Author: AJ

Alice Waters and “Objectivity”

By Iron Chef Leftovers

I really don’t like Alice Waters. Yes, she is one of the original eat local/sustainable gurus, but there are few people who are as full of themselves as she is. She loves to name drop and really has the opinion culinarily that she is right and everyone else is wrong.

I bring this up because there is a site, food52.com that holds an annual cookbook competition called “Piglet”. It is basically a head to head competition between 16 books to determine their “Cookbook of the Year”. Each battle is judged by a celebrity chef (red flag right there), with the winner advancing to the next round. This year, the finale was Momufuku Milk Bar Cookbook vs. The Art of Living According to Joe Beef. In case you don’t know, Joe Beef is a restaurant in Montreal (and currently #1 on my list of places that I want to go to eat in North America) and Momufuku Milk Bar is a restaurant in NYC, owned by David Chang, who is equally full of himself as Alice Waters.

I will be honest, I don’t own either book (although I do have Joe Beef on my Amazon Wish List), so I really can’t say which is the better book. My issue is with the comments made by Alice Waters. I figured this competition was in trouble when the write up started this way:

I am always so hopeful that young cooks with a lot of passion and talent will write books that help to transform the North American diet in a positive way. That is why I have to admit that I am more than a little disappointed in the two finalists for this year’s Piglet.

Buy this book instead of hte two Piglet finalists. That way Alice Waters won't yell at you.

Fine you are disappointed because neither of these books follows your manifesto to the letter. You would think after getting her personal feelings out of the way, she would be a bit more objective. You would be wrong:

Not because the authors are not talented, both obviously are, but because both books seem to contribute to feeding our addiction to sugar and fat.

Thanks for playing Ms. Waters. You just lost all of my respect for falling into the “fat is bad” camp. This is for another post, but fat is not inherently bad for you (it will make you feel fuller quicker, which is why people tend to overeat “low fat” foods) but it of course depends on what kind of fat you are consuming. Do you realize that 1 tablespoon of pasture raised pork fat has more omega-3 fatty acids than olive oil, and don’t even get me started on how much better it is than hydrogenated fats. Fats also allow you to get more nutrients out of your food. Most of what your body needs is fat soluble, and the lack of fat is why many vegetarians end up with health issues, your body can’t process raw vitamin D without the fat to help break it down.

As she continues, she really has nothing positive to say about either book:

Sadly, it is in the ingredients that Milk Bar really loses me — it seems that they don’t have real ingredients in their pantry. I understand the creative appeal of turning something bad into something surprising but I can’t support the choice of highly processed ingredients when fresh and organic ones are increasingly so readily available. Across the board the Milk Bar recipes are too rich, too sweet, and just too intense for me. The fact that “Crack Pie” is their most famous recipe is quite telling.
…
Many of the recipes in The Art of Living According to Joe Beef are heavy-handed and high in fat, but not all of them.

Here finally just sent me over the edge:

Appropriately, the decision between who wins the Piglet award this year between Joe Beef and Milk Bar came back to crack, and ultimately, I would rather be building a garden from a den than to be an addict.

So basically, she votes for Joe Beef because of a single story. Nothing to do with how well laid out the recipes are, or the flow of the book, or, putting her feelings aside, how difficult or easy it would be to make the recipes at home for your average cook. There is a reason why Tony Bourdain said, “Alice Waters annoys the shit out of me.” I completely agree with him on that one.

An Easy Wheat/ White Bread

by A.J. Coltrane

An improvised bread. I would highly recommend using a scale instead of measuring cups when baking breads —  the process becomes dead simple, really nearly impossible to screw up. Once you have a feel for what the baker’s percentages should be (the relative weight of the ingredients), recipes aren’t necessary anymore.

