There is nothing like fresh cheese

This simple kit will give you all the tools you need (except the milk, of course) to make your own cheese. It includes instructions on how to make ricotta and mozzarella. Tyou can easily veer from these examples and make your own chevre or other types of cheeses. Apparently it only takes about a half an hour from start to fresh cheese.

Imagine the awesome pizzas you could make. The rigatonis. Mmmm.

Contains enough for 30 batches and includes cheesecloth (it’s called “butter muslin” but I’m not sure what the difference is), dairy thermometer, vegetable-based rennet tablets and cheese salt.

$25

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Carbon Steel Deli Slicer + 13 pounds of meat = Best. Gift. Ever.

Oh. Yeah.

Seriously. What more can we say? The carbon steel slicer so you can slice up  your cured meats nice and thin, plus a man-ton of meat. And Creminell is the good stuff too: Lardo, Cotto, Calabrese and Finnocchiona. And not just buts of them, but the whole damn sausages.

This is good.

But not for the gout.

But what the hell.

$1,200

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Sustainable seafood direct to your door

Good seafood. There’s nothing like it. But let’s face facts: our oceans are in trouble. Large predator fish are becoming endangered. Farmed fish is always a gamble. And keeping track of what you should eat and what you shouldn’t (even with the help of an iPhone application and Web site) is practically a full-time commitment.

Enter I Love Blue Sea. They deliver “fresh enough to eat raw” seafood anywhere in the US. And everything they sell passes the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Greenpeace standards for sustainability.

Right now, they have Kumamoto Oysters and Uni (Sea urchin) as well as all kinds of fish, crab and even geodock (if you have to ask, you probably don’t want it…).

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How to host tasting parties

I remember back in the day when I was learning video and web by day and bartending by night. I had friends who were chefs and friends who were sommeliers. And we did a lot of tastings. Cheese tastings, wine tastings, charcuterie tastings. Everything – we were so hungry to learn about all these foods and wines that we were discovering and we wanted to compare.

Flash forward now: most of my friends can’t tell between 2-buck Chuck and a premium vintage bottle of DRC. But there are a few that want to learn, a few that put up with my blabbering about triple creme, the black foot Iberico hams fed only acorns and hazelnuts, and the mysterious superiority of wines de biodynamique.

Enter this interesting book from Dina Cheney, who lays out for us tasting grids and recommendations for how to throw such parties. She offers guides for 10 different kinds of tasting parties, and includes some suggested pairings and recipes, as well as information on the types of foods in the tastings (such as origins and grades of olive oils).

Fun.

$15

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The next miracle food/skin product?

On a recent trip to New York City, I had dinner at a restaurant called WD50. If you’re not familiar with it, it is the flagship of chef Wylie Dufresne and is renowned for the style of cooking he uses: molecular gastronomy. That is, using science in the kitchen (we have written about this before). At any rate, the meal was fantastic and one item in the desert was argan oil foam. Now getting oil to foam I will leave to Wylie and the molecular gastronomists, however the flavor of the argan oil was amazing.

We were familiar with argan oil before as it is touted to be amazing for one’s skin and hair. Argan oil skin products abound, but word has it the pure argan oil is the best. Apparently argan oil has an amazingly high concentration of tocopherols (vitamin E) as well as phenols (like the amazing resveratrol that is in wine) and essential fatty acids (EFAs). It also has some phytosterols which are allegedly great at healing scars. At any rate, users have touted it as clearing up acne and rosacea, as well as alleviating eczema and the general bragging of silky hair and smooth luxurious skin.

Did I mention it tastes nutty and subtly sweet with a hint of acidity? In Morocco and increasingly in Europe, which has used it for centuries and now the U.S., this oil is used as a flavoring oil – not a cooking one – to add its nutty contribution to all sorts of dishes.

