zilla369

Saturday: Grilled Boar's Head frankfurters with fontina cheese and sauerkraut Sliced home-grown tomatoes Grilled bourbon-butter corn on the cob Espresso ice cream

Now i'm seeting with envy.

It's gonna be pretty hard to get a buzz when you have to spit it out right after you drink it.

I won a costume contest a few years ago with this costume: Some of the lettering you can't read says "pack of Kool 100s free!" and "Warn'n: Chokin' Hazurd. Not for young'ns under 3 years" The brooch is a picture of Ken surrounded by the words "That's my baby's Daddy" /threadjack we now return you to your regularly scheduled on-topic conversation. Apologies

Starch: the white truffle gnocci we served at school last night was fantastic. You could just flavor with truffle oil if you don't want to break the bank. Dessert: Three kinds of berries macerated briefly in reduced fig vinegar, also from last night. Yum.

Hm...i'll look into that. Maybe i can capture it with my webcam (which records 10-second videos) and turn it into a GIF. Will consult with my more computer-literate roomie, and report back.

Second time through all the Terry Pratchett "Discworld" books.

Welcome, munga! Looking forward to your posts and input. Chili is such a big topic, beginning with: beans or no beans? Cincinnati-style or otherwise? Every time i make chili, it seems to be different. I lean towards dark red kidney beans, big chunks of ground meat (beef and sausage) and green pepper. No pasta! Cheese and chopped scallions as garnishes. Tons of cayenne. A combination of fresh and canned tomato products. Your favorite hot sauce. Sometimes corn, sometimes chickpeas. Anyone? Everyone?

Great tutorial, Chad. So much info to digest it's going to take me several tries to assimilate it all! Tonight i tried your steeling method for the first time, and I really liked it! Your tip about locking your wrist and elbow and using your shoulder as the hinge was a revelation! Thanks for all the work you obviously put into your segment. I'm sorry, and i know it's childish, Nick - but i couldn't help but excise this phrase and quote it just for its purile beauty... please, don't anyone scold me. please.

Oh. My. God. I laughed my ass off at the thought of me ironing money. Local vendors are very lucky i washed it at all. Your Money Angel is a harsh taskmaster, Miss Maggie.

....try to carry two eggs in my pocket. Yes, children, this happened just this evening. Our walk-in, catering kitchen, walk-in freezer, and dry goods storage area are all down two flights of stairs and across a driveway from the restaurant kitchen. I had gone down to the catering kitchen to retrieve a full sheet pan of enrobed chocoalte mousse layer cakes. While i was down there, i remembered that we were out of paper towels at the hand sink, so i picked up a giant roll of paper toweling and put it under one arm. Then i remembered that a co-worker was short one egg yolk for the caesar dressing he was making - and i needed that dressing tout de suite for my pantry station. Now, we could argue all night whether i was trying to be efficient or whether i was simply lazy, not wanting to make another trip down and back up for just one egg. But the most amazing thing is, and i remember this very clearly, as i was putting the eggs (always get two even if you need just one!) in my pocket: this is stupid. The Egg Devil, on my left shoulder, said: "C'mon. You don't want to come back down here for one lousy egg. Just...put them in your pocket. You'll be careful." The Egg Angel, on my right shoulder, said: "Are you crazy? You got some kinda egg death-wish? You'll never make it! Never!!" Fuck you, Egg Angel, i thought. I put the eggs in my pocket (oh yes! the pocket with four dollars in it!), put the towels under one arm and put the sheet tray of cakes up on my oppostie shoulder. Then I - carefully, even gingerly - began my trot up the stairs. Made it up the first flight. Midways through the second flight - *CRACK*. But, ya know, even though i had to wash my four dollars and lay them on the knife case to dry, and even though ONE egg broke, and i had to wear my pocket inside-out for the rest of the night, i DID end up with the one egg my buddy needed for the dressing. So *nyah* to you, Egg Angel. However, i won't be pulling that stunt again any time soon.

