slkinsey

If you're going to be baking -- which is to say, actually cooking with the booze rather than soaking it in after the fact -- you want something with a strong taste, but also something that doesn't cost very much. Any subtle flavors are going to be lost in the cooking process. So, for rum I'd suggest something like Myers. It's not very expensive and it has a very strong rum flavor. For bourbon, I'd suggest you go with whatever is least expensive. There are laws regulating what can be sold as bourbon, and any of the cheap ones will have enough flavor for baking purposes. Although something like the Knob Creek that Katie recommends has a great depth and intensity of flavor, I'm not sure this makes up for the fact that it will be more than twice as expensive compared to the cheap stuff, and I'm not sure that a cake with Knob Creek will taste all that different from a cake made with Heaven Hill. I wouldn't recommend baking with rye, because I don't think any of its special character would come through. That said, Old Overholt is a quality product and well priced. If you want to use scotch, maybe to soak a trifle or fruitcake after baking, just pick up a reasonably priced blended. I like Famous Grouse.

I would just like to point out that while Kathleen has been making drinks with my booze and cooking delicious food, I've had to content myself with a bowl of cereal after rehearsal.

Well... don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that I'd go to Regional if it were next door to Lupa. It's clearly not in that league. Nor am I saying that they do everything well. And, yea, part of my interest in Regional is because it's in my neighborhood, which doesn't have many good restaurants. I'm not sure where the closest Italian restaurant is that's any better. Probably Celeste 20+ blocks to the South. For my money, neither Regional or Celeste is a destination restaurant. But I'd say it's similar in look/feel and cuisine to many inexpensive trattorie I've been to in Italy, and I feel that some of their dishes are very good. Then again, my experiences may be different from yours. Most of the times I've been in Italy I was working in a city, and seeking out "special little trattorie" like a vacationer or student might do was sometimes secondary to finding a convenient and good place around the corner that knew what I liked. I like Regional's bigoli with duck ragu. Bigoli (fresh extruded pasta made with whole wheat flour) are naturally a little grainy. Like any restaurant at this level, not everything on the menu is equally good. I've found that some of their specials try too hard and don't appeal to me, and in general I think their pasta dishes are much stronger than their secondi. That said, I think someone could go there and have the piadina with prosciutto and stracchino as a starter, the casoncelli al burro e salvia or the garganelli al ragu' di vitello or the bucatini alla gricia or the spaghetti alla chitarra con ragu' d'agnello as a pasta, the involtini di vitello as a secondo (the only one I think is particularly successful), porri gratinata or carciofi fritti as a contorno, a bottle of Barbazzale Cottanero Rosso and the ricotta fritters for dessert and do very well.

Michael, this may be going further astray from the topic and I don't know whether it describes your parents, but I have found that most people who seemed disappointed with Regional went there really expecting Italian-American food, and what they got was fairly straightforward Italian trattoria food. I can easily see how someone with those expectations who ordered, for example, Regional's cavatelli con cime di rapa, and got a dish of consisting of nothing more than small shaped dry pasta, turnip greens, red pepper flakes and evoo (no sauce, no cheese, etc.) might be disappointed. But this is actually a dish that is very traditional in the Italian aesthetic. In my experience, the only pasta dish that is a little disappointing is their culingionis al pomodoro, which suffers from a too-sweet tomato sauce that conceals the flavor of the sheep cheese in the ravioli. That said, the secondi are mostly okay, but not at the same level as the pasta dishes. If someone went to Regional and had only a secondo, I can see how they might not be impressed. As mentioned above, they also don't seem to have their stuff quite together all the time when it comes to delivering the courses. It's not unheard of for them to try serving the primo and secondo together, or to bring the secondo out before the primo is finished. And if, for example, I am having a half-order of pasta as a primo and then a secondo while my dining partner is having an appetizer and then a full order of pasta, it is highly likely that the appetizer will come out alone, then the two pasta dishes, then the meat dish -- even though I specifically requested that my half-prder of pasta be delivered together with her appetizer and then her full pasta order be delivered together with my meat dish.

Right. I was thinking more like 6 chopped apples to 1 liter of spirits.

