Nathan Myhrvold, author of Moderist Cuisine, visits Google

The following are my notes from a presentation and Q&A with Nathan Myhrvold, author of Moderist Cuisine.

Who's the book for? People passionate and curious about food

Made the decision to make the book 2 years ago - no ipad then.
Chose to use very high quality: stochastic printing
Photography was used to illustrate concepts that people otherwise wouldn't understand
Use cutaways to illustrate what's going on inside a cooking vessel that we can’t see

One of the volumes is about coffee and wine
Best thing to do to young red wines: hyper decanting. Pour into blender, hit frappe, 30 sec. Makes younger red wines more drinkable. "The other reason to do it is because it freaks wine people out SO MUCH"

1500 recipes in the set, 50% can be done at home; With special equipment, 75%
The rest requires liquid nitrogen, etc. Can do at home but it requires effort

Photography philosophy: Want to provide a view of food they've never seen before
The team believed If they did the food right, shouldn't have a stylist coming and telling them how to fake it.

About the cutaway photography:
It was real, not photoshopped. They cut equipment in half. "We have 2 halves of one of the best kitchens in the world"
Had to be willing to make a mess
Photography motto: "It only has to look good for 1/1000th of a second"
Wok photo was especially difficult: Cut ⅓ off of wok, oil kept catching fire

Also had a video camera HD at 6200 fps
One video: Water balloon popped with a pin. The tension on the balloon pulls it off the water faster than the water drops. Wile E. Coyote-like (water stays in the air)
Another video: Recipe for ballistics gelatin in the book.
Popcorn video: Water expands by a factor of 1600

The project started as an outline for a 600 page book.
Lots of techniques, no good place to learn. Wanted one definitive place to learn about modern cooking techniques.

Plans on publishing more?
A reader once said to him re: number of copies: "your publisher is an idiot.” He responded: “I'm the publisher"
It's the first 2400 page cookbook

Sold the 6000 before they even shipped.
Ordered 25000 more.

Audience questions:
Favorite restaurant? Meal?
El Bulli

Talk more about barbecue temperature stall:
On Google [barbecue stall] vs [barbecue stall temperature] has vastly different results
“What the hell is the stall?”
Most of the community claimed the stall in temperature rise was due to collagen in the meat being converted into gelatin (making touch meat tender)
In reality, there was not enough energy in the reaction that it could be
In fact, it was evaporation of water, like evaporative cooling.
To prove it was evaporation, they conducted an experiment where one brisket was sealed in bag and put in convection oven.
Uncovered one stalled for 2.5 hours and went up; covered one, no stall.

While at Microsoft, had to convince Bill Gates to give him leave to go to culinary school, but couldn’t get into culinary school without restaurant experience. So worked at a restaurant once a week.

In France, a chef huffily walked up to him and said “you know a duck like a Frenchman!”
"I boned a lot of ducks...I wouldn’t admit that elsewhere”

What are top 3 things average cook does wrong?
“Wrong” is hard.
Best tip: If making omelets or scrambled eggs, throw 1 egg white away to improve texture. Cook at extremely low heat (water bath, steam).

What about coffee tips?
There's a large coffee community.
Coffee is mostly about attention to detail, like temperature control
Pressure profiling - allows you to determine pressure of espresso
Best tip: For regular coffee- aeropress. It's like a super soaker for coffee cup. 175 deg. Available on Amazon.

How did you select your coauthors and what are they doing now?
"If I hadn't written software, I never would've written this book....The best software isn't written by a single person”
Chef at Fat Duck. He had understood science.
Scientific American editor

All photos were taking by him and assistant
Most of the people who worked on the book still work for him. Promoting book, figuring out what to do next.

The book’s kitchen is in a space that used to be a Harley Davidson service area. They still get people coming to get their bikes serviced.

How did this book on the art of cooking change the science of cooking?
Engineering underlies art. This book should empower chefs.
Lots of time describing cooking as art in book.
Parallels between modernism in art and cooking.
Cooking is an art. It's about engaging us through our emotions.
Like architecture - most buildings are pretty dull, but they're necessary.

Nutrition?
There's a chapter on food and health. Nutrition not covered completely. Tried to tackle good for you and not good for you food. Food is about energy.

The spectrum of heat application
Most traditional applications are very hot - fire
Most food is mostly water. Can't make food higher than boiling point of water until it's dried out
Grilling is cooking with infrared. Gas flame is a poor way to do it, which is why they have a metal grill to reflect infrared

Shoutout to Padmapper

Padmapper was really useful when we were apartment hunting. It takes Craigslist apartment postings and puts them on a map, allows you to filter by things like pets, # of rooms, etc. While it can't accurately capture everything, it was still my go-to tool - much easier than using Craigslist itself!

Sharing any page in Google Reader

Several people have asked me about this, so I'll share it here.

I use a bookmarklet to share any webpage on Google Reader (that is, things I am not subscribed to). I got this bookmarklet from Reader, but I am no longer able to find it. It still works, so I might as well share.

