Food and Drink

Two of the igniters on our stove don't work (they haven't for 6 years) and we either need to replace the stove or get it fixed (before my mom or someone else burns down the house). [Right now, we just light the stove by hand but if you try to do a low simmer on the front burners sometimes they go out and don't relight on their own.] I think the one we have is a Dacor Classic 30" (natural gas). I have no clue how old it is. Does anyone know some brands that are known to be the most reliable (I don't like to fuck around with gas and electricity). We were looking at the Dacor Renaissance 30" but I am wondering if Dacor is so reliable. Some people seem to mention W…

http://www.americanbeerclassic.com/who.php Basically I get 48 tokens to sample stuff! Feel free to share your recs!

Today I decided to buy a slightly better Balsamic Vinegar than my usual: Leonardi "gold seal" It is fantastic. I know this isn't the super great fancy expensive stuff but it is still good. My read into balsamic is that the very expensive stuff is very sweet and only to be used for desserts. This seems to be pretty thick and sweetish with enough bite that it can still be used for salads with good olive oil. What is your favorite balsamic and what you use it for? I am now very curious about buying some "tradizionale" balsamic vinegar but don't know where to start. I guess I should find a place that has tastings.

Spoiler alert: I can't. Compared some $5 and $10 bottles of vodka that have been in my liquor cabinet for at least 10 years to Grey Goose, and I'll be damned if I can tell the difference. I had heard years ago that most people can't differentiate premium vodkas from something like Smirnoff, so I just Googled it. All kinds of funny articles about it where vodka snobs got shut down consistently, when drinking it naked/nude (whatever the hell they call it when you drink it straight). I especially liked the article where the tester poured the same vodka in 6 different glasses in the 3rd round of testing, and all of the participants were busy making inane comments about the …

Because some of us are really into this horizontal stout release. http://www.fiftyfiftybrewing.com/2012Futures.pdf

Sadly, not served in the taxidermied corpses of small animals..... http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2012/10/24/scottish-brewer-unveils-brewmeister-armageddon-world-strongest-proof-beer/ I really have to wonder how GOOD this actually would taste.....

Since Karen will be running The Chicago Marthon on Sunday, I will be chilling HERE on Saturday evening. I invite anyone who has the evening free to join me.

This is just a long shot idea that would take some serious work(sheep herding), planning, and cash, but I figure I would present it any way. We should make a Head-Case wine. I'm sure the serious wine-o's here know about www.crushpadwine.com but for those that don't, check out the website. We could have a mini meet around the production of the wine and possibly another around the bottling. It also helps that we have a somewhat large group of members in that area. Of course it would take a serious cash outlay for those involved for a wine of unknown quality but I still think it might be worth looking into. Discuss.

Just a friendly reminder - https://plus.google.com/events/chi786mll4pi8b25nfre1scakcs

Did my first, hopefully annual, crawfish boil yesterday. It was a busy day of cooking, 140lbs of the little buggers, but tons of tasty fun. Good call on the limes Dan! Cleaning them up Ready to cook Cooking Time to start eating Don't bother me when I'm stuffing my face Our sole survivor. Found him crawling toward the liquor cabinet.

I'm headed to Chicago next week and I'm looking for a few places to eat. I won't be driving so they'll have to be accessible by train/cab. I'm looking for somewhere for a nice Saturday lunch date. Around $100 for 2 without alcohol should be fine. I was thinking the RL restaurant (which I heard was good from a friend) and The Purple Pig. I'd have loved to gone to the Girl and the Goat but it's not open for lunch. Any suggestions? I'm also looking for a few places for casual dinner with friends. Under $30 per person. Cafe Iberico sounded intriguing. Sushi Wabi or Coast Sushi Bar. Longman and Eagle but I doubt we could find a seat. de Cero sounds interesting.

Apparently, I'm the only one of us going...but, rather than subject y'all to a bunch of random comments in the drinking thread, I figured I'd go ahead & start my own... Here are some of the known details courtesy of http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com/:

What barware do you use? I'm looking for a good set.

Pretty stupid request I know. Apparently my brother is trying to help his friend who is buying a bottle for his wine geek brother. I have no other preference details besides maybe a bordeaux or californian vintage. Not sure why people make these kinds of poorly thought out extravagant gifts. Feel like it's similar to if my brother asked a headphone audiophile what they think is awesome and they say Grado PS1000 and he gets me a Grado PS1000. That being said... that's the gift givers problem not mine I guess. Said I'd ask though so here I am Throw out whatever you'd get if you won 500-600 bucks in a lotto and felt like blowing it on a bottle of wine. Thanks in advan…

So a couple of you have purchased whiskey rocks, which got me to thinking about better things to use with more thermal mass. I came up with the idea of 1 gram pure .9999 silver bars. Or gold plated pure copper balls. What you think?

