paulraphael's Profile
best chicken for roasting? - manhattan/UWS
You might be in luck. Snoop around on the Bo Bo website ... they say they'll make arrangements to drop off birds just for you at a local market (they deliver to restaurants all over the city, so can do this on the way).
Great birds, by the way. I just started getting them from Jeffrey's at the essex st. market. They have white plume (basically the same big-breasted breed as the factory birds), and black plume (the more traditional, stronger flavored birds). They also have bluefoot chickents, which i'm dying to try ... these are supposed to be almost as good as the french poulet bresse.
KitchenAid suggestions...
FWIW, the viking (like other Kenwood clone mixers) is full of plastic gears. It's also belt-driven, which is a design not used in any commercial mixers I know about.
All hobart-made KA mixers had a plastic worm gear. This is a design choice they started making almost 100 years ago. The first KA mixers with all metal gears are the "professional" models, introduced a few years ago. Personally, I don't think plastic or metal gears is an issue, but if you're going to harp on it, you shouldn't be rejecting a pro 600 (all metal gears) for a viking (many plastic gears and a synthetic belt).
What should stock contain?
This notion that "stocks are made with bones and broths are made with meat" comes from a very contemporary tradition of shortcuts in the kitchen. Traditionally, there is NO difference between a stock and a broth besides intended use. There are many ways to make a stock. It's called broth when its intent is to be used as it is, rather than as a base for a sauce.
Before the shortcuts of the Nouvelle Cuisine era, stocks were always made with both meat and bones. It would have been considered unthinkable to make stock with nothing but bones, as is common today mid-level restaurants. Even in the early 20th century, stewards of the french traditions (Escoffier most notably) prescribed making a double stock: an initial preparation from gelatinous bones, which is then used as the base for the final stock, which uses copious amounts of meat. Few have the time and money for this anymore, but it's still possible to use the minimal shortcut of using both meat and bones in a stock. For example, 1/3 beef meat on the bone, 1/3 veal meat on the bone, 1/3 lean split beef or veal shin bones.
The exception to this is when making stock for glace de viande, which should be made with all gelatinous bones. Meat glace is intended to contribute gelatin and roasted flavors; its long reduction evaporates most of the volatile chemicals that make meat jus taste like meat.
A true demiglace, which is reduced much less, should be made from stock that contains significant amounts of meat. You will taste the difference immediately. The only people I know who dispute this are ones who have never tasted a properly made one (which includes most mid-level chefs and culinary school graduates, sadly). And if you're using the stock as a broth (for soup, etc.) there's just no comparison. A bone-based stock will never have the depth and flavor of one made with meat.
For sources, please take a look at James Peterson's Sauces, Raymond Sokolov's The Saucier's Apprentice, or Escoffier's Le Guide Culinaire.
