Win an Oregon Bounty Cuisintership

I just spent the past weekend in Portland, Oregon. Officially I was there to attend a wedding but my not-so-secret mission was to check out the food. I had the best French toast of my life, some very tasty pastrami, scintillating creole Cuban food and outstanding local lobster mushrooms and potato gnocchi that I can't get out of my mind. Portland is also known for artisanal brewed beer, and I am particularly fond of Willamette Valley wines, especially Pinot Noir.

If you'd like to get closer to the great food, wine and drink of Oregon, there's a contest you should enter. Between now and September 18th, 2009 you can win one of seven all-expense paid "cuisinterships" to Oregon. That's roundtrip airfare, six nights lodging and $1000 cash, for a five-day, six-night apprenticeship as an Oregon chef, cheesemaker/chocolatier, craft brewer, distiller, rancher, fisherman or winemaker.

Learn a bit about what makes Oregon such a fascinating culinary destination on the Oregon Bounty web site, then choose the category or categories you are most interested in, and enter to win. Upload a video of up to 2 minutes on why you deserve to win (even a cell phone video is fine), submit a 140 character Twitter-style statement to bolster your case and finally your name and contact info and then it's up to me! Ok, only if you choose Fisherman, but still, when the say "tell it to the judge", that would be me. Right now there are hardly any entries posted online so I'd say your chances are pretty good at winning. This is an amazing opportunity. Here's wishing you the best of luck!

Why do YOU cook, Kalyn Denny?

Photo credit: Kalyn Denny
Kalyn Denny of Kalyn's Kitchen is one of the most positive voices in food blogging. She started her blog with a focus on the South Beach diet, but has expanded to encompass all low-glycemic and low carb foods. Her vibrant recipes and photography are a pleasure to behold, but her passion for fresh herbs and for reaching out to food bloggers is what I admire most. This photo from her garden represents so much of what I like about Kalyn, it's home grown, fresh, straightforward yet impressive and utterly inspiring.

"I suppose in the beginning, we all cook so we can eat the food. Over time though, cooking becomes more about creation and self-expression and much less about just getting fed. When you cook a lot and try to do it well, the process of cooking becomes a form of self-nurturing whereby we show love to ourselves and others.

For me, tapping into that feeling is one reason cooking is so enriching. Beyond that, the challenge of cooking as a creative exercise that starts with nothing and ends with a finished product to be savored is something I find exciting, no matter how many times I do it."

EatSmart Precision Pro Digital Kitchen Scale

I use a digital kitchen scale practically every day. If you're serious about baking or developing recipes, it's a necessity. You may notice some of the more professional baking cookbooks show the weights of ingredients. It's a much more accurate way to measure than by using cups and spoons. When I develop a recipe using an ingredient like fish or chicken, I specify the weight because it makes a big difference in cooking time and also in terms of servings. For example, a salmon steak could be as small as 6 ounces or over a pound.

Kitchen scales can get pretty expensive but the most recent one I tried, the EatSmart Precision Pro Digital Kitchen Scale is not expensive at all and has a lot going for it. If you are looking for a basic digital scale I would definitely recommend it. I spent about $50 for my Salter Aquatronic scale when my earlier scale, a Tanita died. It's a little more accurate for very small measurements (under one ounce) and it has a larger bed, but other than that, it really doesn't have any other advantages over this less expensive compact model. Since I'm generally using the tare function to "zero out" the bowl or plate anyway, the size isn't a big problem for me. I think the small size has a lot to do with the fact that it is marketed as a way to count calories.

Pros:

+ Very inexpensive, $25 (and qualifies for free shipping)

+ Small and compact

+ Plastic and well sealed, easy to clean

+ Easily switches from ounces to grams

+ Measures down to half and ounce

+ Auto shut off after just a couple of minutes

+ Uses 2 AAA batteries

+ Large display

+ Easy to clean

Cons:

- Small bed means larger items won't fit unless placed in a bowl (which you must tare or "zero out")

- When weighing larger quantities reading the display can be a challenge

- Weight limit is 11 pounds

- Scale died after 3 years

Why do YOU cook, Eric Gower?

