Improving my cooking skills (2003)

[Chad]

Damn you people, I don't need another cookbook -- at least one that my wife knows about.

{sigh} I'm in.

Go on about your business. I'll get a running start and jump on the merry-go-round when I'm up to speed.

Truly, cool project guys.

Before we do the beef, someone's got to tell me how to find a good, reasonably priced Burgundy!

And Seth, try the E. Guigal Cotes du Rhone -- best $12 you'll spend this year. It's readily available, as far as I can tell. I like it better than Guigal's $30-40 Cotes Roti, Chateauneuf du Pape, etc. A good Burgundy bargain.

Edited October 28, 2003 by Chad (log)

[Dave the Cook]

A bit off-topic but I've done worse . . .

I looked in the Chef's Catalog that appeared in the mailbox recently.

Wustof has a cool pair but $140 marked down to $80.

Yet the catalog lists a (nearly identical) pair from Chef'sChoice with a sale price of $40.

Thoughts?

Those look identical to me, except for the logos and the fact that the listed dimensions are different. But I can think of a couple of different ways to measure them, so I'm not concerned. For forty bucks, I might spring for real poultry shears. Chef's Choice is a good brand.

As for the torch, go to Home Depot. For $12, you can get a decent propane torch. (You can get it on the same trip as theone for the chain saw.) It won't have the fancy stand, but it will make a bigger flame, which, counterintuitively, is more controllable -- and faster. Or, (sigh), use brown sugar, per adoxograph.

edit: got the price right the second time

[SethG]

As for the torch, go to Home Depot. For $12, you can get a decent propane torch.

Really??!! Twelve dollars? I was going to say there's no way I'm buying a torch, but for twelve bucks....

[Dave the Cook]

As for the torch, go to Home Depot. For $12, you can get a decent propane torch.

Really??!! Twelve dollars? I was going to say there's no way I'm buying a torch, but for twelve bucks....

Flame on!

[marie-louise]

... I may have missed some of the ground rules...

To recap, we are cooking more or less the same meal at more or less the same time to:

1) encourage each other that we need more cookbooks

2) encourage each other to buy additional kitchen tools.

Did I miss anything?

[Dave the Cook]

And Seth, try the E. Guigal Cotes du Rhone -- best $12 you'll spend this year. It's readily available, as far as I can tell. I like it better than Guigal's $30-40 Cotes Roti, Chateauneuf du Pape, etc. A good Burgundy bargain.

Thanks for the wine tip, Chad, and welcome.

As long as were here, I'm going to expose my wine ignorance. As I understand it:

- Pinot noir is characteristic of Burgundy.

- Grenache, syrah, mouvedre and cisnault are characteristic of Cote du Rhone wines.

But both are Burgundies, right?

Jacques is pretty insistent on a pinot noir for cooking (but then suggests a Cab for drinking).

For a braised dish, and in the absence of the sort of specificity that Jacques provides, I would normally use a blend of some sort, and I'd tend towards a fruity version of it, if that's the right way to refer to the grenache-syrah blends from Australia, South America and Spain. Comments? Should I stick to Pinot Noir?

[Dave the Cook]

... I may have missed some of the ground rules...

To recap, we are cooking more or less the same meal at more or less the same time to:

1) encourage each other that we need more cookbooks

2) encourage each other to buy additional kitchen tools.

Did I miss anything?

No, that's about it.

[SethG]

Is a Northern Rhone wine really considered Burgundy??? This is news to me, but I don't pretend to know. Chad may very well be right. Paging Craig Camp. Paging Craig Camp.

I think I can say with some confidence, however, that when a recipe calls for Burgundy, Pinot Noir is what they're talking about. That's what I assume, anyway.

Edited October 28, 2003 by SethG (log)

[Dave the Cook]

Is a Northern Rhone wine really considered Burgundy???

I was going by Chad's remark:

. . . A good Burgundy bargain . . .

