Really Nice!

They don't cook very well. I made a stew with russet potatoes. Six hours later they were still as hard as they were in their raw state. Nuke them before dinner.

We don't need no stinkin' rules! A while ago I read a recipe that said bring a steak out of the refrigerator 30 minutes before cooking to bring it to room temperature. I can't tell you how many times I've read that 30 minutes is the time for bringing an item from refrigerator temperature to room temperature. I don't know why, but this particular reading got me to thinking, which usually involves making a messy kitchen, but that's another post. I bought a 1-inch thick steak and put it in the fridge for roughly 24 hours to get it to 'refrigerator' temperature. Then I took it out and placed it on the counter with a "needle probe" thermometer inserted into the middle of it. After five minutes it steadied at 39°F. After 30 minutes it read 38°F It didn't get to 65°F until 5.5 hours later. This is well past the four-hour rule of never letting food sit out in the TDZ for four hours or more. (TDZ = temperature danger zone, which is between 40 and 140°F.) So what do they really mean when they want you to take something out of the refrigerator for 30 minutes before cooking it?

Ahem, care to share or do I have to make you and yours dinner to bribe it out of you?

Three hours doesn't work because the meat wasn't as tender. It was done to the proper temperature, but was tougher than the four hour time. I'll try again with five hours to see what that does. God, I love food experiments!

From Dr. Hollywood... "I could have been a doctor too if it weren't for all that science stuff." Here's a pdf doc with a lot of sous vide science stuff. There are some temperatures and cooking times included along with a long list of references that might be obtainable on the net.

Ooooh how about oak shavings in tea bags! Malolactic... attached a pint of one of those imitation-flavored coffee creamers to the bottle. After a successful marketing blitz into the tertiary markets, red wine would be next with a cross promotion with Smuckers Blackberry jam. Take that 82 Parker and turn it into a 97-100 in fifteen seconds.

I for one was hoping that with age, it would maintain a similar form of balance. I'm not a WS or Parker kind of guy, but shouldn't that be expected for a wine rated number 1 in the world by an industry standard magazine who says it should be drunk between 2000 and 2008? (And 2005 is well within that time frame.) FWIW, Parker said in 2002 that the '96 could be drunk through 2018. Brad, I'll try your aeration method with the next bottle.

I opened up a bottle of 1996 Chateau St. Jean Cinq Cepages last weekend. This wine was number 1 on the Wine Spectator's list for 1999. This was the third '96 bottle that I've opened since 2002. Each one has had similar results. They all are a bit hot in the back of the tongue (alcohol). Each one is becoming hotter than the one before. This last one was almost undrinkable. It was so out of balance with the acidy and fruit, and the tannins were only supporting the imbalance with the alchohol. Has anyone else noticed this? The wines are being stored in a cellar (55F 70%H). The first two times I drank them using Riedel Sommelier Bordeaux glassware. This last time was with Spiegelau Vino Grande Bordeaux glassware. Thanks!

Seattle Caviar carries it for $49.95 a pound. I go there about once every two months or so to pick some up. The lobes range from 1.25 to 1.75 pounds. 2922 Eastlake Ave East Seattle Washington 98102 206 323-3005 Tell Betsy and Dale that the guy with the Vespa sent you.

Thanks! And yes you really need to go for dinner.

Yup, even his autographs are all about finesse.

It went according to the recipe. We were down there in late June this year and ordered it. Their texture was a little smoother, maybe I didn't work in the butter as well but flavor-wise it was great. I also added the optional chives to the mixture rather than waiting to add it later when serving. There might be some microbiological issues with that over time so I guess we'll have to eat them fast. Oh, and when it says 'salt aggessively' they mean it. It's served cold and the taste buds can't detect salt as well on cold foods. It'll taste too fat or flabby without enough of it.

Last week I made the Foie Gras Terrine (pages 24 and 25) and the Smoked Salmon and Steamed Rillettes (page 26). Both turned out very well. The foie was about 1.5 lbs and filled three 8-ounce mason jars with about 6 ounces in each. The salmon also filled three 8-ounce mason jars. (Smoked the salmon myself.) edit to add page numbers.

