(Part 3) Best products from r/AskCulinary

I think you are starting from the wrong place if you think it will be like Texan chili [con carne]. Mole negro and soft cheeses are the main culinary exports of Oaxaca and they are fantastic. This is one of my two favorite culinary regions in Mexico!

Mole negro
First off, the famous mole negro using the regional pasilla de Oaxaca pepper (aka "chile negro" when dried). There are many recipes for that; find one that has ingredients you can pick up at your local Mexican supermarket or order online. You can cook meat (often chicken) in it or use it to make enchiladas enmoladas. They're soft, cheesy, and the rich, black sauce has a great pepper flavor but also a complex mixture of spices that lend subtle notes to the flavor like a fine wine. Every abuelita in Oaxaca has her own special variation on the recipe.

Traditional meal: nopales + meat + oaxaqueño cheese + guajillo sauce
Another personal favorite coming straight out of restaurants in Oaxaca is often called the Conquista Plate. As you can see, a thin steak over grilled cactus, Oaxaca cheese and chile guajillo sauce. The cactus is nopales; learn to love it's mild flavor, as it's in tons of authentic Mexican dishes. Guajillos are a fairly mild chili with a distinct, tart taste. They're also used all over Mexico so you should be able to find them pretty easily. Oaxaca is famous for cheese, so you can also easily find that in most Mexican markets.

Recipe for the sauce (use only guajillos and ancho). You can find your own instructions on grilling nopales and the steak or whatever meat you want to go with it. That red sauce can basically go on anything.

Chile verde: more like a SW "chili"
Although it's not from further south than Chihuahua and Sonora and has become a staple in New Mexican cuisine, chile verde is probably going to be the best marriage of rich Mexican sauces and a more traditional southwestern US "chili" where chunks of tough meat are stewed or braised in the sauce until tender. I've tested and approve of this recipe as a basic starting point. However, in The Food Lab, Kenji goes into detail about why it's better to let this dish braise in the oven. Here is his final recipe, which is amazing and pretty simple once you get through it a couple times (and usually provides leftovers for days). I do believe he is a bit misinformed (in the book, in particular) about how unique Hatch chilies are; the exact same chilies are widely available as "Anaheim peppers" in addition to other sub-cultivars of the classic "No.9 chile". But I digress.

More about chile verde and SW food
I collected about a dozen cookbooks when living in NM trying to find more chile verde recipes to try. Two more recent ones I highly recommend are New Mexico Cuisine: Recipes from the Land of Enchantment and Red or Green: New Mexico Cuisine. For authentic Oaxaqueño recipes, I have only read Oaxaca al Gusto: An Infinite Gastronomy but it's very good and sub-divides the region to give you a sampling of coastal seafood, cheese from the mountains, and about a thousand mole recipes!

Finally, I want to say I agree with your friend: Tex-Mex is a mistake and traditional Mexican food is where the good eats are at!

Spices are a great way to up your cooking game, but they definitely take some learning. It's almost like learning how to read a language - there are different symbols that represent sounds, and there are grammatical rules for how you put them together.

I recommend tasting examples of spice combinations - go out to eat at places that do interesting spices, like Greek, Indian, Ethiopian, Korean, etc. Then read up online about what kinds of spices and herbs they use for their various dishes. This trains your palate and smell along with your knowledge. Indian cuisine is the hardmode for learning spices, but it's super sophisticated in how it's used. You can and do prepare spices in all sorts of ways for Indian cooking - toast whole, toast then grind, toast whole in oil, grind then bloom in oil, etc. And their different masalas are an excellent way to learn blending of spices. 660 Curries is a great encyclopedic resource for learning about spices and how they're used in Indian cooking.

Try getting a couple spice blends to try - such as Herbs de Provence (French) or a barbecue spice rub - use them in cooking and look at the ingredients. Make it almost like flash cards - you try or smell something, then look up what it is. That will help you become better at recognizing spices and herbs when you encounter them in the wild (in food) and also show you the patterns where they fit together. Generally, spices give more flavor when they're heated with oil, so make sure that your test preparations include that element somewhere to get the most out of the spices.

