Woman on a Mission

Tap, tap, tap... is this thing still on? Seems to be.

I've been sadly neglecting this blog, but since I was still getting a few dozen hits a day and people seemed to find some of my old content useful, I decided that I should leave it up. Just in case anyone needed ideas for things to do with duck fat, or how to cook jambalaya for a crowd.

But I'm on my summer hiatus from scheduled chocolate making for the business side of Tammy's Tastings (special orders still accepted), so I've got a little more time to devote to blogging.

And something to blog about.

I'm a big fan of the classic cocktail list at Zingerman's Roadhouse. With all freshly squeezed juices and good bitters and other specialty ingredients, Zingerman's has the best cocktails in town, I think. It's a serious list, not just a bunch of overly sweet "something-tinis."

But I quickly got into a rut once I discovered the Scofflaw (Jim Beam rye, Vya dry vermouth, lemon, pomegranate grenadine, orange bitters). It's my favorite cocktail ever, and whenever I'd go to the Roadhouse I'd look fondly at the rest of the list, then order my usual.

A few weeks ago, I decided it was time to break out of my rut, so I set myself a mission - try every cocktail on the list. There are 35, and since I set the goal I've tried 7, a different one on each visit. I was already starting to lose track of which ones I'd had, and what I thought about them, so I thought this was a mission worthy of dusting off this old blog.

I'll fill in the first 6 in separate posts, but for now I'll talk about last night's cocktail - The Jupiter.

This is quite a dry cocktail, especially in contrast to the Jack Rose that I'd had on my last cocktail outing. Zingerman's version has Plymouth Gin, Vya Dry Vermouth, Parfait Amour, and freshly squeezed orange juice. But the orange juice is more of a garnish than anything else - the drink is almost clear, with only a bit of floating pulp to make you believe there's juice in there (future posts will have pictures). I wasn't familiar with Parfait Amour, so James brought me some on its own to taste. It's a very sweet liqueur, with a slightly bubble-gum like aroma and flavor. It's hard to put your finger on exactly what it tastes like, but there were definitely vanilla and floral bits in the taste I had. It adds a really subtle note to the cocktail, but I'm sure I'd have missed it if it wasn't there.

I'm used to slightly sweeter and tarter cocktails, so my first sip of this was a bit of a surprise. But I figure it's training wheels for when I work up to having a martini. It was definitely a sipping drink, and as I sipped it really grew on me, and it was a nice drink to relax over while listening to jazz and talking to my neighbors seated at the bar.

7 down, 28 to go...

Food as art

What happened to the Food! | The Best Article Every day

I think these little cauliflower sheep are the cutest thing ever. But the rest of the pictures are great too.

News from Tammy's Tastings

A Box of Flowers for Mother's Day

Every year it's the same question - should I get my mother a bouquet of flowers or a box of chocolates? Well, now you can do both, with a box of flowers from Tammy's Tastings.

Each box of 12 pieces ($22) or 5 pieces ($10) contains an assortment of four flavors:

Jasmine - Dark chocolate ganache is infused with jasmine tea and encased in a crisp dark chocolate shell.
Honey-Vanilla - Milk chocolate surrounds a drizzle of delicate wildflower honey on top of a creamy milk chocolate ganache infused with real vanilla beans.
Pomegranate-Rose - Dark chocolate carries this blend of fruity and floral notes.
Lavender Caramel - This slightly chewy and not-too-sweet caramel has a hint of lavender and is wrapped in dark chocolate.

Visit my website to place your order.

Also...

I've been working on a line of candy bars, and have a limited quantity available for sale at this time. Orders will be filled in the order they are received, but when they're gone, they're gone!

Sweet Salty Crunchy - Crunchy pretzels, salty caramel, Koeze natural peanut butter and roasted peanuts dipped in 60% dark chocolate. Valentine's Day early-bird orderers may remember this as the "Needs a Name Candy Bar."
Pick Me Up - Soft coffee nougat is topped by a chewy espresso caramel that's studded with crunchy espresso beans from Mighty Good Coffee. Dipped in 72% dark chocolate, this is the ultimate candy bar for coffee lovers.
Rockier Road - Fluffy homemade vanilla marshmallows, crunchy toasted almonds and chewy candied ginger stud a soft dark chocolate center for an exciting combination of flavors and textures.

Wedding Season

Are you or someone you know getting married this summer? Chocolates from Tammy's Tastings make beautiful and delicious favors for your guests. And a chocolate or wine tasting event is the perfect thing for a bridal shower. Contact me for more information!

Interview over at Kitchen Chick

Kitchen Chick a local Ann Arbor foodblogger, and she interviewed me for her blog. We talked about how I got my start in the food business (like carrying 20lb bags of flour on a bicycle), what some of my current favorite chocolate brands are, and more. Please check out the interview and the rest of the blog - Lisa's writing and photography are totally delicious! And, speaking as a foodblogger myself, if you like what you see - please leave her a comment - we bloggers LOVE comments!

Oh, and since her post mentions my Easter chocolates, here's a picture of the finished product. I always have a lot of fun trying out different decorating effects, and this time was no exception!

