First food in days and you know what I go for? Flan. That’s right, flan. The nieghbor dropped off some of her mother’s flan on Monday and even though I waited longer then I normally would have to enjoy the flan, it was damn tasty. I’ve never quite appreciated flan for it’s carmelly goodness, but that could be attributed to the fact that I’ve never had good flan. Nieghbors mom has been visiting since last week all the way from the Domican Republic, I believe. The wife had given the neighbor some of her famous oatmeal cookies a while back and in return she promised us some of her mother’s famous flan and boy oh boy did she deliver. Nothing says welcome back to the eating world like flan.

A Bad Picture of Good Flan

What is flan?

Google says: Flan is used in Spanish and Mexican cooking to describe an egg custard that is baked in a large shallow dish, and flavored with caramel. The dish is inverted when served and the excess caramel is used as a sauce for the flan. The flan may be flavored with orange, anise, cinnamon, or liqueur. [Spanish] traditional Mexican and Southwestern baked caramel custard dessert.

Now how do you make flan? Better yet, how do you make the perfect flan?

The Perfect Flan

• 1 3/4 cups whipping cream
• 1 cup milk (do not use low-fat or nonfat)
• Pinch of salt
• 1/2 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup water
• 3 large eggs
• 2 large yolks
• 7 tablespoons sugar

Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 350°F. Combine cream, milk and salt in heavy medium saucepan. Scrape seeds from vanilla bean into cream mixture; add bean. Bring to simmer over medium heat. Remove from heat and let steep 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine 1 cup sugar and 1/3 cup water in another heavy medium saucepan. Stir over low heat until sugar dissolves. Increase heat to high and cook without stirring until syrup turns deep amber, brushing down sides of pan with wet pastry brush and swirling pan occasionally, about 10 minutes. Quickly pour caramel into six 3/4-cup ramekins or custard cups. Using oven mitts as aid, immediately tilt each ramekin to coat sides. Set ramekins into 13×9x2-inch baking pan.

Whisk eggs, egg yolks and 7 tablespoons sugar in medium bowl just until blended. Gradually and gently whisk cream mixture into egg mixture without creating lots of foam. Pour custard through small sieve into prepared ramekins, dividing evenly (mixture will fill ramekins). Pour enough hot water into baking pan to come halfway up sides of ramekins.

Bake until centers of flans are gently set, about 40 minutes. Transfer flans to rack and cool. Chill until cold, about 2 hours. Cover and chill overnight. (Can be made 2 days ahead.)

To serve, run small sharp knife around flan to loosen. Turn over onto plate. Shake gently to release flan. Carefully lift off ramekin allowing caramel syrup to run over flan. Repeat with remaining flans and serve.

Serves 6.
Bon Appétit
May 1992

From SJ-R.com

It’s hard to be a marshmallow in a world obsessed with fire.

I’m talking food here, the blistering, blast-furnace variety that has heated up American cuisine in the past few years. You know, the kind that diners profess to love as sweat streams down their cheeks and flames shoot out their pie holes.

Mo hotta, mo betta? For me, it’s mo hotta, no getta.

Eating in a restaurant is a minefield for me. I have learned to ask servers about the spiciness of menu items, but the answers are subjective. Usually, they tell me the dish has “a little heat.” And it often does, compared to the surface of the sun.

In part, I blame TV chef Emeril Lagasse for this unfortunate trend. He uses bold ingredients like a lion tamer uses a whip, inducing his studio audience into a frenzy as he steps up the flavors. In goes the onions. BAM! In goes the garlic. BAM! In goes the screamin’ hot chile peppers guaranteed to cause death before the second bite. BAM! BAM! BAM!

The spicier the dish, the more the Emerilistas scream and wave their capsaicin-scarred hands, as if that’s a good thing.

The influence of Latin cuisine is another culprit. Although I enjoy the relatively mild flavors of cumin, cilantro, oregano and mint, those tastes are overpowered when serranos are tossed into the mix. To me, fire overpowers the complexities of flavor.

The ability to consume Scoville units has taken on certain bragging rights. I’ve seen otherwise normal adults, usually men, trying to one-up each other by eating habanero-hot chili and chicken wings while acting as if an inferno wasn’t scalding their mouths. What’s next? Walking on molten lava?

