This episode is brought to you with support from Fair Plate. Tickets and information at F A R E P L A T E dot com. You're listening to Heritage Radio Network. We're a member supported podcast network, broadcasting over 35 weekly shows live from Bushwood, Brooklyn. This year, we're celebrating 10 years of food radio.
For the past decade, we've been taking you behind the scenes of farms, restaurants, breweries, school cafeterias, and more. It's been 10 years and we're just getting started. Find us at heritageradio network.org. Hello and welcome to Cooking Issues. This is Dave Arnold, your host of Cooking Issues coming to you live on the Heritage Radio Network.
Yeah, I don't know, like what is it, like 120 or something? From Robert's Pizzeria in Bushwick Brrrr Brooklyn. Got a totally different crew in the in the house today. Nastasia DeHammer Lopez may be calling in uh later. She is in California discussing pasta with very fancy folks, very fancy pasta folks, and eating some low quality white bread, which we can talk about later.
But in Nastasia's place, we have Robert Patrick Murphy, aka Bobby, Bobby Donuts. How you doing? I'm doing really well. Great to be on the show. Yeah, Bobby is the uh beverage director of existing conditions, a bar you might be aware of that uh I'm involved with on West A Street in Manhattan, New York City.
And we do not have Matt in the booth today. We have Jeet. Jeet, how you doing? I'm good, man. How are you?
Doing all right. Now you've never done this show before, right? I have not. We're we're this is the first time we've worked together. Right.
So we're gonna have to go through some stuff here. So what what is your like like give me some food information about you so I have some sort of feeling about who you are. Okay. Um uh like what I like to eat, or like what I like what I think about food. Sure.
Okay. Um I I guess I like to eat home cooked food more than uh go out and eat. I just recently started to cook over the last two to three years. Was not much into food before that, but uh after interning at Heritage Radio Network and getting into the engineering side, uh really started to be fascinated by it. So you're coming at it, you you you you you came to this like strictly as an audio engineer.
All right. Yeah. And when you say how how many people live where you live? Uh it's just me and like two roommates. Two roommates.
And so you cook for them, they cook for you? Oh no, not at all. I cook for myself. Really? Yeah.
Interesting. So, like what level of thing do you cook for yourself? So I think the world, like the i it's when you talk to people that cook, right? So like I love to cook, right? I mean, I I I hope people know that.
Uh but I I love to cook, but I never cook for myself. When I'm when I'm eating just and also I don't like dining alone. So like it's not that I don't mean I know I don't mind it's never an occasion for me to eat out. So I'm never that guy who's like getting blown out like solo in uh in a uh at a place. By the way, not a sexual term.
That just means being treated well uh at an extent. Not a sexual term. Uh well, and Bobby, like verify this so I'm not the only guy saying it when maybe not as much at a bar, but even at a bar, but at a restaurant. By the way, for those of you that don't know, Bobby uh isn't just just I mean just a bar guy, not insulting bar guys, but like comes from a fine dining uh background, was at next uh in Chicago for a long time, correct? Yes.
Yeah. Uh originally from uh Iowa. So if you have any I.O. questions. By the way, I'll give the phone number to call in.
718-497-2128, that's 718-497-2128 for any bar slash Chicago, because that's where he was working for many years, slash Iowa slash cooking for yourself questions called in. When you show up at a restaurant, specifically a fine dining restaurant solo, you get VIP'd instantly. Not because I don't know why, but it's just it's like it's the culture that if someone shows up alone, you give them I guess because the assumption is is that they don't have someone to talk to that you Yeah, you spend a lot of time with them, but people like J Pasqual that has four reservations in one night to go to like three fine dining restaurants, sometimes doesn't even talk. Um still you treat them like people who are solo diners get treated well. They get treated really well.
I mean you sp you tend to spend a lot of time with them. You spend uh tend to like talk to them a lot more, I guess, than other tables. Um but I mean not necessarily, like it's all dependent on the person. Some people are there and like they dine alone and they're like super strategic about like taking notes and like want to be left alone or like doing documentation. But yeah, some people like they eat it up.
Yeah, they want to they want to be like talked to and they want to be given that experience, you know, since there is no one else around. When I'm alone, uh when I'm alone, I just eat as fast as is humanly possible and you know, GTFO. You know what I mean? I'm like the kitchen loves you for that. Yeah, yeah.
So like, although well known story, I wasn't not eating alone. I almost got kicked out of a Michelin-starred restaurant in Madrid for eating too fast before they could explain what was going on because they were taking so long with their danged explanations of what the hell they were serving me. But back back to where we're going. So when I'm eat when I'm cooking for myself, I either make something that my family does not like to eat, right? Like uh I now now my kids are kind of better with it, but like I love poached eggs on toast.
So it for years it used to be if I was alone, poached eggs on toast, and then if I had a country ham in the fridge, which PS is always, I would like throw a couple slices of raw country ham on top of the poached eggs and toast, done. That was dinner, you know. Uh but yeah, like so or like you know, lunch breakfast. I'm never cooking for myself. I'll have leftovers or whatever else.
So I think to me it's it's it's interesting that I don't know. So but gee, you like cooking for yourself. I do, and my girlfriend, of course. She loves my cooking. Well, how often does your girlfriend come over to eat?
Uh at least once a week. Oh maybe twice. Yeah. Is this okay with your roommates? Oh, yeah, they have to be okay with it.
Uh well, is it okay? So in any apartment situation, there's one person who kind of rules the roost. Are you the ruler of the roost? Is this your apartment and the other people are gloming on, or is it an evil share? Considering that I'm the one with the master bedroom, I would think so.
Yeah, yeah. See, Bobby is in the opposite position. He is in a situation where he is not the ruler of the roost, and so he does he would not feel comfortable. I mean, I don't want to put words in your mouth, Bobby, bringing people over and doing a big to-do because you don't feel like it's your place, right? There's just not enough space.
Like, it's just not an apartment conducive for entertaining. Yeah, but even if it was like you always say you're like, I feel like, you know, uh, I mean, invite some people for cocktails or something, but like, yeah, not not for dinner. By the way, Dave, we have uh Ryan from California, and he had a question about induction cooking uh for home cooking. Do it. What's up?
Uh here we go. All right. He should be on right now. Ryan, what's going on? Hey Dave, how are you?
Doing well. Good. Good. So my question was um, I'm looking for a commercial induction cooktop, but for home use. Well, one I'm specifically looking in the stocky close here.
I'm looking for one with a knob, a big old knob on it. And it needs to be 120 volts. Since you know, I looked at the home models and all of them have the touch screens and all that junk. And since I'm blind, I can't really use that. Right.
So I know you have the control freak, which is great, but that's a little out of my budget. So uh well, so I'd I'd like your opinion or recommendations or you know any anything you any advice you give me. Okay, so this is an interesting, this is a super interesting question. I'm trying to think about all the units I've used. So the the control freak has what the control freak has, besides being out of your budget, the control freak, Bobby, you've used the control freak, right?
