Hello and welcome to Cooking Issues. This is Dave Arnold, your host of Cooking Issues coming to most of you pre-recorded from uh the heart of New York City, Manhattan, Rockefeller Center, New Stan Studios. Joined as usual with Nastasi De Hammer Lopez. How are you doing, Stas? Good.
Yeah? I ate dinner at John's restaurant last night. We're doing this show on a Friday because next week I'm gonna be uh in Maine, and the week after that, uh, I'm gonna be doing the Harvard science of cooking thing. So if you're in Boston two weeks uh from uh Monday, right? Two weeks from Monday?
No, a week from next Monday. Whatever that date is. I'm not so good with the with dates and figures and stuff. Yeah. Then uh you can come to the public lecture in Boston.
Yeah, bring uh bring. Listen, it's too late to start storing eggs now. If you leave an egg out now, it will not rot by the time I have my unless you unless you're the kind of person there was a guy named Todd I went to uh high school with, and two months in advance of Halloween, he would start storing eggs under his uh under his bed in the hope that they would get rotten and he could throw them at people like me as I pass by. I don't know. What do you think?
What do you think, Joe? You you uh know any you know any egg throwers? Um I knew a couple egg throwers back in the day. Yeah. Um I wasn't one of them.
I preferred the toilet paper. Really? Yeah. Okay. More crafty and you know, looks way prettier.
Like literally crafty. Yeah. Yeah. I've never TP'd. I've never TP'd anyone.
Neither have I thrown an egg at somebody's house. I have thrown an egg at somebody's person. I've never thrown an egg at somebody's car, and I've never thrown an egg at somebody's house. I have thrown eggs at humans. Anyway, uh, let's bring in uh the other three people into the conversation.
Uh uh, how are you doing, John? Doing good. Yeah? You rudely cut Nastasia off though when she was telling an awesome story about what she did last night. Yeah, he's like, I you don't talk enough.
And I'm like, I have a story. And then you're like, I'm gonna be at Harvard. All right, well, all right. Well, we also have we also I'm gonna get back to that story, but I'm gonna introduce I'm gonna introduce Jack and I'm gonna introduce Quinn first. Hey Quinn, how are you doing?
We got Quinn rocking uh rocking up there in uh Vancouver. Yeah, yeah? Quinn's got a new microphone, people. Yeah, super crisp microphone. He's got the uh professional microphone.
Microphone uh, you know, better than the one I have at home. Nice, nice. Sounds good. Yeah. And uh Jack, we got you uh in Los Angeles.
Yes, sir. Sweet. I also have never TP'd anybody or thrown eggs at the house before, by the way. But what about at people? No, well, I don't know why you throw an eggs at people, but that was that never even came into my mind.
No. Really? You've never thought of throwing an egg at a pool. No. Well, Nastasia introduced me to the friendly Easter egg Cascara.
So Sastas, why don't you talk about the those and whatever you were doing? Well, I'm assuming you were gonna talk because I was gonna ask you separately about uh the restaurant you went to last night, but you actually didn't really start launching into that story until it was too late, but fine. What? We'll go back, we'll listen to the video tape. We'll go back to the video tape.
But I had it on my agenda for you to talk about your restaurant meal uh last night. So why don't you go ahead and talk about it? It was great. It was really the I have to say, John Where'd you go? I went to John's restaurant, which I had said.
Um uh the pasta was cooked perfectly. That was that was the highlight of the night. The pasta, which was dried pasta. Can I say what brand it is or no? Okay.
He uses De Checo, which is the best. It's just the best. And everyone needs to. You're you're you're pro Jecco in general? Yeah.
Yeah. So you think people who hate on it because it's uh such a big brand are morons, right? That's what what I'm hearing from you? Yeah. Yeah.
I think it's truly the best. Like there are some great dried Italian pastas which are maybe better, but like, why you know? Just Ducheco. But it was amazing. It was like Mezza Regatoni, right?
Yep. So what you're saying is you don't feel that there's a need to overspend on pasta because it's only gonna be marginally better or marginally worse than the checkout. Do you think so, John? Yeah. Yeah.
Uh now, for those who have never had pasta from you or with you, Nastasia, what is perfect pasta in your in your mind? Uh not hard al dente, but like a little bit. So if if I were to take a if I were to take a bite out of the pasta and then take a magnifying glass to it. See a tiny little teeny. Of white.
Okay. Yeah. So you like it. Yeah. Like there's yeah.
Yeah. If it's harder, fine. But like the perfection is like origin at it. Yeah. All right, wait.
So so what about what about when what about when the the what do you what do you call it? The nerve, right? On the inside of the pasta, the white, the white, the whisper of white. What if that when it gets a little bit too thick and then you can feel the thing go chunk when you bite into it? Yeah, I don't like that.
And then it gets stuck in your molars and everything. Yeah, I mean, that's not great. Yeah. But it's better. I think that's better than overdone.
Yeah. I think so. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
Well, uh, let me ask this. Uh, how do you feel? Okay. So let's just say somebody, they get uh so you know how everyone now is into the small amount of water, McGillo, right? Everyone's lowering their water content when they're boiling, right?
You guys familiar with this argument? No. No. Right? That you don't need a giant pot of boiling water, right?
Everyone's familiar now. Now we're on the same page. Whether you cook that way or not, you're familiar with the argument, right? And that a lot of studies have been shown that in fact that's true. That you know, you don't need a sh a crap ton of water to cook pasta, right?
Okay, stipulated. However, how about this? I'm gonna try to trigger you a little bit. You pour the pasta in and you don't have a lot of water, and you don't stir it enough before it comes starts coming back to the boil, and you have that one clump of pasta that doesn't cook at the same rate as the rest of the pasta, and then half of the crap is overcooked and then half is too raw. Terrible.
What do you think? But how many times has that happened when you've gone out, not to a restaurant usually, but because they're doing it in giant vats and finishing it off. But I mean, like at somebody's house, how many times does that happen to you? Zero? That's never happened to you.
You've never gotten pasta where where they're doing. Like maybe like at home when I was a kid. And it's ranking on your mom. So hard. Not all moms have to be in the kitchen.
It was actually my dad. Oh, well, that's interesting that you try to make it that way because all the stories you talk about cooking are from your mom cooking. That's not true. What about the peppers? Yeah, that's one story that you have focused on.
What about what about the what about the lemongrass? Every story you tell is about your mom cooking. And now all of a sudden I'm a bad guy. Lemongrass I don't like because it grew in the backyard and I would just smell it all day long. Yeah.
Every time you have something to say, you say something negative about your mom's cooking, and then this time you're like, it was my dad and you're being my dad. My dad made lemon cello, remember that? Yeah, that's you know, I don't know, that's more of a liquor, but okay. All right. So you're saying your dad can't cook pasta straight.