Tammy's Tastings Newsletter

The Smell of Easter

When I host a chocolate tasting, I take guests through 3 steps - taking a "whiff" (what's the chocolate smell like?), taking a bite (what's the texture like?), and taking a taste (what flavors do they notice?). In nearly every chocolate tasting there will be at least one chocolate that everyone agrees "Smells like Easter!"

And why not? While we certainly associate chocolate with other holidays, if you celebrate Easter, memories of chocolate eggs and easter bunnies were formed long before you ever got a box of chocolate from a sweetheart on Valentine's Day.

Unfortunately, a lot of Easter chocolate isn't particularly good. And some of it is downright bad! But thanks to Tammy's Tastings, you don't need to settle for bad chocolate in order to relive your childhood Easter chocolate memories. Visit my Easter page to place your order today! The Easter collection includes a "turtle" bunny or egg (filled with salty caramel and toasted pecans) and an assortment of four other flavors:

Raspberry - This classic combination of dark chocolate and raspberry is a perennial favorite.
Chai Spice - Milk chocolate harmonizes beautifully with a blend of spices that includes cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, and more, while the dark chocolate shell balances the sweetness of the center.
Lemon-Rosemary - White chocolate provides the perfect creamy backdrop to the high notes of citrusy lemon and a hint of earthy, foresty rosemary.
Hazlenut Praline - A dark chocolate shell surrounds this combination of toasted hazelnuts, caramelized sugar, and milk chocolate. Another classic combination, and one that is decadent and delicious!

Orders must be received by Friday, March 14; earlier for shipping to the western US.

Upcoming Event

American Rebels Chocolate Tasting
Coming in April, date TBD. In the 1980's, microbreweries pushed the boundaries of what we knew beer could be. In the 1990's, small coffee roasters began challenging the supremacy of Starbucks. And in the 2000's, chocolate is the new frontier. In this chocolate tasting, we'll have a chance to compare side by side the offerings from a crew of American Rebels - small, one or two person operations who are making bean to bar chocolate and breaking as many rules as they can along the way. Space will be limited - contact me today to pre-pre-register, and you'll be able to provide input on the date and time!

Wishing you good tastes,
Tammy

Interview with Heston Blumenthal

Heston is chef at the Fat Duck restaurant in the UK, and one of the best known chefs exploring "food science," aka molecular gastronomy. This article is a fascinating look at this mad scientist of cuisine.

This has to be one of the wackiest bits...

4: And he recently injected his head chef with a dangerously high dose of chilli oil, intravenously, and then slid him into a £5 million MRI scanner to see how the spices reacted with his brain.

No, really.

I made him tell me twice to make sure he wasn't making it all up.

"I used the brain scanner at Nottingham University," he says.

"While he was in there I attached a drip to him that intravenously fed him chilli oil.

"I sneakily switched the dosage when nobody was looking so he was getting double the chilli the doctors deemed safe."

He laughs here.

"I did give myself a syringe as well because I felt guilty.

"But I wanted to see what parts of his brain my spices would affect so I could create the perfect chilli.

"I needed to find out the point where the pain of the chilli died down and the pleasurable endorphins that make us like spicy foods were released.

Mad scientist, indeed! One just hopes he had the head chef's permission!

I've not eaten at the Fat Duck (yet), but I know people who have. And the reports are almost always good. This is not just about a gimmick or an excuse to play with toys - these chefs are serious about food, and using every technique at their disposal to improve not just the flavor, but the entire experience of eating.

Unusual breakfast

If I worked from home everyday, I think I'd have the weirdest eating schedule of anybody. I've already got a pretty weird schedule - breakfast around 7, lunch at 11, snack at 3, dinner at 6:15. Which written down doesn't look weird, I guess, but when I'm strolling into the office kitchen to get lunch at 11 am, people often think I'm a little early. But hey - works for me!

I've been sick with colds and the flu and sinus infections and pneumonia for (literally) weeks and haven't had much of an appetite. Plus, making food I want to eat has been more work than I wanted to do. But yesterday I ended up with a major low blood sugar headache at the end of the day, so I'm trying to be more attentive to that today.

On the way home from dropping my son off at daycare, I got a craving for pasta. I could have held off for lunch, and had a bowl of cereal or something when I got home, but why? At first I was thinking spaghetti with garlic sauteed in olive oil and fresh parmesan. But then I remembered the goat cheese ravioli that have been languishing in the freezer since last summer's trip to Columbus, Ohio and our obligatory stop at Pastaria in North Market. So I put some water on to boil, and pulled out a few of those. One of the reasons they've been languishing is that it's hard to figure out what to put on goat cheese ravioli. I figured I'd just drizzle with olive oil, and then I remembered the bit of fresh rosemary left from recent chocolate experiments. So I heated up the oil with the rosemary and a strip of lemon zest, then drizzled that over my ravioli when it was done.

Yum.