So the and for those of you that don't know, Control Freak is the uh collab between uh Preston from Polyscience and Breville. They came out with a an induction burner that was kind of meant for caterers and pro people, but still plugs into a 120. It is pricey, right? Uh, but the one of the advantages it does have is that most inexpensive or home induction units have a um uh they're all kind of membrane switches, right? So you're not getting a kind of a tactile uh feedback.
And I have to say that while the um while the uh uh the control freak does have a big old knob on it, for those of you that have uh if you've ever used it, the knob isn't an uh what I would call a hard knob. It's uh it's a rotary encoder. So you know, you could sit there and you know keep turning it, turning it, turning it. So it doesn't actually provide a down-up reference, if that makes sense. You know what I mean?
Like it it only you obviously you could tell I am moving up, I am moving down, uh, but you can't say, for instance, um you can't be like I'm at half, but you can't so like it for me, like a lot of times if I'm looking for tactile response, I'll just I'll I'll auto-go all the way to off and then I know where halfway is, right? Uh or I could tell or I could tell by uh, you know, if I've used a piece of equipment for a long time, I know the or I know the uh orientation of the of the whatever you call the pull of, you know, the the the thing you hold on to, you know, that that that part of the knob, the actual thing that your finger, yeah. I know the position of that relative to the you know to the input that I want to provide. And the control freak won't do that. It does have a um it does have some audible um some audible feedback, right?
Uh in terms of you know, I am on or I, you know, I have been uh turned off. Uh I believe it also provides audible uh feedback on what you what that you've hit uh the temperature or can do. Now I know it's not in your price range, we're just talking about it because the other thing is that it is somewhat programmable, and I would bet, having spoken to the people at Breville, right, that um it could be made with small amounts of intervention, and it might be a project they want to take on. I don't know. I mean I I haven't spoken to them in a long time, but I know a lot of people who do a lot of work with them.
Uh uh and like it like for instance, like you could make it such that it provided a s there's no way to change it from uh a rotary encoder to a hard knob, but like maybe it could provide a different a different tone for what temperature or th you know whatever power uh it has turned to right now. Now, to go back to all the other non-expensive induction units that I've ever used, the only induction units I've ever used that have a hard knob on them are cooktechs and the cook tech units made in Chicago, by the way. Bobby one of the only ones of value. Like it's the problem with uh control freak is yes, it's expensive, but like I have found garlands as well who have the knobs. There is one by um made by Max Burton, but they're it's also you know the membrane controlled yeah, yeah.
I'm looking at the garlands right now. How much are they cost? How much did the garland makes a 120? Um yeah, it does. They have a induction trick top that's uh portable, it's one twenty.
Um of course, since it's one twenty, it's it only goes up to eighteen hundred watts, but that's that's fine for me. It's actually a lot of power. Like, so for those you know, if you haven't used them a lot before, uh, you know, eight eight eighteen hundred watts, they're probably lying, it's probably closer to fifteen hundred, but okay, let's pretend that it's eighteen hundred watts. Um that is much more powerful than the average person's gas uh burner. You know what I mean?
Not not more powerful than mine, but more powerful than the average person's gas burner. Uh you know, in other words, it's enough uh for most for most things. So what what do they charge for that though? It's like 755. You know, kind of expensive.
But since I'm assuming it's, you know, it's commercial, I'm assuming it's gonna last a lot longer to be made out of better build quality, so on and so forth. So the cook techs that I've used are very robo. The cooktechs I've used are like heavy duty, but I've never used a 120 CookTech, and they are very expensive. They are like more than the um uh control freak. They are, but they'll last a really long time, and they they have a really good policy on returns and repair.
Um Yeah, I've not used Garland's uh Garland is owned by who owns them now? They're owned, they're owned by one of the large conglomerates now. I can't I can't remember which one. But for if if something does cost 600 bucks, if Garland's willing to stand behind it, uh, you know, I'd say that sounds like a good deal for something with a hard knob because the only hard knob induction unit I've ever used costs two grand at least. Do you know what I'm saying?
Uh and use it, and it isn't portable in this. I mean, it is portable, but it's not portable in the sense that you know you need a uh, you know, a uh a 220 outlet for it. Um I will say this in general. Uh Garland's gone through a bunch of cycles. Like Garland was once a an extremely well-loved brand.
Then Garland went into the hole for a number of years for for a long period of time. People stopped using Garland. Garland then got, I believe, either bought or the brand got renovated and then Garland's quality started kind of going up. Garland, but as I said, Garland's part of a much larger group. So just because it has the Garland name on it doesn't mean that it's being built by them.
They're probably having someone else in their group. Because, you know, I don't know that they specifically, like engineers who actually go to like a building with the word garland on it every day, like have that kind of expertise. They're probably they're probably outsourcing that. I'm talking at, by the way, this is not research. This is just like, you know, off the top of my head.
Um so a lot of times when you have units, two different teams will be entirely different in terms of build quality. Now, if they're willing to put the Garland name on it, my hope would be that since the last time I checked, Garland was on an upswing in terms of its kind of quality, that they would only put their name on something that they're proud of and that they would stand behind it, which sounds good. It's a little suspicious that anyone would sell a commercial burner for only $600. You know what I mean? Because in general, anytime you you put the word commercial on it, it the assumption is that I'm gonna beat the ever-loving snot out of it and that they're gonna have to fix it because I am going to abuse it.
For instance, the spinzalls that I'm having now are like I'm getting feedback from people, and we can get into it later if anyone cares, about the kind of the different kinds of abuse that they're going through that we now have to figure out how to tell people how to fix. And I can go into that you know at length if someone cares about it. But uh I'd say give it a shot. What do you think, Bobby? I mean, if you need the hard knob, I would say you don't have a lot of other choices.
Yeah, I mean, if the hard knob's what you if you want, um, do it. Oh, we'll I will say drastically though, like I don't know if you own your home. Like, there is a lot of like larger companies that you can buy in unit countertop things now that are a lot more affordable with a lot more high like power rated stuff. But a lot of those are also membrane now. Like Gaganao doesn't have hard knobs.
Yeah, I don't think. I mean, if you look at my brother-in-law, I forget which one he just bought, he just bought, I think he bought an induction unit. The other thing is, induction isn't quite there for home yet. It's not quite there. Like, like you can buy like the ranges, like you can buy the ranges, but for instance, like range over oven combos are uh range over oven combos are um they don't have a lot of 36-inch units, so they don't go for like the prosumer people that go for like the 30-inch wide units.
And honestly, like all the and having dealt with engineers on the engineering side of this, everyone, and I hate to say this, even on the the spinzole, because people keep breaking the knobs off of them, right? We might have to move to what now on a spinzall, it's not so bad because there's not a lot of but you know what? You having this conversation with you, if I ever did have to move to a membrane, I would definitely think about adding some sort of feedback to it so that you knew where you were, some sort of audible feedback to it so you knew where you were. Because it's it it honestly hadn't registered in my head that it would that it that that would be a problem. Now I I put the knobs on it specifically because I wanted the tactile feedback that I think everyone regardless appreciates in a piece of equipment, but just because of the breaking we're getting on it, we might have to move to to membranes.
