Hello and welcome to Cooking Issues. This is Dave Arnold, your host of Cooking Yeshu's coming to you live from the Heart of Manhattan Rocket Fletter Center, New York City, News Dam Studios, joined as usual with Hyme today. John, how you doing? Doing great. Got uh Joe Hazen rocking the panels.
What's up? Hey, welcome to the show. Yeah, hey, I hear Nastasia's coming a little later, so hopefully we get her a little later in the program. We got uh, I think Jackie Molecules in Los Angeles. Yes, sir.
How's it going? It's going well. How are you going? Yeah, I'm good. Good.
And uh, since I came in here like hot and heavy, do we have the upper left today? No, Quinn's still not feeling up to it. Hopefully, maybe he'll call in towards the end of the program and give a howdy. Uh be good to hear from Quinn. So, uh, without further ado, uh, introduce today's special guest, uh, oftentimes guest, friend of the show.
I'm gonna say friend of the show, Captain Oily himself, Nick Coleman. How you doing? How's it going out there, everyone in Radio Lamb? Yeah, and Bassin Bansuri Master. Uh yeah, since the last time I was on the show, we went to uh go see what's the name of the um what's the name of the band that you're the the the bassist in?
They they Oh Dr. Baklava and Human Growth Hormone. HGH. Now let me ask you a question about human growth hormone. Is uh is that the stuff that when it runs unchecked it leads to aggro mellic uh aggromelic you know the the word that I can't pronounce that Andre the Giant hat and uh and uh Ted Cassidy who played Lurch.
Some sort of enlarging of the human genetic I can see the word, but I can't say it. Agromegoli. Agromega. I can't say that. I I don't even know what you're referring to.
You grow real, real tall, you get a real, real deep voice, and eventually it ends up being harmful because your bones keep growing past when they should. I know nothing of this. All I know how to do is play bass. Well, and apparently name your band. Acromegally.
There you go. There you go. I don't know why. It's one of those words I can't say. Never heard of.
Oh, you gotta look that up. That's uh Andre the Giant. Yeah. Yeah. And the pituitary glands produce too much growth hormones.
Yeah. Yeah. Too much of a good thing. That's uh that's my opinion. It's given to young children who are uh small and they need to grow more, they'll they'll HGH them.
I think the the issue is that there are therapeutic levels of everything and then there are non-therapeutic levels. And as Americans, we often fall prey to the if a little bit is good, maybe a crap ton is better. Yeah. The classic uh Britney Spears quote, give me more. Yeah, yeah.
When all you know, I I get it. Never being satisfied is helpful for self-growth. Not hormone growth, but you know, self-growth, like never being fully satisfied. But you should be happy with what you've accomplished while at the same time not feeling completely satisfied, like you have nothing else to do. Correct.
Resting on the laurels is the end of everything. Correct, correct. I like the color of your shirt, by the way. I hope people who are on Patreon can see the color of your shirt. It's uh I can't really describe it.
It's a dark teal. It's uh I I I love Joni Mitchell, and Joni Mitchell wears things like this in the 80s when she would play live, so I wanted to channel dear Joan. It also feels soft. May I touch it? Oh, you put you may very well to oh it is, yes.
It's nice and soft. Uh it's the kind of thing where I I if I saw it on a rack, I'd be like, oh yeah, oh yeah. I don't know that I could rock that color. I think it would make me look sick, but you can. Oh, thank you.
Maybe it's the beard. Uh if you are listening on Patreon, call in your oily oily oily questions to 917 410 1507. That's 917 410 1507. And if they're not on Patreon, uh John, why don't you tell them why they might want to be and how they do that? You go to Patreon.com slash cooking issues.
There's a couple different membership levels. You get uh different perks at every membership level, like uh access to the video, so you could see it in Nick Coleman's shirt right now if you were of that membership level. Yeah, good color, no? Yeah, excellent color. Joey and Mitchell love.
Yeah. Um you get discounts to books for uh Kitchen Arts and Letters. You get prioritized questions being answered. Um we got some great guests coming up. Um so yeah, just a lot of great things to look forward to.
So Patreon.com slash cooking issues. By the way, last week on the show, we had uh uh Jim Leahy and um and uh Peter Hoffman, uh, you know, his co-writer. And the book that I was supposed to be talking to him about arrived yesterday. Nice. Excellent.
Nice good timing. Nice, yeah. Perfect. Yep, perfect. That's the first time that's ever happened.
Someone showed up that I know personally, and I was like, what do you mean you got a new book out? Oh crap. You know what I mean? First time ever. First time?
I hope last time. So uh do you guys I'm gonna push a little something for uh my man John here. I don't know if you know this, Nick and uh or Jack over there next time you're in uh New York or Joe. Uh temperance wine bar, where so John left Booker and Dax. Uh he had Quinn's job.
And he left Booker and Dax and the centrifuge biz in general, and uh to become the chef of what at the time was Temperance Wine Bar. It is now being relaunched to more focus just on temperance being a restaurant that also has an excellent wine list. Am I correct here? That is correct. All right.
Yeah, thank you. Yeah, so uh you want to say something about and you've been talking on the air about uh developing a new menu, but you know, I think people who are, you know, pros in the in the industry like talking about menu development. So what do you got going? I know you're uh you're doing the relaunch, I think what, like the official one on Saturday? I guess next Thursday.
The menu's been out for about two or three weeks now, um, fully, and it's been going well. Um happy to hear it, and it's nice to be doing food that's more personal to me. Whereas, you know, I liked the food that I was doing before this, but that was just more kind of like generic wine bar neighborhood-y kind of thing. Now it's more creative, there's more technique going into it, and it's been uh a lot more fun to do when cooked and plate. And you know, it's fun to have your see a bit of yourself on the plate, I guess.
So it's nice to finally be at that point in my career. Thank you. All right. So what was the uh what was the dish? What was the dish in this menu that because there's always one where you went really far down a road, like tweaking, tweaking, and then all of a sudden we're like, well, oh, oh, ah, and then it had to go back to some sort of internal roots and reset and it came out better.
Probably the fish dish, the water zooy, um, really fudged around with that sauce a lot, which is now just a little bit of reduced fish stock and a uh heavy cream that has uh leaks blended and strained out, so it's got a nice leaky flavor. But it was trying to get those three flavors in balance. And you know, at one point I was really just trying to do too much with the leaks to try and make sure it was on the plate um and it was just too much, and then I just had to revert back and just kind of dial in the ratios. So I think that's the answer to that question. And I think it's helpful people because like I want people who are out there beating their heads against the wall on a particular menu item or food.
