Why must some relationships end?

I discovered Blogging for Books toward the end of 2014.  For those who don’t know what it is, Blogging for Books is a website created 10 years ago to help bloggers connect with publishers to get access to books for review purposes.  For someone with such a small blog like my own, it was a boon.  Unless you have a minimum of 5,000 followers, most publishers don’t want to work with you.  Trust me, I’ve tried.  Back in 2014, I wished that I had found the website sooner.

As of this week, the closure of Blogging for Books was announced.  Saying that I was sad when I heard the news is an understatement.  I’m now back to floundering as a small time blogger.  And I am always going to be a small time blogger.  I did a weekend workshop once with people who all wanted to be food journalists (not necessarily food bloggers, so I was a bit out of place), and several people were amazed that I had absolutely no ads on my site.  Unlike my classmates, I was the only person who blogged purely for fun.  I don’t want to turn my hobby into a job.  I don’t want to churn out content everyday or every other day.  Food blogging has always been an outlet for me.  It’s a place where I can funnel my experiences and thoughts on this one subject that is important to me.

So here’s my good-bye to Blogging for Books.  Its value as a resource to me can’t be quantified easily.  I can only hope that I can find a replacement, or that publishers will one day take this little blog of mine more seriously.

Cookbook price alert

1.  This post is not sponsored in anyway.
2. You must be able to travel to Harvard Square in Cambridge, MA.

I was killing some time the other day, and meandered around the cookbook section of The Coop, the official book store of Harvard University.  Believe it or not, I got bored.  For fun, I walked over to the sale section which is just one room over.  Most of the time, there isn’t anything I want.

This time, there still wasn’t anything I wanted… but that’s only because I already owned it.  The Coop had several copies of The Big-Flavor Grill: No-Marinade, No-Hassle Recipes for Delicious Steaks, Chicken, Ribs, Chops, Vegetables, Shrimp, and Fish for about $8.  I bought this book, written by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby, back in 2014.  I could read it all day because it appeals to me that much.  Seeing it on the shelf reminded me that I should cook from it before the weather turns cold.

Honestly though, I can make a lot of the recipes indoors sans grill.  The appeal of this book is in all the sauce and condiment recipes.

I love this book so much that I want to buy a copy of it just to gift to someone.

Alas, no one I know is addicted to cookbooks as I am.

But if you are or you like to grill, head over to the Coop.  You can thank me later.

The Homemade Kitchen (a cookbook review)

Happiness is… getting a copy of Alana Chernila’s The Homemade Kitchen before it was officially released.  (^_^)

I’ve read through Chernila’s first cookbook, The Homemade Pantry, a few times because it really appeals to the part of me that wants less processed foods in my life.  (It’s probably a pipe dream of mine.  Work lunches are my downfall, and I’m never going to give up frozen pre-made Chinese dumplings.)  So when I found out that I could get my grabby hands on her new book, I didn’t even hesitate.

Overall impression?  I love it.

More detailed impressions and a recipe?  Keep reading.

the cookbooks we own

This is the most random post I’ve ever made on this blog. Between my sister (Stealth Eater) and I, there are a lot of cookbooks in our arsenal. Most of the time, our tastes in books do not crossover. Once in a blue moon, they do.

This will be a list of everything we own. I’ll update it whenever appropriate/possible. My sister has more books than I do, or so we think. I have some cookbooks stored in a couple of different places, but the books I’m listing here are on my “current bookshelf.” Maybe I’ll add the other cookbooks at some point.  This list of books is mostly so that we can avoid buying duplicates (which we’ve done!), and start borrowing from each other. (^_^)

is it for the scientist or for the cook in me?

I’m being bad and looking at upcoming cookbooks on Amazon.com.

More cookbooks aren’t exactly what I need right now. Shoes and boots are more important than cookbooks. I’m not nearly as bad as Stealth-eater, and I try really hard to be very discerning, but every once in a while, there will be a cookbook that I just want to read out of curiosity.

Right now, I’m eyeing two books that I had no idea were being published until this afternoon, and I think the former science student in me is thrilled. (fyi, I have my bachelor degree in Chemistry from a college which was known for their science programs above all else… not that I remember any of it.)

The first book is Under Pressure: Cooking Sous Vide by Thomas Keller. It is being published by Artisan and set for release on November 3, 2008. Sous vide? What is that? I have never heard of the term before.

Googling came up with a very helpful and interesting article from the NYTimes. (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/magazine/14CRYOVAC.html) I was immediately hooked. To take from the article:

For decades, food was poached in sturdy plastic bags at traditional temperatures, simmering or boiling. Goussault discovered that keeping the temperature as low as possible and later cooling the food in several stages yielded a wildly different — and tastier — result. A piece of fish, for instance, can be cooked at about 130 degrees — a hot bath, essentially — for 30 minutes, then cooled, successively, at room temperature, in cold water, then in ice water, before being reheated and served. Cooking in bags at such low temperatures was long considered a recipe for botulism, but Goussault has debunked this fear, proving that the long cooking times followed by proper cooling kill bacteria with the same effectiveness as higher temperatures, also stabilizing the food so it can be stored longer before serving.

Doesn’t that catch your attention? I wonder how the process is still food safe. I’m sure more googling could demystify the whole process of sous vide, but I’m on my lunch hour right now. Sous vide seems to be a very exact process. Times and temperatures are key. So, I’m oh-so-curious about what Keller has come up with and written. And I wonder how well this book would work for home use. The Amazon description leaves too much to the imagination. I want to know what recipes are in it, dammit.

The other book I want to read is A Day at elBulli by Ferran Adrià, set to be published by Phaidon Press Inc and released on October 1, 2008. Anyone one who has any interest in molecular gastronomy should immediately recognize the title. For those who aren’t familiar with el Bulli, I give you the spiel as listed on the Amazon page.

Situated on a remote beach on the northeast coast of Spain, elBulli is famous for being the ultimate pilgrimage site for foodies, and a reservation that is nearly impossible to obtain. Each year elBulli is open for just six months, and receives more than 2 million requests for only 8,000 seats. Renowned for his spectacular ever-changing 30-course tasting menu, Adria ‘s pioneering culinary techniques have been applauded – and imitated – by top chefs around the globe for the past decade, and he was named one of Time magazine s 100 most influential people of our time.

If I had the money and time, I’d want to jet off to Spain immediately for an affair with a restaurant. Alas, I lack the money. I can only read about the experience through people who are wonderful enough to post descriptions and pictures on their blogs. A book with professional photos and words from the chef himself seems like it’d be an even better option.

Sure, I could be crazy enough to do things like spherification at home. Other people have. But, really, I can’t be bothered to go about buying some sodiam alginate and calcium lactate gluconate. At least with sous vide, I can get away with using Foodsaver bags (which I don’t currently have but would like to one day). I think I would just need invest in some sort of thermal circulator (which is probably not cheap but definitely the oddest thing for my mouth to say today).

Of course, I would also like to read The Heirloom Tomato: From Garden to Table: Recipes, Portraits, and History of the World’s Most Beautiful Fruit by Amy Goldman, but there’s nothing about it that screams “mad scientist”. XD

~ Mikan

(aside, I’m in the middle of writing up a review of Tremont 647. Hopefully, I’ll finish it today but no promises.)