btbyrd

It was rice cooked with coconut milk and toasted black sesame seeds were mixed in during fluffing.

Grilled Chilean sea bass with green curry sauce, coconut sesame rice, ginger green beans, spicy carrots, zucchini ribbons, and grilled tomatoes. Could have been neater. Tasted good though.

The Whole Foods near me recently started carrying a small number of Sfoglini products. They're very high quality, on a par with the best premium pasta brands. It's kind of hard to compare them though because the only shapes available are Reginetti/Mafaldine and Trumpets, and I haven't seen other brands offering these shapes in my local market. They have beet fusilli too, but I haven't tried it. But what I have tried has an excellent flavor and texture. They're organic too, not that I especially care about that. But it's a high quality product all around. They have a bunch of interesting pastas available on their website using different types of wheat and grain, and I'd be willing to try most of them on the strength of their other offerings.

Maker's 46 and Knob Creek are both fine products. I was actually able to pick up a proper sized bottle of the former on my latest trip to the store. But the prices on small bottles are often a lot higher per ounce than larger bottles here, so I avoid them. Sometimes there's no difference; sometimes there's a big difference. The most consistent thing that I semi-regularly purchase is Captain Morgan's Private Stock, which is 50% more expensive per ounce in a 750ml bottle compared to a 1.75L bottle. Anyway, as you've noted, this issue has gotten a lot of attention since I posted. The head of the ABC commission resigned and the legislature held a special hearing on the issue. The crux of the problem is that all the booze in the state comes through only two warehouses in Raleigh. The private company operating those warehouses, which was just awarded a 10-year (!) exclusive contract, implemented a new inventory system and did it so poorly that nobody can get what they want -- stores, bars, restaurants are all screwed. Though they've identified the problem, it doesn't seem like it's very much closer to being solved; the shelves are still bare and it's impossible to plan ahead. I can't imagine operating a bar or restaurant in this kind of environment. You've got my sympathies. I can't imagine trying to keep a place like The Green Zone stocked during times like this. I realize that the situation isn't as dire up there as it is down here, but given how driven your bar program is by exotic spirits, it's got to be a difficult time. But kudos on keeping your business open and your head up.

They're compatible, but on my APS-C sized sensor, the 135mm would be equivalent to 202.5mm and that's *suuuuuuper* tight for a prime lens. And it would cost more than most of my lenses combined. But I'm still excited for you on your full frame setup. I just picked up a Sigma 56mm F 1.4 and a Sony 70-350mm G telephoto for my A6500. I doubt that either of them will get much use for food photography, but they'll be nice for portrait and wildlife shots. I think my Sigma 16 and 30 F1.4 lenses will be my workhorses for food stuff (and, to be honest, also my iPhone and iPad). But we'll see if the 56mm (84mm full frame equivalent) can find a place. The 70-350 is right out!

It's a North Carolina problem brought about by an incompetent state-run bureaucracy that has a monopoly on supply and distribution.

It has gotten worse. I took these tonight at the biggest store in the county. It isn’t a small county. 382,000 people live here, and we didn’t all raid this store on a Tuesday night. But more than tequila has vanished from the shelves. All the sections were like this. But at least there’s gas at the pumps. Vodka wall one. A different vodka wall. The tequila section faces us, and the rum shelves are on the opposite side of those shelves. Bourbon. I emerged miraculously with the bottle of Milagro tequila I intended to buy. I couldn’t bring myself to buy a tiny bottle of Maker’s Mark 46 or a giant bottle of Knob Creek, so I escaped with a bottle of Rittenhouse (which they haven’t reliably had in stock recently). This is bad. People should be losing their jobs and the system should be reformed. But since the state is in charge, nobody seems to care. Maddening.

Sure, but these kids didn't really create or demonstrate a new technology. Pureeing chicken and extruding it through a tube isn't new, it's McNugget territory. Shooting lasers at food has been a thing for a while, though I guess they made some slight progress on what wavelengths and wattages work better for cooking vs browning. I guess that's something? But the technique they've come up with produces a metallic or industrial off taste/odor and takes a long time. I don't see this scaling easily to industrial/institutional applications because you'd have to aim the laser at each individual piece of meat, making multiple passes over the entire surface; timely batch processing isn't possible. Meh. 3D printed food is mostly dumb and gimmicky. Extruded paste isn't an inspiring medium to work in, pasta to the contrary notwithstanding. And laser-cooked food doesn't seem to taste very good or offer real advantages compared to other cooking methods. I've seen some other tricks done, like a Japanese crew using lasers to only fry the white/fatty part of bacon, leaving the pink part raw. But like this chicken experiment, it didn't seem especially delicious. The best applications seem to be "drawing" realistic images on tortillas or omelettes, like the Modernist Cuisine crew does. But that's kinda gimmicky too. Bah humbug.

