Quote of the Day

"People are more violently opposed to fur than to leather because it's easier to harass rich women than it is motorcycle gangs."

- Bumper Sticker

Come Back

Shane Bobgrrl, Come Back!

Musical Geography Question of the Day

If your car's got an overdrive that just won't stall, what mountain pass are you crossing?

Bullet the Blue Sky

No, not the U2 song.

If you like Bourbon & Coke, I highly recommend this combination instead: Bulleit Bourbon and Blue Sky Natural Cola. Mmmmmmmm...........

Learning Curve

There's a new Barbecue joint in town, it's called the Howling Coyote. That brings to 5 the places I know of in Eugene that make real pit smoked barbecue -- three sit-downs (Howling Coyote, Hole in the Wall, and Papa's Soul Food Kitchen) and two walk-ups (Tony's and this place I saw in passing this week but didn't catch the name of). We've tried three of them: Hole in the Wall is ok, but it's way overpriced and it's a bit on the dry side. Tony's kicks serious smoky ass. H.C. is good food, but the service is lacklustre (I'm surprised to realize that, while I'm committed to being the best chef I can be some day, when I'm a customer, I'm more critical of poor service than of disappointing food), and the meat portions are small for what you pay. Papa's Soul Food Kitchen has an awesome reputation, but so far it's always been closed or SRO when TFR and I have wanted to go. Crowds and a 2-year-old do no mix well. The last place is a mystery.

We ate at H.C. tonight -- TFR had been there, I had not. The food was good -- the Brisket was moist and tender, though the smoke ring was a might thin for my taste, and given that I paid $9.00 for a platter that was served on plastic, I expected a little more than the 4 oz. or so of it I got. TFR's ribs were good -- I'd argue that my Brisket beats theirs, but their ribs beat mine, especially if you like dry style.

But here was the part I found amusing, and revealing regarding the learning curve here in Eugene rtegarding good barbecue. When we got there, they had run out of pulled pork, and before our food arrived the chicken disappeared too. By the time we had finished eating, the ribs and brisket were gone, and they were closing down -- twenty minutes ahead of time. As we were paying the check, a young man walked in, and got huffy when told they were closing. As we walked out the door, we saw a couple getting out of their car. We let them know that they were closed because they were out of meat. It took them a minute to get it... "Didn't they just open for business recently?"

Folks, this is BARBECUE. They smoke this meat for 12-14 hours. As I'm typing this, they're loading in the Boston butts and briskets that will be eaten tomorrow afternoon. They're making estimates NOW about how much business they'll get TOMORROW. It's not like a regular restaurant where they fire the food when you order it. It's being fired now, and tomorrow, when it's gone, it's gone. Just like happened tonight.

I've heard of places in Texas where people will stand in line for an hour or more, and even then be taking their chances -- often they'll get to the front of the line only to be informed that the food is gone. Are you serious about barbecue? Then you get there EARLY. That's the way it's done.

A few people get it -- this is, after all, the destination location of the Great Migration, people have over the generations moved here from all over, and are still arriving, and those people bring with them the cultural knowledge of their place of origin. But Eugene has a lot to learn about Barbecue.

An empty stomach is a small price to pay for knowledge.

Pondering Life's Deeper Mysteries

What ever happened to Love Potions Numbers 1-8?

Musical Geography Question of the Day

From where was a brave young Indian you should remember well?

Musical Geography Question of the Day

Where is there a shadow on the door?

Boy Howdy

A Tip of the Toque to Professor Chaos for this idea. I'm going to try getting back into the swing of blogging by starting a new feature: Sous What?, a semi-regular post in which I will answer some culinary question posed by a reader. Bearing in mind that I'm still a culinary student and not a culinarian yet, let alone an actual chef, some questions will require I do some research before answering. But this weeks question, posed by the aforementioned Professor Chaos, I can answer now:

What's the difference between a marinade with a base of water vs. having a base of oil?

The main differese is that water-based marinades, and their close relatives brines, will dry food, especially red meat, out more than oil-based marinades. This is largely due to the salinity of the marinades (hence the term brine). Fat, which is what oil is, just vegetable fat, preserves moistness. It seems counter-intuitive, but that's how it works, especially with grilling, frying and sauteeing. Add some acid to cut the fat -- red wine, citrus juice, and vinegar being the top three options.

That's not to say that fatless marinades don't have their place. If you plan to use a moist heat cooking method, such as braising or stewing, dryness isn't going to be an issue.

