Entries tagged with 'cooking'
Posted by Adam Kuban, August 9, 2008 at 1:00 PM
Reader Z. B. emailed with links to the following videos, saying, "Wonder if you've seen this? Interesting idea with the tomato vine and upside-down skillet."
I've actually seen the upside-down skillet thing when Nick Kindelsperger wrote about this broiled pizza hack for Serious Eats last year. It's a cool trick that British überchef Heston Blumenthal, came up with, using the skillet as a superhot base to cook the pizza on. But the tomato vine trick is new to me and pretty cool. Readers, Blumenthal posits that much of the flavor we associate with tomatoes is in the vine, and he makes a sauce in a pressure cooker, lets it cool, and then steeps the denuded vine in the sauce overnight in the fridge. Anyway, the vids appear after the jump.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, June 28, 2008 at 12:00 PM
This series of videos shows Jamie Oliver making pizza. They're fairly interesting because Oliver has cooked around the various regions of Italy, each with its own specific way of doing things. Instead of slavishly sticking to one culinary canon, however, he finds a way of making pies that fuses all the good stuff that works for him. And check out his killer wood-burning pizza oven. All that, after the jump.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, June 6, 2008 at 2:45 PM
A nice, detailed item about making pizza at home on the blog I Think This World Is Perfect—particularly as a family-friendly activity.
Posted by Adam Kuban, May 23, 2008 at 9:40 AM
Grilled pizza. What's there to say about it but that it's pretty awesome and that, yes, you can grill a pizza. It's much more fun and interesting that that other stuff you're thinking about grilling. Burgers? Hot dogs? Steak? Hmmph. Don't you do those every year? And anyway, even if you still want to grill that boring run-of-the-mill stuff, you have three days this Memorial Day weekend, so shake it up, homie.
So here's my quickie guide to doing grilled pizza. It's not a step-by-step, hold-your-hand guide—because I don't think doing grilled pizza is that difficult. Are you going to get it right the first time? Maybe. But it takes some practice. So, to get you started, here's what you'll need, along with some helpful tips and links to some good recipes.
What You'll Need
So you're probably askin': What do I need to grill a pizza? That's not an altogether unreasonable inquiry. Get your answer after the jump.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, March 27, 2008 at 1:00 PM
I don't know whether to thank you or throttle you, Peter Reinhart.
See, your Neapolitan pizza dough recipe rocks. Judging by the three pies I made with it last night, I think it's going to completely change the way I make dough for my homemade pizza. At the same time, it's forced me to review my last 15 years of at-home pizzamaking and conclude that it has all been for naught. And that kinda sucks.
Still, I think I've seen the light—literally and figuratively—and if it means I have to scrap the last decade and half of experience, so be it. It's not like I was at a good place with my previous method, anyway.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, February 22, 2008 at 12:45 PM
In the Serious Eats Talk section today, reader Hobsons96 asks for pizza dough help. Basically s/he can't get the dough to stretch properly. This problem reminded me of the Alton Brown episode on pizza, "Flat Is Beautiful," in which Brown explains gluten, "windowpaning," and yeast action—among other nerdriffic dough concepts.
And then I remembered that there are a number of Good Eats! segments on YouTube, including the two after the jump that might give Hobsons96 some more help.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, October 9, 2007 at 11:00 AM
Editor's note: A short time ago, homeslice Philip G. got in touch, telling me there was a post on pizzamaking.com that was making quite a stir: Reverse-Engineered Coal-Fired Brick Oven. Apparently, a Michigan man had invented a grill insert that he claimed simulated a coal- or wood-fired oven. I clicked over and became fascinated by the metal-and-stone device (pictured below). Could something so simple-looking achieve the holy grail of at-home pizza-making—hot enough and consistent enough temperatures to perfectly cook a pie? I don't know yet, because my 2stone Pizza Grill has only today begun its UPS journey to my home in Brooklyn. Anyway, Philip has been in on the 2stone discussion thread on pizzamaking.com since the beginning, so he offered to do a Q &A with the inventor, Willard Gustavsen. Here 'tis. Many thanks to Philip! —Adam
Name: Willard Gustavsen
Location: Southwest Michigan
Occupation: Designer, manufacturer, builder
URL: 2stonepizzagrill.com
Tell us a little bit about where this project came from—where did you initially get the idea to make a pizza-oven insert for grills?
Most of the design work I have done has been related to specialty tools for the building industry. I have either sold the patent rights or have manufactured products and private-labeled them for companies. I have always liked good pizza and thought it would be a fun project; to see if I could design a simple oven or tool that could duplicate the results of an authentic wood-fired hearth oven. Essentially the 2stone Pizza Grill is just another tool of sorts.
At first, all of my prototypes were wood-burning and were a combination of steel and fire bricks. I tried many different styles, mostly looking for a way to reduce the number of bricks it took and also trying to find ways to shorten the fire-up time. Since I genuinely like pizza and pizza-making, it was more interesting than some of the other projects I've worked on. I kind of had my doubts about making something saleable, because it could be really expensive to ship a lot of bricks around the country.
I guess that's where I started thinking about a grill insert. I already had a grill "the heat source" and I figured most people do, so why bother reinventing "the heat part"? I also got tired of having to burn all that slab wood just for two pizzas.
How long has it taken to get all the kinks out of the system, from start to finish?
I started 5 or 6 years ago. I didn't work on it all the time but kept thinking about it in the back of my mind. I would scrap the last prototype and build a new one, always looking for a way to do more with less—fewer firebricks and shorter fire-up times, for example. Once the final concept was down, it did boil down to ironing out the kinks, as you say.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, September 20, 2007 at 1:45 PM
You may remember homeslice Philip G. from such memorable hits as A Visit to Pizzeria Bianco. He's the dude who (wearing his I Slice NY shirt) made a quick video review of the joint. Now he's back, with a video that shows you how to make pizza at home. Enjoy!
[Warning: Video linked below is set to autoplay. Will make noise if you're at work.]
Posted by Adam Kuban, October 17, 2006 at 8:00 AM
Deep-Fried Pizza at
THE ATLANTIC CHIPSHOP
Address: 129 Atlantic Ave., Brooklyn NY 11201 [map]
Phone: 718-855-7775
Cost: $3 a slice
The Skinny: Inspired by the Scots, who have a penchant for deep-frying just about anything, the battered slices at the Atlantic ChipShop taste like a combination of a pizza roll and a mozzarella stick. Very good, if you're into those things.
A picture is worth a thousand words, but video is priceless, especially when it comes to the wonder of deep-fried pizza. Take a peek:
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Posted by Adam Kuban, October 4, 2006 at 9:56 AM
Jeff Varasano (left), the man who gained quick internet fame when he announced his successful reverse-engineering of Patsy's Pizza (the East Harlem location, naturally), was interviewed by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation yesterday.
Jeff Varasano on the CBC [.wmv]
Freestyle: October 3, 2006 [cbc.ca]
