There’s no food move that I hate more than an overcooked piece of meat. Especially a quality piece of meat. And yesterday I ruined a roast and am still lamenting it. It’s never happened to me before. I used to be able to cook roast beef to perfection even without a thermometer.

Yesterday I had a little casual dinner party. I braved Fairway twice this weekend for supplies. Jamie Oliver’s Sunday Roast: Roast beef with rosemary potatoes and a red onion, red wine jus and huge-ass Yorkshire puddings. I’ve made this meal quite a few times before, but never in my new apartment.

I bought this beautiful 2 1/2 lb. organical eye of round (not round eye, which probably would taste dry and bland). The color was this amazing bright pink.

I had a digital thermometer and all. I took it out of the oven when it hit 135 F. After letting it rest and making my Yorkshire puddings and pan gravy, Matt cut into the roast to reveal, gulp, well-done! We figured it was a combination of me covering it with too much with tinfoil while resting on the granite countertop. But from medium rare to well done? That’s craziness. At least it was the best well-done roast beef I’ve ever had (I think due to the organicalness).

I’m still all (meaning floating frowny head with no body) especially since I was having company over and wanted to impress them. And it doesn’t help that I’m working in a fine restaurant and should be able to cook a god damn roast beef to somewhat near desired doneness.

So now I know not to let foods rest on granite. I should go buy a janky cooling rack. And I’m never letting meat rest under tinfoil again. Lesson learned.

I guess it’s already begun. The wave of delicious beef and pork and sauce.

Joey V., BBQ aficianado, alterted me to The 5th Annual Big Apple BBQ. June 9th and 10th at MSG. $100 for two people.

If you have an AmEx card you can get a “fastpass”, which I guess allows you be an asshole and cut in line or something.

I think if you have the black AmEx, you can get servers to bring the BBQ to you and feed you.

Chef at Home: If you took Aiden from Sex and the City and made him a chef instead of a furniture designer, you’d get this guy. An ex-restaurant chef, he premises his show on making foods without a recipe and showing you how you can too. And add a smidge of Alton Brown’s food science. Take away points for the worst theme song ever recorded (it’s so bad, that I have to fast forward through it because I get embarrassed). In one episode, he made New England clam chowder with whole fresh steamed clams, biscuits and a simple salad with a vinaigrette. Kinda like “Carrie, add a bit of this, balance it out with an acid, throw in whatever veg and herbs you have in your fridge and voila. It’s easier than shopping for a pair of Manolos, babe!”.
ChewFood grade: B+

The Best: A BBC program on Discovery Home. It’s shot a la The Naked Chef or Oliver’s Twist - fast pasted with a shaky camera spliced with extreme close ups (eXtreme shooting!). There are three cooks, two dudes (one’s an Aussie) and one chick. They are given two different dishes to make, like the best noodle bowl or the best veg side dish, in their own style. Then they have to hand their food off to three random people who judge which dish is the best. They do a lot of Asian and Indian influenced dishes. It’s a fun show, especially since I find the three cooks to be at different levels (the male Brit being the most refined and the female to be the simplest). I enjoy it, but I don’t crap myself over it like I do with Jacques Pepin.
ChewFood grade: B+

No Reservations: Anthony Bourdain’s travel show. I’m not gonna review NR. I’m gonna make a plea for someone to please please please pick up Lonny Gerungan’s show or give him an American show. Chef Lonny showed Chef Tony around the street food of Indonesia. He’s this uber flamboyant dude who’s all amped up on goof balls and yak’s dong. Think of Ming Tsai meets Mark from Ugly Betty.
ChewFood grade of NR: A-
ChewFood grade of Chef Lonny: A

Screw The Restaurant.

Screw FCI.

I’m going to The Olive Garden Culinary Institute!

Yes! One day I can prepare frozen pasta and bagged sauces from predetermined recipes!

Never ending pasta bowls!

Jealous much?!

I’m getting into organ meats and I hope I don’t get gout like that adorable Bobby Hill.

Organ meats. Usually known in most of our culture as the crap bits. That shit you throw out can be extremely tasty if prepared right (read: prepared Frenchilly).

I’ve been hording the livers that come with my whole chickens. I’m going to compare it to those little Japanese or Kid Robot toys that I occasionally buy: Little boxes for $3-5 and contained inside is a mystery from a limited edition series. I buy my whole chickens and hope for double livers. Lately I’ve been coming up with only necks. Rats!

I decided to make my own pate-type dealie. Because for some reason, buying it is expensive. And it’s actually really cheap to make. So before you “ooh-la-la” me, hear me out.

I am using Jacques Pepin’s recipe for chicken liver custard (smoother and silkier than pate). If you are on a diet, then I suggest you do not read on. For it is a delicious, godforsaken tale of eggs and heavy cream and butter.

Continue reading…

I heard on the radio that Gordon Ramsay is trying to get people to eat horse. He claims it’s half the fat of beef and ten times the omega-3.

Here’s an article about it.

I’ll try any food once.
And I mean ANY food.
Even zombie meat, as long as I wouldn’t catch zombitis.
I mean, it’s dry aged.

Wednesday night’s Stone Park Cafe / Six Point Brewery dinner.

Short post about it because I was in a rush and forgot my camera. They had a couple of Six Point brew masters there. Not only was the theme beer pairing, but it was also smoke. Cold smoked creme fraiche potato salad. Alder smoked black cod. And smoked choco ice cream! (Which I think may be a novelty, but it was fun to try nonetheless.)

The beers were well paired (you got about eight ounces of beers per course), except for the wheat beer with the amuse of Vietnamese spare ribs. Matt said they should have served something with more carbonation to cleanse your palate of the grease. The brewmaster said he paired it because the wheat beer has a hint of pineapple at the finish and he thought it might have worked well with the Asian style of the mini ribs.

The almost barely visible sprinkle of Maldon sea salt on the sirloin means told me that I was in a fine dining establishment. Fine dining seasoning! (Which is a phrase I’m going to use anytime I put salt on anything. Thanks, Michele!)

They did something cute and brought out teeny servings of hops, malt and barley between courses for you to sniff and taste. The malt and barley would make for awesome granola. The hops were inedible, but look like green rabbit pellets and smelled faintly like weed.

I got the itis halfway through the meal.

Service was poor for the first part of the meal, but I think they were slammed. Apparently they were supposed to know someone from The Restaurant was coming in, but I didn’t get to meet the chef. It’s okay though, I wasn’t in the mood for schmoozing because of said itis.

This was delicious and fun and I’d definitely do it again. I think $55 pp for six courses and booze is pretty fair.

All this blogging about Brooklyn doesn’t mean I don’t heart other boroughs. Astoria is a great neighborhood, even though most landlords don’t approve of Pokey’s. My favorite Americanized Chinese food is there, where I get can order of chicken wings with fries for like $3.

The Cuisine of Queens & Beyond Food Tasting Event

Tuesday, May 22nd

6-9 pm

$50 in advance and $60 cash the day of

Featuring 47 different Queens restaurants

718-777-7918

The flyer

Haiku for tonight:

Oh, industrial
Plastic wrap for restaurants;
You give and then take.

How did I not know about The Brooklyn Pigfest?

I mean, for $85, I wouldn’t have gone (from the photos, it’s looks like only yuppies shelled out for it).

But still, it would have been good to know about.