Just drag this link Note in Reader to your bookmarks bar. It should look like any other bookmark.

Now, whenever you're on a page you want to share, just...
1. Highlight a snippet of the page that you'd like your friends to see in Reader.
2. Click the "Note in Reader" bookmarklet
3. A little popup will appear. Notice the highlighted text from [1.] becomes your snippet. You can also add your own comments and then post for all your Reader friends to see.

Haven't updated!

Whoa, I haven't updated in forever! I'll try to get on that. There's lots of exciting and not so exciting stuff going on. I had another knee surgery and I'm planning on going to Japan this summer. Further updates to come!

Embarassed walrus

From my window

I can see the 9/11 light beams from my window

Chaitanya's nursery 'hood

I'm in NYC with Chaitanya and Bobby. We are running around Chelsea near the office and Chaitanya realizes we're a few blocks from his childhood home. We've just passed his old nursery.

Here's a pic of him in front of the old apartment.

NOLA

Honey the pit bull

Here's the dog i'm watching. She's a cutie!

Plastic surgery video blog

My friend Dave had plastic surgery recently and he's video blogging about the experience and his recovery.  





You can visit his profile page to following along during his recovery process, if you're interested.

wienermobile

Oh I wish I were an oscar mayer wiener...

New blog

John and I started a new blog to keep notes about wine, beer, and food. We've been taking a bunch of wine and cheese classes together (and he took beer classes on his own). I realized that a problem I have with learning about wine is that I never remember what I tasted and whether or not I liked it. By maintaining this blog, I'm hoping that over time, I'll be able to see a difference in the way I talk about wines (and food) as evidence of my developing palate and increased knowledge. We'll see.

Please check out our blog: Artichokes to Zinfandels

Cutie under my desk

Condi Rice just walked by

Just another day at the goog

Oh Google

Someone showing off their ride for Bike to Work Day

Surgery pictures

I finally scanned pictures from my surgery. I understand that not everyone enjoys looking at such things, so if you're interested check them out here

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Now playing: Maroon 5 - If I Never See Your Face Again
via FoxyTunes

Biggest strawberry...ever.

This strawberry is the size of a medium plum. Next to it is what I would normally describe as a 'big' strawberry. I even put a quarter in the pic so you can see the relative sizes.

Edit: I'm kinda disappointed that I ate the humongous strawberry because this picture really doesn't do it justice.

Vacation time!

I'm going to leave for my vacation at some point today. John and I are going to drive from here to Coeur D'Alene, ID stopping in Napa, Portland, Seattle, and Spokane. Here's the plan in case you're interested:

Sunday
Wine and cheese class at Artesa Winery and lots of other fun wine tastings throughout Napa. We're hoping to hit ZD Wines, Ceja Vineyards, and Sterling Vineyards. Or we might head up to Sierra Nevada Brewery if we can get to the Sundial Bridge before sundown.

Monday
As we make our way up to Portland, we're going to visit the Tillamook Cheese Factory and possibly some sanddunes for sandboarding (not me, I'm injured). In Portland, we have several breweries we hope to visit plus Voodoo Donuts, Powell's Bookstore, and more.

Tuesday and Wednesday
By this time, we'll be in Seattle. I love Seattle so we'll be busy visiting lots of stuff. I've never been to the Space Needle but we're also going to visit my old favorites like the Seattle Public Library, Pike Place Market, and Bleu Bistro. I don't think I can handle the underground tour again, but maybe I'll make John do it on his own. If we venture outside of Seattle we're going to try to make the Boeing Factory Tour.

Thursday
We're going to leave Seattle and head east toward Spokane. Ideally, we'll be there in time to have lunch with my Grandpa. Then, off to Coeur D'Alene Resort for dinner with my Grandma and her side of the family.

Friday
Fun resort activities and/or driving up to Bonners Ferry, ID where my Grandma lives.

Saturday and beyond
John and I don't really have a plan for getting home. We figure we'll take the most direct route and play it by ear.


View Larger Map

I wish I could've gone to Carnival, but I can't fly (hence the roadtrip). I'll try to do lots of mobile blogging to keep you updated.

Politics and donating

Until recently, I never truly got why people would donate money to a particular candidate. What does my money matter? I could never donate enough to really make a difference. Don't they have enough? Etc, etc. (Yet I don't feel that way about voting.) I just donated to the Barack Obama campaign fund. Honestly, I'm concerned about the country but I feel there's little I can do. The whole system seems to have screwed itself into the mess we're in. I hope my money helps.

Surgery pics

Here are some pics from surgery...

This is me before surgery a week ago:


This is my knee today. You can see the 2 smaller incisions where they had the arthroscopic camera and tools in me. The larger incision is where they had to open me up to repair the cartilage because the arthroscopic approach wasn't going to work. Also, if you look carefully you can see the "yes" they wrote on my leg to tell my surgeon to work on this leg and not the other one.