I mean, definitely not capacitive things, but that's the problem. Everyone now is moving to touch screens and capacitive things. Not only do they really suck for people when their hands are wet, but they've, you know, very, very uh it's not often that they have any sort of haptics or feedback mechanism so that you can tell what's going on. Uh and it is an interesting problem. And the next time I do talk to the uh control pre-free people, I will um I will definitely mention it to them if if I talk to them.
Uh now. Maybe maybe also look uh we do have a Heston cue at the bar. I mean, obviously it's not tactile and ob situation, but for the price, I feel like I use that thing three to four times a week and it does the job, depending on the interesting thing to that is it doesn't have a hard knob, but it does have a slider. Yeah. So in other words, instead of a membrane switch, it do you remember the old um you remember the old iPad uh iPod interface with the round click wheel?
I do. That would work. Um I've thought about getting a wolf home unit and then labeling with some tactile docs. And I I think they make some audio feedback. But you know, those are those are expensive too, anything is gonna be an investment.
Um this is a $300 investment, and it seems like for a home use, like I would be perfectly happy with it in my apartment. Yeah, it's uh it's meant to have a bunch of other interactive stuff with your phone, which we've never done. One last thing, I have used a Garland induction unit before, but a real robo. So Garland makes some induction walks. They're one of the manufacturers that pr that that sells induction walks.
I'm not gonna say they produce it, like someone in the larger group produces it, probably. But they have two, they have two different levels of induction walk, and at the museum we have the screamer. It's like, get this, it's like it's something stupid. It's like six kilowatts or something like that. It's like the normal ones, like four kilowatts, and ours is like you know, somewhere between five and six kilowatts.
Kilowatts. And it's just like and we were like, all of us, so when you're using induction, uh, right. So when you're an induction burner uh is actually the reason it only works on um uh things that are mag, you know, magnetic uh uh is that it's not just the principle of induction that they're using. They're using what's called the hysteresis loss, uh, which is uh you know uh the hysteresis loss, uh, and that's why they have to find a particular frequency so that they get the maximum loss in there and they're generating a lot of energy that way. So an actual furnace that's melting aluminum can melt aluminum with induction, and that's how you do it typically.
But it takes scabs more uh um current than you would use to heat an induction uh uh pot, and that's why they only really work on things that are magnetic, right? But um uh I forget where I was going with it. So oh, so you can't heat anything up above what's called the curie temperature on an induction range, which is you know, right as it starts to cherry up on you. But we dropped some walks into this thing and it went like right up to cherry almost instantly. It was like we had a bunch of professional uh you know, walk chefs from Chinese uh restaurants come in, high-end Chinese restaurants come in, and like universally beforehand, if they had never used an induction walk, they're like, This is gonna suck.
This sucks. How do you you know because it's not gas? And then we drop it in and they're all like, Whoa, whoa, whoa. So and that's a garland. So that thing kicks them serious behind.
So if the same team put their imprimatur on this that put their impramata on that walk, then you're in luck, but you never never know. Please, if you do try it, please call us back and let us know how it worked out. Absolutely. And if you need help with uh making a more intuitive design with the screws as far as membranes are consumed, call me up. I know some people or I can help you out myself.
Oh, cool. Shoot me uh shoot me something on uh cooking issues on Twitter so that uh we can uh uh keep in touch about it. Absolutely. All right, you guys have a great day. Thanks.
Now you too. Thanks. Um what were we talking about before that? I forget. Cooking.
We're talking about cooking at home for yourself. Yep. Uh Dave, we've got uh Wes asking about country ham. Wait, is this Wes is calling about country ham? Yeah, okay.
I remember this is from a Twitter thing, because I have a different thing on ham coming up in a second. Wes, how you doing? Good. Yeah, just follow up. So gonna be we my wife and I only got two young kids who will not be eating huge quantities, and so we want to make the purchase count.
Um love the Suriano. Haven't really had much else from other US ham buyers. I used to um steal ham from Spain and and smuggle it in my baggage back in the day, but I don't have the opportunity to do that now. Don't have the opportunity because you're a global entry and so you're worried about getting caught, or because you don't go abroad. Just less travel with little kids now.
Yeah, for sure. By the way, if you happen to be independently wealthy, they do have some very good uh like uh iberico, baiota fed iberico that's coming into the country now, but it's preposterously expensive. It's worth it. Right. It's worth it.
No, about the J5. Oh man, yeah. The J5 is where you need to put your money for sure. Yeah, I mean, like that stuff is like the the the correct number of J's. You gotta get the correct number of J's and that thing, but that stuff is ridiculous.
And uh some guy comes by with a 3J. Don't take it. Yeah. So like we're talking, we're talking about Cinco Hotes, which is like single hotes. Like that to me, like that is of commercially available like Spanish hams, like that is the uh the gold standard.
I'm not saying it's the best, it's the one you rate others against. Yep. You know what I mean? And the only reason that I'm not saying it's the best is because I haven't tried everyone. Right?
It's the best one I've tried. Now, I uh and Peter Kaminsky, who wrote uh, you know, uh uh uh a book on uh ham or pork um and you know was involved in the original taste test we did for American country hams back in like oh three or oh four, right? Uh he once said to uh a collected group of people, which included like Jeffrey Steingart and a bunch of other, you know, uh food, food uh intelligents at the time, that um Spanish ham at its best is the Beatles and everything else is the Dave Clark 5. That's what he said. Uh and I was like, you know, Pete, I didn't call him Pete because I don't really know him that well, but I was like, in my mind, I was like, you know, Pete, that's not really fair.
They're different products, right? Uh and you know, I eat American country ham and you know, prosciutto on its own, right? Because uh I I enjoy it, but it's a different experience, both in terms of your pocketbook and in terms of kind of what you would use it for uh than a Bayota fed i ibirico. I would go ahead and say that anyone that does anything with the with like the Bayota stuff other than just eat it straight, is an a-hole. You know what I mean?
Like you're throwing away, like if you're using the the scraps or anything else, fine, whatever. You know what I mean? The little pizza, but you know, or like in Spain, they use the in you know, in Catalonia, they use the fat for different things and everything. I I love how you lied to yourself and you're like two pieces in the pen contour, and you're like, yeah, no, just wonder my thinking. And it's immediately like just open mouth.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Because it's a waste. Now, American hams, on the other hand, although like I don't really believe they should be uh they're fine cooked traditionally, but like I think they stand on their on their own merits and they're different. So you shouldn't think about it as better or worse, just different and worth different amounts of money because of the different kind of procedures that go into them.
Now, I have had nut fed, long cured American hams. Edwards used to make one because he used to buy some like really strong uh pork from Patrick Martins at Heritage Meets and cure it. I think that entire stock was lost. Cesare Cassella makes an American ham more in the Italian style using that same pork, which is delicious, and I advise you to kind of get a hold of it. Um but in traditional American stuff, Sam Edwards makes a very good product.