I assign my partner to create spice rubs for our steaks now, because it's a way for them to practice using their nose and knowledge to make a blend that not only tastes good, but that fits their idea of the flavor experience they are trying for.

Lastly, consider getting The Flavor Bible, which is a great resource for suggesting ways to pair ingredients with flavors, including spices and herbs. While you personally may not like every pairing, it's a good way to practice combining flavors that are generally seen as compatible.

Jacques Pépin New Complete Techniques

The America's Test Kitchen Cooking School Cookbook: Everything You Need to Know to Become a Great Cook

The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science

From here you can move on to:

Institut Paul Bocuse Gastronomique: The definitive step-by-step guide to culinary excellence

&

Larousse Gastronomique: The World's Greatest Culinary Encyclopedia, Completely Revised and Updated

These are all great resources. Also look for culinary school text books and always youtube.

The resources are out there and with everyone having a different way to learn and adopt information the variety in options is tremendous. Good luck and keep cooking. If you have any questions please reach out and if I can help I will.

I've never had a Victorinox, but I really enjoy my Mercer blades. At $30 for the 8" blade styles, they are great beginner knives. Had mine for 4 years now and have never had a complaint.
Couple of the prep cooks at the restaurant I worked at had Mercer sets and also loved them. Great quality for the price.
8" chef knife
Mercer Genesis collection

Not exactly. I have a typical, generic stir fry template (unless I'm trying to do something specific).

Heat a little oil till almost smoking, throw in some dried whole chiles and stir fry until they toasted and are smelling good.

Throw in the velveted meat, cooking till the color is right (need not be totally cooked through at this point), add some minced ginger and garlic and fry another 30 seconds or so until aromatic, then pull the meat and chiles and set aside.

Add whatever veggies and stir fry till just shy of tender-crisp (if you have a lid, another technique you can use--depending on the veggies involved--is adding a small bit of water and putting a lid to the wok to encourage steaming).

Add the meat back in along with whatever sauce is being used, and continue to cook until everything's happy.

My usual finishing sauce is a combination of soy sauce, water, sugar, rice wine, toasted sesame seed oil, corn starch.

There is a FANTASTIC youtube channel for American Chinese featuring an old hand that knows what the fuck he is doing. I will try to find it for when you I get home from work, and will edit it into this comment if I do.

EDIT - The chiles are totally optional. You can leave them out altogether, leave them in but eat around them, or, if you are a heat freak like me, eat them whole along with everything else on your plate. If you just want a kiss of heat, toast them in the oil, and then remove and discard before adding your meat. You can get big bags of the right kinda dried chile at any Asian grocery for cheap.

EDIT - Some links!

So in reviewing, this guy's channel has some American Chinese, but a lot of authentic Chinese recipes as well. If nothing else, watch some of his stir fry videos just to check his technique. Very solid fundamentals, but you'll need a proper wok and a decent gas burner to do what he does.

Here's the channel: Siu's Cooking

Not sure what your setup is, but these things are fantastic if you don't have access to a decent gas range: Portable Butane Burner. These are also available (along with fuel canisters) at pretty much any Asian grocery, usually less than $20.

Here's another solid channel to browse: Happy Wok

Reddit is firmly on the victorinox train and that's great. They're great knives. I want to offer you another option though. I've used a lot of knives throughout the years and I loved my forschners, but at the end of the day they're never going to be as sharp and stay as sharp as you would like. I moved onto the Tojiro DP they're a big step up from the victorinox chef knives for roughly $10-15 more in price. They're made of good quality Takefu VG10 steel, the same steel used in a knives that are a lot more expensive. If you maintain it you won't have to upgrade to something better when you're ready.

I just got this one for Christmas and I couldn't be happier with it. It's pretty powerful, and comes with some awesome attachments.

It even comes with a little measuring cup that the head of the blender fits perfectly into, I've used it to make Kenji Lopez's 2 minute mayo a few times now!! Also, a mini food processor for salsa or making marinade pastes, and a whisk for making whipped cream the easy way!

This is exactly what I was going to recommend. You can also pick up sodium citrate on Amazon. Works wonderfully. For years I've been on a quest for what I would consider the best melting/falvorful macaroni and cheese. Only after I found this tip, did I achieve that goal.