Mmmm. Extruded chicken paste heated with two types of laser. Sounds disgusting. "Ever go to the dentist and get fillings done? They have a laser they use to seal the fillings and you get that smell.. a little bit of an industry odor a sharpness you get to it that you don’t get with normal chicken. You smell the heating of the laser and you can smell it a little bit with the chicken, it leaves a little bit left on it." No thanks. The abstract of the paper makes some incredible claims that the paper doesn't back up in order to make the research seem more interesting. "Infusing software into the cooking process will enable more creative food design, allow individuals to more precisely customize their meals, disintermediate food supply chains, streamline at-home food production, and generate horizontal markets for this burgeoning industry." Uhh... If you say so...

Before the Anti-Griddle was developed, I think Alinea just rested sheet pans on blocks of dry ice.

Ooh, nice! I'm excited for you. I love a fast prime. And that's an interestingly long focal length -- the only lenses I have in that range are zooms. But I'm down here on Sony APS-C, and there aren't any native primes with similar focal lengths available. Oh well. At least the lenses are cheaper!

What new lens did you buy @JoNorvelleWalker?

Cabbage and onions with beet kraut, pickled mustard seeds, and Neuske’s bacon.

The tastiest kind of watermelon.

I’d just blitz freeze dried berries in a blender.

I like it just fine and can't understand why people wouldn't like it, aside from the staining risks. I like the fresh stuff added to smoothies or juiced with ginger (which is some powerful business). I think my favorite recipe that uses a goodly amount is Alison Roman's "The Stew" which is basically turmeric, coconut milk, greens, and chickpeas. I amp up the turmeric by using a combo of fresh and dried. There are oodles of clinical studies on curcumin, but these are almost always done with an extract that provides a standardized dosage that is much higher amount than one is likely to consume from food alone.

The biggest element I've seen in a consumer model is in the Max Burton 18XL. I haven't used it personally, but have been curious because I have the same problem with the elements on all the 1800W countertop units around. It makes me reluctant to invest in a fullsize 240 cooktop because I can't abide hotspots. I mostly use my Vollrath Mirage Pro to boil water and to deep fry (and sometimes to melt chocolate) because the heat is too spotty to saute or fry large portions evenly -- even with very conductive/heavy cookware like All Clad D7 and Copper Core.

Chris Young has committed to doing a YouTube teardown, and they say a video is worth a thousand pictures. But if you just want an idea of what the internals look like, here's a rough indication of what's going on under the hood.

Kyl Haselbauer of ChefSteps has this to report after some limited testing. "So far I am a fan of the thing for sure. The biggest differences I have found so far [between the Ninja and the PacoJet] would be the results when you use whole fruit chunks with syrups or ice cream bases. It just doesn't have the power to blend them Smooth, But it is still pretty dang good. I would just recommend throwing everything through a blender before you freeze it. I highly recommend it for $200. I'll probably be ordering one to keep at home for sure. I won't bash any other products directly here, but it is 10x better than any other brands counter top ice cream machines for way less $$. Not sure about the build quality and how long it will last, but for now I'm a fan.

The air pressure controls the amount of overrun, thereby letting you adjust the texture.

Um... The Standard Pacojet blade looks like this: The Ninja knockoff blade looks like this: There are a couple other blades available in the Pacojet coupe set, but they're designed to process non-frozen products (and they still look like blender blades). There's also a whipping disc. Anyway, it's no stretch to call the Ninja a competitor to the Pacojet. Whether or not it's a worthy competitor remains to be seen.

Purees and sauces and whatnot. It doesn’t have to stay frozen. I recall some Pacotized liver mousse or pate or something. But it’s mostly for sweet stuff.

Chris Young and Dave Arnold are going to do a teardown/review (according to Twitter). ChefSteps has ordered one to try out. I’ll wait for the expert opinions. Cream cheese is for children. Use stabilizers/hydrocolloids like an adult.

I almost never use my No. 15, but broke it out the other day to "deep fry" two thinly sliced shallots without wasting too much oil.

Mushroom miso ramen.