JAZ

Chris, if you have the budget, you might consider these miniature cocktail glasses. Plastic is okay, but there's nothing like glass to showcase a cocktail. I'm not sure if this will help, but when I started teaching cocktail classes, I found that what worked for me was to make a list of the most important elements of drink making (I only had a couple of hours, so I had to pare it down to the essentials). After I briefly went over equipment and ingredients, I paired each element with a drink to illustrate the point I was making. So, for instance, when talking about shaking v. stirring, I made them martinis -- one shaken and one stirred so they could see and taste the difference. When talking about the importance of fresh citrus, I made a Daiquiri with lime juice and one with the stuff out of the green plastic lime and let them taste the difference. And a Sidecar or Pegu Club is a good choice to teach flavor balance.

When I taste something great in a restaurant, I often start thinking about how to make it myself (unless it requires equipment I don't have or ingredients I can't get). Maybe it's genetic -- my mom used to do this as well. Sometimes I try to make it exactly as I had it; other times I just use a flavor combination or other element and make my own version. My latest experiment was pretty straightforward; a copy of a snap pea and radish salad we had at Momofuko Noodle Bar. It was dressed with sour cream and horseradish and chives, and I thought, "I can make this." And after a little playing around with the dressing, I did pretty well. Sometimes, though, my efforts aren't so successful. For instance, I had a shrimp and bean dish at a now defunct restaurant in San Francisco that I never did figure out -- it seemed simple, but obviously I was missing something crucial. I figure I'm not the only person who does this, right? Has anyone else had any successes or failures?

Old Bay?

Dried out and overpriced?

Foie gras hotdogs.

This reminds me of a recipe from Barbara Kafka's Roasting cookbook, except she uses chicken stock and then drizzles them with butter or chicken fat to finish. I don't really think of them as oven fries, but they are fabulous.

Maggie, this is brilliant. I usually just stuff the shells and then bake at 400F. The outsides of the potatoes get a bit crisp, but your way sounds as if the crispness factor is markedly increased. Do you rebake after filling?

Not inherently crispy, but you could make them so pretty easily. I make them by boiling small- to medium-sized potatoes, then cooling. Cut them in half, scoop out the flesh and mix with whatever you like. At this point, I usually just pipe the filling back into the shells and bake them, but you could certainly deep fry the shells first, which would give you your crispy crunchy element.

Chris, are you firmly locked into skins? I make "twice baked" appetizer potatoes from small red or Yukon gold potatoes -- one or two bites depending on the size of the potatoes. They can have the same flavor profile you're looking for (bacon and cheese) or you can make a variety of flavors. They'll need to be heated before serving, but they can be made the day before, so there's really no last minute work.

I started caramelizing some onions for a steak tonight, but they weren't quite done when I was ready to eat. To add some depth, I deglazed the pan with sherry and sherry vinegar, then added a cube of reduced beef stock and a bit of butter. I usually don't like a sauce on my steak, but this was excellent.

My problem will be storage, but I'll make it work. I'm really liking the big cubes.

Having read the entire book, I can say no. Ruhlman almost invariably presents a ratio and then follow it with so much contradictory and convoluted information and exceptions to his rules that I think an average home cook will just be confused. Maybe. I can see someone trying additions to baked goods -- particularly bread, pancakes or shortbread. Whether or not his ratios and recipes "work" is, of course, an important part of the story. (And, incidentally, I'm sure the recipes do work; they were tested extensively.) But another more significant question is whether the book does what Ruhlman says it will do. Here's what he says in the introductory chapters: "When you know a culinary ratio, it's not like knowing a single recipe; it's like knowing a thousand." "Ratios free you." What can you do, now that you know the bread ratio? You can make fresh bread without opening a single book. . ." "I like to think of it as an anti-recipe book, a book that teaches you and frees you from the need to follow." I think the books mostly fails in these goals. I'll agree that ratios for ingredients can be a useful memory device, once you already know the rest of the recipe -- that is, the procedure and the details. But if you already know a recipe for, say, bread, what more does a ratio give you? An easier way to do math? The crucial part is not the ratio, it's knowing how to make bread. And so the only way you can make bread without opening a book is if you know the technique (oh, and those pesky additional ingredients like yeast). Ruhlman says this in the text of the book, so he knows it too. Then why does he insist that knowing the ratio is what "frees" you? What "frees" you is internalizing the ingredients and the procedure, and that just comes with practice -- not from memorizing a ratio. Another problem I have with the book is that once he leaves the realm of doughs and batters, the whole "ratio" idea falls flat. For instance, in the section on sausage, he gives "the ratio" of meat to fat as 3:1. But then he says the right amount of fat for sausage is 30 percent (3:1 results in a fat content of 25 percent). Then he says that the extra 5 percent is usually provided by the meat itself. Okay, fine. But then he says that some meat has more fat than other meat, so you have to use common sense and "eyeball" the mixture. Hey, I've made sausage (from recipes in Charcuterie) and I understand that, but I'm sorry, if I have to do all that, then that 3:1 ratio is pretty close to useless. Why not just tell me I want a mixture of 70 percent meat and 30 percent fat? Or make the ratio 7:3? It's even more confusing when you get to his recipes, which call for 4 lbs. of meat to 1 lb. of fat, except for the chicken sausage recipe, which calls for 3.5 lbs. of meat to 1.5 lbs. of fat. Still not a 3:1 ratio to be found. In short, I think there's a limited set of circumstances in which ratios play a crucial role. There's a larger circle in which ratios can be an interesting concept. Maybe for someone who never thought on her own to multiply or divide ingredients in a recipe, this would provide a breakthrough, and that's great. The subject of ratios would, with the right author, make an interesting chapter in a book on learning to cook. As a primer in its own right, it fails.

