No Koi were harmed in the making of this blog post.
I saw this image and it, strangely, reminded me of my grandfather. That shouldn’t come as a surprise in its own, but what it did was bring me back to 40 years (or so) ago with the family sitting in my grandparent’s backyard having a bit of dessert after lunch.
It was a small bowl of vanilla ice cream and some canned peaches.
My grandfather looked and said, “Oh, goldfish. I like goldfish.”
I was horrified. And then I figured out the joke. He was a simple man, my grandfather, but he did like a few things that I can remember: boiled eggs in an egg cup, almond chicken at the local Chinese restaurant, a decent cup of tea…
I do love this photo. The sandwich was pretty good, as well. Question: Does a piece of food taste better because of where you eat it (in this case my in-law’s property on Christina Lake in British Columbia) or taste better because of what you eat it off of? (In this case, a vintage plate that was made, as my mother would say, “When God was a little boy.”)
Difficult to say. I know the crossword added to the enjoyment, as did the fact that I could eat it while wearing a damp pair of swimming trunks.
How do non-food factors influence how we enjoy (or not enjoy) the food we eat? Would this sandwich taste the same if it were eaten in a rush in the front seat of a car in a January rainstorm?
The ‘perfect’ amount of ground espresso – in this case, 18 grams. If only it were right in the middle of the portafilter. *sigh*
I’m still struggling to figure out all the commands in WordPress. Half of the time I get to a spot and have no idea how I got there and, more importantly, no idea how to get back. Stupid program. Why can’t they just make it for my way of thinking? Sheesh.
This is my second post about coffee. I wanted to write something clever about the ‘magic elixir’ or how amazing coffee is. I did write a bunch but it was so hard to figure out the drafts and the revisions I just had to give up and start again.
Right. Where was I? Coffee!
I’ll admit, I really like it, but it has occurred to me that the actual process of making an espresso adds a lot to my enjoyment of the drink. This may be a theme in my life that I’ll possibly explore ad nauseum in days to come, but for the time being, coffee is as much for me about the process as it is about the drink itself.
Perhaps that’s not quite accurate. Coffee is a really fickle pickle, to use a technical term. When people talk about the process they go though when making a cup of joe, coffee is one of the very few food items that demands that level of attention and respect and will reward you for being diligent and careful. Like baking pastries, careful counts.
Many years ago I bought a Rancilio Silvia espresso maker. I used it every day for 7 years and it taught me a ton about coffee. Careful pays off. A grinder is worth the money (to a point). When I moved from the Baratza Virtuoso that wore out after 6 years I switched to the Eureka Silencio. The improvement in the coffee was immediate. I was amazed. All of a sudden I understood why people would blow $1500 on a grinder.
I upgraded to a Rocket not that long ago, but that has more to do with my magpie nature (can’t resist shiny things) and my ability to rationalize many mechanical things (I am a photographer, after all) than it does with coffee.
Besides, getting a great shot out of the Silvia is way harder than the Rocket. The Silvia is a pretty badass machine.
But where I’m trying to go is to say that some things about coffee really matter: The beans, how fresh the grind is, quality of the water as well as the temperature of it will make a big difference in your coffee experience.
If you’re brewing espresso, the amount of coffee in the portafilter (in grams – get yourself a scale – you’ll need it in the kitchen, anyway) how hard you tamp the coffee and how long you run it through the machine also make a big difference in the extraction. The key is 2oz (60ml) of coffee in 25 seconds at the right temperature. Apparently a single-shot portafilter is for people more adept than I.
Naked (bottomless) portafilters, weighing the coffee once it has brewed and snippy comments directed at people who like to drink their coffee with sugar and have it to go are listed under the heading of ‘smoke ’em if you got ’em’.
Although I will admit that the reason why I hate naked portafilters so much is because your espresso technique is shredded by those things. I don’t mind having my inadequacies gently pointed out. I’m not a fan of them making a mess of my clothes.
https://dontcrowdthepan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Dont_Crowd_Logo_new-1.png00Alastairhttps://dontcrowdthepan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Dont_Crowd_Logo_new-1.pngAlastair2020-05-07 00:15:332020-05-13 18:26:39Coffee – first of many posts about coffee, I expect.
I have Jim Lahey’s book, My Bread as well as Apollonia Poilâne’s book, Poilâne. They are filled with all manner of recipes on how to make bread. Lahey has a bakery in New York; Poilane ships bread all over the planet from France, where they produce it.
My mother made bread every week for years. 8 loaves a week. It was a mixed white/whole wheat loaf, with lots of kneading and a very specific ‘route march’ as she would say. I grew up on it. It was great. But I’m not sure I can ask her for direction on making bread. I’m not sure why. Perhaps I just need to figure it out for myself. Perhaps I know better. I don’t know.
My grandmother was never good at bread. It’s a strange thing to say, given that I would have happily taken a bullet for her. She survived so much – Her name was Frances May Chambers. When she was born, her father was in France, and he was supposed to be home for May. Enough said. The story was that she couldn’t make bread well because she could make great pastry, and the techniques for good pastry (gentle, calm) didn’t translate well into bread (knead, aggressive).
I like to think I’m more like my grandmother than my mother when it comes to baking, and the reason why I struggle with bread is because I excel at pastry. Which is true, except for that last part. My pastry needs work, too. Lots of work.
My pizza dough sometimes works; other times it doesn’t. I use Beddia’s recipe from his book, Pizza Camp. It’s an overnight dough you raise in the fridge. And it’s always at least OK, but it’s rarely great. I have to take it out to rise on the counter for several hours, and I tend to use more yeast than what is called for. When it works, it’s great. But often it’s just… OK. My no-knead bread is coming along, but sourdough starter was a total failure and my most recent sandwich loaf was greeted with the reminder that I have other strengths.
A loaf that actually worked out all right.
Maybe I should talk to mom about bread. Couldn’t hurt.
https://dontcrowdthepan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Dont_Crowd_Logo_new-1.png00Alastairhttps://dontcrowdthepan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Dont_Crowd_Logo_new-1.pngAlastair2020-05-05 22:53:202020-05-08 19:30:34Bread, part one of probably a zillion
A few years ago we went for dinner at a local restaurant – lovely spot. I had a dozen kussi oysters all to myself. Strangely, my wife and kids weren’t interested. But to the title of this post, there was this shallot mignonette that was so tasty and what was amazing about it was how finely the shallot was chopped. We did a salad for lunch today and in the making of the dressing I was reminded – I need to chop my shallot more finely. It was too chunky by half.
So, this is all new to me. I wanted to just click a few things and start writing, but obvouisly that’s just not going to happen right away. Testing, testing…
https://dontcrowdthepan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Dont_Crowd_Logo_new-1.png00Alastairhttps://dontcrowdthepan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Dont_Crowd_Logo_new-1.pngAlastair2020-05-01 21:33:292020-05-01 21:33:46First Try. Not sure how to do this, but we’ll figure it out at some point.