My dad doesn't do like that kind of stove cooking, no. Like he he's not a fan of stove cooking. Okay. So does he grill? Now, now now who's uh going back to stereotypical roles.
Men grill and women use a stove. Says Nastasia Lopez. Yeah, all right. Listen, if anyone happens to be, I hope they're not, but if anybody happens to be listening uh on the Patreon, all access pass, you can call in your questions to 917-410-1507. This is live on Patreon?
I believe it is. 917-410-1507. If they're watching the YouTube, they uh they they can get it. Isn't that right, Quinn? Yeah, all all access and VIP members.
So a smaller subset than usual. All access sounds gross for real. Like it's just gross. I don't know. Well, that was before my time.
So speaking of all access, Nastasia, did uh did you guys get uh backstage at the Robert Plant concert? Oh god, no. Did you make it into the Robert Plant concert at all? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were we were yeah, we tried really hard.
And yeah, we I mean, how hard? Like real hard. Okay. Who's that? Robert Plant and was he by himself?
No, it's Josiah Twain? No, what's her name? Allison Krauss. Oh, those are that record's actually really good. It's really, yeah, I was surprised.
He sounds so good. And then he did a couple Led Zeppelin songs, and I was like, why don't you just do that? Like you know. It's not. No, no, no, no.
You hate it when people are like that though. No, no, no. I just do it a hits. No, no, no. I think he and she sang with him and on the Led Zeppelin songs, and it was amazing.
Even songs that I don't care about, like that Zeppelin songs. Can he still hit the notes? Yes. It's so it's chilling. It's really good.
And then what's his name was there? That's how we almost got backstage. Um the big Lebowski. What's his name? Uh Bridge.
Bridges, yeah. He was in a robe and slippers. So wait, so you have a hookup with him. You have a hookup with Bridges? Because I know someone who's Ruben.
Anyway. Yeah, my friend is. Yeah. Yeah. I've met I met his uh I met his uh spy consultant for that uh old man.
Who's an interesting cat? I bet. Interesting cat. Um, all right. Anything else you guys want to bring up before we get into theoretically talking about uh food?
I think we're good. And or how's your making your own mayonnaise going so far, John? Good. It's fine. Not a problem.
By the way. Yeah. That was the uh that was the YouTube highlight this week. Oh, the uh the mayonnaise rant. Yeah.
Hey, speaking of rants, speaking of rants, so the Ninja corporation has finally not finally the Ninja corporation has sent a creamy. We all know how I feel about the name of their of this product. It's it's the Paco Jet patent has run out, right? That's what it basically is. Hey folks, the patent for the Paco Jet has run out.
Let's make one that people can afford. And by all accounts, like it's it's affordable. I mean, for a pocket, so it's it's less than it's one tenth the cost of a Paco Jet. That's like not like ten percent less. One tenth an order of magnitude cheaper.
Who staged this photo closer to like five percent? What do you say? Yeah, I know. It's it's it's closer to five percent. Isn't that true?
Isn't it 300 bucks? Isn't a Paco Jet still three grand? I thought it was like six grand. Uh used to be a big one. Uh I don't know.
Used to be three grand, whatever. All I'm saying is is that Paco Jet ain't cheap. So uh they I don't know that Quinn, you haven't had a chance to test it yet, but we're gonna do we're gonna do a creamy based episode wherein, you know, Quinn talks about his experience with the creamy. And then, you know, I'll ask him various questions about creamy versus Paco Jet. I have comments on the recipe book, but we can save that.
Are they positive comments or negative comments? Uh well, about the gelato specifically, but I could save it. Well, hold on. Uh can I just say this, Quinn? Because we haven't done any kind of recipe testing together uh as as a whole group yet.
I highly encourage you to just make their recipe as well to see whether it works in their equipment to see whether or not they have made a recipe that works well in their equipment. You see what I'm saying? And then if you actually made their recipe to the letter, then you have a much better place from which to lob criticism at. Does that make sense? It's not a criticism, it's just more that their gelato recipes are definitely not gelato.
They're frozen custard. Okay. Well, the question is do they taste good though? They're gonna call it. I'm sure they're delicious.
All right. I'm sure they're delicious. All right. Well, I wouldn't want to mess with uh, I wouldn't want to mess with Quinn with your uh so let's let's have this out now because they they are somewhat plastic definitions. I remember you had this, uh we had this conversation when you came on uh a year or so ago when the when you did uh the original book.
So what's your main what's your main thing that makes something gelato or not? Is it the overrun? Is it the presence of stabilizers? Is it uh lower lower egg bays or what? I mean it's it's it can be uh a combination of things.
I would say again, sort of a range of sweetness and fat content, as well as the final texture. And the final texture is a combination of overrun and stabilizers. So for you, what makes so in other words, like an actual frozen custard, right? Not like like American style like creme anglaise-based ice cream, but an actual extreme low overrun frozen custard like you'd get out of a Ross or Stolting custard freezer, like from a frozen custard house. Very low overrun.
So, what would be the difference between that and the gelato in your in your in your book? Well, again, in my book, I have a custard flavor where that is sort of like the intentional taste. But otherwise, I would say a gelato is sort of agnostic as to the presence of eggs. And I think most flavors are better without eggs. Okay, but so what I'm getting what I'm what I'm I'm trying to figure out.
So for you that for you, the custard, what what you're calling this recipe that's not a gelato, it's not a bright line as to what goes into it, but the actual just result comes out. You taste it, you're like, no, not gelato. That is that where I'm is that what you how your definition of. The fact went that's way too high. Ah, I see.
Okay. All right. Uh I have to say I love frozen custard. I've always wanted to own a frozen custard machine because it's the only small continuous freezer that exists. It's got like almost a zero freeze time.
It works like a continuous freezer. And then it comes out of the front like a little like weird, like, like uh, what's the shape? Like an ellipse, like a like an like and then into the thing. It's just base in custard out, base in custard out. Oh my god.
Low overrun. Uh now I'm thinking also about how much I like Carvel ice cream, and I'm thinking about when we had the the fudgy inventor on. Yeah. Yeah. That's neat.
Yeah. I wish we could have her in person. That was pandemic days, though. Yeah. Anyway, someday.
All right. So uh ask uh ask your creamy questions, because uh Quinn is gonna try some creamy things out. He's gonna can't believe it. Can you imagine, Stas, if we were sitting around, that's the kind of thing that we would call that in as a joke. As a joke, and then someone would be like, no, we're it's a creamy now.
We're like, no, no, no, no. No. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, we've done dumber. They've done dumber. You know, whatever. You know what we should do, Dave? Oh, well, that's the thing we talked about when I was in LA.
