slkinsey

Ah. I can't comment on what is traditional for Japanese knives, although of course "traditional" and "best" or "reasonably good for home use" are not the same thing. I suppose it all depends on how much time you have to devote to handworking your gyuto on a stone. As to whether steeling is even something that would be good or appropriate for a single bevel edge is harder to say, and I don't know enough about it to offer an opinion.

Sure. Personally I think most distilled water tastes terrible. I wouldn't necessarily recommend making water out of distilled water if taste is an important consideration. I'd recommend a nice, sweet, relatively soft water that's been filtered to remove chlorine. You know... like filtered NYC tap water. My recommendations were only applicable to the goal of creating maximally clear ice cubes with normal home equipment (which I personally don't think is worth pursuing, but to each his own).

I don't want to speak for Octaveman, but... extra-fine ceramic steels like this aren't recommended for what I'd call true sharpening. For that, you'd like to have a stone. Rather, they combine the effect of traditional steeling (straightening the edge) with a small amount of "polish sharpening" to remove any tiny weak parts of the edge. Once the knife really needs to be sharpened, you wouldn't want to do that with a ceramic steel.

No, there is no point whatsoever to paying big bucks for a steel. Especially when you can go to HandAmerican and pick up the S-14GS 14-inch Glass Smooth Steel for 35 bucks (use this for steeling) and the C-14 14-inch Steatite Rod for 25 bucks (use this extra-fine grit ceramic steel for steeling with very light sharpening). What you do not want are the grooved or nubbled steels that come with most knife sets. These will damage your knives more than helping them.

The Mpemba Effect is dependent on certain conditions. It would have to be a huge Mpemba Effect to freeze a tray of 98C (just off boiling temperature) water faster than a tray of 22C (room temperature) water or a tray of cool tap water at maybe 15C. In the context of a normal home freezer and plastic or latex ice cube trays I don't think the conditions would be right for a Mpemba Effect of this magnitude.

You'll probably have the best luck making clear ice cubes doing this: 1. Use distilled water (this makes sure there are no minerals which could cause clouding). 2. Boil the water (this gets rid of any dissolved gasses which could cause bubbles). 3. Use the water immediately after boiling (this makes sure that the minimum amount of gas is re-dissolved into the water, and also will cause the ice to form more slowly -- both of which result in better clarity). 4. Make the ice cubes in layers (this makes it less likely that any remaining gasses will be trapped in the ice as the water freezes and the gas comes out of solution). 5. Open the freezer and agitate the ice trays every 5 minutes or so to release any bubbles that may be forming. This is an awful lot of work just to get clear ice cubes at home. And, of course, clear ice cubes are not any better than cloudy ice cubes when it comes to chilling in the shaker for an "up" drink. So, I could see maybe taking a lot of trouble to make one tray of clear ice and using that ice exclusively for rocks drinks. 1, 2 and 3 will already make a big difference compared to regular tap water. 4 and 5 are for fanatics.

How many bars have kitchens? How many bars would pass health inspections with something made at home in a mason jar? Doesn't matter. I can virtually guarantee you that no bar is purchasing bottled pre-made simple syrup. All it takes is to mix equal volumes of granulated sugar and water in a bottle and shake until the sugar is dissolved. There are some disadvantages to using 1:1 simple syrup, primarily not-so-great shelf stability and too much water relative to the sweetening power. But the advantages for a bar tend to make up for these defects: the less concentrated sweetening power means that overpours are not as much of a concern, and (most importantly) it does not require heat to dissolve the sugar. In addition, shelf stability is not a real concern as it is not a big deal to toss out leftovers and make more. Besides, bars that don't use enough simple syrup to use it all up before it would have a chance to turn aren't likely to have it around. Anyway, this is the reason most modern-era professional recipes call for 1:1 simple syrup.

