A Lot of Information In One Hour

This week's episode of No Reservations was a special on cooking technique, featuring input from some big names in the food world. The show opened with Tony doing a quick demo on proper knife technique (you know, so you don't cut your thumb off). We saw Dave Pasternack of Esca (phenomenal restaurant, BTW) demonstrating how to boil and serve a lobster, legendary cookbook author Jacques Pépin showing the simple technique of making an omelette, Scott Conant of Scarpetta teaching a simple recipe for pasta and fresh tomato sauce, zillion-Michelin-starred Thomas Keller working through his well-known simple roast chicken technique, Laurent Tourondel of the BLT family of restaurants cooking a lovely bacon cheeseburger, and Les Halles chef Carlos Morales (note: don't use an "I'm Feeling Lucky" Google search, because the most famous person of that name is apparently a gay porn actor) cooking french fries and then a steak (number one mistake Tony says most people make: not letting the steak rest for a few minutes before cutting it) complete with grill marks. Interspersed between the various other segments, in a bunch of shorter bits, Tony showed us how to cook beef bourguignon, including prepping each of the ingredients and then the cooking process. The episode concluded with Tony and Carlos eating what they had cooked and talking a bit about cooking and restaurant eating. Definitely worth a watch if you ever do your own cooking.

Jucy Lucy

So Food Wars was in Minneapolis this week, to taste test the Jucy Lucy. I was in Minneapolis about... a year and a half now, I guess, and sampled the Jucy Lucy at Matt's Bar, one of the two restaurants featured on Food Wars (both of which claim to have invented the delicious concoction).

This post really could use a picture in order to illustrate the deliciousness of the Jucy Lucy, so I'm going to borrow one from Wikipedia:



Let me tell you, it was a glorious experience. The cheese is inside the burger! I mean, how great is that? I've tried to make that for myself, but it never works, so I appreciate the technique in addition to the great taste. I didn't get to go to the 5-8 Club, the other contender for the best Jucy Lucy, but I'll be back in the Twin Cities about a year from now, so I'll have to do my own taste test. (If you're curious, Matt's Bar was pronounced the winner, with the Minnesota Vikings' mascot casting the deciding vote.)

No Detroit episode before my trip next week, but no matter - we're going to eat some hot dogs regardless!