slkinsey
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Posts posted by slkinsey
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. . . the presentation might be acceptable for a red gravy Italian . . .
I had the impression that that's what this place is. Is it not? Granted, I haven't been there myself, but the impression I get from pictures and comments is that it's "updated red sauce Italian-American."
FWIW, while I suppose it is possible to get an oustanding experience in a fundamentally flawed restaurant by only sticking to one area of the menu, that still makes it a flawed restaurant. Staying entirely or mostly away from non-pasta dishes is not quite the same thing as not ordering the pad thai at Sripraphai or making sure you stick with Sichuan dishes at Grand Sichuan, where certain dishes that are not the restaurants' forte have been retained on the menu to satisfy certain expectations and exconomic realities. I should add, while I am at it, that I absolutely do not subscribe to the premise that the non-pasta dishes at Babbo are in any way inferior to the pasta dishes. They may be less familiar to those who are not experienced in the Italian way with protein and have more Italian-American influenced expectations about dinner at Babbo, but I think many of the secondi at Babbo are excellent and the fennel-dusted sweetbread in particular is one of the best preparations of its kind in the City. Regardless, even if someone prefers Batali's pasta dishes over his protein dishes, I don't think one would observe what, based on gaf's pictures and descriptions describe, seems to be a fairly dramatic drop-off between primi and secondi.
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If you're going to save the olive oil (something I am not at all sure is a good idea), you should keep it well sealed in the freezer.
Poaching in olive oil is expensive, which is one reason it's great to use sous vide techniques for olive oil poaching. A very small and economical amount of olive oil can completely surround the fish when it's in a sous vide bag.
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The volume seems important, because I think many people want to support their servers but don't feel it's appropriate for servers to receive a windfall "just because." After all, most customers aren't wealthy either. I'm happy to kick in a dollar, or two, or three per drink if it results in a fair wage to the bartender. But if the bartender serves 300 cocktails in a shift and expects $3 on each, I'm not playing that game.
I mean, theoretically, if a bartender is putting out 300 drinks on Friday and Saturday nights and works three other nights at 100 drinks each that's a total of 900 drinks for the week. At $1 per drink that's $900 per week ($45,000 per year in tips, plus whatever minimum wage amount the restaurant is paying), at $2 per drink that's $1,800 per week ($90,000 per year in tips) and at $3 per drink that's $2,700 per week ($135,000 per year in tips).
I think most bartenders, at the higher end places anyway, share tips with the barbacks, etc.
Also, practically no bartender that is in a position to be serving that many drinks per shift works 5 days a week. I know of one person who works that many days at that level, and everyone thinks he's some combination of insane and Superman to sustain that level. A typical Saturday night bar shift at one of these places is going to be around 8 hours on your feet with no break, shaking constantly. That takes a tremendous toll on the body.
It's not clear to me that a bartender on a busy Saturday night necessarily expects a three dollar tip on a vodka tonic. But perhaps not unreasonable for a specialty cocktail prepared by an expert. That said, three dollars strikes me as a bit steep if one is going to tip on a per-drink basis, unless it's a $16 dollar cocktail. This is one reason I think it makes more sense to tip a percentage of the tab.
This also goes back to my earlier remarks as to what you're getting and what kind of place you're in. If I pay eight bucks for a beer where all the bartender has had to do is pop the top off the bottle, a dollar strikes me as pretty reasonable. If I'm paying twelve dollars for an expertly mixed cocktail, two dollars (or 20%) also strikes me as pretty reasonable. As for volume, it doesn't make too much difference to me as long as I am getting good service and a quality libation. Do we tip a smaller percentage in restaurants that turn more tables?
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How many cocktails does a high-end bartender put out in a shift? A hundred, three hundred, five hundred? Knowing that might shed some light on the reasonableness of a $1, $2 or $3 tip per drink.
That's a difficult one to estimate. On a busy Saturday night at someplace like Pegu or Flatiron it could be as many as 300, maybe more. On a slow Tuesday night it would likely be significantly fewer than 100. These are only guesses, though, based on my observations and doing some quick math. Others in these forums are in a position to ofter more definitive data. The point is, I think, that a good bartender at the right place can make several hundred dollars in tips on a busy weekend night, but he/she will also have to come in on slow nights when there isn't that much money to be made. Not too many bars are going to allow a bartender to only work shifts on the busy money-making nights.
