Cooking Issues Transcript

Too Thick for Sous Vide


Hello and welcome to cooking. This is Dave, I'm your host of cooking issues coming to you live from New York City to Rockefeller Center at newsstand studios. joined as usual witness Tassia other hammer Lopez how're you doing? I'm good. Yeah. Anything anything fun happening?

No. Just drove from Connecticut.

We drove him out. Wait, Joe from Connecticut? Yeah. Who's Joe from Connecticut. Me, Joe. Joe. Oh, drove froze. mustaches lives full of Joe's. She's got like 8000 Joe is on the line. So I you know, Paul, I know there could be a Joe from Connecticut. You got as usual. We're going to panels here, Joe Hasan. How you doing? I'm doing great. How are you? It looks a little sweaty. Oh, man. It's just one eff up after the next you know. I, by the way, is John on the Horner. Is he too sick to get on the horn? He's too sick to join us tonight. Yeah, John, please. Please. Booker and DAX people. Give our customer service representative. A little bit of a break for a day or two. Let him Let him he'll his his his meat sack he needs to you know, get back to get back to health. But we do have Jackie molecules, right?

Yes, sir. I'm here and exciting. I'm watching you on YouTube's live stream that our all access patrons can also get.

Well, what am I doing right now? What am I doing right now? Well, you're slightly delayed.

You have your hand up now. Stars just turned her head now. You just looked at the camera.

It's a nine second delay. Now you're

doing like a walk up and down thing with your hand. I don't know what

that was me trying to see if you can see what I was doing. Alright.

Delayed for when I smack you until you to keep my name out of here.

No, I gotta. I gotta keep your Connecticut Joe's name out of my effing mouth. You keep my Connecticut Joe's name out of your effing mouth. Mr. Watson, I decided we're gonna use that all the time. So like, so like, watch this. I was making pizza. I was making some pizza. Oh, keep pizza out of your night, then you have to insult my pizza. And then I had to say keep my pizza out of your effing mouth. Like that. I think it can be used for anything. You know what I mean? Too soon? No. Okay, so back to why I'm so hard. I'll tell you this. Today is the second closest I've ever come to not actually making it in because of a bike accident. And the Stasi almost didn't make it home once in Brooklyn when she used to bike because she hit a pothole that would have swallowed a frickin tank. In Brooklyn, Brooklyn, Atlanta, potholes. Yeah, it's bananas. True. Anyway, she got swallowed by a puddle. Because the thing is this. You look over at the car that's trying to kill you. You hit the pothole, you can't win. There's no winning. Anyway, remember that? So anyway, so I'm going down the street. And for those of you that bike in New York, right there, these cars that they get as close as they can to like the jersey barriers or whatever, during the construction things. And it's like, Yo, we're still here. We're still here. You know what I mean? And so I'm biking next to one and I'm like, You know what? EFF it, I'm going to take it and you're on a city bike, which is like a giant kludge of a piece of garbage. Right? And so you're like me, I got like, two three millimeters. I got two three millimeters between me and this guy's window, right? Bam, I clock his his, his rear view, his side view, with my with my hand, right? I don't think I did any damage. But if you've ever hit someone's side view with your handlebars, it's like, you're in a Jerry Lewis movie all of a sudden, yeah. And like, meanwhile, I'm in between, like, all these cars. I'm trying not to hit any other cars. Because if I hit another car, I'm going down. If I go down, I get this door opens. You hear my car and then not not coming in? That's it. It's over. You know what I mean? So thank God, I kept the thing on its wheels. And there was so much traffic, the dude whose side you I punched his fault, by the way, never caught up to me. So there you go. Silver Linings, silver linings? What was that movie about?

Doesn't matter. Let's go on to questions. Well,

if you're listening on Patreon, are you are you doing a book? Usually John says what's coming up next stuff? Are you gonna do that?

What's coming up next? I think it's the mushroom guys next, figure it

out. No, great. I mean, I may be late, but it's also good that at least one of us is prepared to call in your questions. 2917410 1507 That's 917-410-1507. Listen, a little tip for you guys. And maybe we should do something better about this on the Patreon, the Stasi, and I don't go out as much as we should. Just as he goes out more than I do. Whenever I asked her for recommendations. She clams up and looks at me like I'm in a hole. Right?

Right over I go. No, none of our people want to go why where do you go? Just like weird, really weird places. Why would mean isn't anyone like the tasting menu at the

blind? You always assume

that you know that. That I know are people Yeah, because you're often wrong. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah, I don't think that's true. For

a Bro first.

Anyway, while you're trying to figure out bro fif the James Hoffman set next week. Yep. And then coffee magnate coffee master April 12.

Adam DiMartino and Phoebe Tran. The mushroom people,

their mushroom,

then April 19. Oliver Millman

you sound enthused, man. You should do this for a living but that guy that's cool. You should just you know, you should do this for a living. You should be a man doesn't. I want to imagine Nastasia Lopez World's Worst hype man. Like you can you could make any rapper like the audience just be like,

John, is John like, Is John 10,000 times better? I didn't really I don't know. John. Jack. What do you think? No coffee. James Hoffman? No comment.

Wait, he's not gonna drink coffee. We can't come on.

No coffee. James Hoffman.

No, James Hoffman therefore no coffee. All right. Well, okay. All right. Anyways, so what else are we We're talking about something else first.

Very quickly.

