Hi, babette:

Re: "court-ordered", could be many things. A high % guess would be a tax issue.

I may stop in tomorrow to say goodbye.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, ellabee:

These look like nice units (and priced accordingly). But they do cycle--according to the website:

"When you set the LED display on your cooktop to a particular temperature, the microprocessor monitors it 120 times per second (that's a lot) and cycles itself on and off to maintain the desired temperature."

I think cycling is in the nature of the beast.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, JLo:

Scandanavian: Frikadeller meatballs; Rullepølse, Swedish pancakes.

Polynesian: Ahi Poke/Ika Mata, Squid Luau, Coconut creme pie.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, 8IP:

Worth a try, thanks. Never been to Bravehorse before--in case it was a 5 May special, what standards do you recommend there?

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Tim:

It's not currently offered new, but there are plenty of Sunbeam T-20s still available. Unbelievably advanced for 1950, more so now. For just straight toast, they're coin of the realm. And ultracool. And very safe.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, enh:

Good luck. There may be a pro unit out there with actual 10° increments, but the consensus here is that with the home units--especially the hotplates--the temperature settings are a cruel joke.

If you use the search function, there are many threads here with posts about specific makes and models. If I recall correctly, some Hounds have had great luck working with with chocolate at the lowest settings on some. As for high temp work, none are short on power. The big gripe seems to be that in a 1-10 setting range, 6-10 are too high for much besides speed-boiling water, which leaves you with a 6-speed bike (i.e., no fine adjustments 'twixt 1 and 2, 2 and 3, and so on).

Good luck.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, omotosando:

Ginger at 4and20 is very helpful and extremely knowledgeable, so I'm not surprised it worked out well for you. Good job.

Without seeing your covers, it's difficult to tell the lining. But it's a very high probability that they're tinned. Can you see anything that looks like wipe marks, or sworls? I ask because about the only other things that would be worn through are nickel and silver, and those are electroplated to the metal, and so tend to look very smooth.

If all you're seeing is a tiny bit of exposed copper, I wouldn't go to the expense. Unless you're planning on serving food from them, they're not going to be in contact with what you're cooking. OTOH, with Peter's (and most others') pricing formula, covers aren't very expensive--you'd be paying the rate ($5 or $8, etc.) only times the diameter, but not the height.

Enjoy your fish pan. Do not scrimp on the fat in the pan; there is something about fish skin browning at the margin with the bare floor of the pan--it builds up a lot of heat right at the margin.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Well, I showed up at 10A today, and there were 2 HUNDRED people already in line. So I passed on by.

Anyone who went, what are the specifics? Is CK doing an increasing % discount each day, or what? Anyone get any great bargains?

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Duffy:

Re: handles, have you hefted the Williams-Sonoma Thermo-Clad? The skillet I'm evaluating has a very comfortable SS handle in both palm-up and palm-down positions, and is quite fat (except near the pan body, it tapers). To me this is the best-shaped handle I've found.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Atomic: "Aluminum cools quickly...uneven cooking?"

No, in pans such as these, the aluminum is very thick. Aluminum has--by weight--a very high heat capacity, three times that of copper, and twice that of cast iron. My 10" pan weighs 3.3 pounds.

So very thick aluminum is an ideal combination of high conductivity, heat holding, and (relatively) light weight. At these thicknesses, there is a small tradeoff in *responsiveness*, but even, constant and stable heat is what omelets and dedicated omelet pans are all about.

Aloha,
Kaleo

You're very welcome!

Hi, Ames:

IMO, fully-clad pans exist only for purposes of convenience. The SS is more inert (though not completely inert) than is even anodized aluminum. But SS is a terrible conductor of heat.

Another way of looking at it is that clad pans generally can only *approach* those made of straight-gauge conductive material (aluminum or copper), and the degree of approximation depends largely on what the clad manufacturers put between the layers of SS. Most of the clad makers play hide-the-ball on this issue, and 95 times out of 100 the conductive layer is much thinner than you would find in good non-clad. It is not difficult (or expensive), to find 4mm aluminum pans, but it is next to impossible to find fully-clad pans containing a 4mm layer of aluminum.