I agree with the sort of scale I've seen here with 20% as a good average for cocktaiel bars and other places where drink prices are higher. But what if one orders... let's say... a rare single malt whiskey at $30 per glass or has the bartender bring a $100 bottle of champagne to the bar? No sommelier service... no extra effort any different than pouring any other drink (actually far less time and effort required of the bartender than making a frou-frou or blend drink).As with tipping on wine in a restaurant, I think there has to be some reasonable adjustment made if you're getting something that involved minimal service. Pouring a snifter of scotch or bringing out an iced bottle of champagne isn't quite the same thing as shaking up a perfectly balanced specialty cocktail. That said, as with a restaurant, one should figure into the tip the level of service that led to that scotch or champagne being served. There are plenty of places where you can order a $30 glass of scotch where the bartender is doing little more than pouring the malt you ask for. At other places, like the Brandy Library, the "spirits sommelier" is going through the list with you and helping you choose just the right cognac from their repertoire of several hundred. This means that I'm likely to leave a higher percentage tip at Brandy Library than I am at Macduff's Tavern.
Do you still tip a flat 20% "just because"?I actually rarely tip exactly 20%, although that's my general rule of thumb. I'm likely to tip 20% if it's a straight situation of "I ordered ABC and XYZ and was billed the standard amount for ABC and XYZ." Since I tend to frequent bars where I'm known and where I have friends or personal recommendations, I'll find myself in situations where my bill doesn't reflect what I've poured into my liver. Any time I've benefitted from someone's generosity I try to be as generous in return as my circumstances allow, and often wish my finances allowed me to leave more. If no one's taking my money, I like to leave at least $20. I often worry that I should leave more.
Personally, I think a good bartender deserves at least as much as a waiter in a restaurant, considering that he/she is sommelier, waiter, cook and busboy all in one.
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From a related NY Magazine Aubust, 2000 article entitled: Tipping Points : If it's true that money talks, what are your tips saying about you? we have this interesting tidbit:
Bartenders are a different story. The point of tipping bartenders isn't so much to reward the service you've already received as to insure promptness (supposedly the seventeenth-century English origin of the word: t.i.p.) the next time you order a round. Expectations vary: A buck a drink is generous at the Blarney Stone, an insult at the Bowery Bar. "At dive bars, they make great money, because they're banging out drinks," explains Rich, a bartender at Lotus. "But at a place like this, it's more about presentation, so it takes longer." Rich concedes that a dollar is okay if you're ordering a Bud, but for a $10 Cosmopolitan, the fair tip is $2 or $3. -
There's an interesting little bit in the current NY Magazine entitled Why $1 Isn’t Enough : Bartenders have been getting tipped a buck a drink since the sixties. They want more.
The dollar-a-drink rule, it seems, has shown dogged persistence. Zagat’s reports that for its 2002-03 New York City Nightlife guide the average price of a drink—cocktail, wine, or beer—was $6.92. For the 2005-06 edition it was $8.83. Since that’s a 27.6 percent spike, you might think those tipping $1 three years ago would leave $1.28 today. Not likely, bartenders and tipping experts say. Most people abhor tipping in coins, says Michael Lynn, a professor at Cornell University who studies tipping. “It’s an inconvenience to handle small money. We don’t pass that on.” This means, however, that instead of incremental raises in tips, there’s a 100 percent jump to $2 if you’re feeling generous at the bar. For many, that’s a hike that remains too stiff to swallow.There are also some interesting quotes from several street interviews. I especially like the one from the girl who says she tips "maybe a dollar" because "it's not like they have to work that hard." She might think of staying out of the bars for a while.
So... what are your tipping practices in bars? I have to admit that I am likely to tip a dollar a drink if I'm in a place where the person behind the bar is just pouring me a few drafts. In cocktail bars, though, I try to tip at least 20%.
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What's Hotaling's going for at retail?
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I don't see why it wouldn't work. The reason everclear has such a bite is not because of its proof, it's because it contains lots of impurities due to a not-so-strict filtering process. Diluted down to the same proof as vodka, it should in theory taste exactly the same if those impurities were not present.The problem with doing this at home is that it is very difficult to get decent quality high proof grain alcohol at retail -- most of it is swill.
What is the difference between low and high quality high proof grain alcohol? Is it really just a matter of filtering as with cheap vodka?
