Hello, everybody, and welcome to a brand new series on heritage radio network called the culinary call sheet where we give a peek into the back kitchen of culinary media. I'm your host, April Jones,

and I'm your co host, Darren bresnitz. Part of why we started the show was to offer an unofficial mentorship for anyone who's interested in learning about all aspects of food and video, whether that's TV, social media online, or just something you want to do for fun.

Absolutely what was once niche or a little silly, as I'm sure you remember, Darren, when we started out, this man has now become such a massive playing field for so many creatives using food as the medium.

It's something that has driven us professionally and personally, for so many years. What excites me the most about this show is that we're going to sit down with some of the industry leaders to hear how they made it and what drew them into this industry.

With 20 years in the culinary production game ourselves. We're hoping we can give through these conversations an insider's view into personal stories from the field, as well as an in depth behind the scenes look into some of the most popular food programming. In today's evolving culinary media landscape.

We'll be covering everything from how to style your food, to how to license IP, to developing your own ideas, and some tips from the masters of how to host your own show.

Yeah, it's a little bit of conversation, how to and how do you do the things that you do in color media, which I'm so excited about? I love so many of the guests that are coming on this season. We have talent from Food Network from Vice media eater refinery 29,

we've met some of the best people in the world both in front of and behind the camera. And we're bringing them all together to share their stories, their delicious adventure and their unique journey into this crazy world.

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This piece was brought to you by Roberta's Roberta's pizza.com. You're listening to heritage radio network. We're a member supported food Radio Network broadcasting over 35 weekly shows live from Bushwick, Brooklyn, join our hosts as I lead you through the world of craft brewing behind the scenes of the restaurant industry inside the battle over school food and beyond. Find us at Heritage radio network.org

Hello, and welcome to cooking issues. Your cooking issues coming to you on the radio network every Tuesday from roughly 12 to roughly 1245 from Roberta's pizzeria in Bushwick join us this day is pissing me people because I'm effing with the microphone here because

I'm touching it you already broke it I did not break AC that epoxy on the shock mount that's because of you.

Why can't the mic point from the Why can't the back of the mic point down and the front of the mic point

up? It can if you loosen the screws properly. No Look why just twisting it

no no. The back cord you're just twisting osseous works.

So sit in her chair.

Oh hell no. Oh, hell no. Hell no. We're in the ongoing battle of the of the We Are the road crew. Let me oh, those screws. Oh my god that's of technical genius. Dave other this Wow. All that time. So easy. It was the technology days like don't touch the shock mount again. You jerk or it's gonna give you an electric shock. I wish would that be awesome? That would be so. So Robert Plant have made

a list of people that want to shock. Yeah.

Did you get electrocuted?

He got wicked electrocuted. They. They used to have non isolated equipment. And he was out playing I think in the rain was a plant or was adultery. One of those guys Dave Do you know?

I think it was Roger Daltrey. Actually, yes, adultery,

I think was Daltrey. Right, because he's spinning that microphone. Probably stressing the hell out of that XLR. Are they afraid? Yeah. And then it's just like, like rain. Like on a non isolate? Well, if they've ever played with like, really old amplifiers. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I used to have like a 1970s Vintage custom with a K. Vinyl upholstered like Eddie Munster style bass amp. And that mother that mother used to throw 120 volts across my across the barrels of my connectors like on the regular, so I would just be like, oh, like even just like normal without water. That old that old seven years equipment wasn't, you know, safe.

You know what I mean? I don't think it was.

wasn't about safe though.

wasn't about safe. It's about rock and roll right. Here are the hammer Lopes How you doing good. So this is not cooking really about getting out of the way. Now for those of you that and by the way, Johnny hunter is going to call in in a couple of minutes to

is this gonna be a fun personal story? No.

Well, Miss dassia Lopez hates hates hates country music, right? Yeah, she hates country.

Well, no, that's not true.

