an awesome mv that a friend turned me on to ...

how totally cool is this? the official music video of 70 millions by hold your horses . not only good music but a a very innovative and refreshing video concept for a change.

food fotos: pictures to accompany recipes and food cost analysis estimates

whenever i do a consulting job that requires recipes to be developed one thing i offer the client is accompanying photos. nothing beats a "seeing is believing" approach to teaching someone how to cook, and pictures also help to jar their memory once i have departed the training.

the following three dishes were developed for an american restaurant and martini bar that wanted to have not only a tapas type menu, but also some main dishes of note. the seafood cocktail in the over-sized martini glass was developed to coincide with the massive martini menu they offered at their bar.

these pictures were taken with a first generation logitech webcam, so please excuse the resolution and lighting. you will also notice i have marked up the images that were then put into an album which was kept in the kitchen so that the staff would have a quick reference guide when jamming out orders.

seafood martini: this has been on my menus in some sort of configuration 

since i worked for chef ted at nicoles in mendon, vermont. 

under all that deliciously fresh seafood is a cocktail sauce 

that has won praise for the over 27 years i have been making it. 

i will post that recipe one of these days.

proscuitto wrapped filet mignon: this was a dish we held over 

from the existing menu at the restaurant. we just dressed it up a bit. 

notice that i took the photo before the balsamic reduction was applied, 

so i photo-shopped some in. after all, its a working guide for chefs, not a magazine photo.

the veg in all these shots is one of my favorites, ratatouille. 

when you are serving a lot of guests, need a good sturdy veg and want to add some good colors, 

a good al dente rat will always have your back.

swordfish with 5 lotuses: nothing like a catchy exotic name to prod the guests 

into ordering something great that they may overlook otherwise.

the stuffing is made from sauteed until clear, minced garlic, shallots, leeks, onions and scallions 

that are bound with fresh chopped parsley and mozzarella, fontina and parmesan cheeses.

do not pocket and stuff the fish until you are a few minutes away from grilling it, 

otherwise it will taste like sh*t or possibly go sour. 

also cut as large a pocket as you can, and stuff the filling in as deeply as you can, 

because it has a tendency to ooze out while the fish is grilling.

also, before placing the fish on the flat hot steel put a few slivers of 

fresh ginger and a sprig of rosemary on it. 

this will sear the ginger and herbs into the flesh and infuse it with these flavors.

this is another great technique i learned from my mentor chef ted.

also, note that the plate is slightly glazed with a spoon of veal demi-glace. another chef ted-ism. some may think it inappropriate to put meat glaze
with the fish and my reply to them is:
you've never had a surf and turf dinner?
the fish is resting on a bit of sauteed spinach.

nuff said!

estômago: one of the best foodie movies every produced

i used to think that big night written, directed by, and starring stanely tucci in 1996 was as good as it gets for foodie movies of the past, and that julie and julia of last year was a pretty tasty film too, but the brazial film estômago  just might take the cake.

estômago  means stomach in portuguese and that is the title of this wonderfully delicious 2007 brazilian food film directed by marcos jorge. of all the films that have story lines derived from something to do with food i have to say it ranks at the top, if not the best, for food related plot and quirky lovable characters that i have had the pleasure view.

rather than write a synopsis of my own i have borrowed a good one from the imdb website that doesn’t spoil the movie for those who wish to see it.

The naive immigrant from the Northeast Raimundo Nonato has just arrived in São Paulo and is hungry and without money. After eating in a smalltime restaurant, the owner Zulmiro offers him to clean the kitchen to pay the bill. On the next morning, he offers a job to Nonato, cooking and cleaning the kitchen; in return, he would eat and sleep in a small storage room, but without salary. The restaurant becomes a sensation with Nonato's appetizers "coxinha" and "pastel" and attracts the attention of Giovanni, the owner of the classy Italian restaurant Boccaccio, who offers a better job for him in the kitchen of his restaurant and teaches him the secrets of a good meal. Meanwhile, Nonato falls in love for the always hungry streetwalker Íria, who refuses to kiss Nonato, although they have sex. Events take a turn for the worse and Raimundo Nonato a.k.a. "Alecrim" arrives in prison, sharing a cell with seven prisoners leaded by Bujiú. When the despised Nonato offers to improve their food cooking in the cell, he climbs in the inner hierarchy, sleeping no longer on the floor, but in the bunk bed immediately below Bujiú and earning respect from the other inmates. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