There's a little more to it than that. Vodka starts out, more or less, as cheap shitty high proof alcohol. That alcohol is then rectified (a process of diluting and selectively re-distilling the alcohol) and filtered, both with the goal of removing as many as possible of the substances in the wash that are not ethyl alcohol. These include things like ethyl acetate, ethyl lactate, fusel oils like 1-propanol, 2-propanol, butanol, amyl alcohol and furfural, methanol and other such things. In an unaged raw alcohol, these substances produce off-flavors, solvent-like aromas and a harsh, hot bite. In the end, the vodka producer ends up with a fairly pure solution of ethyl alcohol and water at around 95% abv. This is then diluted down to bottle proof with water (and tiny amounts of other things the vodka producers don't want you to know about). This is why vodka producers like to tell you how many times their vodka is distilled (rectified) and filtered: more rectification and filtering equals a smoother liquor with less bite and fewer off flavors/aromas. Now. . . read back up to the top of the paragraph. See where I write, "cheap shitty high proof alcohol?" That's the stuff they sell in stores as 190 proof grain alcohol. If you could get the filtered and rectified stuff before it's diluted down to bottle proof, like the commercial producers do, that would be even better. But since we can't get that, 100 proof vodka is a good compromise.
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Yea, that's my sense as well. If there are gradations that are sold at different costs, then I have a hard time understanding why they wouldn't have those gradations listed in their pricing guide.
I don't really know enough about farmed salmon to have an understanding of whether there could be significant differences between two salmons of the same size and weight from the same farm. But if this is possible, I have to assume that Acme has certain specifications for the salmon they are purchasing -- which would tend to result in uniformity.
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You use the zest because you want the concentrated flavor from the oils rather than the much more dilute juice which also contains sugar.
I'm saying why not zest AND juice?
Simple: Because then it wouldn't be limoncello. Limoncello is a liqueur containing lemon oil, alcohol, water and sugar. The addition of lemon juice would completely change the character of the liqueur. In addition, lemon juice doesn't have such good storage properties. Eventually the lemon juice will throw off a brown cloudy sediment that would have to be filtered out (this is what my family does every year with the Fish House Punch we make ahead of time and age a year for our Xmas party).
I'm saying that instead of the traditional 750mL of vodka to 15 lemon zests, you could probably get away with 75mL of everclear and get something akin to super-concentrated lemon extract. Sorta like vanilla extract.This is more or less the way "real" limoncello is made. Commercial producers use high proof grain alcohol to extract the lemon oils, add sugar and dilute down to bottle proof with water. The problem with doing this at home is that it is very difficult to get decent quality high proof grain alcohol at retail -- most of it is swill. Using a decent quality 100 proof vodka seems like a reasonable compromise: it should be considerably smoother than the high proof grain alcohol and it extracts at a slower rate due to the lower proof, which provides a larger margin of error for the nonprofessional in deciding when to stop the extraction.
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Aven when you're talking about, say, Atlantic salmon, one side of salmon is not equal to every other side of salmon. So I suppose it's possible that there are gradations of smoked salmon within a given style that businesses can buy from Acme. It's possible, for example, that Zabar's could be paying more for fattier salmon from Acme compared to Fairway.
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* It's a long drink, not a short drink. That means don't skimp on the soda water.
Hmmm. I'm not sure I agree with this. I've been drinking a lot of long fizz drinks over the last year, and while I started out thinking that a proper fizz needs a good several ounces of fizz water, my friends in the biz have demonstrated to me that many a fizz needs only around an ounce. I find this to be especially true of silver fizzes (i.e., those shaken with egg white).
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When life gives you egg yolks, make egg yolk pasta.
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For those who are interested, here is the article.