She met Merle Haggard. I was like so what? Literally, we flew to California to meet Merle Haggard did it for you. You meet like one of like the like the old time legends and you're like, man, but I did it for you. Anyways,

I don't like country music because Dave loves because he does this annoying thing, where every time there's a song that he likes. That's a country song plays. He will be like God, can you believe he she left him? Can you believe she left him with the kids and um, every

time I say Hey, Miss dasya Hey, like story songs. And the only thing she hates more than story songs is discussing story songs. He

discusses the same song

because it's the same story. It's like

any song any any song any song anyway, so there's like a turner. What's that one where the midnight train to Georgia? You're like, Why? Why is she gonna go back down with him when he's bringing her down? And she has a good job in New York and he wants to go back to Georgia. Like,

every way you put it on her.

I know. No. I'm saying she shouldn't give up her dreams. Just how good can this guy be? odds are they're gonna break up when they go back to Georgia anyway. They can't even afford the daytime train. It's no good. Anyway, that's not my point. But so she hates story songs. There's a famous David Allan COE song he didn't write write it but in which he jokingly tries to hit everything that a country music song is about. So it's it's trains, trucks, prison, drinking, Mama and rainstorms. So this one verse hits all of that, but I found and he did that on purpose as a joke. I found a song. It's hits almost everything that Stasi hates. It's by a guy named Johnny paycheck. Who the only song you might know by Johnny paycheck is the only home my mom ever raised. He also wrote I'm gonna take this job and take this job and shove it Oh, yeah. Anyways, so Johnny paycheck has a song that Anastasia hate more than anything. It's hyper Twinkie. Bad production value like white dude music already. She hates it. Then already done. It's a story song done, but get this get this. It's a story about him on a train. It's called Billy Jack Washburn. Right. And he finds this guy almost dead his whole bowling on a train when he gets out of jail. So that's everything right there. He's drinking. He finds this guy almost dead in a boxcar. He becomes like a father to him. Then the guy falls in between the trains and gets crushed and dies. He picks up the body only then does he look at the ID and finds out is his long lost brother. Yeah, like that. That's everything you hate. I'm gonna play it constantly and discuss it and discuss the contrary of your like this. Can you believe? Discuss how he knew it was in his own brother.

It will go into the guy's life

was the man the guy says he hasn't been home in 22 years doesn't even know he has a brother. What are the freakin odds at 22 years later? He's on the tracks and he becomes a mentor to his own brother. Whatever yawns What are the odds it's

like an ESPN like play by play but every time the song comes out

oh my god by the way, I don't know how to find it people but the Seattle one of the Seattle play by play people right? Did a play by play of a drunk person trying to break into a truck with a broom handle. Or at the end he like falls off of a roof. It's it's the funniest like sports play by play ever. The Stasi is very angry by the way that the Pats look?

No I am not really

nobody likes the Patriots. This

one a lot. Do you want a lot?

Did you cook anything for the Super Bowl? Winners? Did

I did chili?

What kind of Chili Chili Cheese Anastasia doesn't

Brady wouldn't eat that because he doesn't eat nightshades That's true.

That's the dumbest thing I've ever seen thinks

that if you drink enough water you don't need sunscreen. That's so stupid as the male goop

He's He's a moron. Like the fact that matter is he's wearing a helmet all the time and like full body armor for playing football. Maybe that's why he thinks he doesn't

even he's not he's wearing a Make America Great Again hat. So listen,

my point is is it doesn't eat nightshades so no potatoes. Isn't he also a vegan? Yeah. What the hell does he eat? He's not going to eat potatoes which are semi related, right? tomatoes,

eggplant, tobacco, eggplant.

I mean, just like goopy pushes this whole lifestyle that you need to have a lot of money to actually live. What when it's when it's Paltrow pseudoscience Her name is goop? No she her company. Oh, she has a company called goop you don't know about this? I feel like I explained it to him. I feel like you would rail against it.

I'm willfully ignoring it because apparently Anastasia has explained it to me. And I must be willfully ignoring its exist. Since you know what I mean, but I don't like Yeah. As people who listen to the show for a long time knows Anastasia does not actually make chili Anastasia makes tomato.

Yeah, but what I did is I bought that powder that McCormick chili What

the hell's wrong with you? And how would you use that you know, making chili is so freakin easy like making chili all you need are dried chilies some tomato products cumin a couple other spices garlic in me you know onions What the hell

then I hit the pack deep into my trash before my friends came

but that's so ticket well least thank Christ your your chili had come in and it which you don't normally

and I made Philly cheese steaks.