Immediate comments from the discord about people listening that would be interested in weird places. Because after all, this podcast is weird as hell to begin with says the places

I go to like usually can't it's like a weird night you know? Yeah, that's what they love best. But that they'll that'll never happen again. I'm testing live feed for Joe so I'm temporary. Okay.

Yeah, again, good information for everyone to know. So anyway, man, my point is this is that like, okay, so like yeah, I'm invited to weird stuff. So yesterday, let me zone do risky law, Amazon de risky. I don't have John here to pronounce it for me, like did a launch with this thing called artists series. Where these guys they're in Paris, they go and they buy individual casks from some well known and some not as well known different distilleries around the world. And they bottle like the single cask. So I went to their the launch of this product, and it was great. But how the hell is anyone gonna buy it? Because literally, I walked up to the to, you know, one of the people who runs it, I asked her I was like, how the hell do you guys? How is it that you even fly all these people to New York and have this event? When like, some total the number of bottles of this things? 143 And you just poured one of them? Like what the hell is this? And she was like, this belt? I don't know. You know, say, Well, I don't know what the how do you say it in French? I say I don't know, in French. You shouldn't say pa Daria didn't say pa I'm like, I don't know. We don't do it to make money and like, why do you do it? I wish we could have a business where we made no money and it was okay. rockstars then you Yeah, I mean, we don't make any money, but it's not okay. Yeah, yeah. Anyways. Congratulations to Questlove on his on his watch. area. Nice. Little a little overshadowed maybe by what happened just before he got it. But anyway. Okay. So if you're going to call and ask for a recommendation, well, here's what I recommend. I recommend we put these things out on the discord. So that people who go out more than we do to kind of normal restaurants. Like Like, I'm more like, I'm better at, you know, where do I buy weird ingredients? Or, you know, like, if you're in a town that I've been to a lot like, what's the good cheese shop? Like, that's what I'm good at. You know what I mean? Like, Anastasia is good at like, you know, where's the fun place where weirdos hang out? Or like, you know, how do you find X, Y or Z? Like, like strange happening in a particular locale. That's what she's good at. But

like, that doesn't happen twice. You know? But the hottest,

the hottest restaurants like I don't really? I don't really go that often to the hottest restaurants anymore. You start? No, I do not. You enjoy going to the hottest restaurants I do not. Okay, but the Patreon people I'm sure a lot of our Patreon people know what.

That's when I stopped doing that also, like the hottest new restaurants why? I don't know. Kind of gets tired. Wow.

Wow, we were just a bunch of mopey Mo's here today. Yeah. Yeah. In case we have time, which we want. If we need to unmute my, my cousin James told me a fantastic joke, and it's not even. It's not even offensive too much. Anyway. But I doubt we'll have time. Okay. So, again, and this is this goes back to the first question that's on my list we had last week from Dale Harris. Get this out on the discord. This is saying you should be handled on the discord. Boston, New York City best places for non alcoholic beverage program. I actually put this out to Derek Brown, who is currently or just formerly of Columbia room, who does a bunch of amazing non ALC stuff. And also Jackson, Kenan Boston. I haven't heard back the names of the programs yet. So I don't know what to tell you, Dale. I you know, like I want people in the who were who were who were, you know, listening in in the discord to help out you know, before it writes in Hey, Dave, have you had we, I've always think it's pronounced Weegee, but I don't know W E. G. I've always since I was a kid pronounce it as we do. What do you think we are Weegee? Wege sounds bad. So I'm assuming it's Weegee, right? Yeah. It's not Uyghur. No, no, it's not Real German is not vague, vague it right? It's Weegee right? Yeah. We have you had Weegee pretzels from Hanover, Pennsylvania. If not, where can I send it back to their top drawer? Well, if I have had them many times, so they don't really sell them that much around here anymore. That brand of record that you get here. You still get Schneider's every once in a while, but for some reason for the past 20 something years Schneider's have been impossibly stale. I don't know why. Schneiders is also the only brand that uses the clear salt you know, I'm talking about the clear pretzels some Are you a clear salt or a white salt gal? Doesn't matter the matter. All right. Remember when we were at the bar, and I was serving hard pretzels, and a friend of yours like a rest a restaurant who came in he's like, You should serve soft pretzels what I tell him? No, I said get your own place jerk. He's like he's like he's like I have my own places like then serve soft pretzels there and leave me alone. I like soft pretzels, but I love hard pretzels put that way. So I used to get them and you know what, I used to be like very much more of a purist on pretzels than I am today. So you know, I like them, they're good, but they contain a small amount of fat. And I used to be 100% against any fat at all in a hard pretzel because it tends to make the texture of the pretzel a little more crack or like so a little bit a little bit less shattering on the tooth and the way that you don't like if you're going to use all purpose flour and you don't use fat your host because it's gonna be too hard because all the protein but if you use Snavely which is what you're supposed to use soft pastry flour you know not bleach but soft pastry flour then you're gonna be fine they use a little bit but you know what it's not cracker like like Bachmann's is which is always disappointing. So I do actually enjoy their pretzels and they are very old school and my I believe I forget what it was that one or one very close to it that my great uncle worked for in the Depression was very close to that and my Great Uncle Luke. So yes, I do appreciate them. But my real appreciation for fat containing pretzels if you go to Dietrich Dietrich's, I think meats in out past Allentown in Pennsylvania near where Anastasios mom comes from. There's a meat store right on the road there and they have this pretzels man I can't remember but it's like coated in butter, and then dried hard. So like that, like was so far in the fat dry pretzel thing that I was always and I was like, okay, okay. Okay. And I'm getting older so I'm actually getting softer in my old age about some things can you believe that says,

aren't you isn't your birthday tomorrow?

