Dinner with Mom and Dad

A great meal last night in Buffalo before my early flight-- Mom made up her barbecue sauce (ketchup, pineapple juice, brown sugar... what else?) for the chicken and Dad grilled it perfectly. The corn was picked this morning and tasted fresh and sweet-- I had two ears with a little butter, salt, and pepper. The oven roasted vegetables-- peppers, broccoli-- were browned, seasoned with a little olive oil and herbs. Mom even made me a chicken sandwich for a late snack on the plane-- I didn't get into SF until about midnight.

Buffalo food: Beef on weck

Completing the Buffalo food trifecta (along with Ted's and wings), we stopped at Anderson's on Main Street for beef on weck (after picking up some great homegrown produce at Spoth's on Transit Road). The Kimmelweck roll is what makes the "beef on weck" sandwich so spectacular-- essentially a kaiser roll with salt and caraway seeds on top, it's a perfect complement to the thinly sliced top sirloin, [au] jus, and horseradish.

Unfortunately, I was too stuffed after the sandwich to have Anderson's specialty: frozen custard. Smooth and rich but light in texture, there's always a daily special flavor (today's was banana) in addition to the regular chocolate and vanilla. The special can be mixed with vanilla in a twist, though I usually go for a small chocolate-vanilla twist in a sugar cone if the special isn't cinammon or black raspberry. Anyway, here's a shot of the custard machines-- that was all I could stomach after the beef on weck, curly fries, and loganberry.

Buffalo food: Ted's and Duff's

Visiting my parents in Buffalo for the weekend, I couldn't resist two treats unique to the area.

Friday for lunch, Mom and I stopped in at Ted's Hot Dogs on Sheridan Drive. They cook dogs from Sahlen's to perfection-- crispy and bursting-- over massive indoor charcoal-fired grills. Grandma used to tell them "grill mine black." Mom had one dog with their chili and famous hot sauce, I had one with everything except mustard-- hot sauce, relish, onions, and pickles-- and extra hot sauce to boot. A side of onion rings had a medium-dark finish, with a good amount of batter-- sometimes they're darker and crispier, sometimes lighter and fluffier. I had a traditional loganberry soft drink with my lunch. Ted's (and everywhere else in Buffalo, it seems,) serves Aunt Rosie's Loganberry, a brand distributed by the local Pepsi Cola Bottling Co. Sadly, it lacks the tartness of the old, Canadian loganberry syrups which were prevalent before the "Aunt" takeover-- there was never an Aunt Rosie, but there was a Ted!

For dinner last night, I picked up a single order of wings (medium) from Duff's on Sheridan at Millersport. The two big schools of wings are The Anchor Bar, where Buffalo-style wings originated, and Duff's-- we've always been Duff's people. Traditionally, you choose the heat of your wings-- mild, medium, or hot-- but Duff's heat scale stands out. As their signs and t-shirts announce: WARNING: MEDIUM IS HOT MEDIUM-HOT IS VERY HOT HOT IS VERY, VERY HOT Wings are wings, and there are good ones everywhere, but like cheese steak sandwiches and pizza, the subtleties make all the difference, and it's correct to get passionate about these things. All I ask is that you call them "Buffalo-style" wings or just "wings," not "Buffalo wings"!

p.s.: It has been two weeks since I started this blog, and I still need to post about my Gaggia Classic espresso machine-- it's brilliant. The biggest problem of getting this blog going is the lousy quality of the camera on my phone...

Mom's roasted chicken

[munch munch]... the dish came out great... [smackety smack...] so good... [drool smack chomp mmm...] recipe at 11...

Update: The recipe could not be simpler. Before you poo-poo it for containing ketchup, understand that this isn't some "cream of mushroom soup" thing-- you'll never know it has ketchup in it.

• Four to six chicken breast halves with bones and skin
  One onion, 1/4" dice
  1 1/2 C ketchup
  1/2 C water
  Seasoned salt (Lawry's, Tony Chachere's, etc.)
• Season the chicken liberally with the seasoned salt, making sure to get plenty under the skin. Mix the onion, ketchup, and water in a baking dish. Smear some of the ketchup mix all over the chicken, and place the chicken in the dish, bones down.
• Bake for 30 minutes at 350, then flip the chickens so the bones are up and bake for another 30 minutes.
• Serve with rice and a salad or steamed broccoli. I go through a lot of rice once I start mixing it with the sauce.

This is the simplest version of the recipe-- it works well with a basic marinara instead of the ketchup, and I sometimes add a few cloves of garlic, chilies, and celery.

As for the technique, I wonder about the meat up/meat down sequence-- I've made it the other way, starting with the bones up, and I think the result is a little different. As long as the skin is intact, the meat will not dry out if it's facing up for the second half hour. Mom disagrees-- she says do it meat up, then meat down. Hmmm...

Food Network rant: Lagasse, Ray, Flay, and Dean

As I watch a "Ming's Quest" episode on Fine Living, I realize that I watch the Food Network shows less and less. It's all about the hosts-- I can't warm up to many hosts that Food Network pushes these days. They're not all bad-- Tyler Florence is solid, as is Alton Brown (though his appeal isn't universal: Deb says he's too geeky for her)-- and I enjoy Iron Chef America, but the network has some problems to address with their "big star" hosts.