Celebrate Valentine's Day with Tammy's Tastings

February seems like the perfect month to celebrate chocolate. There's Valentine's Day, of course. But beyond that, chocolate just seems like the perfect pick-me-up for what can be an awfully dreary month. So this February, Tammy's Tastings is offering a bunch of different opportunities to get your chocolate fix!

First off, there's my Valentine's Day collection, featuring four flavors: White Chocolate & Lime, Passion Fruit, Curry and Earl Grey Tea, in three box sizes: six, twelve and twenty-four. Place your order by February 1st, and you'll receive a surprise bonus treat with your order - a fabulous little candy bar I've been working on that I'm very excited about. Visit my website for full flavor descriptions and ordering details.

Then, I've got a couple of of events you won't want to miss:

Thursday, February 7th, 7:00 pm: Truffle-Making Workshop
You'll make ganache, temper chocolate, and dip and decorate centers I've prepared for you in advance, taking home at least 18 finished truffles. Space is limited and pre-registration is required, so sign up early!

Saturday, February 9th, 2:00 pm: Dark Chocolate Tasting
If you've been wondering what a Tammy's Tastings event was like, here's your chance to find out. You'll taste fabulous dark chocolates from some of the world's best chocolate makers, like Amedei, Domori and Steve DeVries, and learn about how chocolate is grown and made. Get a $5 discount for pre-registering!

That's just cool!

100% edible googly-eyes, and a flying spaghetti monster to boot!

Powered by ScribeFire.

Just 5 Days Left to Order for Shipping!

5 Days Left!
If you've been waiting to place your holiday order, don't delay! This Friday, December 14, is the deadline for orders to be picked up or shipped on December 17th. I'll accept orders until December 20 for local pickup or delivery on December 24th.

Truffling Around
The lovely group to the right call themselves the Divas, and I had the pleasure of teaching them to make truffles on Friday night. This group of six friends gets together once a month to hang out and catch up. Sort of like a book club, but without the books. I ran a chocolate tasting for them in the fall, and when I asked them if they'd like to learn to make truffles in time for Christmas, they jumped at the chance.

I followed that up with another workshop on Saturday. Six enthusiastic chocolate lovers turned up to try their hand at creating some chocolate art. If you thought the truffle workshop sounded appealing, but just couldn't fit it in to your packed pre-Christmas schedule, email me. I'd love to offer another in the new year.

Want to hold a tasting event, but just don't think you have room?
Contact me for more information about renting space in my community's 4,300 sqare foot clubhouse. It has a full kitchen and a variety of spaces suitable for groups large and small.

Holiday Gifts from Tammy's Tastings

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and are enjoying your long weekend. Instead of heading out to the crowded shops today, why not do your holiday shopping at Tammy's Tastings?

For the creative cook, consider a pre-Christmas gift that will keep giving for years to come! I've still got a few spots available in my December 8th truffle-making workshop. The deadline for registration is December 4th, and space is limited. Participants will leave with at least two dozen truffles and the know-how to make their own.

Your favorite foodie will be thrilled to receive a gift certificate for a customized tasting event. Chocolate, wine, cheese, bacon - the possibilities are endless.

For the coffee lover, I've teamed up with Ann Arbor's own Mighty Good Coffee to create a special truffle that highlights their excellent coffee. The Mighty Good Truffle is available in my holiday assortment, on its own, and in a combo pack with two 12-oz bags of Mighty Good coffee.

U of M alumni and natural history lovers alike will appreciate the Puma Box. It includes two dark chocolate truffle pumas shaped just like those that frame the entrance to the University of Michigan Exhibit Museum of Natural History. $5 from the purchase of each box will be donated to the museum.

For the kids, or just your inner child, how about a dozen homemade peppermint marshmallows? These don't taste like what comes out of a supermarket bag! Try popping one in a mug of hot chocolate, or toasting it in your fireplace for a s'more Santa would love.

Show your employees or clients how much you appreciate them with a box of chocolates from Tammy's Tastings. Contact me for special pricing on orders of 10 boxes or more.

For everyone else on the your list, visit my holiday order page for large, medium and stocking stuffer sized gift boxes featuring six special flavors (Egg Nog, Intense Orange, Butter Nut Caramel, Mighty Good Coffee, Fresh Ginger and Peppermint Twist). Shipping is available throughout the US and Canada. Orders to be shipped must be placed by December 14.

Wishing you good tastes,
Tammy

Truffle Squishing

Chocolatier resigns after "act of truffle-squishing" in a rival store. - Boing Boing

Barry Colenso, chocolatier to the Queen and Prince Charles, the man who created the first billboard made of chocolate, and who has been nicknamed "Willy Wonka" has resigned from his position at Thorntons' after being caught by a surveillance camera as he squished a rival company's candies.


That's just so bizarre! And the kind of thing that makes me glad I don't have a retail store for my chocolates - no need for me to worry about random acts of truffle squishing!

With mashed potato frosting

I can't decide if i'm impressed or grossed out.

A Literal Recipe for Beef Cake?

