MisoHungry

Emeril's Table 10: BAM!!!!!

2012-01-22T16:37:00.000-08:00

Table 10, an Emeril Lagasse Restaurant, was another one of those highly recommended Vegas restaurants, so we decided to check it out. Lunch was a fantastic experience that set us back about $75 for two. It was so good that we decided to make a second visit during happy hour. Unfortunately, happy hour was advertised as 3-7 pm on their website and Foursquare, but it was actually 3-6 pm. They changed the hours in June, but didn't bother to change the website or Foursquare for almost six months! We didn't have in the budget to spend another $75 on drinks and a snack; so we decided to opt for other dinner plans (turned out to be the comped dinner at Wicked Spoon).

It was quite a heavy lunch, and well worth the calories. We started with roasted beef marrow, and oh....it was so sinful.

The bread at Table 10 was divine. The addition of unami laden, gelatinous, melty fat made it even more sinfully delicious.

It isn't the prettiest food, but it sure is tasty.

We had some leftovers that I gave to my sister when we arrived back in Austin. I got a giddy phone call about it about 10 minutes later.

Uh-oh, what happened to all the bone marrow?

We also had the braised beef cheeks. I liked the dish, but the magic of the roasted beef marrow overshadowed this dish.

I got the gumbo, which was a perfect gumbo. However, it was overshadowed by the po'boy pictured below.

This was the best po'boy I've ever had. The bread was lightly crunchy, and incredible soft and fluffy on the inside. The pork was perfectly seasoned, tender and juicy with fat. I'd order this sandwich again, in a heartbeat. I would have loved to try the muffaletta (served during happy hour), but alas, no happy hour for us during this Vegas trip.

Touring the Wicked Spoon, Las Vegas

2012-01-19T14:52:00.000-08:00

No trip to Las Vegas is a complete without a gluttonous visit to a buffet. Yes, I said a buffet. While there are inherently undesirable traits about buffets, we visited one nonetheless. Not once, but twice, we visited the Wicked Spoon. The first time was because I had read that this was one of the better buffets. The second time was because both @Windaddict and I won a free dinner buffet. Before we jump into the photos, I'll go through the pros and cons.

Pros:

The cheesy carbohydrate dishes were absolutely amazing. In particular, the cheesy grits and gnocchi were probably best I've had. I'm fairly certain that there was a copious amount of butter and mascarpone cheese those dishes. This statement does not include the cheese covered vegetables.
A variety of foods including the roasted beef marrow and snow crab legs as dinner. I liked that there were were a number of different cuisines represented.
The chao siu bao (Chinese pork bbq buns) were pretty tasty. I think I had five of them over both buffet visits.
The mac and cheese station at dinner was also wonderfully fantastic. You get to choose your ad-ins and type of cheese. They customize your mac and cheese right then.
Visually pleasing dessert display.
The Cosmopolitan does not have overwhelming smell of cigarettes like many other hotels.

Cons:

The price of the buffet is pretty expensive compared to other buffets at $22 for a weekday brunch and $35 for dinner. Don't forget to add tax and tip. There is plenty of overlap on brunch and dinner, so I wouldn't recommend going to both. The brunch was definitely worthy of $22, but $35 for dinner is too steep for my pocketbook.
The snow crab legs were over salted, and many of the meat dishes were overly greasy. Avoid the tacos.
Serving sizes: I thought they were too big as I like tiny little bites. While the pots were a cute presentation, they were pretty big sizes for a tasting. I'm sure other people might think that the servings were too small. I felt guilty throwing out so much food.
While the desserts were pretty, some of them were just plain odd and not tasty.
Avoid the rolls pictured below. They were as hard as a rock. I could probably use them as a military weapons.

Avoid the tacos. The sweet potato hash was kind of dried out too.

Pretty desserts, but some were not as palatable as they appeared.

Yellow jello with pine nuts and a purple macaron? I'm not sure who came up with that idea.

Oh yes, that cheesy grit was fantastic. The bacon was tasty. Avoid that roll in the bottom left side. I saw many of them left on plates. It was not even edible.

I didn't eat most of these, but I do appreciate the time it took to make them.

Carrot cakes and pecan pies. These were actually pretty good.

The mac and cheese station was brilliant.

The shrimp and grits wasn't all that great. The cauliflower au gratin was just alright.

The sushi was just alright. The lamb meat ball was tough, though the sauce was quite nice. Those gnocchi with goat cheese were out of this world fantastic.

Beef marrow, yes. Snow crab, just alright.

These little balls were also kind of hard.

The chocolate covered strawberries were gigantic. I took the chocolate off and ate the strawberries.

These cones were filled with vanilla mousse, and the chocolate balls were filled with chocolate truffle.

I did eat all of it, and it was quite nice.

I'm not sure what was going on with the dessert on the right. I tried the dessert in the middle, and it was too hard to bite through. Sad waste of butter and sugar.

Lean Meat and Century Egg Congee - A Traditional Asian dish

2012-01-15T13:54:00.000-08:00

Asian cuisine can be some of the most forgiving dishes. There's rarely an exact recipe, rather rough ratios. You can add whatever you like in whatever amounts you like. There really aren’t any rules. Any deviation from a recipe is called a "secret" recipe.

