William Colsher

One of the "secrets" to keeping fried food crispy is wheat dextrin, aka Benefiber, aka Trisol. A quick Google will give you percentages.

Why did you heat an empty pan? At 500 F most any cooking oil will be smoking hot and about ready to burst into flame. In actual use you'll never come close to that with any quantity of food in the pan.

elBulli Morphings 1577 Chocolate Bars 2008 74% Chocolate, Milk Chocolate & Cinnamon Caramel, 74% Chocolate & Freeze Dried Blackcurrant White Chocolate, match, and mint, 74% Chocolate & Cocoa Nibs, White Chocolate and Freeze Dried Strawberry SUper easy and as good as the chocolate you use (obviously). Our favorites were the strawberry and cinnamon caramel.

Nothing that exotic - just sugar, a little water and ouzo, then paint the syrup on obulato squares, pop on some toasted pine nuts and dry in the oven.

They're like "vidre" - glass - shatteringly crispy. The recipe is in the 2010-11 volume of the 2005-2011 set.

elBulli 1813 Coca De Vidre. Oh man these are tasty. They're made with anise liquor (I used ouzo) and pine nuts. I'm thinking I'll make 'em with Bourbon and pecans tomorrow.

An elBulli "pre dessert": Gorgonzola Bonbon. A tiny slab of Gorgonzola embedded in Gorgonzola cream and dipped in very bitter chocolate. Good with Port.

Do those of you who use LN2 also use the insulated bowl, gloves, etc?

Pretty much agree with all of the above, though I'd lean toward a stand mixer like the standard model Kitchen Aid before I bought a food processor. And I'll repeat: You mention soup, which brings to mind a high power blender like the VitaMix. The ThermoMix is, as mentioned, a bit of a "cult" and for the same amount of money you can easily buy all the other stuff that's been mentioned. Even so, I'm planning to buy one late this year due to an unfortunate obsession with elBulli 2005-2011. But... all you really need is 1) a good knife 2) a good cutting board 3) a kitchen scale 4) a basic set of quality cookware plus a nonstick frying pan for eggs 5) Miscellaneous hand tools: grater, vegetable peeler, tongs, slotted spoon(s), spatula(s), measuring spoons/cups for the recipes that use volume And... 6) That reliable cook book(s) - see threads here on eGullet I lived for years without a toaster and a microwave but "need" them now. If I was starting from zero, I'd think hard about the SmartOven/Combi-Oven that have gotten a lot of coverage here. If you get into almost any kind of meat cookery, baking, or candy making you'll need an instant read thermometer. Don't mess around with anything other than a ThermaPen. You'll know when you "need" the other gadgets.

I've wrapped up the 2010-11 Survey, put up a list of the 369 "makeable" dishes (i.e. no exotic equipment) along with some dehydrator comments and a couple new dishes aince the last post. http://elbulliathome.blogspot.com/ I'm sure there are plenty of mistakes.

130 F for 15 minutes when I make Lobster Eggs Benedict with little tails like that. However... When I posted I had completely forgotten that I peel the tails prior to the butter poaching for which I apologize. Obviously it's an extra step before cooking that will take some time. And... 130 F might be a little on the rare side for some - other recipes specify 140F for 20-30 minutes which is probably closer to what most people think of as "normal".

Not a professional so FWIW, I'd go with sous vide for the "set and forget" aspect. Skewer 'em so they don't curl, bag with some beurre monte and away you go. At service pull the skewers, cut open the shell with scissors (for easy eating) add a quarter lemon and a little cup of butter and you're done.

Sausage Biscuits and Gravy Eggs Benedict

We all do. Temperature (of ourselves, the air, and of course the food), level of hydration, prescription or OTC drugs, other recently eaten foods (Google Szechwan Button), texture, slight illnesses one doesn't otherwise notice, emotional state... darn near everything affects how we perceive flavors. There are several recipes in the elBulli 2005-2011 books in which an ingredient is cooked at different temperatures or presented in different textures that exploit some of these ideas.

Yes, but their methodology was fundamentally flawed, IMHO.

