slkinsey

Ever the stickler for nomenclature... That's a Marconi Wireless. I believe that drink is called an Applecart. I've done a little digging around on this drink, which always puzzled me for a few reasons. First is that I've never found the combination of applejack, Cointreau and lemon juice particularly appealing, and certainly not very Sidecar-like. For me, and of course these things can be highly personal, the appeal of the Sidecar is in the combination of Cointreau's refinement and the brandy's smoothness. Applejack's whiskey character, which I love so much, seems a less apt fit and I might rather make a simple applejack sour instead. Second has to do with the name. We've taken around here to saying "applecart" like it's the generally accepted or at least historical name for a cocktail compounded of applejack, Cointreau and lemon juice. My looks around would seem to indicate that this is not the case. Rather, there is the Apple Car cocktail or, if the drink is made with the more brandy-like Calvados, the Royal Jubilee cocktail. The Apple Car goes back at least to Embury. I don't know if it goes back any further than that. Anyway... getting back to drinks. Among the way-too-many I had at Pegu last night was the Hoffman House Fizz with which I began the evening. It is compounded of gin (London dry, although I imagine Hollands would be tasty), maraschino liqueur, lemon juice, orange juice, cream and grenadine (dry shake, shake, strain, highball glass, rocks, fizz). Odd-sounding combination, but it really works.

Strictly speaking, I believe McGee is not quite correct about this. Or, rather, he may be saying that 140F/60C is the minimum temperature for efficient breakdown of collagen into gelatin. As those of us who practice LT/LT sous vice cookery know, collagen begins to dissolve into gelatin at around 122F/50C to 130F/54C and collagenase is active down to 130F/54C. These reactions simply take a lot longer at these lower temperatures. This is why, for example, one can cook collagen-rich meats at 54.5C for 48 hours and both convert the collagen to gelatin and maintain a medium-rare texture. FWIW, I take exception to SeanDirty's temperature chart, which is a bit on the low side. I would suggest it's something more like: Very rare: 45–50C Rare: 50–55C Medium rare: 55–60C Medium: 60–65C Medium well: 65–70C Well done: >70C Certainly, cooking SV at 55 seems to just hit the boundary between rare and medium rare (aka, "medium rare on the rare side"). As for cooking something like a pork butt, the comments as to time-versus-temperature are spot on. Unlike wih a naturally tender meat, it is not enough to cook a collagen-rich meat to temperature. No matter what temperature is used, the meat must be held at the target temperature for a sufficient length of time to convert a sufficient amount of the collagen to gelatin. As noted, this reaction is considerably hastened as at higher temperatures, but there is a trade off in moisture loss, etc. It is up to each individual cook to make a final determination as to what combination of time and temperature to use.

My usual is Sweet Maria's Espresso Monkey Blend with 10% each of whatever their to robusta is (currently Panama Guyami Indian Robusta Rustico) and Monsooned Malabar.

When I have leftover celery, I cut it into fine dice and freeze it. This can then be used in preparations where the celery would be fully cooked anyway (e.g., pasta sauces, soups, braises, crab cakes, etc.).

The easiest way to get around all of these problems (cost as well as time) is to do what a number of NYC cocktail pars do and mist the inside of the glass with absinthe from an atomizer.

Yea, that makes no sense to me either.

I wouldn't go guite that far. Cake can certainly play Robin to pie's Batman... or perhaps Gleek to pie's Wonder Twins.

http://nymag.com/guides/holidays/gifts/2008/52175/

Trimming, if you really care that much. As you can see, it's not really apparent on the plate. My guess is that the way to completely eliminate creasing would be to make a series of smaller "sausages" rather than one big one, and to wrap the "sausage" in multiple layers of plastic wrap before bagging.

It should also be mentioned that Steven (and probably many other eG members -- but, alas, not I) has a powerful externally-vented hood over his stove. That makes a huge difference when it comes to lingering cooking odors from vaporized grease, because the aromatic grease is sucked up the hood and vented away before it has a chance to stink up the place.

I do this all the time, both for cook-and-serve at hot temperatures, and also cook-and-chill to use as lunchmeat in sandwiches. Either way, I have found 60C/140F to be the best temperature. I have done this for Thanksgiving a number of times. I don't think it makes sense to use a whole turkey as you would if you were roasting it, because the thickness makes it impractical. Also, I believe that turkey dark and light meat are best when cooked with different methods and at different temperatures. That said, I do know of people who have bound a cylinder of turkey meat (both dark and light) with transglutaminase and cooked it sous vide. My method is to remove and butterfly the breasts, which are stuffed with a mousse of turkey breast, truffles, foie gras and herbs. This is rolled into a cylinder, covered with plastic wrap which is twisted to conform the roll to a "gigantic sausage" shape, vacuum-bagged and cooked to temperature in a 60.5C water bath (I poke holes in the plastic wrap so that any residual air is removed when the bag is vacuumed). I also braise the dark meat in red wine, combine with shredded/wilted Savoy cabbage, bound the mixture lightly with turkey mousse, wrapped in reserved turkey skin into a cylinder shape, "sausage wrapped" in plastic film, vacuum-bagged and cooked to temperature in the 60.5C water bath (since the meat was already cooked, this was to simply to warm the meat and set the binder). And finally, I made a "log" of cornbread dressing wrapped in overlapping strips of double-smoked bacon. This was also bagged and warmed in the 60.5C water bath. For service, the turkey skin and bacon are crisped under the broiler or with a blowtorch. Looks like this:

Interesting chart here: http://homecooking.about.com/library/archive/blalcohol12.htm

40% abv cognac is 31.5% alcohol by weight, which corresponds fairly interestingly with your observed weight loss.

