docsconz

Thanks for the link. Cool program!

Sounds great. Enjoy!

Bella Napoli I am familiar with. It is the best source of Italian pastries in the area that I know of.

It is always sad when an institution passes, especially if it was the last of its kind. Was it any good?

Some of the sap in the collection buckets today was frozen overnight. The sap-ce was collected andkept to melt: I got to taste some fresh maple syrup just off the stove: Wow, was that good stuff. The grade right now appears to be somewhere between A & B. It really is special. I was fortunate enough to be given the jar that I am holding in my hand. On a side note: another name for the maple syrup poured over fresh snow is "JackWax". This syrup is not quite the same as that in my bottle. It is thickened even further before being applied to the snow. On contact with the cold snow it becomes more solid and is eaten like candy.

Here are more photos: The Sugar Shack Maple Steam The evaporator doing its job. Boiling down The leveler The raw sap: The lighter sap came first, the darker sap is more recent and will be closer to Grade B. The sap is collected here and then pumped up to a holding tank. The hose to the tank. The gravity feeder holding tank for sap. The sap gets pumped up into this tank and is than gravity fed to the evaporator. The final concentration underway. Bottles waiting to be filled. Checking the consistency with a hygrometer Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble Just about the right consistency when its boiling like this. Pouring through a filter to get any particles. Look at the color Coming from the filter After filtration Bottling. That's all for now.

More photos coming shortly, but I did discover a few tidbits today. The grades generally come from the point in the season the sugar is harvested. Early season is lighter and grade A, then the season moves into a bit darker - grade B and late season, heavy and very dark grade C. My neighbors are usually tuckered out before Grade C.

I'm hoping Sunday the shack will be fired up and I can be there to take some more photos and help out. It is a lot of fun and a great neighborhood experience. A lot of people pitch in and help out. It is a lot of work. I really admire my neighbors for their dedication to this as well as having a mini-farm with chickens and other animals. It makes for a great neighborhood environment. The warm maple syrup rolled in fresh snow is my favorite maple treat.

While not quite 95 here, it has been warm enough to melt most of the snow.

That's about all there is likely to be of true "Sconzo" Maple syrup - if that! A small amount of the sap may come from my property, but I am not the one with the production capacity or expertise. If I am lucky I may be able to help out in a small way.

People here have those parties too. My neighbors throw a breakfast party every spring with pancakes, sausage, bacon, eggs and of course plenty of fresh home-made maple syrup. It i the kind of event one can only get in the north country. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your point of view) I don't think we'll have much of an opportunity this year of pouring the freshly made maple syrup on freshly fallen snow this year. Then again, it is still early March. That to me is the best.

The way it was flowing today, I would say it could fill a several gallon bucket within a day and probably thensome.

I learned from them not to do it in one's kitchen. It can get pretty messy and the steam can leave some stains. Much better to do it in a sugar shack..

Today has been one of the first really good days of the season for sugaring - a cold night followed by a warm day. Unfortunately my neighbor is away on business and the sap is overflowing.

I also went to Paris for my fortieth, but that was five years ago! Epi Dupin was perhaps the best restaurant that we went to, but we didn't do any of the fancier restaurants. We actually celebrated my birthday by getting some great cheeses, bread, pate' and a bottle of wine and sitting under the Eiffel Tower. I was happy.

That is one of the things one pays for.

My previous experience with J-G was for lunch and that was a remarkeable experience not to mention a wonderful value. Overall, this was disappointing in so many respects. The food would probably have been more well received if the initiation into that night's dining would have been less aggravating. I got the impression of a restaurant resting on its laurels.

I tasted a martini made with Levl this past Saturday night at Jean-George. While it was nice and smooth, I can't say it blew me away.

squid ink pasta served side-by-side with fettucine alfredo.

Great reports. I am dying to join you folks at these. I'll get down there one of these times. I too would be very interested in an anchovy and caper pizza with good anchovies and capers. If we could coordinate, I could bring some capers from Pantelleria to go with Joe's Sicilian anchovies. Perhaps in May.

Clam sauce is perhaps my specialty. I use my mother's recipe. It is true comfort food for me. The key is the clams. I use cherrystones. The smaller varieties like little necks or vongole verace just don't provide enough juice or flavor. I shuck the clams retaining all the juice (about 2 dozen per pound of pasta (generally linguine, although spaghetti is probably more commonly used in Campania in my experience. I then take the clams and since I've reserved the juice, I rinse the clams to get rid of any sand or grit that may be clinging to them and then chop them into smaller pieces. I saute a boatload of garlic in nice EVOO add a handfull of fresh italian parsley and then the clams and a little black pepper. Cook the pasta, add it to the sauce and voila, a little bit of heaven.

I hope to. Do you know if they are taking reservations yet or if not when they are planning on starting?

I am beginning to believe that J-G maybe has jumped the shark. While I have not tried any of his more recent openings (the reviews here and elsewhere really aren't that enticing), I just had a tasting menu at Jean-George that was less than spectacular in a number of ways. I went last evening with my wife, my siblings and their spouses (we were seven altogether) to celebrate my brother's 50th b-day. We have a family tradition of the siblings treating any other sibling and spouse to a dinner at the restaurant of that sibling's choice on the occasion of the 50th birthday. My brother chose J-G and made reservations initially for nine people. He was told that that number couldn't be accomodated in the main dining room, but could in Nougatine. When another brother and his wife couldn't make it, he called the restaurant to change the reservation and was told that he could have the main dining room. he then confirmed the night before the dinner, however, upon our arrival, we were show to a table in the crowded Nougatine afterall. The restaurant stated they had no record of the chaange, although the table was set for seven and not nine. they were unable to put us in the main dining room. The menu in nougatine is different from that of the main dining room. After complaining, they allowed us to order the tasting menu from the main dining room, but if we didn't want that we would be relegated to the Nougatine menu because the "kitchen was so busy". Since we were there to experience J-G and not nougatine we opted for the tasting menu. I enjoyed the food, although it didn't knock me out. It seemed as if every course had an element of foam. Now I like a good foam every now nd then, but this was simply too much considering the derivative nature of the concept. The other distressing part of the meal was that the service was mediocre at best. There were several significant lapses such as frequent banging of waitstaff into occupied chairs and the sommalier forgetting or neglecting to pour wine for one of my brothers. While we generally enjoyed ourselves despite the lapses, the lapses led to less than stellar behavior on the par of some of my tablemates. This may have become a bit of a vicious circle as criticism of the restaurant from my table became fairly vocal. It wa actually rather embarrassing, albeit the criticism was largely though not completely deserved (the food got more criticism than it deserved). The one concesion towards mollification on th part of the restaurant was as we were leaving. The maitre'd gave me his card and told me to call him before coming in next time so he could set me up with "a special meal". The only problem is that I'm not sure I have a great desire to return.

I'm glad to see that michael is still in the picture. I was surprised to find that he wasn't mentioned on the Blue Hill website. This led me to believe that he was perhaps no longer afiliated with that team. This is reassuring news. Liz, Thanks for that article. It wass very well done. i believe that this is an extremely important project on many levels and wish it complete success.

I might just hold out for Bourdain, though.