The Eagle Has Landed

Posted on September 7, 2007 by Hot Knives

While we Hot Knives are mostly proselytizing beer and vegan food, we occasionally regress into fru-fru indulgences on the lactic/enological side. The golden hours portrait above was one of those moments where our collective epicurean id utterly trounced our vegan superego. What you see on your screen is what’s known as a perfect marriage between two fermented fiends. The beverage is a Muscadet produced at the Chateau Mercrediere, a castle in the Loire Valley. The cheese is L’Aigle Noir, quite literally the best Roquefort in the world.
Roquefort, a bleu veined ewe’s milk cheese from Roquefort-suz-Souzon, is widely known as one of the Kings of cheese. Of the 500 plus cheeses made in France, this blue bully is certainly one of the most recognizable to the connoisseur and the layman alike. Unfortunately, as with the other Kings of cheese: Parmigiano Reggiano, Brie de Meaux, and Stilton, Roquefort has been commodified and redefined as tepid sour crumbles that lay atop crappy salads. Like the other big three; it has become a supermarket cheese which obscured its epic history, and its goddamn transcendental flavor.
Like many French cheeses, Roquefort’ origin is tied to a quaint little story involving a shepherd and a lady. The young shepherd, so the story goes, settles down at the mouth of a cave to eat his lunch of rye bread, ewe’s milk cheese and presumably booze of some kind. Between bites he spies a beautiful girl off in the fields. Substituting one desire for another, he runs after her leaving his food to the elements. The elements somehow combined the mold which grew on the bread with the fresh sheep’s cheese and three months later, after botching his new relationship, the shepherd returned to find the first piece of Roquefort.

The wedge gracing our blog has been hand made by the second smallest (of eight) Roquefort collective in France, led in name and blood by Jaques Carles, a 96 year old hard-ass. True to form the rot that impregnates the multitudinal crevasses of this bight white cheese is grown on loafs of rye bread. Every other producer uses lab cultured penicilium roqueforti to make their wheels blue. Carles’ Roquefort is widely know as the best available outside France, the smallest producer Le Vieux Berger doesn’t export, but the one we wolfed down the other day is even more special than his usual fare. L’Aigle Noir is a collaboration between Carles, and another type of French artisan named Chantal Plasse. Chantal is an Affineuse, which means her calling in life is aging cheeses. She selects the cream of Carles’ crop at an early stage, and then baby-sits the cheese to mature-perfection.
The most amazing thing about a great cheese, like a great wine or beer, is when it can occupy your mouth and mind for a significant about of time. A good Roquefort should take a good thirty seconds to a minute to go through the motions in your mouth. This one ranges from sweet and supple, to smokey, to sour, with a long salted butter finish. Unlike most other blues in production all over the world, Roquefort’s power lies in its perfect balance between strength and subtlety.
How does the Black Eagle taste? Platonic.
The wine was good too.
Grain: Three Philosophers
Grape: Muscadet, Sauternes, or Port

Tagged Dairy Pairy | 1 Comment

Duchess de Bourgogne

Posted on August 28, 2007 by Hot Knives

And now for something completely different! Duchess de Bourgogne is not from the Western United States, contains almost no noticeable hops, mostly comes in 11.2 fl oz. bottles, and features one of the most neo-classically emo girly portraits we’ve ever seen on a beer bottle. It’s not typically the beer we cut our teeth on, at least on these pages. And yet… fucking incredible beer. And, the Duchess keeps popping up in our world! (We recently paired her with not one but two recipes, drooled over her in our first radio spot and featured her prominently in our beer and bike brouhaha.) Still, she made us too nervous, downright intimidated, for us to be able to pen a review until now. We kept chilling.
Despite the look and the 6.2% ABV, make no mistake: this is a dark lady. She’s a traditional, flagship Flemmish red ale brewed with roasted malts only and aged in French oak, hence the brownish, oxidized-blood color and the sweet savory notes.
First pour reveals a filmy, slick off-white head that clings on the sides of the glass and forms a clump in the middle like a pendant; beer jewelry. First notes include slightly rotten bread, raspberry and wood chips. On first taste, the Duchess is puckery sour, not unlike kamboocha… in fact eerily similar to kamboocha. Much like that fermented mother tea, the Duchess’ beauty largely hinges on another kind of age secret: the beer is a mixture of ale ages 8 months and 18 months lending it an insane complexity, like a young misses whose adventures bestow on her a sexy middle-aged countenance. Or think of bubblegum beer, fizzy, neon-colored sour candies designed to taste exactly like cask ale. A red Chimay lollipop.
Dairy Pairy: Torta la Serena
Soundtrack: Psychic TV’s “Godstar”

