btbyrd

So sorry to annoy you both! I also fixated on these high end grinders when I first became aware of them. I was especially fond of their high output (and high build quality). But my wife remarked "I don't think I'd ever want to grind pepper faster than the Unicorn does it. It puts out plenty for me." And it turns out, that's true. If I was making bulk pastrami on the regular, maybe I'd want to up my output. But as a normal (well, kind of abnormal) home cook, I don't need that kind of power. And if I did, I'd probably end up buying an electric burr spice grinder. The real advantage in these seems to be in the well machined adjustable burrs that deliver not just high output, but a full spectrum of particle sizes. Upon reflection, I really only use two sizes of ground pepper in my cooking: moderately coarse and fine-ish. I just permanently have my Unicorn set to medium coarse and my Atlas set to fine-ish and between the two of them, all my needs are taken care of. The dual grinder solution is space-hogging and somewhat pricey, but I got my Unicorn on blowout for like $16, so I count my blessings. I still curse its plastic body and less-than-great grind adjustment, but I can't argue with the excellent coarse grinding and high-enough output.

Salad.

My wife and I visited Zingerman's on our honeymoon and bought enough olive oil and vinegar to stock our pantry for a year or two. That was many moons ago. These days, I usually snag some of the 16 and 30 year during the sale. The 10 year is fantastic, but the 16 is only $5 more and is thicker and more complex. The 30 year is astonishing and is my favorite, but it costs 2.5 times what the 16 costs, so it gets used sparingly.

Dave Arnold developed a couple of interesting ISI techniques. Rapid infusion is probably the most useful. Here he is on the ISI YouTube channel demonstrating the technique. (Check out that channel for a bunch of recipes and ideas). The other technique Dave Arnold developed mimics the result of vacuum infusion or quick-pickling using a chamber vacuum machine. You basically pop your soft ingredient in a bag with a flavorful liquid or booze or whatever, get all the air out, put the zippie in the ISI along with some water, and pressurize it to drive the liquid into the product. A similar technique is rapid marination which uses pressure to drive marinades into soft product. Scallops in your whipping siphon? Why not? ChefSteps has a siphon class with a bunch of techniques. It's paywalled, but they have a few public recipes that are worth checking out. Like their hollandaise. It's nice because you can make it a couple hours ahead and then hot hold it in the ISI in a circulator. They also have a good tempura fry batter that's light and airy and doesn't require vodka or beer. That recipe was posted in a video to their FB page. If you have access to liquid nitrogen, frozen and par-frozen foams are fun. The most famous dishes in that regard are probably the frozen apertifs at The Fat Duck and the frozen foam in Alinea's "dessert on the table" preparations. ChefSteps has a Fat Ducky recipe for Strawberries and Cream Cryocycles: Microwave sponge cakes are another fun thing to do when you're not cooking for a crowd. Iron Chef Cat Cora was especially fond of using the ol' siphon cake technique in Kitchen Stadium to pull off a quick and convenient dessert. I have been meaning to do this myself, but it requires you to buy microwavable paper cups that I never seem to have on hand. They also have an ISI kimchi recipe if you like yours bubblin' for some reason. And there's rapid nitro cold brew coffee, if you're in a hurry. These are basically just applications of rapid infusion. Lots of fun possibilities. Mine mostly makes whipped cream.

Hoppin’ John with Anson Mills peas and rice grits.

I do this almost every time I prepare endive (which to be fair, is about three times per year). But I half it and pop it in a bag with some oil and salt at 85C and let it go for like 40-45 minutes. Then unbag while hot and let the surface moisture flash off. Then sear the cut half in copious butter and olive oil and garnish with flakey salt and chives. Endive is relatively tender compared to cabbage, at least in my experience, so you don't need extended cook times to soften it. You can if you really want it to go all sogged-out braisey, but then you're making a different dish than I'm making. If you're not keen on bitterness, you can blend in some sugar with the salt when you season pre-bagging. A splash of vinegar can be nice too.

Mapo tofu Shin Black. It makes sense.

Beef cheek pastrami. Recipe from Modernist Cuisine.

Grilled chicken hearts are one of my favorites. I'd totally eat them more often if I could source them locally. Hearts can get tough if you overcook them though, but I've found a good workaround for that. I learned it from the "Next: Taste of Thailand" eBook. Briefly, you cook the hearts sous vide for 5 hours at 90C. This renders the fat and tenderizes the tough muscle tissue. Then you cool them down, trim any excess fat, and sear them over very hot charcoal. Tasty, tender, and delicious!

Knives in rental properties will be not only dull, but made of garbage steel that will be difficult to sharpen. I like the idea of buying an inexpensive knife like a Kiwi or even a Victorinox Fibrox and using that instead of trying to shine the turds that you'll find at your destination.

Thanks for the heads up Smithy! I finally picked up that All Clad quad waffle maker that I've had my eye on for the past few months. I used coupon code: SDADECVIP15 and saved 15% with free shipping. I don't know if the shipping was because of the coupon code or because of the item I ordered, but either way, I hope it saves someone money.

She's done a bunch of interviews and appearances on Heritage Radio Network. One thing I wish she would try to emphasize more is the role of the USDA and FDA in creating and perpetuating our broken food system instead of placing so much emphasis on corporate bogeymen. There are lots of those to be sure (she heaps a lot of warranted abuse on Nestle in her book Food Politics, for example). But US food policy favors the production of low quality commodity agricultural goods which then get transformed into low quality highly processed foodstuffs, and a lot of those incentives came out of government subsidization and ag policies during the Cold War. I wish she'd focus more on that part of the story. Regardless, she's a legend in the field (and for good reason).