Bravado also rears its highfalutin head when it comes to hot sauces. The names are amusing - Da’ Bomb, Mad Dog’s Revenge and Smack My Ass and Call Me Sally - but the contents should only be consumed by firefighters in full gear and paramedics with quick access to resuscitation equipment.

Let’s be honest: I suspect that most Americans don’t even like super-spicy fare. But they ride the wave because it’s cooler to be part of a trend than to be the only one at the table not digging into the Tex-Mex sampler platter.

The emperor’s clothes are stained with pepper sauce.

Food editor Kathryn Rem can be reached at 788-1520 or kathryn.rem@sj-r.com.

From Cleveland.com

Wednesday, June 29, 2005
It burns! It burns! Why?

Capsaicinoids are the chemicals that give peppers their heat. They are present in almost every pepper, and their most common form is capsaicin.

The capsaicinoids in chile hot sauces bond to receptors in the lining of the mouth, the same receptors that register pain from heat, thus producing a burning feeling. In peppers, the highest concentration is found not in the seeds but in the inner lining.

In high concentrations, capsaicin can be toxic and so painful as to be incapacitating. That’s why a concentrated form is used in pepper sprays.

It burns, but I feel pretty good. Why?

When the body feels pain, it releases neurotransmitters called endorphins. These are natural painkillers and can produce an overall sense of well-being. It’s what produces a “runner’s high” and a “hot sauce high.”

Too hot! What can I do?

Don’t drink beer or water. That only will spread the burn around your mouth. Dairy products such as milk, yogurt, sour cream and cottage cheese do the best job of breaking the chemical bond between the capsaicin and your mouth lining. Bread also can help soak up the pain.

- Jim Sweeney Source: Royal Society of Chemistry

From Cleveland.com

Wednesday, June 29, 2005
James F. Sweeney
Plain Dealer Reporter

It doesn’t matter what your body says: When it comes to hot sauces, it’s flavor, not heat, that matters.

So ignore your watering eyes, runny nose and burning tongue and find the flavor beneath that flame.

People are dripping and drizzling hot sauces onto a greater variety of dishes than ever before. Not just chili and chicken wings, but eggs, soups, stews, hash browns and even pies. Hot sauces are becoming as popular in the kitchen as anything on the spice rack.

It’s a fast, easy way to add spice and flavor to almost anything. The sauces come in a mind-boggling variety of styles, flavors and intensities that can be matched with flavors and foods.

“It’s not just for people who want to burn their taste buds off,” said Marie Dalby, editor-in-chief of Chile Pepper, a bimonthly magazine with 140,000 subscribers.

Why the increased popularity of hot sauces?

People are more open to exotic cuisines such as Thai, Indian and Caribbean with their traditions of heat and spice, Dalby said. As Americans travel and taste authentic cuisines, they demand the same flavors at home. The Internet can deliver almost anything not found on local shelves.

Hispanics, the fastest-growing group in the country, favor hot and sweet flavors, though many of their dishes are mild and subtle. Fusion cooking is introducing heat into dishes that lacked it before.

As a result, heat is spilling over into foods such as dips, peanut butter and jellies, even jalapeno candies.

Many traditional snacks such as Cheetos now come in hot versions.

When Dave DeWitt, the country’s leading expert on chile peppers, began writing about them in New Mexico in the early 1970s, interest was limited to the Southwest. Last month, he finished a nationwide book tour. What he saw on the road convinced him the entire country is on fire.

“When you’ve got hot and spicy fast food in Middle America, you’re conquering Middle America,” he said.

And food is not immune to American culture’s drive to get ever louder, faster and more extreme. Your Buffalo wings are atomic? Then I’ll make mine thermonuclear. You put hot sauce on scrambled eggs? I’ll put it on toast.

And hot sauces are just plain fun. How can you not enjoy something called Scorned Woman, Toad Sweat or Jump In an Open Grave? And those are just brands that can be printed in a family newspaper. There are plenty with names and labels best left off the dining-room table. One local store even has a “naughty shelf” covered by cardboard to prevent tender sensibilities from scalding.

There are more hot sauces now than ever, but they do have a long history.