Nancy Mahaffey at Colonel Newsom's, I haven't had her product in a long time. I used to love, and I think I said this on Twitter uh in response. Like I used to love um uh I used to love those those hams uh because they have this kind of distinct blue cheese note, just realize if you buy from her, like you know, I've had on more than one occasion there be some taint along the bone. By the way, if you buy uh a American ham and you get some taint along the bone, just cut away the taint and you're good to go. Yeah, no, I don't I've had them before, I just cut it away.
Yeah, yeah. Uh I mean I like her stuff. I have a broadband in my fridge right now. That broadband's eating really well at the at the at the bar, by the way, uh, you know, don't don't want to get anyone jealous out there, but we had a um a gravity fed kind of modern Berkle, and in transport or somehow somebody drops something on the gauge plate, which is the thing that moves up and down to uh give you the um uh thickness, and so it wobbles, and unfortunately, on the unit that we had, it's not easy to get into, it's not like you're just adjusting a uh you know a shim or a guide plate to get the gauge plate to be rigid again. And you cannot slice things properly unless your gauge plate is rock solid.
And so I was yelling at the at the at the folks in the kitchen, I was like, any idiot at a subway or blimpies can slice a freaking piece of meat. What's wrong with you? You know what I mean? Because they couldn't until I went back and inspected the slicer. And so this is one of the reasons why to the to date we haven't had any ham on the menu at existing conditions.
But uh today we are getting delivered a some another loaner of a vertical slicer, Burkle Slicer. And how are you slicing this ham by the way, Wes? Um, I actually have like a hundred dollar home meat slicer and it's sharp knives that are long. Um and you know, the home unit is made by like Chef's Choice or whatever, and actually is pretty nice. But it's rotary?
Yeah. Huh. And it's similar to the rival, but it's made by Chef's Choice. I believe so. Yeah.
So the thing about it is is is that um most home units, the pro what they lack other than sharpness and size of the blade, which is a big thing, is uh and so I'm assuming you're cutting the ham down into smaller pieces so that you don't have to try to take such a big slice of it, right? Yeah, I might do both. I might like hunk off a big hunk and then slice some on because I like the presentation, but I don't know. Right, yeah. The other thing they lack usually is stiffness.
So if you get it sharp enough so you don't have to press too hard on it to get it to slice, I'm sure they can do they can do an okay job. But in it, whenever you have a gravity-fed um slicer, what ends up happening is is you're getting tear-off at the bottom, and that's why you get that raggedy bottom on the bottom of your products, and why uh they always you have to if you have a round product, that's why you see people rotating the round product as you go, because it's it's it's as you push down and in, it's cutting more off of one side than the other, and so they end up angling out on you. But we're getting a vertical slicer, which means that our slices will be perfect. Our slices will be perfect. Uh so anyway, we have a good broadband at the bar, which is where I started into this, where you have a two-year-old Benton's.
So I would say, and we haven't sliced into it yet because I didn't want to mutilate it on the on our broken slicer. I think a lot depends on what uh the most of these people, if you're sticking with someone that's you know well known for it, like a Benton's or a Finchville or a or an or a Newsom's or an Edwards or any of these. I'm not a Laquertia fan. No. I know you're from Iowa, but I just don't like what the guy does to Hams.
He trims off all the fat, claims that that's the way that they're done in in Italy, and then gives you this like I think overly dried, overly small. I'm not a Laquertia fan. You like it just because you're from Iowa or you what No, I'm like a I like their spec a lot. Speck's a different product. Yeah, I know.
You know what I mean? I still I still think for what is entry level to the market price. It's not entry level. For for the money that LaQuerch charges, I would take a product from Sam Edwards any day of the week. Or or Nancy, you know, or or broadband's or Finchville or Bentons or any one of those crew.
You said broadband, uh broadbent. But you have to get their good ones like you have to get their good ones. You know what I mean? And I believe, not to not to not to you know shill out for the for the for the mothership here, but like uh Patrick Martins uh has specific relationships with ham curing people who are uh using good quality pork because he's if you ever gotten Patrick like going on something, he's like, Oh yeah, I don't like them, they use the cheapest, the cheapest meat, the cheapest meats, and so like he like tracks when people are using the good hams, and then will often buy them back and distribute them. So he's like working with Cesare, and so you know he he's very uh as I've said many times in the past, the almost all of the American producers have you know 100, 200 years of ham curing in their collective uh you know consciousness.
So it's they're not like kind of you know um Jane come lately to this whole kind of a situation. Uh it's just that that you know, for many years Americans have been using kind of commodity pork, and that's one of the things that's holding them back. And the other thing holding them back is they're being pushed to kind of quick cure things to get you know to the minimum um you know to the maximum uh speed that they can do it, so minimum amount of time of aging. So you're looking at four or five months hams, and even at the same uh level of dryness, a four or five month ham isn't gonna slice the way a one-year, two-year ham is going. So I would say, call, call whoever you're interested in and say, do you have anything that's 12 months or better?
And then if they do, buy that. And then you're probably gonna be uh happy with it. Now I can't remember the name of it. There was an outfit, uh I forget what they what they oh my god, I can't really can't remember what it was. There was an outfit out of the south that was doing only mast fed uh stuff.
So they were sourcing from a bunch of different farmers. Mass fed means they were eating acorns and whatever else they were doing. And there used years ago, there was one called Peaceful Patchers that was doing Tamworth hogs that were all mass-fed, all made on that person's farm, and they were amazing. Uh in terms of the fat had that kind of uh oily quality that you get off of the Gabrico. Uh but I can't remember what the name of this place was, but it was an outfit that was only doing mass-fed hogs in America.
You should we should Google it. I will also Google it. The price was phenomenally high, but if my memory serves me, the product was also very good. They were not an old ham producer, they were a newer ham producer, maybe even a co-op, but just like stressing the importance of the feed of the hog before it before it was killed, which I believe is obviously something that we've watched. And here in I mean, I'm in Washington, but in Oregon, there's gonna be some good product coming up soon.
Um they're facilitating burned down too. This place called Tales and Trotters out of Portland, Oregon. Um, their goal in life is to make uh because we have so many hazelnuts out here growing, they want to do hazelnut fed uh uh Pushita style ham. And do they have stuff in cure already? I believe so, but yeah, like their stuff burned down in 2017, so they had to start up.
Uh uh Yeah, so it's probably a little while before the stuff's on the market. Did you try stuff before it burnt down, or did they never get any product to the market? They never, I mean, they they're they were selling shorter trim stuff, but they it was sad timing. Their Proschito never made it to market before it burned down. So I don't I don't know.
I mean he knows what he's talking about, he knows what he's doing, but I've never tried the prosciutto style. That's very sad. That's very sad. Anyway, I just back up. Anyone, yeah, but uh anyone but just losing all that stock is sad.
Like the stories when Sam Edwards place burned down of dogs eating uh the meat, you know, in the ruins is like Yeah, there's like such big stories about that. Like when uh the Mad Cow disease hit like Japan, like there's like pictures of Japanese farmers like burying their Waiku cows and like praying over them, like how sad they were to like raise those and do the whole process. Well, yeah, anyone that cares about their product, when they lose that product, they're losing a piece of themselves, and I feel for them. You know what I mean? And also, I was saying, what's the name of that company again?