I love the Okay, how do you do it? What how do you

have these bags of cvwd steak

from whom?

That's a little too fancy for you to stick. Somebody.

Somebody who you shall not name? Voldemort. Voldemort major. How are those?

Good provolone,

provolone.

Yeah. All right. That's legit. It doesn't have to be Wiz. I say that as a Philadelphia.

Okay. Yeah, so I here's something I will say that is not standard not approved. But I like anyway when I make cheese steaks. I'm a Greer guy. Huh? Nancy? Oh, yeah, now, Dave too fancy can't make cheese steaks with Dave sort of know half French half Gump.

Johnny is on the line.

We got Johnny Hunter on the line. I got to find the stasis questions. Hold on a second. Hey, John. How you doing? How's it going up there in Madison. This is Johnny Hunter the underground meets underground food and basically anything that you can like make our age underground. Johnny hunter will do. Have you ever actually aged anything underground?

That made anything underground?

Yeah. Have you ever left? Like sharp or any area? What

we'd like? I mean, I mean, we've buried festivals to ferment them and such, but how was it? Good? Yeah, kind of.

Never made it underground. We've

done like the whole like whole pig.

Oh, cooking in the underground. Sure. You know what the thing is? Like, is it really advantageous? Or is it just fun to do? Because I mean, it's hard to control the temperature of the earth. You know what I mean? Like

it's just a fun thing to do.

Yeah, all right. Yeah, I buy that. You know what, like, as I'm getting older, I'm okay with things that are just fun except for in the new bar. I'm having Johnny see what you think I'm having a like a vicious like almost drawing blood coming to blows argument over ice in cocktails. That we'll get into it later when we actually open the bar. I'll have done Leon we'll have Jack and we'll just discuss the merits and demerits of ice and the Stasi is like scooting across the

there's a SpaceX launch at 130 I need to charge my phone.

The Stasi is charging her phone instead of listening to Johnny. I don't know how that makes you feel anyway. Oh, there's a yeah, there's a huge rocket launch later today. That apparently is like some sort of deep space equivalent. And everyone knows the Stasi as a huge fan of the musk Family Robinson, they're

shooting a Tesla in space or something.

What happens when you do that?

What happens if it re enters the atmosphere and crushes the city?

Where's the charging station in space?

No, it's just gonna get in the orbit.

Why would you want a car in space?

Cool. Like what eventually come crashing down to earth again,

now burn up, burn up. You got to design it to burn up. You know what I mean? It's like, it's like, although, like old school. The thing is, like when you throw like, like big objects into space now everyone on earth has to track that sucker and be like, let's not hit that and when we launch something, I mean it's kind of like a real it's a real pooping on everybody's like, it's like the you know, it's like pooping on somebody else's lawn. Really? You don't I mean, mean? I want a Tesla and Stasiuk you know this, the Stasi is going to take delivery of a Tesla sometime in the summer you

didn't line. It sounds like I'm rich but I waited in line for the $1,000 deal to be to preorder your Tesla and

those people by the way, Anastasia like makes all of these stories I can't I can't afford cable. I don't deserve kid

you guys must have sold a billion Sears

Oh, jesus Sears is back off stock again. It's so irritating people. Like I can't control it and Stasi and I have a set of we have a a bunch of them coming in, that we will own and that we will sell in a month and Amazon. I don't know what people I want you to know. Amazon is literally Jeff Bezos spends all of his time making Superbowl commercials right now. And not enough time worrying about what the hell's going was terrifying. Right. Wait, they lost they lost lost lost over 1000 Sears hauls that by the way they have not paid us for true or false. True. Well, we paid for them. We paid we we pay paid customers angry at us even though we've paid Amazon not paid week. Alright, so Johnny, this is why you're on someone, somehow a question came in to for the show that you did. And somehow it didn't make it through. So I'm going to read it now. You ready? Yep. fairly new to charcuterie. So I was excited about the

question just to let you know what I sent him the question, so he knows that too. Oh,