Element

I spent most of this last week in Atlanta for work, and had the opportunity to eat at some great spots. The highlight had to be Element, a "Gastro Lounge + Food Lab" from Chef Richard Blais. My dinner companion is a vegetarian, and although they never got my email about requesting a special menu for her, the kitchen agreed to improvise a tasting menu for the two of us on the spot. But vegetarians take note - they've got a vegan working in the kitchen, so if you gave them the 24-48 hours notice they prefer for vegetarians, I bet you'd get a really amazing meal.


We started off with a couple of cocktails - the LN2 (liquid Nitrogen) Margarita and the Anti-Oxidant-Tini. At first we kind of blew off the idea of the margarita - it's just a frozen margarita with a different freezing method, right? But our (excellent) waiter pointed out that the LN2 allows them to freeze the margarita without adding water in the form of ice - so you get the straight up alcoholic goodness without the watery finish. The Anti-Oxidant-Tini was rather fruit punch-ish (but in a good way), with citrus vodka, pomegranate juice and green tea.


Then we were off to the races with Bread and Butter - a thin crisp of bread topped with butter powder. Pretty standard molecular gastronomy stuff.


Next in the series of our many, many amuse bouches and "gifts from the chef" was a chorizo chip topped with chorizo powder, chocolate and cilantro. I loved the combination of the really excellent quality dark chocolate and the spicy salty chorizo. The veggie alternative for this was a taro chip with olive oil powder with the same chocolate and cilantro. Not quite as good, I was told, since it lacked the salty counterpoint. But we were really willing to give them quite a bit of leeway on the veggie menu, since we knew they were having to improvise.


Watermelon caviar with smoked salt. And some little bits of something herbal and green that we were never able to recognize. While fun, and not unpleasant, this was probably the least interesting thing we ate, and didn't actually taste much like watermelon. Fortunately, things went way up hill from there.


I wish I could show you the tomato ravioli, but alas, all you get is an empty bowl with the remnants of a glorious vinaigrette (olive oil and yuzu, i'm guessing). This was simple, but oh-so-delicious - a thin sheet of jicama around a cherry tomato, topped with the aforementioned glorious vinaigrette and fresh coriander. I assume this is a variation of the summer tomato "lasagna" listed on the a la carte menu. Have I mentioned that it was delicious?


Another "gift from the chef." As you can see, someone's having fun with the anti-griddle! A tangy and creamy frozen yogurt blini topped with a perfectly julienned slice each of black cherry and green olive, and a cilantro leaf. Yum. And since my friend was new to the whole "food science" universe, this and the watermelon caviar were good from the perspective of showing her some of the common tricks of the trade.


Oysters + Pearls. A raw kumamoto oyster topped with cantaloupe dipping dots. I thought the dots were a little too firmly frozen - I didn't like the icy crunch in my teeth. But once the warmed up a bit in my mouth, the combination of flavors was good. I don't much like cantaloupe as a fruit, but I've appreciated it in most of the savory applications I've had the opportunity to try. My friend just got a bowl of canteloupe dipping dots, but she felt they stood quite well on their own and appreciated that they were slightly salty as well as sweet.


A New Caprese Salad + Mozzarella Ravioli + Freeze Dried Pesto - red and yellow heirloom tomatoes, with spheres of soft melty mozzarella on top, balsamic drizzle and a nice freeze dried pesto. All the flavor of a good caprese salad, with a few food science twists. Tasty.


California Roll. This was one of my favorites. The roll was wrapped in soy paper, filled with blue crab in a mayonnaise sauce, crunchy tempura flakes and rich avocado and filled with an extraordinary honey mustard sauce. Delicious. Mmmm.


Bluefin Toro. A rich piece of fatty tuna, topped with some thinly sliced cucumber and microgreens, and dressed with a Thai influenced sauce with that balance of sour sweet salt and heat. The little red bits you see in the picture are tiny chili slices and packed a powerful (but not overpowering). The sauce was a creamy wasabi sauce of some sort. My friend got a watermelon steak in place of the fish and thought that was a great combination, as it emphasized that sweet source hot salt balance really well.


Grilled Octopus + Tandoori Spices + Egg Salad. Yum, yum, yum. The flavor of that grilled octopus (served atop a cube of cucumber) was great. As was the cherry chipotle dipping sauce. The egg (and potato salad) was good for mouth cooling purposes, but not especially interesting on its own. My friend had a piece of similarly seasoned tofu in place of the octopus, and was raving over it for the next couple of courses. She's always impressed by places that can season and cook tofu directly, and i expect this is what pushed her over to definitely wanting to come back to see what Element can do with advance notice.


Fresh Linguine + Sous Vide Egg Yolk + Smoked Bacon. I had been hoping we'd get this item off the regular menu, so I was pleased to see it come out of the kitchen. The portion was really too big for course number 11, but it was so tasty that I finished it all anyway. Perfectly cooked pasta, lovely lardons of bacon, bits of tomato, and of course, the perfectly cooked creamy runny egg yolk to make a tasty sauce.

And then we had our only serious gaffe of the night, which was a really unusually long wait between the linguine and our next course. At least a 20 minute wait. Now, given the heaviness of the linguine, this kind of worked to our benefit, but up until then the pacing had been perfect, so we had to wonder what had happened in the kitchen. But eventually our next course arrived.


