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Food Thread: Try It; You'll (Probably) Like It!

Well, the food rabbit hole has struck again. Somebody mentioned a chain that served good coffee, and I found another one with the same name that serves what looks to me like a sloppy joe, but they call it a "Crumbly Burger!" Wow...that would be a mess in the car.

But that's the pleasure of having a relatively open mind about food. Why not try it? I am not suggesting that you jump the shark and try Skyline Chili or Rocky Mountain Oysters, although some of you might think that sweetbreads is a vile food, and you would be spectacularly wrong!

The photograph is from the internet, not the home of the "Crumbly Burger," but it does look good. Tarting up pedestrian foods is one of the many conceits of a certain class of chefs, and most of the time the results are no better than the originals, and twice or three times the price!

Even when they are successful, the originals are often just as good, and certainly more authentic, and will remind us of times from our youth. That's certainly why I make some old and reliable dishes from my past.

How about you?

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Speaking of trying new things! I have had Shishito peppers in restaurants, but have never seen them in stores until yesterday. And they were great! Easy to prepare and loads of fun to eat while sitting outside and drinking something cold.

And those are thin-sliced lamb shoulder chops in the Sous Vide bags, waiting to be opened, dried off then grilled for a few minutes. Because I needed a side dish for the cheeseburgers!

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Before his rant I get to mock him for using "sweet & sour mix." Awful. And unnecessary. Use some lime juice and a squirt of simple syrup. Who are you people?

Infrequent poster "Top.Man." here with a recipe for a nice summertime cocktail - the Key Lime Martini. But first, a slight rant.

I believe there's only one cocktail that can be called a Martini (fight me!), which is 2 ounces of dry gin and 5 seconds of silence for the vermouth. Actually, I fill a shaker with ice cubes, add an ounce of vermouth and shake, strain out the vermouth, then add the gin and shake again. Whatever vermouth is left on the cubes is imparted to the gin.

Anyway, this is the Key Lime Martini recipe as given to me by the bartender at the Hollywood Brown Derby restaurant in Disney's Hollywood Studios in Orlando. I think it's a winner.

1 1/2 oz. vodka
1/2 oz. Licor 43 (a citrus liqueur from Spain, commonly available)
1/2 oz. Cointreau
1/2 oz. sweet & sour mix

Shake all with ice, strain into a martini glass. Garnish with a thin lime slice.

To be fair, "Top.Man" recognized his failing and suggested the lime/simple replacement. But his Martini is just wrong. I love gin, and will drink shaken gin quite happily. However that isn't a proper Martini.
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From reader "DWinGA" comes a really interesting idea for those lucky enough to have too many tomatoes on hand. I am in awe of you folks, because I can barely grow mold on cheese, much less fruits and vegetables.

Any readers need an idea of what to do with a bounty of tomatoes, and you've got plenty of marinara sauce already put up, try some tomato preserves.

4 Cups tomatoes, blanched, peeled and quartered
1 lemon, halved, then sliced thin
4 cups sugar
2 cinnamon sticks
a 1-inch stick of fresh ginger root, peeled
2 tbsp butter

- Add all ingredients, except butter, into a large pot and slowly bring to a boil, stirring gently
- When foam rises, add the butter
- boil on medium heat for about 45 minutes, until reduced by half
- pour into 1/2 pint jelly jars and can/seal in water bath for 15 minutes
- makes 5 1/2 pint jars

Makes some great preserves. Next time, I going to try to add a couple jalapenos.

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This is crap. Don't be fooled that restaurant kitchens can make better stock. They can't. They just have the ingredients on hand every day, but if you plan your cooking and shopping with the goal of fantastic stock in mind then you too can be a cooking rock star.

Restaurants Are Selling Their Chicken Stock, and You Should Buy It

Save your chicken scraps, spatchcock whenever it makes sense (always), and since most people have onions and carrots on hand, all you need is a couple of celery sticks and maybe some parsley. The only issue is the volume of raw ingredients. I use a 3:1 ratio (at most) of water to solids, and I get wonderfully concentrated, intense and delightfully flavorful stock.

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Anyone ever here of one of these things? Yeah...me neither. But it sounds interesting, and outrageously counter-intuitive. So I have to try it!

This Is the Best Roast Chicken We've Ever Made in the Test Kitchen

I guess it's sort of like a Tagine, but sealed completely. Weird and mysterious, especially because the vessel is called a Römertopf.

Yeah...sure. That's a real word.

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Alton Brown uncensored. And didn't even know that he had a foul mouth. Not as bad as some, but his cursing makes him even more amusing.
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I was fooled! Scotch whiskey caramel milkshake, is not in fact a Scotch Whiskey drink. It is a damned milkshake with a sauce that is flavored with a tiny amount of Scotch.
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Food and cooking tips, Large-breasted Muscovy ducks, young wild pigs, bartenders who use vermouth in Martinis (but not too much), pork belly that doesn't have 5-spice, low-temperature-roast chicken, and good tomatoes that aren't square, pale pink and covered with Mestizo E.coli: cbd dot aoshq at gmail dot com. Any advocacy of French Toast with syrup will result in disciplinary action up to and including being nuked from orbit. And yes, shaking a Manhattan is blasphemy...it's in the Bible!