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Hello and welcome to Cooking Issues. This is Dave Arnold, your host of Cooking Issues, coming to you live from the Heart of Manhattan Rockefeller Center, New York City, New Stance Studios. Joined as usual with John, how are you doing? Doing great, thanks. Yeah, I haven't had you in a while or two.
You've been busy with your opening. Oh my god. No, not even that, dude. It's just where we're at. There's just been staffing shortages like crazy.
It's been people calling out every day, dishwashers, welcome to the world. I mean, I mean, come on, you were in the world before, but you were out of it for like a month and a half, but then like once you're settled and you start something new, starting something new, it's like getting married. It's the worst. It's a lot. Yeah.
It's like, you know what? I'm not into it. Not so into you. No. You know what I mean?
But at least it's a summer in the slow season. So yeah. Hey, for those of you that don't hang out in New York, I know that like a lot of you come from hot climates, but there's something unpleasant about a New York City summer that I can't quite put my finger on. Because there are other hotter places, but there's just something about it. The grind plus the heat in the humanity.
It's not even that hot today. Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah. Yeah. Humid and gross.
Yeah. Yeah, it's gross. Just not, you know. Whatever. Whatever.
We have our good points. Uh got Joe Hazen rocking the panels behind me. How you doing? Hey, hey, hey, hey. Nastasia's gallivanting around the world, so we don't have uh the hammer with us today.
But in the upper left, we do have Quinn. How you doing? I'm doing good. Yeah, great. Right.
Uh, and uh holding down Los Angeles, we got uh Jack Inslee, Jackie Molecules. What's up? Yo, good to be back. Yeah, and today's special guest in the kitchen from all the way downtown at the Bangkok Supper Club, Max Whitawat. How are you doing?
Hi, I'm good. Good, good, good. First time on the show. First time. Nice.
Uh and if you guys have questions, you're calling in. I mean, sorry, if you have questions you're listening on Patreon, you want to call in live with questions, uh, to 917-410-1507. That's 917-410-1507. And John why you tell them why they might want to be on the Patreon if they are not. Well, you go to Patreon.com slash cooking issues to check it out.
Um, there are a couple different membership levels there. Every membership level gets you access to our Discord where you're surrounded, you know, gotta get to talk with everyone else who is there, which is like-minded listeners like you. You get uh to listen to the episodes before everyone else. You get to your pri your questions prioritized. Um discounts with people we work with.
I mean, just a whole bunch of great things. So check it out. Patreon.com slash cooking issues. Is there such a thing as a like-minded cooking issues listener? Or are we an inherently contrarian group of folk?
No, I think it's just a bunch of nerds who like talking about uh foodish issues. Yeah, they're there's quite a bit of agreement on something. Yeah. Yeah. All right.
Okay. Like what? Like what? The current topic in the Discord seems to be that bread prices are getting pretty steep. Oh my god, what's that?
And everyone's agreeing on that. What is this? 17th century Paris? Bread. You know what I mean?
Like, what the heck? Just for stealing a crust full of bread. Like, what is this? That's actually 19th century, but you know what I mean? It's like, uh, what the hell?
There's agreement. Hey, listen, let me ask all of you a question who think bread costs too much. First of all, go to the supermarket and buy trash can bread. It's basically free. Second of all, if you personally, you who are complaining, were going to get up at zero in the morning, actually the day before, and again at zero in the morning, right?
You were gonna buy high quality flour being milled by someone who gives a crap, right? Then you were going to make a loaf you cared about by you know, by hand, and then sell it to someone, ask what you would have to charge. I don't think they're complaining about the baker's charging that. I think it's just like the whole system, how everything's getting so expensive right now. Yeah, it sucks.
Yeah. Here's the thing, right? Uh for those who listen from America, we've been living high off the hog for a long time. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, I wish we could still do it. Yeah. But I know. Nope.
No. Sucks. Yeah. Yeah. Um.
Is anyone disagree with the fact that we've lived so well for so long because other people have lived less well? Is that like a up for debate? And maybe it is. Maybe I just have this as a worldview and it's wrong, or like it or at least debatable. You and I are aligned on that, but yeah, I don't know.
I'm sure other people maybe it's debatable. Who knows? Yeah. We don't need to get into this now, though. Yeah, I'm not saying it's yeah.
I'm not saying one one way about it or the other. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm just kind of commenting. Just comment. I don't have any feelings on it, one way or the other.
Uh all right. So what do you guys got in the last week for cooking? I'll start with one non-cooking thing. My old man glasses are in. I gotta go pick them up right after the show.
No, that's exciting. Yeah, dude. I'm gonna have my Oh boy. Do they do they look like old man glasses? Oh yeah.
Like a cross between like a cross between like a pit boss, like an LA talon agent, and like a tiny old man from the lower east side. Must be nice. Are you gonna look like Junior Soprano? Uh maybe. Yeah.
I can't remember exactly what his glasses look like. But if I look like uh Uncle Jew, I'll be super stoked. You know what I mean? I get my old man glasses. I'm just so like I'll tell you what, man.
Uh it's kind of liberating when you can lean into the old man. You know what I mean? You can't you're not trying to fight it. Going for it. Anyway, so I'm excited about that.
Uh and the other thing is um I got into hard tack. You guys familiar with hard tack? How did you get into that? AKA ship's biscuit. Yeah, what?
Why? Ship's biscuit. Well, explain what it is for us, because I don't think Max knows what it is. Okay. So uh most European navies, uh, the way that they and also soldiers, like the way that they would provision you is they because you couldn't eat flour right away.
Flour required cooking, um, you know. Is they would make uh what was called ship's biscuit or hard tack, which was no salt, just wheat flour and just enough water to make a dough. They would then mold it, and we're talking like 40, 50% hydration or lower. You would then mold it into into flat bricks and then look like a cracker. But instead of like being a normal cracker, it's like 12 millimeters to 14 millimeters, about half an inch thick, punctured with holes so that they wouldn't puff up, and then baked until they were stone dry.
And then you would like you could store them almost indefinitely, as long as you kept them sealed and bugs didn't get at them. And that's what they would send on ships' journeys. Now, sailors and soldiers require a huge amount of calories. So you would get a pound of biscuit a day. And everyone's like, oh, this must have been terrible.
They're delicious. They're delicious. But you have to use the right kind of wheat. If you want to make a hard tack, you gotta go get a soft wheat, right? Hard wheats are terrible.
