jackal10

The same thing is done in most retail industries: white goods, brown goods etc. It can take several million (choose your currency) in fees, staff training and paid advertising to persuade a chain to take your products. Even then all they will do is put some on the shelf. If they don't sell fast immediately (even with bribing the staff with sales bonuses at your expense to push them) they will send them back. Trying to get things into the supermarkets directly is not a good policy. Better to establish a market, for example via web sales and direct sales first, then you are in a much stronger position to negotiate terms. If you demonstrate a market, then they will come and ask you...

Where do you keep the glasses and the other drink things (and the red wine) Maybe move the wine fridge and icemaker there, or to the pantry? Maybe even move the main wash up sink and DW there? If you have the luxury of two sinks, I'd rather keep the wash-up in a seperate area, that way you don't dump the dishes where you are preping the next course.

where;s the storage? Traditionally you need to minimise the triangle between stove, sink and fridge. I find it useful to have a small fridge near at hand, and a large larder one elsewhere- mine is in the laundry room. Where do you store dishes and plates when you take them out of the dishwasher? Have you considered having two dishwashers - load into one and take from the other. Also I would shunt the sink and dishwasher down a bit. You have just taken a hot pan off the stove, or out of the oven. Where are you going to put it down? You need workspace within easy reach.

If you google for "granite worktops" you will be overwhelmed. Many colours and textures are available, with varying prices. Try a local stonemason or monumental mason, since shipping is a major part of the cost. In the UK I used 20mm thick; I seem to remember it was about $150/m or about $50/ft. I guess in the US you will use 1 inch. Even cheaper are granite tiles.

Tiles are hell to keep the grounting clean. Besides you can't do anything (like chop or roll pastry) on the surface Use thin granite on marine ply, - same base as tiles. and about the same price.

There are more pictures of the kitchen in my foodblog http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=33730&st=30 You can see the thin black (slightly flecked) marble worktops. Using thin marble is a) cheap b) not visually intrusive c) Indestructible. I regularly put hot pans down.

Don't use Corian. Anything remotely hot will mark it. Cigarette or cigar buts especially, but also frying pans. Do use marble - it etches and stains. Leave a lemon cut side down for an hour, and its there forever. Beetroot ditto Granite every time, and its cheaper. Use 1/2 inch round edged, mounted on marine ply. Don't use the 1 inch. Hell on knives though, and if you droop china or glass on it from any height the china or glass will break. The surface will be fine - its indestructable, and good for pastry. End-grain wood is another alternative, but not cheap.

Lancashire hot hot or Irish stew: onions, potatoes, lamb. Layer, top layer sliced potatoes. Leave in a medium oven, uncovered Top should be brown and crispy Eat with good bread and sharp pickled red cabbage

Like a moorhen, but with different colouring: white beak instead of orange http://www.eden-mallards.co.uk/images/wildlife/coot_1.jpg

ahh, the madelaines dipped in lime tisane...(and another several hundred pages)

Jackal - really? tell me more? Yes...leave it in the salad drawer, uncovered. The sides might dry out a bit, and you may neeed to cut off a thin slice of the outer crust, which is why its best to start with a big bit.

I find its not so much the beef, as to how its hung and cooked. People enquire where I get my amazing beef, and are surpised when I say Tesco supermarket... Most butchers (even supermarkets with butchers) will store the beef for a week or you, or you can dry age in your own fridge. I buy my beef at least a week in advance. Cooking long and slow (after Blumenthal etc) works. I cook at 75C until the internal temperature is 55C; about 4 hours. At these low tempoeratures ther is no need to rest, since the heat distribution is even. Of course beef cooks better in the large piece: thre ribs or more. Wing rib on the bone is the only roasting cut to consider.

