More BBQ
Went to another barbeque restaurant here in Virginia for lunch called Rocklands Real Barbegue. I was very surprise how tasty it was. I will have to go back when I need my BBQ fix. If anyone is in the area it is just right up the road, just your GPS because I have no idea how to get there, to many roads here. Wine Sommelier Maryangelyn recommends "Clayhouse 2008 Adobe White"
Maryangelyn is a friend of mine and she took some time out of her day to recommend this Clayhouse 2008 Adobe White Wine. Maryangenlyn is a wine sommelier and she is also a great chef too!, So go out and try this wine and let me know what you think. Clayhouse 2008 Adobe White
Vineyard:
The grapes for the 2008 Adobe White came from our Red Cedar Vineyard outside Paso Robles. The calcareous vineyard soils in these white grape blocks are comprised of clay-loam and cobbled sandy loam, and are largely on benchland sites overlooking the Estrella River. Cooler air flows down the benches toward the river at night, helping the grapes retain their crisp acidity.
Winemaking and Cellar Practices:
The 2008 vintage was cooler than normal, with lower than average rainfall and a few tricky spring frosts early in the year. After picking and pressing, we fermented all of the varietals separately, then blended them together after most had reached dryness. The Chardonnay and Roussanne fermented in neutral oak, the other varietals were cold fermented in stainless steel. We stopped the fermentation on some of the Princess in order to leave a touch of sweetness in the finished wine. The final blend is 22% Viognier, 18% Sauvignon Blanc, 17% Grenache Blanc, 16% Roussanne, 6% Chardonnay and 5% Chenin Blanc and 16% Princess, which we are unable to list on the label because it is not yet an approved varietal for table wine. We are petitioning the federal government to add it to the list. The final blend was bottled in January and February, 2009.
Characteristics:
The Adobe White is a proprietary blend with a golden straw color, and fine floral notes of orange blossom, lemon citrus and rose petal. Pear, peach and honeydew melon aromas jump from the glass. The creamy mouthfeel comes from a short time on the lees. The mouthwatering fruit flavors are of apple and stone fruit, with nuances of pumpkin pie spice and tea. The finish is crisp, but balanced with a touch of residual sugar.
Harvest date: August 28 - October 4, 2007
Harvest Sugar: 21.9 - 25.9 Brix
pH: 3.23
Total Acidity: .74g/100ml Alcohol: 13.0%
Oak Age: none
Cases Produced: 8000 Bottled: January and February, 2008
Price: around $12/btl
Maryangelyn also recommends this 2007 SYRAH "CENTRAL COAST"
2007 SYRAH “CENTRAL COAST”This wine is 98% Syrah and 2% Grenache from both Santa Barbara County (67%) and San Luis Obispo County (33%). The breakdown of appellations is Santa Ynez Valley (SYV) 33%, Santa Barbara County (SBC - not in an AVA) 30%, Santa Maria Valley (SMV) 4%, Paso Robles (PR) 32%, and Edna valley (EV) 1% (first crop off our new Sawyer Lindquist Vineyard). The vineyards used, in order of percentage with their AVA, are (and only real wines geeks should read the rest of this sentence): French Camp (PR); Mesa Verde (SYV); Los Alamos (SBC); Chabot (SBC); Carriage (PR); Vogelzang (SYV); Bien Nacido (SMV); Alisos (SBC); Windmill (SYV); Colson Canyon (SBC); Demetria (SYV); Nielson (SMV); and Purisima Mountain (SYV)… that's 17 different vineyards from 5 different AVA's!
The wine is essentially a blend of cool-climate Santa Barbara grapes and warm-climate Paso Robles grapes. The cool-climate fruit gives spice, acidity and balanced alcohol while the warm-climate fruit give softness, roundness, ripeness and more up-front fruit flavors and aromas.
2007 was a fairly cool vintage, in general. The first grapes in this wine to ripen were from French Camp on September 5th, the last were grenache from the Sawyer Lindquist Vineyard on November 5th… that's two full months apart for anyone keeping track! All of the lots were fermented separately, and aged separately, at first, in mostly neutral French oak barrels (the percent of new barrels would be less than 3%). The majority of the blend was made at the first racking in March; the final blend was made before bottling in August 2008. 20,500 cases of 750ml and 3000 cases of 375ml were produced
Eat this and live!
