Bux

Anyone who's ever asked "why" about food or what happens in the kitchen (with the exception of "is the sous chef boinking the hostess?") should be delighted to get a copy of On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee. The author is currently particpating in an eGullet Q&A this week.

It's been my understanding that the "secret" number will get you a reservation closer to the time you call than you can get by calling the regular line, but the likelihood that you will have to wait for your table doesn't seem to change. How many days in advance can one call and get a reservation each way?

I haven't been in Bordeaux in some time, but I'd bet that la Tupina is still a classic choice. I remember a rotisserie that was essentially a wall of fire. Grilled meats are a good choice. A roast pigeon was excellent. It's a simple place with an extensive wine list featuring, what else, Bordeaux.

I'm fairly fluent in restaurant French, much less so in conversational French or restaurant Spanish, but one night in a restaurant in Spain after we had ordered our appetizers and main courses fron the Spanish menu, the waitress chose to bring me the dessert menu in English. I looked it over and decided nothing sounded interesting and was about to order coffee when my wife told the waitress to bring me the Spanish menu. Now there were several things I wanted to try. The translations, designed to please those who wanted to feel most as if they were still at home, sounded banal. Interestingly enough, the meal overall didn't please me and that's no surprise when you learn the restaurant goes out of it's way to make itself agreeable to tourists who are not excited to tryt new tastes.

Mrs. B always makes it a point to ask for the name of the person to whom she's speaking when she makes a reservation, especially in Europe. I think it's a good idea.

I'd like to remind those who might have missed the announcement, that the eGullet Q&A with Harold McGee is in progress right now. Whether or not you have a question for Mr. McGee, it makes for good reading although I doubt we'll get around to discussing everything that's in his 884 page book.

My sense is that editors and their work is not well understood or appreciated by the general public, even that which reads. I suspect this is true up and down the board in regard to books and periodicals alike, but it would be interesting to have a separate discussion, in its own thread, about the role of editors in regard to publications such as food sections of daily newspapers.

Considering the pitfalls of message boards, it's a wonder our discussions stay as civil and useful as this one has been. We all need to remember that the poster to whose comments we respond may be having a bad day and that the post we read is not necessarily the culmination of a life long study, nor the poster's final opinions on the subject at hand.

It pays to have a close contact at the publisher. I've had my copy for over a week now and it's much handier than the proof that lacked an index. I've always believed salt water boiled at a significantly highter temperature than fresh water and was about to post that opinion here in another thread a few days ago, but I thought I'd check On Food and Cooking to see if I could offer some information on how much hotter the boiling salt water might be. I was surprised to learn how much salt it took to make very little difference. Is there any reason to add salt to the water in which pasta is cooked, other than to salt the pasta? Do vegetables generally absorb some salt and might there be a better solution (no pun intended) than salt water in which to cook some vegetables?

I'm not all that surprised. My guess is that many people enter any profession without much knowledge of the major names who have, or are, changing that profession. We recently had a Q&A with Richard Hamilton, a relatively young American chef with his own rather luxurious haute cuisine restaurant in Rhode Island. He was well into his chosen career before he say it as much more than a job.

Of course and I'd argue that a critic can do no less than tell me what he thought of his meal(s). He can do a lot more however if he, or she, is someone worth reading. We should continue to make a great distinction between restaurant reviews and food journalism, but I believe the best reviews actually enter the realm of food journalism. Most readers of restaurant reviews see them as consumer reports. Those reviewers who write for this audience and who don't strive to reach a higher level (at least higher in my opinion) are the ones who are most likely to be least reliable after then are recognized. Those who can turn in weekly columns that are culinary journalism will most be able to rise above the personal treatment they get and those who can enrich what they have to say about a restaurant from contact with the chef enough may overcome the loss of being recognized. What I fear here, as in much of online discussion is that when each of us says reviewer we are really thinking of very different people. I've seen restaurant discussions go astray and realize that one party is speaking about a place he sees as having white tablecloths and a sommelier, while the other person is talking about a place with formica counters where a cup of coffee is presented as you sit down.

