jaybee

It's not. You are saying what difference does it make if your rational mind clouds your emotional or sensory response as long as you come to the "correct conclusions."

Yes, the last rising is after the loaves are formed. I am following Julia Childs' recipe here, as published in The Way to Cook. I found the same recipe in six or seven other books by different authors. I didn't change ovens,as I have only one. The temperature is turned down to 400F. But I suppose the oven probably loses only 10-15 degrees in ten minutes. I used this to bake two loaves for the bread event and they came out pretty good. I left the loaves to rise for nearly 3 hours. The finished product was pretty dense and chewy. It got good reviews at the party, but I don't know what someone with very high standards would say.

Ah, now I understand your perplexity. You are focussing on a destination. I am focussing on the journey. It becomes clear to me now.

I was not applying the criteria of market success to assessment of greatness. Bob Dylan had more impact on the lives of more people than Blumenthal ever will, and both use creativity and technique to further their art.

I can't read this any other way then to say that the acquisition of knowledge, and the desire to acquire knowledge, can be bad because it can possibly lead to less sensual pleasure in life. Is that what you are saying? If so, I think that is bogus. We are wired the way we are wired but I can't think of anything that becomes less enjoyable because we have acquired superior knowledge. In fact, as I was trying to say, really good things become even more enjoyable. But unfortunately, there are also fewer really good things because your standards are now higher. OK, so you are saying, in answer to my question, "no, no way." Fine. I can accept that as your view. I can also accept that some people do get so involved with rational critique that they stop themselves from letting their emotions through, since they see that as a threat to their objectivity. And some people put a very high price on being objective.

I bought a pound of these delicious little morsels tonight and sauteed them in olive in and garlic, seasoned with cayenne pepper. Very tasty. "Popcorn shrimp" are made from these as well. What other ways can they be cooked and used? And by the way, are they just a very small shrimp (funny redundancy) or something else?

The "standard" recipe for 2 14" baguettes is 3 1/2 cups "bread" flour, active yeast dissolved in 1 1/3 cups of water (more or less), 2 1/4 tsps of salt, and 1 Tbs of wheat or rye flour. The dough goes through three rises of 1-1.5 hours each at 70-75 degress F. After each of the first two rises, the dough is firmy kneeded and pushed firmly to deflate them and distribute the yeast throughout the dough. The loaves are formed after the second rising. They are baked in a stone lined oven, with steam at the start, at 450 degrees F for 20 minutes or so, and another 10 minutes, give or take, at 400 degrees F. When the internal temp of the loaf reaches 200 degrees F, they are done. Assuming this recipe is followed and good quality ingredients are used, how can quality decline. Are the bakers using crummy flour, rushing the rises, or doing a lousy job of kneading?

Left brain/right brain is a popular way to talk about rational and the emotional processing. The right brain is, I think, responsible for irrational and emotional mental process and the left brain, for rational process. Now I know people who are excessively right or left brainers. I also know people who have become so obsessed with applying learned high standards (rational) that they color their experiences to the extent that they never seem exited or emotionally moved by an experience. It's as though their reactions are first screened through their left brain before their right brain is allowed to afffect them. I know people who, when you tell them a killer joke, nod affirmation, as though to say "yes, that's funny." They don't laugh, you see.. You can't tell me you haven't known such people. Now it may be that they are wired that way from an early age, or even genetically. My question asked if it can also be a learned process, caused by an overzealous involvement with critical analysis. I was not saying (or implying) that high standards are, per force, bad, but whether they do bad things to some people. Now maybe you think this is a trivial or irrelevant question and chose to make a different argument to a different question. If so, start your own thread.

Why is that the case. One could compare them on the basis of innovation creativity, social impact, musical complexity, sonority (sonerousness?), effectiveness of communicating the artist's intent and other criteria I could think of if I took more time. I would not be uncomfortable with such comparisons, despite the differences in genre and audience size. That's like sayng you can't compare the cooking of one chef over another if they cook different items. One might demonstrate a higher level of skill consistently across many dishes, while the other might shine with just one.

Wilf?

Maybe I should have called this thread "decent into the maelstrom."

Would Ed Schoenfeld please post the recipe of the mushroom dish he brought with the name of the Chinese variety of mushroom? I looked for it at Fairway today, but alas.

How about Germany, where all the stores close at 4 or 5 pm, just when people get out of work? So everyone who has a day job has to go shopping on Saturday between 9 and 12 noon or they're out of luck. These laws were originated when women didn't work, so they could shop all day. They are 30 years out of date. It's nuts. Yet (I think) the labor unions lobby effectively to keep it that way.

