Syzygies

A head's up, I didn't realize at first that one could buy 4 mil chamber vacuum sealer pouches. They're not as widely available. In use, I can see no disadvantage whatsoever to 4 mil over 3 mil, and many advantages. They're subjectively far more durable. I've seen 3 mil bags fail because an air bubble pierced in the freezer, causing me to lose chicken stock into a water bath. I've seen 3 mil bags fail because a large salt crystal pierced through, packaging salt cod for a chest freezer. I still use bone guards on occasion (6 mil squares one adds for extra protection) but they're needed much less often. And did I say that after you get used to 4 mil, a 3 mil pouch in a hot sous vide water bath just feels flimsy? They cost about a nickel each, I can't imagine anyone here going through quantities where the unit price becomes an issue. Rather, the main issue is that one buys 1,000 bags at a time. They come in four packs of 250, an easy pallet share if one were so motivated. (I'm too busy to make promises.) I own a VacMaster VP115, and my working set of four bags are 6 x 8, 6 x 12, 8 x 10 and 10 x 12. One could scrimp by leaving out the 6 x 8 and cut down 6 x 12 as needed, but the small bags are very convenient for small items. One wants to standardize on a single bag thickness (4 mil for me) to avoid having to reset the sealing time each use, often forgetting. I also use these bags with a $30 impulse sealer, usually the 6 x 12 size. Liquids, and anything hot, can wreck a chamber machine. One can squeeze/burp nearly all of the air out of a bag, hanging off the impulse sealer, if the contents are wet enough. We put up our year's partially dried tomatoes this way. Having tried absolutely everything for storing stock, I try not to be judgmental in other people's kitchens, "oh yeah, that was me twenty years ago", impulse-sealing a chamber pouch of stock is the ideal storage and reheat solution. (To be fair, other people are just trying to achieve "good enough" and get on with their lives, they're probably thinking that I'm Dennis-grade OCD. But hey, I'm here talking to the cult of Dennis.) Some people will note that a chamber vacuum machine can be used just fine with liquids, if one takes care, and they take umbrage that one wouldn't use a chamber vacuum machine for everything, after ponying up the bucks. I'd love to enter a $1,000 stakes race, filling bags with stock. The impulse sealer is much faster. Pay attention while entering the site, for a 15% coupon, then buy everything on one order: VacMaster > BAGS, ROLLS > CHAMBER VACUUM SEALER POUCHES > 4-MIL

There is no doubt that Dennis thought about everything; he can't help it. Coming from an older design that looked turned on a lathe, the asymmetric shape of a KK looked funny at first to me. It is entirely deliberate, for example to maximize height over the grill. Dennis thought about convection, placing the chimney that far back. (Aaron Franklin, another smoke whisperer of Franklin Barbecue fame, also reworked chimney positions for his designs.) A key factor here is that any KK is far better insulated than other brands in the category. So there simply isn't that much convection, even at high temperatures, compared to other cookers. KKs stabilize, quickly, and one needs and wants less airflow.

Now you should try making your own English muffins. As breads go, they're dead simple, and they taste very, very good made fresh. King Arthur Flour English Muffin Recipes We grind our own flour and use sourdough starter, but these are established habits. One needs to tend the griddle (we used a Baking Steel) and then finish in the oven. Comals like made by La Chamba from black Colombian clay are said to heat more evenly, but I haven't tried this.

A round Baking Steel fits nicely. 16" is biggest, 15" will also fit inside a standard oven. I custom ordered a 1/2" 15" which I'm very happy with. Stovetop, these are crepe pans of the gods, also tortillas, chapati and dosas, any flat bread. They'll also custom order 3/8" thick, though 1/4" thick is fine, just less thermal mass for some applications like scaring the bejeesuz out of a sous vide steak. Ideal for burgers. Baking Steel

How about Centigrade only? People in Fahrenheit land aren't real comfortable with numbers, are they? They certainly don't use weights in recipes. I thought they checked temperatures with their pointer finger?

Yes, small and bone-out will cook faster. Try a whole shoulder (butt + picnic, bone in) for the other monumental extreme. As a bonus one gets many kinds of muscle, a carnival of flavors. Be careful ordering this, as the language is so debased that even professionals equate shoulder and butt. Berkeley Bowl once sold me a two butt vacuum pack as a whole shoulder; luckily the symmetry tipped me off before I had paid and left the store. So ask what the local dialect calls a bone-in shoulder+picnic in one piece. If they offer you a vacuum pack, always a good idea to have them open it (for a fragrance check), and then one sees if it falls into two pieces.

I've done six butts various times. Eight? Wow.

Wow, every time I see this thread title, I think of belt sizes. In fact, with moderation one can lose weight and enjoy great barbecue. Like the brisket hash we had tonight from the unclaimed piece we set aside for Laurie's daughter.

He floored me at 0:20 when he managed to pick up his brisket by grabbing both ends. Huh? I would have eight pieces at that point.