While chile powder appeared in recipes in the 1700s, the first cayenne sauce was bottled in Massachusetts in 1807.

The most famous hot sauce got its start in Louisiana in1859 when Col. Maunsel White mashed Tabasco chiles, strained them and mixed with vinegar and salt. He shared the recipe with a friend, Edmund McIlhenny, who planted his own peppers. In 1868, McIlhenny sent 350 used cologne bottles full of his sauce to wholesalers. The response was huge, and Tabasco brand remains so popular that some people use it to refer to all hot sauces.

Hot sauce and the accompanying endorphin rush can be addictive.

For Christopher Cunningham, hot sauce at first was nothing more than a way to keep his lunch to himself. Tired of people asking for a bite, he began dousing everything with liquid heat in 1987.

“No one ever bothered me again or asked for a taste of anything,” said the 46-year-old postal worker from Brunswick.

But he was hooked. He started eating jalapeno sandwiches and now plays regularly with the dangerous stuff — Pure Cap and Dave’s Insanity Sauce.

Once he accidentally got some hot sauce on his contact lenses: “I was rolling around on the floor of the bathroom for 20 minutes. My eyes were on fire.”

Fellow saucer Roger Reynolds knew he’d found the right chicken wings when the heat made his ears ring.

“My wife was like, Stop eating them.’ I said, Are you kidding? These are great,’ ” he says.

Like Cunningham, Reynolds, a 39-year-old trucker from Avon Lake, is not sure why he eats fire.

“I guess it’s just my masochistic nature taking over,” he said.

At some point, hot sauce ceases to be merely scorching and becomes a food additive. That sounds benign, but it’s not.

It means the capsaicin content is so high that the burn overwhelms any flavor and simply adds heat to food. Products such as The Source, Satan’s Blood and Pure Cap are capsaicin extracts, many times hotter than any pepper and better dispensed by dropper than a shake of the bottle. (Oh, and wear gloves. And, above all, do not rub your eyes.)

Hot sauce goes well with almost everything, including machismo, said Heather Marks, co-owner with husband Brian of Heather’s Heat and Flavor in Lyndhurst’s Legacy Village. The shop specializes in all things hot, including sauces, rubs, spices and even pickles and peanut butter.

Marks keeps the superhot sauces behind the counter and counsels the brave to sample them with the end of a toothpick.

“It’s usually the boys lining up to see how tough they are,” she said.

There are always people who insist on playing with fire, but DeWitt has advice for people who are interested in trying hot sauce, but who don’t want to get burned: Start with something relatively mild and determine your tolerance and tastes. And avoid the superhot stuff.

Remember, it’s the flavor, not the flame.

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:
jsweeney@plaind.com, 216-999-4850

While recuperating this weekend, I was laying in bed watching Food Network and finding my mind wandering to the point of pondering why there are no hot food specific shows on the Food Network? Here’s what I have in mind:
General Concept: 30 Minute TV Show featuring Hot Foods
Detailed Concept:
Show segments will include cooking spots, information segments and related reports/items. Cooking segments can be further broken down into the cooking with category and the how to make category. For instance: Cooking with Hot Sauce Brand A. and Making Your Own Hot Sauce.
Information segments can include visiting manufacturers, visiting retail locations, history of, touring hot spots etc…
Related reports and items can include related spicy items, festivals etc…

Now, I have no idea on how to pitch this concept to the Food Network folks, so if you do, please let me know! I watch the Food Network about 60% of my total TV watching time in a month so as a pretty avid watcher and hot foods fan, I find myself digging through the TiVo guide for anything spicy, no matter the show. Yes, I have ventured over to the travel channel to pick up John Ratzenberg’s (Cliff from Cheers) visit to Avery Island. I would love to have anything spicy given its own show. There’s BBQ with Bobby Flay, why not Nick’s Spice of Life?
There’s only so much I can take of:
Rachel Ray’s Far to many hand gestures while talking 30 minute meals
Sandra Lee’s Never in my life will I decorate that much Semi Homemade
Paula Deen’s I feel my arteries constrict by simply watching an episode Home Cooking
Iron Lost in translation Chef