Mentioned are:
- The Office Bar, Hoonah (Alaska)
You’re having: A bottle of Rainier. - La Mariana Sailing Club, Honolulu
You’re having: Mai Tais at sundown. - Zig Zag Cafe, Seattle
You’re having: A Deshler cocktail. - Fu Kun Wu, Seattle
You’re having: On a date, anything with the aphrodisiac yohimbine in it. - The Owl Tree, San Francisco
You’re having: A rye Manhattan with bitters—early, before the orders pile up. - Vesuvio, San Francisco
You’re having: A pint of Anchor Steam. - Zeitgeist, San Francisco
You’re having: A Bloody Mary. - Musso & Frank Grill, Hollywood
You’re having: A Martini before dinner. - The Polo Lounge, Beverly Hills
You’re having: Scotch, on the rocks - La Gitana, Arivaca (Arizona)
You’re having: A beer and a shot, Sunday afternoon. - Double Down Saloon, Las Vegas
You’re not having: Ass Juice. - Beach Ball, Newport Beach (California)
You’re having: A White Russian for breakfast. - Petrossian Bar, Las Vegas
You’re having: A sidecar. - The 49er Lounge, Gallup (New Mexico)
You’re having: Whiskey, rocks. - Charlie B's, Missoula (Montana)
You’re having: A very stiff drink. - Cruise Room, Denver
You’re having: A gin Martini. - Donn's Depot, Austin
You’re having: A Shiner. - The Bars of Silver Street, Hurley (Wisconsin)
You’re having: A Leinie's or a Hamm's. - The Inwood Lounge, Dallas
You’re having: A Tanqueray and Tonic. - Nye's Polonaise Room, Minneapolis
You’re having: A Manhattan, rocks. - Half Time Rec, St. Paul
You’re having: A round of Guinness. - Holler House, Milwaukee
You’re having: Beer all night long. - Los Ojos, Jemez Springe (New Mexico)
You’re having: A tequila shot with a beer back. - The Red Lion Pub, Chicago
You’re having: A beer with the beans on toast. - Bungalow, Chicago
You’re having: A Manhattan. - The Matchbox, Chicago
You’re having: A Lemon Drop. - Hideout, Chicago
You’re having: A Whiskey Sour. - Chipp Inn, Chicago
You’re having: Honker's Ale. - The Bar at Tujague's, New Orleans
You’re having: A Sazerac at sundown. - Fritzel's European Jazz Pub, New Orleans
You’re having: Beer, when the band's all warmed up. - Pinkie Master's Lounge, Savannah
You’re having: A gin Martini in a plastic cup. - Churchill's Pub, Miami
You’re having: Two pints of lager and a packet of crisps, please. - Robert's Western World, Nashville
You’re having: A PBR and a burger. - The Tune Inn, Washington DC
You’re having: A ten-dollar pitcher of Miller with a burger. - The Grey Lodge, Philadelphia
You’re having: A pint of Flying Bison once things start to pick up a bit. - El Chapultepec, Denver
You’re having: A Bud and a shot of Jack at 8:45, right before the show starts. - Southwark, Philadelphia
You’re having: A rye Old-Fashioned. - Dee's Cafe, Pittsburgh
You’re having: Yuengling, late. - 21 Club, New york City
You’re having: a Southside. - Nicky Blaine's, Indianapolis
You’re having: The Dean Martini. - Shamrock Club, Baltimore
You’re having: A Guinness. - Freddy's Bar & Backroom, Brooklyn
You’re having: A pint and a whiskey back. - Grassroots Tavern, New York City
You’re having: A pitcher of Bass. - Bill's Gay 90s, New York City
You’re having: A Rob Roy. - The Hotel Bar (anywhere)
You’re having: Another. - Napoleon House, New Orleans
You’re having: A Sazerac as early in the day as you can make it over. - Julius', New York City
You’re having: Anything in a bottle. - Bohemian Hall & Beer Garden, Queens
You’re having: A pitcher of Staropramen with Saturday brunch. - No. 9 Park, Boston
You’re having: An old-fashioned Old-Fashioned. - Pegu Club, New York
You’re having: A Manhattan. - Doyle's Cafe, Jamaica Plain (Massachusetts)
You’re having: A pint of Guinness with a Jameson back.
- The Office Bar, Hoonah (Alaska)
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My friend and fellow eGullet member windelse has had a longstanding theory that there is a secret network of pipes under Manhattan pumping the same crappy "cold sesame noodles" to 90% of the Chinese restaurants in the City.
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I'm not so sure they "more than make it up" -- although there is clearly some making up at play.
But look at it this way: If you get a typical meal at Peter Luger (let's say 1/3 of a tomato and onion salad, a strip of bacon, 1/2 of a German potatoes, 1/2 of a creamed spinach and 1/2 of a steak for two) it will run you about 60 bucks. Let's compare that to a 60 dollar order at Babbo, which would get you something like "warm tripe alla Parmigiana," "fettuccine with house-made pancetta, artichokes, lemon and hot chiles," and "fennel dusted sweetbreads with sweet and sour onions, duck bacon and membrillo vinegar." I have not included cocktails and wine, but anyone who has been to both restaurants will tell you that the markup is likely to be higher at Babbo on booze. Peter Luger's food cost on the steak alone is likely to be more than Babbo's food cost for the entire meal.
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I've found that the best and cheapest way to get duck fat is from, well, ducks. Buy a few ducks, take off all the skin and fat and render that out. Use the meat for a duck ragu or something like that.
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It is easy to see why so many new steakhouses are opening. They hardly ever fail, and the check size is large
I am given to understand that the percent profit, on the steak at least, is the smallest in the business.
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That's pretty incredible. It's a lot more forceful than I thought it would be.
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I can't believe that there will be a substantial shortage of top-quality prime beef in New York City so long as restaurants and customers remain willing to pay. It's fairly well known that a substantial amount of top-quality prime beef goes to Japan, and there's really no reason that couldn't be sold in the US so long as the profitability is the same.
