slkinsey
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Re day-old versus fresh rice: It's not necessarily a fresh versus not-fresh question, it's a warm versus cold guestion.
When rice is cooked, it releases starch. There are two kinds of starch in rice: amylose and amylopectin. Short grain rice has more amylopectin and long grain rice has more amlyose. Amylopectin is stickier than amylose, which is why short grain rice is said to be "sticky rice." But amlyose is also pretty sticky, and well-cooked long or medium grain rice will still stick together when the rice is fresh.
When cooked rice cools to refrigerator temperature, the starch undergoes a process called retrogradation. This means, among other things, that the starch cells collapse, the starch crystalizes and the starch molecules realign within each grain of rice. The result is that the rice gets hard and individual grains of rice no longer stick together.
Since one would like separate grains of rice rather than clumps of rice stuck together when making fried rice, it makes sense to use refrigerated cooked rice. This usually means day-old rice. The hardness imparted by retrogradation also works to the cook's advantage in making fried rice, because it means that the rice will not break apart while it is tossed in the wok. Luckily, when the rice is reheated, the hardening effect of retrogradation is reversed.
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New York Metro just ran a blurb on one of Audrey "Libation Goddess" Saunders' new cocktails at Bemelmans: Falling Leaves.
Pungent pear eau de vie from upstate New York lends the drink suppleness, while the high acidity of Riesling provides backbone. The result? Autumn's multihued spectrum in a glass.I'm pretty sure Clear Creek Distillery is in Oregon and not upstate NY, but I quibble...
The recipe includes pear eau de vie, reisling, honey syrup, orange curaçao, Peychaud's bitters and a star anise garnish.
I was able to try one of these a few weeks ago when I visited Bemelman's with JAZ, Fat Guy, Splificator, Eric_Malson and bergerka to be dazzled by Audrey's mixology. It's a very interesting drink. In many ways it's a cocktail unlike any other with which I am familiar. More subtly flavored and, since the base "liquor" is reisling, with less alcoholic kick than most cocktails (substantially less kick than a Manhattan or Martini). It also needed to spend some time in the glass and warm up slightly for the flavors to have full impact. So, it's a drink that one can have two ways -- taken straight from the shaker it's a light and subtle quencher, after a minute or two it's a more complex and full flavored drink for sipping and thinking.
I'm not aware of any other cocktails (which is to say, short strong drinks chilled with ice and served "up") that have wine as the base alcohol.
One thing I have always noted about any of Audrey's recipes, unlike those from certain other notables in the cocktail world, is that they always turn out just right if you follow the recipe. So if you can't drop in to Bemelmans, mix one up and see what you think.
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The main reason for heating up the pan before adding the oil is that as the metal expands, it seals any tiny cracks and crevaces on the surface of the pan that could promote sticking.
I've read this a number of times, but metalurgists and other scientific types say that it isn't true, that the cracks/pores/etc. don't close as the metal heats up.
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For pan frying you need the oil about half way up the pan. . . . If you had less then you were basically sautéing not frying.
Strictly speaking, this is not actually true. Any time you cook something in a pan with hot fat where you are largely letting the ingredient sit still in the pan, you are "frying." "Sauteing" is when you constantly agitate the pan to keep the ingredients in motion -- not something one normally wants to do with fish.
"Pan frying" is kind of a deceptive term. I prefer the term "shallow frying" which seems to be used only to describe a fried chicken cooking technique that is not deep frying. The way I see it, you have "frying," which is cooking in a fairly limited amount of hot fat, you have "deep frying," which is cooking entirely covered in hot fat, and you have "shallow frying," which is in between the two. Although, if one is going to be entirely precise about it, shallow frying and deep frying are fundamentally different from "regular frying" because they are actually boiling the ingredients in oil.
if you are sauteeing remember hot pan, cold oil. get your pan smokin hot, then add your oil, then your fish. when using thinner pans be careful as you can easily scorch your food. for panfrying see above.This is good advice, but one needs to understand that it only applies to sauteing and high heat frying. For moderate heat frying, it is often advisable to bring the pan and the fat up to temperature together because the appearance of the fat will often tell you when it has reached the appropriate temperature (there is also no fear of burning the fat in moderate heat frying). For shallow and deep frying you also want to heat the pan and the fat together since what you care about is the temperature of the fat, not the temperature of the pan (the fat is what does all the cooking in deep/shallow frying). If you heated up a pan, dumped in an inch of cold oil and then attempted to shallow fry, you'd get nothing but a big mess.