Because I did a side-by-side test last week of hard tack made with uh I only had soft white, I didn't have soft red. I want to get some more soft red and do soft red. But so what you do is you you mill it fairly, you don't try to bear down on your mill, you mill it fairly coarsely so that you get some of the long bran out. So you want to when you go through a 50 mesh sieve, you want to get about 87, 85, 87 percent back out of it. You take the resulting flour there, and you just mix it with as little water as possible.
Just like they in the 18th century, I used a vacuum bag to get the hydration. No, I'm kidding. That's but it is what I did. I put it in a vacuum bag to do the same way a lot of people do with pasta doughs to speed up hydration on and reduce rest time on pasta doughs. And then you just make it flat, punch it, and then you know, bake it at like 420 for like 25 minutes, uh dropping oven down to 375, and then dry it out in a 220 oven for hours and hours until it's totally dry.
Delicious. Even without salt, it's the purest expression of the flavor of wheat that you can get. Uh so I'm for it. Well. Even if you had to eat it like every day for years.
I don't though. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. You know what I mean? Like I think, you know, everyone like talking about I'm surprised you didn't add salt.
That's not what they would have done. Gotta have it. Gotta have it to lay. Yeah, well, I mean, as a bread, this is just I mean, like, again, this is not my daily bread. And also, it's not leavened and it doesn't have a crust.
So, like, salt isn't just make tusk lack of salt doesn't just make Tuscan bread taste bad. It also makes the crust terrible and the texture bad. So it's like matzah. What? Tuscan bread?
No, the uh this um well if if if masa was made with a more whole wheat flour and and if masa was half an inch thick. Were you given an orange to uh keep the scurvy away? Oh man. Uh you know, they didn't know for a long time what caused scurvy, and they had a lot of bad ideas. One, I forget which naval officer, British naval officer, thought that uh that frying hard tack in in what's called ready for this one?
Beef slush. So you had barrels full of salted beef and pork, and you were given huge rashmine allotments of these a day. Because like I said, you required a lot of calories to be on one of those boats. And so they would scrape the goop out of the bottom, the beef slush, which was like salty beef fat and goop, and fry their hard tack in that because you need something to soften it. You know what I mean?
It's real hard. Um a bunch of people thought that the it was the slush that gave you scurvy. It ain't, but yeah. Anyway. Oh, oh limeys.
More you know, yeah. The more you know, the less you know, right? Yep. But hard attack, uh I'm gonna recommend it as something to try. I'm not saying live on it.
Not saying eat a pound of it a day. Got it. Well, maybe you should make some type of cocktail and then you can serve the uh the whale sperm. Dude, as a totally illegal. Like the the Jew for the like look, notwithstanding Jackie Molecule's love of eating whale in Japan.
Whoa. Yeah. I'll eat it anywhere. Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, you know, he goes to secret whale clubs in uh in New York and like in LA, pounding whale, you know, secretly under napkins.
Notwithstanding that, uh, all whale products are illegal here in uh in the United States of America. Um, including, by the way, I th I'm not even sure if you're allowed to have um or traffic in amber griffs, even if it's old, right? Are you? Anyone? Anyone a CT's expert?
Anyway. No. Uh that went far afield. All right, what else you guys got. Uh I've been traveling a lot, but I do just want to give a shout out to Garrett at uh Sunken Harbor Club.
I came in through New York for a quick minute and um Yeah. I wish I could tell you about all the great technique things you told me about, but here's the thing about three tiki drinks. You know. Yeah. Yeah.
Did you have a good time at Bar Contra? Just kidding. You didn't go. You must have had a mind eraser, right? No, I didn't go.
Didn't go. Didn't go. I mean, no, I I was I was I was in Brooklyn, like really close. Yeah, sure. Uh so I I don't know if you know this, but uh sunken for those of you that don't know the geography of New York, it is true there is a river between Sunken Harbor Club and the Lower East Side, but it's the fastest of all of the cross river commutes.
It's literally one or two stops on like a subway that comes every five minutes. But whatever. It's not like Sunken Harbor Club is right next to the subway, except for that it is. Or that Contra is right next to the subway, except for that it is. It's fine.
I'm just giving you crap. Uh you don't have to come. I deserve it. I deserve it. It's fine.
It's fine. I I'm actually, I'm not I just am doing it just to give you crap. I really am fine with it. Uh yeah. Sunken Harbor Club Club is a great place.
I enjoy it. Yeah, delicious drinks. It's the only place I've ever seen you chug cocktails. He had look, his Pim's cup was ridiculous. Yeah.
You know, yeah. In a Pim's cup is a Pim's cup, like a gin and tonic, is a fantastic idea, but often disappointing. And by often, I mean almost always. Yeah. Yeah.
And Pim's, the liquor itself, vastly overpriced. Vastly overpriced. Max, have you been to Sunken Harbor? No, I never heard of it. Oh, you gotta go.
It's above Gage and Tolner. But you have to go to Brooklyn. And it's a beautiful bar, too. The interior design is amazing. I just said have to go to Brooklyn.
He's like, no, no. I love Brooklyn. Yeah. All right. Okay.
What is what does it call again? Sunken Harbor Club. Sunken Harbor Cup. Which is an interesting name because it's uh it's on the second floor. So it's kind of the opposite of sunken.
But whatever. All right. Uh what about you, Quinn? I know you got something. No, you got something for me.
Yeah, we've made uh nice forca. I made my standard uh raspberry cervey formula with a little bit of uh essential oil. Yeah. Okay, why essential oils? And now, of course, you have Raspberry Beret going through my head again.
You know you're gonna do this to me. You did it on purpose. I guess I did. Yes, yes, Dave. All right.
The fruit available in season here was just to get some in your hand. Well, by the way, if if it's fruit in season, what are the essential oils for? Oh they're gonna excellent flavor. Okay. Which is I did a little ginger and a little bit of bergamot.
Bergamot. Do you really think that bergamot essential oil tastes like bergamot the peel? I've never used bergamot essential oil. I've never worked with fresh peel before. Oh yeah.
Bergamot? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Expensive. Good.
Yeah. Very like uh peppery, like bergamot. It's nice. It doesn't a fresh bergamot doesn't even smell like earl gray tea, really. It smells like bergamot.
And there are other citrus that have that when you scratch the peel and you sniff it, it's good. It's expensive. Uh I think I was told to say this before on the air. One of my bartenders once hired a forager and said he would buy some bergamot. So the forager showed up at the bar with a backpack full of bergamot and said, You owe me $400.
And we paid him, and then we had to immediately use all the bergamot in a way that preserved it. So we juiced it, we did an oleo, we did a cordial, we did froze everything down. We're not one ounce was wasted. When something's that expensive, it can't be wasted. You know what I mean?