I went the library to check out some healthy eating books and came across this book. It is very interesting and I believe it is a must buy if you are concernd what you are eating or just want to educate yourself more. If your goal is like mine and you want to live to 100 years old then you really should check out this book, you can find it on Amazon for around $7.00 Tonight for Dinner
Tonight I made myself a Garden Burger dinner and it Reminded me of the old days when I worked for a 5 star hotel in Austin. We would be able to make ourselves food after a hard day’s work and whenever I could not think what to make for myself; I would make myself a Garden Burger. It is healthy and not junk food. So today I was at Whole Foods in Arlington, VA and saw they had Garden Burgers, and now they have different flavors. I bought Portabella. It is made with brown rice, onions, portabella mushrooms, crimini mushrooms, spinach, rolled oats, mozzarella cheese and it is not dry, it is juicy vegetable burger. And today I was thinking I would go ahead and try organic rice base cheese. I bought the Swiss flavor cheese and when I got home I opened the package of my rice base cheese Swiss flavor I ate slice to of it to try before putting it on burger and I was really surprise how well it tasted. It tastes just like American cheese with a slight Swiss flavor. It was really good. And to top it off I bought chocolate soy milk, tasted just like regular chocolate milk. Maybe eating healthy doesn’t have to taste bad and maybe it really can taste good. I have to say I really enjoy tonight’s dinner and the best thing about food; there are so many choices out there. I wish I could live long enough to try it all. 
All recipes
Here is a good site for recipes. I like this site, check it out for yourself. If you know of any other sites you might think I am interested in, please let me know.
Trying to keep me in line
The Food Lover's Compaion
If you were to ask me to pick the one book you should own, I would tell you to get the Food Lover's Companion. It is not a cookbook, it is a food reference book and I could almost guarantee that if you were to walk into any restaurant or hotel kitchen, you would find this book there. I can't live without my Food Lover's Companion and you should not either. (This is the hard cover, the soft cover is a little bit cheaper).
Phillips Seafood Restaurant, Washington, D.C.
plates...but I was not counting.
Five Guys Burgers
Real Army Chefs
Without Military Chefs, there would be no military, they are the backbone of the arms service. Army Chefs don't recognized enough. We hear how our Military is fighting the bad guys, but we don't hear enough about the soldiers behind the scenes. Military Chefs have to work weekends, holidays and long hours, while most of the service gets these days off. They work and make good healthy food. I am proud to be one of them.
Fallen Soldier
Every Army Dining facility has a place for the fallen soldier. (click on the picture to read)
Bar-B-Que
I just drove from Texas to Virginia and on my way I thought it would be a cool idea to try out some BBQ on my way, to make my drive more exciting. I stopped at two BBQ restaurants in Texas and two restaurants in Tennessee. Here is what I thought about the restaurants, I think all of them served really good BBQ. While I am in Va, I will have to try some BBQ here on the east coast. I know the east coast is not really known for BBQ, but I will not be close minded, I will keep an open mind when trying new BBQ. I think it will be hard for any restaurant around to be able compete with the south when it comes to BBQ. 
Virginia Welcomes Me!
Ft. Hood Culinary Arts Team
· Today I stopped by the Ft. Hood Culinary arts team before leaving for Ft. Myer, VA (my new duty station), and I have to say I am really impressed with they have been doing, they are getting lots of good hands on training. Do I think they can win the culinary arts competition in 2010? Time will only tell. Fort Hood Culinary arts team has a have a huge advantage over other teams; they have started training back in June 2009. What I have seen so far, is that they still need to improve to be able to beat the other teams who have been competing for a long time now. Ft. Hood team is new and I just hope some how they can pull it off. So they can continue competing for years to come. But they need to do more research on food presentation and work out some recipes. Other than that I think they will do well, they have been training for a few months now. Other teams start training in December thru March and have good leadership skills and talent cooks on their teams. Fort Hood has a few good chefs too, but cooking and competing are a little bit different. You need lots of patience to compete. Lots re-doing and practicing recipes to make the perfect dish. I will also be there competing too, I look forward to see how they do when I get there and how far they have come. I hope they also walk from all this with a greater respect to cooking and learn that it is not as easy it may look. I wish them lots of luck!
Brooklyn Lager Brewery
Even though my favorite beer is Shiner, I think the beer Gods would say it is okay to try other brands once in awhile. When I used to live in New York I used to drink Brooklyn Lager, Molson Ice, or Samuel Adam's.
This Brooklyn Lager has a bold strong taste, its great with pizza, and maybe pizza from Home Slice in Austin.
This Brooklyn Lager has a bold strong taste, its great with pizza, and maybe pizza from Home Slice in Austin.
Home Slice
Who said the best pizza comes from New York? I have been to many places and I have to say New York is not the only place you can get good pizza, there are many pizza places all over the country, where they serve up good pizza. For example, Home Slice Pizza in South Austin off of Congress, thin crust pizza with lots of flavor. They even served Brooklyn Lager, I thought I was in NY again.
Hey Cupcake!
I was downtown Austin and I came across this little trailer, called Hey Cupcake! I thought what a cool idea, maybe something I should think about when I get out of the Army in two years. Maybe make my cheese cakes again...um?