My birthday is tomorrow. What are you doing? Well, I was planning on getting up in the morning. puttering around doing some work like maybe taking a shower shaving doing some more work than I was going to like go shopping for dinner, cook it and then maybe go to bed

Wow for all of your like family, you know, gatherings and all the family stuff.

I could get all of those. Okay.

It's during the week are gonna at least cook something exciting.

Jen's like chance like you want to go out I'm like where I'm going out on Friday anyway because like one of her friends is coming into town as you know our friends actually. So I'm going out on Friday. I don't want to go out like three times. What am I what am I 20 going out three times a week. I had to go to this event yesterday. Am I going to cook something special? I don't know. I have some magic pork in the freezer. I might cook myself some magic pork. Okay, you know what, what should I have with the magic pork people. Anyone might use my new waterless cookery. I don't have time now to go into the ins and outs of waterless cookery but these like weird aluminum pots from the 30s that I have. I've been doing all of my mashed potatoes in them and cooking them without water so you just cooked you literally it's the craziest thing in the world. You just put dry potatoes into it washed with the peel on into a dry pot. You with me so far, dry potatoes into a dry pot. And the trick is, is you have to almost fill the pot like as full as the pot is can go that's how much you should use. Then you put the lid on and you turn on the heat until you can feel the steam hit the top of the of the lid. And then as soon as that happens, you turn it way down just so that the lid stays hot as long as the lid is hot. You have enough flame to be vaporizing the water but not enough to have the steam leaving it and the potatoes are cooked in their own water but they don't dry out like they do in an oven. So you can let them rock for a long long time and all that happens is the part of the skin that get that is actually touching the bottom of the pan gets brown and thick but not bad actually because I've eaten it and then what you do is you guys aren't grill grill gloves glow gloves? No. So I like these grill gloves I use them at you have some jack No, I don't, you should get some Don't be worried about the fact that they're black. Because it turns out that most of the heat from the grill isn't is not in, not in a range that matters anyway. So white gloves might as well be black in the infrared, which is where the heat is. So don't think that that they're not that good. Just because they're, they're black color don't don't think they need to be mean, if they're reflective, that's better because they'll take on less stuff. But once it's not reflective, it doesn't matter anymore will color the glove is and they're like two, three layers. So but they're there. There's not a lot of liquid on the outside of the potato, right? So I can literally put on these grill gloves go right into the pot, pick up the like steaming hot potato and then just take the peel off with a petty knife, right. And just that little bit appeal that I'm holding on to with it with the petty doesn't burn my thumb mean I also don't feel very much heat with my phone. And so I can peel these potatoes like well they're steaming hot. Leave the jackets on so I lose very little. And you know, I think it tastes maybe better. I don't know. I haven't got a side by side, but I think it's a good way to cook the potatoes, so maybe I'll do that tomorrow. Anastasia. Okay, is that enough of a? What kind of gravy? Should I have?

I don't know. I don't know.

I've been making a lot of mushroom gravy. So I'm kind of sick of it. What kind of gravy should I make? I don't know. What kind of gravy Do you like? Do you not like gravy?

I don't usually make it now. by you. jacker

Joe What's your gravy preferences?

mushroom gravy. Sounds good.

But I just made a mushroom gravy. I make a really good I don't know what about Yeah, but I do all low temp cooking. So there's no pan snowpants stuff left now you know, this is why I like when I whenever I do like birds, Boyd's. I like to like to bone them so I can make a gravy with the bones before I bother cooking them. You know what I mean? I like that like a two front thing, but I don't think I want a chicken gravy with a pork. I mean, I have a bunch of chicken bones in my fridge. Freezer rather me who doesn't right. Anyway. Do you save your chicken bones in the freezer? No. You don't have chicken bones. You don't like to cut up animals when you're alive. I

don't eat I don't cook a lot.

Okay. From where do we get this? Oh, here's another one. Josh Kaplan. I'm a fine dining chef in DC headed in New York City for a pizza tour. I built a list from Mike Portnoy's reviews and asked him chef friends about their favorite spots. Are there any places not to be missed? I mean, I'm not a freak. I'm not on point. I'm useless. I'm a useless person. You guys got to ask me questions like I know the answers to like exactly what's the difference between like a soft pastry flour and all purpose flour and bread flour here. I can help you out. best pizza in New York. I can help you so much. Jackie's D pizza in New Yorker and Joe you eat pizza in New York. What do you like? Are you fancy pizza? People are cheap pizza people. I can tell you a good dollar slice.

One by one. What's your dollar slice? Wait, I'm interested in that answer.

I mean, it's not good. It's good for $1 It's like, you know, like, like a Kia is a terrible Bentley. Right? But it's not a bad Kia. You know what I'm saying? It's like, if you're walking into a place, and you and you're like, I want a slice, I'm gonna hand you $1 Bill, they're gonna hand you like a sallow piece of garbage with like a lot of potato starch mixed in with the cheese. The cheese is stretched and you're like, I get it. That's fine. You know what I mean? And the one on Sixth Avenue, I think is decent for that Sixth Avenue and eighth. Yeah, it's good. Right? You like that? When my son caller, you are on the air.