Yeah. Spe speaking of this, Max, what citrus is very expensive here that is not expensive in Thailand, and so you have to completely change your mentality of how you use it when you come here. Right. The Makut Lam leaf. Yeah.
Makut Lam. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. But you're so expensive.
How much are the I've never bought it fresh? Have I? No. I got it from the Thai farmer. It's a community in Facebook.
So there's Thai farmer all over the country here. And they grow uh they grow uh cafea lime in California. Yeah. So I have to order like what is it, like a dollar fifty per? No, it's uh the by power.
And what my price, what I got is pretty good. It's around fifteen per pound. Fifteen dollars a pound. And then how many, like so that's how many how many lives? I would say like ten.
So how much would that cost in Thailand? Oh my god. Like the whole basket can cost you like five dollar. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember uh I've never been to Thailand because uh I think uh because I'm stupid.
But the uh it's on it's on the list though, obviously. But uh so I've never I've been to other places over there, but like in terms of fruits, whenever I go someplace that has fruit, real fruit, you know, like I mean we have real fruit, but it's only like a couple of them. Like we do apples really well. You know what I mean? But like uh I remember I was with uh Andy Ricker in Thailand in um Panama and uh we just got like a sack of mangustines.
Oh, so good. Dude, when I say a sack, I mean a sack the size of a small child. It was this big. Not even a small child, like a four-year-old. Like a sack of magazines the size of a four-year old for like 10 bucks.
And we just sat on the roof of a building and ate them. You know what I mean? That's what life should be. Oops, I just broke your pen, Joe. Uh that's what life should be.
It shouldn't be like paying a million dollars for fruit. Fruit. I mean, that's what if you believe in this sort of thing, like fruit was given to us to enjoy. But anyway. Well, what about the cantaloupe in Thailand?
Is it good? Cantaloupe in Thailand's good. Candaloo? Yeah, I believe candle or musk fruit. Oh, um you have good melon?
Not really. No, I don't know. Where am I known for that? Oh, I'm sorry, my mistake. I wish I loved melon.
I'm gonna do an event in LA in like late July, early August with Han, who's been on the show, uh, who is a bartender and I believe flute composer. Yep. Yeah. Uh and she wants to do uh a Ford's gin and melon drink. Yeah.
And I said to her, sure, I don't like melon. But let's do it as a good challenge. Max, do you like cooking with things that you don't like as a way as a challenge to try to make something you like? Sometimes I find it hard. I'll give you an example.
My wife likes milk in her coffee, and I don't like milk in my coffee. So I find it hard to make her the best milk and coffee preparation because I can't judge it because I hate it. You know what I mean? Yeah. I think I have to like that ingredients, like the food, and then if I want to sell that to guests, I want to make sure every dish is to my liking.
Yeah. So, like uh for me at the bar, it's a little bit different, especially because I I'm letting like like other people's stuff is on the menu too. And so I have to be like, well, I I don't have to like everything. I have to think everything is good. I have to think everything is very good.
You know what I mean? Proper, balanced, delicious for people who like it. But I don't necessarily need to like everything. Yeah. But I don't know.
Like, I like to find out we haven't asked this in a while, but I do like to ask. What is something that you don't like? Every chef has stuff that they don't like that is like not like that other people like. I don't like fennel. That is crazy.
I know you're not asking me, but fennel seed or fennel the fennel? All of it. You don't like fennel seed. Any of that any flavor. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, okay.
I hate like rich, yeah. Italian sausage. Like I'll stomach it, but I won't eat it. Stomach Italian sausage? Well, thank you.
I just prefer it didn't have fennel seed on it. Yeah. Oh my god. Well, you know who is uh who's on last week? Someone who loves fennel seed was on last week.
Uh Greg Baxter. Yeah, Greg Baxtrom loves fennel seed. Yeah. That's his that was that's his go-to that uh in Baxtrom spice that he has uh that he loves fennel seed. Ooh, sure.
I mean listen, I don't like it, but I still have used it in my cooking and on dishes that I've put out, you know, like I understand when it should be used. Did you pull out your monocle when the time came and do the fennel pollen? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Fennel pollen.
Fennel pollen's good, it's just you know, it's fancy. Uh so what do you not like next? Uh Julian. Really? But a lot of people here don't like it.
Maybe in Thailand it it's weird not to like it. I don't know. Is it weird not to like it in Thailand? I think it's 50 50. 50 50?
Yeah. So you're glad it when uh when people are like you're not allowed to bring that inside or no. Um I don't like it, but I don't hate it. I'm okay too. Like people eating it next to me.
Okay, so let me ask you this. So, as you're aware, when durian comes over here, it has to be frozen, and so it doesn't smell the same. Do you prefer American durian? Or well, if you don't like any of it, it doesn't matter. But for me, for instance, cantaloupe, the better it tastes to people who like cantaloupe, the more I dislike it.
So would you prefer a what an actual person would say is not good durian, i.e. the American one that's been frozen, or do you prefer the real one? The real one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And to be honest, I haven't tried durian here in in your essay.
Yeah, yeah. It's not as uh I mean I've never tried it over there, but from all of the accounts I can get, yeah, the stuff here isn't as pungent, I think, because I'm pretty sure they have to freeze it. Like I know, like the reason why most mangoes aren't very good over here in New York is that they have to go through a hot water treatment to kill fruit flies before they're brought in. And that kind of arrests their uh further progression, and and so you know they're they're picked a little bit harder for shipment, and then they have to go through this hot water treatment, and so that's why they're not as good. Um papaya is terrible here.
I noticed you did a video where you're like, don't even bother trying to get a good green papaya, forget it. And you made a salad with cucumber. Yeah, right, right. Yeah. Is that a decent stand?
I mean, it's not the same, or is that your is like you'd rather have cucumber as a stand in than have like then a fake green papaya? That salad we have a lot of variety of that salad. Oh, and we do have cucumber sometam too. Yeah. So it's not something new.
Okay, okay. Yeah. So uh I I saw the video. You should get you should uh look up the video on your Instagram, and it's using also a clay mortar and pestle. Right.
Right, right. And you say that this one is not for fine grinding like the stone one, it's for just like light like a crushed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I noticed when you were doing the cucumber that you held the cucumber up. John, you should check this out.
Held the cucumber up. I sometimes do things like this and peep freaks people out. I don't do it for this because I don't know the technique, but you take the cucumber and you go, so I'm h imagine I'm holding the cucumber the long way so that the it's like I'm holding it up like it's a baby. And then I take my knife and I go bap directly into the baby's forehead and chest. And I rotate it and it makes like a like a cut, right?
Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then crossway. Uh huh. Then into the thing.
I've never seen this before. Is that traditional or is that a you think? Is that traditional? To make it what, soak up on the side? Right, like crutch.
Uh like in Chinese cuisine, you have some crushed um cucumber, right? Yeah, yeah. Same same similar concept. So you chop, chop, chop, and then you uh slice it and crush it in the mortar again. So it absorbed more dressing.
Yeah, I'll try it. Because I normally like I buy when I'm doing things like this, I buy the small ones, and then I just do the you can't see me because you're only listening. But what I'm doing is having the cute small cucumber on my cutting board and I'm rotating it 45 degrees as I cut, and then it's mac smacks, max, smack. But I'm gonna try the rack attack tack with the with the but people freak out when they walk into your kitchen and you see things that are like clearly go against mentally what people think of as like okay knife ideas. But if you're used to specific motion, you're not gonna overgo.
The danger with knives is when you put yourself in force positions. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. Anyway.
So you've never cut yourself doing that, right? No. You know what's I find dangerous for me, because I'm bad, is the Japanese, like uh uh the Japanese like peel cutting for Daikon where you just rotate the vegetable in your hand, and like I can do it, but the problem is, you know what I'm talking about? Yeah, yeah. The problem I have with it is is that like uh I never like pre-soak the vegetable, I never get the texture of the vegetable exactly right.
And so at a certain point, I know the knife's gonna stick. And then when it sticks, I'm like, do I give up? Or do I put that little bit of pressure on it? And I always put that little bit of pressure on it, and I know that I'm just one or two times away from quack into my yeah. What's the worst cut you ever gotten in the kitchen?
Uh from galango. Oh, wow. Because kalango is very it's so tough, right? Right, right. And then I try to like cut it, and I like use all my power to cut it.
And yeah, just the top of my nails. Yeah. But yeah, that's the worst one. Yeah, yeah. The worst for me was, and don't ever do this, it's so stupid.
I was on my cell phone, uh, you know, old school cell phone, so I had it up to my ear like this, and I was using a meat slicer, and I was like, I was like talking to someone, focusing on a third thing and using a meat slicer, and I put my thumb right into the meat slicer. Oh no. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Not good.
How about Michael Um mandolin? Have you ever gotten that? Every one, right? Yeah, no, I never have because they don't, they freak me out. So I always just throw away the last little bit because I don't I never use them at the school or anything like that.
So like you've done a you've done bad mandolins. Um on what potato? I can't remember what I was using last was something stupid. Like it it yeah, I don't know, but like there was a flap on the tip of the thumb and it's just terrible. Yeah, I had to go to the yard.
Not fennel. Not fennel. That's right, Joe. Even thinly sliced, you don't like it, huh? Joe Joe's bringing up a good point.
Yeah, no. Even thinly slice. Is it that you hate things that are crunchy or you hate things that are refreshing? I hate things that are an easy liquorish. Yeah.
It's not shaming me. Hey, you don't know him well enough to shame him. That's what the thing is. Um yeah. Oh god, cutting yourself is a oh, speaking of mandolins though.
Does anyone make okay? So I had this argument. I have not got do you are you do you like French fries, Max? Uh I'm okay. Okay.
So, first of all, my son said something preposterous. He said the best French fries he has ever had were from Amsterdam. And I told him to get back to Connecticut and never speak to me of it again. Because obviously he's been to Belgium, weasel. You know what I mean?
Yeah. Anyway, so whatever. I was like, you were too young when you went to Belgium, that's the problem. Point being this. Both he and my wife were like, the best French fries are crinkle cut.
I'm like, what are you? Cracked? And they're like, no, crinkle cut's the best. And I realized, well, except for is do we not do we think that only because the only crinkle cut fries we've had are mass-produced crinkle cut fries? Like, the problem is it's so hard to make a large amount of crinkle cut fries for a food service because there's no machine that you can just go sh black, black, black, black.
Someone needs to make a a fast crinkle cut. Here's what I'm thinking, cooking issues, people. Someone has time because I was explicitly told by my wife I would not spend time building this. Imagine a V8 engine where you have a potato where the crankshaft would be, and you just have two sets of knives. You just go boom, boom.
And then the potato flies out. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And you can just dump dunk dunk dumm dunk dum dum dum. Crinkle cut fries. What do you think?
Yeah, sure. I mean, maybe I don't know. Like it has I need to see proof of concept that a crinkle cut fry is actually good first. Well, let me ask you this. For bagged frozen fries, would you rather have crinkle or would you rather have straight?
Straight. I would never choose crinkle. What about what about you? Quinn, what about uh Jack? What do you guys think?
Max is only so so on fries, so he doesn't necessarily have to get it. What I don't buy frozen fries. Oh, Jesus. All right. Well, you're right.
I like crinkle cut. I like crinkle cut. Yeah. All right. All right, there you go.
The question is, is it if you only if it's impossible to make large quantities of crinkle cut at home, so the only thing reference you have is bagged one versus bagged the other. That's the thing, right? And I've just never given, I've always thought that crinkle cut fries were kind of like for clowns. You know what I mean? But you know, maybe maybe I'm wrong.
That's the clown's choice. But I was like, I'm probably wrong. Yeah. What do you say? I'm a clown.
Yeah, I'm a clown. All right. Uh let's talk about Thai food. All right, Thai food. Thai food.
All right. Uh okay, first of all, I was looking at your Instagram, and I don't think I've ever seen this before. This is not a Thai food question. It's just a, I can't believe I've never seen this before because it seems like such genius. Your uh, your strawberry rhubarb with uh the ice cream and the Thai basil, like uh is that an oil or a s or a sauce?
Oil. Oil, yeah. Looks good. But have you seen this picture, John? No.
Okay. You ready? Ready. I don't think so. Are you ready?
Not anymore. I don't know, yeah. Okay. So there's a it there's like a a flat, like like like a like a tart cakey tart thing with with strawberry, right? Then on it is the scoop of ice cream.
It what what's the flavor of the ice cream? Um creme fresh. You're not then imagine you put a thing in it like it's a scoop of mashed potato, and then you put the the oil, the green, the Thai oil into it like it's gravy in a mashed potato. Love that. I have and all the 55 years I've been pounding this rock, right?
I have never seen someone, I've been to Germany, I've had I've had ice cream in the shape of hamburgers, I've even had ice cream in the shape of French fries, I've had ice cream in the shape of spaghetti. But the concept of using ice cream as a mashed potato visual analog, genius. Now, is this something that other people have done, or is this just you guys? I think I have seen it before. I've never seen it.