err..not quite. Alkali is the opposite end of the Ph scale to acid. Salt does not alter Ph. Ph measures acidity. Technically Ph stands for p(otential of) H(ydrogen) and is the logarithm of the reciprocal of hydrogen-ion concentration in gram atoms per liter, and so provides a measure on a scale from 0 to 14 of the acidity or alkalinity of a solution (where 7 is neutral, less than 7 is acidic and more than 7 is basic or alkaline). Salt is sodium chloride, and so does not directly affect hydrogen icon concentration, although there may be impurities. What you are talking about is the effect on taste. Taste perception is complex, and varies between people. Salt, like acid is one of the basic tastes detected by the tastebuds on the tongue, along with sweet, bitter and "omani" or meatiness. We are more sensitive to changes and differences than absolute magnitude, so increasing the salt level lowers the perception of the others. Salt counteracts sweetness, for example (and vice versa - if you mildly oversalt something you can rescue it by adding some sugar). Fat coats the tastebuds, so making them less sensitive. Oil soluble (non-ionic) tastes dissolve better in fat than water-based (ionic) tastes, so the salt and acidic sensations are more reduced and thus the sweet, bitter and "omani" tastes are relatively enhanced. Tends round out flavours, since the perception lasts longer. Think of adding cream or butter to a sauce. Some foods, artichoke and to some extent beans, alter the taste of subsequent foods. Artichoke makes things taste sweeter then they are. Wine also changes in the glass, as it warms up, oxidises and the volatiles evaporate. Probably not much change for Asti, but can be significant for older red wines. You'll know if a wine is truly corked - it tastes horrid in a charateristic way, and not like it is meant to. It happens surprisingly often - maybe 1 in a hundred bottles, even for well made and bottled wines. Once a night for a busy restaurant. Maybe one of our sommeliers can say more accurately. However even more often a customer will send a wine back saying its corked when it is not. Maybe this is from ignorance or from bluster - maybe it is more tannic or acid than they were expecting, since they ordered a tragically young cheap wine, or maybe they are just trying it on, having drunk half the bottle first. Short of an argument, there is not much a restaurant can do, except resell the rst of the wine by the glass.

Wild ducks usally have almost no fat, so can be dry. Their muscle have worked hard, so they can be tough. Their age can be variable as well. A wild duck will only feed two. They should not be very gamey - dont hang for more than a couple of days If shot on the seashore thay can taste fishy, so you need to allow for that in cooking - quite a strong, sharp sauce. This is the time for Seville oranges, and they pair wonderfully (aux Bigarades). Marinade the breasts in lemon, garlic, pepper, bay etc for a day - fairly acidic. Roast the breasts 10 mins or until pink, slice thin, then finish in a sauce made with a little caramel, seville orange juice and rind, port, splash of curacao or gin. Traditionally they were slow roast whole, but I agree it would be easier to cook in pieces - confit the legs and thighs, and maybe serve the breast pink, sliced thin or braise it. You could consider lightly tea-smoking one. You can make the cofit like a normal duck confit, but you will have to add all the fat. Stock with the carcasses, and you can extract a little meat for a hash. The Sporting Wife (Barbera Hargreaves) ISBN 0-85493-121-X has good recips for this and all sorts of game

Cambridge Wine Merchants www.cambridgewine.com Alex Riley Wines (pm me and I'll email their list) Jenkins and Beckers (serious claret) Noel Young (sometimes) http://www.nywines.co.uk/ Berry Bros & Rudd - superb site http://www.bbr.com/

Hope springs eternal. Daffodils are pushing through the ground - looks like a very early spring. Started to plan what to grow this year. Dug some beds over. Jerusalem Artichokes, Carrots, rainbow chard, leeks, kale and a few sprouts still fresh from the garden. Today sowed tomato seeds for greenhouse tomatoes. They always put too many seeds in the packet, so lots spare. Currently a fairly random collection: Sungold - Wins the taste test every time. Very sweet yellow cherry Gardeners Delight. Red cherry Good flavour Fireworks II. FLame derived, early determinate red. Got mildew last year. Marianna's Peace. Billed as the worlds most expensive, tastiest tomato we shall see. Looks like a pink Brandywine Wins All Late large red Pink Ping Pong Purple Calabash Earl of Edgecombe. What tomatos should I grow for best flavour?

onions/dill/schmalts (or goose or pork fat) salt/sugar/vinegar

I ate at L'Oulette in Bercy early December last year. Written up here EU249 for four, including wine and champagne to start. Good value. Southern french cuisine. Pleasant room. Excellent food, good ingredients well handled, but not a mind-blowing "I could never do that" experience.

I bought some in Tesco last week. Waitrose usually have some (might not be organic)

Thanks. I-am-not-a-lawyer, so treat anything I say with circumspection. Asking people to invest in your project "making investment advertisments" in the legal terminology has very specific rules and regulations, with severe punishments for transgression. You can, in principle, go to jail. The rules go back to financial scandals like the south sea bubble, or in more modern times Ponzi and pyramid get-rich-quick schemes and are designed to protect the weak and vulnerable. You need professional advice. Distributing your plan to more than a few tens of people, or putting it on a web site count as investment advertisements. Investment advertisemens must be authorised by "members of self-regulating organisations" such as brokers, bankers or lawyers or accountants, who can check for accuracy of your statements, and have professional indemnity insurance so that they can be sued if incorrect. Expensive. The get out is that you can solicit an few people who have certified that they are high net worth and sophisticated. Different jurisdictions define these terms slightly differently. In the UK (I believe but I am not a professional) "sophisticated investor" is not really a legal category, unlike the US, but in both jurisdictions are self-certified. "High net worth" is currently defined in the UK as income in excess of £100K per annum and disposable net worth (excluding dwelling house and pension) of more then £500K, which must be certified by an accountant or employer. Other exempted categories are members of SRO's (see above), and some organisations.