For me, the perfect cheese is the whole foods unaged cheddar. Several cups of this with some whole milk and sodium citrate makes perfect mac and cheese. Change ratios a bit and you'll have a slicable block of cheese that melts wonderfully.

Sodium Citrate

tried to find a link for the cheese but couldn't find it.

btw, if you can't find sodium citrate you can make it with baking soda and citric acid.

http://www.reddit.com/r/chemistry/comments/1d5z2z/food_guy_with_a_chemistry_question/

Good luck

Also not a chef but here are some good theory and technique books:

Larousse Gastranomique -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Larousse-Gastronomique-Hamlyn/dp/0600620425

The focus is obv iously french cooking techniques and application etc.


Leith's cooking Bible -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Leiths-Cookery-Bible-3rd-ed/dp/074756602X

Prue Leith is highly respected in the U.K for her culinary school...this book gets used a lot in my house

The flavour thesaurus -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Flavour-Thesaurus-Niki-Segnit/dp/0747599777

Once you have techniques you can look to build on them creatively so theory of what flavours work together is pretty crucial.

It might not sound like it makes sense what BaconGiveMeALardon said, but it's true. If you can get your hands on Modernist Cuisine then you can read more about cooking with woks. To sum it up, you need a lot of heat all the time. The Veggies on the bottom cook really fast, as soon as they are in contact with the metal. If you aren't careful, you can burn the food easily. That's why wok cookers always toss the food in the air, that way the hot steam also cooks the veggies higher up while at the same time not letting those on the bottom burn. Here's a pic I found from the book detailing the way a wok cooks food. You have to basically heat up the skillet to around 750 °C / 1400 F, and for that you need a flame 25 times more powerful than a typical home appliance can offer.

For a long time I tried to figure out a way to get wok cooking done at home. I thought of buying a portable wok cooking system hooked up to a propane tank. That was too much of a hassle, though. I will have to enjoy woked meals in restaurants, I suppose.

America's Test Kitchen cookbooks are great about this. They have recipes with explanations for why you cook certain parts to get the desired effects, and how you might alter cooking methods to get different textures or whatever. Often, they give sidenotes about how to get basic elements cooked perfectly. Highly recommend: http://www.amazon.com/Best-Recipe-Cooks-Illustrated-Magazine/dp/0936184744

If you don't mind spending the extra 10 bucks, the Wustof Tri-stone (250-100-3000) is a great all-round kit and value for money. I recommend this over the cheaper Smith's Arkansas Tri-hone kit because the Wusthof kit uses water stones and I don't have to futz around with oil. But if you don't mind using an oil stone, nothing wrong with the Smith's.

I use a 250-1000 combo King Kotobuki waterstone for sharpening , and a 6000 King Kotobuki waterstone for honing/polishing. But this kit is a little pricey in the total.

PS: Here's a great video for technique: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFhMGJYhYpU

A Kiwi will serve you well. You can find them at Asian markets, usually less than $10. They have a nice thin blade that's good for sushi, stays sharp and sharpens easily. I have a few $300+ knives in my bag and I still love my Kiwis.

I would recommend Modernist Cuisine at Home to anyone looking into a scientific approach to cooking without a second thought it is absolutely fantastic.

The full version of Modernist Cuisine is wonderful and interesting and I would say only about 15% of the recipes can be recreated using a standard home kitchen. If you're looking for practicality and recipes you can make yourself with a more scientific approach I would go with Modernist Cuisine at Home but if someone wants to know the ENTIRE in depth science(and history) behind the dishes Modernist Cuisine is the best.

Everybody recommends the Victorinox Fibrox on here, but I recently bought this http://www.amazon.com/Mercer-Cutlery-Genesis-Forged-Chefs/dp/B000OOQZMY and it is very good for the price (I bought it from Webstaurant Store where it is a few bucks cheaper, but you get killed on shipping unless you order a bunch of stuff). My understanding is it's the standard culinary school knife. It's forged rather than stamped, takes a sharp edge well and holds it, and has good heft in your hand. For a bread knife honestly you can go down to Walmart or whatever and buy something for $5, it doesn't really matter except for looks.