Eric Gower's food excites me. His approach to cooking is creative and fresh. Like me, he loves to play with ingredients and find new and different ways to use them. Having lived in Japan, he often combines Western style techniques with Asian ingredients but also uses what's local. His passion for sharing techniques and great ingredients is infectious. He is the author of one of the most innovative cookbooks I own, The Breakaway Cook and he blogs at The Breakaway Cook. Tune in to the Mehta vs. Morimoto episode of Iron Chef America to see Eric as a judge.

I probably eat out, on average, one meal a week. That means I'm cooking roughly 20 times per week, since I cook three meals a day most days. Why do I cook so much?

Cooking for me is this ongoing practice of tweaks. Over the years I've tweaked my food to suit my own palate without a lot of regard for much, except what tastes great *to me.* Cooking, I think, is pure grit: if you do something three times a day, and keep at it, you're bound to get better at it.

If you try to cook competitively like the chefs on tv, you're bound to give up. Unless you have an army of 20-year-olds at your disposal to do all the work it requires, you'll never do it like they do (we'll leave aside for a moment the question of why you'd even want to). It's much better to cook simply, for yourself. Get good at feeding yourself first, and you'll naturally get good at feeding others. Sort of like the flight attendant's instructions to put the oxygen mask on first, before attending your children!

But WHY do I cook? There's a special satisfaction in creating great meals, day after day. Cooking is like coming home, to a place that is safe. When you cook often, you have the power to create a kind of home for yourself, a state of being. It's a place in which you can trust yourself. It's the opposite of a waste of time; it's the ultimate way to spend time."

General Mills Photography Studios

At General Mills they do all their own photography on site for packaging, editorial, everything. They have a labyrinth of prop rooms, a photo lab, multiple kitchens and areas set up for photography and post production.


Walking into the photo area was a hallway with photos taken by various photographers using General Mills products, just for the fun of it. I kept thinking, the photos would make great cards. Actually General Mills thought so too and gave us each a box of cards made from these fabulous photos. Here were my favorites, can you identify the General Mills product in each one? Sorry these are photos of photos, so please excuse the poor quality.



I could have spent hours in the prop room or rather, rooms. Imagine every single color, size and shape pan, plate, placemat and everything in between. In a word, staggering.

A huge thanks to the photographers and food stylists who set up a shoot, walking us through all the steps, the lighting, the props and the styling. I picked up lots of great tips and will treasure the little tutorial they prepared. It answered many of the nagging questions I have had about aperture settings, lighting tricks, photo angles and more. Here are just a few of my favorite photo styling tips:

+ Wrap foil on the bottom of your pan to form the shape, then place it inside the pan so you don't get creases and wrinkles in the corners. This works great for things like brownies that you want to smoothly lift out of the pan without sticking.

+ Remove slices surrounding the slice you want to photograph, so it stays attractive.

+ Use a ruler and pins or toothpicks to mark where you are going to cut slices of brownies, cake, pie, etc.

+ Sometimes tearing into homestyle foods like muffins looks better than slicing them


Aside from the hospitality of our hosts, the best thing about my trip was this--hanging out with Anna from Cookie Madness and Nicole from Baking Bites. They are smart, funny, creative and amazingly talented bakers and bloggers. We had such a good time together. In case you didn't know, Anna is a past Pillsbury Bake-off winner. How cool was it to walk around and have various employees recognize her as a celebrity? I loved it!

My visit to General Mills

Last week General Mills invited around 50 bloggers to come visit their corporate headquarters. I was a little wary. After all, I'm not a big consumer of packaged foods, but the lure of seeing the test kitchens and photo studio proved incentive enough, and I was in!

The evening I arrived there was a welcome reception and dinner at the Mill City Museum. The museum has terrific interactive exhibits about the mill, and there was also lots of early advertising and packaging from Pillsbury and Gold Medal brands. I particularly liked seeing the ruins of the old factory and dramatic views from the observation deck, that really give you a feel for the history of the city and how important milling was.