Tagged Hip Hops | 11 Comments

Hot Knife Cast: World Exclusive

Posted on August 26, 2007 by Hot Knives

Hello readers, get ready to become “listeners”! Our latest installment of vegan hangover cooking instructions (featuring vegan Catalan Toast pictured above) comes to you via sight and sound: Introducing the first of, we hope, many podcasts where we toss out recipe directions, cooking tips and beer ideas into a microphone so you can bring us into your kitchen to keep you company!
For this first attempt we settled on trouble shooting a common scenario that we find ourselves in time and time again — one that actually played a big part in us picking up knives to cook for our friends in the first place — and one that can be handled smoothly with a few kitchen tricks. So here we go… You’ll find the two recipes discussed as well as a beer pairing suggestion below for printer-friendly accessibility. But please give this ‘stove-side chat’ thing a listen and let us know if it blows or rules. Click on the below link to get cooking. Unlimited credit and thanks goes to our friend and producer Meghan Delehanty!

>>> HOT.KNIFE.CAST v1.O! <<<

Two-Minute Herb Bro-schetta

(serves four)
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4 slices stale baguette
3 Tbs. extra virgin olive oil
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 shallots, chopped
4 sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
1 can cannelloni beans
sea salt and pepper to taste
1. Toss your evenly sliced baguette pieces (crostini-sized) into the toaster, set it for about 2 minutes and prepare the white bean bruschetta topping.
2. In a medium sauté pan, bring the olive oil, garlic and shallots up to medium heat. After a minute, throw in the fresh herbs. While that cooks open your can of beans, drain and rinse, empty into a large mixing bowl.
3. Once the herbed oil is fragrant, about two minutes, toss over the beans and stir. Plate the toast pieces and top with your herbed beans. Garnish with extra sprigs of thyme, a splooge of olive oil, and salt and pepper.

Vegan Catalan Toast w/ Wilted Salad

(Serves four)
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4 slices stale baguette
1 red bell pepper
4 large cloves garlic, peeled
1 8 oz. package tempeh
1/4 whole grain Dijon
1 Tbs. extra virgin olive oil
2 shallots, chopped
1/4 cup cheap white wine
2-3 Tbs. Veganaise
1 head wilted lettuce
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 shallots, minced
1/4 cup sherry vinegar (or balsamic)
sea salt and pepper to taste
1. Start by toasting your baguette slices. Take your (defrosted) tempeh and marinate for a few minutes: slather it in grain mustard and a dash of white wine, salt and pepper, set aside.
2. Using your stovetop, char your red bell pepper. Place it on direct flame, holding it with metal tongs. Flip sides every couple minutes until the entire pepper is black. Remove from heat and run under cold water, rubbing charred skin off until you’re left with a lovely roasted pepper. Set aside.
3. Grab your toasted bread and rub one raw garlic clove into each slice, until it melts like butter. Then toss back into the toaster on a lower heat.
4. Heat the leftover sauté pan from the broschetta oil, add more olive oil, and toss in your tempeh. Get it sizzley and flip after roughly 5-8 minutes. Once browned, remove and cut into long, thin, anchovy-length cutlets. Slice bell pepper in similar shapes.
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5. Remove your twice-toasted bread, coat in Veganaise until the toast is white. Then place your pepper and tempeh slices in a corss-hatch, or diamond formation.
6. Reheat the same pan, at this point is boasts lots of spiced juices. Hit it with more garlic, shallots and a little oil. After toasting for about 5 minutes hit it with the sherry vinegar and let it sputter for another minute or two. In the meantime, revive your wilted lettuce in a bowl of ice water, rinse and dry. Slice lettuce into thin slices, place in your mixing bowl and then top with hot dressing.
7. Plate your salad and drape the toasts on top, diagonally.
Beverage: Duchess de Bourgogne
Soundtrack: Velvet Underground’s “Sunday Morning”