Something like this is a bit shorter but still has a wide blade that will allow you to use proper technique. And it has the benefit of only being $7 if you don’t like it:

Deba-Style Flexible Thai Knife (#171), Kiwi https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003LIX4QA/

I have plugged this before but I can't recommend it enough, so here it is again.

The best $7 knife you will ever own

I've been cooking for a while. I own a lot of knives. I have a pretty full kit. I use this knife for almost everything I do professionally.

I personally prefer a utility knife for light weight cutting (I prefer to chop, rather than roll, so a light knife helps). The things that make a utility knife good are a thin, flexible blade, no longer than 6" that will take but not necessarily hold a good edge. All of these qualities also make a knife really fuckin cheap because you aren't paying big bux for a huge lump of high carbon steel.

So why does everyone fork out $80+ for a fancy pattern welded steel shun 6" utility?

Just doesn't make sense. These knives come wicked sharp right out of the package, and for $7 a piece once you've beat it up (and for $7 a piece, you can beat it the fuck up) you just throw it away and buy another.

It may feel like cheating, or that there's a catch, but I haven't found one. They are really solid, dependable, inexpensive knives that you can absolutely trust to do what you need them to do. For the price I think everyone should give these a shot.

Plus you can impress and terrify your family once you learn to cut vegetables Japanese style. Very flashy, very fast, very scary for someone who doesn't know how to drive a knife properly.

Edit:

To clarify a later comment, I took a video of what I'm (possibly erroneously? really not sure) describing as "japanese style" cutting. Really, I'm just calling it that based on how I see chefs using santoku knives.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZFic0GabkM&feature=youtu.be

Tatercam quality, sloppy cut, and turn your speakers down because it is loud. Gives a more clear picture of what I'm describing though. This is what I prefer, contrary to the typical "roll" cut where you keep the tip on the board and move the knife like a piston. For a roll cut, a longer, heavier blade is preferable because you can leverage the weight easier. However, I think that this method will ultimately make you much faster with lightweight cutting (small carrots, soft veg like onions and zucchini, etc) and is worth picking up a cheap, light knife to learn.

tl;dr $7 knife works for cutting most stuff fast; buy it

My first real cookware was a set and I used every piece of that set all the time. The set you reference looks nice, but only has the encased aluminum bottom, the sides are thin.

Better to get a tri ply (or more) set where the entire pan is aluminum core encased in stainless. This type of manufacturing creates pans that are more sturdy (a bit heavier) and the way they heat up and maintain temp is more even. With these pans you'll find that things just seem to cook more evenly.

In my opinion, the Cuisinart Multiclad Pro set is a better set, and less expensive option. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009JXPS6U/

Tools: another knife, or a end-grain cutting board. Digital scales are always handy. Pressure cookers can be had for under $100 and a water circulator (sous vide machine) will fall slightly above that price range.

Ingredients: Foie gras makes a good gift. I would be delighted to get some high-end pork product. for a gift.

Books: Modernist Cuisine at Home is as much a book as it is a reference guide and set of projects. On Food and Cooking is an essential book for food nerds.

I'm searching for the same thing!! I just bought 3 Shun knives and need a honing steel to keep a nice edge. I've looked around stores and amazon and i think I'm going to buy the shun honing steel. its a little more expensive but it's the nicest I've seen by far. here are links.

The Shun:
http://www.amazon.com/Shun-DM0750-Sharpening-Steel/dp/B000139H7I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1346822054&sr=8-1&keywords=shun+honing

a good one also:

http://www.amazon.com/Wusthof-4473-10-Inch-Sharpening-Steel/dp/B00009WDT8/ref=pd_sim_sbs_k_6

What's your home ventilation like? Depending on that you have a couple of options:

• Wok smoking - use a foil-lined wok with a wire rack and tight-fitting lid.
  
  
• A stovetop smoker - same principle as the above, but a dedicated pan you can buy for the purpose. Looks to have a larger area for smoking than a wok would provide.
  
  
• Dhungar technique - you light a lump of charcoal and leave it in your covered pan for like 30 seconds.
  