The lean meat and century egg congee is a dish that is considered common cafe food. It is just as popular in Asian countries as chips and tortillas are popular in Austin, TX. While it isn't considered peasant food, it definitely isn't considered upscale fare. You won't find it at any fancy or event semi-fancy restaurant, but you might find it at a dim sum restaurant.

As my mother made this particular batch, I looked online at other recipes. And many of them were deeply involved and time consuming. As my mother says, "Why make things so complicated?" This version is quick and easy. From the very start to finish, it look no longer than seven minutes. Again, it isn't fancy. It isn't even pretty. But it is comfort food to a portion of the population.

Century egg is one of those Asian foods that might be difficult to understand. These eggs are not visually pleasing. The flavor of can be intensely eggy and pungent. The texture can be rubbery and gelatinous. Some other people might find these qualities unattractive, but I don't find century egg to be unpleasant or offensive. They are usually individually wrapped and fairly inexpensive. Most Asian grocery stores will have them. If you're adventurous, try century eggs!

Adjust ingredients to your liking. The raw ginger can be pretty harsh for those who aren't accustomed to it. Cut back the ginger or mince into tiny pieces. Any type of meat is suitable, however, lean pork meat is the most traditional.

Ingredients:

4 cups cooked rice (I use the sticky kind)
1 piece of raw ginger (roughly 1/2 oz) - julienned or
4 ounces of raw minced pork. Ground pork is also okay.
3-4 Century eggs diced or sliced. It doesn't matter what shape it is in.
1 pinch salt
1 pinch white pepper
1 bunch of green onions, sliced
6 cups of water or chicken broth.

In a large pot, boil the water/broth. Add the raw meat to the water, and allow it to cook. You could add the meat to the water before it boils too. It really makes no difference. My mother puts the meat in nearly frozen. If you are squeamish, you might want to skim the scum off the top pot after the meat has cooked. Add in the raw ginger, and cooked rice. Let the rice cook for 3-5 minutes. It should start to get soft and the liquid should become almost gelatinous. Congee typically as the consistency of a pudding, but if you like it more like a soup, add more water. If you like it thicker like an oatmeal, cook it longer. My mother says that this particular dish should be fairly soup-y, but culinary freedom is in your hands.

Once the rice is almost the consistency you want, add in the century eggs, salt, and pepper. Garnish with green onion when serving. Tada.....easy to make Lean Meat and Century Egg Congee.

A shelled egg. The color of eggs can range from light yellow, gray, and to a deep brown.

The eggs are certainly colorful.

Frozen minced meat ready to be chopped.

Cutting up the ginger, which happened to be frozen too.

The meat and ginger are cooking.

The soup is ready now. If you leave it uncovered, it will thicken into a sticky mass. You can thin it out with with water later.

A piece of century egg.

A close up. Easy and comforting.

The Uni Crab Special @UchikoAustin Makes You Want to do Really Bad Things

2011-12-21T07:39:00.000-08:00

My Christmas present came early this year - a Canon Powershot 95 from the ever thoughtful @Windaddict. My previous camera was a Fuji Film FinepixZ90 that had seen much rough abuse over the last four years or so. It had tumbled down 6th street during a cartwheel and round off Halloween, and it has also taken a tumble down more than one flights of stairs. Needless to say, it has been handed to someone else who really needs a camera, and can probably take care of it through intensive care.

To take part in America Express's Small Business Saturday (both @Windaddict and myself got $25 each), we started at Macho Taco, watched Puss in Boots at Alamo Drafthouse, and rounded out the night with dinner at Uchiko. Uchiko, with its visually appealing food and low lighting, makes photography fun and challenging.

We arrived during social hour, which meant we got to partake in snacks before dinner. This is the ham and eggs. I hadn't messed with the camera yet. I just pulled it out and shot in auto mode. Keep in mind that there's almost no light where we were sitting.

The beef tongue is one of my favorite nigiris at Uchiko. At this point, I still hadn't messed with any of the settings yet.

A gift from the kitchen: uni crab special. Trumpet mushrooms, uni, mitsuba, apefel cuvee, and crab are smothered with a lobster sauce. It wasn't a bisque, but close.

The server poured the sauce all over different ingredients leaving it a visually interesting dish.

If you aren't a seafood fan, you might not like this dish. If you grew up on the coast, love seafood like your first born child, and love unami more than life itself; you'll love this dish. The combination of sweet seafood, meaty mushrooms, intense seafood flavors with pungent uni powder is amazing. I still can't find the right words to describe the dish, but I'll try. *My description is also Chef Tyson Cole approved. This dish is so rich and sinful you'll feel like you're fornicating in a church. If you don't know what fornicating in a church is like, I would recommend this dish. And if you decide to try it (the fornicating), please don't get caught and clean up after yourself.

As you can see, I really loved this dish. I mean REALLY loved it.

This was the sabavichie. It was completely different from the uni crab in style, but lovely all the same. I remember it tasting like a mashup of thai flavors and cevichie, but honestly I didn't eat that much of it. I was still licking the plate of the uni crab.

