Why not? I can make one. If I really wanted to. But no one would buy it. I think my friends wouldn’t mind me giving them one. So, I can make them, pay for them and give them away. For $34.95, Tastebook can get me published. Tastebook is a web startup company that provides tools for users to create their own recipe databases. Users can also share the databases with friends and publish books with content from the recipe databases.
Why didn’t I think of that? Founded by a couple of guys from Ofoto, Tastebook recently received an infusion of cash from CondéNet, the internet operations sub of Condé Nast Publications. Tastebook partnered with Epicurious.com, also a Condé Nast Publications sub, for providing initial content from Epicurious’ online recipe database which include over 25,000 recipes.
To create a cookbook, users collect recipes online from Epicurious (they say more content providers will be available in the future) or add their own. From there users get to decide which recipes they want in their cookbook, as well as the cookbook’s title, cover photo and more. I’ll make one titled “Recipes That Chicks will Totally Dig.”
Much love goes out to my childhood friend, Miss K, who sent info on this company to me. Great idea with a lot of potential. I just hope their site doesn’t turn into and advertising farm like the Food Network has become.
Yankees suck!
I absolutely love risotto. I’ve never tried to make it before. I wanted a delicious side to the Korean BBQ Chicken I made last weekend. I took a nose dive into some of my Italian cookbooks and cruised around the web a little for information on risotto ingredients and preparation techniques. Here’s what I found …
A quick read on risotto history and recipes can be found here. Most of my cookbooks really didn’t explain what risotto really was and the caveats on preparing it. One recipe I found in Lidia Bastianich’s cookbook Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen really caught my attention. It explained that once you understand how to prepare a basic risotto, you can parlay that skill into making any type of risotto you could imagine. The basics are the key to pretty much all cooking and just about everything else in life.
I followed Lidia’s “master plan” for preparing risotto and made a few of my own changes along the way. Nice!
4½ cups hot chicken stock
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium white onion, minced
1 leek, white parts only, trimmed, cleaned and chopped
6 scallions, white and green parts chopped separately
2 cups Italian Aborio rice
â…“ cup dry white wine
2 tablespoons butter, cut into four pieces
â…“ up freshly grated Parimigiano-Reggiano cheese
Salt & freshly ground black pepper
Pour the chicken stock in a small sauce pan and keep it hot over medium heat. In a large sauté pan, heat the oil over medium heat and stir in the onions. Sauté the onions until softened, about four minutes. Stir in the leeks and white parts of the scallions and sauté for another six minutes. The onions should start to brown. Stir in the rice making sure all of the grains get covered with the oil. Keep stirring often for the next two to three minutes until the edges of the grains become translucent. Pour in the wine and let it boil. Keep stirring the rice till the wine has evaporated.
Season the rice with salt and ladle enough of the hot chicken stock into the sauté pan until it barely covers the rice. Bring to a boil then lower the heat to maintain a lively simmer. Continue cooking while stirring constantly until all the stock has been absorbed and you can see the bottom of the pan when you stir. Continue cooking, pouring the remaining hot stock in small batches. Each addition of stock should be only enough to completely moisten the rice. Continue doing this until the stock has been absorbed. All this should take 15-20 minutes from the time you added the wine.
Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the butter and green parts of the scallions until the butter is completely melted. Stir in half the grated cheese. Taste the risotto and add more salt if you like and then add the freshly ground black pepper. Top with grated cheese and serve immediately.
I like a creamy risotto so I used another two cups of chicken stock. This also added to the cooking time since I had 50% more stock to absorb. I also squeezed a little lemon juice at the end. This basic recipe can be taken into an infinite number of directions. Try adding some smoked chicken at the end. I’d like to add some saffron to the chicken stock next time I make it. Shrimp risotto should be good. Maybe I’ll try making an asparagus risotto. I’m guessing all I would have to do is add some steamed & chopped asparagus tips to the risotto at the end of the cooking. Yeah, that’s the ticket! Arrivederci! Yankees suck!