Hey, is this Jacob calling from the morning and I have a moisture management question. And since Dave is the master of moisture, I figured this would be a good place to ask. There you go. Are you? Okay, so I am really curious about the method of making puppy crispy skin roasted pork. Oh, yeah. And I have, I have seen many, many iterations of it. I've seen the Marco Pierre White one where he literally just rubbed some oil on it and puts it in a low oven and it gets insane. I've seen a Chinese method where they prick it with like the Chinese equivalent of like a chip card and then brush it with vinegar and then put a layer of rock salt on it and then roast it and then boil it. I've seen some random guy on Tik Tok who essentially shallow breezes it and smokes it and then finishes it under the broiler. And I am just curious about what's going on. Can you kind of tell all the nice folks at home? How to Succeed at this process? And then ultimately, what my main question is, what I really want to figure out is, can I cook the pork ahead of time if I were to do for instance, an event off site, cook the pork ahead of time without puffing the skin and then bring it to the site and pump the skin on site?

Absolutely. You can. Now it's so it's funny, it's a good it's a good question. Most of the recording and like pricking or the way that the Modernist Cuisine guys used to do it with a dog brush, make sure you get a fresh guide brush you're not talking about with the dog brush, right? The one with all the tiny wires on it. Yeah, they use on duck breasts, but I think they also Use it on pork. Or if you look at like, a lot of the, you know, Chinese language, pork YouTubes, you'll see them like, like multiple stabbing the skin a bunch of time. And that's really just to kind of like help it help it render. But

yeah, render the fat. Right,

the interesting thing comes like salt, obviously is going to draw some moisture out as well as make it taste good, right? The interesting question is always, like, some people are painting it with an acidic paint on top. And some people are painting it with a basic paint on top right, like baking soda, for instance. And I have never like so what's funny is, is that anytime you take most of those things aren't affecting the fat itself, they're affecting the connective tissue under the fat, right? And so anytime you and that which is protein based, and anytime you shift a protein away from what's known as its isoelectric point, you induce changes, right. So the other thing is that baking soda will shift it towards Brown, because it also shifts my art and Browning reactions into high gear, whereas shifting it towards acidic will keep it blonder. So like the more acidic it is, and I haven't tested exactly which effect is going to be better on the collagen to break it apart and cause it to puff up much. But it's interesting that both are used. And it just goes to show how like, the same chemistry in two opposite directions can have kind of similar effects. But again, I haven't run it down on pork skin, it is something that I was going to do for the book, but then so many other people are working on it. And I figured that if I tried to tackle crispy pork skin, I would be accused of like going outside of my wheelhouse. So I kind of stopped plagiarizing. Right, yeah, so I kind of stopped looking into it. But whether or not you can cook it ahead of time for sure the issue is really just drying that skin out in advance, right? So what I would do is, I would if you're, let's say, let's just say we're doing belly, I don't you didn't say you were but let's just say we're doing belly. Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna be belly, keep the piece as big as you can. Right. Also, just be aware that you know how like, there are certain muscles in the belly that tend to dry out more, if you're going to low temp, if you're going to do a traditional brace, then kind of the gelatin from the connective tissue kind of weeps all over everything and tends to moisten the dryer muscles, but in a low temp Cook, where the collagen becomes soft, but doesn't actually completely bleed out into the entire massive, right? Those muscles can end up tasting a little drier than you would like in a pork belly. So but I would keep the brace as big as you can, right? Low temperature and then chill it all the way down Intel it we gels. Okay, till it's a solid mass again and the skin is is is soft in that mean? Sorry, rebuild, not soft. And then then I would cut it into whatever portions you're going to crisp on. And then right I would err dry the skin. And you know, try to protect the meat somewhat from from drying out and air dry the skin and then do it and then you know, I mean, I've always wanted to I didn't do it do a side by side where you know, one side has nothing once you know well the three sides one is one is the vinegar and one is the baking soda. My My guess is that it's going to be differences of just texture on the on the outside, you know? And then of course you have a question. Are you going to pan it in oil because that crisp up real nice? Or is it just going to be a broil? Right? Or are you just going to throw it in the oven the oven is the most dangerous in terms of overcooking the meat at the bottom drying out the meat. You know what I mean?

Sure, right. I've got options there. And that's kind of what I guess another great point that I'm glad you brought up so the the site that I'm thinking about doing this that has a woodfired pizza oven basically. And if it's possible, I mean that could be a thing could could impart some nice flavor on to it perhaps. I also have the Camp Chef portable it's basically like a pizza oven that you stick on top of a propane burner. But like one of the big like the big or like what do you call it almost like a stove. It's got like three propane burners on that you'll see like a lot of people make like flow with or whatever outside right. So I have is basically like a pizza a pizza attachment that they recommend running around 600 to 650 600 650 degrees which I think for this purpose would be great. But then I also have like a big walk that I can take with me outside and then just do the oil over the top of it too.

Yeah, I mean look, I've again I would test all of these. I think any one of these could make a good product just realize that like a woodfired oven where the let's say the DOM of it is getting over 800 And if you do the math, right the difference between 900 800 900 degrees and 500 600 degrees the difference in radiant energy coming off that thing is a lot because it doesn't go up linearly, it goes up. Right? You know, to what does it oh my god just went on my head 6/4 power, right? So it's like, right and

well, I'll say two, we can we can control the temperature on that oven. Like usually, I do more of a, I'm not gonna call it neapolitan style. But it's more of a neapolitan style pizza that cooks in like two minutes, because we're running it between 70 to 100 degrees. But then I also at the same site did Detroit style pieces, so I was running at between five and 600. So like, I can control the temperature, it's literally, I'm building a fire inside of this thing, and like controlling the temperature that way. So I feel, especially after having successfully done these Detroit style pieces, I feel like I can do anything under that under that oven now. But yeah, that was just just another option.