JJ: For cooking fish, the best thing to do is get yourself a large high-end nonstick frypan (like Calphalon Commercial Nonstick). You wouldn't use this for shallow frying (i.e., cooking in around an inch of hot fat) but it works great for regular frying.
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OTOH, good copper cookware will last you lifetime, unlike many other types. It is a sizeable investment, but one well worth it.
This is an especially good point. Stainless lined heavy copper cookware is expensive, although it's not all that expensive compared to brands like All-Clad and Demeyere -- but it is expensive. However, the cost needs to be put into perspective: An 11 inch sauciere (aka curved sauteuse evasee) from Falk will run you 235 bucks. If you keep it for 20 years, thats a cost of around 12 bucks a year. For one of the very best pans made. It's like being able to drive around a Ferrari for a hundred bucks a year. What else can you get for 235 bucks? Well... you can get a good DVD player. That might last you around 5 years if you're lucky. Or, hey... it might get you one-fifth of an okay laptop. That might last you three years. Now, I happen to use my copper pans a lot more often than I use my DVD player and I'll still be using them when DVDs are as obsolete as Betamax. So, in my opinion, the money was better spent on the pans.
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I imagine it comes down, in many ways, to the fact that FOH is usually not a career choice and BOH often is. I'm sure it's also much more likely to be seen in larger, more corporate and/or busy restaurants not owned/operated by family.
I've never seen any signs of this conflict in small family owned/operated restaurants that serve at a leisurely pace.
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Spec's out of Houston, TX sells both Fee Brothers Falernum ($2.39 for 4 oz) and Taylor Velvet Falernum ($13.67 for 750 ml).
Spec's is actually one of the best liquor stores in the country. Whenever I'm in Houston I always stock up on booze I can't get easily (or inexpensively) in NYC.
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Interesting. Almost everyone I know who makes dulce de leche simply boils an unopened can of condensed milk.
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There is the John D. Taylor "Velvet Falernum" bottling to which Jason refers at 11% alcohol. Fee Brothers also makes a "West Indies Style Falernum" which is nonalcoholic. Da Vinci Gourmet makes a "Caribbean Falernum Classic Syrup" that is also nonalcoholic. The Sazerac company used to import a falernum from Barbados, and I think Goslings makes a falernum -- neither one of which seems to be available in the US. Since falernum is typically used in very small amounts, it shouldn't make any difference which one is used.
I, too, would like to experiment with falernum. Most of the recipes one sees that include falernum are rum-based drinks. I like rum as much as the next guy, but it would be interesting to use it with other base spirits.
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Was just there for lunch today. The double cheeseburger was, as always, superlative. Also had to try the Shacktoberfest wild elk sausage. Didn't do much for me.
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Kumquat, along with lemonquat, sunquat and all the other members of the -quat family, has the advantage of having an edible rind, though.
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What is scum-like about it? Are you sure it isn't oil?
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No idea where to buy tokens. I have several subway tokens (from several different cities) in a large dish I use whenever I have to empty my pockets of loose change in foreign currencies.
The subway token garnish, while kind of fun, is a little problematic actually. Since the drink includes citrus and is shaken rather hard, it's not exactly see-through. So it's hard to see the token sitting on the bottom of the glass. One possible solution might be to use a spiral of lemon zest cut with a channel knife and thread the token onto the peel.
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In order for Franny's to be doable for an NY Pizza Survey-sized group, I would have to negotiate something special with the owners. One assumes they wouldn't agree to accomodate us if they weren't comfortable with it -- and that would be fine, as they really aren't set up to handle larger groups.
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So, I had some time to tweak mine:
1.5 oz : applejack
1.0 oz : straight rye whiskey (101 proof is what I've been using)
0.5 tsp : yellow Chartreuse
0.25 oz : fresh lemon juice
0.25 oz : 1:1 simple syrup
dash : Fee Bros. aromatic bitters
Shake hard with cracked ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a twist of lemon and a clean NYC subway token.