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An email just landed in my inbox from my friends at the Distilled Spirits Council of the Uniuted States with their take on the "Nation's Top Five Cocktail Trends," which they have as:
- Super-premium spirits (this category grew by 23% in revenue to $566 million in 2005)
- More vegetable, fruit, herb and flower garnishes as visual appeal becomes increasingly important
- Fresh is best, as the emphasis swings back not only to fresh citrus juices but extends to house made syrups, homemade bitters, and in-house infusions
- Muddling makes a comeback, as practically every bartender worth his salt knows his way around a this technique that was all but unknown a decade ago
- Flights of spirits and flights of cocktails are gaining popularity.
- Super-premium spirits (this category grew by 23% in revenue to $566 million in 2005)
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The Hugo Bracer sounds like an interesting one. I'll have to give it a try. WRT the formula, I note that cocktailDB has slightly different amounts:
1.0 oz : apple brandy
0.5 oz : Amer Picon
1.0 oz : lime juice
0.5 oz : grenadine
That still makes it 2/3 apple brandy to 1/3 Amer Picon, but results in a substantially larger proportion of lime juice. On the other hand, this formulation calls for a lot more grenadine than you used. Not sure of the provenance of cocktailDB's recipe, but it might be an interesting tweak.
Especially wrt the amount of grenadine and simple syrup in old cocktail books, it's hard to judge just how big the dashes were (a dash out of a grenadine bottle might be a lot bigger than a dash out of a bitters dasher) or just how saturated the syrups were.
How did you find the Torani Amer worked? Having tasted it side-by-side with Amer Picon, I am beginning to wonder whether I agree that it's a good substitute. Amer Picon seems deeper with a fuller flavor, and a little bit sweeter without Torani Amer's striking front of the mouth bitterness.
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I don't know a single thing about the Cornell Hotel School except (now) that Holly attended... which, in my book, makes it a top school on that basis alone -- no creeping vines required.
My thought was that in the food industry Cornell would mean more than "Ivy League," so why say it? I guess if you feel the need to put on your c.v. that your parents are nuclear f***ing physicists you might have some reason.
Where on his curriculum vitae does it say this? All I have seen is a mention of his parent's professions in the bio on his web site -- a bio being where one traditionally lists interesting things about one's life, upbringing, family history, etc. It is somewhat unusual for the child of a physicist and oncology research nurse to go into the culinary field, and perhaps some people might find that interesting. I am a classical singer, and people are sometimes interested to know that I am the child of research scientists.
I guess I have a hard time understanding why you are reacting so strongly to this. I didn't get the impression it was mentioned in his bio in order to inflate his reputation. Rather, I thought it was an interesting fact.
also, there are many undergrad programs that compare perfectly well to Ivy ones. Stanford and Swarthmore are not Ivy League-- so what? It seems like kind of an old-fashioned thing to emphasize.Well, regardless of what you personally think, the Ivy League schools carry some additional prestige. This is not to say that other schools don't also have their own special cachet or that other schools might not have even more cachet in certain fields (places like MIT come to mind). The fact, is, of course that a well-motivated student can get an excellent education at Western Bumblefuck State College -- maybe better than the education that some students get at Yale or Stanford. But, again... so what? It is what it is. Doesn't matter if it's "fair." More to the point, there really isn't too much point in debating the connotations of the words "Ivy League" in these forums.
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Wow, thank you both.
so, to make sure I get this;
2 oz gin(tanq, beef)
1 oz lemon
1 oz lime
1 oz HEAVY cream
1 whole medium egg white
tsp sugar (can I use confectioners? I'm not sure what the superfine refers to.)
drops (I think I'm using middle eastern. Bottle is at work, so I'm not sure. Picked it up at whole foods) I'll start with 2, used 3 last night.
Superfine sugar simply refers to the fineness of the grind. The sugar crystals are smaller. You can usually buy superfine sugar in most any grocery store. Comes in a box like this. You can make it yourself by whizzing it around in the food processor, but you should be able to find some already made. You don't want confectioner's sugar, which contains corn starch.
In re to the orange flower water, seek out the A. Monteux brand. That's what you want. Comes in a little plastic bottle (see my link above).
What is the glassware for this? A wine glass? and is there a garnish, or is the fluffy eggy pillow enough
Something tall and narrow. A Collins glass, more or less.
Pairing Cocktails or Spirits with Food
in Spirits & Cocktails
Posted
I've been known to stick with either a Martini or a glass of Wild Turkey at Peter Luger.