And Aged Beef + Corn Puree + Lobster Mushroom + Blue Cheese Foam was well worth the wait. The dark line is a red wine reduction, and next to that, the intensely flavorful and quite substantial blue cheese foam. The corn puree was the highlight of this course - sweet and creamy and rich and delicious. We weren't quite sure it went with the rest of the flavors, but it was so damn good on its own, we weren't complaining. We especially appreciated the whimsy of the baby food jar and tiny spoon. My friend got two big pieces of lobster mushroom with hers instead of the meat.


Finally, onto dessert. We got a single plate of two different desserts, with sharing expected. (Perfectly fine with us.) First up, the Yuzu Tart + Sweet Tea Ice Cream + Mint Flavor. I love, love, love yuzu. So I was all over this dessert. All the flavors and textures played perfectly well together.


Chocolate Sorbet + Banana Guacamole was also lovely. Another liquid nitrogen trick, the chocolate sorbet had a hard frozen shell but a soft liquidy mousse inside. You can't go wrong with caramelized banana in my book, so that was a nice addition to the plate. The banana guacamole was finely diced slightly under ripe banana, so it had a nice sour tang and then quite a bit of heat from some other ingredient. It was a great combination on its own, and only improved when mixed with the chocolate sorbet. A very unique dessert, but a big winner.

Stuffed at this point, we paid the bill and started thinking about rolling ourselves out the door. When this glorious cheese plate comes out of the kitchen and is delivered to the table behind us, compliments of the chef. (They were friends of his.) "We can't eat this!" they exclaimed - he didn't like cheese, she was too full. Being the food geeks that we are, we were ogling this beautiful cheese selection, so they invited us to come and join them in nibbling at it. And even as full as we were, this was clearly an offer that could not be refused. So thanks again, Mike and Heather!



From bottom to top: fresh mozzarella + mango sauce (mango puree, dulce de leche and white truffle), Vallo Nostra + bagel chip and pine oile, Salted Ricotta + green olives + dried capers + parsley sauce, Queso de Mano + microgrees + cherry tomato + cherry chipotle sauce , Tennerone sprinkled with Ras el Nanut + coffee chocolate sauce, Matias + lingonberry preserves, and Valdeon sprinkled with Thai peppercorn + figs + red wine reduction.

This is by far the most beautiful cheese plate I've seen in my life. The menu has the words "ubiquitous cheese plate" scribbled in the margin beside it, but if only all cheese plates were like this one! If i lived in Atlanta, I'd be visiting Element often for a cocktail and cheese with friends. It will certainly be a must-do on my next trip, for dinner and cheese if I can manage it.

Prices are really reasonable - the tasting menu was only $65, and the a la carte menu has small plates starting at $7, and entrees are mostly in the high teens. That beautiful cheese course was only $17. The atmosphere is funky - dark lighting, hip music, waiters with piercings and cooks with blue hair and tattoos. We didn't check out the lounge upstairs, but I bet it's a good time too. Everybody went out of their way to make sure we had a good time - when I took a picture of the LN2 tank on our way out the door, our waiter insisted on making it a little more exciting for us.

Element
1051 West Peachtree Street
Atlanta, GA 30309
404-745-3001

Avoid the evils of cold coffee

Heat Indicating Coffee Lid | GeekAlerts

Now that's a really clever idea.

A gift for the foodie who has everything...

ThinkGeek :: Fundue - desktop USB Fondue Set

Now that's a night to remember...

Opinionated About Dining: In Search of the Perfect Meal

Aka, "What Happens When You Eat at Jean Georges, Per Se, Bouley, Eleven Madison Park & WD-50 All in the Same Night?"

Moto

When I was in Chicago last week, I finally got to try out Moto. This is another restaurant in the "molecular gastronomy" movement which I'm somewhat enamored with. Despite positive reviews from people, I'd been hesitant about going to Moto. It just seemed too gimmicky - and for me, as someone who's eaten food hanging off an antenna before, that's saying a lot. But then I saw the chef, Homaru Cantu, on Iron Chef America, and when all the judges oohed and ahhed over the flavor of his food, I was sold. So, when I had to spend three days in Chicago for work, I posted on eGullet to find some company for a dinner at Moto. Here's the write-up I just posted to eGullet:

Short version: I went in with the same fears as jesteinf, and was also pleasantly surprised. Everything tasted great, and the gimmicks were used to further that, not distract from it. The wine pairings were spectacular.

Long version:
Our (customized) menu was printed on a cracker that was flavored like foccacia - sundried tomatoes, parmesan, etc. That was on top of a lovely salad with fennel and kumquat. We ordered the 10 course menu, then got to eat our crackers - yum.