Juice and freeze the juice in ice cube trays, then bag for use in the rest of the year Make punch (rum, lemon, sugar) Pancakes with lemon and sugar

The duck legs were stuffed with sage and onion forcemeat. I was in a hurry so used a good pork sausagemeat as a base, which I had to hand. If I was allowed more carbs I would use breadcrumbs, onion, sage, garlic, seasoning bound with an egg. I've seen recipes that use Foie Gras as a stuffing. That seems to me a waste, as it would not survive the log cooking and duck is anyway fatty enough.

An angel investor is an individual who will invest in your project. Originally a theatrical term. A good angel will bring more than just cash to the table but also bring their experience, advice and contacts as well as cash. They must (under current financial regulations in most jurisdictions, as well as good sense) be "sophisticated investors" and "high net worth". Both are specific technical terms, the first meaning that they can make their own judgements, and the second meaning they can afford to lose the money. They are thus exempt (or on their own) from many of the financial protection regulations designed to protect people from scams. Indeed, unless they are so certified it is illegal to ask them to invest or show them your business plan. Typically an angel will have already made money in the industry and is looking to do it again, but as an investment rather than working day to day. Different from the FFF round (family, friends and fools), in that the FFF people, like your rich aunt, know and love you and are backing you personally. An angel is backing the business you propose, not you. An angel will need convincing that what you propose is viable, and especially can compete in the market and attract profitable custom. That is the biggest hurdle and gamble: everything else is mechanics and process. I'm not offering to invest, but if I did, as standard as an Angel I would look for a 40%- 60% IRR (annual internal return), to compensate for the risk and pay for the ones that don't succede. That means the business should be able to pay me back entirely from its profits in the third or fourth year of trading. Tough to do, especially in catering (will you be making profit in excess of 2.5M/year in your third year?), but possible. I'd expect to take about a third of the business, and that my money is as good as your money. That is if I put in $1M, the business had better have $2M of your or other people's money in it before I invest, but you (and your staff) can put in some of your money as sweat equity (taking lower or no wages) or some valuation on the intellectual or other property you bring to the party. A third because it gives some control but not overall contral and allows some headroom when you come back for more money, as you will. More that a third and I end up owning the business, which is not what I want. Its tough out there. Others may have a more romantic approach and offer better deals, but get in your way more, Bourdain decribes it well.

Just me, although Jill does most of the clearing and washing up... Edited to add that the remains made an instant cassoulet...

Thanks to the egullet team I can now post pictures again, so this is a longer version of Saturday's dinner Duck four ways (Atkins friendly) Duck pate (foie gras, duck, shallots) rolled in savoy cabbage leaves Champagne Making: Finished Portion is one each as amuse. Consomme Viveur (upmarket Borscht - duck, beetroot, celery, with parsley and onion quenelles) Clarifying: Service. Note clarity: Leg and thighs boned and stuffed served on wilted salad with confit tomatoes, mushrooms, caramelised apple slices, aged balsamic 1996 Nuit St George, Bernard Ambroise, Cuvee Veille Vignes Boning out the duck leg: Stuffing: Overnight in 3 tbs coarse sea salt, 1 tbs brown sugar, thyme, bay, garlic peppercorns Two hours in a 170C oven. Lots of goose fat: Apples, tomatoes, mushrooms Presentation could be better Duck breast roasted, with Rumtopf fruits jelly, roasted cauliflower, sprouts, carrots, onion cream Jelly from the remains of the Rumtopf (fruits in rum - egcI preseves 1). The jelly is set with carrageen so that it is hot temperature stable Must work on presentation. Onion cream is caramelised onions and thick cream, frozen. Lemon Syllabub, langue d'chat. Ancient, but good. Molten Chocolate Fondant, Mocha creme anglais (standard creme anglais but with a tbs of ground coffee infused in the milk/cream before straining out. The remaining slight flecks of coffee are deliberate. 2000 Paradise Ranch Okanagan Merlot Icewine (stood up well!) 200g Lindt 85% chocolate, 120g butter, 200g eggwhite, not beaten Silform mould; 10 minutes 200C oven Cheese Coffee etc