Funny side note to this story: Years ago I happened upon the original Sweat Shop in the Rouge Valley mall. Fast forward to a few years later -> I convinced the wife to take a 4 hours trip to southern Oregon to check out the Sweat Shop one more time. We first hit the Rouge Valley mall and couldn’t find it. We called them up and were given pretty vauge directions but we eventually found to store in the middle of nowhere really. The store was definately more focused on kitchen related items and wine. Even the wife was disappointed in the selection of hot sauces they had on display. I found the bottles to be dusty and looking a little older, so I’m not surprised that they are trying to rid themselves of this side of their business. Hot sauce business requires a lot of love and work - it’s not an instant turnkey sucess story.

The Kitchen Depot culinary supply store is divesting itself of its Sweat Shop side business, which features a wide selection of salsa and hot sauces
By GREG STILES
Mail Tribune

Owner Judy Chiosso-Glass doesn’t possess the same affinity for hot sauce, salsa and other tangy concoctions as her Kitchen Depot predecessors.

In fact, the kitchen supply store owner says the popular sauces are getting in the way.

The Kitchen Depot and its Sweat Shop are located in the Larson Creek Shopping Center at North Phoenix and Barnett roads in east Medford.

“We desperately need space for kitchen items,” Chiosso-Glass says. “It’s such a need that the Sweat Shop has to go. There are a lot of loyal customers in the valley, so it’s going to be a good thing for someone.”

In the Spring, you love the way it feels outside. Ever wish it felt the same way inside?
Chiosso-Glass says she decided four months ago to exit the hot sauce business.

“It’s hard to put a lot of energy into something you don’t want,” she admits. “It came as a package deal and now I’m spinning it off,” says Chiosso-Glass, who is asking approximately $40,000 for the business name, thesweatshop.com Web site and inventory.

The Sweat Shop, founded by Dave and Rita Hyatt and their daughter and son-in-law, Carrie and Mark Hanson, opened in November 1997 at the Rogue Valley Mall.

The Sweat Shop quickly developed a following of folks who like hot stuff on their food — or impress their friends with bottles of the tastebud-burning sauce on the shelf.

Ron and Donna Dixon bought the business in February 2002 and then moved the operation to Larson Creek in the spring of 2003 when they opened the Kitchen Depot.

Chiosso-Glass says the 300 varieties of hot sauce simply don’t mesh with her vision for the kitchen store she took over in April 2004. Along with expanding what she calls “gadget alley,” Chiosso-Glass says the store is adding Cuisinart kitchen appliances and All-Clad pans.

She says she had “serious buyers” ready to assume the Sweat Shop activity, but they got cold feet. Buyer or not, Chiosso-Glass says all of the hot sauces are leaving the store at the end of the month, although she will continue Web site sales. She’s even considered posting the business on eBay.

Ultimately, she wants to put more emphasis on the tools of the kitchen trade and weekly cooking classes. The Thursday-night lessons, often sold out well in advance, feature such chefs as Marguerite Dalianes and Denise Marshall.

Currently, her brochures run three to four months out, but she’s considering switching to six-month leads because of demand.

“We will have to develop a new Web site where people can make reservations for cooking lessons,” she says.

Reach reporter Greg Stilesat 776-4463 or e-mail business@mailtribune.com.

The following question came in from a reader and I’m not sure where to start with it. Anyone out there have any idea on how to make a replica red chili sauce or where one can purchase such a sauce?

I am sorry if you get a lot of emails concerning “where to buy” certain products, but I have been looking everywhere for a type of hot salsa (maybe not a hot “sauce”) that tastes like the red chili salsa that Chipotle offers (See this page on Chipotle Fan.com).
It seems like such a simple product, but I cannot find anything of the sort (I’ll admit, I’ve yet to visit a Whole Foods or the like).
I’ve purchased plenty of hot sauses/salsas, but none have tasted anything like Chipotle’s red chili salsa.

Do you know of any products that sound like what I am looking for?

Ideas?