Here's a picture from Aaron Franklin's book, in case anyone might miss this point: The Importance of Wrapping Brisket Pink/Peach Butcher Paper Roll 24" X 150'

Here's a picture from Aaron Franklin's book, in case anyone might miss this point:

Following Aaron Franklin's technique to the letter (10 hours @ 275 F, butcher paper), I delivered my best-received brisket ever as one entree at a large holiday party. A 15 lb prime brisket from Golden Gate Meat Company, my favorite source in the Bay Area, and it disappeared in minutes. I see this as a new plateau with new challenges, and I'd like to look back on this brisket as the worst I've made, moving forward. That may be easy: Part of what one gets for Golden Gate's brisket prices is much more connective tissue, which dissolves more dramatically with this technique. It would be a stretch to say that I was able to slice it, though it did appear that I presented slices. One may need to moderate the use of butcher paper to match the characteristics of the meat. I want the same flavor, more tooth. The only other time I'd seen this little tooth was after have Golden Gate dry-age a brisket for me for a week. A wholly unnecessary step if one uses butcher paper after the dwell. The butcher paper also seemed to inhibit rendering; I would trim even more fat, moving forward. What was left was all consumed, but people self-selected small portions. The rub-and-fat-stained butcher paper is a fantastic visual prop. Cooking is always part drama and teasing expectations, and butcher paper is far better than foil at working up a crowd. The bark was not the same; others report maintaining integrity of their bark. My brisket did then get foiled for a rest as part of transporting it to the party. With sous vide or reverse sear, one can have it both ways with steak. Can we have it both ways here? I see two options to explore: Open back up the butcher paper toward the end, trimming all but a base underneath the brisket? Or take a "burnt ends" approach and deliberately leave parts on the fire while the main brisket rests wrapped in foil and towels in a cooler. The Importance of Wrapping Brisket Pink/Peach Butcher Paper Roll 24" X 150' BBQ Anatomy 101: Know Your Brisket

For the record, here is the refereed journal article: Probable Zoonotic Leprosy in the Southern United States I believe that if one is aware of a plausibly legitimate health question, one should flag it whether one believes the conclusion or not. You may have misread my position. As a mathematician, I recognize the form of statistical reasoning used by such a study, and I find that form of reasoning to be sound. However, studies can be wrong. My position is simply that each person who might consume armadillo meat should reach their own conclusions on the health risks. The poker player in me wonders why you lead with "There is no record..." Me thinks it's a tell, and I want to shove all my chips to the center of the table!

I remember specific stories about Vietnamese refugees settling in Texas. They spotted the armadillo as a good match for an animal they hunted and ate in Viet Nam, and ran into the problem of armadillos carrying leprosy. Without question, Armadillos carry leprosy, and the genetic similarities between their strains and human strains would not be possible without interspecies infection. The rate is low (95% of people are immune), and some of the record is putative, but I wouldn't characterize the situation as "no record". The CDC has a measured warning: http://www.cdc.gov/leprosy/exposure/armadillos.html Here is the NYTimes report on the genetic study: https://web.archive.org/web/20110501134801/http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/28/health/28leprosy.html?_r=1

Wow. I just wandered into land of red.

I held Russell Crowe's Oscar, first night out back on set after the ceremony. None of the actors would, some baseball-like superstition that they'd be blowing their chance.

Wow, posted on my sixtieth birthday. How did you know! Looks awesome.

I have over a dozen waterstones in two locations, and several decades of practice using them for routine knife sharpening. The difference is more dramatic with Japanese knives, as German knives are a lot of work to get sharp this way, and the Japanese knives get sharper. I only use German knives when a thinner Japanese knife might get damaged. I have discarded any other sharpening system that has come my way, including at least one motorized device with celebrity chef endorsements. Anything else that doesn't require its own lab bench is a joke, compared to a waterstone. One learns the ideal angle by sound, just as one learns the ideal paella socarrat by sound. This isn't a big deal, one will get better. The Japanese revere waterstones, and one can spent a thousand dollars on stones harvested from fabled island quarries. Even affordable natural stones tend to humiliate the user, one moment of loss of control and the stone is gouged. The practical choice is a synthetic stone, and the following combo stone rules all others, a great value: Norton 24450 Japanese-Style Combination Waterstone 1000/4000 Grit, 8-Inch by 3-Inch by 1-Inch One could get a pair of combo stones for four grits, but this is overthinking the problem: Norton Waterstone Starter Kit: 220/1000 grit stone, 4000/8000 grit stone, SiC flattening stone The 220 grit might be useful in a shop but is never needed for kitchen knives. 8000 is unnecessarily fine; better to sharpen more often, with a single combo stone that isn't a daunting task to use. Hide Tools offers a popular sharpening service in Berkeley, and I asked; they don't go beyond 4000. This isn't woodworking, and like cleaning a KK there will be more ash; sharpen again sooner! Stones need to be soaked briefly; I used to place mine on a mortar in the sink, with the faucet dribbling as I worked. This holder is far easier; any variant will do: Steelex D1091 Sharpening Stone Holder Sharpening stones get out of true rather quickly. To save money, one can tape a piece of fine wet/dry sandpaper to a flat surface. However, know thyself, one will never do this often enough. Once one learns to get the stone truly flat before each session, it becomes apparent that this is critical to the best results, well worth the effort. I can't vouch for this flattener, but it isn't a budget breaker: Norton Flattening Stone for Waterstones There are many alternatives, and Atoma diamond sharpeners have a following. This is what I use: Atoma Diamond Sharpener Medium - #400 To see how far people take this, here's some insight into the differences in diamond sharpeners: DMT vs. Atoma Diamond Plates For the Edge Pro – A Microscopic Comparison I've left out some basics that one should read online. The above is more opinion, conclusions I've drawn that weren't immediately clear from reading about the basics. The above is what I actually do, not nearly often enough, decades after any precious attachments to unnecessary rituals have worn off. I'm quite restless until I find something that works (many cookers before the KK, dozens of programming languages before Haskell), and this works.

