slkinsey

wrt the Red Hook, I got it from Enzo's mouth that the Red Hook (which, not for nothing, is a neighborhood of Brooklyn) is a riff on the Brooklyn. The idea is that the Punt e Mes stands in for the herbal bitterness and richness of the Amer Picon/dry vermouth combination.

It's pretty easy to make your own: Throw some celery seed and some kosher salt into the spice grinder.

I am hoping that the gum arabic (in addition to providing some extra silkyness in the mouthfeel) will not only prevent separation in storage, but perhaps also the "curdled" appearance the homemade product can have in certain cocktails. I'm also experimenting with different (less labor intensive and hopefully better) methods for making them. Today's experiment is liquifying the nuts and water together in the Vita-Prep, infusing an hour and draining through a 100 micron superbag. I have a new batch of pistacheat that turned out amazingly well this way, and an currently trying to see if I can make one using roasted pepitas.

Went down maybe another few degrees after a couple of minutes. It's 43F outside right now. Meanwhile, it's 28F up on the New Croton Reservoir, where NYC's famous tapwater comes from.

I just now measured the water coming out of my tap at around 37F. And I didn't even let it run for very long.

JeffL: The picture on the De Lorenzo's site is not so great. Pictures and descriptions elswhere suggest a pizza with significantly less cheese, sauce on top and a puffier crust than rlibkind's friend. rlibkind: sounds like it's close to spot-on, then. fwiw, I think that "tough crusts" almost always are due to the pizza maker using high gluten flour. If they want to use high gluten flour, the dough has to include some fat to tenderize the crust. If he's trying to replicate the "tomato pie" style, as noted above, I'd try for a puffier crust, less cheese and the sauce on top. If he's in a location where this style is unknown, it could be a great way to differentiate his product.

Bob: What is your friend's goal in offering pizza? If the goal is to have a "destination pizzeria" then there is likely quite a bit of work to be done. If the goal is to turn out a respectable "corner pizza shop" product as an adjunct to his bakery business, then it looks like it's probably good to go.

It's hard to tell too much from the picture. From what I can tell, it looks pretty good for that style. If I had any observations as to what might be improved they would be that the cheese appears to be a bit overdone (it can often become a bit "leathery" when cooked to this point), and overall I'd probably prefer less cheese. To my eye I'd say that it looks like a reasonably good, but by no means revelatory, example from the family of stainless deck oven pizzeria pizza.

There have been discussions around on both of these subjects. I can't speak very authoritatively about brasseries, although I do know that they are "technically" large, bustling places that serve beer (the word brasserie technically means "brewery"). Osteria is a word that we might roughly translate to "tavern" or "inn" or "taproom." It's "technically" the lowest and least formal on the ristorante-trattoria-osteria totem pole. It does not have the (often only notional) associations with beer that a brasserie has. However, both brasseries and trattorie can be found at all ends of the spectrum, much the same way that "Gotham Bar & Grill" has very little in common with a roadside bar & grill (and, as far as I know, features neither a bar nor a grill particularly prominently).

I like the photography idea. It's a great way to toe the line between foodies and food bloggers who want to document their meal, while at the same time ensuring that your food is presented to the internet public in the way (well lit, styled, shot) that you would like it to be, and also to avoid having picture-snappers disturbing other customers.

I'm thinking of ways to stabilize a homemade orgeat. Gum arabic, perhaps?

There is no way you can tell whether beef comes from an animal that has not been treated with hormones or subtherapeutic antibiotics unless it is expressly labeled as such (and you trust the labeling). This is irrespective of USDA grading of the meat. All of which is to say that USDA Choice beef may come from an animal that has not been treated with hormones or subtherapeutic antibiotics, but doesn't necessarily have to.

Beef is made of chemicals! But it's okay. So is everything else. Including us.

I tried the arrack/genevieve drink several days ago. I found it an interesting quaff, but not one for the ages.

true, but one takes over and snuffs out the other. i know there are health nuts that are into lacto baccilus fermentation and they talk about minimizing the activity of other types like alcoholic to get the results they want. I used to have a keen interest in the microbiology of sourdough breads, which involves fermentation with both wild yeast and various lactobacilli. So I can tell you for sure that this is not correct. Are there certain conditions one could establish that minimize either yeast or lactobacillus conditions? Sure. But this isn't, generally speaking, one of them. You also have to understand that, in a spontaneous fermentation like this, there are going to be plenty of microorganisms in there fermenting away in addition to yeast and lactobacilli. Think of lambic beers, for example, or any of the many potential contaminant organisms of homebrewed beers. In a sugar-rich environment like this, the lactobacilli eat sugars and excrete acid. For sure, fermentation by lactobacilli will increase acidity (I should also point out that their activity is also largely halted beyond a certain pH). But, you know... all the microorganisms in there will eat a little bit of most things in the mash.