Ingredient Baker’s Percentage Weight Approx Volume
Bread Flour 75 300g 2-1/4 cups
Wheat Flour 25 100g 3/4 cup
Water 65 260g 1 cup + 5 tsp
Sea Salt 2.5 10g 1.5 tsp
Yeast 1.75 7g 2 tsp
Sugar 1.5 6g 1.5 tsp

Process:  I kneaded the ingredients for six minutes in the kitchenaid, covered the bowl with a towel, and allowed the dough to rise for a couple of hours. I put a Le Crueset in the oven to preheat with the oven to 450 degrees. (This is the same process that I use for the Lahey No Knead method, referenced many times on this site.) The bread was set in the pot, slashed, then allowed to bake, covered, for 22 minutes. The lid of the pot was removed and the bread was baked for another 20 minutes.  The bread was then moved to a cooling rack.

 

The postmortem:  25% of the bread flour was swapped out for wheat flour. The combination of the wheat flour, the 65% hydration, and the sugar made for a relatively dense interior. I think the bread may have benefitted from the slashing going a little deeper than it did — it may have allowed a little more expansion in the oven. Still, it tasted good, and was virtually no work, so I’ll call that a win.

Where Should Top Chef Film Next?

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Seattle is on the short list of places for the next season of Top Chef. Seattle is really overshadowed by San Francisco and LA as a culinary mecca, but you have some really cutting edge stuff coming out of here (the Modernist Cuisine Crew) and some fantastic chef doing amazing stuff with local and seasonal ingredients. It would be a real boon to Seattle’s culinary reputation if they get Top Chef, although somehow I see an elimination challenge involving digging up a geoduck.

Marche Jean Talon in Montreal. Everything is local and seasonal here. There is a reason why most Montreal chefs shop here.

I bring this up because I read an article on boston.com that the Boston mayor is pushing for a twitter campaign to have Top Chef come to Boston. I lived in Boston for 12 years and I am back there a couple of times a year on business, so I am still pretty in tune with the Boston dining scene. Let me tell you, cutting edge and memorable are 2 words you won’t hear me use to describe it. Staid, stogy and mediocre are the ones I would use. Yes, there are some great restaurants in Boston (check out my review of what may be the best one here), but generally most places are generic and dated. Folks in Boston are not cutting edge when it comes to dining out nor is there the push for local/sustainable/organic that you would expect to see from a city with that many institutions of higher learning.
You want Italian in Boston, everyone will tell you to go to the North End. What you will find is 30 restaurants all serving “classic” Italian dishes like lasagna, chicken parm and veal piccatta. There are a few “trendy” places there, but their menus are equally as lackluster. You won’t find any place like Altura, or Assiaggio or even Swingside café there, and the North End is “the” Italian neighborhood in Boston.

If you want the best food in Boston, you have to go very high end, which in most cases excludes the bulk of the dining public (Zagat’s has the Legal Seafood restaurants ranked 1-10 and they aren’t at all cheap; everything in the top 25 is $30+ entrée type places). By contrast, the #2 and #3 rated food places in Seattle by Zagat’s are the sister locations of Paseo, where nothing is more than $15. The number 4 place? Mashiko, one of 2 sustainable sushi places in the US where you can easily fill up for less than $25 a person. Paseo and Mashiko are both amazing places to eat.

You want gastro pub, forget it in Boston. You won’t find a Quinn’s or a Tavern Law there. Great burger joint? None that I can think of in Boston (although there are a few pretty good ones around).
My favorite quote from the article:

But so far, Boston — a.k.a. the land of the bean and the cod and the home of the first gastronome to put cream in the chowder — has been terra incognita for “Top Chef.”

Right there to me is the reason to NOT shoot in Boston.

Top Chef has been to New York, Chicago, LA, San Francisco and Austin, all culinary hot spots. Seattle and/or Portland are due. Boston, meh, not so much. Heck, I would love to see them shoot in Montreal before they shoot in Boston. They could have an amazing challenge just by dropping the chefs in either Marche Jean Talon or Marche Atwater and letting them go to town.