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I am a fan of Falk, as many people here know, for the quality of their product, for their prices (I believe Falk is largely responsible for rationalizing the stainless lined heavy copper cookware market), and not least because I like doing business with their US distributor -- aka, Michael "mharpo" Harp. I'll probably weigh in more extensively on this thread a little later on, but for now I'll humbly recommend my eGCI class on Stovetop Cookware and its associated Q&A thread for those who are interested in learning about how different materials impact the performance of a piece of cookware.
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That sounds very interesting. Especially the gin/rum combination. Not something that would ever have occurred to me -- but, then again, that's why you're the pro and I'm not.
I didn't have too much time to do any refinement of my idea, which was significantly less ambitious. I just wanted to make something that sounded like it might have been consumed during the early years of the subway. Anyway, as written the acid isn't balanced and the applejack doesn't come through enough. I added around a half-ounce of 1:1 simple syrup to balance it, but I'd be more inclined to balance it by cutting back on the lemon juice in the future. I'd also use either a straight applejack (I used Laird's blended), or would use the blended stuff in equal proportion to the rye.
Found a recipe for the Third Rail cocktail that included dark rum, applejack, brandy and a few dashes of absinthe.
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Laird's applejack is normally found in the form that is blended with neutral spirits, yes? Is this the form that one would want to use in cocktails, or would a straight version make more sense? All I have in blended, but it doesn't seem to have a particularly strong flavor and I could swear the last bottle I had had a much more pronounced flavor.
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garnish with a well-washed, sterilized and polished NYC subway token.
Won't the drink take care of all of that?
Heh. Would have to include some 151 demerara rum just to make sure.
Actually... an interesting thought (although probably not useful): Subway tokens are made with copper, right? I assume that if one put a subway token into a shaker with some reasonable acidic ingredient and shook it up, it would impart a slight coppery flavor.
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I hope you're not suggesting:
1 oz genever gin
1 oz London dry gin
1 oz Irish whiskey
1 oz tamarind juice
1/2 oz Falernum
2 dashes Strega
Shake well with cracked ice, strain into chilled large cocktail glass, float 1/2 oz of pisco on top and garnish with slice of rum-pickled ginger?
Whoa! It's like you're reading my mind or something. Spooky.
You forgot: garnish with a well-washed, sterilized and polished NYC subway token.
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The problem with Irish whiskey is like the problem with Scotch... it just doesn't lend itself to blending.
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Oh yeah, and on second thought, the applejack? Since its other name is "Jersey Lightning" and it is, or was anyway, the state spirit of New Jersey, I think it must be disqualified from the competition. Strictly for "farmers," as New Yorkers used to call everyone from the Garden State, no matter what their employment. (Not that I harbor these attitudes myself, mind you, but one must take history into account.)
I'd think that NYC's nickname "Big Apple" would be enough to make applejack acceptable in an NY-named cocktail, though. Mostly, though, rye and applejack struck me as two old-school spirits that are a little rough around the edges, so I thought it might be interesting to combine them. That neither one gets the attention it deserves is extra gravy, as far as I am concerned. Are we aware of a cocktail using both rye and applejack? I can't think of any, but of course that could be because they don't combine very well.
You're right about too much Chartreuse in my thought above (whatever it ends up being named, if it turns out to be good). Just rinsing the glass would probably do it, since it's a small drink at those volumes.
I like your genever idea, too. Trying to think of ingredients associated with ethnicities associated with NYC to consider:
Dutch: genever
English: dry gin
Asian: tamarind, ginger, sake
Irish: Irish whiskey
Italian: something like Strega could be interesting
Caribbean: falernum, rum
Latin America: rum, pisco, Cachaça
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We may have to have an in-person shake-off to decide things.
Sounds like fun. We should.
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How about a tall boy in a paper bag?
Garnished with a used crack pipe?
Le Creuset
in Kitchen Consumer
Posted
That sort of thing is perfect when you want to serve individual portions of something like mussels. I also find that it's good to have several ~1 quart pots around for warming sauces, doing individual portions of vegetables, etc.