"How many rums do I need?" is not really a question that can be answered. Or rather, the answer is: as many different ones as there different drinks and styles of drinks that you want to make, depending on how picky you are about specificity. Here are a pair of posts I made in a similar thread a while back: So, it really depends on what you want to make. If you like tiki drinks, there are certain rums that you're probably going to want for that, and those won't be the same rums you want if you mostly like things like Daiquiris, and those won't be the same rums you want if you want mostly to make Swizzles, etc. I would say that you can probably get by with a Cuban-style white; a cognac-style light amber rum (Appleton?); a darker, funkier rum like Lemon Hart (get the 75.5% one for greater flexibility); and a dark rum of moderate funkiness like Myers. This would allow you to at least approximate most styles of drinks using rum. Later on, if you find yourself increasing interest in a certain style, then you can increase your collection almost infinitely in that direction. (Edited to fix typos)

To clarify, I don't think that Inner Circle is so much lamented because it is demised, rather that it is lamented because it is no longer imported into the US. This is because, I am given to understand, the Inner Circle people were such pricks that the importers got tired of dealing with them.

Interesting about this one. I happened to run into a cache of LH 151 bottles the other day, and bought them all. My impression is that the only difference between Lemon Hart 40% and Lemon Hart 75.5% is that the lower proof stuff has a lot more water added. I've made cocktails using the overproof stuff as the base liquor, you just have to make sure that you get a lot more dilution. Ultimately, however, if you bought the 75.5% and watered it down to 40% yourself with spring water, you'd save quite a bit of money I imagine. Simply add 665 ml of spring water to each 750 ml of Lemon Hart 151, and you end up with 1415 ml of 40% Lemon Hart (that's almost two bottles of 40% for the price of one bottle of 754.5%!). (Edited to fix percentages)

In any spontaneous fermentation like this, there is going to be some fungal activity and some bacterial activity.

Very cool. Looking forward to more!

I'd say that's more an indictment of the bars than the bartenders. But bartenders in a shot-and-a-beer joint aren't the same thing as civil servants whose job is to determine which spirits may be sold in a state and how they will be classified.

How can it be that people whose very jobs necessarily require familiarity and expertise in spirits are so clueless?

FWIW, I've mostly heard her mentioning Pegu Club (maybe it's an easy commute from the MSNBC studios?). But, if you read above, Katie says that she ran into her at D&C.

I don't think your point is very well made here, Janet. First of all, you can't compare Rachel Maddow to Katie Couric, et al. when it comes to cocktails. Rachel is someone who is a major cocktail enthusiast, who has mentioned her love of cocktails and NYC top cocktail spots many times in the media, and who is known to pass the time at NYC top cocktail spots such as Pegu Club and D&C with some frequency. She is a political pundit by trade, and one who is known for her casual, irreverent persona. So, as far as that sort of thing goes, a more relevant point of comparison might be any number of the people who post in this very forum. Second, recommending Calvados if one cannot find Laird's bonded applejack is not in any way analogous to recommending mezcal if one cannot find 100% agave tequila. Her recommendation is apt for any number of reasons. It is a simple fact that the majority of New Yorkers can't find Laird's bonded on a regular basis, never mind people in Peoria and Knoxville. It's also a fact that Laird's blended applejack simply doesn't have sufficient strength of flavor to work particularly well in a Jack Rose (in contrast, there are plenty of mixto tequilas out there with sufficient strength and quality to work in a Margarita). Clearly, in my opinion, an inexpensive Calvados is the right choice over Laird's blended if one is making a Jack Rose. Importantly, she does go to the trouble of mentioning what applejack is, and that bonded applejack is the correct spirit for the drink. (She also uses my favorite way of explaining the difference between whiskey-like applejack and cognac-like apple brandy, Calvados, etc.) Third... yea, she uses crap grenadine. Given an impromptu 2.5 minute throw-together in a radio studio, I am willing to forgive her for not working in the time for a lecture on the evils of bottled grenadine and how to make your own at home (never mond the fact that she probably couldn't get her hands on any). So to sum up... On the plus side: 1. She tells us that bonded applejack is the historically correct spirit of preference 2. She recommends the best alternative spirit if one cannot find bonded applejack 3. She tells us what "bonded" is (mostly) 4. She mentions the importance of measuring* 5. She talks about the importance of fresh juice 6. She talks about putting some real energy in to shaking 7. She gives good advice about shaking until it's "too cold to hold" 8. Her formulation seems reasonable * I dispute that she didn't measure the lime. She uses half of a lime, and it seems likely that mention of this was edited out since they do a jump-cut right there. On the minus side: 1. She doesn't say much about blended applejack 2. She doesn't devote time to grenadine and making at home, and uses bottled crap 3. She doesn't mention the possibility of using lemon instead of lime All in all, I call this a clear win. If Katie Couric did something this good, we'd be dancing in the streets. Hell, if Mark Bittman had done something this good, we wouldn't have complained about him so much. Honestly, I don't know how we could possibly want something more from a clearly off-the-cuff little segment like this.