Tagged Knife Cast, Recipes, Veeegs | 4 Comments

Beer “Tasting” Strike Out

Posted on August 25, 2007 by Hot Knives

The jackass comment from one reader two months ago, who called us “cheap whores” in response to us dropping in on a schmoozy beer bloggers reception where we sipped for free, actually broached an interesting subject: Are beer writers, and bloggers, especially prone to favorably reviewing beers if they’re courted in any way by company reps? In our case, we rarely encounter much special treatment. Still, we have on occasion received free boxes of beer. We like to make ice cream with it.
Well, whether it answers that question or not, we recently accepted an invitation from the marketing reps at Pyramid Brewing to take part in a summer beer pairing party in the company’s Gold Box Suite at Angel Stadium. Now, we’ve never been much impressed by the brewery, which is known mostly for their apricot-infused hefeweizen. But we heard they were bringing a seasonal called Curveball and thought it might be worth a swig. Though Alex couldn’t make it, Evan took the train out to Anaheim with his former boss in tow and drank it all in. Not knowing exactly what to expect, we nevertheless assumed that most of the other guests would be beer writers, industry insiders and/or company reps. As it turned out, Hot Knives and Hair of the Dog were the only beer writers present and few if any of the other guests seemed to even care what they were drinking as long as it was cold. In fact this may have been the most ingenious way for the Pyramid employees to throw a party for their friends on the company card we’ve ever seen.
After a couple Thunderhead IPAs (easily Pyramid’s best beer, though admittedly tame and standard) we broke out the video camera to the dismay of some of the older dudes gobblin’ on beef franks and coconut shrimp, so that you readers could be invited to the gold box suite too. Note the sad state of the food and beer “pairings” and even the reluctance of one of the Pyramid guys to look in the camera let alone give us some straight talk about the beers. Rather than engage us, he chose to read the side of the bottle’s bland marketing speak!
All sarcasm aside, conversations with the two very nice marketing people for Pyramid was a fascinating peek into the world of who sells the beer for medium-sized, mainstream microbrewies, where the MBA grads talk more about branding than they do brewing: Listen close to the chatter in the video (abuzz with slogans, units moved and “big sports accounts”) and you’ll see what we mean. That said, the excuse to see a baseball game — one where the Yankees slaughtered the OC home team — was well worth the offensively mediocre hefeweizen. And if that makes us cheap whores, well, so be it.