Just chill for a minute. Just take a chill pill. Reset. Yeah, just go back to square two or something like that and start resetting from there. There was a good nugget of an idea, and once you get too far from me, you just gotta go back.
Yeah, get that nugget back. The Nintendo Entertainment System only had two buttons power and reset. Lest we forget the power of the reset. Well said. There you go.
There you go. You know what's another uh this one, two buttons just to work it was do you ever play the game track and field? Yes. Yeah. Literally just two buttons.
And if you're if your fingers aren't almost broken by the time you've played track and field, like like you are not playing it correctly. It really destroys wrists and finger movement. Yeah, it's really good if you're like a kung fu practitioner and you're practicing iron iron hands, you know what I mean? Because you're just total carpal tunnel syndrome. Yeah, yeah, it's a nightmare of a game.
I mean, I I appreciate playing it. I played it, I built a meme cabin years ago. I and I introduced my kids to this game that I played when I was a little kid, and Dax was like, Oh yeah, all right, I'm gonna beat the hell out of this game. You know what I mean? Like anyway, uh I had something else on uh on you can probably hot rod your buttons too with some come some some cool springs.
Yeah, or what if you were like a like a genius and you like almost built your drum like your your buttons like a snare drum? Like you built your own drums that could have like a rap ba so you could be like. You could do some paradiddles and you can do some rolls. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um so back to the cream.
I appreciate you bringing the cream out. I hope cream makes a comeback in sauce land. Do you remember Peterson's original sauce book that came out? I want to say in like well, you and you guys were barely born, but it came out in like 1990s. There was a redo, but the original one, the J original James Beard award winning sauce book, when I read that, it was the prime era of if you want to make a sauce, what you do is you add cream and you reduce it.
And here's how you make it so it doesn't break. But basically it's all reduced cream. And you know what? When I read that book, I was like, that stuff tastes good. Yeah.
Very much so. Yeah. And then we all moved away from it. Yeah. As being quote unquote too heavy, towards what's weird, which is was we moved to a retro French idea of cuisine mass, right?
And then and then so now, like I'm glad to see my man John is like, you know what's good? Cream. Yep. It's delicious. It's delicious.
Oh, good fats, yeah. And here's something I read. Now, guys, I want you to know I do drink alcohol, but I don't I don't take drugs. Not because I'm against them, it's just it's never become part of my general practice. I'm a little bit worried that my brain's already a little tweaked and I'm worried about tweaking it further.
Period. You know what I mean? But I think maybe I was high because I read, I think I read that Vichy Soise is an American freaking dish. Whoa. No way.
That's gotta cook a thing. That's what I'm saying. Was I high? Was I dreaming? Is this one of those you know how occasionally misinformation will burrow into your brain while you're asleep, and when you wake up it doesn't vanish like most dreams do?
But there's something stuck in my head that Vichy Soise is an American invention. I'm sorry, Dave. I can't allow that. Somebody, somebody, somebody help me out here. Somebody, somebody, somebody please help me.
Like, cause it just it like now it's like gnawing at me. Like worse than this UN council meeting traffic that I like an escorfier disciple who was working at the Ritz Carlton here in New York, supposedly. Hey, you know what I don't believe? Any origin story. I don't even know why I brought up because you you you know who you know who cooks a lot of soup with leeks?
The French. You know what I'm saying? And so, like, you know, like maybe the term Vichy Swaz, you know what I'm saying? But yeah, you know. What a beautiful term that is.
It really rolls off the tongue. Vichy soif. And while we're on soups, borscht hot or cold. Cold. Yeah.
Yeah. Foie gras, hot. It depends on the time of year, actually. Oh, okay. It's so temperature based.
I don't want to in the summer I want cold, in the winter I want more. The thing about cold soups is unless it's chunky. Unless it's chunky, I feel stupid eating a cold soup with a spoon. What about a salmorejo? The Spanish tomato-based cold soup.
Is it similar to a gazpacho? It's similar to like a papal pomodoro, but not as bready. So like a ribolito, but soupier. Soupier. Yeah, it's if it's chunky, if it's got texture, I'm okay.
I feel stupid taking a spoon to a cold consume. Might as well drink it. Exactly. And I don't want to drink my beets. So I'm gonna have to say hot on the borscht.
What do you think about like a white borsche? It's not really beets. I like the red cold, I like the red hot borsche with a dollop of cold sour cream. Oh yeah! The hot and cold combo is really critical.
Now, I'm mentally thinking behind me here, sour cream or creme fresh fool. Sour cream. No, yes. Yeah. Yes, I like the thickness of the sour cream.
Yes, yes, Jack, I'm glad you're with me too here. Because everybody here, we all love the taste of creme frage, but it bleeds like a mother. Seriously. Yep. Yeah.
It's terrible. It's terrible. And like the real franchise franchise aren't willing to stabilize. We can fix it. I could take creme fraîche right now.
I could fix it. You know what I mean? People are like, no, just wait five hours for it to reset. No. No, I'm I'm eating my soup now.
Track and field. I'm eating my soup. You know what I mean? Anywho. Oh, I dropped my pen.
Which is probably glad for uh for Joe because he's not gonna hear me clicking at it. Uh by the way, last week, for those listening last week, it was not I who was clicking the pen last week. It was not me. I did not click the pen last week. Don't blame me.
Pen clickers. Really, really tragedies of society. Do you know who was really good at this uh back in the day was anyone on the debate team but me? They had all in high school learned the pencil flipping trick. Do you guys know what I'm talking about?
Yeah. Where they can just sit there, they can stare you dead in the eye, and they can and they can flip their pencil around their finger, yeah? Yeah, yeah. And that's silent. Joe, you should tell make tell everyone that if you if they want to work with you, they have to learn the pencil flip.
You know? Is that like the uh like what the drummers do with their sticks? Yeah, but with a pencil, and like it's it's like God's fidget because it's deadly silent. It's just like boom. It's like you can't hear anything.
Very ninja, very ninja. It's very like very just silence. Uh yeah. Uh all right, Jack. Since you are our only bi coastal person today, what have you had last week in in the realm of food?