If you're comfortable with a particular piece of equipment, that's nine tenths of the battle, especially, you know, how many times I've seen people show up at events, it's usually events, right? And they're like, I'm gonna use this piece of equipment, and I'm sure it's fine. I've never used it before, but I'm sure it's fine. It's never fine.

Have you? Do you know, do you know anybody who I mean, that's, that's one of my points with my business, is that I want to be able to execute a certain a certain level of, of execution anywhere. And so I have what I lovingly refer to as a completely mobile kitchen, I have all of this propane cooking equipment or electrical stuff that I can take with me and use because yeah, you go do catering events and stuff. And they don't have anything it's like, but I don't I'm not the type of person that has, quote, unquote, catering equipment, I'm not going to warm everything up, put it in a hot box, and then drag it out there and put it on a plate. I would much rather bring cold product and then warm it up on site or finish it on site. So yeah, that's, that's part of the reason that I have so many toys is because I want to be able to execute a high level of quality anywhere.

Yeah. Well, I mean, also, like, I mean, I think the mistake people make right, all the time, is they start in the wrong place, like you know, the equipment that you have, right? And you know, where you're going to be making the food, right? So design the menu around that, around how you're going to make it. You don't design the menu around exactly what you want. You know what I mean? I mean,

right? Yeah, right. That's my first question. When I have bigger events, too. I'm like, what kind of equipment do you guys have? They're like, what can we because that's gonna dictate what's on the menu, you know?

Yeah. Listen, don't don't promise your customer an item until you know the particulars of the situation unless they have infinite array. If they have infinite money. Fine, right. In your money. As Cyndi Lauper famously said, Money, changes everything. Love her? Yep. All right. Well, listen, good luck. Let us know. Tweet me back with some pictures of your tests. I'd love to know what you came down with and how it came out. Tweet me tweet me back cooking issues. I appreciate

you. I'll give it a shot. Thanks for the insight. All right, cool. All right.

And now we're gonna go to an ad for our favorite fish, or a king salmon and we'll be right back with cooking issues. Today's episode brought to you by ora king salmon. Everybody's favorite fish. Today in the studio. We have Michael Fabbro from working salmon to talk about it. And I was curious about sustainability. You guys have the highest certification possible from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch. Is that true? Yeah, that's

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go. The only best green choice for salmon aquaculture, or king salmon. Everybody's favorite fish. And we're back. Okay, so we have a question here. This is a classics in the field question from Zachary Stewart. I don't know if I have the answer today. But let's see here. My sister in law's cooking for is looking for a book that talks about all the cuts of meat from as many animals as possible, at least pork and beef, it should give the characteristics of the cut, how it is best used kind of dishes and how best to cook it. Trying to learn the things a butcher would know without becoming a butcher, how to be informed meat consumer etc. Thanks for the show and keep up the good work. So I don't know if there's one book that deals with all of that the was it called the North American Meat producers NAMP old picture guide of various cuts and I think we talked about it when Matt was on the show. Shell briefly a couple of weeks ago. It's maybe a little outdated. But it's an awesome picture book. It's spiral bound and you can take it into the shower with you because it's meant to be like washed down and like in case you accidentally cut open a cow next to it and like it bleeds all over the book, your books gonna be fine. And that's an amazing book everyone I know likes it. But find it used and don't buy don't spend a lot of money on it. I think the you know, for one that's a little bit now long in the tooth. It's a little bit old, but the Old River Cottage meat book, I think is good. Chi. You know, John reads this kind of crap. And next time we have Matt on I'm gonna have I'm gonna have I'm gonna put a pin in it and ask Matt when he comes back on the show, because he's going to be coming on semi like once every other month. Right? So somebody that Yep, yeah.

Come on in Discord said on the last call. This is a long ass call. Okay. I'm keeping up with the comments.

Yeah. Well, thanks for slowing down the show for telling me that awesome. Licensed magician 69. at AOL writes in. Dave once mentioned that he knows why he goes this size. He's like, that's, that call was long. And here I am. Gonna make it longer. Now.

That's the guy that just got into this really awesome.