So I was waiting for my date at Matt Murphy’s Pub in Brookline … standing at the bar … I had to stand, there weren’t any barstools. Even if there were barstools, there wouldn’t have been any room for them. I didn’t see any beer taps so I assumed they served bottled beer. I asked the bartender what bottled beers they carried. In a comically over-done Irish accent he tells me they don’t have bottled beers and tossed me the menu with draft beers on the back. Hey, I know Irish folks. I’m part Irish. This guy’s Irish accent was way over the top. I mean, yeah, he could possibly actually be from Ireland, but he was trying real hard to make sure I heard his outrageous, yet slightly smug accent. I wanted to say, “Tanks, laddie … just git me a fookin bear and stay away from me lucky charms! Jaysus!” … but all I said was that I’d like a Newcastle.
Anyhoo … as I began to sip my suds I thumbed through the pile of newspaper at the end of the bar. I picked up a page and started to read an article about cooking with a broiler by Mark Bittman. I own a cookbook by Mark Bittman titled How to Cook Everything. It’s one of the best cookbooks I own and I highly recommend everyone in the world to buy it. The article was a excellent read. Low and behold, I was reading the the cover of the Dining & Wine section of the New York Times. Now I’ve pretty much given up hope that the New York Times would ever be a paper worth reading. I mean this is a place that actually pays Paul Krugman to write editorials. Sheesh! Over the past several years I have been convinced that the New York Times is a place with boundless hypocrisy … severely lacking in journalistic integrity, ethics, accuracy, quality and style. I let my hard-nosed attitude towards the paper neglect the Dining & Wine section. I wish I hadn’t. I’m glad I’m back. I went ahead and added the NYT Dining & Wine section to the links on the right and I’ll be perusing through it as often as I am able. Hell, I even linked to the Boston Globe’s food section as well. I’ve largely ignored the Boston Globe since they are owned by the New York Times. Two peas in a pod as they say in Tibet. What makes me sick is the fact that via the Boston Globe, the New York Times also owns a piece of the Boston Red Sox and NESN.
Just as I finished reading the article, my date shows up. Let’s call her Dimples. She orders a Guinness. Nice! The smug extra-Irish bartender says something completely inaudible … He sounded more like the Swedish Chef from the Muppets than the extra-Irish barmaid he was shooting for. Dimples and I look at each other trying to figure out what he was saying. It turns out they didn’t serve Guinness. If you wanna act extra-Irish in a town like Boston, it doesn’t help by not having Guinness on tap. She orders whatever the house substitute was. On to the food … Dimples ordered the fried Atlantic cod & chips. I had the Beef stew. My stew was pretty good. Beef was tender and the vegetables were fresh. The fish & chips were much better. That’s what I’ll get next time I go.
As for the rest of the pub, it was an overall good experience. They typically have live music, but I have no idea where they could fit a band. This place was pretty small. No music last night since there was some sort of a trivia league. We weren’t playing but I helped out the table next to us on a few questions. Doesn’t everyone know that Billy the Kid also went by the names Henry Antrim and William Harrison Bonney in his younger years? As for Dimples, she was wonderful company. Namaste! Yankees suck!
Last year 100 US Marines set aside their rifles and Kevlars and applied their competitive spirit to a battle at the BBQ. The winner: four worthy charities that directly benefit Marines and their families: Wounded Warrior Project, Fisher House, Injured Marines Semper Fi Fund, and Marine Corps-Law Enforcement Foundation.
The competition spawned a book that filled an obvious gap in the foodie community: “Command of the Grill: A Salute to Steak.” A Marine cookbook? Yes, but where’s the recipe for shit on a shingle? Most of the recipes in the book were selected from 10 separate “Command of the Grill” grilling semi-final competitions held at Marine Corps bases across the country, including MCB Camp Pendleton and MCB Quantico. The winners of those semi-finals were to compete in the “Command of the Grill” finals and cookbook launch event during this year’s Fleet Week in New York City.