  If your kitchen is poorly ventilated, then I'd recommend using a smoky ingredient (liquid smoke, smoked paprika, smoked cheese, etc.) instead.

Zero recipes, only plating.
It is a fantastic resource for that because it is open to interpretation.

The Escoffier Cookbook and Guide to the Fine Art of Cookery is a good companion.

New Larousse Gastronomique has many recipes and is an essential reference book

Institut Paul Bocuse Gastronomique: The definitive step-by-step guide to culinary excellence also a fantastic resource.

I assume you're talking about an IR thermometer? I got one because, like you said, it's a novelty and pretty cheap. I use it for things like taking surface temperatures of foods (melted chocolate, meat that I'm curing, etc.)

A lot of TV chefs (cough...Alton Brown) use them for things like taking surface readings of pan's temperatures. Unfortunately, many times an IR thermometer can't accurately measure temperatures in this situation. They rely on a property called emissivity. Emissivity had to do with how a material emits its energy as heat. Long story short, light/shiny objects have low emissivity which means that an IR thermometer will read a temperature lower than the actual temperature. So using the IR thermometer will work much better on dark, matte finished (some types of teflon or cast iron) cookware than stainless steel/aluminum/copper. So buyer beware...

If you're trying to wrap your head around the whole shiny vs. dull situation and why that matters. Think about it like this. A shiny object will reflect the ambient energy/radiation to a greater degree and not so much emit its own.

I'm just curious as to why you'd prefer a set over a couple of good, individual knives? Not judging, just curious.

I'm actually thinking about buying my mom knives for Christmas, as I went over her house on Saturday and cooked for her and didn't think to bring my own (and nearly cut myself on a dull knife, sigh), but I'll likely buy her a nice chef's knife and a nice paring knife, as well as a honing steel. It will likely cost me about $100-200, and I'll likely go Wusthof.

http://www.amazon.com/Wusthof-Gourmet-8-Inch-Cooks-Knife/dp/B0001FATMI/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1382997791&sr=8-2&keywords=wusthof+cook%27s+knife

and then this steel:

http://www.amazon.com/W%C3%BCsthof-4473-Wusthof-10-Inch-Sharpening/dp/B00009WDT8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1382997825&sr=8-1&keywords=wusthof+honing+steel

and probably two knife guards.

Which 12" skillet are you using? the lodge L10SK3? I believe that clocks in around 8.5 lbs

There are several lighter alternatives that are still cast iron.

Here's one example at ~4lbs
http://www.amazon.com/ExcelSteel-Inch-super-lightweight-frypan/dp/B0010D6RMG

CI did a review of several of them but found the performance extremely uneven; but you may be able to adapt to their properties.

The best alternative to maintain all of the properties you're looking for would be an uncoated carbon steel pan. You season and care for it similarly to cast iron and it develops a similar non-stick coating.

As long as you get a model with a metal handle it can handle the same amount of stovetop-to-oven traffic as your cast iron.

Just as with cast iron, the thicker the carbon steel pan, the more heat retention it will have and the more even the heat will tend to be; but at the expense of weight and responsiveness.

Here are a few examples:

http://www.amazon.com/DeBuyer-Mineral-Element-Frypan-Round/dp/B00462QP0W

http://www.amazon.com/Lodge-CRS12-Pre-Seasoned-Skillet-12-inch/dp/B005U93RYW

http://www.amazon.com/World-Cuisine-Black-Steel-Frying/dp/B001KZHF1G

Here's some approximate specifications I was able to dig up

• WC: 1.5mm thick, ~2-3lbs (~2 for 10", over 3 for 12.5"
  
• debuyer mineral B: 2.5mm-3mm thick ~4lbs 10", ~5.75lbs 12"
  
• lodge: 2.64mm thick, ~3lbs 10", ~4 lbs 12"
  
  [edit] It looks like the de buyer mineral b pan has a silicone button on the end that will likely be bad for putting under the broiler, but couldn't find any manufacturer recommendations for oven temperature or if you can just pop the thing off.

If you decide not to go with them the Cuisinart MultiClad Pro set is a very good value. Sometimes even better when on sale on Amazon. I expect mine to outlast me.