well, I have to read it anyway. Because the people who you know, aren't Johnny, are you? Okay? I'm fairly new to charcuterie. So I was excited to hear about a potential hearing focused episode. Well, we're doing the you know, we're doing the extended extended because I was an extended episode, which I think people enjoy Johnny

got a lot of really positive feedback on that. Yeah, extensions are

always the best. For some reason. We're sitting there like, you know, eating pizza, just talking garbage. Anyway, below are a few questions I have. I've included pictures of my hearing chamber, which I can't see here and my pin Chetta although, okay. I don't know it doesn't matter because people on the radio can't see it. So it doesn't matter. It could be a picture of a goat or it could be a picture of SpaceX doesn't matter because people want space.

Why did you see the photos?

Yeah, I see the photo. All right, if you scroll down the

chamber has a simple PID for temperature and a humidifier is outside the chamber on a humidity controller. There's an IP 50 cent by the way IP 57 people is just like a splash splash and dust reading kind of thing. fan on the same controller up at the polls dehumidified air I added a shoe to guide the mist yada yada so it's you know, it's not a it's a fairly well set up. It sounds like a fairly well set up system.

The fan brings major props to Tom on setting up a really nice chamber.

Yeah, right fan brings in fresh his basement air and allows the chamber to be uncluttered. I didn't want to refill the humidifier. So it's plumbed into my waterline with copper. I mean, that's, that's badass right there. And a float

to come set up my new chair and shaper. Facility.

Yeah, Tom, you but what you got to do is you gotta like, like, rent yourself out now. Because the truth of the matter is, Tom, that people who look and you know, Johnny, you tell me the majority of people who do this for a living, don't have time to go find a float switch. And like take copper lines, and plug it in and get it all working. So if you want, like I don't, then unfortunately, chefs don't have a lot of money, but they will buy this stuff. If you show up and set this up. They will give you free whatever for like a long time you'll be like become like, you know, most valued customer, you'll get like free craps. It's very easy if you have a skill like this to trade this skill for free dinners. My right Johnny.

Yeah. So Tom, give me a call.

Okay. Questions? How important is it to measure the that he says Aw, for those who don't know what that is? That's water activity. I don't know why it's a W and not wa but a capital A little W stands for the water activity? And I'll read the question. And then I'll say something and then I'll let John talk about how important is it to monitor water activity is weight accurate enough, I'd like to adjust the humidity early indicator based on moisture content to prevent case hardening. So what that what that means is, is if you try to dry meats to quickly you dry out just the surface and the inside stays very wet. And that messes with the cure for the entire time. It's like it's, it's a big, it's a big problem. So that's why you really want to regulate humidity and not try to quickly anyway. But we'd like some data behind it. Ideally, I'd have continuous data logging of the moisture or weight but I'm not sure if that feasibility if water content is the best bet any equipment recommendations. Okay, now, I'm gonna stop here, I'm gonna say my piece of my Johnny go. Water activity. Without specialized equipment is extremely difficult to measure. Most commercial sausage producers are measuring I believe, water activity, old school measurements for ham are done by weight just because it's the only thing that's easily feasible, but you do have to worry about case hardening. Now, what are your thoughts, Johnny?

Well, that was what I was gonna say is that, you know, weight doesn't necessarily mean that there's not loose water in the product. And that could potentially lead to some sort of bacterial growth that you were seeing. So what I would say though, a couple of things, one doing the whole muscle like pancetta is less dangerous than doing something like sausage. Because you're not having to grind step. Right. The second thing is, I think you can just take visual cues as to whether or not the product turned out. So if you, if you recognize case hardening in the product, then that's the problem that smells off and it's too soft or moist at any point. I'd be worried about that. The only question I had was whether or not he uses nitrates here because botulism would be the one thing that would make me a little bit concerned with the roll up pinch.