Broken Camera
For about 3 months now, I was without a camera. My Samsung Camera had died on me way back when in July and I had to call up Samsung to talk to them about getting my camera fixed. After a few times of calling Samsung and having they send me a battery, then a charger and finally they sent me my fixed camera and I now have a working camera once again. For the last 3 months I have been using my cell phone to take pictures, at first it was no big deal since my cell phone had a 5 mega pix camera build in, but then I got a new cell phone...bad move, because my cell phone was only a 2 mega pix and I was noticing a big difference between the two. When I thought I took a good picture I would downloaded on to my computer and found out that my pictures I took on my 2 mega cell phone was not even worth looking at. But now I have my camera back it is a 13.6 mega pix so I should be back in action taking more pictures once again. Next week I will move to D.C. so that means no internet for a few weeks and no post. So for now I will do my best to take as many pictures as I can get them up on my blog before I go. I hope to have lots more while I am waiting to have my internet back up and running again. So stay tuned for more post and new photos.
Family Reunion
Grilled Shrimp and Spinach salad
Crazy Army Cooks
ARMY cooks are crazy...yeah that is raw chicken you are about to eat, Oh never mind I know he does not care anyway. Eat away!
USACAT
I was training with the United States Army Culinary Arts Team when I was in charge to make this pastry.
Korean Chef
A real Korean Chef teaching us how to cook real Korean food....but why is he on my station? Ok I am just joking, very happy to have him there to teach us a little about Korean foods. What makes Korean food so interesting is that is so healthy for you and it really does taste good. I want to go back to Korea to eat and learn more Korean foods! In picture with the Korean Chef is Chief Smith he is holding a large radish but on his face he has a look like he has never seen one before, Man these CW4 these days, can teach them anything :) . But that Chief is Chief Smith, who happens to be a very good Chef, I think he is one of the best Chefs out there and I mean that too. He is now out of the ARMY and teaching at a Culinary School in Oklahoma, they are lucky students to be trained by him, because I know they will get their money worth and get a great deal of hands on experience from him. He spent his entire 20 year career in the Army doing Culinary and getting paid to do it. Not many in the Army can do that, if fact I think he is the only one who has done it. He has won lots of culinary medals and just all around amazing chef. I make sure I keep his contact number handy just in case I need some tips or ideas.
6 plated desserts
Grilled Cheese
SPC Mosley cooking up some grilled cheese for Army Soldiers, man he looks focused. Perfectly cooked too... Got an extra grilled cheese for me?
Amazing
Amazing! Smitty's finished work on the Korean dancer and drummer boy, as far I am concerned...Gold! (click on the picture to get a close up).
"Just the way I like it"
Burger King don't have anything on WHATABURGER, now don't you wish you were in Texas?
Vanilla Bean Panna Cotta with a Fruit Soup
I made this when I was getting ready for the Culinary Competition in Korea 2008
Birthday
My birthday present from Vincent...yeah thanks a lot. I was scared but end up drinking it anyway.
Carrot Cake
Went to Sentelli's Bakery in Austin and watch Christina make Carrot Cakes....umm, where is my slice?
White Chocolate Mousse in a Filo Shell
Here is a really dessert anyone can make at home.First go to your grocery store and get filo dough (in the frozen section)
You are going to use 5 sheets and in between each sheet you need to brush on melt butter (unsalted) and sprinkle powder sugar through a fine strainer. layer each sheet on top of each other until you have 5 layers. Cut your Filo dough so it will fit in the pan you are going to use, I am using a muffin pan and cook in a 350 degree oven until golden brown.
White Chocolate Mousse Recipe:
1/2 C. White Chocolate in a double boiler set up (make sure the water is not to hot) and let it melt. Whip up 1 Cup of heavy Cream (or whipping cream...same thing) in a mixer and about 1/4 Cup of powder sugar (or as sweet as you like), whip until soft peak. Add 2 egg yolks to your chocolate and mix together. Once cream is whipped you are going to need to temper your chocolate by adding about half a cup of the whipped cream to your chocolate. mix until smooth, if you think it needs more cream to make it smooth, them by all needs feel free to add more. Once chocolate is smooth fold in your whipped cream and place in Refrigerator for about an hour to allow it to set up. When you are ready to have your dessert go ahead and spoon or pipe in your white chocolate mousse in your Filo Shells. Chocolate mousse is so easy to make, there is no reason you should have to buy the fake kind. You want to make your own Berrie sauce too? To easy, here is how you do it. Place berries in a sauce pan with a little water to cover the bottom and add sugar, about 1/4 - 1/2 Cup,bring to a boil and let simmer until you have a nice think sauce. Strain your sauce through a Very fine strainer. If you have extra sauce you can freeze it for another time.
More Tomatoes
I was at Whole Foods again (love that store) and I had been checking out these delicious looking tomatoes. I took a few home to make myself a Tomato with Fresh Mozzarella and Balsamic reduction and of course with Salt & Pepper.
Cooking with a Chef
I got a chance to work with Chef Adam at his home near Austin, TX. this past weekend. In the picture Chef Adam is showing us how to cut a fresh tomato for his grilled turkey burger. While I was talking to Adam, he told me that he loves the movie Star Wars, Guitar Hero and as you can see he also loves to cook too. He believes if you start early in life, and learn the basic of cooking you can too become a great cook too.
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