iain

I am indeed interested. Thanks!

I'm going camping this coming weekend. For a few different reasons, I'd like to prepare most of the food at home to cook in foil packs on the embers of the fire. I've done a bit of web research and most of the recipes/ideas on sites out there are exceedingly basic. I'd love to do something a little more interesting that cubes of beef with onions and potatoes. Does anyone here have any ideas or recipes for great outdoor food that can be mostly prepped in advance?

Were these pieces designed specifically for use at Alinea? Or were they in use at all at Trio?

Are Sichuan peppercorns now easily available in a heat-treated form? There was some talk of this up-thread. I had a co-worker pick up a bag for me in the Flushing chinatown and she was able to score. The guy in the store, apparently, had to get them from the back room and he said they were illegal. I have a 1 lb. bag. This is more than I could possbily use in a reasonable amount of time. Does anyone want any? I'd be happy to meet outside Rockefeller Center during business hours. They're free. Now that I have them, I'm not sure what to do with them. I read this thread, obviously, but am still not sure what to try. What does one do with the oil? Last night I toasted some, ground them, and rubbed on pork chops with salt. It was interesting, but overpowering. I used about 1 1/2 teaspoons (ground) on four small chops. Anyone have any suggestions?

As a followup the the PNW question, what are your thoughts on the super-hopped beers (HopDevil, etc) that seem to be part of a growing trend? Personally, I enjoy them from time to time, but find them to be incredibly unbalanced and hard to drink as a session beer.

Great lesson. Thanks. Any idea when the appendix will arrive? I'm looking forward to it.

I've been working on drinking the beer, actually. For some reason, it never really carbonated fully. I'm thinking it was because I used those PrimeTabs instead of just using regular priming sugar or something. I'd like to hear if anyone has had a good experience with this product. Maybe the problem was somewhere else. If anyone in NYC wants to try some of the beer, I do still have some left. We talked around doing a meetup, but nothing has come of it.

A rather amusing parody of a Gothamist interview with Ms Hesser. Edited to say that it isn't really all that amusing.

I'm a big fan of Saute Wednesday.

Beefamato? I'm intrigued.

I'm surprised by the amount of reaction this piece has received. It was obviously a good-natured, tongue-in-cheek ribbing, written by an Australian for an American audience (I'm pretty sure The Morning News is an NYC-based blog). To find fault with the guy for not having done his research is rather missing the point, I think. edited for spelling and grammar

From The Morning News.

I believe it's the Institute for Culinary Education.

I sometimes get coffee in Starbucks (I prefer the "mild" b/c it has less of a burnt flavor) and have never once been corrected or given any sort of attitude for ordering it "small, black" (I refuse to say "tall") - or had any attempts at up-selling. I dislike the chain as much as the next guy - and find their coffee over-roasted and their terminology annoying, but the people working in the stores seem reasonable enough to me.

Or pray the ATM nearby has not been emptied. Jamie and that you're not mugged walking from the atm to the place.. i've often wondered why an enterprising thug doesn't camp out by the broadway J train stop and knock off every group of guys walking over to lugers.. Oh please. I thought that by this point in time, we'd progressed past the "oh my, Brooklyn is scary" crap. Plus - why don't thugs hang don't outside Daniel and mug rich upper east-siders? Because they'd get caught. Might work once or twice, but after that they'd be establishing a pattern that the police could easily spot. [edited for gender inclusiveness]

Excellent. Thanks both. I'm thinking that for my next batch, I'll split it between tap-a-draft and bottles. Perhaps two of the big bottle (one force carbonated, one bottle conditioned) and the rest in 12 and 22 oz glass. Question: if my current bottles don't carbonate (haven't checked them since the weekend) do you guys think there'd be a problem transferring the contents to the tap-a-draft system? I guess it might aerate on the way out of the bottles, but that's preferable to no fizz at all. Also - what's a 4oz. beer? I've never heard of such a thing.

CDH - you like the tap-a-brew bottles with forced carbonation? Ever just use priming sugar in them? How do they compare to glass bottles? As much as I like the aesthetic of glass, I find cleaning and sanitizing and filling them all a pain in the ass.

The world of fine dining can be very intimidating for young or otherwise inexperienced patrons. What steps do you take to make your restaurant a welcoming environment for all guests? How good a job do you think fine dining establishments on the whole do with this issue?

I'll gladly distribute, assuming the carbonation perks up a bit...

The bottles are at room temperature. In my apartment, that can fluctuate wildly, but often is too hot rather than too cold.

Ok... something seems to have gone wrong. I bottled a week ago yesterday (saturday) and, as of last night, the beer hasn't achieved any carbonation. As mentioned in an earlier post, I used PrimeTabs for priming sugar. I used a combintation of 12oz. and 22oz. bottles. For the 12oz. bottles, I used 3 tablets. For the 22s, I used 5 tablets. To sanitize the bottles, I used 1/4 teaspoon of OneStep in each bottle and filled with hot water. I didn't rinse before bottling, just dumped the solution. Anyone have any thoughts? I realize I could let this go a few more days, but I was expecting something....and got nothing. Not even a slight fizz when I uncapped the bottle.

Excellent. Glad to see this beer project is really picking up some momentum. Bringing it to eGCI should help attract a much larger brewing group - which will translate to more questions and more learning all around. I'd like to see this happen. Still haven't bottled, by the way. Good thing I used a secondary fermentation!

Paul, You should us the next time we brew a group batch.

In case anyone's keeping notes at home, I finally got some caps and will likely be bottling sometime this week. I also picked up some more extract and yeast so I can use my leftover grains and hops. I'm not sure if they'll be at their peak, but I hate to waste. I also picked up the new third edition of "The Complete Joy of Homebrewing" which is still quite good, but I must say I'm hard pressed to find much difference between this and the second edition.

The beef patty place on Flatbush is called Christy's - and it puts every other beef patty I've had in NYC to shame. It's like a carnival in your mouth.