It gets even better though. The oil is extracted from the nut (read: renewable!) of the endemic argan tree. Goats will actually climb to the top of the smaller tree to pick at the nuts (see picture at NY Times Travel). It grows only in Morocco and many of the trees are 150-200 years old. It is ground by hand and – get this – ALL of the argan oil sold is sold through a cooperative that shares its profit with the Berber women who process it by hand (read: very woman friendly) and donates portions of its profit to reforestation (read: environmentally friendly). Does it get any better? A great tasting oil that tastes delicious (it is probably also quite nutritious) and you can rub it all over yourself and look better – and at the same time feel good about it because you are helping women and the environment as well as indigenous cultures.

This bottle is well regarded and is $40 – I don’t see why you couldn’t use it on your face as well…

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Use this to carbonate and foam anything up...try FRUIT!

The latest food trend: carbonated fruit. Yeah, sounds weird, but it’s actually a really fun way to make simple desserts. Here’s how it works:

1) Stuff one of these carbonators with fruit. Make sure you get a good one that handles some pressure.

2) Insert a C02 cartridge and charge it up.

3) Open the top carefully and empty the fruit. Serve with some ice cream, chocolate, whatever – or just eat it plain.

The fruit bubbles, the CO2 sets the color. It’s a pleaser for all the senses.

P.S. – you can have all kinds of other fun with this little charger – try charging booze like absinthe or vodka for interesting martinis, try foaming whatever crazy thing you can think of. Just chuck some liquids in here and see what comes out…

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Bamboo cutting board with stainless colander

If you’re not familiar with the up-side of bamboo, it’s time to learn. Unlike wood, bamboo grows extremely quickly – 7 years on average to a full harvest as opposed to 30-50 for trees. In addition, it can provide 20 times the timber when compared to the same amount of  hardwood grown in the same area. A stand of bamboo can also release 35% more oxygen into the atmosphere than a similar sized stand of trees.

That’s some good stuff.

As far as cutting boards go, bamboo is actually harder than maple. This particular one has a built in 18/10 stainless colander you can use to wash veggies or slough off your food scraps for later disposal. At 23″ x 12″, this should slide over your sink so it’s great for even fabulous Manhattan apartments with limited counter space.

Did we mention it looks cool, too?

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Mmm...Moroccan food

The Moroccans have a dish called the tagine. It is both a literal dish – or more correctly a cooking pot with a cover – and a dish that is served. Think of delicious chicken cooked on high heat with lots of spices, some vegetables and maybe, just maybe, some preserved lemons.

What’s cool about the Emile Henry tagine is that it allows you to cook on the stove top (gas, electric or halogen), in the oven (up to 500 degrees) and even directly on a fire (gas grill, charcoal, even an open fire). It’s also more reasonably priced then other (ahem…) French cooking dishware maker’s versions…

The design of the tagine – taken from the original Moroccan style, has a conical lid that allows the steam to recirculate in the dish and keeps your stew moist.

Some good recipes:

• Fish Cinnamon with Tomatoes and Capers from (RIP) Gourmet Magazine
• Crazy breakfast tagine with eggs from Tamarind and Thyme blog
• Tagine Makfoul (tomato/onion base) from about.com
• Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemon and Olives from Closet Cooking (note: food porn alert)

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Grow your own...

Our current agro-business-oriented food system has been blamed for a lot of the problems we are currently experiencing to our health and our environment. While many of us try to eat organic and local as often as we can, there really is no better way than to grow your own.

Plus, it’s delicious.

But, for those of us who live in the city, having a backyard garden is out of the question because, well, we don’t have a backyard. And for those of you who live in the colder climes, growing things outdoors this time of year is also not an option (except maybe icicles).

So…it seems two artists, Britta Riley and Rebecca Bray, have given us the opportunity to benefit from their Window Farmers project by leaving a Web site with instructions, pictures and forums on how to create and maintain farms…in our windows. Very cool. Highly recommended.

(Their latest project drink.pee.drink.pee.drink.pee is something to behold as well…)

For those of us who aren’t as resourceful, a home herb/herbal tea garden might be the way to start – these stackable pots will work great in a nicely lit area…

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