Are there any dishes or meals you can make at home that are close to, as good as or better than restaurants? Our family almost never goes out for steaks because we can get high quality prime and dry aged meats for much cheaper. Salt, cast iron, high heat and a little time to rest. Bristol Farms, Eataly, Huntington Meats and RIP Harvey Guss. The sides will never be as good as Cut and the drinks aren’t as well made. But for the price savings we only go to a steakhouse every couple of years for a special occasion.
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I generally leave sandwich making to restaurants but for my money a BLT is almost always better at home
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My tiramisu and crème brûlée out classes many of the versions outside my kitchen. So I never order it from a restaurant anymore unless someone here makes a compelling case.
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plus i can eat my steaks at home with white rice.
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Hah, I was just talking about this last week! I prefer steak with rice compared to almost any form of potatoes with the possible exception of roast potatoes. Maybe steak frites.
Something about how absorbent the rice is for steak juice and it doesn’t distract from the flavor…?
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I am with you on the steaks. I generally avoid ordering them at restaurants.
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Can you share a recipe? I’m trying to diversify my desserts. I seem to be stuck making the same 3-4 things all the time.
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Pretty much anything American, Italian, French, Eastern European, or Middle Eastern, unless it involves smoking, cooking over wood, or some special hardware we don’t have.
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Not sure where to start; how about pizza?
pasta?
tri-tip?
Salade Lyonaisse?
potstickers?
roast chicken?
chimichangas?
I will stop there. We don’t eat out very much as I enjoy cooking more than going out.
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Easiest cuisines to get right in my experience:
Middle Eastern.
Indian. (It’s time consuming, but the results are easily restaurant quality or better. )
Hardest cuisines to get right in my experience:
Seafood.
French.
Japanese.
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How about a pavlova? Berry Pavlova with vanilla whipped cream and pistachios
The recipe scales down perfectly. I have made it with as few as two egg whites. Almost any fruit works and it is fairly healthy for a dessert.
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that’s a pretty roast chicken! you just rotate at a periodic interval? any pre-treatment necessary on the chicken?
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Tiramisu…no joke, I use Giada de Laurentiis’ recipe with a few adjustments.
- increase the sugar amount to 1/4 c…the 3 tbsp doesn’t do it for me
- stroll over to Gioia for fresh mascarpone
- I’ve taken to using Kaniche rum and I use way more than 2 tsp…I’m using at least 1/8 c or more
- fresh from the farm egg yolks
I will return with the crème brûlée recipe. It’s been a while and I need to look it up.
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Here is the recipe, Rotisserie Chicken Recipe. Mine is darker than the recipe as I used wood, red oak, during the cooking.
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Rotisseries rotate constantly. Unless you shut them off.
Agree about steak. With sous vide, reverse sear, probe thermometers etc, steak can be cooked to an exact temperature, with much more attention and care. Also I’m a crazy person and hate the trend of restaurants pre-slicing steak, especially a ribeye or something with non uniform fat distribution. And roast chicken as well. Can pull it at lower temperatures than restaurants do, bc salmonella inactivation or whatever happens on a temp/time curve.
Stews etc also fall into this category, why the best Persian food in LA is at some grandmother’s house.
Looks great!
I did a whole roasted chicken once in my life, following a simple Marcella Hazan recipe, and it came out well. Not as attractive as yours though.
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Risotto is something that you can easily make at home at a level better than most restaurants, but it’s time consuming (especially if including the time to make the stock).
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Thank you!
My risotto sometimes came out perfect and sometimes it was chalky. But I decided I prefer riso Originario to Arborio so I lost interest in making risotto anyway.
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