Have you seen it, John? No, I haven't. I think, I don't know, maybe you should trademark this. This could be if if no one else has done this, this could be your cronut. Have any of you fools over there seen this?
Or no? Ever? Anyone else do this? Get nothing from this. Well, you're the ice cream man, Quinn.
Have you have you seen someone treat ice cream like mashed potatoes visually? Like use the back of the spoon to like make a well and then put the oil in the middle. Yeah, that's so old school for like that's like that's like so like America, like growing up, like just a scoop of mashed potatoes, take the spoon, go, and then put the put the gravy in the well. So classic. You know what I mean?
Yeah. So when I saw the dessert, I was like, I'm a jerk. This is something that should be obvious. But you say you've seen it before, but I don't think I've seen it. And maybe I'm just not paying attention.
But I think I would have noticed. Is it a good dessert? I'm sure it's a good dessert. Yeah, it is. Yeah, I'm sure it is.
Uh also, do you guys have because I've seen it? What? Don't you think we should introduce who this gentleman is? We did at the beginning of the show. No, you did not.
We did. I said we have special guest, Max Widawat from the Bangkok Supper Club. Yeah. But do it again. All right, Max.
No, let's flush it all out a little more. All right, all right, right. Okay, okay, okay, okay. So you're originally from Bangkok. You cooked in Bangkok a lot.
You worked with uh Ian Kiddechai here in the US, right? Not in Bangkok or in Bangkok. In Bangkok, okay, okay. And uh I've only met him once or twice. Seems like a nice guy though.
Yeah, he is very nice. And then the first restaurant you opened here was Bangkok Supper Club in what 2023? 2023. And it's like uh it's like like I don't know, it's very cool, like refined. I haven't been yet, but like I've looked at very like refined, high-end, tweaked out, but like a lot of takes on what would be uh considered street food concepts, right?
Behind am I correct so far? Yeah, and you just released actually, which I recently this idea of a tasting menu at your in the in the kitchen. Uh how's that going? Is that fun or not fun for you? In the beginning, I was um scared because I I don't think people are gonna like sitting in the kitchen with the five feet um fire uh chakal is so hot in the kitchen and it's so loud, the dishwasher is banking the pond pans and pots.
But yeah, because and the in the first year we treat that seat as a a la carte, and sometimes when people got seated there, they ask, oh, can we sit in the dining room? Like it's on their first date. They want something more intimate. It's not a good first date, maybe concept. Yeah, yeah.
But after that, when we do uh the testing menu, people really like it. Every time when they walked in when when they see it, I always hear, oh, this is so cool. This is the word that I hear almost every night. And how many seats do you have there? Is it four or six or something small?
Four, four. Four, we uh do three rounds per night. Oh, so okay, so you get like three turns. Okay, so then and do you mostly sell it as two twos or mostly as a full four? Two two, yeah, yeah.
But now even the guests in the dining room, if they want to do the testing menu, we we okay with that too. Now the way the website says it's almost like greatest hits from the restaurant, the tasting menu. Exactly. So it's all the most celebrated uh dishes. Yeah.
So we make everything smaller size. You can get to try almost everything in the menu now in one shot. I'm not saying that you dislike any of your guests, but is it a problem if you have a guest that you don't like who's in the kitchen with you? No. No?
I mean, I'm just it's a mean thing for me to ask. What do you guys say? Yes, one. One time? One time.
They're bringing their uh laptop and work during the testing menu. Uh oh my god. And then have to say, oh, this will taste better if you eat it right away when the temperature is right, when this gonna get sulky. So yeah, yep. Would you like to try it first?
Tap tapping on the on like on the keyboard. Oh my god. Yeah. Oh my god. I hope they were making their billions of dollars or whatever they were doing.
Very important. Yeah, yeah. Why go to a restaurant like that? I know, right? Why?
Uh well, thank God it's only happened one time. Yeah. Only one time. Yeah. All right.
Uh and it's actually not that bad a deal, this tasting menu. Right. It's a good deal. It's $150. 14 course.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You're sitting in the kitchen. I guess the issue is, right?
You make it reasonable so like people who want to enjoy it can do it, but at the same time, they have to line up because there's only 12 slots a night. Right. Right. So it's like in the one way accessible, but in the other way not. I mean, it's accessible in the sense that you're not overcharging, you're you're giving people good value, but it's hard to get.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um so uh Joe, did I gotta run out of? So let's go over some of these things. Give me oh uh actually, let me do the question.
I have a uh listener question from the Patreon, and if I don't get to it, they will murder me. And rightly so, by the way. Um from Elliot, what would you say is important for the optimal Masaman curry? In particular, are fresh macroot limes important? And if so, where do you get yours?
We talked about that a little bit, uh, if you don't mind sharing. I can find leaves, but not the fruit itself so far. Would you rather have frozen cilantro root or fresh cilantro stems? Uh do you end up with uh big bits of chili skins in your final paste? If not, do you do anything in particular to avoid that?
Uh do you chop rehydrated chilies finely first before pounding, for example? Okay. The first question, uh the macro lime, kaffia lam. Yeah, we've mentioned about that already. I got it from the Thai farmer from California.
And we have to order once a year. We peel the skin, put in the ziploc bag, and then freeze it and use throughout the year. We always buy like 50 pound. Wow. Yeah, that's a lot.
Like the whole restaurant smell like in Thailand, that smells smell like Thai toilet. You know why? Oh, you haven't been to Thailand. No, no, no. Have you experienced that?
I'm sorry, explain. So in Thailand we have so much uh makroot lamb, right? And in the bath, in the urinous. They cut the makrout in half and then put it in the urinal. Just to smell the nice fragrance whole.
Yeah. Huh. But people still like it in food, unlike lavender here. Right, right. Right.
Wait. Okay. But before you finish the question, uh you wanna tell people about Masaman curry in case they don't never had it just explained roughly Masaman curry like red potato. Explain what it is. Oh yeah, so Massaman curry it's uh more like uh like central Thai cuisine and it's very very spice forward like katamam, cinnamon, and these that you don't like.
Clove. Yeah, so it's more like a spice forward curry. And it's not too spicy. It's sweet, sour from tamarin and sometimes macro too. Yeah.
Yeah. All right, so okay, so that's your source of the uh macroot limes. If you wanna uh find it on Facebook, it's called Thai Farmer. Thai farmer market. Yeah.
And do they do will they sell to people or only wholesale? Oh yeah, two people, two households too. Okay, yeah. Good to know. But it's a private group, so I don't know.