There's a similar test from 2010 over at Serious Eats: http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/08/what-are-the-best-eggs-cage-free-organic-omega-3s-grocery-store-brand-the-food-lab.html There seem to me to be two methodological flaws with that test: 1) the eggs are scrambled in butter and salted and 2) there was no attempt to quantify the differences in feed except to mention that Misty and Logan supplemented their diet with bugs and worms - I suspect the pets mostly ate a commercial feed mix not too different from what factory chickens get. And that seems to be confirmed by this article, also from 2010: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/01/AR2010060100792.html?sid=ST2010060101402 There's also no mention of breed, but that becomes a more complicated question since you'd also have to control for diet. As I mentioned, I've been obsessing over poached eggs, partially because the ones we'd been buying at the supermarket don't have much flavor at all.

I've used the P12SGR3 on our glass top electric stove for years with no particular issues. Like all cast iron they can be a little brittle - I dropped mine once and the handle snapped off . Still works perfectly though. I like the looks of that LSRG3.

Regarding eggs and cheese.... The suggestion regarding eggs is a particularly good one (disclosure: I happen to be obsessing a bit about the poached variety just now). Find yourself a couple Farmers' Markets some weekend and buy fresh eggs from a couple of different vendors. Talk to them about how their chickens are kept, what they eat, etc. Take notes. Then go home and cook them simply - poached or soft cooked - any form of frying adds the complication of the oil you're using. Take notes regarding weight, cooking time, temperature, etc. Look at the eggs. Taste the eggs. Compare them to each other and to your usual eggs. Take more notes. Incidentally, while you're at those markets, find a creamery that produces several types of cheese. Buy 2 or 3 kinds based on the same milk. Don't put them in your refrigerator. Repeat the egg experiment, taking notes. Always challenge yourself a little. In case you haven't noticed the note taking thing is important (the particular product less so). Do this sort of thing every week (really). And read. Take the suggestions above seriously. If there's a cuisine you're particularly interested in someone here will certainly have advice on where to begin. Search out interesting blogs. Many of the members here have theirs listed in the signatures. And be sure to spend a rainy weekend broswing the archives here. I'm lucky enough to have the Reading Terminal Market about 5 minutes out of my way home after work. I stop in probably twice a week (for fresh Mozz and seafood) plus weekend runs to various Farmers' Markets. Once you get out of the supermarket mindset you'll begin to see so many possibilites you'll never have to ask a question like this again.

2009 Makeability survey is up. 56 of 105 recipes are makeable provided one can source the ingredients. Comments, suggestions, and requests are more than welcome. http://elbulliathome.blogspot.com/

2007 & 2008 Makeability surveys are up along with a couple more dishes. http://elbulliathome.blogspot.com/

Pizza tonight. Bonci dough, grape tomatoes & marjoram from the garden, home made Large Black pancetta (Ruhlman recipe), Valley Shepherd mozz from Reading Terminal Market

Tonight's elBulli experiment: Miso Soup Spherical-I and a perfectly normal burger: red and yellow sweet peppers sauteed with red onion, sharp white cheddar on Philly's finest Amoroso buns

>what are the differences between the types of gas chargers There are 2 types N2O and CO2. My impression is that most applications use N2O. >how long will it stay that way Several hours for sure. >Is it expensive to use in a busy kitchen Don't know. >Any advice on good websites to buy from and any good recipes would be appreciated! I'd say the "usual suspects": Amazon, WebstaurantStore, etc. >and any good recipes would be appreciated! http://forums.egullet.org/topic/107085-foam-recipes/ http://forums.egullet.org/topic/130145-isi-whipper-%E2%80%93-which-one/ http://forums.egullet.org/topic/83890-warm-foams/ etc. Search using "ISI whip foam" Outside eGullet http://blog.khymos.org/ has an ebook of recipes that includes some foams. and of course: http://www.isi.com/us/culinary/ And be aware that many foams are made by simply applying an immersion blender to the foam base.

And the 2006 "makeability" survey is up at http://elbulliathome.blogspot.com/2014/06/elbulli-2006-makeability-survey.html This is starting to get fun. I can see where one guy could do a whole elBulli style menu in a home kitchen.

I checked out chileheadmike's link and hit these: http://www.chileplants.com/search.aspx?ProductCode=CHIBOD