Right? I mean, one thing I would I you know, like I'd like you to talk about this for a second if I go to the second part of the question, but I think something that people kind of need to go back to the basics on is kind of the two things one, the concept of multiple hurdles. And second is like knowing where They're not you're riding on the edge. Right? So like, if you're, if you're in industry, you know, consistency is the most important thing. You know, there's safety first, then consistency afterwards. And so monitoring, and also, they're pushing the limits of trying to do things as fast as possible. So they need to get there the water activity measured. Because you know, it's consistent, you know, the answer is blah, blah, blah, right. But if you, you know, if you aren't acting that way, if you're not living at the edge of the envelope of safety, right, you have multiple hurdles protecting you. So Johnny points out nitrates, nitrates are going to protect against botulism, right. Also, most people when they're curing, non whole muscle cuts are letting it ferment to a way lower pH than is necessary very, not that many people are going for that like super sweet, super low acid, although I do enjoy those sausages, right. So you know, you have your nitrates, and nitrates, you have your, your acid from your initial ferment. And then most people are also drying it more than is necessary. And probably have the one thing that they people probably do mess with in the wrong direction, I would say is the salt. But like when you have like those, all of those multiple hurdles, the chance that any one thing is going to screw you, I think is relatively low. Now, if you're doing a minimally dried product that is, you know, not been fermented and it has a, you know, if you take away a bunch of those hurdles, well, now you got to start worrying. I mean, what do you think, Johnny?

Yeah, I mean, if he was pulling something out, that would look too wet, and he wasn't using nitrates. And you know, it smelled off, you know that, then you start to get concerned. But if you know the correct Saltine, and the time that allowed for selfies, and if he's following the recipes from the books that he mentioned later, then I'm not too worried about it, the one thing I was going to mention is you can get a third party to test the water activity if you really are concerned. And that can happen at most any food safety lab or you can send off product and it's like a $30 test.

I had this idea. John, are you ready for this idea? And I was never able to get it to work. But tell me whether you're ready because I think I think this could work. So the water activity, right? You should shouldn't you be able, because the water activity is measuring kind of like how much free water there is in in a product. Right? So something that people don't think about is they they think for instance, it's something that thickens things lowers the water activity, not true. Not true at all. Right? So like gels and anything you add that all it's doing is making it appear like the thing is drier isn't actually reducing the water activity. Right? But shouldn't it be maybe it's not. And I've been told it's not. So it must not be but I tried wants to take samples of known water activity, seal them in vacuum bags, and then throw throw them into a vacuum chamber and see whether if you put a an unknown sample in, whether the like, Okay, so the one that's driest puffs last everyone knows anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, when you put a sealed vacuum bag into a vacuum chamber. At a certain point, the the interior vacuum level of the bag of the chamber is such that the moisture in your bag will start evaporating off the surface of your food, and the bag will inflate like a pillow. Right. And that I believe is related directly to the water activity of the product. So it would seem that as long as all the temperatures were the same that you'd be able to take, let's say a series of known water activities and bags, throw them into a vacuum chamber as like an indicator and then throw in your sample bag and then see, you know, oh my sample plus in between these two, so it must be at that isn't Don't you think that should be possible, Johnny?

I mean, that makes sense. To me. My only thought is is you had heart. He's hurting at any level then that could potentially like make your perception off on what's puffing and not

right. You'd have to slice it whatever. Like the sample that's in your vac bag. You'd have to like slice it up. But I don't know why that wouldn't work. I think someone told me once they didn't think it would work, but I don't know why that wouldn't work. You know, maybe, yeah, maybe someone here can talk about but do you have something to test that stuff? Or do you just go based on weights? Yeah,

we bought a we bought a water activity meter. And so every one of your if you're doing any commercial production, you have to do it. So

and the way those work, right? It's you have a little chamber you seal it in the chamber, you lit it Aquila braid, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? How long does it take to test? Five minutes? So it's not so bad. But how much is that piece of question.

The other thing since he's not making sausage just to think about is that he does if he would want to use a pH meter and it might even be worthwhile to get the pH on the on the product because you do still have issues. They'll stability factor that matters with pH plus water activity,

how much of a drop you're gonna get on a whole muscle cut?

During probably, I mean meats naturally around five, six, so you probably dropping down to five, three.

Right? So it's a lot, which is significant, right? Because everyone remember, every single hole number in PAH is tenfold is a tenfold increase in, in free hydrogen?