That's a question that's hard to answer. I would absolutely agree with you that most people in the media, on discussion forums like this and "on the street" who opine about workplace smoking bans are more concerned with their experience as individuals and consumers. But they're not the lawmakers. I'm no expert on Constitutional law, but I'm not sure that a law based on reducing the exposure of individual restaurant customers to secondhand smoke would be one that held water. But, then again, maybe it would. Regardless, whether or not lawmakers were concerned more for the workers or the customers (or themselves), this doesn't diminish the effect or the ostensible purpose of the legislation. Lots of studies have shown that nonsmoking bar and restaurant workers have significantly reduced presence of various smoking-related substances in their blood following a ban, and the air quality is greatly improved. Have a look at this article in the Journal of Occupational & Environmental Medicine, for example, or this article in BMC Public Health. There are many such studies now in publication. So, regardless of whatever "hidden motives" the lawmakers may have in enacting these legislations, the ostensible purpose is to protect workers from exposure to secondhand smoke in the workplace, the the effect is to do just that. As I've pointed out in other threads on bar and restaurant smoking bans, there are all kinds of laws regulating legal behaviors. One of the primary factors for consideration seems to be answering the question: does this behavior impact negatively on others in this context to an unreasonable degree? In the case of operating a motor vehicle under the influence of alcohol, lawmakers have answered in the affermative. And it's not like invididual business owners can decide whether or not to allow drunken driving on their property. If you own a huge factory lot, it's still against the law to drive around in the fork truck three sheets to the wind. Well, the evidence pointing to the negative health affects of exposure to secondhand smoke is at this point overwhelming, especially now that several bans have gone into effect and medical scientists have been able to conduct before-and-after air quality tests, blood tests and surveys of medical complaints. So, it seems reasonable to act to protect workers. This line of discussion begins to move away from what would be topical for eGullet, but I have a hard time believing that any corporation could get away with this and I'd have to see some evidence that it's being done before I'd believe it. Regardless, I'm not sure it makes a convincing argument against this kind of smoking legislation either way. If some companies decided that they would try to prohibit their employees from drinking alcohol, not only in the workplace but completey, and were testing employees and potentially terminating them based on the results of these tests, that would be wrong. But it still wouldn't be a convincing argument against drunk driving laws. Time and time again, the argument "they can choose to work somewhere else if they don't want to be exposed to this danger" has failed the test. Factory owners can't say, "get a job somewhere else if you don't like working with machinery that has open moving parts -- there are plenty of factory jobs." Construction companies can't say, "get a job somewhere else if you don't like working without a hard hat -- there are plenty of construction jobs." Office managers can't say, "get a job somewhere else if you don't like the occasional pat on the behind from your boss -- there are plenty of secretarial jobs." And, under a ban, bars and restaurants can't say, "get a job somewhere else if you don't like working in a room filled with tobacco smoke -- there are plenty of bar and restaurant jobs." The fact is, of course, that few factory workers, construction workers and secretaries in America today would continue to work in the environments I described. But it's also a fact that the work conditions I described all used to be commonplace... commonplace until legislations were passed to improve the workplace in those areas. Today, there are plenty of NYC office workers who would never think of taking a job at a firm where smoking was allowed on the office floor. Ten years from now, it's entirely possible that it would be unthinkable for a bar or restaurant worker to take a job at a bar where smoking was allowed. As people are frequently wont to say, your freedoms extend only insofar as they do not injure your fellow Americans. No one can reasonably suggest that secondhand smoke doesn't affect the health of nonsmokers. I do think it's too bad that there aren't more choices for smokers, although most bans do offer loopholes for businesses that make 15% or more of their revenues from the sale of tobacco and related products. So it's entirely possible for a restaurant or bar to take the trouble to make itself friendly to smokers (unfortunately, studies have demonstrated that current ventilation and filtration technology is simply not effective). The difference is just that the status quo has changed. Now the status quo is to not allow smoking. But, if a bar or restaurant really wants to allow it, there are steps they can take to make that happen. The difference is that the easy way out is now to disallow smoking, and as we know most bar and restaurant owners are going to take the easy way out and dn nothing. It would seem that the majority of polls do not agree with you. And yet, the unregulated free market does agree with me, as I said. So go pound sand. We don't have an "unregulated free market" in the United States, nor to any modern nations in the world. Looking around at other countries, by and large one can observe that the less regulated employers are as to workplace conditions, the more abused workers are and the worse workplace conditions are. And, again, "wanting" and "tolerating" are not the same thing. Your so-called "unregulated free market" only agrees that a smoking-permitted environment was tolerated, not desired, and demonstrates that business owners generally take the easy way out and do nothing if that is an option. As I point out above, there are steps bars and restaurants can take if they really, really want to have smoking. But most of them can't be bothered. Just like they couldn't be bothered to do anything about it before when the shoe was on the other foot. So what's your point?