Oh, so you have to they have to want you. Um I think they just except like Jimmy Jimmy Joe jerk can't go there and get it. They have to like you enough to want to send it to you. Maybe. Yeah, okay.
Elliot, not that you're Jimmy Joe jerk, but I'm just saying. Uh okay, cilantro root versus stems. Oh wow, this is very good question. Uh but I want to tell everyone about the cilantro root first. Yeah, yeah.
Okay, every every chef, every restaurant, does anyone if anyone wants some cilantro leaf, let me know. Because we throw away cilantro leaf almost every other day. Really? Because we use a lot of root, and we use a lot, like because root in Thailand is like four inches, but root here is like quarter inch. Huh.
So same taste though? No, like way different. But still, we have to use so much the that tiny root uh to make our curry um dressing, marinate, sauce. We use a lot of cilantro root. So even we try to use the leaf, how much as how much we want, but still at the end of the day, it's go bad.
Huh. Yeah, so let me know. If you want to trade, oh please, yeah, trade. Let's trade. Yeah.
Just give me the tiny like bottom part that you throw away. I will uh bother with the cares of cilantro leaf. Is it they so I see a business here where someone just buys the thing and then splits it and sends one to the restaurant that doesn't use the bottoms and one to the you know, I had a similar problem once because um I was using celery leaves, like uh European celery leaves, not uh not like what we call Chinese celery, and uh and not lovage, celery leaves. And when I was a kid, you could get them. You know what I mean?
Like they would sell celery and the leaf would be on top. But no one sells it like this way anymore. Yeah. So in order to get it, I had to buy I had to buy uh a like a bunch of flats, like this, like I'm now it's like four feet, like four foot high stack of flats because the farmer who is literally throwing them away, yeah, wouldn't sell me just like a flat at a time. You know?
I tried to ask the vendor to that, can they serve it for me? I would pay like the same price as the yeah, the the whole thing. Yeah, they didn't because they don't they don't want to bother people. It's so strange, right? Right.
And so like I thought I was like, oh, I'm a genius. I'm taking stuff that people are throwing away and I'm gonna use it. And instead, it's like people don't want to go outside of their distribution concepts. Right, you know? Yeah.
And to answer this that question, I prefer the frozen root. Frozen root. Yes. To frozen root to fresh stem. Or frozen root to fresh root.
Frozen root? Oh, the question is frozen root and fresh stem fresh. The question was can they substitute the stems for the root? Oh, the yeah, yeah, we do that too. Because we cannot use the whole yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
We we use the stem as well, but it's not as good. I would say like 50%. And the color, sometimes we don't want green color in that sauce or the curry, but the stem has color. When we blend them together, when we power them together, there's some like a little bit green uh color in that sauce. You like the frozen one though?
Yeah, I prefer the frozen root. Because we're gonna blend it, we're gonna match it anyway. So I don't mind the the frozen. If we get the actual like white root, yeah, I prefer that. It freezes well.
Because you know what I've had frozen, it's not the same, obviously, but I don't like uh the frozen galangle I've had I don't like very much. No, that's not good. Yeah. I was like, someone's like, you can buy I was like, I need galango, and they're like, we only have frozen. I was like, uh I'll buy it.
You know what I mean? I don't like it. It's not good. It was like spongy and I think they already soaked in some chemical, some salted water. Uh huh.
Yeah, but if it's real. I I ordered uh galango from the Thai farmer too, and I freeze it, and it's come out the same. But not from the package. Yeah. If it's from the package, I think it's been treated already.
Is that why it's bad? Because I was juicing it and the juice didn't taste right. No. It's not good. No, not good.
No. Uh but fresh one and you freeze it and then refreeze. Yeah, that's good. Do in Thailand do they use the other galango, the one that they use in like South China, the s the sand ginger, the with the lesser galangol, they use both, or they Yeah, we use use both. Yeah.
What's the difference between the two? Because we only get the one kind of galangle here, the kind of like bigger. Uh the lesser ginger, you mean the more yellow color? Yeah, we don't get no, we get like so I know that there's at least two galangles, but we only get one. So I don't know the difference.
I don't know the other one. I thought that maybe it's not a galangle. The one I'm thinking of is sand ginger, which is a different ginger, the one that's used in the in the chicken uh in South China. Well, I don't remember. I didn't I didn't look up my ginger ballast like before I came.
Like it showed, right? Yes. So, but uh anyway, I don't know where I was going with that. Um, talk to me about you have a a dish and I'm looking for it where you use what you call beetle leaf. But the beetle leaf in and it's like a duck breast and a beetle leaf wrap.
The beetle leaf that you use in Thailand, I looked it up, I don't I'm asking, is not actually beetle leaf, right? It's one from Thailand that's not the same as the one used in India for wrapping beetle and pond, right? It's its own pepper leaf. Right. It's different.
Yeah. Where do you get that? Uh like local local supplier. Here? Here.
Can you get it on the street like at like Bangkok Market or something? In Bangkok? Yes. Yeah. No, no, no.
Bangkok Market in New York. The one on Moscow. Oh. Uh. Or like who's who can I go to here?
Does SEA have it? S A South East? Yeah. Yeah, that's uh isn't that the name of We got it from uh Eshen Bokshoi. That's the name of the spire?
Yeah. I'll get it. Is it good, this leaf? Yep. Have you had the Mexican?
Okay, so for those of you that aren't following what I'm saying, because no one is the pepper, the genus pepper, peper, has in it the things that we use as spices. So black pepper is a pepper. Uh long both long peppers are peppers, cubebs, pepper. Those are the ones where we're using the fruit, right? And in black pepper, that's also green pepper.
It's all that's all the same plant. In the leaf side of it, there's actual peeper beetle, which is the the beetle leaf, which is used in like you think of it for either chewing beetle nut, uh, or you think of it for pawn, the you know, and that one has a kind of a very strong, I've made a drink with it once, a very strong, like almost like phenolic taste, like very like you know, like the very there. The one in Mexico is Oja Santa, which is also a uh pepper, um softer leaf. That one I use in cocktails, but now I want to try this one from Thailand. Lola?
It's like also in Vietnamese? Yeah, uh that's Vivian's a lola. So it's quite so like the wrap bolalo? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's the name of the well, okay.
So I'm looking on the internet because I didn't do nothing about it. Pepper lolot is the there's pepper lola and pepper sarmentosum, which I guess are the same species that are used in like that whole region of Asia. And it tastes like what? Tiss very like it's not bitter, it's like nutty. Um yeah, I would say it's nutty, like leafy, and yeah, there's some like uh distinct flavor.
You think it would make a good drink? I do. Yeah, I'm gonna try some. I'm gonna get some. I should have brought some today.
