What We've Made In Class So Far

Ratatouille - rustic style, not the confit byaldi Remy makes in the movie.
Deep-fried chicken breast strips
French fries
Clarified butter
Basic white stock
Basic brown stock
Minestrone
Fumet - fish fumet is redundant.
Puree of split pea soup
Cream of broccoli soup
Beef consomme
French onion soup gratinee
Shrimp bisque
Crab chowder with basil
Bechamel sauce
Macaroni & cheese
Chicken veloute
Cream of mushroom soup
Sauce Espagnole
Vegetarian tomato sauce
Eggplant Parmigiana

One Of The Great Things About Food...

there are no mistakes, only discoveries. And sometimes they're even edible!
While trying to make an apple foam, I accidentally use 4% methylcellulose and xanthan gum, instead of .4% as prescribed by Wylie Dufresne on the Next Iron Chef. So I just kept adding apple juice until I got a consistency that I liked, poured the mixture into a silicone demi-sphere mold and froze it. It had a texture similar to a granita, and tasted like apple sauce. Something I will definitely have to try again, maybe with the strawberries left over from Valentine's.

Valentine's Dinner

Sous-vide salmon, following the advice of Sean Brock, with orange-basil sauce, porcini rice with spinach.Coffee foam, chocolate-covered strawberries, champagne & strawberries. I tried to make chocolate cigarettes, but alas, that didn't work out so well.

New Food Science Column

The Washington Post has an exciting new column called The Gastronomer.

Superquick Ice Cream

Beautiful in its simplicity, amazing in its obviousness (once I heard about it), Ferran Adria's recipe for superquick ice cream is one of the greatest things I've found. While written with frozen strawberries, any pound of frozen fruit will do. For that matter frozen vegetables would probably work too, though I am not yet ready to try broccoli ice cream. I have tried strawberries, peaches, and blueberries, pictured here. All were delicious.It would be interesting to try using frozen corn and sour cream, instead of strawberries and yogurt, to create a garnish for chili.

A Strange Combination, And Yet...

My favorite grocery store recently had a coupon for seafood that I felt I had to take advantage of, and so I purchased some Arctic char. Having never cooked char before, I turned to the internet for advice and recipes. I decided to go with this one, as I do rather enjoy chipotle and lime. Alas, I had no ground chipotle, so I used ancho instead. I also had to use the broiler method because, well, I don't have a grill. It turned out alright, though I think 2 tablespoons of salt is a bit too much.
No big surprise, the ancho and lime got me to thinking about Latin flavors. I had purchased some avocados to experiment with, and now seemed a perfect time to try something a little peculiar. I cut up and mashed an avocado, and then mixed in a packet of hot chocolate. A quick Google search shows that this is not that odd a combination, but it's a pretty safe bet that the manner I used is not a normal one. I suppose I thinking about guacamole, with emphasis on the mole. This was not the most appetizing-looking thing, so I added a bit of food coloring.
This was used to coat some egg noodles. Dinner was finished with corn seasoned with salt and liquid smoke.
Overall, I think it was pretty tasty. All the flavors played well with each other, especially when all the components were on the fork at the same time, but could probably use a bit of tweaking.

Kitchen Zen

Always remember, "A falling knife has no handle."

Does this make it Pop Punk Cuisine?

A local community college has a good culinary program, and so in an effort to better myself, and learn proper technique, I have enrolled. I still plan on continuing with my own experiments, so not all my DIY cred is gone, but I am now an official culinary student.

Meat, and how to cook it

Occasionally, I'll pick up a cut of meat from the grocery store that I'm not entirely sure how to best prepare; should it be braised or broiled? Can I grill it? Thanks to this site, now I don't have to wonder as much.

Sur Sous Vide

Since an actual immersion circulator is a bit out of my price range, I make due, quite nicely I believe, with a probe thermometer and a 12-quart stockpot. Circulation is provided by my left arm and a wooden spoon.
Again I made steak (I AM from Texas, after all). I vacuum-sealed it for my protection with my handy-dandy FoodSaver, and following their suggestion, I heated the water to 165F. They also suggest that cooking for 10 minutes will give you a nice medium-rare steak, though I left mine in for 12 minutes, since the last time I did this 10 minutes got me rare instead, which I prefer but I know it's not for everybody.
Out of the water, but still in the bag. You can see all the juices that would have been lost if I had used more traditional methods. Now to hit it with a blowtorch, and voila!
Cut it open, and...

OOOOOO, pretty!!!
Worth checking out is this thread over on eGullet.