SALMON & sesame: raw salmon, dusted with the Japanese spice mixture of a name I can't remember or spell (something -rashi), and topped with a crispy yuba skin. Our server held a copper pot of bubbling liquid nitrogen and scooped from it some freeze dried sesame oil (which became a powder) to top off the salmon. Yum.
Wine: Ruinart Blanc de Blanc, Reims, Brut, NV

BEET with bacon: Okay, you'd really have to love beets to like this one, but luckily we all did. This looked like a piece of yellow cake, but was actually a frozen aerated beet concoction - it was surprisingly cold, and had a texture that reminded me of semi-freddo. It was topped with some little bacon bits, and surrounded by a beautifully plated goat cheese sauce and swirls of red and yellow beet sauce as well as bits of beets.
Wine: C. Schmitt-Wagner, Longuichen Maximiner Herrenberg Spatlese, Riesling, M-S-R, 2005

SKATE & popcorn: the popcorn was in the form of a lovely yellow sauce that did indeed taste kind of like popcorn if you thought about it. There was also a bright green shiso mint sauce, some absolutely fabulous passion fruit noodles and quite a bit of coconut powder. And a little piece of seared skate wing. Beautifully plated, and best when you mixed all the bits together - this was definitely a "sum of the parts" dish.
Wine: Stone Paddock, Sauvignon Blanc, Hawkes Bay, 2005 (the passion fruit in the nose was spot on with those passion fruit noodles - excellent pairing)

CUCUMBER with lemon & basil: A palate cleanser of some picked cucumber and a shot of cucumber/basil/lemon juice. Tasty, and certainly palate cleans-y.

SMOKED PORK with frozen fried rice: Wow. Just wow. Even jesteinf's fiance (who doesn't particularly like pork) liked this. This was a piece of pork shoulder dusted with Thai spices and smoked. It was perfectly cooked, with lovely unctuous melting fat. It was served with some kind of sauteed green and some frozen noodles that, yes, tasted like fried rice.
Wine: Barboursville, Reserve, Cabernet Franc, Virginia 2005 (Yes, that's the US state of Virginia. It was great, and another amazing pairing.)

PASTA & quail: Introduced to us as "chicken-fried quail," this was a very twisty twist on mac and cheese. The pasta had been freeze dried or something, so it was crunchy. Meanwhile, the quail managed to have exactly the texture one would expect from pasta. And it was all topped with an amazing white truffle cheese sauce. Someone at the table christened it "haute trash." But man, I'd totally eat that again.
Wine: Betts & Scholl, The Chronique, Grenache, Barossa, 2005

FRUIT & bubbles: Ah, at last I get to try the famous carbonated fruit! We had two pieces of carbonated watermelon, served on either side of what we heard as "white chocolate and exploratory cheese sauce." We were wondering what was exploratory about it, but then someone told us no, it was "explorateur cheese sauce". Whatever it was, it was amazing. Also on the plate were some granulated black walnuts, a rice puff cracker thing flavored like strawberry daiquiri, and some cinnamon apples. From the texture and flavor, I believe the apples had been cooked sous vide or something unusual. This was just so tasty - we were all oohing and ahhing over that cheese sauce, and now I'm pondering incorporating it into a white chocolate truffle sometime, it was such and intriguing combination.
Wine: Meinklang, Ice Wine, Pinot Blanc, Burgenland, 2003.

2 & 3 dimensional truffle: The three dimensional truffle was a white chocolate truffle filled with a completely liquid cotton candy flavored center. The 2 dimensional version was a piece of rice paper that was flavored like cotton candy and printed with a cartoon drawing of a cone of cotton candy. A very familiar flavor in a new and (for me anyway) preferable form.

GRAHAM CRACKER & blueberry: My note taking fell to pieces on this one, as there was just too much. The twist on this one was that the graham cracker component was as a smooth mousse, with blueberry "dots" and ginger "dots" adding some crunchy texture. There was some strawberry sorbet in there too. Tasty.

KIWI, mint & maize: This looked for all the world like a plate of nachos. There were sweetened corn chips. There was ground beef made out of chocolate (but looking exactly like ground beef). There was a green salsa of kiwis. Then shaved mango sorbet that looked exactly like cheese. And a little pile of lime cream in the corner as the sour cream. The illusion was impeccable. So impeccable in fact, that I had to close my eyes to taste it properly. If I had my eyes open I just couldn't make my tastebuds cooperate. Awesome.
Wine: Elio Perrone, Sourgal, Moscato d'Asti, Italy 2006 (this might have come out with the previous course, I can't remember)

STRAWBERRY shortcake: Edible packing peanuts flavored with strawberry and sandwiching some sort of cream.

After we'd finished up and were chatting about what a lovely meal it had been, a waiter walked by with the cart they used to prepare a course on the GTM at tableside. Seeing that he had a little bit of batter left in his syringe, I called out "Hey, do you have enough there to make us some?" "I'll see what I can do."

And sure enough, a few minutes later out he came, wheeling the cart again for:

FLAPJACKS prepared tableside: A metal sheet is frozen in liquid nitrogen. Pancakes are cooked, then turned back into a batter, and that batter is "cooked" into pancakes on the anti-griddle, and served in a spoon with some BLiS bourbon-barrel-aged maple syrup. Man, that was good.

And then we were really done. And it was a great meal, and a lot of fun. Josh and Marisa were great company. I would absolutely go back.