Let's try to keep it to food. Yeah, okay. I was in uh Pennsylvania actually with my high school friends who are all like extreme Long Island dudes, you know, like two of them are mechanics and like very, very long island kind of vibe. Extreme Long Island, like they had Camaros. No, no, like accent wise, and just sort of like the palette, the palette, you know, a real Italian uh Long Island guy.
Yeah, so so I did uh I did Kenji's um chicken palm recipe, which is like a buttermilk brine, and uh it came out really really well. Yeah, I have to say. All right. Where in Pennsylvania? Yeah.
Uh like coconut's area. Like a BMB. It was like a kind of I love it. I love it. I love it over there.
I'm going to Pittsburgh in a week, and I have maybe one meal that I get to choose. So I'm gonna stop by. Don't I I can feel John behind me burrowing into my head. I'm gonna stop by the meat store for you on the way over. Excellent.
And get you your ring bologna. Beautiful. By the way. And jerky. Yeah, and jerky.
I'll get you whatever you want. So the name of the store, what is it? Deach, Deitch, Deach, Deitch? Uh, Dita's. It's this one store when you're traveling across Pennsylvania, you go a certain direction, and it's like it's um, they just hack up every animal and then cure every part of it, and like some of it's in liquids and some of it's jerky, and some of it's yeah, Drix.
And they also have a very good, for those of you that have never been to Pennsylvania or understand anything about anything. Pennsylvania is the snack food capital of the world, right? That's why if you look at anything of chips or pretzels, it says, you know, reggae you pen, like it's it's basically like it, like it's a Pennsylvania thing. Like Pen Dutch. Yeah, well, yeah.
But they but but it's just potato, everything, all the snacks. You know what I mean? It's like, we're not Fritos. Let's give someone let's give someone else Fritos. You know what I mean?
And tortilla chips, but they're now made of it. Fritos, uh Fritos Lay or just Fritos? No, free free toe is the item. Like Frito Lay. Like, like the Fritos, I think, uh, though they're everyone loves them, so they can't be underrated, but I think they're under eaten because they're too expensive.
I think the issue with Fritos is is that you look at the bag and you're like, why is that bag five dollars? It's so tiny, but it is heavy because they're a dense thing. They're dense. They're de but they're good. Are you uh pro uh is everyone here pro Frito pie?
Oh yeah. Yeah. The hack for me is at 7 Eleven you get the Frito bag. You buy the Frito bag. Right.
You then walk over to the chili and the cheese, open the bag, dump the chili and cheese in, and then get a fork and eat it straight out of the bag. How do they scan it? They just scan the Fritos. Oh wait, that's free. Chili and cheese is free.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This is a hack. Oh, you assemble in store. Wow. You assume you buy the bag of Fritos.
You then walk over to the hot dog area. You then open the bag, you put the chili in, you put the cheese in, you get a plastic fork, you walk out of the store with your bag of chili cheese Fritos. Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. You can do this while staring the person in the eye, and they won't. What?
Yeah, it's a secret. Hey everyone, you're welcome. You know what I mean? It's like that's the craziest thing I've ever heard. That's nuts.
That's how I roll in a 7-Eleven. Man. Just uh just a heads up. There's a there's a caller that just joined us. We're not sure if that's uh maybe one of our fellow companion producers.
Uh hello, perhaps producer. Hey, Quinn, what's up? How you doing? I'm alive. You're like, okay.
Hello. Uh so uh I know you've been feeling uh not uh good, but do you have any food stuff? I saw you did some tortillas. You want to talk about 'em. Yeah, I know.
Again, I've been resting, but my my dad's been working like a dog. Um so yeah, we did uh full kernel to Massa mixtimalization tortilla thing. And I think it turned out, you know, pretty good for like the first real attempt. Yeah, you know what? Uh uh wait, so what were you grinding the uh masa in with?
We we had like a hand cranked Mexican style grinder. The uh we got like the corona, the corona from Colombia, the corona, yeah. Uh uh, I I I I hate those things so much. Wow. I I hate I hate them.
I hell my god, I hate them. Although, is it very old? I think the older ones were a little bit better, like uh they're sandcast, right? So, like how good the burrs are in one of those things, depends entirely on the casting, the particular casting that you get. So, you know, you can get ones that can't grind where a spit, or you can get one that like you know, has been used so much, like that you know, one person has eaten like their lifetime supply of zinc coating and and cast iron, and but yours grinds well.
So, like what was your what was the general feeling of the folk who actually had to put their arm into I mean you know it could it put several hours to grind a kilo like on and off. Oh god. Um God, how many times two two times? Two times or three times? Two or three times through.
One time. All right. Uh man, yeah. I feel sorry for your dad and your brothers who I feel sorry for. Well, no, my it didn't no today.
It was just my just my dad. Next time it's my brother. Yeah, yeah. Reminds me of that barbecue spit spinning. Yeah, yeah, Quinn's uh Google Sheet Doc people's turns are gonna change.
Oh my god. Yeah, that's that's I think why beer was invented. I'm pretty sure. You know what I mean? Beer invented to survive.
While you're turning a spit. You know what I mean? It's like it took so long to cook your meat that like the stuff was sitting there fermenting next to you. By the way, uh I'm interested in anyone in the New York area. I know there's one or two I haven't tried them yet, making mockly.
Very pro mocky. Anyone who's making mockly, which is the Korean rice wine that's not made with Koji, which by the way, if you're interested in Koji and why wouldn't you be? Please check out uh Rich She's new substack, Flavor Freaks.net. Uh but uh they use Naruk. I know I've spoken about this on air, but the interesting thing about Naruk is is it's wheat based.
So it's like cr like cracked and then wheat with flour mixed, kneaded and then molded into what looks like like uh like a hall's like cough drop, but big, and then squished underfoot and then like uh put in straw and then kept at a high humidity for a while to start growing its own form of non-cold koji molds. It's then dried out, cracked up and then mixed with the steamed rice to make all the different kinds of Korean rice. All the different kinds of Korean rice wines and beverages are made with Naruk and not with Koji. And this stuff is fantally astic. And I wanna find someone who's making it here, maybe not even traditional traditional Korean.