So here I am spending time on your stuff. See? See. See. All right. Dave wants to mention that he knows why electric multi cookers aka Instant Pot, etc. aren't made to reach a full 15 psi. He did not say specifically why? What's the reason? Okay, so Anastasia and I used to hang out with occasionally, someone who made these things. professionally for one of the big name manufacturers, I won't say I won't say who it is or what it is. And literally, some of it is this following fact. They're like, Well, what do you need the extra? What do you need the extra pressure for? Right? So there's a whole range of people who, like are engineering and making this aren't necessarily cooks, and don't really understand why you would want the extra pressure because in truth, right, it doesn't necessarily take that much longer to cook something at 10 psi than it does to cook it at 15 psi does takes a little bit longer five psi. But they're not sitting down in a kitchen like they would be in the 1910s 1920s. And frankly, they're not hiring someone in a kitchen. So it used to be that the big manufacturers would hire, they would set up a test kitchen. And people who make food, like Unilever still do this. But kitchen manufacturers don't have kitchens anymore, where they're hiring people to come up with recipes that are awesome with their equipment to sell to you. I just don't think that's as much of a thing as it was in the teens, 20s 30s 40s and 50s. And so they're not doing like the tests were like, you know, that we used to do back in the day where, you know, we get a pressure cooker, and we put products in it at 10 different pressures and see which one tastes best? The answer is 15. Like, like 20 psi, not better or worse, like 15 is the answer. So part of it is just not understanding why you would want that extra pressure, they have to overdesign it to get it to go to those pressures, it becomes more of a design problem. And also, those electric instapot things a regular real honest to god pressure cooker, you moderate the moderate yourself, you set the temperature and you moderate it. In one of these things, there is a pressure relief valve that goes but they're monitored. They're doing the temperature with just a temperature sensor, right with like a thermistor. And, and so what they're doing is they're choosing a temperature, that's not that high. It's above boiling, what's not that high, I think so that they don't scorch or have any other problems and just make their life easier. And I really think that's, I really think that's why they do it. Interesting fact, you have to to get a pressure cooker to build up pressure, you need to create a little bit of steam, right? Obviously, duh. And the thicker your item is, the bigger of a temperature differential there is between the bottom of the pan and the actual liquid that is at boiling point. So even though the liquid that's boiling is still just at boiling temperature, because you don't really have enough solids in your products to increase the boiling point of the water that much, it can be as much as 15 degrees difference in the bottom where where the heater is in the product, it's actually boiling in a thicker item than in a thinner item, you always need some superheat at the bottom of the pan. And so very thick items at the bottom of your pressure cooker, you have to use a lot of extra superheat. And then if you if you chill, if you make a gel layer on the bottom of your pan, like let's say you're thickening and a grave and you make a gel layer on the bottom of the pan, then all of a sudden, you're creating a layer you have to have conduction through and that drastically increases the temperature you need to maintain pressure without scorching. And so I would very much caution you when you're using pressure cookers to make sure that the liquid that's directly touching the bottom of the pan is as thin as possible. That makes sense. Okay. Will Robinson wrote in Hey, when Dave was talking a slash complaining, is there anything? Do I ever talk about things without complaining about them? Who knows? Oh, okay, so it's like talking is complaining. You don't need to say both, right? Yeah. About the measuring cup that came with his Zojirushi rice cooker. Rice Cooker. Was he was he fully aware that the Japanese go? Is a volume of measurement predominant in rice cookers? No. And I wasn't, I was just you know, I had never really researched where that measurement came from. So then I looked up a go and ago is 180.4 milliliters according to the Wikipedia, if you can believe the Wikipedia, which is for those of you that are keeping track 0.76 cup, and so I took my Zojirushi Cup, which hasn't seen water in I don't know decades, right? Because I don't get my rice scoop wet. I'm not crazy person. And them to fit didn't hold 180 milliliters, but you have to meniscus that sucker like all the way to the top. So it's dribbling everywhere. So thank you will for it's still a ridiculous unit and why don't they just call it like rice measure or go? Just tell me go? Don't insult me and call it a cup when it ain't? No, I mean, don't insult me. Do we answer this question on tap cocktails? I know you're gonna want to say yes, because you hate any question about to have cocktails? I don't think so. All right. Joe Waterhouse writes in Hey, Dave, I've been thinking about tab cocktails for a while now while now and wondered if this is the one where I keep asking John to reword it because I can't read it on air because it's not. You read you read it. you reword it. And I'll read the next question. All right. Steinberg says still thinking about corn tortillas, can you make nixtamal under pressure cooker to speed up the process? I have found that it's not helpful. What happens is, is that when you're making so for those of you that you know, I don't know haven't been following next immunization so an externalization. You're using a base, traditionally either calcium hydroxide Cao Cao H, or potash. Even older, because it's harder to make calcium hydroxide. And you boil corn, dry corn, you know, in don't do with popcorn apparently as regular like, you know, field corn. Although there's it's delicious when you do it with really fancy varieties. Oh, you know what, I should make some lies some of my bloody butcher, oh, my God is gonna be so good. Anyway. You boil it in an alkaline solution. And it does is it does a couple of things. It dissolves the outside of the seed coat a little bit and actually turns that into kind of these hydrocolloid, like things that help plasticize, the masa that you're making it also partially gelatinous, is the kernels, so that you know, some of the starches is functionalized, which also gives body to the dough, but you have to do it kind of the right amount. If you overdo it, then too much of the starch is gelatinous too much. You know, too much of the outside is kind of wiped off and it's not good. Then after you, you boil it, then you soak it for a while at a lower temperature like while it's coming down, soak it, then you rub off, you know however much of the outside C code you want, then you grind it into masa and that's what is tortillas and whatnot masa, you can use it wherever you want, but it's masa. If you pressure cook it, it's easy to go too far too fast. You're not really boiling it that long anyway. And so you know, it's going to be at a high temperature for so long that it in my experience, you weren't saving a lot and the odds that you could go over were too high. That was my experience. Anyway, so you want this to be you answered, you asked me the question, just reword the question so that I can answer it. Alright, Dave, I've

been thinking about TAP cocktails for a while now. And I wondered if you could tell me if I'm being very smart or very stupid if I attached a keg to a cement mixer under

