Margaret Pilgrim
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Posts posted by Margaret Pilgrim
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re need for tight lids, for most long, low temperature oven braising, I brown well on stove-top, add appropriate liquid, then cover with a paper lid, no metal or glass lid. -> fork tender, unctuous meat, rich reduced jus. The companion lids of most of my pots sit on the shelf.
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I would suck it up and go for the All-Clad. I use mine quite often and love the resulting product and the clean-up. It is a workhorse in my kitchen.
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There should not be any problem fitting a tasting menu into your normal style of consuming. The problems arise when you are traveling and schedule night after night after night of larger than normal meals, perhaps after some larger than normal lunches. While survival is probable, your enjoyment of the later meals will be less than they would have been had you arrived hungry with an unjaded palate.
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What am I missing? I cover dough tightly with Saran and set the bowl on a stand several feet from a heating vent. Our house is a constant 68 degrees, and rises to perhaps 75 with the heat on. The area near a vent -> perfectly risen dough. I don't think I "get"/want/need a proofing box.
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I loathe chopping and dicing, get terribly bored attending stove-top cooking and can't abide making cookies since my attention wanders before the last batch is out of the oven.
But I am happy washing dishes and cookware that I love. It involves handling stuff I identify with and is a source of instant gratification: you have dirty stuff on one side and sparkling clean on the other.
Of course, the satisfaction only lasts until someone starts to eat again and upsets the zen balance....
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How does this house "made" mozzarella compare with other fresh mozzarellas? What are the cost differentials among these? The provenance is unimportant to me if the product is correct and if the price is within the range of its competition.
I've bought many "fresh" mozzerellas that tasted over-the-hill to me. If the house-finished polly-o product offers the clean, fresh cream taste of good fresh mozzerella, what they call it is not an issue with me. I will pay a premium if it is actually superior in taste.
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Lovely responses, all, the crux being a corollary of the French rule that "ll" is always pronounced as a y except when it it pronounced as a double l.
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This style beverage has been around since mid-century, known as Champale.
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The grillers in Spain search out ready-for-retirement farm cattle and oxen, "rest" and feed them for some months before butchering them. Some of the most fabulous beef of my life was at Etchebari in Axpe, Basque country. It was 18 year old draft animal. I've heard reports of 22 year old ox from this kitchen. Wonderful flavor and tender as love.
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All excellent advice above. And do do it! I am constantly boggled at the parade of half awake bobos I see each morning heading for either Starbucks or Peet's. Where do all these rich people come from? In a year, the dollars any one of them spent would buy me a ticket to Paris!
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Here is another list, but be aware that any entry on such lists is subject to change.
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Counter seating = eating on stools at a counter like in an old fashioned soda fountain.
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Spinning off this topic, I never make gravy with remembering one of my first holiday dinners.
I made gravy, removing some fat from the roasting pan, then adding flour, blending well before adding liquid. My M-I-L stood next to me and asked where I ever learned to make gravy that way, adding that she always added a slurry to the drippings. I told her my mother taught me.
I gleefully told this story to my mother, who looked at me askance, and replied that she had never made gravy this way.
What can I tell either of them? Messages from outer space?
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I would caution Atelier diners to understand the room: counter seating, counter service.
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Check out these posts on Chowhound. Chow has an extensive Paris following and this question comes up yearly.
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It only lives for most of forever. I have taken to buying a fresh quart when I am making a recipe, pouring off the recipe amount and freezing the rest in 1 cup containers.
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My husband reminded me of "his" favorite saved food. Whenever I make bouillabaisse, I go to my fishmonger and ask for a white fish frame. He will give me the entire skeleton, which usually includes cheeks and other large chunks of exquisitely fresh fish. I extract enough of these for a meal before boiling up the chopped up bones for soup base. In fact, a frame is usually big enough to chop in two and freeze one for another batch.
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Eternal question! FWIW, our son has a LaCanche. It is beautiful, the stove top works a dream. The oven seems to be reliable, AFAIK.
In a parallel world, my husband and I recently discussed replacing our vintage, actually read "prototype" Viking range. It is a piece of #$%&. But it works. I don't "notice" it.
After shopping stoves that cost multiples more than my first car, we decided that we needed a proper oven clean and anew exhaust hood.
BTU per burner might be your guide. We found that our ancient range had higher BTU than most of the new kids on the block.
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Will do this, RG. Have you any overnight bean experiences to share? Would love to try some in a wood oven or, since I revisit your photo, a Franklin stove. Thoughts, please?
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If willing to shift to the other coast, Margot's Bistro, Padstow would by my choice. Depending on your demands for specific date, it's my sense that you could book the house for an intimate nuptial. (Can we come?)
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To be fair, it really depends on how and why you travel and dine AND how well you use the internet. I spend most of my travel and dining dollars in France. Trusted bloggers keep me ahead of the curve in Paris while Google finds me the insolite country gems. The Paris addresses are seldom in the books when we first visit while most of the country stops are too small or private to interest the guides.
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I haven't bought a guide in well over 5 years, feeling that hard copy compilations are stale before they hit the booksellers or postbox. The internet now brings us opinions of diners as soon as their plates are cleared. Furthermore, one can calibrate the tastes and sophistication of internet personalities whereas one never knows the experience of those 8000 or 80000 lay reporters who submitted opinions to Hardens or Zagat or OA or...
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I've never seen a perro caliente - what's on it?
A favorite trailor, not truck, at the Laney flea market in Oakland, CA on Sunday mornings lets you load your dog with any or all: lettuce, chopped tomato, chopped onion, cilantro, sweet relish, dill pickles, jalapenos, mustard, mayo, catsup, srirachi. I ask for it all on my turkey dog. Sounds wrong but works for me.
re true taco trucks, our all-time favorite is in Lodi, CA, (north of Stockton) opposite the car wash on Lodi Ave. I order them with single tortilla, since I think they get too heavy with the normal 2. Choice of lengua, cabeza, birria, al pastor, carnitas, pollo or steak asada, all superb. Simple layering of tortilla, meat, salsa, hot sauce, chopped onion, cilantro. $1.25 ea.
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...mise is EVERYTHING. Mise is the difference between an "easy money" day and "dans la merde." Mise is more than just having a stack of towels and some bowls at the ready. It is a mindset -- a zen yoga jedi kung-fu mindset.
Before work, I show up one hour early. I drink coffee. And I visualize how my day is going to go. Even if I don't exactly know what I'm doing that day, I know what kitchen I'm in, so I know basically what's going to happen. I visualize the entire day's events, while chugging coffee. And then I get up, put my game face on, go to work, and rock 'n' roll. And when I'm cooking at home, same thing. I don't care if I'm cooking for 1 or 5,000. There's no difference.
Mise is the paddle that keeps you out of sh-- creek.
Yours is a weird but spot on post. You are obviously a pro. I am a housefrau. But we connect on the concept of conscious rehearsal of upcoming kitchen duty. During that last luxurious half hour of wakefulness before hopping (dragging) out of bed, I mentally rehearse all food prep and process I anticipate for the upcoming day, particularly so if I am giving a dinner party.
When the time approaches, I automatically reach for the mise, the bowl, the plate, the serving pieces without thought since I've done it all in my mind.
2012 New Year Food Resolutions
in Food Traditions & Culture
Posted