We went to brunch here last Sunday and as usual, enjoyed it immensely. The brunch menu is more limited than the dinner menu, but what's there is great. We had the fried oyster sandwich and a version of eggs benedict with chunks of pork belly instead of Canadian bacon. The oyster sandwich, similar in all respects except the bread to a po' boy, was the best I've ever had (my apologies to New Orleans). The balance of flavors and textures was phenomenal. The egg dish was only slightly less successful. The eggs were expertly poached, the hollandaise was excellent, and the pork was the perfect accompaniment. Three or four large chunks were (I think) poached or cooked sous vide, then pressed and deep fried. My only complaint about the dish was that the bread underneath, while tasty, had a crust that was very difficult to cut through. Thinner slices or a different bread would be a better choice. Drinks, of course, were great as always.

For anyone who missed Joe Truex's foie gras hot dog the first time around, Repast restaurant is bringing it back for the Fourth of July. Chef Truex, the co-chef and -owner, always does great things with foie gras, but this remains one of my favorites of his. I tried this the first time I ever visited Repast, even before I moved to Atlanta. Three of us ordered the appetizer (along with several others), and the first one to bite into it said to the waiter, without batting an eye: "We'll have another order." It's that good.

His main point, I think, is to get consumers to realize that blithely assuming that meat with a label of "free-range" comes from happy animals who are allowed to roam at will with no "cruelty" is mistaken. It's the same thing (as Dave mentioned above) that Pollan did when he talked about the Rocky and Rosie chickens from Petaluma CA. Are those chickens treated better than factory farm chickens? Certainly. Are they allowed to roam free and feed on bugs (which is, I think, what many people think of when they hear the terms "free-range" or "cage-free")? No way. Most people, if asked, would say that ideally, they'd like a reliable source of meat that tastes good and doesn't harm animals. What writers like McWilliams and Pollan have done is to point out that the issue is much more complex than placing "factory farms" on the evil side and "free-range" on the righteous side. How is that a bad thing?

I bought some of these before I moved and used to use them sometimes, although in my old crappy freezer they took forever to freeze, which was a drawback. Then I moved and now have an automatic ice maker, which actually makes pretty decent sized half-moons. I got lazy and stopped using the silicone trays. A few days ago, however, my ice maker stopped working, so I dug these out again and, like Chris, I'm in love. Not only are they a great size and shape, but they taste better -- I haven't noticed it with shaken and strained drinks, but in rocks drinks, it's pronounced. I guess the water for the ice maker sits in the tubing and develops off-flavors, which I only really noticed in their absence. So what to do when they come to fix the ice maker? Use the stuff from the ice maker for water baths, cooling stock and that sort of thing, and continue with the good cubes for drinks?

At my market, they bag differently if I bring my own bag(s). If I don't, they give me 6 bags for 10 items, with all the heavy items in one bag and each other one with eggs only, or bread, or one package of meat. If I bring my own bag, they seem to consider it a challenge to fit everything in the bag I've brought, even if I say they can use another bag. Either way, I often end up out in the entryway where the carts live, rearranging my bags so I can walk home with them.

Although I don't make oven fries, I do roast red (waxy) potatoes, and I've found the best trick to keep them from sticking is just to let them roast until the side that's on the sheet pan is done enough to release by itself. When I try to turn them too soon, they stick, but if I'm just patient and wait until they're deep golden brown, they're easy to get out of the pan. I do toss them with oil, but I wouldn't say that I drench them. Maybe this wouldn't work as well with starchier potatoes like russets, though.

Bob, your lamb breast does look amazingly good. But I'm sort of confused. You didn't smoke it? and you didn't use pink salt (nitrates) in the cure? Maybe I just don't know what "bacon" means, but I thought curing and smoking was part of the definition of bacon.

