We really enjoy cooking for people who are serious eaters

check out chuck’s recent experience with us

http://www.chuckeats.com/2008/07/15/mccradys-charleston-sc-ingredient-fetish/

if you haven’t read chuck’s blog you will be hooked instantly, chuck has quite the dining resume

this is one of my favorites

it’s an old pea introduced in the late 1800’s

the flavor when they are fresh is very earthy, almost like eating dirt, in a good way of course

these will be great with a truffle puree and some jean marc apple vinegar….with pork of course

we are going to grow a whole field of these this fall….lots of shelling to be done in the meantime, we just bought 4 and a half bushels from our friend Todd Blair, thanks to Randolph for helping us find Todd, whom we also got our piggies from

we finally harvested our jimmy red…

anybody want to grow some next year??

we now have a ton of seeds

I am doing a participation cooking demo at Charleston Cooks on July 31st.  Charleston cooks is right across the street from McCrady’s.  It’s only 60 bucks.  I will be focusing on vegetable cookery but will also touch base on some other things.  Seats are limited since it is a participation class.  This facility is amazing.  I look forward to seeing you in class….don’t be late!!

Discussions:

vegetable and fruit compression using the vac machine

vegetable and fruit infusion using a vaccuum

vegetable aeration using a vaccum

cryoblanching using liquid nitrogen and vaccum

cooking vegetables under vaccum in a pressure cooker

other ways to utuilize the pressure cooker to cook vegetables

creating a vegetable driven dish using lots of different ideas and theories

fish sous vide

vegetable cakes

using hydrocolloids to reshape vegaetables

using versa whip

frozen ice cream pearls using liquid nitrogen

should be a hoot

here is the link:

http://www.mavericksouthernkitchens.com/cooks/classes.html

We have decided to take a different approach to gardening.  I have pulled inspiration from Thomas Jefferson’s garden at Monticello.  We are trying to eliminate plastic mulching and tractors without killing ourselves.  Stay tuned to see how things develop.  We are very excited.

Since attempting to raise vegetables and pigs my daily checklists have changed a bit.

Fish Carcasses (tomatoes)

Egg Shells (tomatoes)

aspirin (tomatoes)

Bone Meal (tomatoes)

Lime (tomatoes)

organic fertilizer (tomatoes)

4 gallons sour milk (pigs)

2 gallons sour heavy cream (pigs)

2 large lexans of kitchen scrap (pigs)

water (me)

slim jims (me)

if you are curious about all the strange things for the tomatoes check out this site

www.growbetterveggies.com

Cynthia is one of the most talented tomato growers in the united states, if not the most talented, she is also the person responsible for all the crazy delicious vegetables for my favorite restaurant Manresa.

if Cynthia said to put toenails into the soil to get a better tomato I wouldn’t have any toenails

The peach is compressed and then bruleed.  We serve it with a brown butter crumble and honey-mascorpone cream….

This has been an incredible project on many different levels.  This corn is from James Island, here in Charleston.  Jimmy Red Corn is nearly extinct.  Thanks to Ted Chewning for keeping this strain alive, he was nice enough to share some seeds with us this year. We ended up growing 1600 feet of Jimmy Red for seed.  The scraps will be used to make grits for the restaurant.  We use liquid nitrogen to ensure that the corn stays nice and cold when it is ground.  Next year, John Haulk corn.

my piggies love milk.

http://www.ideasinfood.com/ideas_in_food/2008/07/photos-of-mccradys.html

here is a link to some pics from the dinner with the guys from ideasinfood..

what a great night, thanks to all that made it possible