It would seem that the majority of polls do not agree with you. For example: Almost three-quarters of people (73%) who responded to a BBC survey want a ban on smoking in all public places as a way to cut tobacco-related illness. Health groups released polling data today showing strong support among Virginia voters for a aw that would prohibit cigarette smoking in most public, indoor places. A 57 percent majority of Arizona's registered voters agree with the customer on this debate: There should be no smoking allowed in public spaces such as bars and restaurants, according to the latest Arizona Republic Poll. Nearly two-thirds of likely voters in Charles County favor a comprehensive statewide workplace smoking ban, according to a new poll that could bolster efforts by Commissioner Robert J. Fuller (D-St. Charles) to pass a similar local measure. A smoking ban in Memphis restaurants has broad support locally, a Memphis Business Journal online survey found. ...a vast majority of New Yorkers have said in recent polls that they are happy with the new law. One survey shows that many regular restaurantgoers see a smoke-free environment as an attraction I could go on, but I would suggest that tolerating smoking in public spaces is not the same thing as preferring smoking in public spaces. Times change, and what people are willing to tolerate has changed. It used to be that movie theaters were filled with cigarette smoke. Nowadays most people, many smokers among them, would find that intolerable. I'd love to hear what you think about seat belt legislations. Let me guess: rabidly against them?

One hopes that there will be some effort made to scan all these microfilms with OCR at some point. Maybe someone will invent a fast and economic method of doing so.

I think you miss the point of these legislations. I agree that bans on things like trans fats are going too far. And I would also agree that an outright ban on smoking would be going too far. But that's not what this is. This legislation isn't preventing you from smoking. It's only telling you that you can't do it in a public building or workplace, where your smoking has a negative impact on the health of other people. So, this is legislation that offers protection to people against the negative effect that your smoking has on them. This would be like enacting legislation that offers protection to people against the negative effect that your drinking has on them. Hey, wait a minute! We do have legislation that offers people protection against the effect of your drinking on them! It's called drunk-driving laws! See, the law doesn't care about your drinking in restaurants and bars, because when you drink in restaurants and bars your drinking doesn't have a negative impact on the health of the workers in the restaurant or bar -- only, potentially, on you. The law does care about your drinking, on the other hand, as soon as it does have a negative impact on the health of other people: to make one example, the minute you get behind the wheel of a car. Similarly, the law doesn't care about your smoking when it doesn't have a negative impact on workers in their workplace, like in the privacy of your own car or your own home. It does care about your smoking as soon as it does have a negative impact on the health of workers in their workplace, like when you are in a restaurant or bar. I'm sorry you're losing the ability to have a cigar with your dinner. Really, I am. But I bet most restaurant and bar workers aren't -- or, if they are, they won't be sorry about it once the bans becomd more widespread and the business self-corrects. Similarly, there were an awful lot of people who got all up in arms about losing the "right" to sip an open beer while driving their cars (something that was legal in Texas until September, 2001), and maybe for some people this would have coninued to be okay. But I think most of us would agree that on balance it's a good thing that it's not allowed anymore. I'm curious: Do you not care about the health of restaurant and bar workers, or do you care mostly about your ability to smoke a cigar? This is to say, if there were a way that you could enjoy your cigar in such a way so that the restaurant workers were not exposed to your secondhand smoke, would you prefer to do it that way? I'm thinking of something like a clear plastic, externally vented "tent" that could be lowered over you and your table for a reasonable markup. Would you want to do this? How about dining in a sealed, externally ventilated smoking room, and served by waitstaff with respirators -- again, for a reasonable markup? Do you think something like this would be reasonable and fair? Would you be willing to pay more?