Tagged Ceremonies, Hip Hops | 1 Comment

The Big DIPA

Posted on August 22, 2007 by Hot Knives

A number of breweries both known and not are releasing beers whose flavors don’t really correspond to their determined class. When you take a sip of Gonzo Imperial Porter, one of the Flying Dog litter, it seems more like a regular west coast style stout than something deserving such a regal moniker. Avery’s Hog Heaven “a barely wine style ale,” while a great beer, had the two of us hotly splitting hairs over what qualifies something as a barley wine as opposed to a strong ale. The situation can sometimes be incredibly frustrating. When spending over $8.00 on a beer it damn well better taste like you want it too or a sense of wasted time and money sets in like a blistering PBR hangover. When a bottle becomes a boondoggle; you might find yourself turning your back on a brewery forever…
The Big DIPA is something to ponder in the aforementioned contextual brain twist. It is purported to be a bottle conditioned Double India Pale Ale, hence the acronym. While the contents of this silly looking Belgian bottle certainly taste nothing like any double IPA we’ve ever tried, it’s specificity defies both its categorization by its parents and the knee jerk reaction you typically experience with bottle boondoggle.
The look of the beer is sumptuous: a burnt caramel color topped with a cloud of foam reminiscent of towers of bubbles that hid you private parts when bathtubs seemed huge. Wonderful hop aromas tickle your nose hairs and you think about all the niceties associated with a solid flavorful IPA.
Here is where you take a double take at your purported double. Instead of that wave of citrus and pine you might be craving, you get a solid yeast rush, followed by the briefest tinge of hops and a malty afterthought. Confusion.
A second sip with eyes closed reveals a completely different and more interesting beer than the label that strange frog king graces with his rotund visage implies. With more swirling and a slightly warmer temperature (which the bottle actually suggests) the character of a truly great bottle conditioned ale makes itself known. The complexity of flavors from sweet yeast, brief dry hops, and long lingering toasted malts evokes visions of a strange cocktail: Saison Dupont, a splash of Green Flash Imperial IPA, and a swirl of Downtown Brown.
For those of us constantly seeking newer and greater IPAs, this bottle is something to avoid. Blue Frog’s DIPA is nowhere near a true double IPA, or a single for that matter, but at least its more boon than doggle.
Dairy Pairy: 20 Month aged Comte
Soundtrack: Jesus and Mary Chain “Head On”

Tagged Hip Hops | 3 Comments

“Almonds Beet Cheese” Salad

Posted on August 17, 2007 by Hot Knives

Rest assured, you will never come across a Hot Knives recipe for cashew cheese nachos. That’s just not something we’re OK with — fake cheese in general, and nacho cheese especially.
That said, we’re sick of being barred from improving upon the now-completely-cliché “goat cheese and beet” salad. So we went ahead and tried out our own version of a beet salad, using freshly pulsed almond paste in place of chevre. Much like our runny polenta replacement for Hollandaise, this creamy substance doesn’t much taste like the hay-feed funk of a slightly stanky goat’s cheese, but it does a damn good job of a) holding shape in plated presentation b) complimenting the distinct roasty, earthy flavor of a beet c) blandly playing off of whatever flavor you wanna give it.
Here we whipped blanched almonds with some coconut milk and a little lavender. Next up, watch for our nutty, beer-spiked version of a past-its-prime smoked gouda (it’s intense).
Yes, Alex is plating this salad in front of a microphone in the picture below. And no, we’re not suggesting you contact mic your salad ingredients. Right now we are putting together an exclusive Hot Knives Podcast, so we can invade your kitchen WHILE you’re actually cooking. Coming (very) soon!

Almond “Chevre”

1/2 lbs. raw almonds
1/4 cup coconut milk
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 tsp. lavender leaves
Sea salt and fresh black pepper
Filtered water (as needed)
1. Place your almonds, skins still on, in a deep bowl and cover with boiling water. Let them sit for 8-10 minutes (it’s ok to steep them this long because you want them a little mushy, not perfectly crisp like most recipes call for). Once the water is just cool enough, start peeling off the skins to reveal blanches white almonds. Drain and dump in your blender or food processor.
2. Pulse your almonds while slowly adding the coconut milk. Mixture should become liquidy enough that it is stirred by the blender. Continue to pulse while pouring in the oil and lavender, salt and pepper. Finally, add cold water if needed to further liquefy the mixture. The product should be spreadable, roughly the texture of a whipped cream cheese.

Dill Vinaigrette

1 bunch dill
1/4 cup olive oil
3 Tbs. white balsamic, or sherry vinegar
1 tsp. water
1. In a small saucepan, heat the olive oil on medium. Separate the dill bunch into two equal piles.
2. Toss half of the dill into the oil and quickly sauté for under 10 seconds (just to bring out color and flavor). Remove and empty oil and dill into your food processor. Add light-colored vinegar of your choice, the remaining dill and some sea salt to taste. Pulse unto smooth, green and consistent. Add a dash of water, about 1 tsp. if needed. Set aside.

