Some of the most notable "Gourmet" recipes never made it to the magazine. Through its 69-year run, the magazine's food editors and test kitchen staff developed hundreds of adventurous, experimental, personal and just plain luscious recipes that for one reason or another escaped the print edition. With Gourmet.com's 2008 launch, multimedia supplements to magazine features, test kitchen video throw-downs, staffers' favorites and perusals of family archives afforded the opportunity to showcase Web-exclusive content, and a chance to serve up these recipes to their more cyber-savvy readers.
Though an Oct. 13 Tweet by the magazine's Executive Editor John Willoughby advised followers to "Go to gourmet.com, copy Web-exclusive recipes that will disappear: strawberry dumpling, banana upside down cake, curried pork noodles, etc.", Slashfood has been told by other Condé Nast insiders that after the magazine's recent, sudden shuttering, the future of Gourmet.com content remains uncertain, save for mag-published recipes that will be migrated to sister site Epicurious.com.
We're not taking any chances. We've clicked our way through 300-plus Web-exclusive recipes from October 2005 to September 2009 to find the 25 you simply must copy, paste and collect before they're (possibly) lost to the ages.
The debate this column fueled last week concerning the standard baseline tip isn't the sort of thing most servers spend much time considering: We'd all like our patrons to leave us lots and lots of money, thanks.
But that doesn't mean there aren't service issues upon which front-of-the-housers may never agree. I'm thinking here of doggie bagging, a practice that I've seen pit close friends against one another. The contentious question is who does the boxing.
At the white tablecloth restaurants where I've worked, it's understood that the task of wrapping a guest's half-eaten food in foil – ideally sculpted into a graceful swan – falls to the server (although since foie gras and lobster tail make for notoriously bad leftovers, many diners opt to have the vestiges of their five-star meals scraped straight into the trash.)
That's not always the case at slightly more casual restaurants, where many servers routinely plop Styrofoam boxes onto their guests' tables. As a veteran of fancy dining rooms, I always figured those servers were lazy. Turns out, they're looking out for their guests' interests.
Shun's santoku knife on caramelized onion tart. Photo: Alex Van Buren
Knives. Outside of the full-time food dork world, people -- even foodies -- don't tend to talk about them much.
They have a bad association as, um, dull conversational topics: There's the unwelcome knife salesman banging on the door, or that eternal infomercial ("Only $39.95 in three easy installments!"). I owned a sub-par knife for years, until a friend trained at a local culinary institute basically took it away from me.
I've been shopping ever since with an eagle eye for sales. The santoku style caught my attention for its multiuse blade (note the indentations, which purportedly help keep food from sticking) and stylish look. And when I grabbed a Shun in hand at a local shop -- its base has a slight teardrop shape, perfectly suited to that soft nub between thumb and index finger -- I fell in love.
As promised, we're beginning our recap of the Big Apple Barbecue Block Party this past weekend, featuring 15 of the best pitmasters from around the USA. After you take a dip in the barbecue sauce fountain, courtesy of Mike Mills and Amy Mills of 17th Street Bar & Grill, click on the post to see our photos. "Peace, Love & Barbecue," everyone!
Every once in a while it's good to have a refresher course in kitchen safety. The FDA's 1996 flick "Dirty Little Secrets" does just that with a dramatic announcer, toilet paper in the fridge and a copy of "The Silver Palate Cookbook." Did they miss anything? Weigh in.
My oh my, what a strange food week it has been. A judge actually had to rule on whether Cap'N Crunch's Crunch Berries are fruit. Turns out, they're not ... just in case you were confused.
The CoffeeMeister talked Chemex, Skinny Chef got salty. We asked you where America's best beer bar is located and what the Hungry Bride should serve the small vegan contingent attending her wedding. Oh, and Elvis got his own cheese straw.
Jackalopes and humans wanted their free doughnuts while others delighted in the return of the Vanilla Bean Coolatta. And the Obamas, they had a date in New York.
Yes, it's that time again when Slashfood reflects upon a delicious week of food news. And what a week it was! Aunt Evie and her Pickled Beet Dip faced off against Aunt Renie's Red Onion Cucumber Salad in a double dose of Flashback to the Seventies while LeNell shared her Rock Candy and Rye Whiskey recipe.
The Skinny Chef showed off her knife skills this week as the Hungry Bride contemplated her cocktail reception. We met grilling expert Gena Knox, who helped us kick off the grilling season with hanger steak and deviled eggs.
Margaritas are lovely, yes, but sometimes the liver needs a break. And Mexico, of course, is no one-trick culinary pony. In fact, while ambling through the famously taco- and torta-laden neighborhood of Sunset Park, Brooklyn, last weekend, a compadre proselytized wildly about a maple-walnut popsicle right before running into traffic to lead us to the deli where it lived.
Traditionally no friend to the walnut unless it is candied, we were inclined to pass. Then we noticed that in this popsicle, walnuts were a minor player relegated to the stick end of the treat. We politely accepted a small bite. And then another.
And then we turned on our heel and ran back to the deli to rummage frantically through the cooler gleaming on the sidewalk: mango-lime, pistachio, egg nog. Egg nog?! Walnut! Where was it? Pops flew everywhere as, like a dog frantically chasing a mole burrowing underground, we went shoulder-deep into the icy cooler. Thank the stars, a lone, innocuous "nuez" pop remained.
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