An event in LA. Okay. All right. I mean, you know. Yeah, we gotta make it make it happen.
Uh schedule is always I had one more creamy, I had one more creamy situation, but I forget, I forget what it was. Some some sort of creamy comment. Oh, yeah. Uh, Patreon members, we're gonna have a discount to purchase the creamy. Is that true, Quinn?
Uh yeah, we are I have the discount code ready, or more of a yeah, discount code. So yeah, I will figure that out and post it maybe next week. And so uh what are they what are they gonna what are they what are they gonna what are they gonna what are they gonna give off? What are they how what percentage are they gonna give us? I believe it's uh 10%.
10. Okay. So off $300, that's $30. So so basically you can make money. If you're gonna get a creamy anyway, you could join the Patreon, get the discount, make some cash.
We make some cash, you make some cash, you have a creamy, have a creamy day, right? Anyway, speaking of creamy, when is Nick uh Coleman coming on? Ooh. Greasy creamy. So I was talking to Mark Ladner at Nastasia's party, uh, along with our greasy greasy friend Nick Coleman, the olive oil uh master from uh uh what's it called, Grove and Vine.
And I asked um Mark how the old uh at Oto, how the old uh um gelato used to work because they you know they the olive oil gelato was the big flavor there. Remember that, Stas? No, but really yeah, that was the big flavor, is their olive oil gelato, and everyone's like, give me the recipe for the olive oil gelato, and no one would ever give them the recipe for the olive oil gelato. But he kind of was like, they made a lower fat product and then added the oil during the spin. So they were using an LB100 uh Carpagiani uh L uh Lab 100 LB100, which is a great old machine.
No one makes them, they don't make them anymore, so I don't know what the current model is because I haven't had one. Uh and yeah, she would add the olive oil kind of mid-spin. That was that was her technique for anyone who wants to try it out. Let me know. I would love to make it with some of his fancy Dan olive oil.
If you were making the olive oil gelato, would you use like a throat ripping green olive oil, or would you go more buttery? Probably buttery. Really? I'm I would rip my throat. Yeah.
Yeah. What if I use that? Green. Green? Green gel?
I like cream. I don't like olive oil gelato, but I would go buttery. I think people would want buttery. Hmm. You think I think they would want butter in the road.
You go buttery in the base. You go buttery in the base and then serve it with a drizzle of the throat ripper. Hmm. Yeah. I don't know.
Interesting question. Well, maybe you can cream some up for us. Do you remember uh for any of you who uh used to keep track of old demos? So, like one of the funny things about olive oil is that while you can get it to kind of get hard in the in the fridge, it doesn't turn ro rock hard. So one of uh I think this was uh Alec, one of Alex Stupaks, I think it was a stew pack thing.
He used to uh drip olive oil into liquid nitrogen, like, and then he'd get the little olive oil balls and then like plate them out, and then they would like kind of melt into the dish as little balls. It was kind of cool. Yeah, and then maple syrup was the other drip into liquid nitrogen, the maple syrup. You remember this stuff, Stas? No.
Nastasia never liked any of those demos. She wasn't paying any attention. Listen, Alex Stupak. Where was this? Everywhere.
It was the demo everyone's doing. He he did it at the French culinary, maybe like three or four times while we were working together back when he was uh still at WD. Anyway. Uh and then we would have to go out to events and and like Stupak would be the pastry chef that did do the event, and he would sit there and do the blue boob bloops and then play pays a you don't remember any of this? Nope.
Okay. Anywho, pretty sure it was Stupak. Uh pretty sure. Alex Stupak, for those of you that have never been wound. What?
Tylly Wound. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He makes a clock spring look like it's like it's loose. You know what I mean? Like one wrong move on the Stupak spring and boing, it shoots up.
Yeah. Anyway, but Alex Stupak, uh, because he's such a freaking perfectionist, his demos are amazing. At least they used to be. I haven't been to a Stupak demonstration in years, but it used to be like if you come to like one of our demonstrations, it's just a complete crap show. It's just like stuff everywhere, like yelling and screaming, product everywhere, because I'm trying to do a bunch of stuff in a very short period of time, and I'm fundamentally disorganized.
He does a bunch of stuff in a short period of time, but like a machine. He's like, he's like, can you tell the yelling story with the French fries? Which which one? The one where you showed up, and I gave you one. Didn't we already tell you?
No, you I don't need to. So Nastasia and I have been working together for far too long, right? We both assumed that we would work each with each other for like five, six years. We would make whatever money we needed, we would do that, and then we would be like, we'll go our own ways, and then we can just be friends. Instead, we have to work with each other.
Right, Stas? This was a huge mistake. I guess so. Yeah. Anyway, so uh so we uh, you know, we got called a couple years ago, but right before the pandemic to do this French fry thing.
And so like I hadn't done like all the French fry BS in a long time, like all of the different tests. Like I make french fries all the time, but I haven't done all of the tests and bring them. So we go to existing conditions, which was still existing at the time, and you know, I go back to use their their fryer, and we do a bunch of prep, and then I'm doing all this other crap, and then the next day Nastasi and I have to load up, right? So I'm chronically late. People know this, I'm chronically late, right?
So I'm doing a bunch of stuff, Nastasia's doing a bunch of stuff, but Nastasia loves in a high stress situation to give you crap about stuff that she knows. So like I come in to the bar, like sweating my f, you know, like like, you know, wishing I had a box of cornstarch in my chonies. So I was sweating so hard, right? And then I'm like, Nastasia, in front of this whole thing, because these other people were there, shoots me this F you look. This F you, you're late again, I'm always dealing with you, you and your crap.
When meanwhile, I'm trying to get stuff together so that we can go do this shoot, and I need to literally just a look. Not just a look, not just a look, not just a look, Stas. That's the thing. There's no such thing. If we didn't know each other, then it would be just a look.
But it's like after years and years and years of the same looks, the same conversations, the same thing. That's like when you walk up to somebody and you're like, after they're like, fine, fine. Yeah, fine, fine, fine, whatever. Then after a while, it makes them mad, right? Then, like the next day, they're still wound up from.
So if you walk up and tap them once, they're like, you know what I mean? You get no, there is no you can imagine the other people. It was a photo shoot happening in the bar. The bar was not open for business that was not like open. And it was like noon, and there was a photo shoot.
So I gave him one look. And he goes off. So the people there just think that he randomly went off on me. Also, also, you gotta understand, people, is that prior to this, that day we had had unpleasant conversations on the telephone. Did we?
Yes. It was a day, wasn't it? Yeah. And anyway, so like, yes, I'm like, what the hell? Oh my god, screaming, screaming, screaming.
So he looked so bad. And I think it was that also a time when someone said, Is that your wife? And you were like, I would never treat my wife like that. I'm not an animal. I'm not an animal.
