slkinsey

It's not at thermal equilibrium til the ice is mostly melted. Ice doesn't have a high thermal conductivity. Thermal equilibrium is also not an applicable concept when one is speaking of shaking or stirring a cocktail. You don't reach thermal equilibrium when you are shaking a cocktail, you shake fast and strain the drink. When you are making a cocktail where a lot of crushed ice is sitting in the glass with the liquid, like a swizzle or a julep, is when the concept of thermal equilibrium applies. Hmmm. I definitely prefer a chilled glass. It makes a notable difference in the temperature of the drink, especially over time. If you're finding a lot of ice shards in the bartender's drinks, that's likely due to bad ice or overzealous shaking or a combination of the two.

In tests that have been done by friends, stirring with cracked ice seemed to produce the coldest cocktail. IMO, as it relates to chilling cocktails, I believe that the most important variables are the temperature of the ice, the size and configuration of the ice, and the composition and temperature of the shaker. This last one may be a little confusing to some, but there is a reason that a lot of the better cocktail bars in NYC are using metal-on-metal Boston shakers instead of the more common metal-and-pint-glass ones. A glass mixing cup has a much higher thermal mass than a metal mixing cup of equivalent size. So, assuming that the shaker and mixing cup are at room temperature, the metal mixing cup will transfer less thermal energy into the drink than the glass mixing cup. If the mixing cup is frozen, however, the advantage is reversed and the drink should turn out colder from the metal-and-glass shaker. Pegu Club uses metal-on-metal for shaken drinks and frozen glass for stirred drinks to good effect. I remember when they went over to using frozen glass for the stirred drinks, shortly after the opening parties, and there was a very noticeable drop in the temperature of the stirred drinks.

Vadouvan, may we assume that your #4 above means after the water bath has rebounded back to the set temperature following the addition of the food? Because, unless you assume a very large amount of water and a very small amount of food, there is no way the water bath won't dip more than two degrees when a substantial food item is added. This is simple thermodynamics, and is borne out in my own experiences with an expensive laboratory circulating water bath heater.

I can answer many or most of these (one advantage of having chemists as parents) but I'll start with this one: When you mix a cold solid (in this case, ice) with a warm liquid (in this case, water and alcohol), heat flows from the warmer liquid into the colder solid until thermal equilibrium is reached. Thermal equilibrium in this example would be a relatively stable temperature for the solid and the liquid to coexist at which all the solid hasn't melted and all the liquid hasn't frozen. In the case of pure water ice mixed with pure liquid water, the temperature of thermal equilibrium would be the freezing/melting point of water -- zero degrees C. Mix together some distilled water ice and distilled water, wait a minute and measure the temperature. Zero degrees C. What happens when we introduce alcohol into the mix? Well, alcohol has a lower freezing point than water. As a result, when we mix water and alcohol with ice, the temperature of thermal equilibrium is lower than the freezing point of water. Mix together some distilled water ice and some 100 proof alcohol, wait a minute and measure the temperature. Lower than zero degrees C. When the liquid inside the glass is lower than the freezing point of water, condensation that forms on the outside of the glass is likely to freeze. This effect is magnified in drinks like a swizzle or a julep because the ice is crushed, resulting in increased surface area for transfer of thermal energy, and because the liquid addition is likely to be fairly high proof, lowering the temperature of thermal equilibrium. The effect is further magnified when a julep is served in a traditional silver cup, because silver has excellent thermal conductivity.

Vadouvan, here's the reason I think your requirements are too high: The part of this discussion that led to your proposal was talking about whether it might be possible to mass produce a sous vide bath so that this kind of cooking could be affordable in the typical home kitchen. A mass-produced, low-priced setup for the home cook simply would not require accuracy to one-tenth of a degree C. It's not reasonable to expect a restaurant-quality sous vide setup for a consumer bargain price (much the same way that a restaurant stove costs around 20 times more than a low end residential stove).

Yea, that's pretty much my feeling as well. I do think it could probably be done for around 200 bucks if you relax your requirements to accuracy within 1 degree C rather than tenths of a degree C.

How about that "stew" you make by sealing up beef and a bunch of vegetables in individual foil packages and tossing them into the fire?

I've had an all-stainless Matfer professional model for around 8 years that I'm very happy with (I've seen "Matfer Professional" sold online made of composite fiberglass -- not the same as mine). One advantage I think it has over the more popular Bron professional is that the blades are all completely removable. I can, for example, easily sharpen the blade on my mandoline.

Yes, it's definitely true that a reasonably precise circulating water bath could be mass produced and sold for right around the same price as, say, a fancy fuzzy-logic rice cooker. I'm not sure I agree that they could be made for 40 dollars. Ultimately you're still talking about something like 400 bucks for a home sous vide setup (figure a couple hundred bucks each for a mass-produced circulating water bath and vacuum sealer).

This, I suspect, is the biggest part of the bottomless portafilter's popularity in professional settings. That and the techie/trendy appeal.