The company is based in Maine. They contract with fisheries and canneries to produce a product tailored to their spec (while also producing some products themselves in North America). Latvia is one of the largest fish processors in Europe and their canneries handle fish from all over the North Atlantic.

I'm definitely not a super-taster! The Nuris have a piece of bay, a clove, and a peppercorn hanging out in the tin (along with the chili, carrot, and pickle), so it's not like the spices are a secret. But they vary somewhat from tin to tin, with most being close to the average. (Same with the salt level.) My first tin of Nuris was a clove bomb and I loved it, but none since then have had that same level. Except for one rogue tin of their spiced mackerel filets. Whatever the case, it's clear from tasting the oil that the flavor isn't just coming from the chili. I find clove to be pretty distinctive, so I can usually suss out that note... the other flavors are mostly a background spice melange. On a related note, I recently discovered that Minerva makes a tin of sardines in olive oil with clove. Since I'm apparently so keen on that flavor, it's on my "to try" list for sure.

By “nuanced” I just meant that the spicy Nuris have clove, black pepper, and bay leaf (and carrot and pickled cucumber) in addition to the heat from the chili. The flavor on the Matiz spiced sardines is just from chili, so the overall flavor of the oil is more one dimensional. It is hotter though. Both are great, though if I could only have one it’d have to be the Nuris.

@blue_dolphin with the link before I could drop it! I’m pretty sure all the Edwards hams are smoked.

Are you looking for unsmoked ham altogether or just ham that hasn't gotten the "smoke flavor added" injection treatment? If you're looking for unsmoked country ham, none of the famous European hams are smoked. There are unsmoked American country hams too, but my experience is almost exclusively with smoked product (Benton's, Father's, Edwards). Here's the country ham thread. When it comes to city hams, you just have to research whatever brands are available to you. There are a lot of larger operations that can actually smoke hams at industrial scale. It's usually not a very heavy smoke, especially compared to country hams.

No and no. "Country ham" just means "dry cured ham." They can be smoked or unsmoked. City hams are injection brined. They can be unsmoked, smoked, or injected with liquid smoke.

Hams, whether city or country, can be smoked or unsmoked. Country hams are salt cured and then aged to remove moisture and develop flavor. This traditional process takes a lot of time. Think prosciutto, serrano, jamon iberico, or American style country hams. City hams, by contrast, are cured by injecting them with brine. This allows rapid salt/nitrite penetration and yields a faster, wetter, less salty product. Honey Baked Ham is probably the biggest name brand for this type of ham, and many other brands have a similarly sweet profile (but not all city hams are sweet hams). City hams are ready to serve from the get-go, but if you're going to cook and serve a whole country ham, you often need to soak it to leech some of the salt out or it can be unpalatably salty.

ATK suggests that oiling potatoes before baking results in a leathery skin. This accords with my experience. They suggest a quick dunk of the potato into a very strong salt brine before cooking. A few minutes before you take the potato out of the oven, brush it with some oil to crispify the skin.

The salt levels on Nuris are inconsistent, which is unfortunate. You might have just gotten a salty batch of mack. The Matiz spicies are good, but they're a "one note" type of spice... just spicy hot without the clove, bay, and peppercorn hit that other spiced sardines can have. I like having both around, but the oil on the Nuris is more delicious. If you like things spicy hot, Rainbow Tomatoes Garden carries the new-ish extra spicy Nuris. They're a bit pricey at $8.50, but are worth a try if you like things hot.

The warning about burning carrots and sweet potatoes applies to the musui or "waterless" cooking method which uses the water inherent in food itself to generate steam. This steam further cooks the product, along with radiant heat from the walls of the cooking vessel (and direct conduction at the places where the food touches the pot). It's essentially the same thing as steam roasting, but without adding your own water. I first learned about this cooking method from Korin, which used to sell ceramic waterless pots from the brand Blissio (manufactured by Ginpo). Foods that are high in sugar and low in available moisture will scorch before they release enough water to properly steam themselves. That's why they advise to add water before adding these ingredients, or to place these ingredients on top of other, moister ingredients. All that's to say, the remark is only meant to apply to their Musui Kamado product (their fancy induction crock pot) and their "oven pot," which is the same thing except you use your oven to heat it. The novel selling point of these particular pots is their tight fitting lids, though I'm not sure how much that actually makes a difference. Ginpo/Blissio makes the exact same claims about the "precision lids" on their ceramic waterless pots. It all seems like mumbo jumbo to me. That said, the idea of a high end crock pot with temp control and removable inner pot that's safe to use on the stovetop and oven is attractive. You can do sous-videy style things with it. But it is tiny, with just under a 4qt capacity and a 9" internal diameter. I don't know that I'd be braising a pork shoulder or beef chuck roast in it any time soon. It looks like it's better used for other things. It seems like a product I'd have to buy first and then figure out what it's best for instead of knowing that before hand and buying exactly the tool that I want. As for their pans, I can't comment. I don't get the appeal of thin cast iron. I'd be interested to learn more about the ceramic coating they use on them, as that seems to be the main selling point beyond aesthetics. You can put the oven proof one in the dishwasher, which I suppose is another unique selling point.

I will forever be envious of your "evidence" box @paulraphael! @rotutsHere's a link to their Dao Vua knives.

They’re called pigtail turners. I don’t see the appeal myself.

Miso ramen from Nissin Raoh topped with some hunks of leftover roast chicken leg and wing.