Flash in the Pan

A baseball star in the 1970s and 1980s, Greg "The Bull" Luzinski, has a barbecue sauce out under his name: The Bull BBQ Sauce. He was a great slugger, but I found his culinary exploits to fall short. The sauce tasted both overly-vinegary - without being a Carolina style - and too sweet as well. It may sound like a contradiction, but that's the results to the literally in-house testing panel. I also tend to write off products that include Liquid Smoke (on the ingredients label) because that isn't the job of the sauce. If you can't get smoke flavor from the grill, the meal is a loss anyway. And my wife noticed the high fructose corn syrup component in the listed Worcestershire sauce, which automatically put the product on her "do not buy" list. I'd say that if you're in the market for a good barbecue sauce, take another trip around the bases and keep looking.

Labels: barbecue, opinion, review, sauce

A weekly round-up of food and drink oddities:

• The Stress of Dealing with a Food Crisis At the G8 summit, world leaders prepared themselves to deal with the issue of a food crisis by having a 19-course dinner prepared by 25 chefs. (The Guardian)


• Yes, We Have No Bow-wowersBeijing officials have called on restaurants and hotels to stop serving dishes containing dog during the Olympics. (Financial Times)


• Cocoa Chanel An Ivorian fashion designer makes outfits from jute sacks used to ship cocoa from the Ivory Coast. (Reuters)


• World's Hottest Curry Title? A London restaurant took at shot at serving the world's hottest curry and is waiting on the Guinness Book of World Records to confirm this. Every diner had to sign a disclaimer. (AFP)


• Iron-Rich Diet A Peruvian doctor had to pull 17 metal objects - including nails and a knife - from the body of a patient who ate them. (Reuters)


• Curdled Carriers Thousands of liters of sour milk, sent by farmers protesting low dairy prices, are clotting the EU's main sorting center. (Reuters)


• Cooler Armor A Connecticut man used his lunch cooler to protect himself from the gunfire of two would-be robbers. (AP)


• Some Strong Tea A Japanese calmed down a knife-wielding robber by serving him tea. (Reuters)

Labels: news, odd, weird

A weekly round-up of food and drink oddities:

• I'll Drink to That The Museum of the American Cocktail returns to its home in New Orleans on July 21. (Organization web site)


• Shaken, Not Whirred Japanese beer company Asahi unveiled its new robot bartender. (Engadget)


• Hops Go the Brewers Craft beer companies are facing "rapidly rising commodity prices, industry consolidation, and a slowing economy" and trying to figure out how they're going to make money. Oh, wait - we'll pay more. (Businessweek)


• Life's a Bowl of Cherry Pits A son out spat his father to take his seventh International Cherry Pit Spitting Championship. (AP)


• Battle of the Courses A restaurant in a part of Beirut controlled by Hezbollah is war-themed, with a bullet-shaped menu and chefs working in military fatigues. (Reuters)


• Hot Dogging An American successfully defended his world title in Nathan's annual hot dog eating competition. (Reuters)


• No Starch Decision A UK court ruled that Pringles are not a potato snack, and so not subject to a tax. (AP)


• Hope They Are Red An international body has adopted a standard for tomatoes. (AFP)


• No Restaurant for You Three retired family members have at least temporarily lost a 50 year battle for a top Paris restaurant valued at $110 million. (AFP)

Labels: news, odd, weird

A recent grilling special issue of Cook's Illustrated (with which I have a love hate relationship - good tips, but an arrogant approach to the best way to do this, that, and the other) mentioned using a pommade in making well-done burgers. I had forgotten about this, even though I use the technique in meatballs and meatloaf. The French word means a cream or ointment. In a cooking context, it's a term for making a paste and adding it to another mixture so that, after cooking, the result remains moist.

In this case, a good pommade is simply bread (one slice per pound of meat) soaked in enough milk to make it soggy, then rubbed into a paste. Mix the pommade with the ground meat, add in salt and any other flavorings you like (a teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce per pound of meat is a touch I like), and then make patties without packing the meat in. Cook as you normally would, watching for over cooking.