Like I particularly think that Americans would like the variety called champagne mockly, which is where it's bottled with, and I don't even they might do dosage, but you could the cool thing about mockily is is that you don't just make it once. Typically you'll like make it, and then often you can charge it with rice again and again and get different kinds of effects depending on the temperature and how many times you've charged it with fresh uh uh liquor. And then off you can have it totally clarified, or you can have it milky and bubbly, which is amazing. So if it's when it's milky and bubbly, it's and it's fresh, and you'll appreciate this nick alive, right? Still fresh, still alive.
It's alive. In the way that polque is alive, and I've never had real pulke, so I've I can't, I've only had it in a can after it's been killed, right? So mockley is a living thing. So I want to find someone who doesn't want to make here that doesn't want to make a dead object. In Brooklyn, they're already doing it.
I know, but I I haven't tried their stuff. I'm interested in trying, uh I'm interested in trying maybe get them on. Yeah. You know what I mean? Because I'm interested in trying like you know, people doing and the other thing is is that like there's so many different ways to do it that I don't think that they're I mean, there maybe there's wrong answers, but I don't think there's a right answer.
You know what I mean? Like, so I mean something can be overtly flawed, I guess, but you know, they they have different levels of acidity because they're wild. They're they're wild, they're literally wild and also wild. You know what I mean? Uh just quickly, I think we have another caller calling in.
I think it might be one of our fellow companions, producers. Is this Nastasia on the line? Hey. Oh, wait, it's just it's just me. Just you, just you.
Wait, so wait. So what day, what day is it now? Tuesday. Tuesday. Wait.
So it I never know, and you get mad because I've known you for 8,000 years, and I don't remember anyone's birthday. Is it your birthday? Or was it your birthday? No. My birthday, Quinn's birthday was before.
Your birthday's in April. I know it's somebody's birthday, but I don't know who's. It was Quinn's birthday three days ago. Quinn's birthday. It's your birthday's in April.
I don't know. That's when you made the puff tortillas. My brain is hosed, man. Brain is host. Anyway.
So happy belated birthday, Quinn. Well, that's messed up, dude. Yeah. All right. So back to tortillas for one second.
Here is uh here is I did some tortillas too. I've been doing flower tortillas because uh no, incorrect. That's what I used to say. Like I think that just a bad uh I think like a great corn tortilla is a work of angels, but a great flower tortilla is also, and so now that anyone can have regular access to the flour that makes God's tortilla, you know. Uh by the way, the one that people normally buy is Hayden's Mills, which is great.
It's it's you know, they they grow good stuff. Um they stone grind. It's not a hundred percent uh Sonoran white wheat. Um I believe it's not 100% whole wheat, but it might be, right? Uh I highly recommend that this is something where you grind your own.
So I would buy uh white Sonoran wheat. You can get it from Breadtopia. The farmer that they grow that grows it is um, they are uh Native Americans. And I in fact I called them and I I didn't call them, I emailed them. And I said, uh, hey, listen, um, I'm currently buying like five pound and like 20 pound units from Breadtopia.
Can I just buy like 40 or 50 pounds at a time from you directly? I'll pay the same amount, right? Can I support you as and they're like, no, it's easier for us to ship in bulk to breadtopia and you buy from them. So you're not like shafting them at all. Go to Breadtopia, get the Sonor and white.
And uh, although Bredtopia did shaft me the other day, get this. I ordered 40 pounds of Yakora wheat from them. And it came, the bag was punctured, so the entire inside of the box was filled with wheat. And the wheat itself, anytime you buy wheat, you need to look at it. So look at the first like three, like, look at like get like three quarts of it and spread it on a full-size sheet tray and look, right?
Some wheat's gonna throw off dust. Some wheats, I mean, probably won't throw off bugs because they've killed those things with like high speed, called an entilter, uh, until I can't pronounce it. Anyway, uh, but you want to look for foreign seeds, you want to look for molds, and you want to look for like weird little things. So, like, usually the things that make it through are the things that are in the shape of wheat, which makes them hard to get out. My wheat, my 40 pounds wheat, full of little clay balls in the shape of wheat.
So I had to sift through 42 pounds of wheat kernels, and every like one quart thing that I was sticking on to my sheet tray and looking at, like kernel by freaking kernel, everyone had at least one or two clay balls in it. So I was like, oh my God. This is why crazy Sylvester Graham told you to wash all of your wheat. I've just recently done a test on washing wheat and then drying it. I didn't know it's much of a difference in the bread.
So I don't think you need to worry about it as long as your wheat's relatively clean. But back to Sonoran white. When you grind Sonoran white when you're in mill, which I hope you guys eventually get a flour mill, uh, you want to first clean your burrs with rice. You want to put rice, white rice, not brown, white, because you don't want any fat at all. You want something very hard and sharp, which is what rice is.
You want to grind it, uh, not too coarse but also not too fine. And that's gonna scrape your burrs clean and in essence redress them if you do like half a cup of white rice. Uh get all the rice out, and then you want to grind it so fine that just before your burrs lodge up. Like you and you need you need to get it so that you're gonna feel the flour and it's gonna feel gritty. Take it one little snap further and it's gonna feel greasy.
And you can't do that with many wheats, but you can do it with Sonoran white, because it doesn't gum up the way a lot of other things do. You can get that kind of greasy feel. And you wanna get that so that you can get the huge puff. You want to really beat the snot out of the starch, get a lot of good damaged starch in there, and really get the brand fine, get all the particles fine. Uh, and then you can have a fantastic tortilla flour.
I did uh I did 40 tortillas on Sunday, and we had like an 85 to 90% puff rate. Now, when I puff my tortillas, I don't do a traditional Southwestern style because I'm a white guy from New York. What I do is I use the Sonoran white wheat, and I use a very tortilla similar recipe. I also don't I use olive oil, in fact, in mind and not lard because I have a lot of vegetarians coming over. Um, but I puff it chipati style.
So I take a large griddle, uh, I have a crepe maker, so it makes my life easy. And then, you know, you you get it pretty hot, and then you put it down uh until it's just blistering. So I I make the balls, I'll tell you the exact recipe, in fact. I use uh for 500 of that flour, I'll use uh 79.5% uh water, so like 397. Uh about about 5% uh oil, like 24.3 of olive oil, uh, and about 1.9% salt, 9.3 salt.
I make 40 gram balls out of it. So you need the hell out of it. Let it sit for a couple of hours, let it fully hydrate, make balls, throw those balls into flour because they're wet, right? And then roll them as thin as you can. I tried using a tortilla press.
