vengroff

I have the pro model from back when their name was uuni. The thing I like most about it is it gets really really hot, well into the 900+°F range. The downside is that it is not really built to retain heat. You have to keep the firebox full of good hardwood to sustain high temperatures. There is a firebrick surface for baking, but otherwise, no real thermal mass. That being said, when it is hot it cooks quickly with a nice char. Here is an example: I've tried multiple fuel options and only hardwood really delivers the way I want for pizza. The pellet option really stumps me. Either I completely don't understand how it is supposed to work or my pellet feeder is defective in some way. I just can't get it to put out enough energy to maintain a temperature much over 400 °F no matter how I tune the vents. One big bonus is that once you get used to how to control the oven it can be used for a lot more than pizza. For example, here's some branzio. Everything on the plate was cooked in the oven. It's also decent for bread, but again you have to watch the fuel level and manage the temperature carefully. Overall, I'm satisfied, but only because I've taken the time and effort to learn how to use it effectively and because I'm willing to monitor and manage it while cooking.

Quite a while. I'm glad to see you have kept this site up and running. I'm back from the west coast and look forward to contributing again. I promise the TWA Hotel is better than Rosa Mexicano in DC*, which I regrettably recommended in a thread long ago that just may have been where you first brought up the subject of ventworms. * I still think the original location in NYC before ownership changed and it chainified was really excellent.

This probably would have been a more useful reply a year or more ago, but with hope that in another year or two it's still there and fully open, here goes: I have stayed at the TWA Hotel at JFK twice before catching early morning flights out. Before that, I had not been in the building since I was a child. It's hard to beat the convenience of the location. It is a quick walk through a tunnel to T5 and, after a slightly longer walk, you can take the Airtrain to any other terminal. The retro 60's vibe is fun. Might get old after too many visits, but so far two has not been too many. The Connie Cocktail Lounge is closed due to COVID, but is definitely worth a visit whenever it eventually reopens. The rooftop pool supposedly has runway views but I did not get a chance to visit.

Ruhlman was in Seattle the other day. Rather than beat the Simon/Cleveland connection to death I asked him about Morou. In the show it came across as if he was eliminated because the judges didn't like his plating. Ruhlman said it was more than that, but he was not specific.

I picked up a ham hock to supplement the giblets for the gravy. Seems to me that when in doubt, adding additional pork products never hurts.

Smart man. It's a castrated rooster grown to somewhere in the 5-10 lb range. Both last time I checked, but that was a couple years ago. I remember going to Eastern market to pick one up the day before Thanksgiving 2003. There was a sign for turkeys and a huge line snaking through the market and then outside. I walked over to the other side of the counter and asked if I needed to get in the turkey line to pick up the capon I had ordered. The man behind the counter smiled, shook his head no, and went back and retrieved my bird.

One word: capon Try it and you'll never go back to turkey.

I don't think I've ever had champagne paired with cheese before, so I did a little googling to see what kind of pairings were recommended. I found this page listing several. <off-topic> I started looking at some of the other pairings on the page and came across the one matching cream cheese and white zinfandel. I think that has got to be among the most brilliant pairings of food and wine I have ever seen. If those two don't go with one another I don't know what does. </off-topic>

OK, leftovers warming.

I wish, but alas there is no photographic evidence.

Saturday Night - Washington Wine Dinner for 20 2004 Amavi Columbia Valley Semillon Market Salad Adapted from Blue Ribbon Bakery 2003 Three Rivers Pepperbridge Vineyard Sangiovese Tuscan Roast Cauliflower Penne with Red Onion, Red Pepper and Basil Adapted from M. Batali's Babbo Cookbook 1995 Apex Cabernet Braised Short Rib of Beef T. Keller's Bouchon Recipe More of Both Reds (Port was aborted based on the first mangy whiff to emerge from the bottle) Cheese tray: delice de bourgogne, humbolt fog, boucherondin, basque blue 2003 L'ecole 41 Late Harvest Semillon Key lime, lemon, and mixed berry pies.

Hard to imagine, I know, but also sitting on a shelf at the store I got it from were two magnums of '88 Margaux they just acquired from a private cellar. Only 30x the price of the Vixen.

