Where my fellow cooks at???

[PensFanInDC]

We've eaten at his brother's place here in L.A., ink. Prior to Spain, that was actually my most favorite restaurant meal, even though there was one dish in particular that I just didn't care for.

The Votaggio brothers' cookbook is completely awesome, one of the best modernist books out there.

I'd say Volt was the best restaurant meal I've ever had. The total experience is the deciding factor. We could choose from a 7 or 9 course (i think) meal. We chose the 9 which included a cheese course and a fruit course that was not in the 7 course selection. The wife had 2 glasses of wine and I had 2 of the most incredible old fashions I have ever had. They were served on the rock...one giant spherical cube that was obviously made with distilled water because it was crystal clear.

What I really want to do is get a bunch of people together and dine at table 21. It's a 22 course meal at a table in the kitchen where you can watch them work. $600 for the table. Alcohol is extra.

[pittsoccer33]

What I really want to do is get a bunch of people together and dine at table 21. It's a 22 course meal at a table in the kitchen where you can watch them work. $600 for the table. Alcohol is extra.

When you have something like that how big is each course? I cant imagine them being larger than a fork or two full of food because if they are you'd be full halfway thru.

I'm not sure how I'd feel sitting in the kitchen - I really would prefer NOT to see how my food is made. I imagine most restaurants look like this:

[tifosi77]

There's a huge misconception about food safety and safe cooking temperatures.

The USDA says that a beef steak is only safe to eat if it has been cooked to 145°F internal. The USDA calls this 'medium rare'. I call it shoe leather. Actual medium rare (when not defined by well meaning bureaucratic fools) is only 130-140°F..... and even this is too much cooking for my taste. I prefer the top end of rare (125-130°F), and if I know the producer or butcher I'm happy to eat 'bleu rare', which is 115-120°F. (The lower in temp you go, the more lean the meat should be; unless you get the fat hot enough to render, it will just be more or less like eating lard. And that is pretty undelicious.)

The government guidelines are crafted the way they are because the way most people cook involves high heat and relatively short periods of time. This means you have to raise the temperature to a higher degree to assure yourself of killing bacteria. But implicit in that is the fact that killing bacteria is function of temperature and time. You can achieve the same goal at a lower cooking temp if you just hold the product at that temp for a longer period of time. This is why I prefer the low-temp methods I'm always going on about.

The only things I cook over high heat now are relatively thin cuts that you can cook quickly, like flank and skirt steaks. And those are always on the grill.

But know that any time you consume 'undercooked' food there is a risk of foodborne illness. That's incontrovertible. It's just a question of risk-reward. To me, the risk is exceedingly low - 99.99999% of all bacteria will be on the surface of a fabricated cut of meat, as that's the only bit that's exposed to air. And you sear that over heat that's much higher than 140°F, so you're good to go there. A healthy muscle will not have any bacteria on the inside. So unless you buy your meat from a purveyor who injects the fabricated cuts with chemicals and brines and stuff to artificially manipulate color and texture, thereby carrying some of the surface critters to the inside, the real risk of getting sick from eating 'undercooked' meat is minuscule. Frankly, it's just not worth worrying about, so long as you properly source your food. YMMV.

My wife and I have had food poisoning once in our lives. It was either gelato or pizza consumed in Florence, Italy on our honeymoon. (Those were the only things we both ate the day we got sick) Conversely, I've had horse sashimi in Japan, and chicken tartare. I can eat my body weight in raw fish without batting an eye. I'm fine.

[shmenguin]

eww...you're gross

[PensFanInDC]

What I really want to do is get a bunch of people together and dine at table 21. It's a 22 course meal at a table in the kitchen where you can watch them work. $600 for the table. Alcohol is extra.

When you have something like that how big is each course? I cant imagine them being larger than a fork or two full of food because if they are you'd be full halfway thru.

I'm not sure how I'd feel sitting in the kitchen - I really would prefer NOT to see how my food is made. I imagine most restaurants look like this:

Spoiler:

1) The courses are small. For example this is a meat course:



2) Those are not pictures of one of the most prestigious restaurants in Maryland. Those are pictures of Golden Corral. Not exactly the same thing.

[pittsoccer33]

i googled horse sashimi



it has to be cultural, but i just dont think of horsemeat as something you eat. ditto goat brains or eel brains or whatever that whacko eats on the travel channel. to me thats like eating decomposing sawdust or a power cord.

[PensFanInDC]

I've eaten raw eggs and raw ground beef (steak tartare with a raw quail egg). I challenge tifosi to a sashimi eating contest. If you serve me a steak that is cooked anything past medium rare I will send it back. If I had only one protein I was allowed to eat for the rest of my life it would be raw tuna.

[pittsoccer33]

do you stick a meat thermometer in all steaks? i wouldve thought piercing them would be a no-no.

i learned to use a cast iron skillet from suggestions on this board. ive been very happy with how filet mignon turns out and to a slightly lesser extent strip steaks, but not so much with ribeye. should they all go to different temperatures? should i get a thermometer?

why is raw tuna more desirable than cooked tuna? flavor? consistency? i always thought seafood was gross but the tuna steak i tasted recently was really really good. i guess it was some kind of rare.

ketchup is my #1 favorite food. i love the way it tastes on almsot everything. maybe that happened because everything we had growing up was cooked past 160 or so

[tifosi77]

When you have something like that how big is each course? I cant imagine them being larger than a fork or two full of food because if they are you'd be full halfway thru.