pressure, but we did this. Don't do it. The cement mixer we dealt with this one. The cement mixer probably the cement mixer, remember is that how are you going to keep the the tube from getting wrapped around itself and kinking you're going to spend so much money on a nice rotary fitting. And then you still have to make sure that the rotary fitting spins on center. Right? Because the mistake people make is you can't freakin carbonate unless it's under pressure. And I highly recommend you do not stick the co2 tank into the cement mixer with the keg. Because if you make a mistake with a keg that's at like, you know, 80 psi 100 Psi if you're doing a room temperature, that's at 100 psi. If you make a mistake with a co2 tank, and you knock the nipple off the end of a co2 tank, that's 800 psi that's a that's a rocket. That's a missile. That's not that's not a good idea. Nicholas said asked would you recommend any resources or books on how to get the most out of your road? evap I think we already answered this one tonight. I know there are no good books on rotary evaporation just because there aren't enough people doing it. Look at cooking issues the best thing to do. And I know that sounds like a dick move. Either get one and find a chemist who is willing to come to your house, pay them in booze and have them show you how to set it up and then go on cooking issues or anyone else who writes about using rotary evaporators for cooking and then try to learn the difference between what a chemist is trying to do with a rotary evaporator and what you are trying to do with a rotary evaporator because it's free Very different. But learning the nuts and bolts of running one actually keeping one in good shape is a very different thing from learning how to make it taste good. And usually, like, you can't find the same person who's good at both, or that makes sense. question, why do Why does meet this from Jay? Why does meat go dry slash mealy if you sue Vita for too long, even at low temperatures, for larger cuts, I noticed it continues, even at temperatures lower than desired. Is there a way to prevent this while still breaking down college? And if not, does this suggest some stakes are too thick for suevey? too thick for CV? That's my that's my that's my mental my mental capacity too thick for cvwd? me ask you before I'm going to answer it. I'm going to answer your question and to give you your time. I have been studying like the long extended history of low temperature cooking, going back way far back, you know, we should do some time starts we willing to do? How easy is it to dig in your in your backyard? Easy, really? So it's not like, like where I was in Connecticut? We're all rocks. You wanna do some underground cooking? No? Why?

Okay, yeah, let's do it.

Why? I'm gonna curious if you say no, you said no. So quickly.

I've asked you to do that last summer. And you're like, I don't have time. I

don't. But I'm gonna say I don't know what you may pay me views. Terrible person anyway. Here's the issue. So collagen breaking down. Everyone likes to say everyone likes to think and I might have even written back in the day. But it's just simply not true. That once meat fibers, the fibers themselves, right, the muscle fibers reach a certain temperature that they are relatively static, right. And so then you can keep it at that temperature forever without it over cooking. simply not the case, right? simply not true. So what happens is, is that it's true that most of the movement in a protein like that happens relatively quickly, but then it keeps on first of all getting firmer. And then also getting, like mushier as it goes forward. Right. So the more you can drop a temperature below your target temperature, right, the longer you can keep things running. But certain things, it's almost impossible to keep them from going dry or stringy. So for instance, like tenderloin has no connective tissue in it at all. And so you start noticing that mushy fibrous SNESs in in a filet very quickly, which is why like, I try to keep all of those cooking times down below an hour on a filet if you're going to do it, right, like all in I want that like under an hour. And this is why if you read all my a lot of my old stuff on the blogs, I'm like, I really don't like cooking chicken longer meat low temp longer than an hour, because once it's reached cooking temperature and stayed there at cooking temperature for more than an hour, I start to notice some of that machinists. And this is borne out by tests that we've done. Terrible test. Remember, those tests are disgusting, they were stars, of just eating skinless, unsecured meat, like cubes of meat that had been cooked at various times and temperatures. And that's when you notice it not not when you're when you're finished. And so those meats really want to only be at their target temperature for a little bit of time and then dropped sometimes substantially. I think you noted that you're dropping down to 125, I can't do that and Celsius, but you need to drop a good five degrees below your cooking temperature to really halt a lot of that progression forward in terms of machinists, college, and on the other hand, you need to break down for a long time. And so a lot of times you have to run a compromise between breaking down of collagen, and not making the stuff mushy. So it's not necessarily it is it is a thickness question, right? In general, with very thick cuts of meat, all I'm looking to do is hit a target temperature on the very inside for insurance, I'm never doing kind of direct serve on those things. So I'm not really tenderizing those big, big, big cuts more when I'm doing tenderizing with Soviet I'm doing smaller things like ribs or, you know, short ribs or things like things that are high in collagen that you want to like render out for a long time. Things like roasts, I tend to just take them up to their target temperature and even though it takes a long time. It's fine because the part that is kind of what you would call mushy on the outside is going to get overcooked when you roast it at a high temperature anyway when you're doing the actual finished cook off so it's not really a problem. Does that make sense? Does. All right. Okay. Henry bots writes in what's the difference between tomato paste in a tube that says 2x versus a small can and can they be used interchangeably? It's a good question. I haven't used any of that. 2x to base stuff. I'm a can man. You ever you are You Tube lady. Anyone? Anyone in the discord jacket? Your tube tubes? Yeah. The internet's a series of gems.

Guess why do you hear your answer to this? Why? I don't know. It's easy to open and close if I only need like a little bit for something. Wow, when was

the last time you only needed a little bit of tomato paste? I'm always like I use so much tomato paste

Spooner. So really? Yeah.

