Where my fellow cooks at???

[Shyster]

About a year ago I gave up volumetric measuring in the kitchen. Everything is weighed on digital scales now, and I write recipes in terms of percentages relative to the whole, or to the main ingredient, rather than as a collection of individual measures. Takes a lot of getting used to, but once you adapt your brain and your habits to this method, things go so much faster in the kitchen.

Interesting. I'm sure you know that's how professional bread bakers write their recipes (i.e. every non-flour ingredient is listed as a percentage of the weight of the flour), but I've never considered doing that for other recipes.

[Shyster]

If I had that much disposable money, I'd pay that for dinner at Noma in a heartbeat. When you go to places like that, it's so much more than just a meal. It's a totally immersive sensory escapade that you will remember for the rest of your life.

Bourdain spent an entire episode of Parts Unknown on Noma and Chef Redzepi. I appreciate what he's trying to do, but I think I personally would have a problem dropping that much bank on food that the Chef scraped off a rock sometime that morning. Plus, it seemed to be mostly vegetarian. If I'm dropping more than half a grand on a meal, something large and expensive better have died in the process.

[tifosi77]

Interesting. I'm sure you know that's how professional bread bakers write their recipes (i.e. every non-flour ingredient is listed as a percentage of the weight of the flour), but I've never considered doing that for other recipes.

Certainly. In fact, I believe that was the root of the movement for doing savory/dessert recipes this way. Modernist cooking is not about using six-syllable ingredients and $100,000 worth of lab equipment to make carrot soup (well.... not just about that. ); it is also an effort to strive for absolute consistency and repeatability. This is the hallmark of any great restaurant cook, but the modernist cook takes this concept to a new level. Hence the desire to find the most easily replicatable way of creating and sharing recipes led them (perhaps inevitably) to what bread bakers have been doing for centuries.

It does take some getting used to, but if you are already familiar with the methodology (I seem to recall you saying you liked baking your own bread some time ago, right?) you're better than halfway there.

Check out the Chef Steps recipe tool if you'd like to give it a go. The ingredient fields are logarithmically coded, so you can scale your recipe on demand either by changing the weight measure or the percentage. (You can also do that with their recipes that have already been posted, so if you're having a dinner party and only need to cook for 4 when their recipe as written serves 10, you can do that with one click)

[tifosi77]

If I had that much disposable money, I'd pay that for dinner at Noma in a heartbeat. When you go to places like that, it's so much more than just a meal. It's a totally immersive sensory escapade that you will remember for the rest of your life.

Bourdain spent an entire episode of Parts Unknown on Noma and Chef Redzepi. I appreciate what he's trying to do, but I think I personally would have a problem dropping that much bank on food that the Chef scraped off a rock sometime that morning. Plus, it seemed to be mostly vegetarian. If I'm dropping more than half a grand on a meal, something large and expensive better have died in the process.

It's funny, because I have the exact opposite reaction as you. Being exposed to things like that Parts Unknown episode, and Redzepi's appearances on Mind of a Chef, and the videos his publisher (Phaidon Press) published a couple years ago that utterly pique my interest in his cuisine. So where your reaction is you can't imagine having a meal that pricey without having a lot of dead critters in your belly, I'm looking at it from the perspective of being excited by the prospect of not needing a lot of dead animal matter in my belly to justify the expense of a meal like that (never mind the requisite trip to Denmark).

I am intrigued beyond belief by Rene Redzepi and what he and his team are doing at Noma. He and Alex Atala of D.O.M. in Brazil (and to a lesser extent, David Kinch at Manresa in Los Gatos, CA) are the most exiting chefs in the world right now exactly because of their laser focus on exploring new tastes and textures in the plant and veggie world.

[tifosi77]

For what it's worth, these are the Phaidon videos I was talking about:

Vintage carrot and camomile
[youtube][/youtube]

Asparagus and spruce
[youtube][/youtube]

The Sea
[youtube][/youtube]

Steamed Oyster
[youtube][/youtube]

The hen and the egg
[youtube][/youtube]

[columbia]

That dude would probably appreciate a scattered phenomenon in the Low Country: wild green onions.