Um, hang on. Because I believe we should support people who are trying to do this sort of thing. Absolutely. Yeah, no, it's called uh tails and trotters. Tails and trotters.
All right. Well, I can't say anything about their product because I haven't tried it, but I will gladly support them if the product matches it because I support the project. Right? Cool. Anyway, all right, so uh if you find anything good, let me know.
Your suggestion. All right, cool. Let me know if you find anything good. Hit me up on the Twitter. All right.
So let me see here. I got some uh I got something on something similar. So here's uh here's what it is. This is in from uh Kit uh Kim Yardi Ferrer, which by the way, thank you for helping me on the pronunciation because I would not have gotten it otherwise. Uh hello, Hammer.
You're being hammered today, Bobby. I'm hammered. Yeah. Not yet. Uh Hammer, Dave, and the rest.
Gee, you're the rest. How do you feel about that? As always. Yeah. Oh long time listener.
I've heard 266 of your 357 episodes. We had 357 episodes. We're at 357 now. Uh, but first time email writer, the restaurant group where I work as creative chef just got a gift of a whole leg of pure blood Wagyu beef. So we're talking about you know beef and ham together, right?
Steamship round. Yeah, uh well, we want to turn it into a raw cured ham. So not obviously not ham, but you want to raw cure, you want to cure it and serve it raw. Uh I want a soft texture with a strong cured flavor, so I'm thinking about brining it for three weeks, you using Brian Poulson's all-purpose brine recipe of one gallon water, 225 grams of sea salt, 125 grams of sugar, and 42 grams of cure number one, because it's impossible to find cure number two in Mexico City. Alright, so you're in Mexico City.
Then hang it for 18 months. You listen, you're gonna want uh you want the one with nitrate, not the one with nitrite. You need the longer acting stuff. So just order it from Modernist Pantry or whomever will ship it. What?
Amazon usually has it too. Well, but he's got it shipped to Mexico. Anyway, but like uh you want the longer acting stuff because even in a in a brine situation, it needs to make it in before it gets converted to get the kind of the kind of cure. Is 21 days enough brining time considering the beef leg is three times the thickness of pork leg but ten times more weight? Uh what should I do?
Should I brine it instead of dry salting? I would say no. I would not brine it instead of dry salting for this kind of uh this kind of an application because none of the great dry cured products in the world are brined. You know what I mean? Uh like none of them.
No. So while I've never done a side-by-side, like like the fact that I don't know of anyone that does it that way is uh kind of tells you something. I also don't know of anyone that does the whole leg as a as a piece, right? So uh I looked up on uh, you know, it's my old recommendations on um curing hams, right? And typically, so in a ham, in an American ham, when you're measuring a ham, you measure the depth uh from where the face of the meat on top is all the way to where the fat is on the other side, and they call that the depth of cushion.
And they talk about curing seven days per inch of cushion because on a ham, there's all that fat on the one side. I don't know how your leg is trimmed, but there's all that fat on the on the one side. And the uh cure does not penetrate through the fat uh nearly, nearly, nearly as much as it does through the leaner part of it. Now, uh, so they recommend seven inches per uh seven days per inch inch of cushion. I would, if I were you, and I also don't know how much the intramuscular marbling on a wagyu is going to affect the penetration rate because all that fat is gonna stop the penetration rate.
So uh I would look at as your reference, I would look at, and I know that if you're in Mexico, now that I know you're in Mexico, that you know, for you Sesina is something different, but I would look at the Cecina de Leon, the Spanish kind of version of it, and if you look at the pieces, even the biggest pieces they have, which are cut off the leg, that's all made from leg, right? Uh, there's kind of squashed flat, right? So it's not the weight isn't the important thing you're dealing with here, it's the thickness. So I would I would I would I you know if you really need to do it with the bone in, I guess, but I I would I would take the pieces off and kind of push them uh flatter, right? And then um and then salt them.
I I'd have to have like maybe someone on online here, a Johnny Hunter can weigh in at some point, or I can text him on whether he's ever salted something that big. I know that uh I've had hams made before from 350 pound hogs where the ham alone was like 35 pounds, you know what I mean? And it was big, American style, not squished flat, and they were able to cure it, but it it took a lot longer. But the issue is this in traditional dry curing, the one advantage a brine has is that the brine concentration is the brine concentration. Typically, the way that you work for uh a larger thing like a ham is you salt the outside, you pull it out, the inside still isn't salted, right?
So you do that at refrigeration temperature, so it's not gonna uh spoil. The inside's not stalted. You brush the salt off the outside and you go into what's called the equalization phase where the salt level equalizes, and that's another couple of weeks after the initial salting, right? So if you keep applying salt the entire time until you're cured through, the entire thing is incredibly oversalted. And so I don't have a lot of physical expertise, because I don't do it on kind of how to get that right on anything of that size.
So I would try to put it into the same conformation that you're gonna deal with and that other people have already dealt with, and then use their numbers because you don't want to spoil something that is kind of uh of you know of this uh magnitude. I would say when I was uh when I was a butcher in New Mexico and I did like uh dry aging and made a couple hams along the way there too. Um dry is way more forgiving than brine. Bryan like is just like so it can be so quick, and like when you're doing something you don't know about, like you just don't know the permeation rate, like on something like beef and that rate, especially with the fat content, like how do you look at the fat inside of that? Do you plug it or like how do you how do you pull out, you know?
Like I mean, typically you're the the but the plug is gonna be done later to see how the cure is done. You've already salted at that point. Yeah. So I look, I would I we're gonna I'm gonna need some outside expertise. So you know, maybe I'll ask Johnny uh what he thinks, but I would go dry and I would squish it flat.
If you look at the at the if you look at the larger pieces of the Sessina from Lyon, you'll see that all of them have been conformed down such that there's no one chunk that's as big around. Whether they dimple it in the middle or whether they squish it flat, they're all doing it, or go back to Speck, you can roll the whole thing out flat and then cure it relatively quickly. But I, you know, I'm getting the impression that's not the presentation you want. But uh I you know it's just gonna be difficult. The fact that nobody does it that I know of whole like that for a for a beef, like says something.
You know what I mean, right, Bobby? Wouldn't you say? I mean it could be that it's just not cost effective, nor probably the best technique for it. I don't know, I don't know. Uh but you know, hit me back up again and because I I'm interested in your problem.
Uh the Urban Pirate wrote in and said, please go if you need scientific papers, and I know there's a lot of people who listen to this who uh don't have access to scientific papers but would like them. And we've mentioned something like this before, but it's changed. You ready for this website, people, to get any scientific paper for free? HTTPS colon, forward forward. By the way, can you just say slash slash now?
Because people don't use backslashes. I like slash slash. Alright, right, whatever. Uh Sci-Hub, that's S-C I dash H-U-B dot TW. I don't know what country TW is, but dot TW.
You can assent you can essentially get any paper there. If if that site is down, because they move it around, just Google Sci Hub for a mirror to that site. And that came from the Urban Pirate. Thank you, Urban Pirate. And not I'm not advocating theft, by the way.