Do I read you right? Are you claiming that it is wrong to use my subjective point of view about sensual enjoyment to criticize people who don't share my point of view? Oh horrors. What a terrible thing to do. Sensual enjoyment is not subjective. It can be measured on a quantitative scale. It is a linear dimension. My question seeks to determine whether culinary analysis has a negative beta coefficient in relation to sensual enjoyment, or whether there can be colinearity between them. I even accept the possibiity that they can be positively correlated, using parametric statistics. Using non-parametrics, there is no question that they can.

Actually, I recall we had the same assessment of that meal, dish for dish. We both thought the board had gotten too dull and needed some (on-topic) controversy, which is what led me to start this topic.

Jaymsie, not to sound smug, if I can't give a first rate hug, I'd rather shrug. High quality standards, you know.

If we are talking Babbo, with Toby, the Browns and Mrs. P, we all ordered off the menu, since you pissed off the waitress by asking if the kitchen would cook for us and she didn't understand you. Or are you referrrng to our last Blue Hill meal with Stella Bella, where Michael did cook for us and we got better food than the people ordering off the menu? That meal was mixed. I recall one or two dishes that were good and two that were not.

You mean "could have had." You might have enjoyed it for other reasons we didn't notice and you could have made the convincing argument. Are you choossing to ignore what I said were the reasons I (seemingly) enjoyed it more than you. Except for the lamb chops we ate different things, you know. Or is it your opinion that I am wrong in having enjoyed the things I ate more than you enjoyed the things you ate?

'Cos it's fun. And Steve yes you did enjoy New Tayyab and you were fun to dine with. So maybe Jaybee's NOT talking about you after all. I am not talking about Steve. Dining with Steve is fun. You can count on him to sniff out what's good and order it. Except for the time he had us all eat fondue at Artisinal. But I took that as an abberation, not a measure of his standards.

The starter salad I had with lambs tongue was delicious. It's dressing has always been to my liking. The beef cheeks ravioli with truffle sauce were delicious. Every time I've eaten them at Babbo, I've enjoyed them. The giant prawns were mealy and not very tasty. The lamb chops were not hot enough, but the meat was good quality, the degree of doneness was right, and the seasoning was tasty. The wine you chose was very good and went very well with the food. The desserts were so so, but not unpleasant. The people at the table were interesting and fun to be with. I sat next to Toby, which is always a delight. But now I reread your perspective, I guess I am wrong. If I knew more or had more experience with that kind of meal, on balance, I would have had a much less enjoyable time.

Yes, it was wong. The Babbo discussion, which I had with Toby at DiFara's was prompted by the dinner I had with my friends, but I brought it up with Toby because she was at the Babbo dinner, so it is related. The question was also prompted by our discussion of how good the pizza was at DiFara's and how it measured up with other "bests" we'd eaten. It is true that I did enjoy the Babbo meal more than you, or at least I talked more about what I liked about the meal while you talked more about what you didn't like. That is another aspect of hypercriticism that interests me. I find some people prone to talk almost entirely about what they don't like. Reminds me of Schroeder in Peanuts, who walks around with a dark cloud over his head. Boo to that!

Well I was at that meal in question. And the reason we didn't enjoy the meal as much as you is because we have more experience both at that restaurant and probably eating that type of meal then you do. So our sphere of experience is different then yours. That is my entire point. Your liking it is relative to your sphere of experience which is fine. But maybe if you had eaten there a half dozen more times, and you had eaten in a half dozen contemporary Paris bistros recently, you would have felt differently about it. Yeah, jaybee, maybe if you were more experienced you would have hated it too. Don't feel bad; you'll get there

Well I was at that meal in question. And the reason we didn't enjoy the meal as much as you is because we have more experience both at that restaurant and probably eating that type of meal then you do. No, Steve I was not referring to Babbo or any other meal with you. I was referring to a meal I had with two old friends I hadn't seen in a while. Since I had last seen them they had gotten more into food and wine. I was reminded of the quote "A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again." Alexander Pope (1688-1744) - An Essay on Criticism . I will ignore your proposed reason why I enjoyed that meal more than you.

Yeah, we Americans are so stupid, ignorant and dumb. Gosh, it never fails to amaze me. I wonder how we became the richest, most powerful and most successful nation on earth populated with such idiots?

Thank you britcook. I had a feeling my relatively simple question would stir the pot, but I was also looking for views on the question. It was prompted by dining with some old friends who had become "gastronomes" and "oenophiles" and I was struck by their inabilities to enjoy the meal and wine for the shortcomings they found. It may be that, in the early stages of gastronomoelia, some think it is more important to be critical than it is to enjoy. As they mellow, the realization that it is possible to both dawns.