In re to the crock pot question, there are really two basic techniques of cooking sous vide: One technique is the sous vide version of LTLT (Long Time, Low Temperature) cooking. The idea is that you want to take advantage of certain chemical reactions that happen over a long period of time (e.g., conversion of collagen to gelatin) and prevent other reactions from happening by controlling the temperature (e.g., "well done" meat). The meat is vacuum packed and then put in a water bath of other environment in which the temperature can be controlled very precisely. This is for things like beef short ribs at 55C for 36 hours. Only a few degrees can make a big difference. Beef short ribs at 60C for 36 hours will not be anything like the beef short ribs cooked at 55C. This would not be posible with a Crock Pot. It is simply not possible to maintain a sufficiently low temperature with no hot spots, etc. for that langth of time using a Crock Pot. And, of course, as Sandy points out, the temperature is not sufficiently adjustable. The other sous vide technique is to cook the food for a relatively short period of time to temperature and then serve it. This is typically used for things like fish and other kinds of tender meat that don't benefit from long cooking. This is something you could do in a Crock Pot, but I'm not sure why you'd want to. You can do the same thing using a large stock pot and a thermometer. Since the food is likely to cook for an hour or less if it is sized properly, paying attention to the temperature and adjusting the stove every 10 minutes or so is not a big deal. In both techniques you get the benefit of substantially lower moisture loss, enhanced effect of herbs and other aromatics, and "same doneness all the way through" that are really not possible through any other technique.

Okay, interesting. I can buy the argument that it's useful as a diagnostic tool for packing technique. That makes perfect sense, although I'm not sure why you'd want to use it as the regular everyday portafilter instead of as an occasional diagnostic tool. Not so sure I buy the "heat sink" argument, though. If the portafilter is properly preheated, it shouldn't be meaningfully different in temperature from the rest of the path traveled by the water. And, of course, unless the coffee grounds are also preheated, there is going to be a slight modification of the temperature simply due to the grounds absorbing heat from the water. Having a greater thermal mass in the portafilter should only provide more temperature stability, not less.

What is supposed to be so great about them? And don't they make it very difficult to get the coffee into an espresso cup?

Just for the sake of accuracy, the Velvet Harvest on the menu at Pegu Club was created by Chad Solomon -- a talented young bartender shaking at Pegu Club and elsewhere.

Here is the whole list: Hydrogenated fats Olestra Nitrates Alcohol Raw oysters Saturated animal fats Soda Low-acid home-canned foods High-fat snacks, chips Liquid meals All in all, it strikes me as a stupid idea and a stupid list. None of these things are all that bad for you (and some of them, like alcohol, can be good for you) in the right amounts.

Actually, Dave, I think the Aviation is an even better drink for the 2000s than a rye Manhattan. This is for a couple of reasons: First, I think it's a drink that is closer to the mainstream of what's going on in contemporary mixology. But I think it's an especially good choice because the Aviation is a drink that has achieved widespread recognition and popularity among contemporary cocktail enthusiasts largely via the internet, and the 2000s is the first decade in which the internet really became a powerful influence on the "real world." To a certain extent, it's hard to say things about the 2000s. I have long felt that the accepted zeitgeist of a decade doesn't actually correspond to the calendar decade, but rather from something like the third or fourth year of one decade to the third or fourth year of the next. Looking at it that way, we're only two or three years into the zeitgeist of the 2000s.

This keeps on coming up. Here is another thread talking about more or less the same thing. This is all based on a horribly biased scare-tactic "report" by the Environmental Working Group, and as I detailed in the above-referenced thread, Consumers Union has been slammed for publicizing this stuff in the past. Above and beyond the naturally-occurring pesticides produced by the vegetables themselves, there are also the "natural pesticides and fungicides" that organic farmers are allowed to use on their crops . . . like copper sulfate and other things far nastier than their "artificial" cousins.

Indeed, this is sadly true. . . I recently stopped into Henry's, a local restaurant-with-bar in my UWS neighborhood, for a quick drink after a concert. Since I didn't want to go around the tree about whether they used fresh citrus juices and all that (I had been thinking of a 10 Cane daiquiri) I opted for a Manhattan, which I figured wasn't too hard to screw up so long as the bartender listened to the way I wanted it made. First I asked if they had any rye, upon which the bartender rattled off a list of Canadian whiskies. Then I said I meant straight rye whiskey, whereupon he said that they didn't have any. Then, looking at the back bar, I see a bottle of Old Overholt. So, I got my rye Manhattan, but it's still ironic that the bartender didn't even seem to know what straight rye whiskey was, nor that he had a bottle of it.

It was later than you'd think, actually. . . 1985.