So I've been observing this conversation a bit and had a few of my own thoughts. I wanted to do a sous vide rack of lamb but nothing on the Internet tells me how to do a rack a lamb with the exception of the comment quoted above, so I decided to conduct my own experiment. To make it a sous vide I used the Tilia FoodSaver® system to bag the lamb. Before proceeding with actually bagging the lamb, make a compound butter using herbs and seasonings of your choice. In this first experiment I softened 8 ounces of butter and mixed it with salt, pepper, and herbs de provence, toasted mustard seed ground in a pestle/mortar and smoked Spanish sea salt. Place the butter in the bag and apply pressure to distribute it evenly. You can’t rub the butter into the lamb because it won’t stick. After rubbing the butter into the bag, slide the rack of lamb into the bag. There should be an even distribution of butter on both sides. Seal the bag as you normally do. To cook the lamb I used as my basin a 1/3rd 4-inch hotel pan. Insert the lamb and fill it wil water to identify how much you need, then remove the lamb. I have an electric stove and this is one of those rare occasions where electric will be better than gas because electric maintains a constant temperature better. I inserted a thermometer into the water, the kind that has a 3-food chord attached between the probe and the display panel, turned on the stove one notch above low and waited about 25 minutes for the water to get to 125°F. Just as a grill, oven, or skillet has hot spots, so does a container of hot water on a stove. You'll want to swirl the water every now and again to get an accurate temperature reading. It will vary three or four degrees in either direction after a swirl. My goal was to cook it between 125°F and 130°F and took a guess at cooking it for four hours, thinking that that should be enough time to cook it. And it's not going to go over the temperature for medium rare in the water anyway so it could sit at that temperature for a day. Here’s what it looks like in the water after about 1 minute. Notice that the butter is just beginning to melt This is what it looks like after 10 minutes and through to 4 hours. This picture was taken just before taking it out of the water. Notice that the butter melts but there's no red juice from the meat. Through osmosis, the butter is being absorbed by the meat to naturally achieve an equalibrium between the densities. Also notice that there's no 'ballooning' of the FoodSaver wrapping due to the low temperature of the water. When I took the bag out of the water I wasn’t sure if resting was required. But I let it sit about 5 minutes anyway. There’s no carry over cooking when cooking at this low of a temperature for that long. Notice that in the cut meat, there's no juice on the cutting board. This picture was taken about 10 seconds after slicing. To make it look a little more pallatable, I sprinkled the fat side with a bread crumb mixture. Run some stale French bread through a food processor and pass it through a tamis. Toast it in a skillet with some EVO, Iraqi sea salt from a friend who recently returned from Iraq, and Tellicherry pepper. Sprinkle the top with the bread crumb mixture. To make this a seasonal dish I made an heirloom tomato 'chutney', which consisted of the following: three heirloom tomatoes, one green, one red, one yellow sauteed fennel a no-name EVO lemon juice Murray River Australian sea salt Banylus vinegar Fireweed honey In my menu planning I suspected that the lamb will come out extremely soft so I need a bit of a crunch to accompany it and decided on sautéed fingerling potatoes to develop a nice crust on them. The sautéed potatoes consisted of: homemade bacon fat Fingerling potatoes Fleur de sel from Brittney lemon zest Here’s the dish: This lamb was phenominal! Fork tender, creamy center, intense flavor of lamb and a subtle note of butter. I'm saving the butter for a future use as I want to try this again, but will go three hours. If that works, I'll bring it down to two hours etc. etc... I also want to try it with half a rack. I'll post the minimal cooking time needed when I get to that conclusion. Thanks to all for contributing your ideas.