Now then, it is reported here that HA pans can "silver out", i.e., lose the anodizing in the presence of highly acidic foods. Have you experienced this with your old set? If you have not, it is unlikely you would with a new set, unless you suddenly shift your cooking toward the strongly acidic.

How important is it for you to be able to: (a) wash your pans in the DW; (b) scour them using strong abrasive powders; and/or (c) use metal utensils? If these 3 convenience factors weigh heavy for you, then you will probably think it's worth the small downtick in performance to have clad. But if the maintenance over the last decade with your old set was no big deal, then why trade down?

Regarding fond, I think either HA or SS will *form* fond just fine. The difference would come in how you get the fond into your integral sauces. I'm habituated to deglazing by waiting an extra minute or so, and then using a light hand with the utensils. But if you want to attack the fond immediately and very aggressively with metal tools, then clad might suit you better.

Since you're getting a new (and great) gas range, induction compatibility is not an issue.

Finally, there's aesthetics to consider. Many people prefer shiny stainless because it appears cleaner, newer, higher-tech, healthier, etc. I suggest to you these things are *only* appearances.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Brunhilde:

Starts tomorrow at 10 and runs for 6 days.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Ames:

Neither these Costco sets nor the A-C is likely to have an aluminum layer as thick as your hard-anodized set. They won't say how thick the conductive layer is, which I always find suspect.

I finally finagled out of Williams-Sonoma how thick *their* aluminum in their new Thermoclad line is (2mm), which is decent but hardly high-performance. ONE of those pans would be almost 2/3 the cost of either Costco clad set you're considering.

My take is that if you're after the convenience of fully clad pans, great. But your performance is likely to actually decrease. Same with A-C.

Knock yourself out with the Blue Star!

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Jay:

He was a private in the Army, a mule handler in Cuba.

Yeah, his friend the Governor "recomissioned" him as a Kentucky Colonel. I think you'll find that, at the time of his first "commission", it was a paid thing (5,000 Colonels were made from '32 to '35 by the aptly named Gov. Ruby Laffoon).

He was about as much of a Colonel as a bunch of retired basketball players.

He reputedly stole the "original recipe" from a lady named Childress, years later admitting as much by paying her family $1,200. While he ran a Shell gas station in Corbin, he terrorized and beat the owner of the competing Gulf Station across the street; if memory serves, the man was either pistol-whipped or shot, and the Gulf Station became his first restaurant/hotel.

Recently, one of his suits was featured on Antiques Roadshow. The owner, a friend, remembered him as a tyrant.

Aloha,
Kaleo

And, he was an A-hole and not really a Colonel...

Hi, Jason:

I think Mr. Gonzalez should get one of your "STW" ratings--for his writing style alone. And I think Mr. Gray's talents lie more in politics than polemics ("I'm not going to nitpick..." and then proceeding to do just that.

But on a deeper level, to advance this inquiry, we need to keep an eye on who's *invested* in an outcome (and which one and why). It's easy to trot out the numerous studies proving how sense perceptions--even among experts--are steered, limited and skewed by things any objectivist critical taster would be embarrassed to find were affecting his/her scores. And it's just as easy to deflect and dismiss these criticisms by acknowledging and co-opting the obvious intrinsic subjectivity and unreliability of judgments. IMO this is merely what these "authors" are doing.

I think we would all be better off if we could agree that: (a) Past a point, all that is truly objective are the lab results; but that (b) critical tasting (and the education/experience that informs it) is nevertheless capable of helping us in non-subjective ways to buy and enjoy better wine than we might otherwise.

I would also suggest that there is something like a quantum "observer effect" at work--the act of observation makes changes on the wine being judged. At some level, the judge must be considered part of the system being observed.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, pdx:

In the Puyallup Nisqually language, 'Tacoma' translates to "What's that smell?"

Just Kidding.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Jim:

I saw a bunch listed on eBay. Just search "100x loupes". I'm not sure about seeing one specifically for Android, but there were models for Samsung and iPhone. Worth a closer look. [Rimshot]

Aloha,
Kaleo

That's the way I was taught growing up, too. Always with a coin...

Hi, JayL:

And your deadlift numbers at the gym are coming up too, I expect.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, cowboy:

I'll venture off the reservation here. If he's PC, he probably already knows what he wants... I say finesse his knife desire out of him(or have his SO do it).

