Culinary Conversations

[karstopography]

The Big Green Egg is a great pizza oven. My daughter is our best pizza dough maker. I seem to have trouble getting the moisture right. Bread flour works better for us than AP. I get the BGE up around 650 degrees indirect heat with the pizza stone preheated. My daughter can get the dough nice and thin without tearing it and that with the hot oven produces a great texture. Pizza is done in just a few minutes, just like in one of those hot brick ovens.

[Sue_CT]

Have not made any pizza this summer yet. I used a stone in the grill last year. Going to have to try it again soon. Ripe tomatoes are just starting to come, I had 3 this week and 4 or 5 more now finishing ripening on the counter. Soon.

[PlainJane]

Have not made any pizza this summer yet. I used a stone in the grill last year. Going to have to try it again soon. Ripe tomatoes are just starting to come, I had 3 this week and 4 or 5 more now finishing ripening on the counter. Soon.

That sounds good!

[worth1]

So they are saying throw out your red onions due to them having possible salmonella contamination.
I always assume chicken is contaminated with it.
Even if my onions were from this place in California (which they aren't) I would just cook the things instead of eating them raw.
Salmonella and other contamination's has really put me off on eating raw produce from the market anymore.

[worth1]

Remember that fat I bought for sausage???
I just got the craziest sausage idea I have ever had in my life.
Seriously.
Think boudin/boudain with a twist.
Not rice but whole sweet corn ran through the grinder but not cream style with salt black pepper red hot pepper and powdered garlic for the spices.
Frozen fat and beef trimmings ran separately then mixed.
How could this not be good if cooked first at 160F in water for ten to fifteen minutes and then finished on the grill to cook the casings?

[worth1]

Anybody see anything wrong with this.
Someone I know saw it in an Asian marketplace.

20200908_184732.jpg

[MissS]

Wagyu beef in not a product of the USA. Kobe beef comes from a district in Japan.

[karstopography]

American Wagyu is from crossbreeds of Japanese Waygu and American Cattle. Like Champagne can only be legitimately called Champagne if it’s from the right region in France and done by the right methods. True Kobe beef is from the right cattle from the right region around Kobe, Japan.

Still, American Wagyu is awfully good. Never have I had true Kobe.

https://www.snakeriverfarms.com/kobe-vs-wagyu

[worth1]

I think there are four or so breeds of Wagyu cattle.
Wagyu translation is Japanese cow.

It kind of bothers me when companies don't respect other countries protected names.
I consider it a form of counterfeiting.
The US is horrible with wine and cheese.
Years ago the Japanese built an almost exact replica of the Harley flat head 45.
The name they gave it translated to something like The King.
The Japanese didn't even eat beef till about a hundred years ago they were used as draft animals.

Their motorcycles were all improvements of British motorcycles.
Namely Norton and Triumph.
They are very good at taking a product and improving it like the beef.
The NSK bearings are top of the line.
The Chinese counterfeit them.

[karstopography]

https://www.expressnews.com/food/articl ... 161562.php

Article on the origins of the breeds in both countries.

I couldn’t eat American waygu all the time, but once in a while it’s nice.

[worth1]

I have bought select beef that looked better than prime.
Someone messed up.
America needs to step it up when it comes to grading beef big time
I told someone some time ago I didn't select beef according to the grade but what it looked like.
They didn't understand at all.
To them it's like buying gasoline regular mid grade and premium.
Not realizing it has to meet set standerd but no rules about exceeding a set standard.

[worth1]

I buy the giant bag of chicken leg thigh combos a lot.
When I get them I wash them like a hundred times and then put them in freezer bags using the water displacement method to remove air.
A few days ago I pulled a bag and put it in the refrigerator to thaw slowly.
I forgot about them for maybe a week.
Well this ain't gonna be good it's chicken you know.
Took it out last night dreading the smell that was surely to come wafting out.
To my surprise it was as fresh as a daisy no small at all.
Had it baked for supper.
If it had not been washed there is no way it wouldn't have not went bad.

Wash that poultry and wash it again and again.
It is worth it.

[worth1]

While at the store today I remembered fruit fresh and citric acid.
Got the Ball brand citric acid as usual.
Then I stopped by to pick up some bulk spices I needed for an up and coming homemade sausage event.
Low and behold they had bulk citric acid for about half the price of the ball brand, 3.99 a pound.
Well I got a pound of it while I was there and put up the Ball brand.
No worries my hands were sanitized, they have the bottles all over the place at our local HEB including the bulk spice station.
For the most part the bulk spices are a far better value than the name brand bottled stuff.
Couldn't believe how much cheaper the nutmeg was, got whole and ground.
While on the subject I even remembered to pick up some bulk turmeric.
Been out of it for awhile.

[pepperhead212]

That sounds more like what I paid for citric acid last time!

Yesterday, I saw on the news that a company that has an Asian market that I used to go to in Philly (was my favorite, when I used to go over there frequently) opened one over here in Jersey, much closer, and brand new! I'll have to check it out next time I go to that area, though I really don't need anything.

[worth1]

The thing about making homemade onion rings is you eat them as fast as they come out of the oil.

[Sue_CT]

That is why I started cooking bacon in the oven. Every time I took a few strips out of the pan to drain, and added more I would snack on the freshly cooked pieces, so by the time the next batch was done, there were none left, lol.

[worth1]

What's worse is when you cook it and someone else eats it as fast as you cook it.
I had to run the guy out of the kitchen.
He ate almost half a side of bacon.

[worth1]

You would think a company like EVO that makes round top griddles that sell for close to four thousand dollars would know the difference between a griddle and a grill.
They call the things grills when in fact they are a griddle.
Drives me batty.

[karstopography]

My buddy has the Campchef outdoor propane flat top, the griddle. Great for cooking bacon, a lot of bacon or burgers, tons of cooking space. I love a flat top. My only stint as a pro chef was working the flat top one summer as a 16 year old at my grandmother’s drive in restaurant in Freeport. What an education was that.

A burger on the flattop, the griddle, tastes different than a grilled patty. Doesn’t mean one is better than the other. Dirty’s in Austin there by the Campus always did a great burger on the flattop. GM, I think it’s long gone now, right down the road grilled theirs. They could not be more different, but yet still both are called a hamburger or cheeseburger.

The Inuit supposedly have several words for snow because it stands to reason in a climate where they live those distinctions matter.

For the hamburger lover, the distinctions on how the patty is getting cooked matter. The mix of the meat matters. The thickness matters. How the buns are handled matters. The trimmings matter.

Same for bacon. Oven cooked bacon tastes different than cast iron skillet bacon tastes different than flat top bacon tastes different than aluminum pan cooked bacon. The cut of the bacon, the smoke, for example applewood smoked bacon tastes different hickory smoked bacon. I’ve made my own bacon, but I’m the guy at the store that’s going to look at the packages for just the right fat to lean mix. People go and grab any old pack, no, no, no!

[worth1]

Players on the end of the drag is gone.
Used to be open all day and night.
Onion rings were killer.
Loved that place.