Stacked Beet Salad

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2 beets
1 fennel bulb
1/4 vermouth or red wine
3-4 shallots, chopped
sea salt
1. Start by boiling your beets: Bring a pot of water to a boil and toss in beets. Let cook for 8-10 minutes or until a fork sticks into them easily. Remove, drain and cool with ice cubes or running water.
2. Use a vegetable peeler to remove the gnarly brown skin, revealing perfect, raspberry colored beets. Set aside.
3. In a sauté pan, toast the shallots for 1-2 minutes and douse with half the vermouth, or red wine (we prefer vermouth if you have it, but the red wine will add a nice color and stronger flavor). Slice the fennel into thin ribbons (using a sharp knife or a mandolin) and toss in the pan. Braise the fennel for about 10 minutes, adding the remaining liquor as needed. Then salt and remove.
4. Slice the beets into 4-6 circular pieces each, like thick, evenly cut potato chips. Finally stack your salad, placing a beet slice down, followed by a spoonful of almond paste and so until you have a stack of red and white layers. Save the pointy top of the beet for the last slice. Serve on a long plate with fennel salad on the other side and dill dressing drizzled on both components.
Beverage: Cantillon Gueuze
Soundtrack: Lee Scratch Perry’s “White Belly Rat”

Tagged Recipes, Veeegs | 1 Comment

Deez Nuts

Posted on August 15, 2007 by Hot Knives

We figured that an assortment of awesome cocktail nuts would be the perfect accompaniment to the end of a huge bike ride, and the beginning of a beer bust. It was a model marriage.
These three nut recipes work extremely well together both in term so of taste and timing. While you don’t necessarily need to make all three at once, the cook times for these three make for some pretty sweet simultaneous preparation. If you feel it, you can heat and plate these three types of nuts for a triple threat single landing-which will subdue even the most ravenous of party guests.
The main thing to keep in mind when working with nuts is: they continue to cook after they come up to temperature. When you are roasting, toasting, frying etc. raw nuts, you really only need to start seeing color change to warrant removal from flame.

Sweet Pistachio Meat

2 cups raw pistachio meat
3 Tbs. extra virgin olive oil
2 Tbs. Maple syrup
2 Tsp. Ground Nutmeg
1. Turn your oven up to 400.
2. In a small roasting pan, toss the pistachio meat with the olive oil. Place the pan in the oven for about 10 minutes. Check them around the 8 minute mark; if you hear some nice sizzling, and the nuts are starting to brown, remove from the oven.
3. The second the nuts come out of the oven hit them with the syrup and the nutmeg.

Thai Peanuts

4 cloves garlic
2 serrano chilies
2 cups raw blanched peanuts
¼ cup canola oil
1 Tbs. sea salt
2 Tbs. Sweet Chili Sauce
1. Heat a wok on medium heat and add the oil when the pan is hot.
2. Peel and slice the garlic, slice the chilies in half. By now the oil should be hot, so throw the garlic, chilies and peanuts into the oil. Agitate constantly until the peanuts begin to brown.
3. Toss the peanuts with sweet chilies sauce and salt.

Cajun Cashews

2 cups raw whole cashews
3 Tbs. extra virgin olive oil
1 Tbs. Cajun seasoning
1 Tbs. sea salt
1. Heat a large heavy bottomed skillet (cast iron if you have it) with medium flame. Add 2 Tbs. of the olive oil when the pan is hot.
2. Add the Cashews, agitating often, until they begin to show some brown along their long edges, about seven minutes. When more than less are turning colors, add the remaining olive oil and cook for an additional minute.
3. Transfer the still hot nuts to a salad bowl and toss with Cajun seasoning and sea salt.
Beverage: Samuel Smith’s Oatmeal Stout
Soundtrack: The B52’s “Rock Lobster”

Tagged Veeegs | 2 Comments

La Grand Crew: The Aftertaste

Posted on August 12, 2007 by Hot Knives

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Wow, what a hangover, our blog has a migraine.
The aforementioned La Grand Crew bike & beer tour swooped through L.A. yesterday in an ambitious arc of drunken geekiness. The event was an epic success — certainly more excellent than even we anticipated — and that’s mostly due to the quality of humans that showed up for our pet experiment. Twenty-six rad warriors showed up, everyone from the costumed Cub-ride party circuit, to Midnight Ridazz elders, to Azusa beer friends, to Hollywood ladies on beach cruisers to dudes who hadn’t even looked at a bicycle in 6 years. Starting in Highland Park, we weaved our way to the ocean and back in a yeasty 35-mile circle. We hit all five of the brew clubhouses on the itinerary, as well as a last-minute deli sandwich pit stop at a lovely liquor emporium thanks to Hair of the Dog Dave’s suggestion. If you saw a rowdy pack of boozers taking up one-and-a-half lanes on Sunset Boulevard, well, that was us.