They're not common, but they didn't natively grow here until Hurricane Hugo blew threw and brought the seeds. I've picked them a few times and they're pretty good.

[tifosi77]

Are they anything like wild leeks/ramps? Cos those are pretty effin great.

[columbia]

Hmmm, I've never had those, so I can't compare.

I made a coconut milk, potato, chick pea, green pea curry earlier this week and decided to add some spinach. However, I just dished out the heated curry in a bowl over the spinach leaves and stirred it a bit.
I HATE overcooked spinach and this retained the freshness of it. Very good.

[tifosi77]

Modernist Cuisine Is Static: This "Bagel" Is Proof, by John Mariani

Spoiler:

I hesitated to share this link, simply because I don't want to give an utter toolbox like Mariani any extra uniques. But if you know anything about John Mariani, you already know the credibility level he has. (Low) It's clear from reading his comments that he has no functional understanding of modernist cooking, and that he's partly intimidated by it.

Alan Sytsma at Grubstreet penned a pretty thorough rebuttal: John Mariani Says Modernist Cooking Is Over, Despite Plenty of Evidence to the Contrary

[tifosi77]

Also, that friend who ate at Noma this week? Yeah, while in Copenhagen she also ate at Kadeau (1 Michelin star) and last night on their return to France she ate at L’Arpège (Chef Alain Passard, 3 Michelin stars, currently ranked #16 in the world by Restaurant Magazine). Seriously, she's probably spent well north of $1,000 on those three meals.

[columbia]

1%ers

[eddysnake]

Also, that friend who ate at Noma this week? Yeah, while in Copenhagen she also ate at Kadeau (1 Michelin star) and last night on their return to France she ate at L’Arpège (Chef Alain Passard, 3 Michelin stars, currently ranked #16 in the world by Restaurant Magazine). Seriously, she's probably spent well north of $1,000 on those three meals.

Folks recent trip to France and they ate at Domaine des Hauts de Loire (Michelin 2 star) and me mum asked if she could order something to go for later. Chef did not like that

[Shyster]

1%ers

Yeah, that's a big reason I don't think I could enjoy a meal at some place like Noma. While I'm eating, I'd probably be constantly thinking something along the lines of "the cost for this one meal could probably buy me my own weight in delicious roadside barbecue, which to be honest I wouldn't enjoy eating any less than this stuff."

[the wicked child]

Random thought... Anyone have a good hot sausage recipe?

[blackjack68]

1%ers

:pop:

Yeah, that's a big reason I don't think I could enjoy a meal at some place like Noma. While I'm eating, I'd probably be constantly thinking something along the lines of "the cost for this one meal could probably buy me my own weight in delicious roadside barbecue, which to be honest I wouldn't enjoy eating any less than this stuff."

Preach on fellow fat and bald guy!

Amen!

[count2infinity]

Starting at noon and working clockwise:

Cayenne candied sweet potatoes (not as much sugar as normal ones, just enough to sweeten them up a bit)
Kale blanched then sauteed with bacon, mushrooms and garlic with a little balsamic vinegar
Homemade cranberry sauce
Roasted chicken with a little bit of homemade gravy
Green beans, blanched then sauteed with garlic, almonds, and a little soy sauce.

The wine is "Bishop" wine. Never tried it before, but it is delicious. It's a shiraz.


The wife also made some coffee cake that we'll be enjoying later with some decaf and Bailey's.

[Gaucho]

You're going to spoil all this with Bailey's?

[shmenguin]

Threw a tablespoon of garam masala into today's batch of chilli. Very excited to see the result.

[mac5155]

I just put some chili on also. I didn't have any onion though. I guess I could still go get one as I'm not gonna eat it until 7 tonight.. But I tried some onion soup. I really don't have a chili recipe.

[shmenguin]

Today's the first time I documented what I put in there. I need a solid, defined recipe

[mac5155]

Cheese with the chili. Yay or nay

[blackjack68]

Not for me, but I don't use beans either.

[the wicked child]

Cheese with the chili. Yay or nay

Depends on the chili.

[mac5155]

Not for me, but I don't use beans either.

I use 1 small can of beans and about 2 lbs of beef. Also I like the beef to be in big chunks.

[blackjack68]

I use ground beef and pork cubes.