Food Network turn-offs:

• Emeril: I loved eating at Emeril's and NOLA when I lived in New Orleans, but I might have liked his restaurants less if he'd been on TV back then. Bam? What was it that Tony Bourdain said about him?
• Rachel Ray: I see how she's completely professional and "great on TV," but her television skills don't make me enjoy her programs-- she comes across as a know-it-all. My big complaint is that she does not tip adequately. It's one thing to get people on tight budgets to go out for good food, but she shirks her responsibility to show people how to appreciate good service.
• Bobby Flay: His Iron Chef America appearances speak for themselves-- when things get difficult, he's not nice. Again, good TV skills don't make for a good host.
• Paula Dean: Just like a dessert with too much sugar for its own good, this lady is too sweet for me to handle on television. She's on, like, every show they have.

Costco run

After a laundry stop at Brain Wash, I did a little shopping. In spite of all the junk they sell at Costco, I found a bunch of good stuff.

• Their wine selection is great, and priced well to boot. Of course, I don't take advantage their great wine-- I go cheap, getting what I'd buy at Trader Joe's. I grabbed a Ravenswood Lodi zin, a Rosemount shiraz, and a Coppola "Rosso Classic" blend of zin, cab, and syrah.
• 1 gallon of Odwalla fresh squeezed OJ-- a staple-- for only $4.59-- that's a great price, given that you'd pay $7 for a half gallon from a white bread supermarket.
• A long Italian loaf from Acme Bread Company, a great Bay Area bakery.
• A pound (!) of organic spring greens from Earthbound Farms for $3.49. It's a struggle to finish the big box before the stuff starts getting slimy...

Fine, fine, you got me-- I really went to Costco for toilet paper and ketchup. I'll make Mom's roasted chicken with ketchup in a few minutes...

Sunday afternoon...

Last night was a lazy at-home evening and I had time to cut down most of my garden, harvesting all of the serranos, most of the Thai chilies, and a few tomatoes. I took this shot this morning-- the rest of the serranos (~20) are freezing on a tray, and the rest of the Thai chilies are drying.

Shout Out #1: Deschutes Black Butte Porter

I've been raving about this beer since the first time I tasted it, calling it "the best beer in years." Tasty but not too sweet, lighter in the mouth than most porters, the folks at Deschutes Brewery in Bend, OR know what they're doing. Try some and pass the word along.

Utensibility: Part 2: Kitchen Power Tools

There are more (toaster oven, microwave, George Foreman "grill", waffle iron), but I use the following tools all the time. To be clear: I don't like spending money on tools when I don't [think I] have to. In the case of the impending Gaggia Classic delivery, I realized I had to spend money to get what I want... but still couldn't resist cheaping out and ordering a refurbished unit!

• 
  Cuisinart DLC-7 Pro 14 cup, 6A food processor ($50 on craigslist). This is a serious work horse of an appliance.
• 
  Farberware Convection/Broil Oven ($40 from a coworker) cooks a 1 hour recipe in 45 minutes, and browns more reliably than my (rented) apartment's oven... or any oven I've used. Great design-- since the controls are on top, the oven cavity is big enough for a standard cookie sheet. Everybody should have one of these.
• 
  Gaggia Classic espresso machine ($360 refurbished from Whole Latte Love) rocks my world!
• 
  CDN digital thermometer/timer ($25 from Home Chef) is useful every day.
• 
  EZ-Cook butane canister gas stove ($12 at Kamei) gets the job done with reliable flame control.
• Braun immersion blender ($8 from Ross), a no-nonsense, fixed blade thingie that does the trick.
• Hamilton Beach 62580 5-speed hand mixer ($? from ?) works when I don't feel like using a spoon, bit it takes about as much effort. I'll get a KitchenAid sooner or later...
• 
  Juice King JK-50 juicer... ok, not a power tool, but it has a big lever and looks awesome ($FREE: found on the street in the Mission).

Utensibility: Kitchen Basics

Following B+P's lead, I thought I'd open with a rundown of my favorite tools.

• 
  First and foremost is my Mundial 8" chef's knife (~$40) from Columbus Cutlery. I use some other knives occasionally (carbon steel paring and boning and an OK cleaver), but I use this for almost everything.
• 
  The surface I make a mess on daily: my round bamboo butcher block from Costco (~$14, such a deal!), solid on one side, jus collector groove on the other. This goes for $60 elsewhere, and it's easy to spend >$100 for something similar. I wish I'd bought three of them.
• For pots and pans, I have a rag tag collection that works fine for me:
  • Hand-me-downs from Mom, my Revereware copper bottom 2 and 3 qt. saucepans and 5 qt. pot (labelled as 2 qt., strange) from the late 60's. They're light and cheap, but they conduct heat quickly and evenly, and they clean up great. Tip from America's Test Kitchen for cleaning stained copper: apply a coat of ketchup, let sit, and wipe.
  • Anolon 8 qt. stock pot and 12" fry pan (bonus with the stock pot)-- I beat the hell out of them and they like it.
  • 10" stainless steel pan and cast iron skillets, heavy but cheap from Macy's.
  • T-Fal "Sapphire" 8" non-stick pan, part of a set and the only survivor after 11 years. I have no idea why its non-stick coating is intact-- I'm cruel to it.
• Translucent high temperature spatulas by Culinary Technologies from The Gourmet Depot. I prefer the translucent material to the fancy colors Le Creuset uses.

Next up... power tools!

Testing...

Test post to "Salsa Eating Salsa"... is this thing on? This is mic number one, this is mic number one, isn't this a lot of fun?