It's just if anyone who's part of a large institution can get this, and like I've always said, like one of the great things about living in New York is we have a public library where anyone can get access to great stuff. But the problem is our public library isn't what it used to be. They're closed the mid-Manhattan branch. I feel that like I I f I feel you should be able to access this stuff. You know what I mean?
Yeah. Uh anyway, and they sent me uh on a hilarious uh idea, which is Anonymous email or anonymous anonymous email. You seen this? Anonymous email.me dot me, and you can send an anonymous email to anyone. Yeah.
So I'm gonna start just trolling people I hate with anonymous email.me. Yeah, I saw a really good meme the other day that was like libraries, a place that you can go get information for free, relax in a comfy chair, and not have to purchase anything. Shh, don't tell millennials. This episode is brought to you with support from Fairplate, a taste of Ireland in New York, taking place Saturday, March 9th at the Rag Trader. At Fairplate, you can sip and savor Irish whiskey, cheese, grass-fed beef, and more.
Tickets and information at F-A-R-E, P-L-A-T-E.com. Uh all right, we have if we have time. Do we have time? Do we have time? Do we have time?
A little bit? Yeah, sure. Okay, cool. By the way, Jay Schroeder, who you know from Chicago, who used to work uh with uh Rick Bayless, and then he opened what's the place? Cosa Santos now.
Yeah, yeah, name. It's the basement of a Kyoto. So uh he's coming out with a book, I think tomorrow. I came in, I think it dropped yesterday, actually. Really?
Called Understanding Mezcal. Now it's it's in our bar. He was graciously sent me a copy, but Jack and Bobby wanted me to leave it at the bar, so I haven't read it yet, because they want to read it. I did not say anything about leaving it at the bar, but I think Jack wanted Jack wanted to read it. Yeah.
Anyway. He also kindly sent us this delicious mezcal, but I was not able to find any information on it. Yeah. Yeah. It uh fermented in wood underground, distilled in copper and wood.
It's uh it's a cupriata chino uh from Michael. But that's all I could get out of it. Because I couldn't find the maker. The maker is Jose Inez Vieira, and I apparently the Vieira family is a big family of you know mezcaleros down there, but I don't know anything about it. But remember that he said this, it had all those fruit and berry hits in the in the back end.
Yeah. So maybe if he wants, he can come on and talk about his uh his new book at some point. We'll have the bar team back on and we'll all talk about it, but thanks for the book. I'm just saying if you want to send me your book, it was some some delicious mezcal or something. We appreciate it.
We do. Um But on the cocktail thing, Caesar from Seattle writes saying, Greetings, and Bobby, you'll like this. Recently a friend of myself were discussing how a dirty martini should be made or should not uh they describe their preferred martini as tasting like the Pacific Ocean, which considering that they live on the Gulf Coast caught me thinking, what would a Gulf of Mexico drink taste like, oil spills and all. We debated and somewhat agreed that it should be a tropical drink with a layer of Jaegermeister on top to simulate an oil slick. What do you think would accomplish this theme, thanks uh Caesar from Seattle?
Well, I mean you could just float a layer of olive oil on top. If you want to stay in the martini thing, even if it's a martini, so in order, I I don't understand, Caesar. Is the question what is the equivalent of a dirty mart? So if a dirty martini tasting of the Pacific is supposed to make you think of like Kumi oysters, right? Yeah.
And and so on the Gulf of Mexico, a dirty martini shouldn't be a martini at all. It should be more of a tropical tiki drink with an oil slick on top. I mean, you want an oil slick, all you gotta do is take some Nisso olives, dehydrate 'em, powder them, infuse them into your vodka, and then you have black vodka. There's your oil slick. Yeah, but but that's not actually providing a slick of sludge on the top.
By the way, Miss Noer. Miss Nomer, oil, gasoline and refined oil floats, but crude oil sinks. Which was actually the reason why, you know, the spill in the Gulf, one of the reasons to spill in the Gulf, or why Newtown Creek here in uh in in New York City is such a nightmare because the heavier stuff sinks straight to the bottom and kills out things forever. Uh you don't you don't even the people don't even realize you eat east east coast oysters all the way up in into Maryland and there's still oil slicks in the shells. You still see little deposits everywhere.
Yeah, I mean that's the thing. That's why I eat the northern oysters, baby. Cleaning up the uh Dave, we actually have uh the Urban Pirate on the line. Oh, Urban Pirate. Thanks for calling in.
We actually have uh Hello? Oh, Urban Pirate. Whoa, I'm in the barrel, though. The pirate has me in a barrel. Uh quick question about vita preps.
Sure. Can you hear me? Yes Hello? Yes, we got you. Ah, okay.
Well, I can't hear you, but I'll just say my question. Um so I'm trying to decide between a vitaprep and a vitaprep three. And I can't figure out if the added horsepower is actually necessary. Okay. So does he want to dip nails in liquid nitrogen and then powder them?
I don't have a do we do we have what do we have at the bar? Do we have a three or do we have a No? I think we just have normal. Uh look, I mean, here's what is I don't know how much more of Vitapep 3 costs than a stand a standard Vitaprep. Uh you're not pulling three horsepower out of a wall socket.
Like I've got to. Right. There's not enough wattage. There's not enough wattage. So everybody kind of lies about their about the power that their products provide.
Now, that said, there is a website on the internet, I forget the name of it or the name of the person who ran it, where they actually did a bunch of real-world tests on how much energy was actually being put. They're using temperature rises and higher friction and lower friction items like simple syrup is to figure out how much wattage they could actually pull. And I think they might have done some ammeter tests, right? But strictly pulling amps out doesn't necessarily is not the same as how much power you're putting onto your product because the motors aren't 100% efficient, obviously. And they're what they said was that the original Vitapep actually gets fairly close to their ratings.
In other words, the original Vitapeps aren't heavily overrated in terms of uh what the power that they can uh develop is when they're blending. Now, if you're blending water, it doesn't matter how much power you have, your blades can't put that much energy into the water anyway. It's more the the the thing where a regular Vitapep is gonna bog down is purees, uh pestos, nuts, things like this. Things where the the blades can actually generate a lot of power against them. Uh now that said, I don't know what a th what a three horsepower quote unquote vita prep can do that a regular one can't because a regular vita prep can suck almost can it you can't get that much power out of the wall, as you said.
So I don't really know, but I will say this like if the Vitapep 3 is going to not cut out when it heats up as much, then that's going to be a better deal because if you're using in a commercial environment, if you're doing abusive things to your vita prep, like nuts. Yeah, you're not gonna blow out. Yeah, you're not gonna blow. Look, if it's gonna be on your counter, if you have cabinets, I would get the one that fits under your cabinets. Yeah.
Although I had a question about that. I assume that one has different slopes on the sidewall. Is that gonna unpack the efficiency of the bunding? Yes. I don't know how because I only have the tall one.