Here's another thought. It's a good idea to have a basic first-aid kit in the kitchen (not all the way across the house in the bathroom). A basic kitchen first-aid kit should include antiseptic wipes, anti-bacterial ointment, various sizes of bandages, and finger cots - so you can get back to work right away (unless you need stitches). I like to try and keep a supply of blue band-aid-type adhesive bandages in case one falls off - they're easier to spot.

One of my instructors tells a story about a knife injury on Valentine's day while he was working at the only high-end restaurant in a small Indiana town. Early in the day, during prep, he dropped his chef's knife and didn't get his foot out of the way in time. The knife went through his clog, his foot, and stuck into the floor. He was taken to the emergency room, stitched up, medicated, and sent back to work for the dinner shift - but told to stay home the day after that. After all, all the doctors in that small county hospital had Valentine's day reservations for that evening

Hey! Watch it. The midwest doesn't start until Pittsburgh... after you pass through the Deep South's northern annex, a/k/a/ Pennsylbama (or Pennsyltucky in some local patios)... I demand you retract that implied slight against Kentuckiana.

You'll have to find yourself a different volunteer to be the instructor in that segment, oh great coordinator. Wondering idly how easy it would be to french finger-bones, zilla

I don't want it to sound as if I'm scolding marie-louise - and I'm sorry about your stitches. Stitches on any body part that bends a lot in the course of your normal day are a nightmare. However: her cautionary tale serves to underline what I said about never taking your eyes off your knife blade while it is in motion. To do so is to practically guarantee an injury. The unfortunate thing about a dull knife is that it is more likely to slip and cut you even if you are paying attention.

We experimented with that on the culinary team. It doesn't yield competition-grade consistency of thickness, but it will work beautifully for less formal situations.

That's why the good lord invented stock. What Mr. Guy said. Naturally, you want to improve your skills to the point where you are creating the smallest possible amount of waste. But if you want to create specialized cuts to garnish and plate with, you'll want to have a plan in place to utilize the scraps. Stock is a fantastic use for carrot and onion trimmings. Potato and mushroom trimmings are great in cream and/or pureed soups.

I'm going to attempt to make it a part of my prep and see what happens. In competition you'd probably get points off for not doing it the "classic" way, but in the real world of restaurant prep, it might just be an improvement. Glad you liked the lesson. Thanks to everyone that read it and everyone who posted questions and comments.

Nope, not wrong. Whatever's safest for you is the way to go!

For me, it's a control issue. I just don't feel in control of my blade without the finger-thumb grip. But if it saves us from bursitis - even better!

Hey, wow...that's cool. I think it would take a little longer than the way I do it, but it's obviously much safer in the long run. I'd encourage everyone with a high-speed connection to take a look at that video. Thanks!

I would be interested to get this clarified, as well. Perhaps Chad and Bruce can confirm a yes or no tomorrow. And i wonder if one could order a serrated knife custom-sharpened to the other side for lefties?

Most of my knife skills were fine-tuned during preparation for American Culinary Federation student competitions. We were taught that the judges we'd be performing for prefer almost totally silent knife-cuts; they don't want to hear any chopping noises or board-banging. That is why I ended up being most comfortable with the tip-fulcrum method. Neither one is right or wrong, it's a matter of what you get used to. It would take me another few hundred hours of practice to get accurate cuts with the opposite method, although i can do passable mushroom slices that way - I still prefer the wrist-fulcrum in the end, though.

This was a much-discussed issue amongst the knife cut coaches at school. My theory was that, even though a knife may be perfectly sharp, it is "triangular" in cross-section (wider at the spine than at the edge). I'm guessing that's what tends to make it lead to one side or the other when trying to perform a perfectly vertical cut. The solution? Practice, practice, practice, until compensating for the phenomenon is second nature. A mental trick such as Stone describes is often helpful, as well.