The next day bright and early,we headed to the test kitchens. They have 16 stations and test and develop 2000 recipes a year! Not all the test kitchen staff was present, but I was told they have about 15 employees. It was a dream kitchen, light and airy with huge glass windows looking out on the manicured landscaping. I can't imagine a nicer space to work on recipes. If I worked at General Mills, those kitchens would spoil me so I'd never want to cook at home, ever again.

In terms of the products, I can't say I fell head-over-heels in love with anything. I just don't eat much cold cereal or snack food, (products which Michael Pollan likes to call "food like substances" due to how processed they are). My favorite product was probably the Progresso Creamy Tomato Basil soup. It had very few ingredients, a fresh basil and tomato flavor and pleasing texture.

Though I buy imported Italian tomatoes for sauce, I also buy Muir Glen fire roasted tomatoes because they are very consistent and add a terrific smoky flavor to soups, stews and sauces. I learned that Muir Glen is planting some heirloom varieties of tomatoes and handpicking them for limited edition cans. I can't wait to try them when they become later this year. If you're interested in heirloom canned tomatoes too, join the "Tomato Connoisseurs Club."

Overall I was impressed with how General Mills is clearly responding to consumers demand for products that are organic, gluten-free, and with no artificial flavors and colors. I told them I wasn't even interested in trying anything made with sucralose, to me it leaves a nasty aftertaste. And while it was too sweet for me, the Cascadian Farm organic dark chocolate granola was an interesting product introduction. I suggested they consider cocoa nibs instead of dark chocolate, you never know, it could happen...

Next up--a visit to the photo lab...

Barbecue Style Brisket

Summer is almost over, but it's not too late to plan one more backyard barbecue. This past weekend I had some friends over for a potluck at my folks place, and the main attraction was the beef. My father recently purchased a smoker in anticipation of trying some Snake River Farms beef I had been given as a sample. I first had Snake Rive Farms beef at The French Laundry and more recently tried their burgers, both were fantastic. Wagyu beef has a higher percentage of unsaturated fat, more than any other breed and American Snake River Farms beef is free of both added hormones and antibiotic residues. It's extremely tender and flavorful.

Brisket is an economical cut of beef and I was curious to see if American raised Kobe beef would be superior to conventional beef or grassfed in terms of flavor as well. Oh my. Was it ever. I don't eat beef all that often, but this is really the most rich and luxurious beef you can buy. It's a great way to indulge and tastier than steak, in my opinion. A whole brisket, when available, is about 14 pounds of meat, but needs to be trimmed of fat. You can cut it into three large pieces, each of which will serve about 6 people, maybe a few more.

My father is not big on recipes, but I did get the details on how he prepared the brisket. Here are the basic steps and measurements:

1. Dry rub and marinate
After trimming the meat of most of the fat, rub the meat with a spice rub. You can make it or use a commercial product that contains salt, sugar and spices. Wrap in plastic and marinate in the refrigerator overnight.

2. Smoke
Rinse off the rub to make sure the meat will not be too salty. Brush with barbecue sauce and smoke in a smoker for 2 hours at 250 degrees. Note: If you don't have a smoker you could skip this step and just add 2 hours to the baking time.

3. Bake low and slow
Caramelize an onion until golden. Slice a raw onion and create a bed for the meat in a deep disposable style foil baking pan. Layer the meat on top of the raw onion and add about 1 cup water and 1/2 cup of barbecue sauce, place the caramelized onions on top of the meat. Seal the pan with foil and bake at 250 degrees for 4 1/2 - 5 1/2 hours or until meltingly tender.

4. Chill and slice
The meat will be very soft and impossible to slice. Chill it and defat the sauce. Slice and reheat gently in a warm oven. Serve with the sauce--reduced and defatted.

My favorite way to throw a party is potluck. Everyone participates and it showcases the talents and backgrounds of each person in a fun way. Those who don't cook can bring beer or wine. It's not too late! I hope you'll throw a barbecue before Summer is nothing but a memory...