I would say that this would only be a major omission if the book were attempting to be a general guide to sous vide cookery. I don't know where people got the idea that it would be. The reason he doesn't need to include time-versus-thickness information in the book is that he goes to the trouble of describing in excruciatingly precise detail just how big the food items should be that are cooked in his recipes. When he tells you to split a single 455 gram side of Spanish mackerel, sandwich two thin slices of jamón serrano between the two pieces, bind with transglutaminase and cook at 61C for 12 minutes, I can't believe it is possible that there will be differences in the thickness of this food item that would meaningfully affect the specified 12 minute cooking time. Thus, no time-versus-thickness discussion needed. If he were giving an example of a kind of recipe you could to with most any sort of fish at most any size, then he would need to open it up to a discussion of time-versus-thickness, as well as a discussion on temperatures for fish in general. But, as noted, that is not the purpose of this book.

If Cherry Heering is produced in America, it's news to me. I have an old-style bottle from 2004, and it has a giant sticker across the top that says "imported" in addition to the words "product of Denmark" across he front and "imported by Charmer Imports, Co." on the back. In fact, I am quite certain that the scarcity of Cherry Heering that we had back around 3 years ago was due to the fact that Heering changed the bottle design and therefore temporarily suspended shipments to the States while jumping through our various legal hoops attendant to changing the packaging.

You'll notice that Audrey's recipe as posted above (don't have Imbibe! handy, so don't know the extent to which it might differ in there) doesn't have much booze in it. If you whip the yolks until well-thickened, then beat and fold in the whites, you shouldn't get too terribly much separation. How fast is it separating on you? I think the hot milk could be heated up quickly and in small amounts in a tweaked (stepped-down) small electric hotpot or kettle. Most places around here seem to use an electric hotpot or kettle for their hot drinks. Cream of tartare should help the egg whites to bind.

Ah yes, La Luncheonette! I had cervelles au buerre noire there on my infamous "Offal Truth" guts-eating tour of NYC with Herbacidal and jogoode. It was... er, brainy. Not something I'd go back to have again.

One convincing argument I recently heard in favor of paying full-price to buy All-Clad nonstick at Williams Sonoma. Due to their incredible returns policy, you can just bring back your All-Clad nonstick pans every few years, tell them "this isn't nonstick anymore" and they will replace it with a brand new one.

AFAIK, at Pegu it's made fresh on the day it will be used. You can see Audrey's recipe above. I've seen her make the batter in a food processor in less than 10 minutes. Honestly, I think probably the best way to dispense T&Js is to give them out for nothing on an especially cold and snowy day, or in any event push them heavily as a "rare Wintertime special you won't want to miss out on." That way, the next time there's a hint of snow in the air, people may find themselves wending their way to Veritas for some of that hot eggnog thing they only serve a few times a year. I know that when I get the word that Audrey's thinking Tom & Jerry season is soon upon us, I try to get down there when it snows. I'm not aware of anyone around here who offers Tom & Jerrys throughout the winter as a staple menu item.

Interesting how a lot of these recipes differ in alcoholic strength. Both of our recipes call for a pint plus one ounce of booze, although yours has considerably more dark rum (mine is a pint of bourbon plus one ounce of dark rum). But your recipe has exactly double the nonalcoholic ingredients: 4 pints of half & half whereas mine has 2 pints; a dozen eggs whereas mine has a half-dozen; 2 cups of sugar whereas mine has 1 cup.

I wonder if it's possible that Hoshizaki can't sell their cube ice machines in the US because Kold-Draft still holds the exclusive patent for the technology. I note that the crescent ice cubes are produced by a different method (running water) than the square cubes (more or less the same as Kold-Draft does).

That's all good and well if you want slim crescent ice like this. But only Kold-Draft is going to give you a full 1.25-inch cube like this. So, in my book, even if the Hoshizaki machine is "better" by some criteria (more reliable, etc.), it doesn't matter. The Kold-Draft ice is far superior.

Really?! It's one of Mrs. slkinsey's all-time favorites (although we follow the McElhone formulation). Fresh-squeezed OJ is a must.

The Disaronno family claims to have invented amaretto. If one believes this, then the "genuine" article would indeed be made with apricot kernels. That said, it seems fairly clear to me that it's supposed to be bitter almond flavored.

Technically I suppose an amaretto could be anything slightly bitter and mostly sweet. The "-etto" ending is diminutive of amaro, meaning "bitter." So, amaretto means "a little bitter" or perhaps "bittersweet." Traditionally, this means the flavor of the bitter almond. Almonds, almond flavored desserts, almond flavored drinks, etc. probably came to Sicily from contact with Arab cultures, and all made their way north. My understanding is that amaretto the liqueur probably came after amaretti the cookies, which are most certainly made with almonds, and indeed Lazzaroni Amaretto is made by infusing actual amaretti into alcohol. There is no doubt that amaretto is supposed to be bitter almond flavored. But there is also no doubt that apricot kernels have an almond flavor, and Disaronno's recipe claims to have been around since 1525. I doubt it's been that long, but it seems certain that they've been using apricot kernels for at least a few hundred years.