I built my shelves so that the standard Vitapep would fit under it. If that gives you an idea. Like, because I use this I use the standard uh Vitapep. Or the solution is you can just store the the um pitcher next to the Vitapep. It's the one problem the Vitapep has.
The other gripe I have with a lot of the new Vitapeps, Vitamix, rather, because they don't call it that anymore, is uh is they're now all electronic, and and you don't really have the old interface that the Vitapep uh used to have, and their their knobs aren't as uh sturdy as they used to be. Um why are these things? Even the analog knob is not analog anymore, it's a digital knob? I think so. My brother-in-law registered you know, after they got married for a Vitapep, and he was like, they sell Vitamix, they sell the Vitamix that has the program.
Should I buy it? I said, no. And he's like, but they also have the knobs. I'm like, no. He's like, but don't I also want the programs?
No. You know what I mean? Like, I was like, just get the one that's the most analogous possible. But I believe, and this is again, I'm talking out of my of out of my rear end here because I haven't studied them recently, but I believe, as of recently, I think they're all electronic under the hood, and that they just now have the appearance of being analog. But I can't say, I can't say with certainty that that's the truth.
And regarding the warranty, I I heard that the commercial warranty is voided if you use it at home, but I assume that because it's beefier component, I shouldn't worry about the warranty. Uh how are they gonna know you're using it at home? If you try to make a warranty claim and I'm not a business. Right. Uh maybe the you the the the funny thing at home that's worse than a restaurant.
The funny thing about it is is that the commercial one always cost more and had a shorter warranty because in fact the only difference used to be between the home version well you know 10 10 12 years ago the only difference between the home version and the not home version was that the commercial version cost more and had a worse warranty. Had the same motor had the same uh everything were different colors though. Uh maybe different different colors so I I don't know I should research I should go back to the stores and kind of look at it. Also you know though they might have changed their thing I saw on Amazon someone was selling uh one of the Vita preps now for like under $200. I think their price I think they they they go on sale more now than they used to go also don't don't ever be a free doesn't have any kind of sales reasonable pricing.
Don't be ever afraid to look at the refurbished ones too like refurbish I'm a huge fan of refurbished goods in general I uh uh most of the you know I I I haven't tested the three versus versus the other ones I say in a heavy duty commercial environment uh yeah go for it look everything with that thing is gonna be the tip speed of the blades at the at the thing that you're using it at. So for soups and stuff, if it gets to the same tip speed, you're gonna be uh you're gonna be okay. Yes, the Vita the Vitamix regular one will bog down in in certain scenarios, and for that you're gonna maybe want the the higher end one, but as a person of quality, just don't overload the pitcher. That's all you have to do. But oh, here's another fact that they don't necessarily tell you, but they should.
Vita the Vitamix runs most efficiently at high speed. So uh what you should do is it when you're ramping it up, you should ramp it up as quickly as possible and then put it in high. It's much more efficient in high than it is when it's in uh any of its intermediate modes. So if your Vitamix is uh overheating, like it's because you are not putting it in high counterintuitively. Thank you.
I have a quick follow-up on ham storage if there's time, otherwise I'll write it in. Sure. Well, what do you got? Let's see. I'll if they rip me off the air there.
It ain't no single hoda, but um I I it's still it's in the one of those black cloth bags. I assume it's vacuum packed under there. I've been storing it near the window. It's the winter right now. It has the bone in.
Do I need to be concerned about storage? No. No. No. If it's wrapped, you don't need to be concerned about storage.
What will happen is uh it won't age normally. It will still it will still age and against the vacuum packing, you will have to trim off the areas that are adjacent directly adjacent to the vacuum packing, just because they no vacuum packing is absolute and they will probably be somewhat oxidized, and so you'll have to just trim a little around where the packaging is. There might even be, depending on how it was done, some uh you know, if they didn't do it properly, there might be some mold in that area. But I've never had a problem with it. I've kept hams for a long, long time.
Dave, one last caller. Uh we have Jake from New Jersey asking about the bar and uh the whip creamer or the cream whipper cool Jake you're on the air Jake maybe he's not on anymore all right so back hey how are you doing man hey what's going on uh I've been listening to the backlog I hear you talk about uh EC a lot yeah so for Christmas my uh my wife just got me the um uh what is it the gourmet whip just uh the regular cream whipper right and I've been interested in doing um like a nitro cold brew coffee right um I stupidly thought that the regular nitrous chargers were uh were the right thing and they they clearly weren't since the nitrous colder is supposed to actually be not nitrous but just nitrogen N2. Um okay so um what are you trying to do with it you're just trying to increase the pressure them out with a nitro whip that they they sell actual N2 chargers and you're supposed to only use them in the the nitro whip whipper are you familiar with that at all? No I only use I only use nitrous oxy look here here's okay okay let's just back up for a second what do you there are two things you can be doing here right so if you're doing for instance i if if you're doing the the if you're trying to get that creamy head I have used it. Someone came by the bar with the nitro.
They're doing cocktails. Yeah, they were doing cocktails in the nitro rip and they're during the coffee. So the idea with nitro the idea with nitrogen, right, is that nitrogen is not very soluble in wall in liquids. So you are having you create lots of micro bubbles, but not any sort of effervescence. I don't want to call it carbonation because nitrous doesn't taste like CO2.
Yeah. Okay? But you're getting this kind of micro bubble nucleation, kind of micro texture, the equivalent that you would get out of like really frothy shaking, or that you might get out of uh like an espresso machine when the when when it's pulling a shot, right? Sure. And so this is why in a beer which also has CO2, they have they put nitrogen into it so you get this kind of micronucleation so that you get this like dense creamy head coming out as though you were as though you were gonna pull it out of a cask, right?
And so that's why beer and beer gas wants that high pressure, they want a higher pressure but not overcarbonated, and they want to create lot lots of little bubbles, so they want like a lot of immediate kind of pre like pressure to release, right? They'll use beer gas, which is a mixture of nitrogen and CO2. Now, I use nitrous oxide specifically because it is soluble, and I'm getting massive amounts of continuous and continual gas evolution rather than just a first. So when you're using nitrogen, as soon as you release the pressure, it's like pop, and that's it. And the texturization you get is the texturization that you get, along with the whipping effect of coming out of something that is whipping it high under pressure, right?
But you're not getting any lingering effervescence out of it. Does that make sense? Sure, yeah. Yeah, and you're not getting as much expansion in the product as you would if you had a soluble gas that was coming out of it at kind of a high rate. So it's a different thing.
Now, uh well, I don't know, I don't remember. What was the name of the company that used the nitro? Was it called nitro whip? I thought it was ZC. No, it's it's it's easy, but they they call it the nitro whip.
Yeah. Yeah. And uh my memory serves me, they made it so that the cartridges aren't cross-compatible, right? Yeah. Those freaking Austrians with their safety-minded stuff.
Uh I think it's you know for sure if they're actually not compatible, because they say not to use it, but I don't know if that's really true. I don't know. Uh they came by and demonstrated, but they didn't leave the unit in the bar. No. Okay.
But that said, you know, what is your fun? Like, I would just say, like, what is your function? Like, what what is it that why are you doing it? La Cologne uses nitrous. They do, yeah.