Do we know each other? I was here when the Spring Street Bar opened and we suspected it was the beginning of the end, but I've also had critics, be they artists, journalists or others commenting or writing on art, teach me to see things in my own work I didn't see when I made it. People can't really open open other people's eyes or your taste buds, can they can open minds and enable one to better understand and better appreciate art, music, food, etc. Pan is on to something here and we must separate the concept of restaurant reviews and food journalism from what any of us is used to reading. There's no doubt many of my professors were brain dead, but the idea of education, even formal education is not a bad idea. The idea that one could learn from reading is a good one. If what one reads isn't enlightening, one is reading the wrong stuff. Russ, I get pleasure from intellectual undertanding and here I may even side with those I seem not to agree with. If it's explained to me, it may be more meaningful when I taste it.

Scribner has offered us five copies of On Food and Cooking in connection with this Q&A. We will draw names from a hat, or perhaps a large kettle or salad bowl from among those who ask interesting questions of Mr. McGee and announce the winners here in this thread at the end of the session. As is our practice, hosts and managers are not eligible to win.

We’ve always processed our food. Take a hamburger, it’s dead cow that been subjected to the process of grinding and grilling. Nevertheless, for most of my life, connoisseurs, gourmets and the like have looked down their noses on what’s been called “processed food.” We’ve tended to make a sharp distinction between hand made food and that which has been industrially processed. It seems that distinction is fading, or at least the line is shifting. A seminal moment may have been when we invited the food processor into our homes and kitchens and allowed technology to do more than open cans of processed food. Sous vide is a term that’s been mentioned elsewhere in this Q&A. I remember “boil in bag”frozen dinners that brought scorn from gastronomes, but highly respected chefs are now using vacuum packaging not only to prepare food to be finished at catered affairs away from their kitchens, but often to be served at the table in their famous high priced luxury restaurants. They’re not necessarily using the technique because it’s efficient, but because it works well to achieve the flavor and effect they want. It’s easy and probably correct to note that cooking has been evolving for a long time and the big difference may be acceleration of the change, but it seems to me that some note should be made that the kind of processes that were shunted off to industry to make food that’s cheaper or more convenient are now being examined anew with regard to making food that tastes better or is more interesting. Our chefs, and by extension, our home cooks, are becoming architects of the kitchen rather than just master masons. Is there a danger they will lose the hand touch or become slaves of technology or will it allow us to have masters in different areas of a more complex field?

I find that although I speak very little French, I am far more clueless about the dishes if I get an English carte, than if I see the names of the dishes in French. I also find that I am not alone in that regard. French is just a better language to describe food. I would have more sympathy for your location if I didn't live some 5,000 kilometers further away than you do. The restaurant sounds quite lovely and appealing.

Don't get your hopes up. I have an American friend who's been working and living in Paris part of the time and seems to be the very image of a petite svelte Parisian. She's got an apartment in Paris, but complains she still can't tie a scarf with the flair of a Parisian. She seems to have a good time nonetheless. Rambueau runs for some distance. Just off the western end is the rue Montorgueil, a pretty good shopping street for food. I seem to recall some cheese shops. They might not be worth crossing all of Paris, but if you're in the area and coming from most parts of the U.S., a cheese shop doesn't have to be fabulous on French terms to be fabulous.

The odds seem to decrease greatly every year. They were also doubled against getting a reservation the year they stopped doing both lunch and dinner. Four years ago I don't recall having a problem getting a reservation. Two years ago, we didn't make them early, but gave them a week or ten day span and they replied with a date outside our window. And that was after we met Alberto in Paris and propably required luck and a cancellation. We're overdue for a meal there. I only hope Luis appreciates that as much as we do. There's no doubt that there are other great restaurants in Catalunya and several of them are truly destination restaurants in every sense of the word. I'm beginning to suspect there are plenty of non destination restaurants that will make you happy to be there as well.

What a superb engaging article this is! ← Interesting concept here. Are the slimmest and most attractive Parisian women all wearing lace underpants. Certainly there's an investigation to be done. Please, research should be conducted without prejudice.

I've seen "mar i muntanya" from time to time on a menu and never given a thought to it's origin. I assume it was a traditional concept and I've been under the impression that it covered a range of combinations. I guess fifty years is long enough time to become tradition in gastronomic terms--especially in Catalunya. Oddly enough "surf and turf" in the US, conjures up the most banal of restaurants and the most banal of plates.