And there are, of course, exceptions to every rule. Slow cooked food is the exception in this case. Alton Brown recommends brining turkey to make it moister. Smoked fish is brined then dried, creating a layer called a pellicle that retains moinsture in the meat. And when I barbecue brisket, I marinate it in a fatless marinade, but one that's fairly low in salt, and it's further mitigated by the way the meat is cooked -- fat cap up, so all that yummy fat melts into the meat. But for leaner cuts of meat, and cooking on a grill or stovetop, I'd go with an oil-based marinade.

CORRECTION:

My Chef Instructor has made it clear to me that brine-based marinades and brines CAN be used on thinner cust od meat, but the amount of time they're used is decreased -- any longer and drying will occur. The general rule of thumb is 1 lb. of salt per gallon of water, which results in a brine of about 20% salinity. This salinity is optimized for penetrating 1/2" of meat per side per hour. That means an inch-thich steak is being penetrated from both sides and needs on 1 hour in the marinade.

Musical Geography Question of the Day

If She's workin' four to twelve at Trucker's World tonight, where are you?

Scotland The Brave

A la the Dropkick Murphys.

Something to Blog About

You were all right. All it took was something to talk about.

The culinary and food service industry has one of the highest, perhaps the highest, rates of charitable giving, volunteerism, and community activism of any industry in the country. One of the things I appreciate about the culinary program at LCC is that while they're teaching us the basic skills to become cooks, they're also instilling in us the mindset of chefs. Today was a prime example. We didn't have regular classes, but rather spent the morning and afternoon at a charitable event called Project Homeless Connect, sonsored by Food for Lane County, providing the bulk of the food service. I was assigned to the grill, and with the help of another first year, grilled 800 burgers in 2 1/2 hours. I've learned a few things recently, from both today and from school in general:

1. Radiant Heat CAN cause burns.
2. Some grease doesn't come out no matter how much bleach or hydrogen peroxide you use.
3. When you're the one doing the cooking, it doesn't matter how low on the totem pole you are, if your runners don't keep up, YOU ARE WITHIN YOUR RIGHTS TO KICK THEIR ASSES.
4. For an industry that involves a lot of fast-paced hard work, when things go wrong, you can end up working even harder and faster, or you can end up doing a lot of waiting... isially the latter, then the former.

Doldrums

You may have noticed a significant lack of posting on my part over the last few weeks. I'm afraid it will go on for some time, and may even become permanent.

Part of the problem is, obviously, time. This term makes last seem easy, and it's only going to get more hectic from here on out. Betwen school, homework, being a dad, and being sick, I haven't had much time to blog.

Part of the problem is a lack of inspiration. Nothing seems to make me want to blog these days. Politics? Blah. Everyone's minds are made up: left, right, middle. We're not going to convince each other, all we're doing now is marking our territory. I'm still committed to my convictions, and I'm just as committed to voting those convictions, but I've seriously begun to question the usefulness of pontification about it here on this blog. Food? I'm spending hours every day studying it, talking about it, making it, I kinda want a break from it here. The Lad just turned two, and there's plenty I could say about that, but that's about it. There are plenty of issues in my life I could talk about here, and in fact would LOVE to vent about in a blog, but the problem is, people who know me in person read this blog, and I don't want everyone I know knowing everything about me. It would be nice had I maintained some anonymity, and could use this blog as catharsis, but that's not the case.

So there it is. I've grown fond of the interaction between myself and my readers, especially my fellow bloggers (I'm looking at you, Naked Villainy, Llama Butchers, Ken and Emily, Bobgirrl, Eugene Rants, Nightfly, and a host of others!), but I wonder if I've run out of things to say.

Can You Say Swamped, Boys and Girls?

Throughout toe first Term plus of Culinary School, it's been interesting to observe the difference between learning a new concept, and experiencing a new concept. What we are taught in the classroom, we actually do in the lab.

This week's culinary concept which I learned last term but only truly experienced for the first time yesterday?

In the Weeds.

Changing of the Guard

Final:
Indianapolis Colts 38
Monkey On Their Backs New England Patriots 34

Indianapolis was down 21-3 at one point, making this the biggest conference championship comeback in NFL history.

Having spent a couple of years in college in Fort Wayne, and still having friends from Indiana, I've watched their hearts break time and again as the Colts have come so close but fallen short, more often than not brought low by the Patriots. I can only imagine how much sweeter this championship must be because of the team they beat.

Congratulations to the Colts and their fans -- enjoy the Miami sunshine.

For Everyone Who's Endured High School Lit Class Movie Day

A tip of the toque to Maximum Leader at Naked Villainy:



Peter Sellers reciting the Beatles a la Olivier as Richard III

Friday, Fishday

Since it's Friday, I decided to cook seafood for dinner, and I decided to go with slumgullion.