Edit: http://www.amazon.com/Cuisinart-MCP-12N-MultiClad-Stainless-12-Piece/dp/B009JXPS6U/

I love mine.

I use it at least once a week. Great for all kinds of sauces. All I have to do is stick the detachable blade in the dishwasher when I am done.

I smoked meat in my oven a few times when I lived in an apartment.

You can buy something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00004SZ9D or build your own with a large aluminum foil pan, lots of aluminum foil, and a baking rack. Regardless, you should use special indoor wood chips and the Camron instructions for indoor smoking. As you can see from the reviews, a lot of people do smoke indoors. It will make your apartment smell like BBQ and if you have a sensitive smoke detector, you may want to cover it or take it down (I have always had to take down apartment kitchen "smell" detectors everywhere I have ever lived)

With this method, I got a nice smoke taste on the meat, but not as much as a real smoker, so I also added liquid smoke to my BBQ sauce. Now that I have a real smoker, I still add liquid smoke to my BBQ sauce as it just makes it better.

If cast iron is too heavy, get a carbon steel pan. It too gets seasoned like a cast iron, and is great for searing.

Like this Lodge Logic model.

https://www.amazon.com/Lodge-CRS12-Skillet-Pre-Seasoned-12-inch/dp/B005U93RYW

Try this then. If you think about how long you'll own your stones, the price is a few cents a year or less if you properly maintain it.
http://www.amazon.com/Kotobuki-King-1000-K-80-Combo/dp/B00200L90I/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1421365781&sr=8-10&keywords=whetstone

This one doesn't come with a case/stand. I'd recommend getting one to increase the lifespan and ease of use. If you're completely new to whetstones, look at getting sharpening guides to help you get a feel for the proper 15 degree angle.

Not a cookbook, but definitely something she might enjoy if she's studying gastronomy:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/kitchen/e71f/?srp=2

Also good:
http://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Gastronomy-Exploring-Traditions-Perspectives/dp/0231133138/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1331915990&sr=8-2

http://www.amazon.com/Building-Meal-Gastronomy-Constructivism-Perspectives/dp/0231144660/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1331916059&sr=8-4

A little technical perhaps, and not for someone without a background in chemistry, but Molecular Gastronomy by Herve This is pretty interesting.

Not gadgets, but look into the Modernist Cuisine books: https://www.amazon.com/Modernist-Cuisine-Art-Science-Cooking/dp/0982761007

Obviously not all at once because of cost, but look into maybe getting a kindle and the digital version or something similar 😂
Or just go to a store, browse through the books and look for neat gadgets to get (as suggested in the books).

> http://www.amazon.com/PB2-Powdered-Peanut-Butter-6-5/dp/B002GJ9JWS

Whoa! Never heard of that. Cool! I bet that would work really well. Thanks!

Protip: I keep a laser temperature gun (https://www.amazon.com/Etekcity-Lasergrip-774-Non-contact-Thermometer/dp/B00837ZGRY/) in the kitchen precisely to know how hot my pans are. Also makes a great laser pointer for pet entertainment and it is handy to figure out where the drafts are coming from.

Anything an inch or more thick tends to get reverse seared or sous vided in my kitchen, really just much better methods if you've got the time and the tools.

Lots of good answers so far but check this out: Sodium Citrate is now known to be an excellent emulsifying aid for cheese based sauces. Here's a similar recipe. Stirring in about a teaspoon or so before you add the fromage should go a long way towards keeping your sauce properly emulsified.

I'm surprised so far no one has mentioned Larousse which is generally my go-to along with The New Best Recipe for more generalized fare.

I generally don't cook from cookbooks, but I do use them for inspiration or fundamentals.

I have to say that I avoided getting a wetstone for a while. I just bout this stone recently and found it was pretty easy to sharpen using it. To be fair, my knives were pretty beat up and dull before I sharpened them. So, I bought a pretty low grit stone. The only thing I'd recommend is getting something at least a little higher. Now that I've sharpened with both the 250 and 1000 sides once, it doesn't seem like the 250 side will be of much use anymore unless I want to change the edge angle entirely which is not likely.