Well, I didn't tell you. But it's like uh we have this drink where we where we you know use liquid nitrogen to smash up the the I've done it with beetle leaf and not good poisonous, but I did it with oh santa, which is the pepper thing, and we do it with um we do it with uh you know agave spirits or or sotol, but it's uh oh now I gotta try the I gotta try the Thailand one. But so you what are you doing with it with the duck breast? So this is original dish from Thailand. So in in Thailand we serve that leaf with all different components, like ginger, um, shallot, uh, dry shrimp, toasted coconut, uh, cashew nut, and uh the sauce.
So it's like DIY dish. People when you eat it in Thailand, you just wrap the leaf into a cone and then put a little bit of everything the chili, lime ride, and the sauce, and wrap into a a parcel and then eat in one bite. But here uh I put some full grass terin and uh smoked duck breads on top to give more like mouthfeel. More, more yeah, yeah. I was giving you the Hannibal Lecter there, John.
So if you know I thought I was busy thinking about the foreground duck, and that sounds delicious. All right, so uh on your on your Instagram you have uh a lot or a lot of people posted this uni and crab tartlet. Yeah. So I looked at it uh on the on the list, and you also, this is actually nice. I think people should do this more often.
On one of your Instagram posts, you you have it before it's assembled so people can see the constituent parts, which I think is nice. Uh not just like here's the finished boob. But you call it on the menu out as a limestone tartlet. Does it have lime water in it? Why is it a limestone tartlet?
What does that mean? Uh there is a paste. Oh, you just mentioned about the paste that you eat with the butter leaf. Yeah. Uh when Indian culture, when they eat the the there is a limestone paste.
Right. It's pink color. You use the pink one? Yeah, the pink one. So what we did is we soak the paste into water, let it sit for check it well, let it rest, or the the clay sink now, and then we scoop the clear water and put into the battery so that battered limestone uh water help.
Uh all the crispy part, I think it's alkal make it alkali. Yeah. So all the crispy batter stay lasts longer. So uh I remember I I bought this stuff once because I thought it was lime like the fruit, and then I discovered that you had to do this stuff with it. We used it for bananas.
Oh yeah. Yeah. When you cook it, it's not break. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But what's the difference?
So for those of you that go to Thai markets, they make a red one and they make a white one. What's the difference between the red one and the white one? Why you would use one or the other? Is it just a color or that? I'm not sure.
But I in Thailand I have I always seen the uh the red one. The red one, yeah. Yeah, it's more common. I think also maybe the red one is good because you can see when it's settled out. Right.
But I don't know whether it's actually different or not. But they had both, and I've used both, but they both do the same. They make the banana hard. Yeah. For those of you that want it, but what does it do?
I've never used have I used it in batter. In the batter, it also makes it just super crispy because it's alkaline. Yeah. That's crazy. So these don't know, you just literally you buy a small plastic jar of it.
You mix it up with the water and it settles out. And you could do it again and again. Yeah. How do you know that it's no good anymore? The color of the water will no, I think it's lasts forever.
But because every time we use it, some some part will like go away too. Like in container, we s we will see the clay on the bottom, like keep like go less and less. So you just add more add more water and then add more clay. Yeah. And just keep it going.
Yes. Yeah. In Thailand, they they make the in the clay pot, like big clay pot in the back of the house, and then they keep using it for everything. What do they make it from? Are they getting it for like from the ground or do they bake off shells for it?
Because I know like lime, like cow, like you can either like roast off shells that are very, very high temperature to like make them into lime. I think it's like so amazing that there's all every cult not every, but like many cultures around the world use some form of alkaline thing. I'm gonna try it in a batter now. Yeah. Anyway, people love this dish.
Yeah, they do. That's it's our first bite in the testing menu, too. So the the crab meat in the middle, uh in Thailand, we eat that as uh relish. We eat with the cucumber, green mango, white turmeric, like a dipping sauce, and then yeah. I've never used the white turmeric.
How is it compared to the yellow one? It's milder. Yeah. Yeah, and a little like it's refreshing, fake grand, and doesn't stain your hands as bad, I know. Oh yeah.
Yeah, but like uh, you know what I hate? I hate we I've never bought the white turmeric, but I hate it when they give me the you know, the regular turmeric, and it's not the color's no good. It's like in between. It's like it's like not orange, it's like yellow, pale, worthless. It's in between.
Choose one way. One way, right? Go white. Is it the same plant exactly? The white and the yellow and the orange one, or is it like is it raised differently, or is it just a different cultivar, you think?
That I'm not sure, but I think it's different. Yeah, yeah. I mean, like uh, yeah, all those things are good. Uh okay. So, okay, so the limestone, by the way, if you use too much of the limestone, does the flavor of that come through?
Do you have to be careful with how much you use, or is all the liquid in the batter if the limestone water? No, it's just the like let's say one quart of batter, we put like one tablespoon. Right, a little bit. Because if it's too much batter, I remember with the banana, yeah. If you soak it too much, we used to use a vacuum to inject it in because I'm very lazy and very impatient.
Uh and if you did too much, it's like you know what I mean? Yeah. Or if you let it soak too long before you cook it. John, have you ever tried that technique? No, I've been meaning to.
Dude. Yeah. Dude. Sounds fun. You can take a ripe banana and firm it up, and then in the pan, you could just beat the hell out of it.
Not gonna break. Not gonna break. It's nuts. But it still tastes ripe because it is ripe. Yeah, you've just made it firm.
Right. It's crazy. Yeah. No, I need to try it. Yeah.
We use it for uh sweet potato too. Not not here, uh, but back in Thailand when we have some uh dessert that it's like ice, crush ice with dust, uh candied sweet potato. So again, we don't want to uh break it, and sometimes Thai people like to do more like cut uh vegetable coving, make it look like a rose of flour, and then all the at the edge, it's thin thinner than the the middle part, right? So if you don't soak in the uh limestone water, the the edge of the flour petal is gonna like break. Right.
But then yeah, we the technique is with the limestone water, and when you candy with the syrup, it's not gonna break. Huh? But uh, do you let the limestone water go all the way through or do you let it stay soft in the middle, but like just hard on the outside? All the way through. All the way through?
Yeah, we soak it for how long like hour? Huh? Yeah. All right. That's so cool.
I'm gonna look it up. Do you is there any use besides for funerals of the of the wax candles with the aroma? Yeah. Are they good? I tried to buy one once, but I couldn't make it taste good.
I couldn't do anything, it tastes good. I got it from Thailand. Like it's really good. Like it's you like it or you hate it. It's smoked, but it's a lot of figurants in there.