Um and I I like them for the first three steps, and then when the gas is gone, I'm like, this is just the regular coffee again. Right, but that's the thing. If you're doing if you so it if the if the beverage has an underlying texture or structure, and you just want to texturize it for the serve, right? Like people with Guinness want that head on the Guinness. Yeah.
Then you don't need constant production, and then something like nitrogen is gonna work because it's going to produce the effect of that. Yeah. If the beverage needs constant evolution to maintain its texture, then nitritus is a better choice. Yeah. But nitrous adds sweetness and nitrogen does not.
Yep. I don't know. I don't know. I don't have enough experience. So what do you think?
Is it is it safe enough to try it if I if I get the N2 charger and it fits? I don't believe it fits. I think I think I asked them and they said it doesn't. I can't say for certain. There's multiple safeties in a real uh you know, in the real EC things.
So I doubt that I knowing the knowing the the EC folks the way I do, uh if they actually thought it was a safety concern, then they would guarantee that they were not interchangeable somehow. Like they would change the size of the cartridge such that you could not do it. And because that's just the kind of thing they would do. You know what I mean? Sure.
Like, because they're they are extremely conscientious about that sort of thing. Alright, cool. Thanks. And then uh one one other unrelated question. Oh, what do you got?
Um I'm real interested in uh in your bar existing conditions. Okay. I hope everyone is, right? Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. So I have a uh a life-threatening allergy to nuts, and I know that you guys use um some liquors and some things like Borja that that have nuts in them. How much of a cross-contamination risk do you think there would be if I was to you know order drinks that obviously didn't have those things? Right now, the only nut containing product we have in the bar is Frangelica. Yep.
So, you know, uh, and so the the tins, if you told someone, they would uh I guess double wash the tins out. We could even we have extra tins we could even go pull. Yeah. But uh but Frangelico never goes into the mixing glasses, at least, you know, not on the r not on a daily basis. Uh the frangelico is kept with an open speed pour, but it's not uh and that's not a drink that people order commonly.
We don't currently have any orjaz on the menu, and our kitchen is nut free. Awesome, thanks. For now, we might make an orjan in the future, but for now, stu come by soon. Come by soon. And our and our waffle press has never had a nut in it yet.
Nope. Yeah. Popcorn. All right, thanks a lot, guys. Cool.
So on the way out, Bobby. Thanks, Bobby, for coming. Thanks, G for doing a thing. Uh well, we you have something we wanted to push, right? Yeah, we gotta talk about the chef series.
Oh my god! Yeah. That's why you're here. That's why I'm here. So existing conditions, we have a chef series coming up.
So we could talk more later about what the equivalent of a dirty martini for the Gulf of Mexico is. Yes. If you actually want it to be a martini, I think olive oil on the top, and you can blacken it up with a few. Yeah, I was gonna say, look up uh Michelle Bra black olive oil. Old technique, uh that doesn't get enough cred.
Really beautiful. That's your answer 100%. Alright, so existing conditions is doing a chef series. Where can you find it, Bobby? Uh you can find it on our Instagram page, on our Facebook page.
And we're exconditions.com. Yes. And so what do we have coming up very soon? Our first one is Brian Fisher. Well, second, shorty did one.
That's it. Second. So our second one is Brian Fisher. Uh he's actually coming out to do a dinner at the James Beard House with uh Noah Sandoval, uh Justin Carlisle and himself. Uh and he's gonna grace our presence this coming Sunday with a five course tasting menu.
Uh so that's like five days from now. Five days from now, yeah. And we have plenty of tickets still available. We're gonna be doing some beverage pairings alongside of our team. Um it's gonna be really awesome.
He's running currently a restaurant in Chicago called Entente. Um, formerly of a restaurant called Schwa. Really great guy. Uh I never got to go to Schwa. It's still there.
You can still go. It's delicious. I don't get to go out, I don't travel much. Well, we'll have to go to Chicago soon. Uh no, so so tell them what the deal is.
What are they getting? Um well it's a five-course menu. Five courses people. Yeah. Uh wait, four courses?
Five courses. Five. Five courses. Three courses? Five courses.
Five courses for how much? Uh it's a hundred dollars plus tax and gratuity, and then we have a fifty dollar beverage pairing. All be told. Um I don't think we should sell it without the beverage pairing. It's too much of a hassle to worry about whether the people got the beverage pairing or not.
Yeah, I agree. But um, just don't want to give people the option. But I feel like for New York style tasting menus, uh, this is gonna be one of the better values you'll see. Like, look up his food. Why the hell do we give good values?
We should just rip people off instead of giving them such a good value all the freaking time. We're just dumb dums. We're the stupidest people on earth. We just give people good stuff for not that much money. But don't miss out.
They're going, they're gonna do the the James Beard House on the Friday or the Saturday. It's Friday. Friday, and then on Sunday they're gonna come in for a one night only, and then we're gonna do a whole series of these. Who else do we have coming up? Well, so it's this coming Friday, or I'm sorry, this coming Sunday.
Um, Brian will be here. They're gonna do their dinner on Friday. Uh, I think it's Friday, yeah. And then Sunday, Monday, Justin Carl, one of the other chefs is doing a dinner with him. He uh has a restaurant in Milwaukee called Ardent, and it used to be a thing where he called into you quite a bit.
Yeah, he's been a huge fan for a long time. Um he would do a ramen pop-up on Friday and Saturday nights, and he called it Red Light Ramen. So basically, when they would turn the red light on the window, people would know that the ramen bar was open. So it would it would, you know, change and morph from this fine-ending restaurant into a ramen bar. And it became so successful that they were able to buy the brick and mortar next door, turn it into an actual ramen bar.
He then uh a couple years ago got married. His wife's from I believe it's Guadalajara. Uh their mother joined him up to Milwaukee, and they've since opened uh the laughing taco tackeria. Um I think they're already at four locations now. And like we're doing ramen in our place, right?
We're doing ramen on Sunday, then Monday we're doing tacos. Wait, so when when is that one? So that is uh not this Sunday, but the following Sunday Monday. All right, so go on our Instagram or go on our website and buy tickets to these because they're fun and unfortunately for me they're also good value. Yeah.
Um Justin Justin Carlisle's the ramen and the uh taco night will be a la carte. We're doing some features on some of our own food. Uh we're making some stuff, we'll have some drink specials. We meaning Bobby wants to do a New Mexico night from when he lived in New Mexico. Well, I mean, I I hope that will happen at some point.
But yeah, we'll be doing drinks for those nights. Uh, you know, beverage praying for Brian. Um, but the a la carte nights will be contributing some food, uh, you know, showcasing some of our beverages that we like at our bar, showcasing some nice mescals, we'll be specials. It's just supposed to be a really fun night, you know. Get people that are in the industry to come for uh a Sunday, Monday, see the bar.
We'll on a la carte nights that you know, obviously have like uh the full bar available to you. So come come get some drinks. We're also launching some new drinks this coming week. We have a lot of stuff coming on the menu. So existing conditions.
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