Syzygies

Charcoal fired bread oven

Re: Some truly valuable information..... I made frost shelters for our citrus trees out of my crate scraps.

Re: Bronze Behemoth Game On! 2 I know Steve Sando from when he (and we) came regularly to the SF Ferry building farmers market. He's the real deal, and his beans are the best available. It makes a difference. Pretty much any bean from the Xoxoc project is an almost vanished Mexican heirloom variety that he's rescued, with much more character than a bean variety one already knows. To fill out his flat fee shipping, load up on extras. Calling in for advice couldn't hurt, they don't list everything. But his Piloncillo: Evaporated Cane Juice is the best sugar I've ever tasted (imagine it in a rub!), and they have this dried cactus candy that's incredibly addictive. Etc., Etc.

This is prior work, published in 'Modernist Cuisine' Here is the AmazingRibs blog entry:Understanding And Beating The Barbecue Stall, Bane Of All Barbecuers It refers to this page by Greg Blonder, July 2011: BBQ stall explained Here is an interview with Nathan Myhrvold, February 17, 2011: Modernist Cuisine's Nathan Myhrvold on Culinary Myth-Busting, Bacon, and Barbecue Modernist Cuisine was published in early 2011. I wrote Greg Blonder to ask about priority. He's adding a footnote to his post. He claims that this idea was not original to Nathan Myhrvold, as many people including himself had made the connection years ago. He only wrote this up recently at the prodding of AmazingRibs. See this thread: Bronze Behemoth Game On! 2 I just saw this the other day, but from a different source, which I suspect is the original: Modernist Cuisine's Nathan Myhrvold on Culinary Myth-Busting, Bacon, and Barbecue

Re: Finishing side tables n66951 n66952 Sutherland Welles The Real Milk Paint Company Penofin Verde ADD-2 PREVENT mildewcide So I've gotten rather into this question, and the outdoor furniture that I make (redwood tables, etc) are weathering California rainy seasons just great. Of course, any time I oil anything, my main redwood "work bench" table (by the KK) gets the spills, which I then rub in. Sutherland Welles is the real deal, and their polymerized tung oil does yield a stronger finish. However their outdoor blend can only be shipped to CA in quarts (it takes a week and then they bill you, real old school), already with paint thinner and mildewcide. Penofin Verde is based instead on rosewood oil, with natural antimildew activity, to which they add a mildewcide and a natural solvent. It's thicker than Sutherland Welles tung oil (economic death if they can't claim with a straight face that deck contractors can apply it in one coat) and I wanted to thin it for better penetration. They wouldn't play along, giving no good reason but no advice. Lately I just buy pure tung oil, and citrus solvent, from the Real Milk Paint Company, and thin anything I have with citrus solvent. Nice for me and CA to go green, no downside that I can see. For outdoor finishes I add mildewcide, available at any paint store. I'm giving up the added polymerization of Sutherland Welles, for blend-it-myself control. Our puppy licked up some spilled Penofin. I wouldn't cook with it, but no need to call poison control. Puts a nice spin on "green" methods.

Re: Limoncello Rosemary

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Kung Fu KK The notion that one "needs an idea" is deeply embedded in our collective psyche. This may be true for radical moments in science or the arts, but clarity comes as often through subtraction as through addition. Everything you need is right in front of your eyes, you just need to see which parts matter. Like so many of us, I worried about everything, my first few years with ceramic cookers. Most of it really didn't matter. WIth a bit of experience, the many right ways to use a KK are dream-easy to execute. To see this, it helps to have weekends too busy to fret over KK technique. I learned this subtraction principle for food in college. I got this idea that I wanted to supplement our dull food plan with the best cheesecake ever, for those late-night times when one gets really hungry. A maven friend (I still wonder what makes someone track such things) immediately named the four people at our school who felt they had mastered cheesecake. Straight out of a Kung Fu movie, I climbed each of their hills to learn their wisdom. Each recipe had some good, obvious ideas, and some ridiculous nuances. (Ok, maybe they didn't specify the sock color, but that's what I was hearing...) Averaging the parts that made sense, and taking the whole situation a lot less seriously, I ended up with good, classic cheesecake.

Re: From Fresh to Ham at Home... Yum!!

Re: extruded loading question I honestly don't think it matters, and I've gone through many boxes of this stuff. Were one worried about the fire going out, or not lasting long enough, a tight, regular crystal structure might have its advantages. But I've never had a fire go out, or not last 24 hours, so this isn't an issue. Were one worried about getting enough airflow, a loose, random packing might have its advantages. But I've never felt I needed more airflow with this lump. The idea that there's a right way to do everything has an intoxicated authority. This isn't always the case.

Re: V Pills for those on the go From a friend:

Limoncello Limoncello 750 ml Everclear (151 proof grain alcohol) 24 unwaxed organic Eureka lemons 500 ml water 2 cups cane sugar Wash lemons. Peel just the yellow part of the zests, into a 2 quart ball jar. Add Everclear. Let rest for 2 to 3 days, to make lemon extract. Boil water with sugar to make simple syrup, let cool. Strain lemon extract into simple syrup, bottle, and store for serving in one's freezer. Makes 1.5 liters.