No, that's not correct. The ban does not say that workers cannot smoke inside while they are on the job. The ban says that no one can smoke in the workplace. The reason no one can smoke in the workplace is that smoking in the workplace creates secondhand smoke in the workplace. The effect of the legislation is to say: "Secondhand smoke is a danger in the workplace, therefore there will be no secondhand smoke in the workplace. Since secondhand smoke is created by smoking, there will be no smoking in the workplace." The purpose of the legislation is to protect workers from inhaling secondhand smoke at their place of work. If people want to expose themselves to secondhand smoke outside the workplace on their own time, that's their own business. No one has anything to say about that. The government has determined that secondhand smoke is a sufficiently dangerous workplace hazard that it should not be allowed in the workplace. Similarly, the government has determined that fires in restaurant kitchens are a sufficiently dangerous workplace hazard that restaurant kitchens must have fire extinguishers. If people would like to expose themselves to firsthand or secondhand smoke outside of the workplace, or if they would like to cook without protection of a fire extinguisher outside of the workplace, that is their own decision to make. Your "secondhand smoke in the car" example does not follow, becase the car is not the employee's workplace. In the cases where it is the employee's workplace, I think that certain exemptions might apply (e.g., if the employee is the only person to use the car, smoking might be allowed). Your "making the employees clock out on a smoke break" also does not follow. Employees are provided (again, by the exact kinds of workplace regulations you don't like) with a certain amount of paid break time per shift.

Hmm. I'm not sure about this. Of course, I live in New York City and have access to amazing quality ricotta -- way better than I've had homemade -- at places like Fairway. I'd also argue against homemade being much cheaper than bought. A half-gallon of milk is going to run around 2 bucks, and at best will result in something like 2 cups of curd cheese (homemade "ricotta" isn't actually real ricotta cheese). So, we're talking about something like another buck fifty for an equivalent amount of much better ricotta. And it's a pretty big pain in the butt to make for what you get. I might feel differently if all I could get were Polly-O.

Daniel, I don't object to smoking in principle (in fact, I feel very strongly that cannabis should be legalized). Also, it's a fact that 99% of the places I'd want to go don't, didn't and wouldn't allow smoking anyway. So it really doesn't matter to me one way or the other, because it doesn't affect me. You just seem to have an attitude about this that says, "they're the owners and therefore they should be able to do whatever they want in their business." All I'm saying is that this is not only unrealistic but incongruous with the known history of workplace and public health legislation. The facts are that the government can and has made legislations and rules of this kind to protect workers in the workplace. I think you will find that there has not been a single successful lawsuit protesting a workplace and public space smoking ban. So, no... you haven't made the case. Not at all. Let's go back to my earlier example of an analogous situation: The law requires that restaurant kitchens be equipped with a portable fire extinguisher suitable for a Class K fire, with a maximum travel distance of thirty feet. That fire extinguisher must be serviced by a certified fire extinguisher servicing company. This extinguisher is there for the protection of the employees. Let's say we have an outdoor restaurant like Shake Shack where the structure contains only the kitchen, and let's further say that the only people working in this kitchen are owners of the restaurant. Now, keep in mind that it is legal for individuals to be in their own kitchen without a fire extinguisher. Plenty of people do this in their own homes every day. What you are suggesting is that the owners of that restaurant, because they are the only kitchen employees, should be able to decide that they don't want this government-mandated workplace protection. It's their restaurant, right? And if they're only endangering themselves and no one else by not having a fire extinguisher, they should be able to make that choice, right? This is analogous to the argument you're making. Do you think you can make this case? If sole proprietors should be able to decide to forego the workplace protection of a smoking ban, then it follows logically that sole proprietors should be able to forego the workplace protection of having a fire extinguisher or certain kinds of ventilation, the requirement that employees not operate machinery under the influence of narcotics and alcohol -- well, pretty much any workplace safety protections they want. You're saying: "they're sole proprietors, and as long as no non-owner employees are affected, they should be able to do whatever they want." Well, guess what: they can't. They're subject to the same laws, regulations and rules as business owners who have employees. If you're not happy about that... hey, I feel you. Take it up with the Supreme Court, not me. I'm not telling you how it should be, I'm explaining how it is. Going back to my example of an analogous situation, the restaurant would still be required by law to have a fire extinguisher.