Another idea: What about a decent bench microscope or set of loupes for him to judge his sharpening? For very short green you can get a 100x electronic loupe/microscope that plugs right into your 4G phone.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, PK:

This has been asked (and answered 661 times) before: http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/650836

So far, my vote's for filet mignon or turducken.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, chowgeek:

No, Mauviel uses a range of gauges, from about 1.5mm up to 2.5mm. My sense is that the M250 actually has less thickness to the SS lining than does Falk, which would mean a very slightly thicker copper foil for Mauviel.

Some tinned Mauviel pieces still go over 3mm, but the only one I'm familiar with being imported any longer is the rondeau.

You should also check out Bourgeat.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Mustardeer.

This is already a disc-bottom stocker, so your performance should be about the same as with the others you suggest. You might well improve on it if you went with a thick, straight-gauge aluminum stocker to take advantage of the hot gas flow up the pan's walls. Offshore-made models are very inexpensive.

My only thought on your lagging boil speed is that a mirror polish on the bottom is going to reflect a lot of the radiant component of your hob's output. If you're not returning the SLT pan, you might try scuffing up the bottom with sandpaper to matte, or hitting it with flat black stove paint. Do us all a favor if you try this, and do a controlled B&A experiment, will you?

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, chowgeek:

You're quite welcome.

Yes, even 2.5mm copper pans can be heavy. Falk claims that if going thicker than 2.3mm would make a positive difference, they'd use thicker gauge. I don't believe them. ;)

If you watch eBay diligently, you can occasionally find vintage extra-fort (3-3.2mm) pans that are stainless-lined. These are--as far as I can tell--mid-to-late 20th C. pans, but before Falk Culinair dominated the market. Unfortunately, there are never (please, someone prove me wrong) any in a curved saucier design, but I have seen a few splayed.

Interestingly, James Peterson does not mention curved-wall sauciers in his classic tome, nor does he mention SS bi-metal pans at all (he does mention nickel-lined). There is a single clear photo of a SS-lined cocotte, but it is not a Falk. The cover photo is of a sauteuse evasee, but it also lacks the "pouring rim" of a Falk and looks to me to be tinned.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, Chowgeek: "This pan meets the requirements of Julia Child and James Peterson as to what constitutes an appropriate copper sauce pan. i.e. 1/8" thick copper, rounded bottom..."

I'm not picking on your pan. Falk is in the upper 98th percentile of pans, and near the 100th of anything in current production. But Falk is 2.5mm thick, only 2.3mm of which is actually copper. The 1/8" pans recommended by J. Child and James Peterson are 3.175mm. So Falks are nearly a millimeter thinner than the recommended 1/8".

Also, the bottoms of *none* of these pans are round--the walls are splayed. It is true that the "corners" of a saucier design like Falk's (curved sides) are slightly more open that those of a Windsor or fait tout (angular sides), but the difference is not huge. For that matter, I've never seen a vertical-walled saucepan with square "corners"--all are radiused to some significant degree. My 2-strand birch whisks, 2.25 inches in overall diameter, fit into the "corners" of my straight-wall saucepans just fine.

You are fortunate your pan survived the overheating. I would not assume that this is repeatable. I've posted photos here before of a bi-metal pan that was not so lucky. And when that happens, the pan is a goner. As it would be from salt-pitting.

The emergent problem with Falk is that they're less than honest about their pans' capacities, and they're poor at customer service--downright hostile at times. But I hope your experience with them was good.

Happy Cooking,
Aloha,
Kaleo

Hey, INDIANRIVER: "Like the ancient copper ham cooker I scored at a flea market in Metz, France."

Oooh, you can be so *cruel*. I need a jamboniere... Maybe that's the way you get to Hawai'i!

My dad fought Germans in Metz in the Fall of 1944. Wish he'd liberated your jamboniere rather than the swords and regalia.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hi, CM:

Well, why risk anything? The PC models I mention are approved for this use.

The broasted chicken I'm after is juicier inside than I can attain by simply frying (yes, I've tried brining). It's one of those preps I'm concluding *requires* something like this.

Aloha,
Kaleo

Hey, INDIANRIVER:

Package deals aren't that much; combining air, car and lodging makes it pretty affordable. You gotta really work not to have a good time...

Aloha,
Kaleo