Re: Limoncello Rosemary I caught the Limoncello obsession on various trips to Sicilian islands. There was an ice cream freezer at a little shop on the walk back from snorkeling on Panarea, with some house-made limoncello tucked away deep in a corner. Nice afternoon lift! I later collected methods everywhere I went. On the Amalfi coast for our honeymoon, we inquired whether the limoncello was house-made, getting the enthusiastic response "Sempre a casa!" Is the rosemary your innovation? I never saw it. Then again, everything happens in Italy. Here in SF, Boccalone sells a wonderful 'nduja with twelve ingredients, which they claim is authentic. (And authenticity is overrated! Better to channel what people would do under your circumstances.) I never saw more than pork, fat, salt, red pepper, in Calabria or for sale in NYC, and my Calabrian cooking lessons take this view. I've tried various citrus, including many Meyer lemon experiments. In Italy they'll argue that the southern Italian lemon, with a thick rind almost leaning grapefruit, is superior and essential to the recipe. I had the absolute best results with the best examples of organic (ordinary) lemons one sees only every few years at market. This has to be a crime of opportunity; what's available on demand isn't good enough. One has to make the comparison, doubling the amount of rind but steeping for at most 48 hours. This is a minority opinion but one held by some Italians; I'll never go back. To my taste, the 40 day steep is too brown in appearance and taste, by comparison. (I know it's not actually brown unless one does something wrong. I said by comparison.)

Smoke Pot One easy way to obtain a very refined smoke in a KK is to use a smoke pot: Drill a few 1/8" holes in the bottom of a two quart cast iron dutch oven, fill with apple and/or hickory chips or chunks, and seal on the lid with a flour-water paste, mixed in a ziplock bag with the corner then nicked for squeezing out the goop. (The idea is if the lid comes loose, one gets convection, defeating the purpose of the smoke pot.) Now set this over the coals, and light the fire directly under the pot. This is an empirical observation, not a theological observation. The idea comes from the standard method for making charcoal. I'm not suggesting that those who use this approach are making armagnac, while those using open chunks are making moonshine. This is something you have to decide for yourself, by experiment. So I'll probably have trouble understanding "I can't imagine..." responses (or simply be saddened by the lack of imagination ), but any "I tried both ways and I like open chunks better" response is simply an honest difference of opinion. (Laurie won't ever let me go back to open chunks.)

Clustersmoke Putting cold meat in the cooker is a competition trick to increase the smoke ring, which stops forming around 130 F. The judges have lost all sense of taste by partway through a competition, but they can still judge appearance and texture. Adding curing salts also has a dramatic effect, but they can spot this.

Alcohol I pour on as much 91% isopropyl alcohol as I dare, and throw in a match. There is an art to this. I've made some rather loud pings (the kind of ping that can upset the chickens in four neighbors' yards) when I get carried away, but I haven't lost any limbs or anything. It really doesn't take much, and there is a window in which one can close the KK. This isn't like flashback, which is dangerous. The combustion byproducts are said to be carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide, so I steer way clear till the fumes burn off. After that, there is absolutely no sign of the accelerant, unlike lighter fluid, or even those wax cubes which leave trace smells in the fire. Isopropyl alcohol The carbon monoxide could be why you don't see this widely recommended. But it works, really well. Ethanol costs more, but one doesn't have to worry about carbon monoxide in the combustion byproducts.

Mushrooms There are nights we don't light the fire...

Re: Would you have cooked this Chicken? Yeah, Fergus Henderson (one of my zombie masters) says to use whole heads of garlic in stock, skin on. I compromise by halving through the equator, for exactly this reason. (Wasn't it soylent green?)

Re: Three Extruder Machines are in the House! No but someone who didn't know all the back stories could misread it...

Re: I know my history In response to a private message, let me clarify that my picture was a mashup intended to look obviously fake; the perspectives deliberately don't match. Had I wanted to mislead anybody, I can do better. I have no doubts about the veracity of the original picture. The joke was obscure and did not belong on this forum. It did not refer to Dennis. There are few people I trust to the degree I trust Dennis, and every long timer here will tell you the same thing.

Re: No lift gate That thing is amazing! Can it also turn the KK upside down to shake out the ashes?

I know my history Lucky us! I found another ceramic pioneer with experience stealing boats!

Re: Ok, got a tracking number I hope you're bringing them some 'cue?

Re: Bronze Behemoth Game On! 2 Also from Modernist Cuisine's Nathan Myhrvold on Culinary Myth-Busting, Bacon, and Barbecue Hmm... I learned such a method years ago, from Paul Bertolli's 2003 Cooking by Hand. It isn't rocket science, one estimates the weight of water in the meat, and adds the right amount of salt to the brine water to reach a desired salinity at equilibrium. Salt divided by total water, not exactly e=mc^2. So now "We've invented" reminds me of that famous Hemingway quote about Henry Miller,

Re: Bronze Behemoth Game On! 2 I just saw this the other day, but from a different source, which I suspect is the original: Modernist Cuisine's Nathan Myhrvold on Culinary Myth-Busting, Bacon, and Barbecue Nathan Myhrvold was CTO at Microsoft, and is spending his billions on a food lab that birthed the $625 five volume treatise Modernist Cuisine. I'm actually rather interested, though I think scientists make poor cooks, I don't have their "only book you'll ever need" mindset, and some reviews cite inexplicable errors in the first printings.