mhberk

Add to that the borish "Are they real?" as he stares at a woman's chest.

Yeah, I can see where some might find that offensive

No, apparently he doesn't - what a well-written piece with lots of great observations about the various contestants. Interesting that Bravo allowed this trashing of one of their guest judges to be posted! Well, they did allow Rocco to respond (and it sounds like he's not done yet).

It sounds like Rocco took the trashing well. What did Rocco do on his "The Restaurant" show that pissed so many people off? I only caught a few of episodes, but he made the comment: "Apparently, I have a long road ahead of me before I am forgiven for my behavior on 'The Restaurant.'"

I've been Tivoing a lot of Nick Stellino's Family Kitchen lately. I made his Salmon in Red Wine Sauce last night and served it with braised bok choy. It turned out pretty well.

I thought this week's episode was a good one. I enjoyed both the ingredient ID quickfire and the challenge to recreate a package frozen meal. It was interesting to see how the 'science' behind the deconstructed packaging of the ingredients was lost on most of the contestants. (And what the hell happened to Rocco Dispirito - he looks like the freakish lovechild of Martin Short or David Gest and Jocelyn Wildestein - I much prefer the 'old' Rocco!)

I think it was a pretty good episode overall. Joey's departure was pretty emotional. I think that had it not been for Rocco speaking up when the other judges were questioning whether the truffles were Mediterannian, CJ and Tre wouldn't have won.

Wow! Anthony Bourdain REALLY doesn't care for Rocco much!

Maybe we'll see you there!

I'm sure you will. Our reservation is at 6:30.

I'm very happy that I have secured a table for August 18th.

I'll be there too. This just happened to be the night that we reserved back in May for a six-top with a kitchen view. I just hope, under the circumstances, that things still work out.

Joe, I remember that you were promoting the lobster ravioli at one point. Is this still something that can be requested?

I was really expecting Padma to be stripped down slathering duck fat all over herself

I have one of Monica Bhide's cookbooks

Yeah, I can't STAND Ilan!! A typical example was during the final 4 episode when he orchestrated the whole "we need to tell the judges about how unprofessional Marcel is" thing. He went on and on about how the judges needed to know how he acts in the kitchen. During the Judges Table, Elia initiated the debate about Marcel's professionalism, she turned to Ilan for support and Ilan just stood there speechless. He wouldn't defend her. He just made her look like a cry-baby.

Last night's show was pretty boring. I enjoyed the Padma tribute, but my favorite part was the mock quick fire challenge performed by the 2nd season cast! Thirty seconds to cook steak, eggs, and........a potato.

The one here in Columbia closed down a few months ago. I guess they must've fallen on....

I was kind of wondering when they put Mie-n-Yu and Cafe Atlantico in "the Adams Morgan District". I enjoyed watching her chase Al around at the food market.

Thanks, everyone! A jar of chutney for each of you!

I'll take mango please

Is the steak in the picture even warm inside.

Yes they were. They were around 105 degrees when I took them out of the oven. I let them sit for 10 minutes (and the temp increased) before I put them on the grill.

I buy tamarind juice for my satay marinade at the Korean market at the Golden Triangle shopping center in Howard County (rt 29 and rt 40)

Trim off all but 1/4" of fat post-oven. If you remove more than that, you'll lose the seal/flavor effect that the fat imparts on the grill. To avoid having to remove the steaks during a flare-up, just build the fire so there's a cool spot on one part of the grill, and put them there until the flame ebbs. Judging from the look of those steaks, though, you're doing everything perfectly.

Thanks for the tips bioesq! I used Dan's grilling technique where he grills them directly over the chimney starter for about 30 seconds on each side the get that nice crust. I think I will trim a lot of the fat next time, but mostly, I think I just didn't let the coals burn down as far as I should have.

Last night I had Chilled Cucumber and Almond Soup: pureed cucumber and almond with crab meat, thinly sliced cucumber, baby greens and pickled cherries. I am not clever enough to accurately describe how good this was, so I'll just say Best_Soup_Ever.