Jesus. The day before, and this is there's there's video evidence of this. There's video evidence of this. The day before, I'm trying to do stuff, and Nastasia is just standing there the entire time I'm trying to cook. Best content ever.
Saying, why is this taking so long? This is not working. That doesn't look right. What's the while we're recording? This is kind of what I had to deal with all the time.
It's like my Instagram. It's like I think. Nastasia is the master of thousands of tiny knives. Right? It's like what she it's like, she's like a bullfighter.
She's she keeps stabbing you, bleeding you. And then eventually she comes in with the big shagunk and takes you out. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, that's fair, right, Sas? Yes. Yeah. He's like, what am I gonna say?
It's not fair. Yes. Again. I can't help it. I can't help it.
I can't help it. Okay. KG wants to make some scallop crude for a course I'm serving this weekend. Which weekend? Is it too late?
Probably. It is, but they're still interested in the answer. All right. I I checked. I got that stupid song now in my head.
It's much too late for goodbyes. You hate that stuff the most, right, Saz? I don't know who that who is that. Isn't that uh Wilberry's with uh George Harrison? Oh, I don't know.
I don't like traveling Willbury. Speaking of songs, has everyone heard about this uh Janet Jackson song? Uh is it Daydream? Not Daydream Nation, um a rhythm nation that will shut down a laptop or a computer? No, why?
Because there's a resident frequency in the song that's unaudible that uh matches the same resident frequency of internal hard drives of certain windows, um, excuse me, uh certain PCs, and it's shutting laptops down, not just the one that's playing it, but the ones that are in the same room. That's so slick. I like that a lot. I like that a lot. It's crazy.
That is so strong. Oh my god. So now somebody's sitting at the bar at the restaurant with their computer open for too long. Just play that on the speakers and get them right out. No, no, no.
Yeah. Oh my god, that'd be amazing. That's like the equivalent of like uh you ever like want to build a Faraday cage in your restaurant so that nobody's cell phone works? Yeah. It'd be amazing.
For those of you that don't know, Faraday Cage is like uh it's like uh you it's like being inside of a microwave. It's like none of the signals can make it out. And you're good. You don't have to deal with it anyway. Didn't you have a baby at like 60?
Wow, I don't know. But I'm sure that's right. She's real. I do know for a fact that uh I do know for a fact that even after menopause, it's possible to have a baby if uh you know your uterus still works. I know that that's been done.
Yeah. Uh back to scallop crude. Uh from serving this weekend. I was thinking of curing the scallops. Can Dave or anybody else share any experience or resources they have for brine versus direct salt salt sugar application versus koji cure, as well as uh how long to cure for?
Uh I'd appreciate it. Thanks. Huh. I've never done koji uh on a scallop. You you uh John anyone?
I haven't. I've seen combu done before. Yeah, but combu is kind of classic, like combuck. I used to do like um like the best uh Saba sushi, you know, the mackerel sushi, the the one that's like not fresh, the one that's like the next day, pressed with combu and you get that combu pressing. And I've done that a lot with fish, but never as a ceviche alternative, just as something that dehydrates, salts, flavors the fish where it's pushed against it, but not in lieu of.
I don't think the combu is salty enough for it to be in lieu of a total cure, right? Um I mean I'm I wish KG, we need to put this out on the on the Discord. Quinn, do we have anything anyone like available on the Discord now? Because I haven't done enough tests to know for sure. I would say uh I mean, I'm I'm typically acid plus salt, and so I usually toss with salt and then add acid, and then that turns it into a brine because it's not dry.
But what do you typically do, John? I don't do salt only, acid. Yeah. And so, you know, um, and so that that's what I would do. And the salt will firm it and help cure it.
And the ass, because the acid's gonna, you know. What do you think? Yeah, no, I agree. My favorite thing to do, actually, is to cheat. Uh, and if you want to do it very quickly, is like slice everything thin so that you can basically just mist bottle like uh you sprinkle salt and mist bottle acid on it and then have it cevichify very, very quickly.
That's what uh Nils used to do at the French culinary. We would never wait to actually do any real ceviche because I don't know, he just didn't want to. With the exception of he actually used to he used to acid cure with citrus juice uh salmon roe, and it was pretty good. He would like you know, take the already salted salmon roe and then like soak them in acid and they would kind of denature a little bit. Okay.
It was good. Uh but yeah, he used to do the the fake quick ceviche by slicing thin and then uh applying acid. Am I answering this question? Is this making it? I think so.
Yeah, yeah. Uh you know what the worst is? Uh scallops that have gone off. Yeah. Oh my God.
By the way, if any of you and I've never lived anywhere else for a long period of time. So, you know, I'm sure wherever you you who hear me come from, you have great scallops. But here, the best scallop you can get within 500 miles is if you can get a day boat Nantucket scallop. Yeah. I mean, those things are ridiculous.
They're so sweet. How much do you love it, John, when you get a scallop at a store and it's clearly been so treated and puffed up with water that as soon as it hits the pan, it's like it's so sad. Scallop is my favorite shellfish too. Really? Yeah.
I love scallops. Where are you? Where are you on scallop, Stas? I hate them. I hate them.
One time, and Mark Ladner also hates them. One time they like they gifted us some at a restaurant. We put them in a napkin and put them in my purse. Yeah. Yeah.
Jeez. That's how much we hate them. Yeah. So you're saying you don't like um any prep, no prep. Uh no.
Would you I'm trying to figure out if it's a sushi thing, I can deal with that, but what about, and this is not the ideal way to make a scallop, but what about like battered and fried? No, no, no, no, no. So you can't even tolerate that. No. I overeat them as a kid.
Oh, who cooked them? I don't remember. I really don't remember. Okay. Uh that's interesting.
Huh. Huh. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's interesting not to like them in any way. I can I can tolerate sushi.
And I can if somebody is serving them at their house and they're so proud or whatever, I'll eat, I'll eat it, but it's nauseating to me. Yeah. Oh, I love how you You taught me. That's so strong, Sas. No one knows what they're talking about.
Yeah. Well So like when someone, you know, look, it's not even a thing anymore. Now, like nauseous doesn't mean nauseous anymore, right? It doesn't mean anything anymore. So no one uses nauseated.
People say I'm nauseous, and I'm like, you are. But it doesn't have any meaning anymore. You know what I mean? It used to, because something that is nauseous is something that causes nausea. Someone becomes nauseated because they're exposed to something that is nauseous and cause them nausea.
But this is uh this is a linguistic, not a good linguistic hill to die on because that's not the meaning of the word anymore. Now, if you say I'm nauseous, it means like I'm gonna throw up. And everybody knows that, so why be a dick about it? You know what I'm saying? Yeah.