It took about 10 minutes for my 8" chef knife and some other 5" knife that I found under my kitchen stove when I bought my house. :)

I've heard that the Lansky sharpening system is pretty easy to use, but the one common complaint is that it gets a bit tough for larger kitchen knives. There is a stone in it for serrated knives as well.

Cooking by James Peterson is a good resource. Very readable with plenty of illustrations, recipes, and techniques shown step by step.

Jacques Pepin's Complete Techniques is on my Christmas list.

The greatest cooking encyclopaedia though has to be the Larousse Gastronomique. One of my very favourite possessions and something that I refer to more than any other book I own.

Ohh fun thought! Not tested, but I think you should get some of the powdered PB2 stuff and replace some of the sugar with that!

It would be a fun experiment.

http://www.amazon.com/PB2-Powdered-Peanut-Butter-6-5/dp/B002GJ9JWS

I would try out some recipes for peanut butter hot chocolate (most seem to be hot chocolate with a spoon of peanut butter) and substitute PB2 for regular peanut butter. There's also a chocolate pb2 that you may want to try. You could premake your mix in a jar and bring it to work, or maybe just stash your cocoa and pb in your office and mix it there. Good luck!

I find the portable butane burners to be unbearably under powered and the butane canisters seem to get used up really quickly.

I would go with a propane cooktop that you can hook a 20lb propane tank up to. And find a place you can fill the propane tank, instead of exchanging it. It's often like 1/2 the cost to refill.

EDIT: One of these would be even more fun.

Might look into a larger qyuto as well. That santoku looks like a 165mm. The 210mm Gyuto would be a nice addition.

• Start with the guy who wrote a book on techniques. Jacques Pépin.
  
• Expand into an American Master showcasing family americana style food but with high technique Thomas Keller Ad Hoc
  
• Check out the deep science behind food to understand why people do what they do Modernist Cusine at Home
  
• Or if you want someone to explore the science and break it down for you in Alton Brown
  
• Youtube. Check out Gordon Ramsay, American Test Kitchen, Heston blumenthal or Blumenthal again, Thomas Keller, Pepin Videos, There's so many food videos from chefs my reply would be huge if I linked it all

Instead of large amounts of velveeta, I'll add to try using white american cheese in combination with some cream cheese and a good cheese. If using a lot of good cheese (like half or so, use sodium citrate to ensure you won't get an oily mess www.amazon.com/WillPowder-Sodium-Citrate-16-Ounce-Jar/dp/B00250Y9Y6

Victorinox is fine. Wusthof is awesome but Mercer (same steel as Wusthof, but less thrills on the finish) is my first choice at a reasonable price.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000OOQZMY/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=2UB5W2RPVSSOV&coliid=I3SQF0CAZSIM1L

Oven thermometer is a must, but IR guns are also a fun and cheap investment.

Harold McGee is pretty much the standard tome for a scientific approach to the cooking process. If you can get through most of On Food and Cooking you are doing pretty damn good.

The only major step up from that would be the more exhaustive and much more expensive, 50 lb, 6 volume set called Modernist Cuisine

Edit: words are hard

http://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Gastronomy-Exploring-Traditions-Perspectives/dp/0231133138/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335042671&sr=8-1

its an amazing book!

Agreed on $33. But if you're willing to spend $20 more, Tojiro DP is a lot better.

I bought the Cuisinart MCP-12N MultiClad Pro Stainless Steel 12-Piece Cookware Set and have been very happy with it.

This. Before you start, though, find a reliable cookbook (I like Cook's Illustrated's New Best Recipe for this, as well as Cook's Illustrated and America's Test Kitchen, generally). Nothing worse than spending your time and money on making a crappy recipe.

I have only used then on gas ranges or this little gem. But I think you will be fine. If anything, when you are the at restaurant supply store, grab one of those burners and then you can break it out whenever you need to get some consistent heat either for stir frying, making eggs, or heating up that cast iron to get a nice sear on your steak. That little butane burner is a life saver.

American here. I use a Lodge Carbon Steel 12" skillet, cast-iron Lodge and Field 12" skillets and a stainless steel, aluminum core All-Clad D3 12" skillet.

I like all these skillets and all have their own niches in my cooking with plenty of cross-over.

