French-laundry | Easy Delicious Recipes

Taco Bell’s Cantina Tacos: Better Than The Original?

August 9, 2010 – 11:31 am | by admin

These came from Taco Bell. Really. [Photo: Robyn Lee] Yountville, California, is home to The French Laundry , the Thomas Keller establishment many consider one of the very best restaurants in the nation. But just 200 feet down the road, in the gravel parking lot of a particularly divey bar, there’s a taco truck —serving the best tacos I’ve ever had. Whatever meat you choose is cradled in a double-wrap of corn tortillas, with diced onions, cilantro, and lime: cheap, simple, perfect. The taco ideal. So when I heard about Taco Bell’s limited-time offer of Cantina Tacos , in classic taqueria style, I was intrigued. The promotional photos looked nearly identical to those I devoured at the stand in Yountville—still, to this day, my favorite tacos. I was a huge Taco Bell fan as a kid (three soft tacos, no cheese, no lettuce, with two orders of cinnamon twists) but have since lost my taste for the flour-tortilla tacos filled with meat paste. Frankly, I didn’t expect much from their new offerings. But with the “Cantina Tacos,” you’ve got a choice of three different types of meat (beef, chicken, or pork carnitas), with diced onion and cilantro on two corn tortillas. They add a slice of lime in the tin foil, …

This Post was extracted from New Vegetarian Recipes
Go here to see the original and read more: Taco Bell’s Cantina Tacos: Better Than The Original?

Tags: boston, california, cilantro-on-two, french-laundry, Laundry, night, parking, photo, scarfed-it-down, tacos, thomas

No Comments | Posted in » Cooking Food

Critic-Turned-Cook Says Goodbye To Some Old Cookbook Friends

August 5, 2010 – 8:07 pm | by admin

[ Photographs: Leslie Kelly ] Like most food junkies, I’ve got a wicked cookbook habit. I constantly need a fix and, as a newspaper food writer/critic for many years, that itch was easy enough to scratch with a steady diet of review copies. I have also scored scores of recipe-filled tomes at bookstores, junk shops, and from friends. Yet, like all addictions, there comes a day of reckoning, and mine happened last week when a bin of cookbooks came tumbling down from on high in my ridiculously cramped and crowded garage. I took it as a sign that it was time to do a little spring cleaning in the middle of summer. The goal? I would like to be able to park my car in the garage. Maybe it was time to say so long to some old friends, as painful as it might be. My cookbook habit began innocently enough. When I was in high school, the woman who was like a second mother gifted me a copy of Better Homes and Gardens’ New Cook Book , a great guide for beginners. As soon as I mastered that, I moved on to filling my shelves with Julia Child and Craig Claiborne and not one, but two…

This Post was extracted from Food Recipes Online
See the original post here and read more: Critic-Turned-Cook Says Goodbye To Some Old Cookbook Friends

Tags: barbara, book, claiborne, cleaning, cooking, french-laundry, homes, pennington, peter-reinhart, result, southern, writer

No Comments | Posted in » Cooking Food

A Decadent Cheeseburger at Checkers Downtown in Los Angeles

July 15, 2010 – 1:39 am | by admin

From A Hamburger Today [Photographs: Damon Gambuto] Checkers Downtown 535 S. Grand Avenue, Los Angeles CA 90071 ( map ); 213-624-0000; checkersdowntown.com Cooking Method: Grilled Short Order: An upscale dining room makes a decadent burger Want Fries with That? Yes—they’re straightforward and satisfying Prices: Checker’s Cheeseburger (w/fries), $14 (Lunch and Bar Menu) Notes: The Thursday night’s happy hour is called FOUR because selected drinks and small plates are $4 a piece from 4 p.m – 8 p.m. I’d say it’s in the running for best Happy Hour in town. Each week’s deals are previewed on their Facebook page Sitting in one of Los Angeles’ most storied neighborhood’s, Bunker Hill, Checkers Hotel is an attractive piece of the art deco city’s history. The building dates back to the 1927 when it was opened as the Mayflower Hotel. It lacks the grandeur of its more famous neighbor, The Millennium Biltmore , but recently has managed to do something that not too many hotels in town have: garner some attention for its dining room. Most of the Los Angeles food scene talk about how Checkers Downtown has focused on their very clever and very tempting happy hour. They call it FOUR and, as you’d imagine…

This Post was extracted from Roasted Chicken Recipes
Read more from the original source: A Decadent Cheeseburger at Checkers Downtown in Los Angeles

Tags: allison, angeles, checkers, checkers-hotel, dollar, french, french-laundry, Hamburger, hamburger-today, hotel, maps, mayflower, presentation, result, running

No Comments | Posted in » Cooking Food

Critic-Turned-Cook Mulls Question: Worst Meal Ever?

February 11, 2010 – 7:30 pm | by admin

[Photograph: Robyn Lee] A few days after showing up for the Master Chef casting call , I got together at Palace Kitchen with fellow reality show hopefuls to compare notes. We mostly knew each other by our Twitter handles. “Aren’t you Seattle Food Geek ? (Also known as Scott Heimendinger.) And Salty Seattle (Linda Miller Nicholson), MarcSeattle as well as… hey, isn’t that Serious Eats contributor Michael Natkin ?” In between bites of sublime bites of Spam—yes, housemade Berkshire pork Spam, served on creamy grits, a poached egg on top—the pleasant conversation focused on, what else, food. One question stopped me cold. Marc Schermerhorn asked me, “What’s the worst meal you’ve ever eaten?” As a former critic, I’m used to being asked to name my favorite places or dishes that inspired awe, so this query caught me by surprise. I’ve been thinking about it since. It’s Not the Food, It’s the Service For all the hits I’ve been fortunate to taste while reviewing restaurants, there have been some colossal misses, even out of kitchens with stellar reps. But I think the worst meals I can remember have more to do with sloppy, rude, or inattentive service. Now, before all you front-of-the-house folk …

This Post was extracted from Serious Eats
Go here to see the original and read more: Critic-Turned-Cook Mulls Question: Worst Meal Ever?

Tags: food, french, french-laundry, kitchen, michael-natkin, seattle, table, worst

No Comments | Posted in » On And Off, food

What’s on the menu chef?

October 7, 2009 – 6:37 pm | by admin

Delicate plump cushions of free range egg enriched, durum wheat artisan pasta, ripened under a Tuscan sun, encasing rennet free, organic, silky, goats milk cheese studded with fresh lemon thyme and cracked black peppercorns, poised on a crushed tomato, garlic and onion infusion and lightly showered with a fine mist of freshly teased, aged Parmigiano Reggiano – or cheese ravioli with tomato and parmesan ? In many restaurants today the menu descriptions are more inflated than the chef’s ego! What is the logic ? Do they believe that embellishing the menu descriptions entitles them to charge higher prices? The style of menu writing in McDonalds seems a little more down to earth and in tune with their client base. Maybe that’s it, customer expectations in upmarket restaurants are more to blame than the chef’s aspirations for poetic immortality. Well I’m not so sure that chefs have ever paid that much attention to the guest’s experience of menu reading. Years ago menus were concise, structured and totally lacking in poetic licence and could only be navigated by the discerning diner. Every chef got his own copy of “Le Repetoire de la Cuisine” which was not a recipe book but his very own little red book of…

This Post was extracted from Best Food Recipes Blog
Go here to see the original and read more: What’s on the menu chef?

Tags: Chef, client, drop-the-french, food, french-laundry, japanese, menu

No Comments | Posted in » Cooking Food