But I still appreciate Stas busting out the correct old school usage. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. But you know, she is a she is a trained poet.
That's true. Useless. Uh that's draw. Um, real quick, I pulled up that picture from Instagram. So at Mission Chinese a seven years ago, combu cured scallops that they place between two sheets of combu, let it sit overnight, served with like grapefruit segments and toasted nori on top.
Yeah, I'm sure there was some extra salt in there. Probably. We used to combo like combu cure sabasushi, fantastic. And on the rice, when you push the combo against the rice and let it sit and it gets that green transfer and it gets that beautiful. One more thing on scallop.
So, scallop's not a thing people don't like overcooked, right? Right. But when you have a not good scallop and it's a little bit raw and it's got that mush texture in the middle of it, you know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Oh my god.
Terrible. Sad. Terrible. Well, because the thing is is like the difference between I you know, I can deal with a with a mediocre scallop as long as it's like, you know, not too over or too under. I can deal with it, right?
I don't need a great crust on the top of it. I'm fine. You know what I mean? Especially if you're just gonna hack it up and toss it into pasta, whatever you're gonna do. I don't know, right?
Doesn't matter. But uh I don't even know what I was gonna, I don't even know where I was gonna go with this. That's it. I that was it. I was like, I can tolerate it.
But I was like, but I was like, but there it's one of those things like a tomato where the difference between the low end and the high end is tremendous in terms of quality. You know what I mean? It really is. You know? And low ones, you're like low, like ones that like, yeah, they they water out instantly and they free in, you know, they they smell relatively fishy and they have that mush texture in the middle of them, and then they they don't take on the color and they just and then they serve them to nostasi, and she's like, Thanks.
I I now say I'm allergic. If if people ask about, I know it's I know. I don't want them to waste their scallops on me. I don't want them to waste their scallops on me. Okay.
Okay. Rex, getting married next summer. Any advice on working with a caterer on the menu uh or on food that you think works particularly well or should be avoided. Wedding will be mid-June in New York City with around 100 guests and family style service. We'd like to do a fish slash seafood entree, although we don't have raw bar money and probably need a beef or chicken uh for the older family that expect the beef or chicken.
Yeah. That's tough. Uh listen, listen, listen. The problem with mo like if you're doing the standard stuff like this, it's about choosing recipes that can tolerate abuse, right? So if you find a caterer that you like, the best thing to do is to find someone you like and then have them test a couple of their recipes for you and taste it, and then abuse the hell out of those recipes and see how they're gonna they're gonna work.
When I go out to a uh a wedding or an event, and someone orders the fish, I'm like, really? And then the but I was at an event the other day, and somebody and somebody next to me ordered the fish and I tasted, I was like, oh, that was shockingly fine. Because like fish is hard to get people to do it right unless they're using more modern techniques with good holding and stuff like this. It's just fish ends up getting hammered to hell. So what can you do?
You can say, hey, listen, let's do um uh let's do canals. Let's do like fish in some form that it's okay to hammer, right? Choose fish that can, you know, take a beating and and still still be fine. Skate. But people don't do skate at weddings.
Why don't they do skate at weddings? Because they don't want to do all that searing. They want something that they can just quote unquote broil and serve. But skate's one of the few fishes you can beat the hell out of and not and you know, have it be okay. What do you think?
Yeah, could I wonder if you could do like a salt bake fish, like per table. Oh, listen. You just need a lot of oven space. Well, but the thing is that it's a good idea, it's a good idea. It's very presentation forward, which is good.
The problem is is that the caterer needs to be good at it, or there'll be problems. Dave, can you can you do a PSA for why Phil should have his wedding at my house and how food would work there? Like it's a free space. Big roast. It's in charge one now.
Oh my God. All right. Well, I mean, like, you look, I mean, like, I got married when I was very young and we had no money. So, you know, it was at my uh at Jen's uncle's house in the back, and we got a uh what's it called? A uh we did brunch because brunch is a lot cheaper.
Oh, yeah, that's the advice you had for him. Brunch is so much cheaper for a wedding. And because be because at brunch, you can just get a bunch of cases of champagne, or we use kava because we didn't have champagne money. So you get like a bunch of cases. No one expects necessarily a full bar at lunchtime.
They're used to brunch being like a sparkling wine scenario, right? So you can get some beers for those kind of folk, some sparkling wine, and you know, for your crazy uncle, you can get a couple of bottles of something so they can go in the corner and souse themselves to death. Right? And then uh, you know, and then just brunch food is just much more, even though every service industry person detests working brunch, back me up on this, John. It's the absolute worst.
Even though you're starting it next week. Lunch, not brunch. But brunch food is pretty bulletproof. That's what's good about it. So it's easy to get that stuff out there and everybody's gonna be happy with it.
You know what I mean? As long as the French toast doesn't dry out, everyone's gonna be fine. No one's gonna, no one's gonna be like, oh my god, the French toast. Maybe they will. Anyway, yeah.
Hopefully they won't. You know, uh anyway. Uh so my advice was uh, you know, he what was he trying? He was trying to save money in some really stupid way. He doesn't want to pay for like um uh rentals, like cups and and tables and porta potties and all that stuff.
And I was like, okay. But he look listen. You save on the space. You save on the space. You save on the space.
Um anyway, so back to the thing, working with them, find someone that you're willing to to work with that you like. I mean, the problem is is that the more someone has already done weddings, the less they're gonna want to work with you because they're just gonna want to do their shtick. So it means you're gonna have to work if you're gonna do a lot of work with someone where you're gonna have a lot of input, it's probably gonna be someone that's relatively new to it, which means there's a higher risk. Would you agree with that, John? Yeah.
One thing I'll say is this when we got our wedding cake made, uh, I apparently like uh we were the only people that this person had ever worked with, the wedding cake person, who actually cared about the flavor of the cake. She was like, Um, I just normally use a box cake. I'm like, no, you will use this carrot cake recipe. And I gave her the carrot cake recipe that I wanted. She's like, Oh, that's a good recipe.
I might use that in the future. I was like, thank you. But I care about the quality of the cake. Yeah. You should.
Right? Yeah. That's the last thing. That's what they're gonna remember. I won't go into the Juspiti, which I still don't know how to bring up the Jesbeedy triggering me.
All right. That's a good story, though. That's what I like to do. Someday, someday we'll do it again. When uh you know, we when it comes to talking about my uh my grandparents again, we'll bring it up.
Crazy grandparents. Dave, I for some reason some like email came up. I think something with Alexis, and then Questla potluck thing, and then the name of your drink. Do you remember what the name of that drink you served? My grandma lives in my driveway.
Yeah. But it doesn't make sense to a lot of people because I realize that non-bartenders don't call Grand Marnier grandma. Oh. And because it had Grand Marnier in it, because Grand Marnier was a sponsor. And furthermore, I found out that most people have never had their grandparents live in their driveway for like three years.