Grappa is typically fairly high in alcohol, so you shouldn't have any spoilage problems. Just make sure you take the stuff out of the grappa after achieving the flavor you want (and obviously you can't put in so much watery flavoring ingredients like apples that the alcoholic strength is diluted). Most infused grappa I've had has been a relatively straightforward herbal infusion, which is the traditional way: rue, licorice root, that sort of thing. If you're going to do something like an apple, vanilla and cinnamon infusion, I think you're wasting your money on grappa (which isn't cheap in the US). Better to do it in a bottle of vodka or overproof rum. Nardini is one of the less expensive brands, for example, and you're still talking 40 bucks a liter.

Hi raji! I was probably unclear before. I know they refire the oven a few times a day: before lunch service and before dinner service. It's important, I think, just to make sure that you go as close to that time as possible. My personal experience is that a lot of the people who don't particularly like Grimaldi's (and there are plenty) are those who tend to go at, say, three o'clock in the afternoon to beat the crowds. Well, this is the worst possible time to go there, since the oven was last stoked sometime around 11:00. This is what I've been saying about the inconsistency. 12:00 or 5:00 will get you a mind-blowing pizza. 3:00 or 8:00. . . a very good pizza, but not in the same league. I guess I just don't agree with their oven management technique, which seems to be doing two or three big burns a day but otherwise not fueling the oven. This could, of course, be economics. They may have decided that it doesn't make good financial sense to keep the oven at peak heat at three o'clock in the afternoon when they won't be doing all that much business. Still, I've never been to Patsy's East Harlem and had a pizza that seemed to come from an underheated oven. Great picture of the oven, by the way! It's image DSC_1466 for others who may wish to give it a look. How were they about letting you take pictures? Did you arrange with them beforehand to take pictures? I ask because we were told (fairly rudely, I might add, even by NYC standards) that they did not want us taking pictures of the oven.

Strangely, Vanilla Pepsi is pretty good. And it's hard to understand why Coke would have made such an artificial-tasting product. Artificial vanilla is usually simply vanillin, which is the main flavor component of vanilla. It's not as complex as the real thing, which has a zillion subtle flavor components, but it doesn't taste all that "artificial." On the other hand, I read somewhere that a big reason behind the flop of "New Coke" was the substitution of vanillin for vanilla extract.

If you're speaking of the presumed connection between aluminum and Alzheimer's disease , the jury has been in on that one for years. There is no danger from using aluminum cookware. Some quotes: I don't think retinning is terribly expensive, but it's not cheap either. Perhaps there is some kind of test for lead you could do? I think there are tests for lead glaze in pottery.

Berentzen seems to be the apple schnapps of preference among my shaker-wielding fans. Here's another one from Audrey: There's also the Apple Core from First as featured in Anthony Giglio's Cocktails in New York (thread here) which is: Apple Core 1.25 oz : apple vodka 0.75 oz : Berentzen Apfelkorn apple schnapps 0.25 oz : fresh lemon juice 1 tsp : apple cider Fill cocktail glass 1/3 with apple foam (1 sheet gelatin per cup of fresh apple juice, charged in a charger). Shake with cracked ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

The bonded applejack is 100 proof and 100% aged apple brandy.

I agree that a tin lining should be safe. The discussion about copper and safety for cooking evolved out of a discussion on "what if" the lining was failing. Hey, knock yourself out. It's your own body and you can take your own risks. I will simply point out, however, that it's possible to ingest too much copper (and lead, etc.) without immediately getting "sick" from it. Especially if you're only using it maybe a few times a month. I cook with my copper cookware on a daily basis, and personally I wouldn't use a copper pan for "regular cooking" if the tin lining had failed. I'd get it re-tinned. Plenty of people eat food that's been cooked in lead-glazed pottery every so often, or drink hard booze that's been stored in a lead crystal decanter for years and don't "get sick" every time they do it. . . but that doesn't mean it's not a bad idea.