Yeah, yep. So the second part of this question was on the book series,

right? Let me just read what he said. So people know what literature is worth reading, what literature worth reading is there that I might not find on Amazon. I've read charcuterie, home production of quality meats and sausages, and I'm working my way through the art of making fermented sausages. The more technical, the better. Though, the Maryon, ski books may have already I've optimized bringing technical instruction to the home producer. What do you think?

Yeah, so my favorite Chuck Berry book that I read, kind of starting off was the cooking by hand by Pablo trollee, which has like, some really great essays, I think, on sausage making and meat processing.

all around great books. No, in general. Yeah. On mentality, you know, I mean, on mentality of cooking and caring about things. Great book, do people still read that book?

I mean, I still use it. I go back to it, because he just has a lot of really good information. So his section on on sausage and stuff, I think is some of the best fundamentals of explaining how to make a product and how kind of environment effects the drawing.

Right. The only but I mean, I haven't read it in a long, long time. Do you have looked at it recently, but it's, it's it's getting to be about 15 years old, right. That book came out before the original. Simon's Ruhlman charcuterie book did at a time when the only available reference that normal people could get at a bookstore. This is prior to you know, Amazon, frankly, I think or around the time that came out was right tech, who tosses the sausage maker if anyone remembers that old tome. So it was kind of one of the lone voices in the wilderness in English on how to make, you know, that wasn't a very expensive, professional book that you could get so and it still holds up all this time later.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's, it's, I mean, it's better than the Roman.

Wow. Right. You know, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna go there. Because, you know, my old my old editor is, you know, is the editor of that book? And so yeah, I never didn't say anything ever against Maria gonna Shelley production ever. Because, you know, lightning, the sky will open and a lightning bolt will go through my head and strike me dead.

I mean, I think the Ruhlman book was an important book because it was the first one out there. I just think.

Right? The first one out there that Well, again, there was a sausage maker. But the thing is, like so much of that data is like in the sausage maker. Like I just don't trust you remember that book you ever see even see that book? picture of him on the front was

like a copy floating around for a while. And it was, there's a lot of wrong things in it.

First of all, like I love like the attitude of that guy. The guy was from upstate New York and the company still exists that you know, he's passed away. I think maybe one of his sons runs the company now. The dude, hard smoked everything. The guy wanted everything to taste like your boss. You're basically he's like you give him any recipe. He's like, how can I make this recipe tastes like kielbasa. You know what I mean? That's that's basically do remember this, Johnny? I don't know if you remember the book at all? Yeah, that was it. I was like, Whoa, man, you're throwing some hard smoke on that brother. You know what I mean? And I was like, it was. Yeah. Interesting, interesting book there.

The other thing I was wanting to point towards, as far as resource goes is there's a couple of Facebook groups that are pretty useful. And I can I'll tweet out links to those ones later. People want to know,

yeah, do it. Tweet, tweet, tweet. I don't know whether Dave, what's the best way to do this? Put it on, just have him tweeted on his. So what's your Twitter handle?

Were Johnny Hunter,

and tag tag heritage radio or tag cooking issues or something like that. I'll

tag you in heritage radio. So

now all of a sudden, now you're running out of all your characters. So I don't know. You know, I don't know what you're gonna do with that. By the way. Now, you know, Madison, Wisconsin is like, somewhat close to Canada. Right? So yeah. Do you have you ever and I know it's not like, you know, you have to go over to Toronto and whatnot. But have you ever done a peameal bacon? Canadian? If you made a good one? Yeah. I love that stuff. Why is no one in America sell the real stuff? Why do we have that horrific? See, I think I've said this before on the show. It's one of those things where you know, Americans like to poke fun at Canadians, right? And like, but they shouldn't do it by passing off that crap they sell in the US as Canadian bacon because that's, that's not like poking fun and so on a that's a bad product and be it slanderous to the actual product. You know what I mean?

Yeah, in the female bank, it's super easy to make. Yeah, she is just like a lawyer along this line, a little bit of cure.

Now, are you a cornmeal on your Peameal? Bacon? Are you a premium on your Peameal? Bacon guy?

I mean, I think the female is kind of the traditional.

