May 2013
116 posts
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Mario Batali, Among Others, Ask for BBQ Advice From Josh Ozersky: The James Beard Award-winning food writerJosh Ozersky is once again holding court on Esquire’s “Eat Like a Man Blog,” answering readers’ questions about grilling just in time for Memorial Day. Even chefs have questions: Mario Batali wrote in to ask about boiling ribs (though not seriously, we don’t...
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The Evolution of Space Food: We’ve come a long way, baby, when it comes to feeding our astronauts. Because missions used to be on the shorter side, lasting a few weeks at most, food wasn’t quite as important. Yes, it needed to be nutritious and edible, but astronauts weren’t stuck with freeze-dried bacon bars for months at a time. Now that missions are longer, lasting months, the...
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Is Kale Getting Stale? Some Chefs Are Turning to Collard Greens: Kale has been a hot item on restaurant menus recently, but it could be cooling down. Maybe taking its place? Collard greens. Hugh Acheson, the owner of Five and Ten and The National in Georgia, recently declared collards the “new kale” during a guest appearance on The Food Network’s show Top Chef, and the hearty...
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Pilau Pals
Cook’s Country senior editor Bryan Roof, left, gives test cook Nick Iverson a pretty intense look as he takes a taste of Nick’s preparation of shrimp pilau (a Southern dish of rice cooked in broth often served with seafood or game) during the early stages of recipe development for a future issue of Cook’s Country magazine. See more behind-the-scenes photos at:...
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Gin: When to Add Lemon and When to Add Lime: The twist is as much a part of the flavor profile of gin and tonics as the gin and tonic themselves, so do you put a lemon or a lime peel in your G&T? If you want something refreshing, Charles Rolls, co-founder of Fever-Tree Tonic, says go with lemon (or even an orange peel). Looking for something a little more tangy to go with your Tanqueray?...
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Trying to Find a Use for Greek Yogurt’s Toxic Byproduct: Greek yogurt has been a hot health food item for a few years now. But did you know that a byproduct of its production, acid whey, is toxic? The thin, runny slop can’t simply be dumped because it robs oxygen from streams and rivers, a phenomenon which can turn waterways into “dead seas” by destroying aquatic life in large...
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New Cardboard Carrying Case for Fast Food: Ever feel like there must be a better way to carry a burger, fries, and a drink than the flimsy paper bag fast food chains provide? You’re not alone: Rhode Island School of Design industrial design student Seulbi Kim came up with the TOGO BURGER, a streamlined carrier case, to solve the problem. The handy contraption seems like just what the...
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Boston-Area Restauranteurs Dish on Rude Diners: Some restauranteurs say customers are getting ruder these days. Restaurant consultant Ed Doyle, of RealFood Consulting, says that two trends have come together to make the perfect storm of an entitled customer: “You’ve got the dining consumer who is better educated about food than ever, or thinks he is,” he says, “and we live...
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Slicing Out Gluten
Cook’s Illustrated associate editor (and resident pizzaiolo) Andrew Janjigian carves a pair of pizzas into tasting-sized slices during a preliminary test of five different recipes for gluten-free pizza dough sourced from various websites and cookbooks. Andrew will use his findings from this test to pick a lane for developing his own recipe, due out in a future publication. See more...
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Picture Cook: Illustrated Recipes from Katie Shelly: The visual designer Katie Shelly has one heck of a side project: She is the author of Picture Cook, a book of recipes that she has drawn out instead of written. Each one is illustrated in a flow-chart type format, and they are as visually pleasing as they are easy to follow (we’re particularly enthused about the recipe for carrot soup)....
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NASA Backs Development of a 3D Food Printer: NASA just awarded a six-month, $125,000 grant to Anjan Contractor, a mechanical engineer with a background in 3D printing. And no, he’s not working on printing state-of-the-art space shuttle equipment. He’s working on printing food. Contractor’s vision is one in which every kitchen has a 3D printer from which people feed themselves...
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Bucking Tradition: 25 Modern Wedding Cakes: Why stick to a traditional wedding cake when you can have an avant garde, modernist confection? POPSUGAR Food has put together a slideshow featuring 25 wedding cakes with geometric, eye-popping structures and designs. From “naked cakes” to ombre frosting, these towering treats are anything but boring.
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Microgreens and Edible Flowers Pack Quite the Punch: Microgreens and edible flowers add a delicate touch to dishes, brightening up fatty cuts of meat and adding pops of color to thinly sliced sashimi. Boston Magazine recently published a beautiful photograph of the tiny plants that we can’t stop staring at. But these mini greens and buds are as flavor-packed as they are pretty, because,...