Daniel, I get that you feel that way. But the fact remains that you simply haven't made a case that this legislation is meaningfully different from any other piece of workplace safety and public safety legislation.

...not to mention that there is no way homemade dry pasta (which is to say, extruded semolina-and-water pasta) can compete with artisinal dry pasta on either a price or quality basis. Plenty of condiments like ketchup are probably better than one can reasonably make at home.

The New Jersey legislation does not appear to have exemptions for businesses in which owners are the sole employees and all are smokers. This seems like it would be a somewhat reasonable exemption, although I can think of plenty of cases that could cause problems. For example, let's say that three smokers are partners in a bar and decide to have a smoking workplace. They are the sole employees and they take turns tending bar. One of the partners quits smoking for health reasons. So, now what happens? He has to give up his partnership in the bar, and his livelihood because he isn't a smoker anymore? Or would it be the case that any partner at any time would have the right under the law to decide to make the business non-smoking at any time? At some point, one gets into a situation where there are a million individual cases and a million would-be exceptions. It is not unusual for laws of this kind to apply to all workplaces, regardless of whether they are operated only by the owners. But, let's be honest here, the number of establishments where the sole employees are both owners and smokers are minimal. And where they do exist, there is very little the law can do to affect their business. If those three bar owners were instead partners in an accounting business who wanted to have a smoking office, the police wouldn't be breaking their door down to arrest them. For what it's worth, the New Jersey legislation does give exemptions to "any cigar bar or cigar lounge that ... generated 15% or more of its total annual gross income from the on-site sale of tobacco products and the rental of on-site humidors" and "any tobacco retail establishment, or any area the tobacco retail establishment provides for the purposes of smoking," as well as the casinos (this last one being purely political, of course). Let's use an example that is easier to understand: If workplace law says that a restaurant has to have a certain kind of fire extinguisher on the premises, I believe that even a small restaurant where the owner is the sole operator would be subject to that law. The law does contain this exemption" You also mention like strip clubs, sex shows, whore houses, peep booths.. All these take place in public businesses provided proper zoning and permits.. Why can't people provide permits for smoking establishments.. It is incredibly unfair to not offer the other side an alternative. You could provide a small percentage of the restaurants and bars in a given area a smoking permit.. Thus allowing these starving waitresses a larger pool of non smoking restaurants to work at. These are not analogous situations. Public nudity and sexual acts are a fundamental part of the business for strip clubs, sex shows, whore houses, peep booths. This is what they sell: public nudity and sexual acts. Smoking is not a fundamental part of the business for restaurants and bars. What they sell is food and drink. For the small percentage of businesses where tobacco smoke is a fundamental part of the business (i.e., cigar bars and tobacconists) there is a provision in the New Jersey Smoke-Free Air Act that allows smoking in these establishments. A cigar bar would bt the smoking analogue to someplace like Roberto's (the steakhouse at the Penthouse Club in NYC).

In the interest of capitalism I'll add that the machine shown from this vendor is available from many vendors. It's a generic unit and rebranded by many companies. The vendor linked is a reseller in a large group of reselleers using the same videos etc. Many versions are branded 'Weston'. Other examples: http://www.cabelas.com/hprod-1/0030017.shtml http://www.cooking.com/products/shprodde.asp?SKU=445342 rmillman and pounce: What's the advantage of these units over something like a Foodsaver Professional? Do they pull a harder vacuum?

