Archives Under "blog" (RSS)
The 6 Best Chef Blogs of 2008.
4 January 2009 | blog, faithful readers, food | 5 Responses
In 2008 I read a lot of shit on the internet. Some of that shit didn’t smell. Here’s a list of blogs that were time and time again good reading over the past year. My faithful readers should know about them. The components of a good blog are information, inspiration, visuals, and personality. Without these, it’s just words.
IDEAS IN FOOD -The single most engaging food blog on the web. The information and inspiration that this site provides is huge amenity to the food world. The frequent updates from this husband and wife teams blog entice my tongue and stretch my perceptions of what can be done with food. A recent post about short ribs still has me drooling. Check out their ideas on Foie Gras and Hot Ice Cream. Chefs Aki and Alex write a web column for Popular Science, called Kitchen Alchemy, and can also be followed on Twitter. They even appeared on Food Network. Congratulations to these two brilliant Chefs on their new baby!!
eggbeater- When you Google “Pastry Chef Blog” the first hit you get is eggbeater. Shuna fish Lydon a gift to this planet. Her words, so often, have spoken right to the heart of me; seen me. I have also learned a ton from her. Be sure to explore her recipes, read her posts on Chefdom, and Visit her Flickr page. You can check her out on Twitter, as well. From what I gather, she’s just moved to London, and is running a retail operation. I feel Shuna…I think that’s why I enjoy reading her blog so much.
Line Cook- high up in the rankings for Google search “line cook,” you’ll find this great blog. Intuitive musings about restaurant life, pictures of the good food at nopa in San Francisco, and just good reading. On a personal level I don’t know much about Line Cook’s author, I think his name is Richie. I know he owns a rabbit and writes this kick ass blog. He cooks delicious looking food. His writing has made me pensively reflect on my career, and wax poetic about where it will lead. He has a knack for describing kitchen situations vividly, using cook jargon fluidly. His post about pastry certainly struck a chord. I know Ruhlman, Shuna, and even Micheal Laiskonis all read, so your in good company. Read into the archives, you’ll find a lot of good stuff. This blog is creating a buzz on the web, and I couldn’t be happier. If you work in a kitchen, you should be reading this.
David Lebovitz- I have benefited greatly from this blog, as well as the man’s book The Perfect Scoop. His down to earth approach to writing and great recipes have given me great ideas. His Salted Caramel Ice Cream is one of my favorite recipes of all time. I’ve used it as a base for both raspberry and apple. He loves eating as much as I do I think, and writes about it often. He also lives in Paris, of which I am jealous. His site contains an extensive recipe section, blurbs about his books, and of course tons of great interesting content. He’s also tweeting like crazy, and who isn’t these days?
Ruhlman- The dog-eared copies of his book The Soul of Chef are passed around among cooks everywhere, seen almost as frequently as Kitchen Confidential. He sometimes judges Iron Chef America, was one of the judges of Next Iron Chef. He went on to write The French Laundry Cookbook with TK, and book with Eric Ripert from Le Bernardin. He has also written one of the most definitve volumes on Charcutertie, the art of cured meats. He latest book with TK, the eye-popping Under Pressure, I covet highly. As you might imagine, a blog written by this guy has got to be good. And it is. Frequently updated and packed with great recipes, insights, and pictures, it’s well worth the bookmark.
Michael Laiskonis- Last but not least, the blog of one of my personal heroes, the pastry chef at world reknowned Le Bernardin in New York, Micheal Laiskonis. His posts are always well written and packed with information and insight, as well as glimpses of whats it’s like at Le Bernardin. His desserts are amazing, and when he posts a recipe, I always pore over it repeatedly, trying to glean what it is to be a world class pastry chef. I have a special file on my computer for his recipes. Apparently, he was thinking of quitting the blog, but instead started a second one. His blog is a benchmark for Chef’s everywhere. Great photos, exceptional writing, profound insight and luminous inspiration.
So there’s my list peeps, hope you enjoyed it. Now go back to reading Reddit. Or Digg, if your one of those types.
FUCK!! part II: Snowboarding, Boredom, and Leftovers.
30 December 2008 | Ten 01, blog, cook, delicious, eating, real | 2 Responses
We lived in limbo for a few days, concerned about our kitchen. The broken water pipe had been connected to the restaurants heat system, which we really needed to open. The weather had taken a turn for the worse, and would soon prove to be one of Portland history’s most devastating storms. On Thursday around noon, after a morning of nail biting and pacing, my buddy Nate called me; “Let’s go night riding at Ski Bowl!” I had no excuse, he was offering me a free lift ticket. I called Perez to see if he wanted in, I knew he was going just as stir crazy as I was. The city of Portland had shut down; chain-slapping buses spun sporadicly in the falling fluff. We knew the mountain had been dumped on. We rallied around 4 pm to embark on a two and a half hour journey in Nate’s 78 VW Bus. We chained up around Rhododendron; the roads were getting nastier the higer up we got. Perez was periodically recieving phone calls from our bosses, keeping us posted about the restaurant. After much back and forth, we learned that we’d be closed until next week. Our concerns lifted, an icy updraft, when we saw the lights of Ski Bowl. Heavy snowfall blanketed the mountain, and we were soon strapped in and smiling. We drank PBRs as we ascended the lift, smiling and swinging. We raged the gnar for three hours or so, carving powder and bally-hooing to each other as we mached by. I missed the mountain life. Everything makes sense when you can carve powder turns. We finished our beers in the parking lot and headed home. The weekend went by slowly. The skies were gray the roads were gray and the snow that covered everything was gray. I felt the walls closing in; I lost myself in the web. I annoyed my dogs with guitar and no walks. I happily braved Tri-met to meet Chef and Perez on Sunday at the restaurant. I was prepping Tabla desserts and they were cleaning out the walk-in. We crammed all we could into our freezers, but a good amount of food was about to spoil. Not surprisingly, Perez and I immediately volunteered to cook and eat the food. It would be a crime of the highest order not to. A damn shame. We packed up what we could, and grabbing beer near 4th, caught a bus to my place. We hit the grocery to augment our booty. We drank and cooked and cranked music. We thrashed my little kitchen and dirtied every pot, pan and dish. We even fired up Old Blue. My fiancee was out of town so it seemed the thing to do. We cooked and ate, carrying on and finally enjoying a bit of this down time…by cooking. It made life feel semi-normal. Through all the bedlam, the food was there for us. We got back into the restaurant early in the week and re-prepped everything we had lost. Teddy put our kitchen back together. Christmas day came and went. The rains finally came and washed away the slush and snow, the city awoke. People mingled in the streets, then filled the seats in the dining room. Smiling servers ferried food to grinning guests. A storm had come, and in it’s wake a sharper image, clarity. I felt as if the people around me were looking at each other a bit different, feeling a warmer glow. I felt an in-the-trenches level oneness, a communal happiness to be back at work. Sometimes shit happens, and all you can do is dive in and swim.
Read Ideas In Food.
13 September 2008 | blog, creative presentation of the week, delicious, food porn | 3 Responses
If you aren’t reading IDEAS IN FOOD, my faithful readers, You should be. I look forward to their frequent blog posts. Food Porn in it’s purest form. Innovation through science. Pictured here is chicken skin crusted skate with rhubarb mustard, shrimp spaetzle, arugula and fresh bergamot. Chicken skin crusted!?! And what the hell is bergamot? Seriously, Cheers to you Ideas In Food Chefs. I want to eat your blog. How could I not? 32 preparations of Foie Gras? And what about Hot Ice Cream? Amazing stuff here guys. Best food in the Blogosphere. Look at this Torchon!!