That's coffee, cafe alan. It's a lot of spice in there. Use it at the restaurant? We use it uh for special menu. Testing menu event, but not all the time.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anything like that, I'm like, I wanna have someone who knows how to use it make it for me. I think you need to have someone who knows. You know what I mean? Right.
If it's too much, it's gonna be too like overwhelmed. Like there's a lot, a lot of things that I've tried myself that I don't like. I don't believe that I know anything about them yet. Like uh uh chunyo from Peru, the freeze-dried potatoes. I've tried making them twice.
Terrible. Terrible. Terrible. But I'm not gonna say that they're bad because I don't know how to use them. I gotta go to Peru, which I hope to do this summer.
Uh Thailand first. I gotta get uh an event. Um uh natto, like Japanese natto. Yeah, always hated it. Went to Japan, was like, okay, I don't like natto.
Please make natto for me. That is delicious. And they did, and it was delicious. You know what I mean? So it's like I can't judge something until I've had it the way that it's supposed to be, you know?
Yeah. Um, I had a question also on your menu. On your grilled beef tongue, you call out coulantro. I've never seen someone call out coulantro on uh a menu. Do you guys use that in Thailand?
Yeah, huh? Because to me, like uh for those who are Americans who don't like cilantro and you think it tastes soapy, coulantro tastes even more soapy. You know what I mean? I like cilantro and I like coulantro, but I'd always use cilantro instead of coulantro. So what do you guys use the coulantro for as opposed to the cilantro?
Coulantro, by the way. Is that it looks like longer, yeah, yeah. Uh do you also use the other one, the uh the the delphinium style uh cilantro over there? Like the finer? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, we do. Yeah. Oh, we call it uh Mexican cilantro? Yeah, cilantro. Yamacho, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You use both? All three. Both. All three.
Three. So what do you use the coulantro for as opposed to because I never end up reaching for it? Like I always use just standard cilantro because again, not smart. It's similar, but I wouldn't say it's the same. It's I think it's like more pungent, but there's some texture to shoe too.
It's more that leaf is thicker than cilantro. So we use it as a uh in the beef tatar, we dice it in the beef tartar. Also on the beef tongue, we slice it and uh garnish on top. Do you think it's kind of funny that you're throwing away all these cilantro leaves, but then you buy coulantro? I know.
You're like you're like, you're like, you know, I really want coulantro on this, and then you have this pile of cilantro leaves, you just have to like not look at it. Just don't look. We're gonna find someone. Someone who's listening to this wants the cilantro leaves. You know, let's try it.
Do you know? Dave, you should start you should start a uh cilantro butcher. Yeah. Do you know uh I'm I use a lot of cilantro. You butcher it.
My standard my standard meat sauce, like uh uncooked meat sauce, is like 50-50 cilantro parsley, lemon rind, lemon, oil, sugar, pepper, salt, garlic. You know what I mean? Plus some hot pepper. Like that's the standard, like, you know, just like 20 seconds in out. Um, but I'm not using that in in a restaurant, so it's I can't go through restaurant quantities.
But it it eats a lot of cilantro leaf that way. A lot. Yeah. Very green. Um, our beverage beverage director used to make the cilantro cocktail too.
Yeah, we had a cilantro cocktail. They're good, but you can only use so much. Yeah. You know what I mean? You can only use so much.
Still, still not enough. Yeah. Oh, speaking of pounding things, I saw you wrote somewhere or were quoted somewhere, you are definitely team mortar and pestle as opposed to blending certain things. So, and I've heard this before from traditional Thai chefs. So, talk to me about the difference between blending and using a mortar and pestle for something like a paste.
Right. We have two minutes, don't worry. Okay. Yeah. Uh so the grinding is, you know, when you grind it on the stone, it's kind of break the all the fiber, and also break, uh bring out that brings out the aroma in the herbs too.
So you cannot get that from the blade. Yeah, you really, but you think you could so if someone handed you something, you're like, this was made in a blender and I don't like it as much. Like, like you know, I don't think no one can in other words. You think you can tell that like like if if someone pounds it, it's not just you think you could definitely tell the difference between uh like a pounded product versus a blender product. For for the dressing, yes.
You can see the fiber, the the powder, the powder, the sauce is thicker, more fiber, but the blender is more like liquid. But for the curry paste, yeah, when you cook with the outer component with the coconut cream, you you wouldn't see it. Uh talk to me about coconut. What's the best way to for people do you have to make it, or is there a good way to get coconut? Can you even make good coconut here by buying coconuts?
Or can you even get the good coconuts for making coconut milk? What do you do? Uh at the restaurant we use so much, so we use the can. But if you want to make it, yeah. We make our own uh coconut chips.
It's the same kind of coconut. You break it and then you blend and squeeze the juice out. But what can do you think is good? Who's got the good one? R I D.
Yeah, I would use that one, so good. Uh nice. And talk to me about the toasted rice. How do you pronounce the toasted toasted rice? Kaukua.
Kaukoa. Now, I've seen on the internet like all different uh how finely it's it's breaking up. What like what's the difference between people who leave it coarse or make it super powdery? Well, which one do you do? Is it depend on the application or no?
And it's sweet rice only, right? Can you do it with other rice? Uh sweet uh gluten rice. Uh sometimes if you don't have that, you can use the jasmine rice too, but it's not gonna come out the same. But the techniques that I really want to share before we run out of time.
Yeah, you do do it. Toast it so like sometimes toast it just like brown. No, it's not enough because the all the the inside is still white, you need to like roast it until almost like dark brown, almost burn before you break it or after before you break it. And at the end of the toasting method, you put the galango, lemongrass, and coffee a lime at the end, like two seconds, and the remaining heat going to like uh dry all the herbs, and then you blend everything. Uh blend all pot everything together.
And how fine we are you looking for? Uh you want to like sand. I would say sand. Sand. But still like a little bit, a little bit crunchy.
You can still feel it. Yes. And then how long is it good for? Oh, if you keep in the dry storage. Oh yeah.
Up to three months. And this is definitely something you should make yourself and not buy. Yes, please. And it's easy to make. Tastes much better from stallboard.
Oh, cool. All right. Well, listen, uh, I need to we need to go over to the bank. Bank out supper club. Yeah, dude, we have to.
So stupid. We're so stupid. Yeah, we need to go. All right, Max Widowat, thank you so much. Come on anytime.
I look forward to tasting your food live in person. Cooking issues. When quality is part of your name, it's more than a word. It's the reason for everything you do. And at QFC, quality inspires us to make everything we do better.
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