cdh

A friend has been living over there for a while... he gets to Roberta's from there pretty regularly. He's also a fan of L'antagonist on Malcom X blvd, and I'd concur with that.

Mine got here too. Will play with it soon. Would love to hear from anybody who has played with both one of these and a Control Freak...

I couldn't stop myself at the $69 price point. I had been convincing myself that waiting on Kickstarter to come through with the MasterSous device would cover what this does... But at that price and the added value of instant gratification, it was too much.

And the Jasmine or the Pegu Club also make fine highballs during the heat of summer.

Lots of cocktails make delicious highballs... I like my Manhattans tall and fizzy pretty often.

Geisha is a novelty. It is different, and it is rare. That's why it is expensive. Would I want to drink it every day if I could get it for $8/lb? I don't think so. There... I've disputed its primacy.

That looks like an agricultural recommendation. It's like a chart that says Riesling is a great wine grape when planted beside rivers. Fine as far as it goes, but misleading in the extreme if you expect exceptional wine when Riesling vines are planted next to the Cuyahoga.

Define "best". You need to figure out what you like. Generally anything offered by a specialty green coffee seller is going to be far above the commodity grade stuff where "is it robusta", "does it taste bad" are not questions that should be on the radar. The importers do cuppings and only things without appreciable faults get bid on. Whether you _like_ the flavor of a typical Sumatra or Costa Rica coffee is another question.

It's a relative of koji, one of the more appetizing things in that rogues galley of an ingredients list.

seeds?

Aaargh... you've generated gigantic temptation. I'm awaiting my Master Sous from Kickstarter which should arrive this fall, and is an precision induction widget -- with an automated stirring function. Do I need this in addition to my elderly Sunpentown Mr. Indunction II?

Vegetarians are tastier than carnivores?

Weddings are one of the few times people are absolutely stupid with their money. Don't be the bargain option when you're selling to a bride.

And the natto thing just does not appeal. Stringy slime, and ammonaic aroma? No thanks.

Not a fan of bugs. I've tried the Lao presentation of both crickets and silk worm larvae, and neither did anything for me. Crickets are too chitinous... like eating shrimp with the shells on, or chewing your fingernails. The silk worms were just unexciting flavorwise in the omelet-ish presentation.

We get it. You can't stand him. You don't need to keep telling us.

I watched the chicken parm episode. I thought it was pleasingly nostalgic. I never hated Good Eats to begin with, and I'm not likely to start hating it now. The last season before the break felt like he was running out of ideas, and now that he's had a good long time to think up new stuff, I'm optimistic.

The effort is precision, not strength. Cutting through just enough to get through the skin without nicking the white segments is the hard part. Squeezing them makes them crack, but that can squash the segments too...

The casing is able to be cut with a knife, with some effort. I'd say its hardness is just shy of almond shells. Case is fibrous, but not stringy. You eat the white segments inside. Taste is unique, texture is sorta grape-like. It is bright, but not sharp. Offset by sweetness. I'd not say particularly aromatic.

The other day at my local Korean supermarket I happened across fresh mangosteens... sold in a bag, @$10/lb... I couldn't resist, and they were in great shape with one or two exceptions. Where are mangosteens that are legal to sell in the US coming from? I hope these delicious things become more available and less crazily expensive. But they're worth it... Can you find them where you are?

So they're a cactus like plant? The plants look a lot like night blooming cereus. I may have to try to get a cutting and start one myself.

Unboxed my recent CSO purchase and put it to the test tonight. I figured steam bake would be the best way to finish bacon wrapped scallops... and it worked great. I'd probably give it another minute or two next time, but steam bake for 12 minutes at 450 got lots of the fat rendered out of the bacon and started crisping it up. Glad I took the plunge.

Those little guys are around 50ml, so figure 48 or 49ml... You're shooting for a 2-4% solution. Any more that that and the oil can start gumming up the works in the atomizer sprayer.

What are you keeping in the little spray bottle? My bar has a collection of little atomizer bottles with various stuff in them. Best use for them I've found is citrus oils... dissolve about 1 or 2 ml of lemon or orange or grapefruit oil into a bottle full of grain alcohol and you can add citrus zestiness without fiddling around with citrus zest.

Very interesting. Not many new micro/craft breweries do any lagers. These folks seems to have declared it a specialty and do only lagers. That must make their beers quite unusual. I recall having something by them a year or two ago... I'll have to see if they're distributed in PA.