Batting 7th and Playing Left Field for the New York Yankees…and Other “Old Guy” Baseball News

By Blaidd Drwg

You know you are in trouble defensively when a statement like this is made:

Sources said that there is a good deal of sentiment within the Yankees organization to go after Raul Ibanez — who wants to play for the team — to be their designated hitter against right-handers, partly because they believe he can give them some days of outfield play.

Although Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsui are also available, they are generally regarded as unplayable defensively, sources said.

That is from an espn.com article on the Yankees trading AJ Burnett to the Pirates. Raul Ibanez was a terrible outfielder when he was with the Mariners and 5 years younger. I wonder if anyone in the Yankees organization has actually watched Ibanez play in the field. Damon, Matsui and Ibanez are all guys you don’t want out in left field for you team if you can absolutely avoid it. Besides the Yankees already have a more than serviceable outfield rotation with Curtis Granderson, Brent Gardner, Nick Swisher and Andruw Jones. Where and when do they think they will need Ibanez in that mix?

In other “old guy” baseball news, Tim Wakefield has finally decided to retire after pitching so long for the Red Sox that I believe he was Ted Williams’ last active teammate.

Hockey Night – Pictures From The 18th Row

by A.J. Coltrane

Pictures from the February 17 game, Seattle Thunderbirds vs Tri-City Americans.

Good photo opportunity - they're holding mostly still.
Another fight. You can tell this one was serious because the refs jumped right in.
They don't skimp on the intermission entertainment!
2nd intermission - throw a puck in the sunroof and win I'm not sure what. It wasn't a car. I hit the inside end of the sunroof. So close.
The penalty box. He looks like he could use a hug.
A fun night all around.

A Bad Week In Seattle Dining News – The Venerable Institution Edition

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Seattle Met Magazine has an interview with Le Gourmand Chef/Owner Bruce Naftaly in which he announced that Le Gourmand will be closing its door in June of this year. Le Gourmand is expensive. Dinner for 2 will run you close to $200 with drinks. Mrs. Iron Chef and I have been there twice and let me tell you, it is worth every penny that you pay.

It is not a fast meal; you are probably looking at 2 to 3 hours for dinner. Le Gourmand is French using Northwest seasonal ingredients. Chef Naftaly has been doing the local/seasonal/well-sourced thing since before anyone ever thought it to be trendy.

The menus change based on what is available on any given week, the ingredients are impeccably sourced (Chef Naftaly can tell you where any specific thing he uses comes from if you really want to know) and they are masterfully prepared, flavor bombs that come out of the kitchen looking like works of art. It is not a Tuesday night quick dinner place, but a place to go for a special occasion romantic dinner and a meal that you will remember for years to come. Heck, I still can taste the rabbit saddle in the mushroom sauce that I had 2 years ago at Le Gourmand. I can also probably tell you exactly what was in it from memory.

All of this artistry comes out of a kitchen that really isn’t significantly bigger than most people’s home kitchen.

Le Gourmand has been around 27 years with Chef Naftaly cooking practically every meal. In addition to that, one Sunday a month is dedicated to a cooking class (well two of them actually) which Chef Naftaly somehow manages to cram 12 people into an already crowded space and then shows them the secrets of the Le Gourmand kitchen, preparing a 3 or 4 course meal over 3 hours. The cost for this privilege, $75 per person, including wine, or to put it in perspective, the same price as other places like Dish It Up, charge for their cooking classes.

I have attended a number of these classes and I have found Chef Naftaly funny and personable, willing to explain everything he is doing and why he is doing it and more than happy to give you the secrets of his restaurant to create at home, albeit probably less successfully than he can.

While I hate to see a Seattle icon close after so long, Chef Naftaly has decided it is time to move on. He wants to write a cookbook, which I will be the first in line to buy when it comes out, and he has decided to continue to teach cooking classes, which I would be more than happy to continue to attend.