To qualify for the semi-finals, Marines were required to submit an original grilling recipe and explain in 50 words or less why their recipe is the best and why they should win. At the semi-final events, each Marine grilled two New York strip steaks and a panel of judges chose one winner based on creativity of the entry essay, visual appeal, and the taste of their steak.
The book showcases the winning recipes, honorable mentions, profiles of the Marine competitors, celebrity Marine recipes and a rigorous “Steak Boot Camp.” Capt. Eric Dominijanni’s Disco’s Hot and Tangy New York Strip Steaks is one of the recipes covered in the book. “Capt. D” has been cooking since he was a child. While stationed in Iraq, he was known to make paella for his troops in the back of his Assault Amphibian Vehicle. “I may have had to fight like a barbarian, but I didn’t have to eat like one,” Dominijanni said. Sponsored by Weber, the goal is to raise more than $500,000. All proceeds will go to the above charities.
The winner of the competition will be crowned National Commander of the Grill and take home a prize package worth more than $5,000. The prize package includes a new luxury Weber gas grill, and a grilling lesson and dinner for him/her and 10 of their Marine buddies — at their U.S. Marine Corps base — with chef and best-selling author Jamie Purviance.
Check out Command of the Grill to find out more information on the book and how to get one of your own. Yankees suck!
Semper Fi
Cooking is one of the few activities in this world that is both an art and a science. I lean towards the artsy side most of the time by paying little attention to the exactness of measurements, temperatures and processes. These habits make me a lousy baker! This book caught my eye as something that would be an interesting twist to the normal cookbook. I got much more than I bargained for!
I learned that an evening in the kitchen can provide you with a syllabus chock full of art projects and science experiments. The history of the noodle, neurology of taste, geology behind salt, expressions of herbs, creativity of a recipe, chemistry of a cocktail, biology lessons in vegetables, physics of heat, engineering behind a pastry, and design of a holiday meal. Many have told me that design is a good idea! Presentation of the finished artwork is something I need to work on.
Art & science aside … cooking is really an excerise in humanities.
The author of this book, Robert Wolke, is a chemistry professor and it shows. Mr. Wizard’s World meets Julia Child. Kinda like Alton Brown, but not so annoying.
I learned a lot from this book and I’m not even close to finishing it. It provides lots of lessons about cooking along with plenty of practical recipes. It also delves into how to shop for food. What to look for while buying meat, breads and vegetables. Most importantly, it tries to answer the question we all need answers to, “Why?†Does it really answer it? You be the judge! Yankees suck!
Slashfood tipped me off today that the Food Network will be airing a new show featuring my dream woman (well, one of them) Nigella Lawson. Nigella is one of Britain’s most influential food writers whose tremendous cross-over television success is being extended to the US on a large scale. She has already been aired on the Style Network with shows called Nigella Bites & Forever Summer with Nigella. I’ll take forever ANYTHING with Nigella … especially the bites!
Nigella’s father, Nigel Lawson, was the second most powerful executive in British politics while serving as Margaret Thatcher’s Chancellor of the Exchequer. She studied medieval and modern languages at Oxford and enjoyed success as a journalist. She also served as Deputy Literary Editor of The Sunday Times. She shifted gears and became a freelance writer for several publications including The Guardian, Daily Telegraph and Times Magazine in the UK. She also wrote for Gourmet and Bon Appétit in the US.
Nigella has authored several books: “Forever Summer”, “Nigella Bites”, “How to Be a Domestic Goddess”, “Feast” & “How to Eat.” She’s also the subject of the Gilly Smith penned biography “Nigella Lawson.”
I once read an article that referred to her as an “irresistible domestic goddess!” My take is that she’d make an irresistible anything. If she were an “irresistible tow truck driver”, I’d buy into that! You can count on Nigella’s new Food Network show being at the top of my TiVo Season Pass priority list!
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