Slumgullion originally was a word to describe a watery meat stew, and comes from the California Gold Rush, but a more modern western U.S. meaning of the term is a soup made similarly to New England Clam Chowder, but including other seafood as well as the clams. It is a chowder well suited to Oregon's seafood. Here's the recipe I used:

Ingredients:
6 oz. Dungeness crab meat
6 oz. shrimp meat (I use the tiny sweet shrimp native to the Oregon coast)
4 0z. bacon
2 lbs. clams in shell (I actually only used 12 oz., but the only shortcoming of the final dish was a lack of sufficient clam chunks)
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
3 tbsp. butter
1 cup sweet yellow onion, small dice
1/2 cup celery, small dice
2.5 lbs Russett potatoes
salt to taste
pepper to taste
fresh thyme to taste

Mise en Place:
stock pot
2 large saucepans (3 quart or bigger)
wooden spoon
paring knife
chef's knife
Chinois or mesh strainer
non-reactive bowl
ladle
cutting board

Place the potatoes in one of the saucepans and fill with enough water to cover. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce heat and simmer until fork soft. Blanch, peel, and cut large dice.

While the potatoes are boiling, place an inch of water in the stock pot, bring to a boil, add the clams. Boil for 5 minutes and drain, straining the water through a chinois or mesh strainer into a bowl. Chop the clams and rinse, removing the stomach grit.

Cut the bacon into half-inch pieces. In a second large saucepan, render the bacon and add the small diced onion and celery, sweat until clear. Deglasse with 1 cup of the clam water and transfer to the stock pot. Add the clams, shrimp, crab meat, potatoes, cream, butter, remaining clam water and milk, simmer for 1 hour, adding salt, pepper, and thyme at the half hour mark.

Makes 6-8 servings.

I made a simple parmesan toast to go with it, and paired it with a Chilean Sauvignon Gris, which was wonderful, but any white wine with a citrus component would go well with it.

Heh

A tip of the toque to best friend Lurch, who forwarded me this e-mail. It's apocryphal but amusing:

A New Orleans lawyer sought an FHA loan for a client who lost his house in Hurricane Katrina and wanted to rebuild. He was told the loan wouldbe granted if he could prove satisfactory title to the parcel of property being offered as collateral. The title to the property datedback to 1803, which took the Lawyer three months to track down.

After sending the information to the FHA, he received the following reply (Actual letter):

"Upon review of your letter adjoining your client's loan application, we note that the request is supported by an Abstract of Title. While we compliment the able manner in which you have prepared and presented theapplication, we must point out that you have only cleared title to the proposed collateral property back to 1803. Before final approval can be accorded, it will be necessary to clear the title back to its origin."

Annoyed, the lawyer responded as follows (Actual Letter):

"Your letter regarding title in Case No. 189156 has been received. I note that you wish to have title extended further than the 194 years covered by the present application. I was unaware that any educated person in this country, particularly those working in the property area,would not know that Louisiana was purchased, by the U.S., from France in 1803, the year of origin identified in our application. For the edification of uninformed FHA bureaucrats, the title to the land prior to U.S. ownership was obtained from France, which had acquired it by Right of Conquest from Spain. The land came into the possession of Spain by Right of Discovery made in the year 1492 by a sea captain named Christopher Columbus, who had been granted the privilege of seeking a new route to India by the Spanish monarch, Isabella. The good queen, Isabella, being a pious woman and almost as careful about titles as the FHA, took the precaution of securing the blessing of the Pope before she sold her jewels to finance Columbus ' expedition. Now the Pope, as I'm sure you may know, is the emissary of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and God, it is commonly accepted, created this world. Therefore, I believe it is safe to presume that God also made that part of the world called Louisiana. God, therefore, would be the owner oforigin and His origins date back to before the beginning of time, the world as we know it AND the FHA.

I hope you find God's original claim to be satisfactory. Now, may we have our damn loan?"

The loan was approved!

Woo Hoo!

Snow Day!

Gwynn In

I never doubted it for a moment. Tony Gwynn has been elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eleigibility with 97.61%, seventh highest vote in history.

As a lifelong Padres fan, Gwyn epitomized Baseball for me. He was a technically excellent hitter -- I remember a poster Nike had that had a schematic diagram of the perfect hitting stance fading into a photo of T. Gwynn. He's also Mr. San Diego -- he played his high school, college, and pro ball ALL in the city of San Diego, and now he coaches for his Alma Mater, SDSU. He was good natured, a sportsman, an gentleman, a humble guy, and a humanitarian. If you look up the word "nice" in the dictionary, there's his picture. He was a gold glove fielder, and the quintessential team player -- on at least one occasion foregoing salary raises he could easily have merited so that the Pads could fit a needed deal in under the salary cap.

Congratulations, Tny, you deserve this honor, and I'm proud to say I was there in the Murph on numerous occasions to witness your stellar career.