If you have had the pleasure in dining at Le Gourmand, go back for one last hurrah. If you have not, I can’t recommend enough that you should go before the doors close. You won’t regret it.

In other sad Seattle restaurant news, there was a fire at DaPino’s in Ravenna, causing 20,000 dollars in damage. You may not know Chef Pino Rogano or his work by name, but chances are you have had either his sausages or cured meats at any number of the fine Italian eateries in Seattle. Heck, he probably makes the best sausages in Seattle done by someone not named Batali and has been doing it for over 25 years (and I personally think Pino’s salami is better).

On the bright side, I believe Canlis is still standing and serving dinner and Paseo reopened after their 6 week vacation, so all is right again with the world.

Recommended Game: Call of Duty – Modern Warfare 3

by A.J. Coltrane

Recommended Game: Call of Duty – Modern Warfare 3.

Specifically, the Team Deathmatch mode, since most shooter campaign modes bore me. (Except for Borderlands’, which needs it’s own writeup.)

An impossibly busy staged "scene" -- if it wasn't staged then in about two seconds there'd be one guy left.

Why I like It:  Multiplayer Team Deathmatch pits two teams against each other in a race to get to 75 kills of the opposition.

The thing is, the game’s leveling system encourages running around like crazy, shooting everything in site and getting shot frequently in return… but if I did that I’d lose every encounter to some tween jacked up on Red Bull and pixie sticks (with a liberal assortment of other recreational stuff tossed in.)

As a fossil, there’s really one way to compete with a Twitchmaster 2000 — skulk around corners and wait for them to run into your sights. Then blast them with a silenced weapon. Skulking has the added advantage of allowing for more precise aiming; weapons inherently become more accurate when you’re not moving much.

The reason this strategy works is because whenever anybody fires a non-silenced weapon they show as a red dot on the minimap, so they can often be seen coming and prepared for. That, and opponents are often so impatiently charging around that they don’t bother to check corners — they’re just rushing to the next highlighted enemy on their map, so they’ll just cruise right on by if you’re reasonably concealed and quiet.

The silencer is essential to the strategy for two reasons: 

1.  It hides your location on the map, so the opponents don’t see a red dot and sprint to your spot. (It’s one thing to show up on the minimap when you don’t plan to be there ten seconds from now, but since skulking involves moving a lot more slowly, so it’s essential to keep a low profile.)

2. It often allows for multiple shots at an enemy before they figure out where the shots are coming from. That’s a good thing too, since it’s hard to hit a sprinting target sometimes.

Note that this is not considered an “honorable” way to play. Etiquette says that you’re supposed to run around like everyone else and not be a buzzkill crouching in the shadows. The slow, stealthy approach irritates the hell out of the Twitchmasters. (I know, because I hear them bitching when they’re not muted.)

…and it’s part of the reason I enjoy the game.

———

The essential parts of the build:

Type 95 Assault Rifle – Red Dot Scope and Suppressor. (Use “Attachments” to allow for both.)

Perks – Blind Eye, Assassin, Steady Aim.

This build is invisible on the minimap. The Type 95 is a high accuracy burst fire weapon — it forces me to not “spray and pray”. The burst fire encourages me to be more accurate, and I’m able to stretch the ammo a little further, which is important since I’m not dying much. The 95 also hits hard — it’s a two-bullet kill at close range, so I can deal better with goofballs with (short range, high damage) submachine guns. The Steady Aim helps in close quarters, and in situations where one or both parties are surprised and not scoped — I hate losing shootouts just because I walked around the corner at the same time as somebody else who is using a better short-range weapon; Steady Aim and the Type 95 help to even that playing field. All around, it’s a build with few weaknesses, and it has the benefit of stealth. Hard to beat.

The Magic of Jeremy Lin

By Blaidd Drwg

Jeremy Lin is a good story – a guy who is a Harvard grad, was cut by 2 teams and languishing at the bottom of the Knicks bench, gets a chance to start and leads the team to a 6 game winning streak where he is averaging 26.8 points per game.

