his line twice and just said something like "don't overcrowd the pan or it won't bloody work". It's a refreshing change from the super polished idiots that dominate food TV these days.

I've done the reverse a few times and it turned out fine (only for stuff like salted butter caramels), so I guess it would depend on the application. I'm not too sure on the actual differences in the way they behave though.

To answer b), it really doesn't matter. Even if the flavours did vary slightly, they are so subtle that when used in normal quantities, the difference would be negligable. To answer your second question, squid ink keeps for a long time, so you could always buy much more than you think you need, and add it until the colour looks good, and use excess for another dish.