I had a sandwich or that the last time I was in Toronto, and I was like, oh, man, I feel bad. All the insults over all the years that I've leveled at this product have been misplaced. So finally, Tom wrote, are there lesser known whole cuts that I should be considering for dry cure? I have access to a butcher that breaks down whole animals, so anything's on the table.

Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, you can care quite a bit with a pig. But the one thing that I think people might have a good time with is a spec, which is using the sirloin which is a pretty cheap cut and easy to cure and gets a lot of the ham flavor and a lot less time.

Do you are you a fan of the heavy Juniper on that? I know I am. Yeah, for sure. Do you believe in keeping your spec flat? Or do you roll that thing?

Or we keep it flat? Either slice?

I like it flat too. I like it flat and presser. Oh, by the way, I shouldn't say this. But Johnny, have you been on Amazon? Prime Video? And have you looked up the Hormel video?

Before I have it? Oh,

I mean, I shouldn't say but it's good. I think the museum might do a thing on it. You know, like some sort of a program based around it. But everyone needs to go on their Amazon Prime account. I like how I'm pushing Amazon even though we hate them. Whatever. They whatever I've like I said like they're terrible to sell to but they're awesome to buy from. I'm conflicted. I'm of two minds. There is a video Johnny, you must watch it as soon as you hang up. It's a 30 minute video from the I think mid 60s was the very last point in time when it was cool to be industrial meat production. And so there's two kids watching trains go by two extremely white children. Watching trains go by me and like, look at all those Hormel cars. You know what I mean? And they're like, and then they're like, maybe, maybe dad will take us to the Hormel plant. So they write a letter to Hormel, a woman because all the secretaries of course are women, opens the letter and arranges for the family. Of course the even though the mom is involved, the dad takes him to the Hormel plant. Of course, it is, it is, you don't actually see them sticking the pigs and the cows but from the minute they're bled out, you see like the automated knife that cuts the pigs in half. You see like the bacon press, you see like this person who all they do all day is uh, is bone hands. There's a guy with a face trimmer so like, it trims off of the or actually I guess off the backside you know trims off the outside skin of the hammer on the top side, and he's got an automatic machine so he's literally rolling the hands through like ripping the skins off, it shows you the skin being turned into gelatin. It so shows you the skin being sent off to make footballs out of it shows stripping the skins off of cows. It shows the flushing the cow hide. It shows making spam. It shows testing SPAM for fat content with like, like a lexical analyzer. Do the children like look at the Hormel plan? It shows making Dindi more beef stew, it shows cooking things in Cannes, it shows an entire the entire industrial operation of turning pigs and cows into anything that pigs and cows can possibly even aid of in a zero waste phenomenon. There's a guy who's burning out the hams for their bone pressed hands. And the guy is like the guy is like freaking like the Zen monk. Like he just his hands like move like he's swimming through water, but instead he's just taking the bones out of hands. And it's miraculous until you realize that all this man did 24/7 And during his work time was bone hams. It's like Simpsons like Bart Simpson in that episode where they're trapped in Japan he's like knife goes in fish. guts come out knife goes in guns come out. It is it is with you must watch it as a piece of Americana as a piece of if you're pro or anti industrial agriculture. You must see it for that. You must see it for a slice of like mid century like American mentality. The gender relations stuff in it is intense. Because there are these there's a 60 something year old woman working the line packing. Get this Hormel wieners into packages right and this entire line of women who are like making sure that these packages line up. They're all referred to and associate does this uniformly referred to as girls. I'm just seeing girls put the wieners into the package, the 60 year old woman there and then later on there is a person who is a woman that they feel has actual skill whereas a skilled job the only such woman in the entire thing actually there's one woman scientist she's a woman. She's the one Then what does this feel? I forget what her I forget what her skill is, doesn't matter. What does it matter? What does it matter, but and then at the end, it's like look at Hormel technology. And then they have like these 1960s computers with a giant reel to reel tapes. And they're like, We can print our entire payroll in like an hour. So you must watch this if you're interested. Oh, and the reason I brought this up is they show they don't have a ham present. They show it but they do show the bacon press. So they show like the bacon sides going in. They show the needles they saw like the continuous needling of the bacon sides as they go through. And then they show it being pressed into it's bacon shape. Oh, my Johnny, if you really want to just be like drool. They show the rotary slicing knife for slicing the bacon into sliced bacon. And just like like bacon slices coming out. It is intense. They show the spam cookers. I mean, it's about the coolest half hour of what the hell that you can watch for free on Amazon Prime video. Have I sold this to Johnny?