[col klink]

And, Dave, I'm just not feeling a purchase of that blow-torch.  (I think I'd rather save for a chain-saw.  The back 40 needs more work.)

Dude, the blowtorch is totally cool.

I bought mine at a metal works shop in the industrial district of Seattle for about $20 (with attachments, it was a kit). I totally embarassed myself though when I picked it up. I had just walked around the place for an hour picking up sheetmetal and angle iron to build a new smoker, checking out the place. Industrial size castors, shitloads of plate steel up to 2" thick, you know, big manly stuff when before we leave I check out the shop and find the blow torch amongst the rest of the burly welding supplies. All these guys are walking around in their heavy duty work cloths all grimy and dirty and I say "cool! this would be perfect for creme brulee!"

[hjshorter]

For a vegetarian version of this week, I'll skip out on the Beef (no one will be around to eat it) and sub in the Gratin of Eggplant, Tomato and Zucchini - pg 201 of J & J. 

Won't sub the Creme Brulee for anything, because it's creme brulee and therefore it is always welcome in my home.

That gratin looks delicious. Let us know how it turns out. And what creme brulee recipe should we use?

I'm buying a kitchen torch. Scott has a blowtorch for jewelry making, but I don't want it in the kitchen.

Matt - that is hilarious.

Edited October 28, 2003 by hjshorter (log)

[hjshorter]

Damn you people, I don't need another cookbook -- at least one that my wife knows about.

{sigh} I'm in.

Go on about your business. I'll get a running start and jump on the merry-go-round when I'm up to speed.

Truly, cool project guys.

Yay Chad! There's always room for another cookbook.

And I second the Guigal Cote de Rhone.

[Chad]

Is a Northern Rhone wine really considered Burgundy???  This is news to me, but I don't pretend to know.  Chad may very well be right.  Paging Craig Camp.  Paging Craig Camp.

I think I can say with some confidence, however, that when a recipe calls for Burgundy, Pinot Noir is what they're talking about.  That's what I assume, anyway.

Ack, my bad. I just checked my "Larousse Encyclopedia of Wine." Looks like the northern Rhone ends just below Lyons, where the Burgundy region begins. Sorry 'bout that, folks.

Still, it's a good bottle of wine.

Chad

[SethG]

Ack, my bad. I just checked my "Larousse Encyclopedia of Wine." Looks like the northern Rhone ends just below Lyons, where the Burgundy region begins. Sorry 'bout that, folks.

Still, it's a good bottle of wine.

Chad

You'll get no "Chad-enfreude" from me, dude.

I looked it up too, and found that most Cotes du Rhone is Southern, not Northern Rhone, as I posited above. And, also news to me, Beaujolais apparently is Burgundy.

There's nothing wrong with recommending good Cotes du Rhone-- I only wish other regions, like Burgundy and California, had such affordable good wines.

Edited October 28, 2003 by SethG (log)

[MatthewB]

Ack, my bad. I just checked my "Larousse Encyclopedia of Wine." Looks like the northern Rhone ends just below Lyons, where the Burgundy region begins. Sorry 'bout that, folks.

Still, it's a good bottle of wine.

Chad

You'll get no "Chad-enfreude" from me, dude.

I looked it up too, and found that most Cotes du Rhone is Southern, not Northern Rhone, as I posited above. And, also news to me, Boujoulais apparently is Burgundy.

There's nothing wrong with recommending good Cotes du Rhone-- I only wish other regions, like Burgundy and California, had such affordable good wines.

*pssstttt*

Languedoc & the Roussillon plus Spain. Search out Mourvedre blends.

[SethG]

Hey, why don't we cook this:

Another new dish, just coming onto the menu, is duck cooked in the signature Ducasse style: sealed in a vacuum bag with seasonings and wet-cooked to a uniform medium-rare temperature throughout. The result is beautiful, as is the underlying female Pekin duck from Four Story Hill Farms in Pennsylvania (where Mix gets pork as well). The chunks of breast are topped with a mixture of orange zest, minced olives, bread crumbs, and brown butter. On the side, braised endives.