I write all my recipes around the six ounce can of tomato paste. Hmm. I mean, like, I'm always like, huge difference. I don't have the tube. I would guess they're the same though. I would guess that I would guess that like maybe they're a little bit different. But I would guess that it's just like a dosing thing. You know what I'm saying? Like maybe like you're saying like, it's easier to dose out the stuff that's in a tube. Like some cultures like, like, have all of those like toothpaste tubes and stuff lying around anyway, like they're used to cooking with them. The only thing I have in a tube in my kitchen is callus caviar. You guys like that stuff? Yeah, yeah. I never had it. Nails used to call it Swedish toothpaste. It's like, a fish row and salt. And like oil. And it's got this like, it's got this kid with this preposterous grin on the front. Like, like, oh, yeah, I

know what you're talking about. Yeah, ridiculous. Yeah, yeah,

it's good. You know, it's good on crackers. You know, it's not good on anything you're gonna have. It really ruins wine. You should really have it when you're not drinking wine. It's not wine friendly.

Yeah, yeah.

I don't know what it is smoky. Yeah. Smoky, salty. Something about cured fish products. And most wines. I don't I don't like like a love. A love cured fish. I don't really like champagne. And lox, to me is like the worst combo. Like carbonated. What about Ustaz? You hate that too, right?

I don't think I like that.

I mean, that's maybe the only situation where Champagne is not the right answer. Yeah. Because you know, every other situation. It is. They get this one. All right. Timothy hellmouth writes in Hey, can you talk about cooking with essential oils for Steam distilled ingredients? What's the difference between food and non food grade oils? Is it a big risk to consume a minut amount of an edible oil it's not explicitly foodgrade for some background of assembling ingredients to make the chilli sauce in the Sichuan tofu rice recipe which I didn't click so I don't know what it is. They use my god I can't pronounce that. I was at qubit. Look up. Look up, let's say a cube Bebo is that cube? Let's say a cube Ebba for soapmaking or for aromatherapy, but nothing explicitly. foodgrade thanks for making the show. Timothy. Is it is it cubes because I love cubes? I live cubes.

Is that what it is? Yeah.

I don't know. Let's say a though.

What two questions in a row. But I also have this is this is great. What's the same question?

What's let's say a cube Ebba. Cube? Ah. You guys looking it up? I don't know the internet's anyway. To answer your question. It's very difficult to dose those things and also essential if the recipe specifically calls for an essential oil, that means that use the essential oil, try to find a food grade one. They are minute quantities. I remember once we did a thing at the French Culinary Institute, we were trying to make cocktails and dishes with the essential oils. And this was back when the schools still use styro cups. We still had Star Cup Styrofoam cups for like drinking coffee out of and whatnot. And we were done. We took a dropper and we put dropper in and it melted this Styrofoam cup. Are you there for that was to us? Yeah. So in other words, like to try it? Maybe Sure. I don't feel qualified to give you an answer. Now on the way out because I have a minute and 40 seconds I'm going to read you the introduction from the houseware story a history of the American housewares industry by Earl little sheet from 1973 made by the National housewares Manufacturing Association, who's managing director golf Zapple wrote this rather a breathless introduction. And this is the most over the top anyone's ever been when talking about housewares. This is back when it was still cool to ruin the environment and build as much stuff as humanly possible before the first oil crisis. The publication of the house where a story is one of the proudest accomplishments of the national house where Manufacturers Association and its 34 years of service to the American housewares industry. We're sure this lively and comprehensive history of a fascinating business were proved to be of great interest to all members of the industry, veterans and newcomers alike. We hope that further this important first will enrich their understanding of the industry and make them even more proud to be a part of the amazing conglomerate we call housewares. It was 1968 that the industry leaders then serving as nama directors determined that the time had come for someone to chronicle this American economic miracle that is housewares. Someone somewhere should write a history of this lusty, sprawling giant that has grown at ever increasing speed in the years since World War Two, reaching an annual volume of over $15 billion in 19 Seven Need to. They felt it was time that someone weave into words the narrative and industry, whose 1000s of manufacturing plants stretched from coast to coast and whose myriad products are found in every room in every home in the United States. No small job. The principal question confronting the Board of Directors was who that someone would be. But of course, the answer was obvious to all Earl lifts she a man who's experienced background and talent eminently qualified him to take on this major production. Fortunately for the housewares industry, Earl promptly accepted the commission of this exciting undertaking. He immediately began one of the most thorough and painstaking research tasks ever attempted, arose natural curiosity about anything and everything took over his journalistic intuition came into full play, and he was off on what was later described as the most stimulating challenge of his almost half century career of editorial and merchandising endeavors in the housewares industry. No one but those closest to him during these past four years can fully appreciate Earl's dedication to the detective work necessary to unearth the people the facts and the figures about an industry whose roots literally go back to the first man who cooked a piece of raw meat with a crudely improvised utensil, and no one will ever know the number of hours nor the amount of intense effort Earl poured into producing this sweeping history of a many faceted industry. The housewares story is of course dedicated to the 1000s of men and women who make up the housewares industry to those former and present manufacturers, representatives, buyers and trade press editors and others who've contributed so much to this book. Without their help. This thorough and comprehensive story could not have been written. The National housewares Manufacturers Association is proud to have played the initial role in the conception of this history of the American housewares industry. And we hope you will share our pride and take pleasure in the intriguing historical saga that Earl if she has woven in the house where story cooking issues