The wife made some Mac ‘N Cheese Saturday, so that became my first meal back into the eating world when I finally had a meal Monday. Wanting to take it easy on my stomach, I added my favorite store bought hot sauce Cholula to the gryuere based cheesy goodness. I fell asleep on the couch (go figure) and only awoke to find the dogs both sneezing. It seems they had decided to sample my dinner that I had only half finished. The sneezing fits and nose rubbing that such a small amount of mild hot sauce induced is enough to keep them away from my food for the next few months, until they get brave again. Jack Russells tend to remeber until they’re brave enough to try again.

Note to self: Have the wife try this recipe out next time I’m sick

Mac and Cheese Dog Casserole
You won’t get this at any ballpark!

1 pound elbow macaroni
Salt
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
1 package beef or pork hot dogs, chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 tablespoon butter
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 tablespoons all- purpose flour
1/2 cup beer, 1/3 of a bottle – whatever you have on hand, chicken broth can be substituted
2 cups milk
Pepper
1 rounded tablespoon spicy mustard
2 rounded tablespoons ketchup
3 cups yellow sharp Cheddar, shredded, divided (Buy preshredded cheese. You will need 1 1/2 sacks of 10-ounce packages.)

Boil a large pot of water for macaroni. Salt water and under cook macaroni, cook about 7 minutes until just under al dente in doneness.

Preheat broiler and set rack 12 inches from heat.

While pasta works, heat a large deep nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, 1 turn of the pan, then add hot dogs and brown on both sides, 4 minutes total. Remove the dogs with a slotted spoon to a paper towel lined plate. Add another tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, 1 turn of the pan, and the butter. When butter melts, cook onions 4 to 5 minutes, then add flour and cook another minute. Add beer and cook off completely, 1 minute. Whisk in milk and bring to a bubble, then season the sauce with salt and pepper and stir in the mustard and ketchup. Lower heat and add 2 cups of the cheese. Stir to melt, 1 minute. Adjust mustard, ketchup, and salt and pepper, to your taste.

Drain pasta well. Combine pasta and hot dogs with sauce and coat evenly then pour into large casserole and top with remaining cheese. Melt and brown cheese under broiler, 2 minutes. Serve.

Just wanted to pop in to let you all know that I’m slowly recovering from a serious bout of food poisioning ala seafood. I’ve never felt worse, seriously this has really kicked the crap out of me - pun intended.

I haven’t eaten anything days, so if your waiting on a review, it’s going to be a little longer of a wait. But I will be back with reviews and recipes as soon as my stomach allows.

Kate Francesa and Rick Monaco have owned the business for the past three years. They closed the business deal Friday with John and Sherry Knotek, who will take over the the store on July 1.

Hot Stuff of Saratoga sells a variety of salsas, hot sauces, condiments, cookware and accessories. ‘The business is growing every day and demanded our full-time attention,’ Monaco said. ‘Operating Saratoga Salsa is a full-time job.’

Francesa and Monaco will be focusing on Saratoga Salsa, which they founded four years ago. ‘The Knoteks are very energetic and have great plans to expand the market,’ Monaco said. ‘We couldn’t ask for anyone better to buy the business.’

Knotek is a native Saratogian and his wife works at St. Clement’s School. Monaco said they are thrilled that the store will remain the same type of store and the name will also stay the same.

‘It’s a destination here in Saratoga,’ he said. ‘It’s the only place like it from Port Jefferson, Long Island to Saranac Lake.’ ‘We’re looking forward to taking the ball and rolling with it,’ John Knotek said.

He plans to expand the e-commerce part of the business, build up distribution and expand on certain lines of merchandise.

‘The fun begins July 1,’ Knotek said.

Saratoga Salsa

Saratoga Salsa has customers in Key West, North Carolina and New Orleans. Their original plan was to visit them for tastings of new products, Monaco said.

‘We haven’t been able to get there because of the store,’ he said.

They’ll be operating the company from North Carolina during the winter.

They entered in the America’s Best Zesty Food Show in California last weekend and took first, second and third places for their three entries. The awards were determined by chefs who used the products to cook and make drinks.

‘Everything has a family twist,’ Monaco said.

Their latest product, Fireman Fred’s Flaming 3 Alarm Chili Mix, is named after his father.

Some local merchants who stock Saratoga Salsa are Pepper’s Market, The Candy Gram, Compliments to the Chef, Putnam Market and Impressions of Saratoga.