I hated it. I hated it. Roll them out like you would roll a shapati. And then uh on the hot griddle until you start seeing little blisters on top, flip it once, boop, and then onto a handheld grate, get a chipati grate. Like onto a grate over an open flame, boom, footballs, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, footballs.
And you want to you want them to puff so that they steam themselves on the inside and they don't dry out, but they're cooked. And I'll tell you another little secret is that uh I had some left over, and usually you can't reheat chipatis made with ata. They just don't reheat well. The ones with the white set the snoring white, they do reheat well if you steam them for like 30 seconds. You want to steam them for like 30 seconds because they're so thin and like you know, they've already puffed once that just a light steam brings them back.
Not a hundred percent because they're not, they don't have the outside texture's not perfect anymore, but they're not at all effed up. So that was my that's my week, that's my weekly cooking for you guys. Yeah. Uh and one last thing I want to try that I haven't tried yet because I had to cook for someone's birthday, and they wanted like, you know, my pork chili and my veg goop and my tortillas, right? They didn't want what I wanted to make.
You want to know what I want to make? Tell you my idea. Terrible news, by the way, for lovers of meat in New York City. The Ridgewood Pork Store closed earlier this year. Oh yes.
Ridgewood pork store is no more. Yeah. Uh and I like I I thought they owned the building, but they didn't. Uh so Ridgewood Pork store, you could smell it within a two-block radius. You can smell the smoke, uh, the good smoke.
You know what I mean? And uh it was just a fantastic place, like all oak on the inside. Remember when we went there, yeah, it was great. Yeah, all like, you know, like meat hanging up on like old rails, like oh, beautiful. Um the one thing I used to be able to get there, one of the many things, uh, was whole leaf fermented cabbage.
And when I make stuffed cabbage, I like to use fermented cabbage leaves, not fresh leaves that have been blanched like a chump, right? Because you want to use like fermented cabbage leaves. And so then I was thinking, hey, what if instead of using rice, what if you did a lasagna, so not rice, lasagna and then sauerkraut pressed. So you got all the things to do, like a stuffed cabbage lasagna situation. You think that would be good?
Yeah. As long as it doesn't fall apart when you cut into it. Yeah, you gotta get the moisture management right. You gotta get it so it doesn't soup out on you. But uh, what do you think?
I think it would taste good. Cheese or no cheese? No cheese? It's not, you know, it do you like stuffed cabbage? I like stuffed cabbage.
Hmm. But I don't love it. Stuffed cabbage is not my go-to. I feel like the cabbage to meat ratio would be ugh. Well, but don't you get to choose what that cabbage to meat ratio is?
I guess everything. I think if you want the lasagna effect, it's gonna be like two or three layers at least. No, no, I'm using pasta instead of rice. There is actual pasta. Oh.
So it's pasta. And then what's the lasagna? Tomatoes, ground meat. No. No.
I believe lasagna has cheese and no sauerkraut. Right. So you remove the sauerkraut. I mean, sorry, remove the cheese and add sauerkraut. And like something like a stuffed cabbage, like in the form of lasagna with a pasta base.
I think it would be good. I don't. Why not? Why don't you think of the good? I think there's a reason we haven't seen that.
Yeah, because people in Hungary like have those cabbages and they just make it the way they want to. Because lasagna cabbage is not great. Because no one's done it. Because you go to Italy and they're not like, you know, we have eight tons of sauerkraut. You know what I mean?
Not the chakro capital of the world. I guess you can lasagna anything. I once took Thanksgiving leftovers and made lasagna with like some a layer of stuffing and then a layer of turkey, and I made like a lasagna out of Thanksgiving leftovers. And it was surprisingly great. You know what else is great?
I love that. Yeah. It's like the bajamel is the gravy. Yeah, like chil chiliquilis as lasagna is delicious. Right?
You can you can make a you could basically take the concept of chiliquilis and make it into lasagna. Verticize it. Yeah. And you know what it is? A good.
Yes, that sounds great. With an egg on it? Please. You know what I mean? I think a lot of Mexican cuisine can be lasagna-sized.
I think everything can be lasagna-sized. Although uh to be fair, the chili kill is one, you're not using pasta, you're using the the tortilla, yeah, yeah. Delicious. Yeah. Fantastic, right?
You know, it's like, you know, you're you're halfway to uh like an enchilada pie or something. You know what I mean? It's like what's that Mexican dish that I love. The uh it's almost like nachos, or it's an Indian dish, but it's like nachos and uh it has like potato and the yogurt and the chips and the little discs, the puries? No, uh it's uh well, it's just chuck.
Uh the world of chuck. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a nacho lasagna.
Look, it turns out that when you take a bread stuff and then you like like put things onto said bread stuff. It happens to work. The the rubber bread stuff. Hey, uh, what do you got? I also did something uh original with my master.
All right, let's I actually made massa newky. Now, how was it? It was pretty good. It was just basically two parts, massa by waist, two eggs, whole eggs, a little massa arena to tighten it up, but then we actually dispense it. Uh, you know, sort of wily style, like a uh a Parisian yerky.
Yeah, he he gets that from Jackie Peeps. I think Jackie Peeps was the first person I saw doing that out of a piping bag. You know what Wiley does? Wiley ties dental floss over the uh, that's what we do. Yeah, dental floss.
Yeah, yeah. So for those of you who don't know what we're talking about, you you tie you tie dental floss between the two handles of your pot. So you have a pot of rolling water boiling water, and you tie dental floss over the top of the pot, and then you take your bag, and you're just like but not with like you're not Irish when you're doing it. So it's like, you know what I mean? So you're like, you know what I'm saying?
Move into Montana soon. Gonna be a dental floss tycoon. Wow. Wow. Uh Nastasi, what do you have in this week's blah blah blah?
Um, nothing food related. So nothing food related at all. Come on, you ate something. I mean, uh, Jack and I go out, but I don't think we went anywhere worth mentioning, right, Jack? Did you go anywhere?
I don't without naming the place that you hated, what dish did you have that you despised? Because Jack always despises something. Uh what did I have that I despised? Or you're not sure. Well, you but the last thing I had that sucked.
I mean, like, I feel like you know, you're pretty harsh sometimes in a good way. Not bad. Oh, soggy truffle, soggy truffle fries at the Greek theater. Oh, what a nightmare. Unacceptable.