Yeah. When the motor home left, there were holes where the wheels were that were four inches deep. And that's true. The motorhome boop, boop, boop, boop off the thing, big dents in the driveway. Wow.
The umbilical cord. The umbilical cord would nightly pop the circuits as grandma cranked her electric blankets. And that's real life. Anyway. What do you got, Quinn?
Oh, yeah, we do have a uh a question from the Discord this morning. If you want to do that before the other questions, do it. Do it. Okay. Uh Biff Dick from Philadelphia asks, is black garlic fermented or does it undergo myard reactions?
Or both. The latter. And uh after you answer that, I I have a comment. Okay. The latter.
That's easy. Keeps getting asked. People call it fermentation because there are a lot of complex reactions are taking place, but it's all at a temperature. It's not, it's not anytime fermentation is there, it needs to be uh it needs to be facilitated by some form of microbe, right? And if it's not, then it's just chemical reactions, and that's what's going on.
I called this question in like eight or nine years ago. Oh, sorry. Wait, what do you say, Quinn? Um, I think this conf it's confusion happens. I see this a lot as well in um discussing discussions around uh tea processing.
I'm pretty sure the word for fermentation in Chinese and other languages is just broader. But someone talk about I mean we'll get McGee on. We'll get McGee on. When they talk about just oxidation, it's called the fermentation phase. Right.
I I hear what you're saying, but I don't feel qualified to make a a comment on on on tea. Yes, I hear what you're saying. A lot of the oxidation is not caused by any micros, but then there are ferment. I agree with you fundamentally, but we'll get we'll get an expert. We should get a tea expert on sometime.
Yeah. Have we ever had a tea expert on. I know a producer enjoy it. Yeah. I mean, we talked with someone at MoFab.
And I know we know Harney. Remember that guy, Dave and Emerick? Oh, not Amarick. Oh, uh Fong? Yeah.
Yeah. Who was who is uh starting his own tea garden in uh south of San Francisco? And he was like, There's no such thing as wild tea. As soon as you pick it, it's not wild name more for a thousand years. We're like, okay, man, Jesus.
Remember that? My God. Mark Wade. Hey, Dave, big fan. In the process of starting a small cocktail concept, tiny cocktails or a small place with normal-sized cocktails.
Unclear. And uh everything is going pretty well. I wanted to see how you went about sourcing quinine, as you referenced in your book. Mainly wanted to see if you're able to get it with your business formation documents or if you need some additional licenses. You do not need licenses.
You just need to convince someone. The problem is really just the cost. So if you're buying from Spectrum or one of these other places, it's just going to cost you a lot of money. I haven't had to buy it in a number of years. So the easiest way to do it is to find someone who works at a university for a lab and just pay them to buy it for you.
That's definitely the easiest way to do it. Make sure you're getting USP. If you can get sulfate, not HCL. But maybe we should look it up again. I'm sure somebody at this point on Amazon's got to be selling it, right?
Yeah. We should get modernists back on the line to get the why doesn't modernists carry that crap. You need only a tiny amount. I don't know. We'll get on it.
All right. Uh perennial pantry writes in uh hey, we're a food company working on grain puffing. We process Kernza. Now, Kernsa is like some, it's like a long thing, right? Like wild rice-looking kind of thing.
Ecologically beneficial perennial grain. Uh deeply rooted, can extend 10 feet or more into the ground. Yield is rapidly growing after harvest, good conditions, more seeds than annual wheat. Uh, and better for cows and cattle to eat after you take the kernels off. Okay.
Anyway, so they're growing this stuff and they're puffing it, right? Uh, and they keep burning the grain in the puffing gun, right? So they're using uh 2.5 kilogram puffer, right? So that's like five. Isn't that the size that we had, S, the one that that we that we had the unfortunate experience with?
They're two and a half kilogram puffer, uh, trying many different moisture charge sizes, PSIs, temperature, and tines. We keep burning. Any tips, resources, or insights on the burning issues? Thank. All right, so burning is caused by one of two things in a puffing gun.
One, you're, you don't have a good seal. If you're able to puff other grains perfectly, but you can't puff the grain that you're puffing, that's when you know that, okay, it's not the seal that's the problem. It's not the gun itself, it's my recipe that's going in. So what's happening to you is if it is burning in that case, is uh either there's a lot of sugar in it, right? Because you can't you can't puff things that are high in sugar.
So if there's too much sugar in the grain, it's gonna scorch during the during the puffing procedure as it heats, right? The other thing is is it could just be a low moisture. Did they say in the thing that I can't remember what I read? Temper that thing up to like closer to take the moisture content of it, right? And then uh you can either buy a moisture content checker, which is what we used to do with the puffing gun, or you can, you know, the AAC, the AACC uh method where you crush it finally and dehydrate it uh for an hour and then re-weigh it with a milligram scale.
You can check the the moisture level of grain, but temper it up to a higher moisture level so that it uh the starch can you need enough moisture for the starch to gelatinize at the high temperature and then expand when it goes off. So those are the two things I'd check. And it's pretty easy to temper it. You just, you, you, you weigh it, you add the amount of water that you that you need to get it back up where it's going, you thoroughly mix it by hand, seal it, and let it wait for, you know, 10, 12 hours to like equilibrate again, and then go directly from there to puff it. That's what I that's that's the first things that I would do.
First check the sugar, then check that. The final thing that you can do if you can do this, is that the the way that to really puff, if you're gonna puff a lot, is not to puff using a flame at all. The way that the actual people used to do it, even with the big puffing guns, is there would be an input into it, and they would just inject high pressure steam into it. So if you can get a steam generator so that the temperature of it is like injected with steam, and then maybe even just boost it a little bit with a flame, that's gonna have not as much of the heating time be heating. But if there's any leak at all in that puffing gun, you're going to take it into a room at Harvard full of students, you're gonna set off all of the uh fire detectors in that room, and every scientist and grad student and student in that room is gonna have to go outside at night uh and look sad.
Very scary. And and look angry and sad at you. Remember that, Stus? That was like a couple months after the Boston marathon, too. Oh my god.
Remember that? Oh my god. And we were doing everything we could to not call that thing a pressure cooker. Oh. Oh my God.
Nightmare. From Dave Kitchens, uh, I just finished liquid intelligence and enjoyed it. I have been agar clarifying grapefruit juice, and it got me thinking. Do you have any idea if clarifying grapefruit juice eliminates or decreases the now? You ready?
I'm gonna try to say this word. Feranocumarins responsible for the issues related to taking certain medications. Uh, I can't find anything in the scientific literature, but I was just wondering if your science background, if you had thought this might be a possibility. In fact, I have thought about this a lot. I just have never been able to get it measured.