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Fruit Tart Teamwork
Test kitchen staff photographer Daniel van Ackere, left, gives Cook’s Illustrated test cook Dan Cellucci a hand arranging rings of raspberries atop a layer of pastry cream within an outer collar of sliced kiwi in order to keep things moving smoothly on a photo shoot for our Classic Fruit Tart. See more behind-the-scenes photos at: http://bit.ly/o0qi36
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Calorie Bombs Hidden on Chain Restaurants’ Secret Menus: A man walks into Chipotle and tries to order the “quesarito” (a burrito wrapped inside a quesadilla). The woman behind the counter tells him she doesn’t know what that is and that it doesn’t exist, but if it did, it would be available between the hours of noon and 1pm. Welcome to the world of secret menus at chain...
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8 Summer Drinks to Sip Now: You’re on a porch in the sun, you’re surrounded by good company, and you’re sipping a cool drink. While we can’t provide the first two items in that delightful summer scene, The New York Times has published a few recipes for summer drinks that will complete the libation portion of the equation. The White Wine Mojito, Sherry Cobbler, and...
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What’s It Like to Be a Fruit Vendor in NYC?: Many of the fruit cart vendors in New York City are from Bangladesh, have a specific street corner they always set up on, and have a loyal customer base. This video from The New Yorker is a part of the magazine’s “Making Money” series, which focuses on how different people make a living in the Big Apple. It stars Rahman Khandker, a...
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The Battle for Best Chef of the United States Military: It is an honor for a chef in the United States Military is to be chosen to compete for the title of Armed Forces Chef of the Year. The competition, which is in its 20th year, takes place at the Joint Culinary Center of Excellence in Fort Lee, Virginia, where the military trains most of its chefs. Each participant must make and serve four...
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Best Of Seven
Assistant book team test cooks Sara Mayer, left, and Meaghen Chace plate up samples of gluten-free chocolate chip cookies prepared from seven different recipes (some of them originally gluten-free, some adapted from recipes using traditional wheat flour) during a taste test. What’s next? Our editors and test cooks will dissect the results and use their findings to craft their own recipe,...
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7 Signs Americans are Eating Better: While America isn’t exactly the healthiest nation when it comes to its citizens’ eating habits, there are a few signs we’re moving in the right direction. One of Esquire’s blogs, “Eat Like a Man,” lists seven of the more promising trends. We are, for example, eating less meat per capita and prefer our produce local, fresh,...
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Want to Sell Something? Make it Birthday-Cake Flavored: If you’re hoping to make a product that flies off the shelves, just make it taste like a birthday cake. Products from iced drinks (Coffee Bean Tea & Leaf’s Birthday Cake Ice Blended beverages), to cookies (Oreo’s Birthday Cake flavor), to toothpaste (Archie McPhee’s Cupcake Toothpaste) have done well in the past...
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Hawaii: A Safe Haven for Spam: Many Americans love hot dogs, eat a lot of bologna, and enjoy sausages. But when it comes to Spam, another processed meat, we are not so apt to crack open a can. Yet Spam, much maligned in the rest of the nation, is served and loved everywhere in Hawaii—from fast-food restaurants to the annual “Spam Jam” street festival. Slate has the full story on the...
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David Chang Makes Space Recipes for Astronaut Chris Hadfield: Even though charming astronaut Chris Hadfield has since come back down to earth, there’s another video loose on the interwebs in which he floats around and holds forth on how to eat in space. This time, some celebrities join him on camera: Momofuku’s David Chang and the guys from “Mythbusters” teamed up to...
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Kale is Now the Marker of Cool: Long gone are the days when a filet mignon on a menu signified a hip and with-it dining establishment. It seems that today all it takes to make the hot list is to offer up a kale salad. Many spring events in NYC have played host to this humble green: At the Art Production Funds gala last week the vegetable was served with lemon, Serrano peppers, and mint. At Frieze...
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Grown Man Gets Stuck in High Chair at McDonald’s: Well, we thought we’d seen it all, and then a grown man gets stuck in a high chair at McDonald’s and the cops have to come pull him out. In fact, three policemen in Cork, Ireland, had to come to the rescue of this oversized baby. Not surprisingly, witnesses say alcohol may have contributed to the adult male’s desire to fit inside...