Unacceptable. What a nightmare. By the way. Truffle oil. Truffle oil, of course.
Two four dithiapentane. Well, give it give it to me again. Give it to me again. Two four dithyopentane. No.
Sounds wretched. Wretched. Uh oh my god. Don't you love when you walk into a place and all you smell is the truffle and you're like, ugh. Makes me sick.
What's the what's the white truffle oil fake? What's that one? Is that also that's that's also this synthetic chemical odorant called two for Dithiapentane to simulate the odor of a truffle when it's actually fake and it smells more like rotten feet than the delicate ephemeral quality of a fresh white truffle. Not sure what you think about truffle oil, Nick, but I'll say this. Someone once calculated that if you add it up all the truffle oil that's produced, it would be like the truffle, uh the truffles had been like, you know, 80 times the number of truffles that have ever been, you know, produced.
Yeah. Yeah, it substitutes the illusion of something for the thing itself. Yeah. Oh, speaking of uh not quite the thing itself. Have any of you guys tried the Australian, uh, the Australian black truffle, the one that it's actually is a black paragord truffle that species, whatever it was just went out of my head, but that species, but grown in Western Australia and it's off season.
Have you guys ever tried them? Is that any good? I have not. What about you, John? I have not.
No. I'm trying to figure out something we can have at the bar where I can just stare at a person and I just keep adding it, and it keeps adding to their bill the way they do for a truffle. Because like we need something in a bar where if someone comes in and they want to be an idiot with their money that you can allow them to be an idiot with their money. And truffles are fantastic for that because, you know, once you have enough truffle on your eggs or pasta, you don't need more your raviolo single, but you you don't need more, but it's not gonna really hurt it to have more. So you can just sit there and just be like, sh, sh, sh, sh.
And then you look at the person, almost always a guy, you look at them, sh, sh, and you and you make them feel like if they stop you, that they're cheap. There's gotta be You you really reach into the deep insecurities of a man when you've let it rain truffle and stare him in the eye, and you see how far you willing to reach into your pocket for this one dish. Yeah, the key, the key is to not freak them out too much. So I think the key is is you look at the truffle when you're shaving it, and then every three slices you look up with a little bit of a side. You looking for the nod?
Keep going, or like you should stop. Don't say when. Yeah. And then they're like, uh, and you're like, shh, shh, hmm. And then they have to keep going more and more because they're trying to impress whoever they're with.
I feel that way about the Parmigiano Reggiano. I've never had the courage to allow as much Parmigiano Reggiano grated onto my plate in a restaurant as I truly want. That's because you feel bad because they're not weighing it before and after and adjusting your bill accordingly. No. Um, but what I really were, you get as much as you want.
I really do require like a separate parm dish to be added as I continue eating. That's the proper way to eat certain foods. Okay, okay, quick question, question, question, question. First of all, I can't help myself when I actually have it on the table. I'll always jab a knife into the parmigiano, break off a chunk, and just eat it.
Well, I like to end the meal. They say, never leave in Italy, never leave a table without a piece of cheese in your mouth. It's the last thing you do before you end a meal is you little piece of cheese and you walk away. I see. I see.
Now, uh, what we went. All right. We just remembered as you guys give it. We went to this Italian place. Nick, you've been there too.
Dan Tana. Oh legendary establishment in LA. Uh, you know, red and white checkered tablecloth. Um is it like a musso sort of thing? Um better.
Yeah, explain it, Stas. Jack has a way better explanation being a Long Islander. Wow. What's my explanation? I don't remember.
I mean, the food's not good, but it's, you know, the best vibe you could ever ask for. Agreed 100%. The bartender just looks at you and says, Go ahead. You know? Like to fight you or I remember when I was there, they were almost disturbed that we were there.
It's kind of like an insider joint. One last thing before I get one last thing before I get to the and now I I I kind of want to go with Nastasia because she likes places that are like that. I'm gonna say something that's gonna piss you off, Nastasia. I think you would enjoy Australia. Wow.
Yeah. I would like, you know, it's just the accent. That's it. Like I I'm sure I would love it. I really think you would like it.
Like, like I only went to Sydney, but I really think you would enjoy Sydney. Yeah. So sorry about that. Yeah, now you know, put it on the list of places to like uncross off where you need to go. You know what I mean?
Like, cause uh, yeah, good place. And I'm not gonna try to convince you guys to like Vegemite because you need to come to that on your own. You know what I mean? It's certainly an acquired taste. We've got a uh Discord question for Nick.
Well, is it one of the questions that I'm about to read him or a different new question? Nope, he forgot to submit. All right, do it. All right, so this is from Andrew Cummings in Oakland, California. I recently visited Italy and stayed with a friend's family, and she recommended olive oil as a gift.
I wanted to get something that they couldn't get there, so ended up getting Sciabica's Mission Olive Oil since they say it's a California native variety. They say they harvest them very ripe and late in the season, which I find interesting. What does he think of that variety of variety of olive? Did I mess up? I think that's the name of the brand, not the olive cultivar.
Okay. But was it do you know the brand? Come on, man. Um it's like talking to my kids. Yeah, I think that that's a California brand.
However, if they're bragging about harvesting later in the season, I find that deeply alarming. All olives start their life green and ripen to a deep purplish black. And typically the best olive oils in the world are these early harvest oils where the olives are 85% lemony green. You get less oil in the fruit, but the oil tends to be more vibrant and dynamic. So uh Nick, you're talking about early harvest olive oils.
I see you brought some olive oils. While you opening the olive oils that you're gonna do, before you talk about them, let me ask you an olive oil related question in from the Patreon. So this is from Worst Salad. Uh I read an oil about I read an article about Oleo Secondo uh Veronelli, uh a method of oil production in Italy codified and evangelized by wine critic Luigi Veronelli. Uh there's a website, but it seems pretty niche.
Uh you can count the quote unquote approved producers on one hand. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts if you have any, and just as a brief thing, in case I didn't know what that what worse sales talking about. So I looked it up. And it's basically uh this person who right before they died, they were old when they did it. They they said that uh they wanted to make their own olive oil.
Uh, that is one, no chemical farming, two, quick pressing of fruit on site, three, depitting the uh uh olives before pressing, and then uh pressing only individual cultivars. Uh and then uh labeling with uh with the the cultivar, the date and where it comes from, and only packaging in glass. So, like uh that the basics according to, I forget where I scraped that, but so that's what we're talking about, Nick. All of that sounds good. The removing of the pit before extraction is a method in Italian known as dinocciolate.