We went to Rover’s last Friday for a birthday dinner. It’s been three years since we were last there and they’re still one of the best in the city. The service is outstanding and perhaps the most professional in town. They’ve done a bit of remodeling; the entrance is now on the east side of the building and they’ve expanded the kitchen; it used to be the same size as a typical home kitchen. We had the eight-course grand menu degustation ($125). Our wine choice was Bouchard Père & Fils Le Corton 1997 (red burgundy). Amuse Bouche – from left to right, oxtail and foie gras terrine with sauternes gelée, gougères, and cracker with mackerel and caper berry. This was rich and acidic. Lots of flavors. Scrambled egg with lime crème fraîche and white sturgeon caviar – The Rover’s standard. The egg is slowly scrambled and mimics small curd cottage cheese in texture and ‘scramble’ size. It’s very smooth and creamy, and starts out cold on top with the caviar and moves to warm in the middle and hot on the bottom. Very good. Oregon quail with sun dried tomato, romano beans, and potato salad – Dotted with orange and yellow pepper coulis. Good earthy tones really matched the earthy tones of the wine. The creamy texture of the potato salad was a nice contrast to the quail. Soft-shell crab bisque with dungeness crab and glazed baby fennel – Sweet and creamy, finely textured with a hint of sweet licorice from the fennel. Maine lobster, baby beets and english peas with an organic red currant sauce – The lobster just melts in your mouth. I’ve got to practice my sous vide cooking as this was an inviting dish and there simply wasn’t enough of it. Hudson valley foie gras with caramelized shallots and big cherry gastrique – This was perhaps the best seared foie gras I’ve ever had. I’ve been to The French Laundry four times and have had foie gras there each time but this one was spectacular. The crust was crunchy and sweet, I’m guessing it was dredged in a bit of confectioner’s sugar and flour. The bing cherry gastrique hit the wine right on the mark. Copper river salmon tournedos with carrot, spinach, and a red wine bacon jus – The salmon was medium rare; the spinach buttery creamy, and the bacon jus carried a smokiness with each bite. The vegetables had a good snap to them. The bacon jus married well with the earthy tones in the wine. I have to admit, this is about the best wine I’ve ever picked to match so many dishes. Each dish brought out different notes from it. This is one of the things that makes the pinot noir grape so food friendly. Celery sorbet – Our intermezzo; celery sorbet with fennel. There’s something about the licorice in the fennel that elevates the celery flavor. It’s creamy and almost reminiscent of chocolate. The wine stops the sweetness of it, but the celery lingers. Celery and fennel appears to be an interesting flavor profile that might be were pursuing in the lab.  Venison with chanterelles, onion confit, foie gras, and a peppercorn mustard sauce – The mustard sauce adds some punctuation and acidity. The onion and fennel is sweet, the bordelaise sauce, egg, and foie all add different dimensions of richness. The ground venison was very lean and perhaps could have used some fat for more moisture and a little softer texture. Symphony of desserts – Chocolate cake, strawberry shortcake and mango soup. A delicious ending hitting all areas of the dessert repertoire: heavy, light, savory, sweet, chocolate, fruit, soft, crunchy… Mignardises – jellies and chocolate with a creamy hazelnut filling. edit to fix the wording in the first paragraph.

Ah, the nostalgia of it all... "The U.S. winners are little known to wine lovers, since they are in short supply even in California and rather expensive ($6 plus)." It seems to me that over the years Stag's Leap has garnered more publicity from winning this event with their cabernet than Chateau Montelena did with their chardonnay. Any idea as to why? Both grapes have gone through their marketing product life cycle of growth and maturity at different times and rates since this event, yet you can't write about Warren Winiarski [owner of Stag's Leap Wine Cellers] without mentioning the Judgement of Pairs. I seldom read the same when Chateau Montelena or even Mike Grgich [winemaker of the '73 Chateau Montelena chardonnay] is mentioned.

I'll be going in to visit mine next week. Gina says they stopped taking new people for the adoption program for a while because they don't have the space to store them while maintaining enough space for the sandwich side of things.

During my first visit to The French Laundry in July 2000 I had a table in the garden next to the kitchen. There were four tables, about 10-11 people. One young man was serving the wine and he gave a lot of details, notes, and comparisons to the wines he was pouring for the tables and he was able to answer every question. About half way through the meal, my third or fourth glass, I asked him his age. He replied 23. I asked him how he got to know about wines at such a young age. He said that he started drinking wine when he was 3.

How about Queen Anne?