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Liquor Brands by Celebrity Endorsement: Celebrities love endorsing booze. Frank Sinantra repped Michelob, and even Orson Welles was a spokesperson for Paul Masson Champagne. But these days you can’t be a celebrity worth your saltwithout speaking up for a liquor brand. Do you know which celeb backs what drink? Test your knowledge with this quiz from Ad Age.
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“Fiery Apron-Clad Little Ladies” on Mo Rocca’s Cooking Show, My Grandmother’s Ravioli: The grandmothers are coming, the grandmothers are coming! Well, they’ve actually already showed up to a Cooking Channel show called “My Grandmother’s Ravioli.” In this charming bit of small screen magic Mo Rocca travels around the United States visiting homes and learning to cook family...
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Our Treat
With filming for season 14 of America’s Test Kitchen wrapped and ready for post-production, Cook’s Illustrated executive editor Amanda Agee, right, and Cook’s Country executive editor Peggy Grodinsky plate up Rice Krispie treats prepared by our test cooks during judging of our annual Rice Krispie treat competition, a sweet and gooey battle royale between test cooks, kitchen...
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Tony Maws on Defining “Best” in the Restaurant World: Chef Tony Maws, the powerhouse owner of the Cambridge, MA, award-winning restaurant Craigie on Main, has a bone to pick with the food world. And that bone, full of marrow and served alongside oxtail pastrami, is that there is no way to qualify “best” when it comes to restaurants and cooking. He takes issue mainly with the idea that...
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Boston Bites Back: Chefs Raise Money for Bombing Victims: Boston Marathon bombing victims and first responders joined hundreds of well-wishers at Fenway Park while dozens of top chefs served food and drinks from concession stands last night. The event was to raise money in memory of and for those wounded in the attacks on April 15 on Boylston Street. Emergency workers, victims, and government...
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Edible, Intricate Cake Sculptures from Marcella Robin: Beautiful, intricate cakes are puzzling: Unless you watch someone make them, you often can’t even begin to imagine how they were created. Which is why we’re crazy about this video featuring baker Marcella Robin, of Portland, Oregon, making her sculpturesque confections (it should come as no surprise that she has an art degree). Our...
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Beer for Dogs: Dog: Man and woman’s best friend. Beer: Man and woman’s other best friend. If you identify with these two statements, try combining them and check out Bowser Beer: It’s a cold brew for your furry friend made from meat-broth, malt barley, and glucosamine, a compound added for joint health. And don’t worry, there’s no alcohol in it, so Fido will still be...
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Getting To The Point
Equipment corner correspondent Adam Ried gives a bit of positive encouragement as Christopher Kimball takes some candidates from a testing of inexpensive chef’s knives for a test drive as production continues on season 14 of America’s Test Kitchen. Stay tuned for our findings! See more behind-the-scenes photos at: http://bit.ly/o0qi36
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Space Chef Chris Hadfield Comes Back Down to Earth: We’ve written about the awesome space chef (well, astronaut, officially) Chris Hadfield here, here, and here in the past few months. His videos about space food are always informative and funny, but unfortunately it looks like we’ll have to wait a little longer for more floating culinary adventures: The Canadian astronaut came back...
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Famous Characters’ Favorite Cocktails: Pop Chart Lab has designed an infographic cataloguing famous literary, film, and television characters’ favorite drinks. Can you name the favorite libation of Don Draper from Mad Men, The Dude from The Big Lebowski, and Jack Barnes from The Sun Also Rises? If you can’t think of the answers off the top of your head (for shame!) this print will help...
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The Terroir of Vermont Maple Syrup: If you think maple syrup just tastes like maple syrup, you’re letting down some folks in Vermont. The anthropologist Amy Trubek won a $45,000 grant from the U.S. Agriculture Department and convened a group of wine and cheese experts, a sensory scientist, maple producers, the state government’s Maple Specialist, and a Middlebury College chemist to pin...
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To Make a Reservation or Not to Make a Reservation? That is the Question: Reservations seem to be going the way of aspics: out of style. But is getting rid of them (reservations, not aspics) fair to patrons? Some restaurateurs argue that it creates more equality for diners, because “first come first serve” is as egalitarian as it gets. Those who would like to see reservations die out...
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Dacquoise Direction
America’s Test Kitchen director Herb Savush gives lighting and filming instructions to the camera crew while setting up a beauty shot for our Chocolate-Espresso Dacquoise as production of season 14 continues. See more behind-the-scenes photos at: http://bit.ly/o0qi36