Certain things, like high fat/neutral pH carnitas or melted sugar, etc. seem to be okay. . . which is to say that they seem like cooking tasks that do not encourage copper to dissolve into the food. That said, there are a lot of things that are "traditionally" cooked in ways that are poisonous (e.g., cooked in lead-glazed pottery, etc.). This is one of the reasons I always recommend that people buy stainless-lined heavy copper instead of tin-lined. You have to baby tin-lined copper substantially more than even nonstick. No high heat, only soft (wood or thermal plastic) utensils, no scrubbing of any kind, etc. If your pan needs to be retinned after only three uses, it's likely that you either didn't use it gently enough or the pan wasn't tinned particularly well to begin with. It's also the case that a lot of what seems like "bargain priced French copper" is actually not made to be cooked with at all, but is meant for table-side presentation and service (e.g., Mauviel's table service line). Of course, if you don't use it -- problem solved! It's hard to say whether or not that is true. There are several things to consider: You're probably not getting all that much copper into your body via absorption into the skin simply by handling copper with some frequency. So what we're talking about in your case is how much copper you have potentially inhaled in dust form from sanding copper (or perhaps in vapor form?). Unless you're leaving visible drifts of copper dust on your work surface (as, for example, a sculptor who works large pieces of copper might), and unless you're getting this exposure on a daily basis, it's unlikely that you're ingesting a great deal of copper. More than a "regular person," sure. . . but maybe not meaningfully more. From what I have read, it seems highly unlikely that you are being exposed to a copper particulate level in the air (~5,000 ng/m^3) that would make it likely that you would suffer from the various health risks associated with such exposure (metal fever, atrophic changes to nasal mucous membranes, various lung ailments, etc.). Then there is also the issue of the form of the copper. As I mentioned upthread, the soluble copper compounds (i.e., those that are likely to get into your food from cooking in a copper pan) have a greater impact on human health compared to the forms in the copper dust you might be getting from your work. So, I would guess that cooking in copper on a regular basis puts more copper and more of the worst forms of copper into the human body than working with copper jewelry. Of course, I don't fully appreciate the kind or magnitude of your work. If you're regularly working in an environment where copper dust and vapors are filling the air, you might consider protecting yourself. [NB. When I say "cooking in copper" here, we're talking about cooking in unlined copper, or in copper cooking vessels in which the lining has substantially failed. I cook in copper all the time, but in stainless lined copper where the food never contacts the copper.]

There is also Domaine Germain Robin.

In what context - and how much? I'm sure EVERYTHING is poisonous to some degree, but as a jeweler, I have been filing and sanding and inhaling copper for 20 years and have never heard this before... What they said above. Copper is one of those things that is essential is small amounts and poisonous in larger amounts. Copper poisoning is usually an acute condition, but is is possible that it can build up and have a cumulative effect over time. So, for example, cooking tomato sauce in an unlined copper pan might not make you sick. But eating that tomato sauce 5 times a week for six months would be a very bad idea. This is all the more true because soluble copper compounds are the ones that pose the greatest risk to human health. If you think you're ingesting a fair amount of copper (I don't know how often you work with copper or how much of it you might ingest on a regular basis), I'd recommend doing something to minimize your exposure (gloves and a mask, for example).

Interesting drink, Chef Shogun. I think it might do a little better in a Collins glass (tall and narrow) rather than a pint glass, though. That way the gradient will display better, and it's a more elegant drink.

Make sure the copper isn't showing through the tin lining. Copper is poisonous.

The great thing about these places is when you ask about the other items on the menu. For example, here is a conversation I have witnessed a few times: Fat Guy: "Say, what about this noodle dish here. . ." Guy behind the counter: "Fried dumpling! Five for dollar!" Fat Guy: "I see, I see. And how about this congee. . ." Guy behind the counter: "Fried dumpling! Five for dollar!" Fat Guy: "Right. Two orders of fried dumplings." Guy behind the counter: "Fried dumpling! Five for dollar!"

Um. . . I don't know.

Kathleen probably won't know the answer to this, so I'll chime in. The steam wand on my Silvia is outfitted with a custom-mod three hole steam tip from 1st-Line Equipment. This means that, instead of a single jet of steam pointed straight down, there are three jets of steam pointing out at an angle in three different directions (the configuration is triangular). This makes it much easier to achieve the crucial "turn over" of the milk that leads to proper microfoam.

I started a large amount of charcoal with gasoline years ago. Once I got all the burning cinders out of what was left of my hair and clothes, it was a pretty good fire.

I always laugh when I think about the various liquors and ingredients of which Pegu Club is going through unprecedented amounts. I am quite sure, for example, that they are going through as much Rittenhouse rye, Punt e Mes and Green Chartreuse as the rest of the island of Manhattan combined. And I've got to suspect that they're going through a significant percentage of NYC's Laird's applejack now, too.

Do T'afia and Noe have distinct bar areas that people go to, or is it more of a tiny little place where people wait for tables at the restaurant?

They usually jump up on my side of the bed. . .

Off the top of my head, I've seen Rittenhouse, Old Overholt, the Old Potrero bottlings, Wild Turkey, Van Winkle, a couple different kinds of Michter's, and Beam at Pegu. I don't think I've seen Pikesville, but I could be mistaken.