Yes, that's precisely it; no course is going to be more than about 4-5 bites. No matter what we're eating, our palates adjust after those first few bits, and so we tend to perceive the food as not quite as flavorful as it was just 45 seconds ago. The idea behind a tasting menu is that the whole meal is nothing more than those first 4-5 'fresh' bites. New flavors, new textures, multiple preparations of the same ingredient. Your palate is constantly being reset and recharged.

For example, that big meal we had at Arzak started out with five amusements. Each served individually, none of them were more than 2 bites (one was actually a warm soup drank as a shot), and all were presented and consumed within about seven minutes of the start of the meal. From there, the courses did get gradually larger.... but they also got more spaced out. All in, the final 12 courses took 2 hours and 20 minutes.

I'm not sure how I'd feel sitting in the kitchen - I really would prefer NOT to see how my food is made.

It's called 'Chef's Table', and it's a pretty common thing among high-end restaurants. Some places are trying to expand that concept into a dining experience that's a little less exclusive; bar-like setups, or 'kitchens in the round', where all guests can view the chefs at work. (If not cooking, then at least assembling the final dishes at the pass) The best new restaurant in L.A. is actually in an old pizza joint, and they kept the main counter in place. There are no servers, and the chefs and cooks all deliver each dish to the diners themselves.

[tifosi77]

it has to be cultural, but i just dont think of horsemeat as something you eat. ditto goat brains or eel brains or whatever that whacko eats on the travel channel. to me thats like eating decomposing sawdust or a power cord.

You're missing out on offal. Brains and sweetbreads are fantastic, perhaps my favorite parts of the beasts.

Horse wasn't that big a deal. In fact, it's nutritionally more advantageous than beef critter.

[tifosi77]

do you stick a meat thermometer in all steaks? i wouldve thought piercing them would be a no-no.

i learned to use a cast iron skillet from suggestions on this board. ive been very happy with how filet mignon turns out and to a slightly lesser extent strip steaks, but not so much with ribeye. should they all go to different temperatures? should i get a thermometer?

why is raw tuna more desirable than cooked tuna? flavor? consistency? i always thought seafood was gross but the tuna steak i tasted recently was really really good. i guess it was some kind of rare.

ketchup is my #1 favorite food. i love the way it tastes on almsot everything. maybe that happened because everything we had growing up was cooked past 160 or so

Abso-floggin'-lootely get a thermometer. I consider a probe thermometer to be the second most important thing in meat cookery, behind only the meat itself.

I recommend a needle probe thermometer, simply because they make a smaller hole.

[PensFanInDC]

why is raw tuna more desirable than cooked tuna? flavor? consistency? i always thought seafood was gross but the tuna steak i tasted recently was really really good. i guess it was some kind of rare.

To me it's a mixture of texture and flavor. I think raw tuna is the most amazing texture of any food in the world. I also think cooking tuna damages some of the subtle flavors that raw tuna has. Cooking it brings out a lot of the low notes in the meat. I prefer the lighter, almost acidic but not, flavors of the raw.

[mac5155]

I used to always get well. I usually get medium now, sometimes medium rare if im confident about the place i'm at.

[pittsoccer33]

The first time I ever went to a "nice" restaurant must've been Lemont for a fraternity banquet in college. That was also the first time I got a filet mignon, and first time I ever had fresh green beans. I assume it was medium or lower.

My first trip to a prime steak house was Mortons in DC in 2011. I asked the server what he recommended, which was medium rare. I got this enourmous porterhouse t-bone that I loved.

[PensFanInDC]

Mortons isn't bad. The Prime Rib in Baltimore is better. I got a 48oz prime rib and ate the whole damn thing. And then I drove from Bmore to downtown DC to play a show. That was one of the most uncomfortable situations I have ever been in. I didn't touch red meat for 18 months.

[mac5155]

There is no way you get a total of 48oz of prime rib out of one single cow.

[columbia]

Or out of your system before a rock show.

[mac5155]

lol

unless you use the same way it came in.

[PensFanInDC]

There is no way you get a total of 48oz of prime rib out of one single cow.

Um....what?

[PensFanInDC]

lol

unless you use the same way it came in.

Thought about it. I had the meat sweats all the way down to DC. Got on stage and was just dripping with sweat. Stomach was all bloated. Terrible...

[mac5155]

There is no way you get a total of 48oz of prime rib out of one single cow.

Um....what?

Was it all meat is what I mean. The prime rib is the back 6 ribs on the cow. Each rib is like 6 ounces of "prime" meat if it's a big cow. What im saying is I dont know how you get one 48 ounce cut of prime rib from a healthy cow.

[mac5155]

Im thinking Filet Mignon.

[pittsoccer33]

they serve these cows there

[tifosi77]

Im thinking Filet Mignon.

Yeah, I was gonna say. A 48-oz prime rib isn't even that big. It's only about half the primal.

But there's no doubt that it's pre-cook weight with the bones in.

[PensFanInDC]

Im thinking Filet Mignon.

Yeah, I was gonna say. A 48-oz prime rib isn't even that big. It's only about half the primal.

But there's no doubt that it's pre-cook weight with the bones in.

Oh yes...bone was still in for sure. It was still a monster of a steak.