I have an old desk in my university office. A monumental hunk of solid wood, marred by disintegrating varnish of unknown type. Using the top has felt for years like a day at the beach. The last thing I want in that difficult-to-clean space is messy solvents and/or a power sander. A heat gun might help... Before sandpaper, people used "cabinet scrapers". The Japanese hand methods have survived better in our imaginations: One spent as long preparing tools as using them. Here, a cabinet scraper can only be used so long before it needs a new edge preparation. There's a three step metal-working process that I've never witnessed in person, that leads to the perfect microscopic lip on the metal that does the scraping. On one hand, mastering this would be an advanced school in metal care, I'd have to be better at sharpening knives afterward, even if it's not really the same process. On the other hand, the first $5 scraper did more than half the job, and life is short, I'm thinking of just buying a couple more. Embarrassing, like buying a new flashlight when the batteries fail, but practical. I'll ship the spent scrapers to California, and see if I ever play with them in my shop.

Keep a water stone flat with a diamond stone (who cuts the barber?)

I'm reading an old spreadsheet in NYC; I can't go out to the garage to double-check. My notes say that the lip on a 50cm paella pan is 19.8" in diameter. I believe that this is my go-to pan for more than four people. It fits in my KK, and once I sawed the handles off I could even close the lid. A 42cm fits easily, handles and all, and is also a size one wants around. Sawing the handles off a 50cm is not for the faint of heart. I suppose there are people here with lab lasers or welding equipment who could make short work of this, but it would be a multi-day project with a Swiss army knife. My tool set is somewhere in the middle, and it took me twenty minutes. Forget enamel unless you want to feel like the seventh occupant of a trailer park home. Carbon steel is next least expensive, and can actually be seasoned. One could well be happier going with stainless steel and cleaning completely each time. Paella is an aggressive cooking process, and I have my doubts that many people can season a pan well enough to survive paella cooking. I have books that actually praise the flavor from a carbon steel pan, alluding in flowery terms to the seasoning coming off into the food, which suggests that no one is managing to actually season their pans. Forget the recent web craze involving flaxseed oil; they got hung up on the single concept of polymerization, at the expense of all else. Flaxseed oil works on rough cast iron, but peels off smooth metal. True seasoning is many, many cycles of fat such as lard, cooking starches, and high heats. Think very thin coats of lard at 600 F till the smoking stops. The goal is the black crud on a fifty year old cake pan that won't come off for love or money. An after dinner KK fire is ideal for seasoning; go hot enough without reaching the self-cleaning oven stage, which also strips the seasoning. As I said, one can also go stainless steel. I ordered four bags of Fideo Pasta for Traditional Fideua yesterday, from La Tienda to take advantage of a sale. I prefer pasta to rice, for both risotto and paella. So do the Catalans.

Creole Gumbo

Yes. If one wants uniformly sized burgers, use a digital scale. I set out a number of Corelle saucers, smeared with olive oil. Divide up the meat, and form into patties with the lightest finger touch, using the saucers as guides to obtain uniform diameters. Using a burger press to form burgers is like using a rolling pin to punch down bread dough. There are many purposes to punching down bread dough, but none of them read "collapse all those little air bubbles". There is a duality to a great burger, a floating tender lightness, and at the same time so meaty it surprises you every time. Think love and sex. Here is my go-to meat grinder; also order other sizes of plates. If you have time, nearly freeze the chunks of meat before grinding. The issue is to avoid smearing the fat, which a food processor is prone to do. Even if one never aspires to be a master sausage maker, one can look to this group for best practices. This is like visiting Hida Tools for Japanese knives; the critical activity is woodworking, and cooking is by comparison play. Here, making burgers is the kindergarten version of making sausages, but the sausage makers are the only ones who can truly teach us how to handle meat. http://www.sausagemaker.com/10-Stainless-Steel-Meat-Grinder-p/15-1010.htm

Gesundheit!