Had dinner at Union last night. The menu is completely revamped. If you haven't been there in a while, it's probably time you return. The focus on the tasting menu is gone. The left side of the menu now contains: appetizers eight selections pasta three selections soup two selections The right side of the menu has: Fish three selections meat two selections game two selections poultry two selections Side dishes five selections, $7 each I'm sure the quantities of each will be juggled nightly. The menu mentions that Ethan will do a 5 or 7 course tasting menu for the whole table. We each started off with a glass of N.V. Drappier champagne. This has a very good fizz with notes of citrus and mineral. I'll be searching to add this to my collection. We first had Crab Salad with avocado salad and basil oil. This classic has always been a favorite of mine. We then had a split of 2002 Domaine Zind Humbrecht Pinot Gris. A very nice summer sipping-type wine. That is until the second course came along; Sautéed mackerel. This was a great pairing. The lime zest and the Casa Bria olive oil went perfectly with the wine. Then came another fish dish that we shared and I forget the name of it. It was served sashimi style on a razor clam shell, drizzled with Casa Bria olive oil, Basque red pepper and chives. The fish had the texture of a raw scallop. If I remember the name I'll edit this post. The smokey pepper contrasted the wine rather well. Next came Grilled prawns. I haven't had these here before but they were grilled perfectly. They had just enough char to work with the flavors of the previous dish, which contributed to Zind matching. We then moved into red wine territory. 1998 Grgich Cabernet Sauvignon. I beginning to think the critics were wrong about the 1998 vintage in Napa/Sonoma. True the tannins aren't there like '95, 96' and '97, but the acidity is. I'm starting to notice that of the Napa/Sonoma wines in my collection, the '98s are holding up better than the '97s. Anyway, this Grigich was great! It has a good bottle-age bouquet developing. The next course was Orechiete Pasta with Grilled Octopus. Good stuff with a tomato sauce and black olives (Niçoise?). Again, this dish matched the wine. The last of the savory dishes was the Squab on Grilled Figs. It was medium rare (perfect doneness), and glazed with a demi glace. Both of these dishes made the Grgich a correct sellection. For dessert we had a Cherry Crisp with a quenelle of cognac ice cream. It was served in a cast iron gratin skillet. A rich ending to a rich meal. Dinner lasted 2.5 hours. It was thoroughly enjoyable and the service was great. If you haven't been there in a while, maybe it's time to return.

The cross street is Massachusetts. It's not downtown. It's one block south of Safeco Field.

Wendy, I was about 1.5 hours behind you. :-) I noticed about 6 to 8 1995 California chardonnays, all for $27. I'm not sure what flavor is left in those. I did see a 2000 Chateau Potelle Cabernet Sauvignon for $39. They don't distribute up here and when I was down there in September 2002 I picked up some bottles for $70 each. So this was a good find.

Well the house is no longer as I sold it and moved into a condominium. I'm stuck sharing two Weber barbecues with 180 other units. I shall not be denied my right to homemade bacon (U.S. Constitution Article IV, Section 5. No person shall be denied the right to make homemade bacon.) So I made bacon using a Weber barbecue. Steps 1 through 4 are the same as above. This time I brined the pork belly in 1/2 cup salt, 1/8 cup maple syrup, some cracked pepper, and some dry mustard. Here's the MEP list for making bacon with a barbecue: 2 metal ramekins, towel, wood chips (in this case, hickory), plastic wrap, aluminum foil, tongs, 2 pot holders 1 metal wire rack, 6-inch 1/3 hotel pan. (The pot holders were unnecessary, but should be available just in case...) Here's the barbecue 'pit'. So sad... Before starting, get your MEP together because you're going to have to work fast. Unroll the foil and plastic wrap. Place the hotel pan on top of a long piece of plastic wrap. You'll need enough unrolled to wrap the top as well. Place the two metal ramekins in the 6-inch 1/3 hotel pan. You'll dump the wood in between these two ramekins and then place the bacon on the wire rack on top of the ramekins. In this setup, I'm using the ramekins to gain some elevation between the wood and the bacon. Make an envelope out of the foil and place the wood chips inside. It doesn't have to be airtight. And in fact, you probably don't because you want to quickly open the envelope to dump the wood into the hotel pan. Also, you'll need some air inside because you're going to get as close to burning the wood as you can. Place the foil envelope in the barbecue as close to the flame as possible. Move the grate to the side, if you can. Use the tongs to turn the envelope every 2 or 3 minutes to help ensure an even burning. It took me about 10 minutes to get the wood to an "all black with red amber edges" stage. After the wood has charred well enough and there's red ambers on the edges, dump the wood into the hotel pan, insert the bacon on the wire rack (balance it on top of the two metal ramekins), and wrap the plastic over the pan to trap the smoke. Place the foil over the wrapped pan and use a towel to seal. It should be air tight. Crimp the foil hanging over the edge as tight and close to the lip of the edge as possible. Refrigerate for 24 hours. After 24 hours, open the package, remove the bacon and discard the wood. I prefer thick-sliced bacon; this is a little more than an 1/8-inch thick. The slicer is too big for the condo storage so I don’t have it handy. Using a serrated knife for slicing was very easy. If you prefer thinner bacon I think you'll need to use a slicer. Bake on a sheet pan in a 325°F oven for 16 to 20 minutes. Yum! For some reason, cooked bacon doesn't photograph very well.

I googled "British Columbia wine regulations" and the first document is The Complete Alphabetical Listing of Statutes with Associated Regulations. I searched for wine and clicked this document.

OUCH! If there's ever a statement for not eating at an establishment, that is it!