That's only half of the question you should be asking. The second part you should be asking is: How many people are going to Les Halles who previously would not have gone due to the smoke, and how much money are they spending there? If NYC is any indication (and, of course, there are always going to be individual counterexamples) the answer seems to be that, on balance, the economics are equal or, if anything, perhaps a little better after the ban. But, even if we accept the premise that the economics are worse for business owners (which would still not mean that the overall economics are worse, because one would have to figure in things like the societal savings associated with a healthier bar and restaurant workforce) there is still a further question we should ask: What economic price is worth paying in order to protect these workers? When the government mandated guards on all moving parts of factory machinery, that cost the factory owners money they weren't spending before. Overall, it was not to their economic advantage, and they wouldn't have done it if the government hadn't made them do it. But I hope we all agree that taking this step to protect workers in the workplace was worth a certain economic hit to the factory owners.

I really don't get why so many people have a hard tims understanding this. Bar and restaurant smoking bans (just like airplane and office building smoking bans) are not there to protect customers. They are there to protect the workers. If you believe that the government shouldn't be able to regulate smoking in the workplace, then you also believe that OSHA shouldn't exist and that the government shouldn't be able to regulate anything having to do with workplace safety. What the heck, those miners can always get a job working at another mine if they don't like working without respirators, right? The Occupational Safety and Health Act has been around for over 35 years, and it is firmly established that not only can the government enact workplace regulations to protect workers, but indeed this is a responsibility of a good government. History has clearly shown us that business owners aren't going to inconvenience themselves or spend money to protect their workers unless the government makes them do it. As for smoking being a legal activity, this is a fallacious argument. There are plenty of activities that are legal in certain contexts and not legal in others, sexual acts being the most obvious example. I should point out that there is no law preventing citizens from the legal act of dosing themselves with nicotine in the workplace. Nicotine patches, nicotine gum, chewing tobacco and snuff are all legal. What is banned is a way of ingesting nicotine that negatively impacts the health of workers in their place of work (and the evidence is too overwhelming at this point to suggest that secondhand smoke is not a health hazard). Or, more to the point, the real effect of these legislations is not to ban smoking in the workplace, but rather to ban secondhand smoke from the workplace. If smokers were willing to envelop themselves in plastic spacesuits while they were smoking, I imagine this might be allowed. But, on the other hand, I think most any smoker would rather just step outside for a few minutes. Some places have suffered, it's true. Of course, some places are going to suffer from any change in the marketplace. This would be especially true for businesses that don't have much more to offer beyond a place to smoke while someone sells you a bottle of overpriced beer and a watered shot, and a place like this that was in borderline financial shape would have been especially hard hit by the temporary dip in business during the "sorting out" period. Some of these places closed. It's too bad, but the bar and restaurant business is a ruthless one. Places close all the time for all kinds of reasons. In terms of the overall business, my friends in both the bar and restaurant world all tell me that the effect of the NYC and NYS bans has been good for business. I believe that there is economic data to back this up, perhaps in the thread on the New York ban. It can be temporarily difficult for businesses under a ban that are conveniently close to businesses that are not under a ban, as in Kim WB's example. I say "temporarily" because it seems clear to me that the country at large is moving in the direction of smoking bans for bars and restaurants, and soon these disparities won't exist. Similarly, bars and liquor stores near the border of a state with a lower drinking age lost business when legal age in their state was raised to 21. Some of these businesses, if they depended heavily on 19 and 20 year olds for business, suffered greatly. Some of them were unable to adjust, and they closed. But, eventually, the other state went up to 21 and the disparity ceased to exist.

Well, that's hard to say. Certainly it's true that it will become way more vanilla flavored. The reason bourbon seems like a good candiate for a vanilla-infusion, I think, is simply because it's already clear that vanilla flavors go well with the other flavors bourbon brings to the table. I don't remember where I read this, but I seem to recall an experiment where tasters evaluated artificial versus several forms of natural vanilla in baked goods, and either the artificial vanilla came out ahead or there was no meaningful difference. I can see how real vanilla would make a difference in a sauce or someting like creme brulee or panna cotta. It's less clear that it would make a big difference in the context of a chocolate chip cookie. When they're not obscurred or cooked off, the non-vanillan chemicals in natural vanilla make a huge difference in terms of complexity. Something like 130 flavor compounds have been isolated in natural vanilla.