Some additional comments:
Service: Service was really quite good and friendly. They made a couple of mistakes, the biggest of which was ignoring our telling them that Marisa didn't like dark chocolate (they could easily have left it off her "nachos"). I had requested a short pour for the wine pairings, which they said they were happy to do, but then my pours were pretty much the same size as Josh and Marisa's. BUT, they only charged me for the half pour, so I'm not actually complaining. Lastly, they made a mistake handling the gratuity on our split bill (charging me 1/2 instead of 1/3 of the total 18% service charge) but we just dealt with it between ourselves rather than making them run it again.

Freezing: Cantu definitely likes his freezer! 6 out of what ended up being 12 courses had something frozen about them.

Plating: The Beet and Skate courses had some of the best plating I've had in a restaurant meal in recent memory. Just gorgeous to look at.

Different menu, different name: Looking at the three menus, you would assume that there was no overlap across them. But in fact, as we discovered by carefully observing and talking to the the GTM-eating couple beside us, it's just that they use a different description depending on the menu.

BEET with bacon = RED/YELLOW beet cake
CUCUMBER with lemon & basil = LEMON, basil & pickled cucumber
SMOKED PORK with frozen fried rice = BBQ PORK with the fixin's
PASTA & quail = CHICKEN FRIED mac-n-cheese
FRUIT & bubbles = C O-two fruit
2 & 3 dimensional truffle = 3 COTTON candy stages (they got one more than we did)
KIWI, mint & maize = CHILI-CHEESE nachos

Moto
945 W Fulton Market
Chicago, IL 60607
312-491-0058

My Top 5 Favorite Places to Eat in Ann Arbor

I don't usually do memes here, but I've been feeling so guilty about the total lack of new content here lately, and I saw this one on Foodmomiac and thought - now that, I've got time to do!

Step 1: Add a direct link to your post below the name of the person whotagged you. Include the city/state and country you’re in.

Nicole (Sydney, Australia)
velverse (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia)
LB (San Giovanni in Marignano, Italy)
Selba (Jakarta, Indonesia)
Olivia (London, England)
ML (Utah, USA)
Lotus (Toronto, Canada)
tanabata (Saitama, Japan)
Andi (Dallas [ish], Texas, United States)
Todd (Louisville, Kentucky, United States)
miss kendra (los angeles, california, u.s.a)
Jiggs Casey (Berkeley, CA, USA! USA! USA!)
Tits McGee (New England, USA)
Kat (Ontario, Canada)
Cheezy (London, England)
tafka PP (Jerusalem, Israel)
Liza ("Northern" Israel)
Beth (Dublin, Ireland)
Emily (San Francisco, CA, USA)
Mamacita (Houston, TX, USA)
Foodmomiac (Chicago, IL, USA)
Tammy (Ann Arbor, MI, USA)

Step 2: List out your top 5 favorite places to eat at your location.

In no particular order:

Zingerman's Roadhouse - Yes, it's expensive. But it's also really tasty, and really consistent - I know I'm going to get a great meal. And the cocktails are out of this world. My favorites are the Scoflaw and the Knickerbocker, but I honestly haven't had one I didn't love. For food, I often get the mini-burger sampler, and either share it with my 3 year old as dinner for both of us, or bring half home for the next night.

Cafe Zola - When I want a nice dinner out, this is one of my go-to places. The entrees are good, but I've been known to make a meal out of just appetizers - the goat cheese with fig preserves is great, as is the antipasto plate. And they have the most amazing mussels.

Sabor Latino - Best tortilla chips in town, bar none. Excellent salsa too. My favorite thing to order here is the carne al pastor taco. With a big glass of horchata.

Kosmo Deli - What's not to love about a place that sells a "Seoul Dog" - a hot dog wrapped in bacon, deep fried, and served with kimchi? Not that I ever actually order that, mind you. I go for "old school" bi bim bop - white rice, bul go gi, cucumbers, broccoli, carrots and sprouts. And a fried egg on top, of course. Everyone I've taken here has been really impressed with the bi bim bop, and even better - they also make a mean grilled cheese sandwich for the little guy.

Jerusalem Garden - I've always said that Ann Arbor's best food finds are in the cheap eats category, and Jerusalem Garden is a quintessential example. It was the falafel with hummus sandwich that got me hooked in the first place ($4.39 for a huge sandwich!), but now I go straight for the chicken shawarma sandwich. The chicken is amazingly flavorful and always perfectly cooked, and the combination of the hot chicken with cold pickles, tomatoes, lettuce and garlic sauce has my mouth watering this very minute.

Step 3: Tag 5 more people.

Eh - I don't tag people, but please feel free to tag yourself, and post a link in the comments.

Wine Club 2nd Anniversary Dinner

A couple of weeks ago my wine club celebrated its second anniversary with another fabulous dinner. You can read about last year's here: it was a 9-course extravaganza with a paired wine for each course. This year we decided to go a little easier on ourselves, and do fewer courses but have a couple of wines with each, so we could compare and contrast. With some canapes for nibbling and some chocolates at the very end, it still ended up with nominally seven courses, although I personally prefer to think of it as 5+. As it turned out, in addition to having fewer courses, they were for the most part each less complex than last year, so all in all it was a pretty relaxing afternoon and evening of cooking dinner for 16.