I scored a bottle of Vixen. I'm hoping it's the Jones to the Red Chook's grape crush.

Not a course exactly, but How to Taste by Jancis Robinson and a mixed case of $10 bottles is a good start.

I had a Black Chook sparkling shiraz the other day. It's like grape soda, but less sickeningly sweet and with alcohol. Seems like something worth having around on a blazing hot day when you want to throw a butterflied leg of lamb on the grill. But clearly not appropriate at this time of year in Seattle.

Curious how most of the one and two stars are downtown, and the three stars are all within a few blocks of each other. Other than outlier Le Bernardin, I think they are all within two blocks of Columbus Circle. I'm really glad to see Scalini Fedeli get a star. Nobody ever seems to talk much about it, perhaps because they started in New Jersey before taking over the original Bouley space. But for French-leaning northern Italian it's really hard to beat.

The door? Or is it the window? I love that little trick. It's like an architectural preview of the cooking.

I have no idea if the Bouchon rumor is true or not. However, I've seen the kitchens* at Per Se and I've heard Slater's rants about Watergate. They are completely different worlds. *There are three: a main kitchen; a completely seperate kitchen for the private dining room; and a pastry kitchen which will also supply the new Bouchon bakery downstairs.

Speaking of alternative closures, have you seen the Vino-Lok? It's basically a glass stopper with a small clear o-ring seal that looks to be made of silicone. I just ran across one for the first time tonight on a bottle of 2004 Zweigelt from Gernot Heinrich in Austria. I had to google to figure out what it was even called. Seems to have worked just fine for the short time this wine was in the bottle. I suppose drying or cracking of the O-ring would be the failure mode, but I wonder how long it's built to last before that happens.

Macrina is pretty damn good, but the hands down best pastry in town is at Cafe Besalu in Ballard. It's a small place with an open pastry kitchen where chef/owner James Miller and his crew hand make croissants in the finest European tradition. His ginger biscuits are also not to be missed.

Some shots of the prosciutto:

And how could I forget, Salumi, Armandino Batali's hole in the wall joint where the house cure 17 different kinds of salumi. I had the opportunity spend a year curing a whole prosciutto under Dino's direction. Talk about slow food.

Next time any of you are in Seattle, make sure to stop in at Union. Chef Ethan Stowell does some amazing work with a menu that changes daily. Whenever I pass Wild Ginger and see the throngs waiting in the lobby to be seated, I'm tempted to go in and direct them two blocks down to Union. Earth and Ocean (formerly the domain of Lark's chef Jonathan Sundstom) continues to do some interesting work, e.g. sable fish sous vide. As for some of the other places mentioned in this thread, some comments: Flying Fish's chef de cuisine Steve Smrstik has departed for the well regarded 35th Street Bistro in the Freemont neighborhood, north of the main downtown area. Word on the street is there was some kind of dispute of the use of organic-only ingredients. He didn't believe that they universally produced better dishes. Of the Tom Douglas places, the only one I think is worth visiting regularly is Palace Kitchen. It's especially good late nights, when it is one of the only kitchens of note still open. Dick's is miles ahead of McDonalds, I'll give you that, but the fries tend toward the limp and greasy, and the only burger you really want to order is the standard cheeseburger. It has about a 1:1 cheese to meat ratio that makes is as much like a grilled cheese sandwich as a burger. The hand scooped shakes are decent. Two Bell's is where I met my wife--no joke. Back then it was about 1/3 the size it is today and the burger and grilled sausage sandwich, both prepared on a tiny grill at the back corner of the bar, were pretty much the entire food menu. Shiro's is at the top of the traditional Sushi places. The monkfish liver, when available, is by itself enough reason to visit. My other favorite Japanese place is Nishino. The chef trained under Nobu Matsuhisa before moving north from LA, and that experience clearly inspired many of the dishes. Toro tartare with caviar and yuzu and dungeness crab are favorites. They also have a killer sake selection. I really like the food at Lark, but the one thing that kills me every time is the Denny's quality stemware. Come on guys, Speigelau is just not that expensive any more.