Bourbon whiskey is aged in charred new oak barrels, where it picks up plenty of vanillin (aka 4-Hydroxy-3-methoxybenzaldehyde, the primary flavor of vanilla) from the wood. Among all the wood-aged spirits, bourbon seems to have the most vanilla flavor. Many other wood-aged spirits (scotch, cognac, etc.) are aged in used wood barrels -- often used bourbon barrels, which are in good supply since they can only be used once for making bourbon -- precisely to limit the infusion of vanilla flavors. Rye is also aged in new charred oak barrels, but for some reason does not seem to have as much vanilla flavor.

I've found bonded applejack to be a good substitute in most any drink that works with bourbon or rye. LOL! And did your courage flag, Sam? To quite Wilfred Owen: "Our eyes wept, but our courage didn’t writhe."

Here's what I'd do for white beans and shrimp: Cook the beans to just tender and cool in their liquid. Put a lot (like a cup) of good quality extra virgin olive oil into a frypan or saute pan. Bring up to temperature, throw in the beans and cook them in the oil. Toss in some finely sliced garlic. After everything is warm, add the shrimp, a big fistfull of chopped parsley, maybe a little chopped fresh rosemary and a good pinch of red pepper flakes. Toss on the heat for maybe a minute until the shrimp is barely cooked through. Turn out into a serving bowl, sprinkle with coarse sea salt to taste and drizzle with a little raw extra virgin olive oil. Basta.

A few things on David's observations... First, if you're expecting applejack to be calvados-like, you're missing the point. Calvados is suave and smooth with a brandy-like character. I'd call it "apple cognac." Applejack, on the other hand, is rough and sharp with a whiskey-like character. I'd call it "apple whiskey." It's supposed to be like that. If what you want is a smooth, suave brandy-like product, you're probably better off with calvados than applejack. Try a good, reasonably priced brand like Busnel, and I bet you'd like that. I'd guess that part of the reason you prefer the 7.5 year Laird's is because, at the lower proof and with more age, it has more of a brandy-like calvados character and less of a whiskey-like applejack character. Second, your Jack Rose recipe seems odd to me. Do I have this right? You're doing 24 parts applejack, 4 parts lemon juice and 3 parts grenadine? What does that come out to, something like 3 ounces of applejack, a half ounce of lemon juice and a teaspoon of grenadine? If you don't like drinks that are rough around the edges, I can understand why you wouldn't like bonded applejack in that formula. It's very far from the traditional formula, and I'm not sure I'd like it either. Again, if you don't appreciate a spirit that's a little rough around the edges, your formula is only going to make it worse. A spirit would have to be quite smooth to succeed with your ratios. More traditional and balanced would be something like 2.5 ounces of applejack, 1 ounce of lemon or lime juice and somewhere between 1/2 and 3/4 ounce of grenadine, depending on the sweetness of the grenadine. This is all to say that while your subjective experiences are your own, it's hard to accept your evaluations as to the quality of the respective spirits with such an unorthodox recipe. You might also try 2 ounces of applejack, a teaspoon to a half-ounce of 2:1 demerara syrup and a few dashes of Peychaud's bitters stirred with cracked ice and strained. This might give you a better basis for comparison. Third, I suppose this all comes down to individual preferences, but I don't have any trouble sipping Laird's bonded. No, it's not something I'd sip out of a snifter, nor do I think it compares to something like cognac or calvados on that basis. Comparing it to that kind of spirit is missing the point. It's plenty sippable out of a flask, and that's how I'm likely to be taking it. Actually, on reflection, I'd say it was every bit as sippable as, say, Wild Turkey 101, which is a quality product in anyone's book. Indeed, at a recent multi-course offal tasting dinner, johnder brought along a flask of Laird's bonded to sip just in case our courage flagged at the prospect of eating pan fried sheep testicles. Finally, maybe you just prefer smoother, more aged spirits.