Canape: Belgian Endive with Pigeon Rillette and Onion Confit
Gruet Brut New Mexico
Wegeler Riesling Sekt Brut Germany

The pigeon rillette was a gift from a friend who picked them up in France. As garnish, we made some onion confit by slowly and deeply caramelizing yellow onions and then deglazing them and the pan with a splash of white wine vinegar. Delicious. The goat cheese ones in the background were for our vegetarian.

First course: Asian Summer Rolls with Fresh Herbs and Blood Orange Dipping Sauce
2004 Zed Sauvignon Blanc, Marlborough, New Zealand
2005 Quinta da Alorna Arintho, Ribatejo DOC, Portugal

Smitten by some beautiful organic blood oranges at the grocery store, I bought some without really knowing what I was going to do with them. In the end, I cut them into supremes, and tossed them with some fresh parsley and cilantro, and served them as a little salad on the side of the spring rolls. I mixed the juice with lime, fish sauce, sugar and ginger to make a dipping sauce for the rolls. The rolls included mango, jicama, carrots, cucumber, mint and cilantro, and were really exceedingly tasty.

Second course: Hake Puttanesca
2004 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling Kabinett, Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, Germany
2001 Querceto Chianti Classico Riserva

This is a horrid picture of what was one of the best tasting things I've made recently. I should probably be ashamed to admit that my Puttanesca recipe came from Rachel Ray, but it was so good that I can't really mind. We used awesome ingredients - imported olives and anchovies and salt-packed capers from Zingerman's, San Marzano tomatoes - which is essential in such a simple dish. So good - I think I need to make this for dinner tomorrow.

Entree: Rosemary Garlic Smoked Leg of Lamb, Flageolets, Truffled Green Beans
2003 Mas Amiel Notre Terre, Cotes du Roussillon Villages, France
2005 Theirry Germain SauMur Champigny, Saumur Champigny, France

One of our wine club members loves to smoke meats on his grill, and offered to do something that way for the dinner. We went back and forth on a number of different preparations, and ended up settling on this one. We made a paste of garlic and rosemary to stuff a boneless leg of lamb, then included some dried rosemary sprigs on with the wood chips for the smoke. Very nice flavor, although we got our timing wrong and ended up having to rush the cooking along. For our vegetarian member, we marinated some shiitake mushrooms with the same flavors, then smoked them briefly alongside the meat. Just before serving I seared them up in a hot pan. Yum.

Cheese course: Selection of “Stinky” Cheeses
Chateau d’Orignac Pineau des Charentes, Charentes, France

For this course, I picked the wine (on the recommendation of my excellent wine seller, Everyday Wines), and then got to decide what kind of cheese course to go with it. Pineau des Charentes is actually a blend of Cognac and unfermented grape juice, and my god this stuff is amazing. So smooth, so drinkable, and - at 18% alcohol - so dangerous. Wow. My wineseller suggested that it would stand up well to some stinky cheeses, so I sent one of our members (who works with Zingerman's) off on the task of finding some. Apparently all the people working the cheese counter that day had different ideas about what a "stinky" cheese was, so we ended up with four quite different and quite tasty cheeses.

The wrinkly looking yellow one is Langues from Champagne in France. Moving clockwise, Hoch y Brig from Switzerland, followed by Epoisses from Burgundy in France, and lastly a Golwydd Caerphilly from Wales. That's a little bit of fig preserve in the center - it was the one thing all the cheesemongers agreed on.

Dessert: Baked Pears with Goat Cheese, BLiS Maple Syrup
Lustau Capataz Andres Solera Reserva Deluxe Cream Sherry

Not much to look at, but very tasty. The recipe came from my friend Alex, who usually serves it with honey, but thought it would be a great foil for the BLiS maple syrup. This syrup is produced outside Grand Rapids, MI, and is mostly only available to restaurants. Alex lives in Grand Rapids and swapped me some for a box of chocolates. There are a few varieties, but this one is aged in used Bourbon barrels and is remarkably complex and delicious. We baked the pears with some melted butter for 20 minutes, then drizzled them with a bit of 10-yr aged balsamic and baked for five minutes more. They were served warm with a round of fresh goat cheese (from Prairie Fruits Farms, which was well worth effort it took to bring it back from Champaign-Urbana with me on the glowing recommendation of a food friend there) and drizzled with the maple syrup. It was an excellent combination, although next time, I'd skip the balsamic in order to let the maple stand out more. As it turned out, this was an absolutely perfect match with the dregs of the Pineau des Charentes from the previous course, making us all wish we had another bottle of that!

Chocolates: Lavender Caramel, Orange

I took this opportunity to try out a couple of recipes that I was working on for my Mother's Day chocolate selection. People seemed to like them, but we were all a little tipsy by then!

As usual, it was a blast. I'm looking forward to next year already!