I still have a non-stick Calphalon skillet too but I no longer use it. I get plenty of non-stick characteristics with my other pans and I feel the other pans are more versatile and healthy.

Thank you!

Follow up question: would this be considered a smooth steel?

Wusthof steel

Or maybe this one?
victronox honing steel

I guess I'm not sure whether steels with very small ridges are considered smooth or you mean something entirely smooth. My googling has yielded mixed results.

The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science https://www.amazon.com/dp/0393081087/

Along with these suggestions, check out PB2. It will probably be easier to mix than regular peanut butter.

The Flavor Bible helps
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001FA0P86/

I recommend Cook's Country's Best New Recipe that will give you the how, the why, and how they figured out the how and the why.

It sounds like it was a webpage version of The Flavor Bible.

I would recommend The Food Lab by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt. It covers a lot of techniques and dishes-out the science behind them.

If you just purchased your knife, DO NOT SHARPEN IT YOURSELF.

Your knife needs to be sharpened only every few years, maybe. However, it should be honed as part of your day-to-day process in the kitchen. I read an article the other day referencing an Italian master chef who honed his knife every four minutes, but come on, that's overkill.

The difference: sharpening a knife (with a whetstone) refers to re-grinding the steel to form a new edge. Usually the edge on your knife is fine (especially if it's brand new), it's just been knocked about and isn't entirely facing in the direction of your cutting force.

Honing a knife (with a honing steel) reshapes the blade and evens out any distortions or irregularities that may be present from ordinary use. After honing a knife, it cuts better not because it's sharper, but because you can actually use the cutting edge.

Here's Alton Brown's explanation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRUYAgrsoLw

It's doing to depend out the range more than anything. Every range will be a bit different, and the burners on the same range will probably be different as well.

It only takes $16 to find out how hot your pan is getting

Volume 4 of Modernist Cuisine, https://www.amazon.com/Modernist-Cuisine-Art-Science-Cooking/dp/0982761007, has many handy charts for starches and other hydrocolloids. Most are in percentages, but there are enough example recipes in there to learn about how to use and work with percentages.

https://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Gastronomy-Exploring-Traditions-Perspectives/dp/0231133138

Get a small butane burner. I got mine at an Asian food store, but they're available at camping stores & restaurant supply places and of course on line eg. http://www.amazon.com/Portable-Butane-Stove-Camping-Burner/dp/B000RA8V1S
The butane comes in a can about the size of a can of spraypaint. I think they burn hotter than my propane camper stoves, they are super portable and can be used indoors if you need an extra burner. There is no problem with soot.

I don't know much about it, but as far as I know Modernist Cuisine: the art and science of cooking is supposed to be a modernist Bible.

Edit: Modernist Cuisine at Home is probably more suitable for your needs though.

The food lab. You can also buy Modenist Cuisine at Home.

• The Food Lab: Cooking Through Science by Kenji Lopez-Alt
  
• On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee
  
• The Flavor Bible
  

Another book set you might consider is:
Nathan Myhrvold's Modernist Cuisine.

Wikipedia Link

Amazon Link

We try to shy away from cookbook recommendations, but you will hear it any number of times:

1. Harold McGee On Food and Cooking.
   
   
2. Modernist Cuisine by Nathan Myhrvold. Myhrvold is considered by many, including the undersigned, to be a wretched patent troll so I won't give him any money.

Here is a nice backgrounder on the sciency side of the chemical effects - and it should be a basic part of your understanding of salt effects. The Food Lab's chapter on the science of ground meat opened a whole new avenue of cooking fun for me, just by understanding why when you add how much salt to ground meat yields totally different products. You can generally access the basic ideas by googling "food lab", including the ground meat product you want to make as a google term, if you do not have access to the book. I commend buying it, because it is the kind of reference work that cries out for annotating and browsing.

...and now for a much less technical reasons: (1) salt lightly early on, because you may want to concentrate stuff down and (2) if there is some salt there, you can easily say, "that is under salted but what else does it need?" - with no salt on board the lack of salt is all you will notice.

Balance out final heat, acid, umami, finishing herb stuff, all of which can affect final salt preference, then correct the salt if needed.