The the ingredient of uh most concern that I have always looked at is called bergamoton, and bergamotin is in fact a uh Furanocumarin, and that what it interferes with mainly is things like statins. And so a lot of people who take statins or like things like this, they they have an issue. But what's funny is is that if you knew you were going to consume a certain amount of uh grapefruit every day, you could actually adjust for it. But some medicines be you become more uh they become more reactive in your system with grapefruit and some less. It's just very bioactive, which is crazy.
I have a feeling that it would actually reduce them, but I don't have the proof. Anyone who can hear this that has a lab will send you some clarified juice and you can test it to see whether or not the level is low, because I've always thought maybe like that would be an answer for people, because you know, people who would they couldn't drink the gin and juice if they're like, I can't have grapefruit juice. I'm on statins, it could be like, oh, well, we fixed that. Anyway, so it's a good question. And I have thought about it.
I just don't know the answer. Curtis Barnard writes in uh what would my ideal fridge or freezer set up in a home kitchen be? No space for one in the garage. Uh I mean, I'd rather have a fridge and freezer in my garage than a car. Keep that car out in the driveway.
You know what I'm saying? Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I mean, come on. Priorities, Curtis.
Uh, would you do undercounter units, glass fronts on the fridge, commercial units or residential? Okay, listen, commercial units suck, right? They they like they're good for commercial, but at home, they just take a lot of energy and they're very loud, right? And so, what I know from my from being alive and having had commercial fridges in my house for a long time because I love them, is that while you love them, nobody else in your house is gonna enjoy your electric bills and they're not gonna enjoy the noise of the compressor unless you're unless you're so fancy that you can have remote compressors and you can have your compressor in the basement and then your fridge upstairs. Not only are you gonna have to spend a fantastic amount of money getting that thing fixed every year when it breaks, because it will, right?
That's the other thing about commercial refrigeration. It breaks constantly, right? Uh but if you had that kind of money, I'm assuming you have space in your garage to put a fridge or a freezer and not worry about this problem. Under counter fridges are nice. I will say this.
Uh uh undercounter freezers are nice to store certain things. Um, but I would just, and glass front ones are okay, but typically at home, especially with a freezer, you want the freezer to be as sealed up as possible to keep the quality of the stuff uh at tippy top, tip top. So, like, let's say you have one like your standard fridge freezer combo, that one is one that automatically defrosts, then opt for your undercounter being uh one that uh doesn't do an automatic deep frost, and then keep that one for your deep freeze stuff. And that way you can keep stuff longer at a higher quality. Um but I like under under counter.
The problem with undercounter refrigeration in general is that it's not very space efficient because it has to be both counter depth, which real fridges aren't, right? And short, right? So you're you're losing twice. And if they if the compressor is contained in it, so the way the real refrigerator works is is it's very tall and it's very deep. And so they store the compressor stuff behind and underneath typically your fridge and freezer.
You can't do that in an undercounter, and so they have a very uh they have a very small storage area for the amount of linear space they take up in a counter. Does that make sense? Yeah. Okay. Uh Kev McHugh writes in what are the best options for using carrot juice in a cocktail?
If you're gonna clarify carrot juice, make sure you put some acid in it. Otherwise it won't clarify well. I mean, classic is carrots and apples, carrots and apples, carrots, apples, vodka, carrots, apples, vodka. Enjoy it. It tastes good.
Add to add a little citrus. Um, I used to juice it uh with a champion. Um, that's what we would do. Juice champion. So like classic, like granny, granny and carrot, juice them both, then it clarifies well, carbonate, delicious.
Yeah, just like being John Malkovich. Is that what they do in being John Malkovich? Yeah, that's how he survived. That's one of the old guys was always drinking carrot juice. Everywhere it went.
I have not seen that in a long time, but I remember enjoying it. I'm I'm a I'm pro Malkovich. I bet you I would not be, I bet you he would be a weird guy to have as a friend, though. Malkovich? Malkovich?
Malkovich? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, like, who would you think would be a worse person to have as a f as a like a standard friend, like to just have a normal conversation with? Malkovich or Daniel Day Lewis?
Daniel Day Lewis. Worse? Yeah. You would hate him, Dave. What do you mean?
Well, it depends on what character he's pretending to be, right? Yeah, I guess. Lincoln. Oh God. With his high voice Lincoln, his like whiny voice Lincoln.
Yeah. Oh my God. There will be blood. I like him. Oh, yeah, but then oh my God, he's just so aggressive the whole time.
I would prefer that. That's like having dinner with my grandpa. You want this? So it's familial. You'll understand it better.
Never talk about that. What's the Daniel Day Lewis' hardest role he's ever been? Do it. Do the voiceover. Daniel Day Lewis, in his most difficult role ever, plays a normal father.
Anyway, so like uh, but like I remember like singing like my grandpa was. Did I say this on air? I remember like, so like Booker, you know, Booker, who's autistic, first of all, right? And is three years old. Okay.
Three. Grandpa is, you know, in his mid-70s at the time, whatever. And like, you know, Booker's not, Booker's not. Did I say this on air already? Did I tell the story?
Yeah. So, well, John doesn't remember. So, like, grandpa goes to Booker, makes a fist, puts it in Booker's face, and goes, You want this? And I turn to him. I'm like, Grandpa, you're not as young as you used to be.
Otherwise, I will, I will, I you're my grandfather, but I will throw you on the floor if you threaten my son. Are you nuts? You know what I mean? Can you imagine? Yeah.
And he's only half joking. And I was only half joking. You know what I mean? It's like. But why was he mad at Booker?
Sounds like your grandfather was a sailor. Uh pilot. World War II, he was a uh, he used to train people to uh fly bombers during World War II. The rest of his uh flight contingent uh, you know, went over and they all got uh killed in P40s in North Africa because their the planes weren't as uh as good as the German planes as the Mesher Schmidt's that they were flying against, so a lot of them got wiped out, and they kept him as a bomber instructor, and so he was a light bomber instructor. But he was a weird dude.
He just he had a weird thing about about men. He had these weird, like boys and men, like this weird, like, you know, uh he felt somehow like he was competing even with people who were his descendants. It's we it's weird. It's hard to do. Exactly, Stas.
Exactly. Uh Chris Grady, what's the difference between Mexican sour cream and creme fresh? I've seen recipes with very similar times and temps. You know what? I've never done the analysis, but uh crema that I get, uh, first of all, is highly, you know, stabilized with stuff.
I know I I've never had artisanal crema. I've only ever had, you know, the stuff that I get in my local grocery store. But um, it's always more liquidy, whereas creme fraîche always seems to set up firm. And then when you break creme fraîche, it goes liquidy, and then you wait for a while for it to set up. That's why everyone's like, I'm gonna use creme fraîche in a sauce.