this film garnered 17 awards and 14 nominations

if the film is not available in your local you can find it here:

and for your reference:

the vengeance trilogy: korean cinema at its best

typically, since i was a child, dining out and going to the movies went hand in hand. as far as i am concerned nothing beats going to see a good flick and having a great meal with friends or family. usually the film comes first to stimulate a bit of conversation while eating. my favorite place to do this in bangkok is at the central world. they have the world cinema complex on the 7th floor which is surrounded by some great restaurants (predominantly thai and japanese).

another fun thing to do is to invite someone over to the house, cook a nice meal, and sit down to watch some classic film. since moving to thailand i have had the pleasure to be able to see many films that i would not have seen back home in the states because most asian films only make it to the larger population centers of america, if at all.  i have come to love the films of china, japan and korea. like the cuisines of these countries, their films are diverse and of many flavors. unbeknown to may westerners, a lot of the films that they are watching have story and plot lines that have first appeared in asian cinema. quentin tarantino, to name just one, has "borrowed" much from his asian counterparts to construct such films as kill bill and reservoir dogs.

as far as korean cinema goes park chan-wook is considered to be one of the finest and his vengeance trilogy is considered to be his best work: sympathy for mr. vengeance (2002), oldboy (2003), sympathy for lady vengeance (2005). if you like quirky plot lines that twist and weave and take you places that you never imagined, then watch these three films. although oldboy and sympathy for lady vengeance are not sequels, watching them in chronological order is recommended. in this way you will see how the director/writer has evolved in his story telling and movie making abilities.

chinese new year buffet menu: siam bayshore resort - 1999

when i was living and working at the siam bayshore resort in pattaya, thailand one of the perks of the job was the responsibility for overseeing the chinese restaurant.

i have been a big fan of chinese cuisine since i was child and the earliest memories of dining out are at a chinese restaurant in new york city with my family. as often as we could we would go. i was constantly amazed at the the cuisine and the culture. my dad would tell us stories of when he was with the 4th combat cargo squadron providing logistical support for the flying tigers in the CBI (china-burma-india theater) during ww2, which is how i got the bug to come to asia 30 something years later. he spent a lot of time in canton where they have the best sea food and the qing ping market. possibly the largest fresh food market on the planet.

when i say i was overseeing the bali hai restaurants that is exactly what i did, and no more. basically if they needed something, i got it for them, my domain was the western kitchens. the chefs that run the kitchens at the siam city hotels and resorts are some of the best in thailand, and the city property has one of the most outstanding chinese dinning rooms you will ever see, lin fa.

one thing i did get to do was write the buffet menus for the holidays and festivals, something i truly miss to this day. typically we would serve between 300 to 500 guests depending on the event and season. this leaves a lot of room for a lot of food. the smaller buffets would be set on the hotel balcony that over looks the gulf of siam but the larger affairs were out on the terrace, which overlooks their private beach. watching the spectacular sun sets from this perspective was another perk of that job.

buffets at siam city resorts require the cooperation of every department in the hotel. housekeeping provides all the linen, event specific uniforms, flowers, plants, trees (yes trees) and all the table decorations. engineering provides the stage, music, lighting and special effects. front desk took care of all the reservations and of course the food and beverage department provided all the rest.

every buffet had demonstration cooking as well. this is when chefs prepare the food right on the buffet line. huge bbq pits with whole pigs on a spit was a typical center piece, with smaller grills for skewers of meats and seafood, as well as giant woks filled with all the savory chinese and thai foods one would expect.

 this is the menu i wrote for the 1999 chinese new year celebration, which as it turned out, was my last time for doing that. the following year i left to open a place of my own in the neighboring beach side village of jomtien. (menu will follow in a subsequent post.)

when you read through this menu keep in mind that this is for an international clientele and there will always be other foods (not chinese) to make certain everyone has something they like. also, you will see notations about certain dishes. this was a working menu used as a proposal submitted to the general manager a few weeks prior to service.

 click image to view enlarged version.

 my dad: decorated captain in the cbi

 click image to view enlarged version.