I have a feeling that this is going to take a turn for the worst soon – the Knicks have Mr. Ego himself, Carmello Anthony, currently injured, but expected back soon, not to mention Amare Stoudemire coming back from an injury. Those two guys represent the Knicks 2 leading scorers and represent 38 shot attempts a game between them. They both want the ball. Lin is currently taking 24 shots a game. Something is going to have to give and I have a feeling it is going to be Lin’s shot total. The Knicks are going to need him to be more John Stockton than Michael Jordan in order to keep Melo and Amare happy. The problem is I am not sure that Lin can be Stockton. As a starter, Lin is averaging 8.5 assists and 5.1 turnovers per game. While the assists are fine, the turnovers are scary. The Knicks are already 29th in the league as a team in turnovers per game. While Lin’s sample size is small, the number is a bit disturbing – his turnovers have been 1, 8, 2, 6, 6, and 8. To put it in perspective, he has averaged about 1 more turnover a game than the current league leader, Russell Westbrook.

I really want to see Jeremy Lin do well, but I have a feeling the Knicks are headed for a disgruntled player showdown with Melo, and the guy making 18 million a year is always going to win out over the guy making the league minimum.

Gary Carter’s Battle with Cancer

By Blaidd Drwg

It appears that Hall of Fame catcher Gary Carter’s doctors have found more cancer. Carter has been battling brain cancer off and on for the last few seasons. It is probably not good – the cancer was aggressive and inoperable, when he was first diagnosed. Normally I would not go out of my way to mention this, but Gary Carter is one of the good guys out there. He has spent a good part of his life raising money for charity, even during his playing days, and is very sincere and humble if you ever get a chance to talk to him. I had the opportunity to meet him in Montreal in 2002 during an Expos game and I asked him about his charity work, especially as a player when he would go to visit children’s hospitals to bring some cheer to the kids there. He said he felt it was his responsibility as a celebrity to give back to the community.

In 2011, MLB made a “Stand Up to Cancer” commercial. At the 19 second mark, the Baseball Tonight Crew is pictured. On the left, you have John Kruk, who is a cancer survivor. On the far right, you have Ron Darling, who was Carter’s teammate with the Mets in the late ‘80’s. Darling is holding up a sign for “My Catcher” referring to Gary Carter. I am not sure how many people even realized what that referred to, but it still gets me choked up when I see it.

The commercial is here:

Update – ESPN is reporting that Gary Carter has passed away at age 57.

 

Belgainfest – A Review

By Iron Chef Leftovers

[Photos and captions – A.J. Coltrane]

Last weekend, Coltrane, Annie S., Mrs. Iron Chef and I ventured to the Bell Harbor Conference Center for the 3rd Annual Belgianfest, presented by the Washington Beer Commission. Thirty plus breweries, 70+ Belgian style beers and 600 people graced the new venue for what is rapidly becoming a great event. The beers ranged from golden and abbey style beers on the lighter end of the taste spectrum to heavy wood aged and sour beers on the other end of the spectrum, most of which were high in alcohol. I took copious amounts of notes, but I didn’t take notes on everything that I had. After a couple of hours, palate fatigue set in, so I stopped writing things down. Here is what I had (listed by order of their appearance in the Belgianfest program):

 

The lines at the men's rooms were long. Total Johnsonfest.

American Brewing Company
• Big Pucker – a beer that lives up to its name. Lip puckering sour all the way through with no hint of wood. Like sucking on a sour patch kid all day.

Anacortes Brewing
• Dubbel- slightly sweet and off dry, hints of hops with honey and sugar on the back of the palate.
• Trippel – a very characteristic Belgian Trippel on the front of the palate, with a refreshing crispness on the back, with subtle banana hints teasing you the entire way.
• Sour Red – A great beer to introduce someone to sour beers. Slightly sour with the initial hit on the palate but fading into a malty red ale with hints of wood. Not overpoweringly sour like most brett beers.