Indeed they do, Holly. Not only the opportunity, but almost a necessity. I've found that trying to bite a Triscuit against the grain results in a broken cracker and a big mess, depending on what's on top of the Triscuit. Whereas if you go with the grain, the Tricuit almost never breaks up. I like that.

When I was growing up, we always had saltines, and usually a "fancier" cracker -- often Triscuits or Wheat Thins, both of which I remember liking a lot. I guess I "outgrew" crackers as time went on, because when I started cooking and eating on my own, I hardly ever bought them unless I needed some for a cheese plate, in which case I tended to stick with water table wafers or the like. Recently, though, my Publix had a sale on Nabisco crackers, including both Triscuits and Wheat Thins. I got a box of each. I found that I no longer like Wheat Thins; they're too sweet and have a weird aftertaste to me. But I'm once again a big fan of Triscuits. I admit to liking the fact that the ingredients are just wheat, oil and salt, but mostly I just like the way they taste, and especially the texture. I like them plain, and also topped with tuna or chicken salad, cheese, or even peanut butter. Any other fans out there?

Please reconsider. The copper layer in All-Clad isn't thick enough to make a noticeable difference in the way it cooks -- I've used all four lines of All-Clad enough to know this -- and the price is much higher than for the other All-Clad lines. If you want copper encased in stainless, I'd recommend Demeyere's Sirocco or Atlantis lines, both of which have a thicker layer of copper. Also, the Demeyere can go in the dishwasher; because of the exposed copper on the A-C Copper Core, it's not dishwasher safe. I've had my Demeyere for 8 years, and it looks great, with very little upkeep. For an explanation of how Demeyere is constructed, see this video: . (By way of disclaimer, I used to work for Sur La Table, where this video was filmed. I have lots of Demeyere cookware, which I was able to get for a steep discount when I worked there.) I don't know how Mauviel M'Cook is priced, but it's simply not true that Demeyere costs twice as much as All-Clad. If you compare All-Clad Copper Core with Demeyere's Sirocco line, you find that from the same retailer (Sur La Table, in this case) Demeyere is less expensive: the 2-qt. Copper Core is $235 and the 2.3-qt. Sirocco is $230; the 3-qt. Copper Core is $310 and the 3.2-qt. Sirocco is $245. In this case, you get a vastly superior Demeyere product for less money. When you compare the Stainless All-Clad with the Apollo line of Demeyere (both aluminum cores and stainless exteriors), the Apollo is more expensive, but not by much ($160 for a 2.3-qt. compared with $140 for the A-C Stainless; $175 for the 3.2-qt. Apollo compared with $165 for the 3-qt. A-C). In this case, you get a superior Demeyere product for slightly more money. The only way you can figure that Demeyere is twice as much as All Clad is if you compare the highest end Demeyere lines (Sirocco and Atlantis) with the lowest end All Clad line (MC2), and that's simply not a reasonable comparison. This is one problem shared by disc-bottom sauce pans. A small pan on a gas burner allows the flame to over-heat the outer edge of the pan, sometimes burning the contents. Obviously there is not problem with water, but reducing a sauce or frying can result in problems. The limitation is greater for disc-bottom skillets. Burning around the edges in a gas burner; no browning around the edges on an electric burner. ← Demeyere solves this problem by making the disc the same diameter as the pan in the case of sauce pans and saute pans, and by not making their skillets with a disc bottom at all -- in those, the core layer goes all the way up the sides (see the video linked to above).

The first serious cookware I bought was an 8-piece set of Le Creuset. It included a skillet, a 4.5 dutch oven, a 2.5 quart dutch oven, and two saucepans. Now, I love Le Creuset dutch ovens; I own several and never had any hesitation recommending them to customers. And the skillet in the set was actually very useful -- it was sort of a combination skillet/saute pan, and since I had neither, I used it all the time. But the saucepans sucked. I mean, at the time, I didn't realize it, because I didn't have any basis of comparison, but really -- cast iron saucepans? Whoever thought that was a good idea? So, not a total waste of money, but damn! if I'd known then what I know now, I never would have bought the set.

When I was growing up, my Mom almost always used a tablecloth. Plastic lined or oilcloth during the week, with a nice linen one for company or Sunday dinner. I vaguely remember some placemats in there somewhere, but they can't have been too common. I've rarely used either myself. For a while, I used a tablecloth in my old apartment, mostly because my table was ugly, the room needed brightening, and I got a great tablecloth on sale. Of course then I didn't want it to get dirty, so I used a placemat on top of it. Go figure. Now I have a glass table. I still have both the tablecloth and the placemats and I use neither.

I tried some on salmon tonight. I have a couple of rubs that I like to use with salmon, but neither seemed to go with the side dishes I had planned, so I was thinking I'd just use salt and pepper. Then I remembered Old Bay and gave it a try. Nice.