And the theory is that it gets rid of some of the bitterness in the oil, though I think that's overblown, and that's why 905% of world-class producers leave the pit in, and the pit gets removed in the centrifuge that separates the solids from the water from the oil. So I don't think that step is really important to remove the pit before extraction. And you're a pro-centrifuge, correct? Procentrifuge, pro-modern milling, where in the traditional method, which is called first cold pressed, the olives are crushed with granite wheels into an olive paste, and it's stacked on what looks looks like a 100-layer lasagna known as fiscoli, and it's put in a physical hydraulic press. What comes out is about 20% oil and 40% water.
The remaining 40% are the pits, skins and pulp left over on the mats. Wait, so what's the yield? Around it depends on the cultivar and the moment of harvest, but I'd say generally 20% oil, 40% water. And the remaining 40% are the solids. And then the solids what?
Pig feed? The olive pits can be dried and crushed and used as fuel to heat home in the winter because they burn very steady and evenly. The leaves can be used to make olive leaf extract, which is high in olipine and good for the immune system. And the skins and pulp can go into animal feed. No.
Do whatever you want to do. Yeah. Because I'm sure there's a lot of oil left in it, right? Um, there's a small amount of oil left in it that you have to add heat or chemical solvents to extract the remaining amount. Right, right.
But it's a it's not much. Not enough, you're saying? No. It's not an important thing. And like that's what I would do.
They do use industrial. And some producers I know um will have two mills on premise. One for their high quality stuff and another for more industrial oil. And the and they're kept separate. So the oil and the olives from one never goes to the other, and it's a quality control thing.
I see. I see. Uh all right. So by the way, that other by the way, just to be clear, going back to the it's Shabika olive oil, not skiabata. It's Shabika.
Oh man, now you're nuking on John. Shabika olive oil, it's California oil, and they actually um are very famous family that I'm sure does good oil, though. The late harvest thing, it's like that that there's just more issues that can happen to the olive the later you harvest. It's the last crop of the year. You harvest the olives in November, even possibly into December.
So the longer they're on the tree, the more problems can arise. Weather problems, pest problems, and getting it off the tree earlier is just a very good technique. Fustiness? Does it get more fusty? Fustiness happens when the olive after the olives are picked and they sit in piles, and if they sit there too long, they undergo anaerobic fermentation.
And that gives you the defect known as fusty, which is like a cured table olive. Yeah, baby. Anyway, I know you. What's the one that you say there's intentionally fustified that's good? The one from Provence in the south of France, which is called Frute Noir, where they intentionally add the defect of fustiness by temperature controlling very green early harvest fruit for a few days to get this like perfect clean, fusty quality, which is really nice in fish or potatoes or anything where you want to add the black olive topping out flavor without the texture.
You know what oil I had fresh and I didn't enjoy it? Perilla. Perilla oil. I didn't like it. I didn't I didn't hate it.
It had a kind of like a nori taste. It wasn't from me. Cesar. Yes. Cecilia.
It's no olive. No, it's not. Uh all right. So uh why don't you tell us what you uh what you brought? And while you're doing that, uh, you have before on the show thrown shade on some of the old school first press stuff, specifically the Nunez de Prado, stuff that used to be famous back in the eighties and nineties.
Were they ever great, you think? Or is it just but they've been surpassed by modern technology or what? I think uh it's interesting in food. A lot of food doesn't taste like the way food is supposed to taste. You look at bananas, you look at strawberries, you see these things.
They look like bananas, they look like strawberries, and you taste them, and they're kind of nothing. I think like over decades, food is becoming the taste of food is becoming more abstract from the way it's supposed to taste, and we get used to it as the decades roll on, and we think it's normal. But what's interesting about olive oil is we're living in the golden age of high quality fresh olive oil. Olive oils have never in the history of 8,000 years of production been produced at this level consistently globally, and you can order it directly delivered to your door. So it's like an amazing product at the moment.
How would they order this directly to their door? You go to Grovenvine.com. I see. And we have a cooking issues promo thing that is available. All right, nice.
Now, please uh open these and pour these. We'll describe what you're pouring and nine minutes. We have nine minutes and 14 seconds, and then we get ripped off here. So, what we have, because it is September in New York City, I have gone to the Southern Hemisphere in the beginning of June to source fresh olive oil from the Southern Hemisphere, which at the moment is the freshest oil on the planet. We have two oils here from uh Chile.
One is by the producer Alonzo, and another is by the producer Monte Olivo. The Alonzo oil is made with the piqual olive, which is the name of the fruit, always has something to do with something. So Pequal comes from pico, meaning pointed, because the fruit itself has a nice point to it. And the Pequal olive hails from Spain and typically has aroma of green tomato leaf when harvested early. Let me smell.
I love green tomato leaf. So here we go. I love that smell. We used to distill that stuff because I love the smell of it so much. Back when people used to say it was poisonous, which of course, maybe I mean a little poison.
Now we work with different artists. Ooh. Um the labels the label. We work with different artists. My dear friend Susan Minot, the novelist and painter, did the art for this label.
And early harvest pequal oil when the spelled like Minot Town, like spelled like Minot North Dakota. M-I-N-O-T. Yeah. Like Minet. Yeah.
And smells like green tomato yon dress. Yeah. I got it from me. I handed him one. So you always want to put in the palm of your hand, couple with the other hand, and swirl the oil and warm it.
This is why I love you. Now you swirl it, the bottom palm warms the oil, the top palm traps the aromas. And when we taste oil, it is a time to slow down. It is a leisurely activity. Oh God.
And the action is in the glass, and the answers are inside of you. I never I never find that to be the case, Nick. All right, I'm gonna smell it now. So now we just smell. Okay.
Just smell. Early harvest, piqual, when the fruit is 85% lemony green, milled in the modern method where the olives go through a series of vacuums and centrifuges, and the fruit is never exposed to oxygen in the production process, which is a faster, cleaner, and more sanitary method of oil extraction. Because the transformation of fruit to oil is so critical that you can destroy the volatile aromas in the milling process. Every step is a chance to ruin it, isn't it? Every ch every step is an opportunity for greatness and a chance to ruin it.