Black Raven Brewing
• Cask Saison – Off-dry on the front of palate yielding to a malty saison with a hint of sour. Nicely balanced and not overwhelming.

Diamond Knot
• Strong Belgian IPA – great hop character on the initial sip that does not overpower with a long finish reminiscent of an abbey beer. If you drank this one blind, you would not be sure if you were drinking an IPA or an abbey beer.

Elliott Bay Brewing
• Long Black Veil – drinks like a wonderful dry stout with a hint of sweetness on the finish from the Belgian yeast. A beer worth sipping on a cold winter day.

Engine House No. 9
• Love Child Kriek – a crisp beer that had overtones of oak with a hint of cherries on the back of the palate. Too much oak, not enough cherry, but not unenjoyable.

Fremont Brewing
• Return of the Blood Funnel Saison – heavy citrus notes on the palate and the nose give way to a crisp ending. Very refreshing and reminiscent of an aranchata.

 

Sweet waffle with brie and basil. I think they've shrunk since we first saw them. Still, a hit everytime.

 

Gallagher’s Where U Brew
• The Monk – orange and coriander on the nose and palate. A supercharged version of a Celis White.
• Black Imperial Belgium – a confusing beer with fruity overtones and a malty finish. Liquid dark bread. Did I detect some Rye or Caraway in this beer?

Hales Ales
• Tres Fem – collaboration brew. Tart cherries and malt dominate this beer. Made me want to get a pint and a scoop of vanilla ice cream and make a float.

Schooner Exact
• Biere de SODO – a beer with a confused identity in a very good way. It first wants to be a pilsner, then Belgian ale and then an IPA. Throw in a slight funkiness at the end and you have 3 great beers in one.

Silver City
• The Giant Made Of Shadows – lots of dried fruit with a distinctive Tempranillo hit on the back of the palate from aging in Tempranillo barrels. This beer paired wonderfully with a piece of 85% dark chocolate.
• Nutcracker 2005 Special Brown Ale – a very crisp beer. Yeast gives way to citrus fruit with a pleasant oak finish. Really great for a 7 year old beer (and that was by design).
• La Fat 2007 – a Belgian/Scotch hybrid. Lots of toffee and caramel but no noticeable oak or Belgian character.

Snipes Mountain
• Darkstrong – a “sweet and sour” beer. Lots of sugar on the front of the palate with a sour finish. Detected hints of chocolate but none of the rye malt that it was made with.

Wingman
• Black Widow – subtle hints of Cab Sav on the nose and a touch of oak on the finish, but predominately figs and dried fruit. Didn’t pick up much of the Belgian character, but it hid its 11.4% alcohol really well.

Not Iron Chef Leftovers' floral cursive, in case you were wondering.

So many great beers. I loved the trend of brewing more common styles with Belgian yeast strains and I am starting to see a lot more restraint with the use of wood in Washington beers – for so long, oak dominated most barrel aged beers brewed here. The brewers are still using the oak, but tuning it back and really letting the beer shine. It was nice to see some new breweries at the event and a few aged beers making an appearance. Overall, it was a fun 4 hours of beer tasting.

My top 3 for the day:

The Bronze Monk goes to:
Silver City – The Giant Made Of Shadows. I love Tempranillo and was happy to see someone use a Tempranillo barrel in brewing.

The Silver Farmhouse goes to:
Anacortes Brewing – Sour Red. So balanced, I probably could drink this one all day long and be very happy (and it has nothing to do with my love of Anacortes beers).

The Gold Abbey goes to:
Schooner Exact – Biere de SODO – I really loved that you could taste all of the individual components in this beer. The pilsner characteristics were there without being overwhelmed by the hops and the Belgian characteristics really displayed without being overrun buy the bret that was present. I want to drink this beer again and again.