No, I'm so excited. Yeah,

I think Dave, we need to take a break so you can collect yourself.

All right. All right, Johnny. Thanks so much for calling in. Hope to see you soon. We'll be back in a couple minutes with more cooking issues

My name is Brandon boy, co owner of Bluebird as a super duper awesome place. The furnace is a very, very, very, very proud sponsor of the Heritage radio network. We're also super awesome. Thank you heritage.

All right. All right. So that music that they're playing there is actually what they play lunch music and the pizza cooking place like literally like that mixture of drag racing and like space guns and like metal a little metal heavy. Not like not like metal like not metal in the sense of like, not like glam metal. Not like long hair. I mean they have long hair, but not like glamorous metal more like like lots of double bass drum pedal. Like lots of you know, like, just like anger shouting. Yeah, you know,

we're gonna call it mosh pit. Yeah,

my masters aren't always like that. Anyway. Caller you're on the air.

Hey, Dave. I had a sausage question for Johnny. But if we've lost him, I lost my request.

Yeah, I don't know. I think he's not on anymore. So yeah, sorry, but but he might still be listening. So if you ask it, he might tweet a response to you.

I'm trying to sort out how to make the Chinese style that song sawfish Is there any way to do those without a long slow drive? Or is that just built in?

I don't know Johnny, if you're still listening tweet that tweet that I sent out on the on the Cooking issues and we got a loan open. What or a callback Yeah, so what's your what's your non Johnny Hunter related question?

I'm trying to do I'm trying to get a fried noodle to puff

Okay. Hasn't hasn't already been fried? Are you talking about like ramen.

So I'm making I'm making a fresh egg noodle and then deep fried. And they come out really crisp and crunchy and otherwise good but they're just a little too dense and I would like him to just expand a little bit.

Here's what you got to do. The trick is anytime you're puffing, what you need is you need to turn the well starch in the case of pasta, gelatin in the case of gelatin collagen in the case of pork skin or or chicken skin or fish skin. Well you got to do is you got to fully gelatinous that stuff. And then you want to dry it uniformly uniformly. To a I forget what the percentages are but a relatively low moisture I'm making this number up I don't know 10% The way you do it is you just like when it looks glassy again. Then as soon as it gets glassy, it's usually good. If you go further than that it won't puff anymore. So the trick is you want to cook your pasta, cook it in water. The reason not to fried at this point is because you're trying to keep the structure of the pasta relatively intact if you fry it now the water will leave and the places where the water is will no longer be places that will expand when you have puppet later get me so then what you do is you cook it the longer you cook it the better although it starts to fall apart but the longer you cook it the better. I will cook it with some salt in the water so that it has some flavor. Then spread it out and let it lead Dry even just like letting it dry almost naturally is good enough if you turn it, turn it once or twice, but like low oven with the door open best is like low temperature and Excalibur dehydrator. And if you want to, you can push the dehydration a little quicker, like you can keep it up at like 130 for an hour or two to flash off some of the water, and then drop it down to like 110 115. And just let it ride until it gets like I said just gets glassy, this also works with rice. It works with wheat, barley, anything anything like this, then once it's at that state, you just throw it in the deep fryer or microwave it or use a heat gun for paint, and they'll puff but the trick is cook preferably overcook par dry, and then fry. And you can tweak it

to go somewhere to cozy Thank you very much.

Yeah, and you can tweak it right. So depending on how much water you leave in the product, or depending on how much structure is left in it by how much you cook, you can make it harder or puffier you can get it anywhere from barely expanded to like, you know, like almost like like pork rinds from a package even with pasta. So Anastasia knows she had to deal with this, like week after week at at the French culinary and old school. If you go on the old cooking issues blog, which might still be available somewhere on the internet, maybe on the archive or something. There's a there's a whole post on puff snacks, which kind of goes over the parameters back when I'd actually studied them. So I'd take a look at that. All right, let's know how it works out.