Sounds easy, right?

Edited to add grin, in case anyone thought I might be serious.

Edited October 28, 2003 by SethG (log)

[hjshorter]

Hey, why don't we cook this:

Another new dish, just coming onto the menu, is duck cooked in the signature Ducasse style: sealed in a vacuum bag with seasonings and wet-cooked to a uniform medium-rare temperature throughout. The result is beautiful, as is the underlying female Pekin duck from Four Story Hill Farms in Pennsylvania (where Mix gets pork as well). The chunks of breast are topped with a mixture of orange zest, minced olives, bread crumbs, and brown butter. On the side, braised endives.

Sounds easy, right?

Edited to add grin, in case anyone thought I might be serious.

Uh, yeah. I don't have a vaccuum sealer. Although the garnish sounds mighty good.

And I will confess to not liking rare duck. Or rare lamb.

[Dave the Cook]

Hey, why don't we cook this:

Another new dish, just coming onto the menu, is duck cooked in the signature Ducasse style: sealed in a vacuum bag with seasonings and wet-cooked to a uniform medium-rare temperature throughout. The result is beautiful, as is the underlying female Pekin duck from Four Story Hill Farms in Pennsylvania (where Mix gets pork as well). The chunks of breast are topped with a mixture of orange zest, minced olives, bread crumbs, and brown butter. On the side, braised endives.

Sounds easy, right?

Edited to add grin, in case anyone thought I might be serious.

Oh hell, I did this just last night. Except I used a castrated male duck instead of a female.

[edemuth]

And what creme brulee recipe should we use?

Heather, there is one in J&J and another in Dessert Circus... I like DC's directions better, but am willing to go with J&J for consistency's sake.

Does anyone else feel like messing around with puff pastry sometime soon? I have my eye on the pithiviers recipe in DC (or, as I refer to it, Just Jacques).

[hjshorter]

And what creme brulee recipe should we use?

Heather, there is one in J&J and another in Dessert Circus... I like DC's directions better, but am willing to go with J&J for consistency's sake.

Does anyone else feel like messing around with puff pastry sometime soon? I have my eye on the pithiviers recipe in DC (or, as I refer to it, Just Jacques).

I'll go with J & J's recipe.

I checked DC out from the library and really like the looks of it. It may be one to buy if I can find it used.

Edited October 28, 2003 by hjshorter (log)

[maggiethecat]

it made a lot of sauce

I apologize, my dear friends, for poking my nose into this wonderful thread when I'm not yet a participant. But Heather's comment on the volume of sauce reminds me that I found this true when I made this recipe.

And then I slapped my forehead and yelled "D'Oh!"

Unlike us, the French always have a loaf of bread on the table, so that sea of sauce is never going to go to waste.

[hjshorter]

I was pleasantly surprised to open my deep freeze today and find a largish hunk o'beef, perfect for braising.

[SethG]

Speaking of desserts: have any of you used Payard's Simply Sensational Desserts? We have it at home, and my wife has made a lemon tart from it several times that's really very nice.

[Chad]

Grrrr. I think someone else in Wichita is playing along . . . and not playing fairly.

I was at the library yesterday to check out J&J. I know they have it, I've borrowed it before.

Not there.

Check the computer -- the book has been reported as "lost." Hmmm

Check Torres' "Dessert Circus." Also "lost." And with the same checkout/return dates as J&J.

Bastard.

Chad

[Dave the Cook]

Speaking of desserts:  have any of you used Payard's Simply Sensational Desserts?  We have it at home, and my wife has made a lemon tart from it several times that's really very  nice.

I think I counted 300 books in the cooking stacks at my house. But this thread has exposed innumerable flaws in my collection.

Chad: if it helps, be happy that your library has even heard of Jacques Torres. Mine is far more acquainted with the culinary talents of Suzanne Somers, Al Roker (not too awful, actually) and Dom DeLuise.