If you're used to feeling the burgers on top for how well done they are, remember that the pommade will make them feel squishier, therefore less done. I'd use a thermometer the first time or two using this technique. At least, I would have, had I thought ahead. Last week I tried it and the burgers came out medium well, rather than the medium rare most of my family prefers. Guess I'll have to try it again - and not spare the digital readout.

Labels: burger, meat, technique

Yesterday, Starbucks announced that it would be closing "600 underperforming company-operated stores in the U.S. market, which includes our previously announced plans to close 100 stores," according to A Message from Howard. He started with all the wonderful things that happened since becoming CEO again, and mentioned such upcoming things as the introduction of "healthy, good-for-you beverages" starting July 15. (Healthy? Good-for-you? Is this still a coffee spot?)

In addition, in Southern California, we will introduce a refreshing, indulgent cold iced beverage. Steeped in Italian heritage, it will be an exclusive product that our customers can only find at Starbucks.

Sure, other companies will probably call it something else once they lift the concept. But then came the bad news - under performing stores would close, full- and part-time employees would lose their jobs. At least they say they'll be offering employees either a position at a nearby store (though once you're out of major cities, heaven knows what "nearby" will mean) or some severance. And given how they have benefits even for many part-time workers, I can't fault them. The chain simply expanded faster than its audience.

I even have some sympathy for CEO Schultz. Clearly he's been torn between the business becoming enormous and wanting the atmosphere of a cafe with comfortable seats for deliberate loitering over a cup of coffee and the smell of freshly ground beans in the air. But you can't be big and neighborhood at the same time, which shows that even success doesn't mean that you'll be happy and free of conflict.

Now, if only they'd stop over-roasting their beans.

Labels: business, coffee, Starbucks

The New York Times has a short science piece on whether mayonnaise increases the danger of food poisoning as the weather gets warmer. The good news: a number of studies suggest that commercial mayonnaise is not at fault, as the degree of acidic ingredients makes the substance pretty unpopular with the microbe crowd.

One prominent study published in The Journal of Food Protection found, for example, that in the presence of commercial mayonnaise, the growth of salmonella and staphylococcus bacteria in contaminated chicken and ham salad either slowed or stopped altogether. As the amount of mayonnaise increased, the rate of growth decreased. When temperatures rose to those of a hot summer day, the growth increased, but not as much as in samples that did not contain mayonnaise.

However, summer brings another danger - cold drinks and condensation that can leave water marks. Luckily, mayonnaise can bring a solution. You smear mayonnaise over the spot, leave it overnight (or even a day or more), wipe it off, and the spot is gone. There are a number of sites online that describe this technique; I know about it because my wife read it in some book, tried it, and was delighted to find that it worked. No, adding bacon, lettuce, and tomato is not necessary.

Labels: food safety, mayonnaise, science

A weekly round-up of food and drink oddities:

• Nineteenth Amendment? We Don't Need No Stinkin' Nineteenth Amendment Proving that dead ideas of the past are never far away, the Phoenix Country Club still has a men-only bar, with women relegated to some dump of a back room, crossing the line from "weird" news to pathetic. (New York Times)


• It's a Good Vintage For those, like me, who missed this story the first time around, Martha Stewart has lent her name to some $15 a bottle wines that I notice the other day in a local grocery store. It's probably the only wine that matures according to a strict calendar. (USA Today)


• Say Cheese A Wisconsin sculptor recreated John Trumbull's painting "Declaration of Independence" in a ton of cheddar. (AP)


• Peanuts ... Popcorn ... Kung Pao ... In time for the Olympics, Beijing is providing to restaurants official English translations of local menu items. "'Bean curd made by a pock-marked woman,' as the Beijing Youth Daily rendered the spicy Sichuanese dish, is now 'Mapo tofu.' And 'chicken without sexual life' becomes mere 'steamed pullet.'" (Reuters)


• Hold On There, Pardner The Naked Cowboy, a New York City street performer, is suing Mars for billboards depicting a blue M&M in the cowhand's signature outfit of boots, a hat, and white briefs. (Reuters)


• Maybe If They Call It Adult Grape Juice A burgeoning Finish wine industry is halted in its tracks as the European Union, which doesn't recognize Finland as a wine-producing country under EU rules, prohibits inhabitants from selling what they make.(New York Times)

Labels: news, odd, weird