What do you think, John? I think it smells lovely. You get I get you get you get the I get the green. I guess the most important the most important part of olive oil production. Would this be good on a tomato?
Should I have had this a couple of days ago with my freaking ant rubies? It would have been outstanding on tomato. The God's tomatoes, remember, are Ant Rubies German green and the German stripes, the stripes from uh Stokes Farms. You have to pick them yourself. Don't let somebody else buy your tomatoes.
Don't ever let somebody else buy your tomatoes for you. It's a very personal thing. Yeah. And then we taste it, we sip it, and aerate it in the mouth so the oil hits all parts of the mouth. And noise alert people.
Aerate it, hits all parts of the mouth cavity, then you stop, then you swallow. You may notice a peppery sensation. What causes that in the throat is oleocanthol, which is a natural antioxidant and polyphenol found in the oil, and is considered an attribute of quality. And they talk about one cough, two cough, and three cough oils in terms of intensity. It's because you're a professional.
So that is early harvest Chilean pequal. Olive traditionally hails from Spain, but is grown all over the world. Um I would eat the hell out of that. Because people love it, because it's a great, it's a great olive oil. I would eat the hell out of that.
You know what I would, you know what I would want with that? Bread. Like in other words, like it wouldn't doesn't require anything else. Very simple. Though it would be great on beans and in soups and pastas and lots of different things.
It'd be really good on bread with tomatoes and stracciatella. That would be one thing it would be good with. By the way, that's always what I want with uh good oil PS. You know what I mean? Like, all right, what do we got coming up next?
Next one. Also chile. This is a very cool label. How long is this gonna taste like this? Um because it was harvested early and because it was milled in the modern method, and because it's filtered and we've removed the mac micro and macroscopic olive sediment in it, it's gonna have a longer shelf life, and if kept in a cool dark environment, it's good for about a year.
No. For sure. At this level, I want to tell people something also. Like every sip of it I take is growing in intensity because I I find that with the oils there's a persistence in some of the flavors. So like every sip of it is more intense in a good way than the one prior to it.
It's cumulative. Yeah. Yeah. Um but yeah, unopened in a cool dark environment, that's gonna be good for for a while and still have that green tomato leaf aroma. Because the fruit itself was so healthy in the beginning.
It's the most important important part of olive oil production is everything. All right, explain this one because I have some more questions for you there. So this is from Chile from a different producer. This artist is Marissa Rigante, who's an incredible painter who did the label for this. And this is made with a Coratina olive, which traditionally hails from Puglio, which is the heel of the boot in Italy, but is grown all over the world due to its high antioxidant levels.
And you like that olive, right? Love the Coratina olive. Now, this one is more grassy, bitter, and peppery, and would be excellent on a grilled seasoned steak or a soup or anything where you really want the oil to cut through and brighten up the dish. That's another good use for olive oil. Drizzle it all over your magic pork.
Very good. You gotta go get your magic pork, and then you cook the magic pork. The magic pork has fat injected into it already, but oil is always oil, is always welcome. The Lordly Lipid. Oil, I have to say is the oil, salt, and pepper on a ribeye steak is where you wish to be.
And that sea salt flake at the end, right before you're about to eat it, and and not a drizzle, but a dose. You need to dose your meat and olive. I think we're on the same page here. And you the steak needs to be, and I'm a low-temp guy, but the steak needs to be warm enough that it still has some warmth. That's why like I'm a big believer in sizzle platters.
But you don't want you wanna mound it up on the sizzle platter, because I don't really I know you don't care as much, but I don't want the I don't want the oil to hit, I don't want the oil to get too hot. I want to care. Yeah. That oil should be raw and it should be fresh, vibrant, and dynamic and cut. Oh, that is very grassy.
It's ridiculous. Grassy, bitter, peppery. Typical of Coratina olive. Like hexanal. Go for the hex.
Go for the hex. All right, I'm gonna taste this now because I have questions for you. We're gonna run out of top. While I'm tasting this, actually, why don't you answer this? Jordan, we talked last week because we had Leahy on.
Continuing off from the discussion last episode, a preference for butter or olive oil for dipping bread at restaurants. Does Captain Oily always prefer olive oil over butter? What about low-quality olive oil versus high quality butter? 100% high quality butter over low-quality olive oil, especially in a restaurant. You want it to taste great, and high quality butter.
It is amazing, and low quality olive oil tastes like gasoline. Oh my god, the mouthfeel on this is ridiculous. Why is the mouthfeel so ridiculous on this? Yeah, still alive. And it's the sharpest oil I've ever maybe tasted.
This stuff's crazy. Classic core ticket is crazy. It it it it it it has a higher viscosity than I was expecting. It's crazy. Uh Maddie wants to know.
Are you anti-infused olive oil or are the things you like? If someone wanted to use uh extraversion olive oil for something like a chili oil for pizza, how would you recommend infusing room temp, low temp, how long, etc. Thanks. I would get excellent quality Calabrian chilies and I would have them dry. I would have dried chilies and I would just chop them up and put them in olive oil.
It'd be incredible. Keep it room temp, delicious. Uh generally you would never take a world-class oil and infuse it. You typically, when you buy oils that are infused, they're not made with the best olives. But infused oils are wonderful.
It's like a gateway drug. Yeah. Uh Phil Stan wants to know how to add Xanthan to uh his uh frozen margaritas. Choose one of the liquids that isn't the uh booze, like add the xanthan to the pineapple puree. All right, but you don't need to add that much.
Like uh I I I uh only use one gram for like 1400 like uh mils of uh of frozen stuff. You need only a little bit. The problem is when people pre hydrate their Xanthan in their mixes, uh they add too much and it hydrates all the way and it gets snotty. Uh I'm gonna talk to Nick about fried food next time because I want to make sure we get all the grease and talk about this olive oil a little bit more. We have 16 seconds for you to talk.
And Alexander, I'm gonna figure out a use for your vanilla beans. Don't make vanilla extract. I'm gonna figure it out, but like talk about this oil on the way out and where they can get it one more time, Nick. You can get this oil or the last oil at Groveandvine.com. And if you're a member, there's a little bit of a cooking issues promo.
This is nuts, super fresh. It's nuts. How long is this one gonna stay this fresh? This fresh. A year.
Oh come on. They're really good quality oils, and they have a nice shelf life because they're filtered. All right. Thanks for coming on, cooking issues. Chin ching.
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