If I recall correctly, Passard is a Breton and I assume he's used to salt butter and developed a taste for it. Let's not forget that while we sit around and argue over the superiority of one product over another, to a great extent, it's a matter of subjective taste. We should also understand that not all sweet or salt butters are the same. At the very basic level, some butters have more butter fat than others and while salt takes up space in the mix and I believe it tends to increase the water content, it's possible to have a salt butter that's creamier than a sweet butter. How the milk is cooled and how the butter is made, along with the feed of the cow, have an effect on how hard or soft the butter will be. I'm not so smart, I just have McGee's new On Food and Cooking beside me.

eGullet Q&A with Harold McGee, November 8-12, 2004 Click here for access to the eGullet Q&A with Harold McGee. The forum oficially opens on November 8 when Harold McGee will join us. Members may start posting their questions in the meantime. We invite those who may be unfamiliar with Mr. McGee to read about Harold McGee. Following that post you will find a series of pre-release comments about the book in the next post. These have been forwared by the publisher and while most of us tend to take these blurbs with a grain of salt, a few of them are quite illuminating. The come from a wide range of clulinary figures including those members love and those members often seem to love to hate. I think all members and especially those who have read the original volume, will find the Introduction to the new edition worth reading. I'm very excited to have Harold McGee engage our members in an eGullet Q&A at this time for a number of reasons. The first edition of On Food and Cooking was, and is, an exceptionally influential book. It arrived at time when there was considerably less interest in science in professional and home kitchens. The second edition appears when cooks and chefs are hungry for the kind of information McGee has assembled. A generation ago, McGee's role was to spur an interest in science. Today it's to sate a growing thirst for knowledge and information. It seems that no matter where I allow the book to fall open, I am quickly absorbed and fascinated by what is written. If there's a challenge, it may be to find a boring page. I'll try to look for one with a very technical drawing and see if I'm bored or lost. I suspect it won't happen and I fear we will see fewer posts here on eGullet while our members devour the book. Looking at the positive side, they should all return and contribute to more stimulating discussions. If you've not noticed that food cooked in water looks and tasted different than the same food cooked in oil, or if you've noticed, but couldn't care less, this book may not be for you. Everyone one else will probably find it interesting and those with any sort of curiosity will likely find it fascinating. The information contained is hardly limited to the physical changes one experiences in cooking or why mayonnaise becomes mayonnaise. Summing up the range of the kind of information contained is too difficult a task. Each time I think I've got a grip on an inclusive phrase or sentence, I discover more lore outside my range. The greater part of the challenge amy have been in organizing all this material in a manner that makes for such easy and compelling reading

What struck me as over the line and not part of any report on what actually happened, but the frame of mind of the poster was this: Nothing in the post suggests to me that this was necessarily on the minds of the hosts/owners, but it offers some insight as to how the diners may have felt all through dinner and perhaps going into the meal. In general, I don't like to have other people tell me what a thrid party was actually thinking when they said something. It actually offends me. It's bad enough to have access to only one side of any encounter. It's worse yet to be told what the other party was thinking and didn't stay and in this case I think it makes me suspect a good deal of this should have stayed private because it comes across as too personal. There is also in the post an admission of at least some of the diners being all too willing to escalate the unpleasantness that detracts from the empathy I might otherwise feel, but I commend the honesty.

You're not going to find fresh piquillo peppers in a NYC greenmarket. In fact you'd have a hard enough time finding fresh piquillo peppers in Navarra even in season. Commerically they're grown for the canning industry and it's my understanding that most chefs in Spain work with canned piquillos. The best are roasted and peeled by hand. I don't know where to get these in NY, but I know they are served in restaurants, so they are imported. The brand recommended to me was Lodosa, which we bought in the Pais Vasco. Piquillo peppers are generally mild with a slight bite, but we've had some that were surprisingly piquant. There's plenty more to be found on piquillos if you do a search on the Spain forum.

It does seem a little weird for the main review to be of a restaurant in the same price range (or lower?) than the $25 and Under review. The clear message, in spite of the rather good review of Thomas Beisl, is that those restaurants reviewed in the $25 and Under column, aren't in the same league as those that get a real review and it's not price that makes the separation.

I think this is misleading, at least to those who haven't used a Michelin guide. The crossed forks and spoons (there are actually no knives) and the stars are two separate and parallel ratings. The forks and spoons denote a level of comfort or luxury. The stars are for the cooking or the quality of the meal. It's been argued that the decor and service figure into the qaulity of the meal as well when Michelin awards its stars, but it's still a separate rank. Not all restaurants have stars, but all restaurants are rated from one to five crossed forks and spoons. All of the three star restaurants in Paris have either four or five forks/spoons. When we get to the one star places in Paris, the range is from one fork and spoon all the way up to five and there are restaurants with five forks and spoons, but no stars at all.