Thanks to Will “Wildbell” Campbell and his commando cammy skillz, there’s a set of fantastic photos chronicling the entire ride. Check ‘em out: Don’t miss the painted mustaches of Joe Borfo and the bikini-clad “Let’s Fuck,” marvel at the B-Rad’s skills of biking while wearing a freaky giraffe mask, and take in the dignified wool man-capri-bike-pants of John. Some of our favorite memories were watching our new friend who calls himself Reverend Dak buy a bottle of Avery’s “The Reverend” Belgian-style ale. Then there was the slightly bizarre yet supremely thoughtful flyer waiting for us at 7-Eleven announcing the series of offered discounts (featuring wacky mountain bike clip art and snazzy photos of corporate suits toasting beer mugs at what could only be an staged corporate retreat). Most of all, we rejoiced at seeing Dan make it home alive on the clunker of a bike he had scavenged for the ride — he got the dedicated badass award.
Now, no ride would be complete without a little reward at the finish line, so we set on “tasting” all of our spoils; the goal was to end with 99 bottles of beer on the wall. Sadly, we made it only to 77. Still, it was the most impressive craft beer line-up outside of a store that any of us had ever seen. We roasted up some hot nuts, shared sips, swilled each other’s sweaty saliva, and talked beer until we were drunk. The Hot Knives contingent managed to stay sober enough to capture a little of it on video. We love you La Grand Crew!

And for those of you who missed out (even as were riding our in-box was piling up with people saying they had found out about the ride too late), there may be a second installment once we can bring ourselves to drink beer again. Stay tuned.

Tagged Ceremonies | 12 Comments

Whiskey Popsicles

Posted on August 7, 2007 by Hot Knives

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What with the upcoming La Grand Crew beer and bicycle outing, and now this recipe, it’s shaping up to be unofficial ‘Beverage Week’ here at Hot Knives. Considering it’s the dregs of summer we’re fine with that.
A few days ago we set upon making a 4-course salad dinner for friends that we firmly insisted was to be strictly eating only: no photos, no blogging. Sometimes you just have to take a vacation right? Well, since we’re mildly OCD when it comes to sharing food and booze tricks, we found a loophole and stuck a quick liquid dessert in the freezer. The mix of sour cherry juice, vermouth, bourbon and fresh mint comprises all the ingredients for a traditional Manhattan. When dinner was over we had a popsicle tray of frozen cocktail popsicles (cocksicles!) waiting for us. The result? Tongue-numbing flavor crystals.
Now, the original Manhattan (invented for a New York party thrown for Winston Churchill’s mummy in the late 1890s) hinges on rye whiskey, its less sweet and more mild. Unfortunately, we didn’t have any Rittenhouse rye on hand, so we deigned to use Knob Creek bourbon. Not advised.

Manhattan Popsicles

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1 tsp. sweet vermouth
3 Tbs. sour cherry juice concentrate
2 dashes Angostura bitters
2 shots Rittenhouse Rye Whiskey
1 mint leaf
1. Take your popsicle tray, remove the stick lids. Add the vermouth to each insert and swirl. Then measure out the juice and bitters, add it and throw in a mint leaf. Return the stick-lids to the tray, should be dipping into the mixture. Stick tray in freezer for at least 2 hours.
2. Once completely frozen, simply run water over tray and pop out the popsicles. Pour a tumbler of whiskey (at room temperature) and place one popsicle in cup, as if it’s a large ice cube. Garnish with one more mint leaf and sip.