We had dinner there over the weekend and I encouraged my wife the get the soup. I'll simply say that I don't think words exist that are clever enough to describe how good that soup was! That soup was the perfect complement to sitting outside on a warm summer evening in Cleveland Park.

On a side note: Everytime I go there and the waitron will come over and ask if there's anything else they can get us, I always (half) jokingly ask for the roasted chicken recipe. This last time, our waitress (who I'd never seen before) said that the recipe is a secret and the chef's not giving it out to anyone. She continued by saying that there's some big contest in DC for who can figure out the recipe. At first I thought that she was talking about the "Palena Chicken Project" going on with some of us, but the waitress said that there's a $1,000 prize attached to it. I'll admit that some of our recipes a very close to what they serve there and I would NEVER use my recipe for a public or financial gain, but has anyone else heard this contest thing before?

Well that goes without saying!

Actually, I could probably live if Trattoria e Pizzeria closed down. If Vennari's Pizza closed down again, that would be a different story!

To prevent flareups, trim the fat off and discard.

Do you trim them before they go into the oven or before they go on the chimney starter?

Alright, did the steak thing tonight. Went up to Whole Foods and bought 3 - 2 1/2" choice, dry-aged strip steaks. Cooked them at 275 for 30 minutes, let them sit under an aluminum foil tent for 10 minutes, and then finished them on the chimney. Served them with a side of spinach (that was tossed in a reduction of shallot slices, chicken stock, white wine, lemon juice, and butter) and mashed, roasted cauliflower with roasted garlic (my in-laws can't eat potatoes).

The results were right on! Easily the best steaks I've ever made! Next time I think I'll increase the oven time (because of the thickness) and I'll let the hardwoods burn down a little more before I put the steaks on. I let the hardwoods burn down half way, but I still had major flair-ups and had to keep removing the steaks.

One more question:

On the online edition of Cook's Illustrated's "The Problem with Thick-Cut Steaks" article, there's a video titled "Why does it matter when I salt the steaks?". In the video, it shows a raw piece of meat with salt on it, time-lapsed over a period of 60 minutes to show the moisture being reabsorbed into the meat. The narration says:

"A piece of salted meat will release moister over the course of 20 minutes through a process known as “osmosis”. This liquid will inhibit browning if you try to pan sear the meat too soon. But if you wait a bit longer, the salts on the surface will dissolve in this liquid, creating a brine in which the course of 40 minutes will break down the large muscle fibers in the meat, allowing the liquids in the meat to be reabsorbed and creating juicier and more flavorful results".

It looks like the steak is sitting out (with salt on it) for close to an hour. Has anyone tried this? What were your results?

It won't be superfluous, but I'd get double- or triple-cut steaks (small roasts) to exacerbate the effect and to give you a little more room for error on the searing front.

WARNING - NOVICE QUESTION ABOUT TO BE ASKED:

What's a double or triple cut steak? Is this the thickness? I was thinking about a 1 1/2" to 1 3/4" cut

I don't remember the article being primarily about mimicking dry aging. I remember it being about having more rare/MR meat through the thickness of a thick steak, rather than charred exterior/well done layer/medium layer.

From what I remember about the print article (which they left out of the online version), they went into much more detail about the searing of the steak. They found that pan searing a steak first (and THEN putting it into the oven), greatly reduced the temperature of the pan (even for those steaks that had been at room temperature before the searing). Once the steak hit the pan, the temperature would drop significantly and then have to work its way back up to its original temperature. My interpretation of the article was that they put the steaks in the oven first, so that when you pan sear it (afterwards) the pan would maintain its high temperature and produce a superior sear on the steak.

Question: would using the method on nice dry-aged Prime (or even Choice) from the butcher be worthwhile (could it hurt?), or, to use my father-in-law's expression, would it be like rubbing butter on a fat pig's ass?

I have the same question as well. I'll be cooking for my in-law's anniversary dinner this weekend and I was thinking about going up to Whole Foods to get some prime dry-aged strips. Would the "prime dry-aged" strips be superfluous?

There's a show on the MOJO Channel called After Hours with Daniel Boulud that does something similar to this.