And then you take the creme fraîche and you add liquid to it, and you're like, oh my God, it's too runny now. And then you're like, just wait, just wait. And then it sets back up again, and then you can put it back on the plate, and then you're like, and then they're like, I'm gonna use creme fresh, and then they do what you just said, but then they put it on something hot, and then that like gross white stuff bleeds out from underneath the dollop of creme fraîche. You with me? Yeah.
Yeah. I love creme fraîche. I'm not anti-creme fraîche, but I'm saying crema is highly the Mexican crema is more typically more stabilizing that you never get weep out of it. It doesn't ever weep because I think they guar the hell out of it. I don't know what they add to it.
And uh, and it also is always liquid, it never sets solid like creme fraîche. We say that's accurate. I don't know how, why it's that way. That's just been my experience from years of eating both. Um creme fraîche, a good thing to have around uh to dope to make your own uh cultured creme though.
That's always that's always the one it always almost always works. Like buttermilk doesn't always work, even though it's active culture. I've used it. Like usually creme fraî that I've used as a dopant for making cultured butter works. I don't know why.
I never, you know what? I should know what the cultures are, but I don't because I haven't had to care enough. I'm being I'm for I have to be forced to care. Kevin McGowan, I'm an avid hova cook. When buying new gear, my strategy so far has been to start uh at a professional cooking supply shops with the assumption that they sell no nonsense, straightforward, good quality kitchen gear.
Is this a sound strategy for a home cook? Uh, should I look uh for any pitfalls when shopping at these types of places? Well, I mean, uh we we can all chime in here. One of the issues is is sometimes people buy lower quality stuff because it's gonna get beaten up. When you go to a kitchen manufacturer who's gonna make like your hood or your counters, and they say to you, commercial or residential, and you're like, why?
And they're like, Well, because I'm gonna take it to a higher surface polish if I'm gonna do it residential, because they know commercial people don't care how it looks, unless you're Jean Georges, they care how it performs. So there's typically a lower surface level finish in a lot of stuff that's designed for the your average day-to-day professional, right? So, like, for instance, like I really love my Volrath Centurion pans with my thick aluminum bottom on them, but no one would want them at home because the handles look janky, even though they're strong. The handles look janky and the lips that they don't look like when someone comes over to my house, they're not like, oh, that's fancy. I'm like, actually it is.
You know what I mean? Uh, but uh but my point is is that I think that's one of the reasons not to look for it. But in general, I think you know, the pe people who are selling high quality commercial stuff, it stuff can take a licking. What do you think, John? Yeah, no, I I agree.
I mean, it's I love having all professional equipment and things like that. I don't know, I'm thinking like stainless steel bowls and fish spats and whatever. Yeah, that stuff's all good. Yeah, it doesn't look great necessarily, but I know it's gonna last forever. And you can get infinity of them for not that much, like sheet pans and whatnot.
Hey Stas, I have an idea. Here's a terrible idea. Ready for it for our LA party? So when the French Culinary Institute uh shut down, there was this guy, what was his name? Oh, yeah, John.
And uh we went and got their entire library and loaded it into a truck and drove it to uh to Stanford, where it is now or wherever it is, wherever our storage is. Yeah. And uh so that's where the library is fixed for MoFat. So MoFat has this library that we can't use, including all of these chef demos that are on DVD that we need somebody to uh somehow because we have the rights to put them up on the internet for the museum and like annotates and do whatever we want, but just we don't have the time. We don't have time anyway.
Okay. Anyway, but what we did get that we own personally, Booker and Dax, is the giant, giant industrial spetzel maker. Spretzel party. Spetzel party. Oh my god.
Can you imagine a Spetzel party? An LA Spenzel party. But here's the here's the kicker. Nastasia Lopez agrees to wear her freaking derndal. Oh yeah.
I have that. No, that's appropriation. I think that's not uh you worked in Switzerland. Yeah. That's close enough.
You worked in Switzerland, that's close enough. We have the giant Spenzelmaker. And what are we gonna make? So we can make Spetzel. I'm just gonna put it out here.
Schweinhox. What? I said sausages, but okay, sausage is fine. Yeah. Schweinhoxa, also good.
Or I'm gonna put this out there. Jaeger Schnitzel. Jaeger Schnitzel and Spetzel. But that's their combination. Well, what's the reason?
Spenzel party. Do you need a reason, Nastasia? No. Yeah, come on. I mean, like that doesn't happen.
No one in LA is thinking Spetzel. So you figure out like some place, right? No one. Oh, you're going to LA. What are you doing?
No one's thinking Spenzel party. They're like, why? Why do you have to go to Let's do it? Because you don't sell it like you don't do this. You know, we're having a Spenzel party.
You're like, Spitzel party. And people are like, oh my God, Spetzel. I haven't had that in a decade. Let's do it. And they're going to show up and just gonna have bowl after bowl after bowl of Spetzel with butter and cheese.
It's not that big. Oh, I didn't know that. We just need a big old pot when we're there. And then it's like zoop zoop, zoop, zoop, zoop, zoom, special, spezzel, spezzel, spezzel. And then it's gonna mushroom, mushroom.
Actually, mushroom special is delicious. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, I was like, I'm excited. Uh Peter and uh Peter Um writes in, what's the most interesting thing you've clarified? Oh my god.
The worst or the most interesting? I clarified a uh I clarified a Chipotle burrito once. It was terrible. Uh Jack Disconey writes in, are you planning on opening a uh a new bar in New in New York City? Hey, we just need to find a money person, but I'd like to.
Matt, I'm looking for shelf stable cordial uh lime cordial recipe. I've played around with it a little bit, and the closest I've come is making what has recently been dubbed super juice. I was like, blah, blah, blah. What is the question for me? Oh, how do you do it?
It's the way to make it shelf stable is to just uh, first of all, the problem with most cordials is getting the acid level right. Uh Quinn, you can put up on the on the on somewhere, like you know, our current cordial recipe, because he he's working on it. Bottle the cordial and then put it into uh water that's hot enough to kill the yeast in it, and it'll be shelf stable, right? So bottle of cordial in little bottles, make sure it's at 50% bricks when you're done. Make sure that it has six percent acidity when you're done, and then uh and then bottle it and bring it up to temperature the same way that you would pasteurize maple syrup before you do it.
Uh and well, nice thing. All right, so we're gonna get we're we only got we only got three left, uh uh uh Quinn. Are we doing all right? We're doing all right. We're good.
You ready to save those for next time? Yeah. Yes. Yeah, sure, sure. All right.
Sorry, Craig. Sorry, Martin. We'll get to you later. And Kyle. Cooking issues.
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