That's a good list, Dave. I would make one suggestion/amendment. The drink of the 1980s should be a frozen Margarita. As for the drink of the 2000s, it becomes very difficult. I see cocktail culture in the new century taking two divergent paths right now: One path is what I call the "new old school." This would be the school to which you & I and most of the people we like belong, grounded in the idea of continuing the great tradition that was interrupted by Prohibition and largely ignoring the "three different kinds of spiced rum blended with ice and 5 different kinds of fruit juice" mixing that happened in the 80s and 90s. These tend to be dry, strong drinks based on traditional spirits. But I think there is also the "new new school" path, where the idea seems to be to continue in the direction set in the 80s and 90s, but presumably with better quality. These tend to be sweeter, fruit-flavored drinks based on flavored vodkas and flavored/spiced light rums, etc. A good example of a "new old school" drink might be the Little Italy from Pegu Club (Rittenhouse bonded rye, Cynar, M&R Sweet) and a good example of a "new new school" drink might be the Wet Water Martini from Cherry (Beefeater Wet, Chambord, Power-C Vitamin Water).

AFAIK, gizzards aren't all that bad for you. A gizzard isn't really an organ or gland like a liver, heart or kidney. A gizzard is simply a specialized, very muscular "pre-stomach" that is found in birds and other animals that lack teeth. The idea is that the chicken swallows bits of gravel which stay in the gizzard (aka "craw") and act in place of teeth to grind food into small pieces before they are passed to the main stomach. So, fundamentally, a gizzard is just a piece of tough muscle. I don't think they're particularly high in fat or anything like that.

Daniel, the problem with your line of reasoning is that it leads directly back to an industrial revolution-era unregulated workplace. Your examples are, of course, deliberately ridiculous ones. But how about some real examples that would follow from this philosophy: Should construction companies be forced to mandate hardhats and provide safety lines and harnesses? Should mining companies be forced to provide ventilation and other air safety measures? Should manufacturing companies be forced to meet safety standards so their machines don't tear their workers' arms off? Your line of reasoning suggests that they shouldn't -- that the "employees should conform to the business" and simply accept these risks. I believe -- and the government of this and every other modern country agrees -- that the clear answer to all these questions is, "yes, they should." And the sad fact is that none of these things would have happened in these industries if the government hadn't stepped in with regulations. For sure, mine owners and factory owners and industrialists weren't suddenly going to decide to spend money on safety measures unless someone made them do it. As for "taking the punching out of boxing to protect the worker," that is an even more flawed example. In boxing, punching is an inherent part of the job. No punching equals no boxing. So you can't take the punching out of boxing. Similarly, being around gigantic raging fires that have a risk of exploding is an inherent part of the job if you work putting out oil field fires. You can't take that out of the job, because then there wouldn't be a job. Being around secondhand smoke, on the other hand, is simply not an inherent part of the job of working in an office building, serving someone a plate of food, working as a flight attendant, pouring someone a glass of beer, etc. Take away the secondhand smoke, and the job is not affected one bit. I should point out, however, that in boxing they do take safety measures to protect the workers. Boxing is a highly regulated job. Boxers wear gloves, their hands are taped, both tape and hands are inspected, there are strict rules that must be followed, there is ringside medical personnel, and there is a referee in the ring to make sure the rules are followed and to protect the safety of the workers. For what I think is a definitive study on the health risks associated with secondhand smoke in the bar and restaurant workplace, google for "Respirable Particles and Carcinogens in the Air of Delaware Hospitality Venues Before and After a Smoking Ban," which was published in the Journal of Occupational & Environmental Medicine (46(9):887-905, September 2004. Repace, James MSc). The fulltext is out there somewhere.

I've made these points elsewhere, but Tommy makes the crucial point very well. These bans are not about protecting customers from secondhand smoke. Customers can choose to go elsewhere. They are about protecting workers in the workplace. This is also not an issue of the government unfairly interfering with owners' rights. It has long been established in this country that the government can enact measures to protect workers from unnecessary hazards in the workplace. I don't see how a workplace smoking ban interferes with owners' rights any more than OSHA regulations or sexual harassment laws.

Yea, that one from SLT looks a lot like mine. I'll have to take a look, but I'd swear that mine have five wires on the narrow side for every one wire on the wide side. I'll try to remember to get mine down and look.

Ah! You used the wide side of the chitarra. You know, I've never used that side. Never actually made pasta from that side. It may be that my wide side is a lot wider than yours as well. I got mine from friends in Abruzzo, and it's nothing like the ones I've seen for sale here (which tend to look like this one, whereas mine looks like the one on this page). Your point is very well made about the pasta cutters that come with machines, though. I've never been happy with them. Even brand-new they don't separate the pasta strands to the extent that I would prefer, and you do get that "pinching" effect you describe. I prefer to simply roll the finished sheets of pasta into a cigar and cut them into whatever width I would like using a sharp knife. The chitarra is cool to use, though, isn't it? I've been needing to re-wire mine so I can use them again (I have two). After a while, the wires seem to get stretched out too much. When I rewire, I also plan to quadruple wire each strand on the wide side so the strength of the wires on the two sides is more evenly balanced when the chitarra is tightened. With only single wiring for each strand on the wide side, the narrow side has about 5 times the number of wires compared to the wide side.