I was at my mother's some time ago, and remembered that my stepfather (long since passed away) had some old liquor bottles in an armoir in her basement. I found several botttles of scotch and one cognac there. Was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on them. Worth bringing to a H-C meet? Literally, the only one I had ever heard of was Pinch....and the Ambassador is labelled the "lightest scotch in the world." The others are VAGUELY familiar, but most likely because I had seen them previously in the armoir. Please take a look, and any thoughts/opinions appreciated. Going to do some innernet searches as well...... Thanks! Todd.

Yes. Yes it is. Anvil # 97 Whiskey Skin The Anvil list calls for Scotch but I used Irish Whiskey to compare to the Toddy since the only difference is the lemon rind aka skin. (Use small bar-glass.) Take 1 lump of white sugar. 1 small wine-glass of Irish whiskey. 1 small piece of lemon-peel. First rinse the glass with hot water, put in the sugar, fill the glass half-full of boiling water, add the whiskey and stir. Serve with a spoon. No you are not having Deja-vu. It is pretty much the same drink as the toddy with the addition of the lemon rind. There is no spoon.

So, I have an idea for a new thread. Basically, I'm going to be playing bartender for an upcoming bachelor party. What I want to do is to make up a small drink menu, where the names of the drinks are somehow related to my buddy. He's a English PhD with research on Lovecraft, who is converting to Catholicism and enjoys fencing and Japanese culture. So, we'd either throw out drinks that would fit the genre (i.e. Lucien Gaudin Cocktail) or a name of a cocktail that doesn't exist, and people would work up a recipe that matched the name, which is either an original cocktail or somehow modified. Okay! So, the first name would be 'French Letter' and then someone would post…

A friend of mine in denver was telling me about his neighborhood tradition, and I thought it was a good one. Candy for the kids, shots for the parents. Just have a few shot glasses and a bottle of your favorite libation available for the parents who are walking around in the cold. It'll make their night!

From the Piddle Brewery, Dorset, that is. Recently when driving through the picturesque and amusingly named village of Piddletrenthide I saw a van similar to this. Subsequent investigation revealed the existence of the Dorset Piddle Brewery and their amusingly named collection of Beers. They certainly know how to work a theme. You can even get They even have merchandise They have even made it into a sorbet So, do you fancy a Piddle, then?

I would like to make margaritas for a 4th of July BBQ we are having on Monday. As much as I like my guests, I don't think I want to use $50 tequila in their margaritas (just because I don't really think they would appreciate it). Any recommendations for budget "party" margarita tequila? Let's say under $35. I was thinking maybe El Tesoro Platinum ($35) or Cazadores Blanco or Reposado ($23/$27). I have had these in bars but don't remember them that well. Any suggestions?

A huge thanks again to Al and Claire for making such a great afternoon possible. What a double-whammy of cooking skills to boot! And thanks to everyone for coming and making it a night to remember. Claire's lovely blueberry pie cools near an open window Strip after strip of uncured applewood smoked bacon adorns the tenderloin Even more bacon hits the pan...destined for desert Grahame tucks the chocolatey bacon goodness into the deep freeze... ...and proceeds to reap the benefits of being the chocolatier Mikey's high-proof stash isn't taking prisoners Conversation heats up as the bacon cooks (…

I'm in LV for one day. Could somebody please recommend a good and interesting place for breakfast? Thanks in advance for your suggestions.

Question for the coffee experts: I want to buy my husband a new coffee grinder for Valentine's Day. Right now we have a Cuisinart Burr grinder but it is having some problems. We drink drip coffee (pour almost boiling water from a tea kettle into a porcelain cone filter with a paper filter). We don't need it for espresso. Any suggestions of good grinder than don't cost a million dollars. I would prefer to have a quiet grinder if possible.

I'm doing this for my own amusement...but if anyone else wants to add info/pics they should feel free to do so... also, most of this is being taken from Three Floyds themselves, Hoosier Beer Geek &/or Beer News...if interested, I can provide you with the many twitter accounts associated with those three groups... to summarize...this pic: first indicated that there would be Brandy Barrel Aged Vanilla Bean Dark Lord at this year's Dark Lord Day... then this pic: on Chicago's MetroMix page suggested that it'd be available in bottles... & now Beers News posted this story where they report having spoken with Lincoln Anderson from Three Floyds who's sa…