My favorite dish at Uchiko used to be the truffled congee. It inspired me to make a macaron with a similar flavor profile of lemon, togarashi spice, and truffle. Then the truffled congee went away, and I was sad. This tamago congee was a good replacement. This congee has slow scrambled egg, black truffle, and koshi hikari.

The slow cooked scrambled egg in congee had a comfort food element for me that reminded me of that flashback scene in Ratatouille, except the Asian version. I grew up eating plain congee, called mwua in Taiwanese or shee fan in Mandarin. No, I didn't use proper pin yin. Really upscale comfort food is really good.

I found a piece of egg!

This was the dessert special of lemon gelato, pistachio soil, and beet puree. That's black pepper on the meringue pieces. This dessert has also inspired me to make another macaron flavor out of it. Black pepper, lemon, pistachio, and beets.

This was the perfect way to end a Small Business Saturday.

Luxury Gift Ideas for the Spirits and Beer Fancier

2011-12-14T08:35:00.000-08:00

The holidays are around the corner, if you have food lover friends like me, you probably have the same problem. I never know what to give those friends. They have all the kitchen gadgets they could ever want. They probably already have anything else they could ever want. I usually resort to giving them gift cards to restaurants they like to visit. This year, I opted to donate to two non-profits, The Lone Star Paralysis Foundation and Trigger's Toys, in honor of my friends and family instead of giving formal gifts.

There are a plethora of blog posts on homemade gifts, creative gifts, and artisan gifts. This one doesn't fall into any of those categories. If you have some extra cash to spend (like somewhere in the neighborhood of $300) on a beer or spirits connoisseur, I have two gift recommendations. These are high end gifts, and packaged as so. I have personally tried both of these. While none of these are on my shopping list this year, they are something I will think about for future occasions.

The first one is Casa Dragones - a sipping tequila. I was invited to a tasting, and boy was I educated on sipping. The tequila is crystal clear with a very complex nose that changes depending on where you hold the glass. I got deep spice notes with an anise finish that lingers. If you ever get the chance to try it, you'll understand why it is $300. It is nothing like the tequilas that you use for mixing. For the price point, you don't want to mix this one.

The bottle is beautifully handcrafted with many symbolisms carved right in by hand (look at the bottom). Every tiny detail about this product has been thoughtfully chosen.

Photo courtesy of Casa Dragones.

The second gift is the Sam Adams Utopias. This high ABV beer is not readily available in all markets, but it is well worth the effort if you can get a bottle. The 2009 batch was 27%. I got a bottle a few years ago from Denver, and though it set me back a pretty penny, it was enjoyed by many at a private party. The beer does not taste like a traditional beer. Rather, it tastes like a fine aged bourbon, scotch or port. The flavor profiles in each batch may vary. It is only made every other year, and you'll have to pre-plan how you'll be getting your bottle. Denver or on the East Coast are good options. Asking friends in those areas to pick up a bottle for you is probably your best bet. If you receive one of these for the holidays, someone really, really loves you.

Photo courtesy of Sam Adams.

Best Lessons I Ever Learned Came from Canine Sports

2011-12-04T12:01:00.000-08:00

I wrote this post almost 2 years ago right after @MousetheDog earned his 22nd and 23rd titles, but I never found the right time to post it. I truly feel that some of the more valuable lessons I've learned came from dog showing. @MousetheDog was my first dog, and he was a spectacular and exceptionally well-tempered and forgiving creature. I'm so lucky that he tolerated all my mistakes.

Now that he's nearing the end of his competitive career, I'm starting this process over again with another teammate. The goal of this post isn't to encourage others to start showing their dogs, but to remind myself of all the lessons I've learned over the last decade. I'm going to use these lessons as I start off with my new partner in canine (I love puns), @VestaTheDog. @MousetheDog's new job will be to teach her all that he knows, and Basil's new job will be to keep our new little tyke in line.

The Roman Reign Posse, in a shark.

I love my dogs. It doesn't take long for someone to realize that I'm borderline-dog-show person. The only way I get to stay on the sane side is by being equally immersed in other activities. This blog post isn't entirely about dogs, it is most much about what I've learned through showing dogs. I've showed, trained, handled, and judged (not in all activities) dogs in conformation, weight pull, drafting, rally, herding, water rescue, packing, and obedience. Needless to say, I was exposed to many different breeds and many different types of dog owners. And the politics in the dog world is tremendous. The movie, Best in Show was a severe understatement of what really goes on at dog shows. Dog show politics makes any other type of politics (including governmental) look like a walk in the park on a sunny day when the birds are chirping.   I heard that horse show politics are worse, but I'll avoid that for the time being.

Showing dogs has made me a more patient and understanding person. Showing dogs can be the ultimate test of persistence, and it can frustrate you to no end. After all, the essence of handling a dog in the show ring is that you and the dog have to work together like a team. That's right. That animal that would rather hump your leg is supposed to do what you ask. Furthermore, that dog doesn't speak English. I tend to laugh when people complain about their students or their employees. At least human students and employees speak English (or another spoken language) and can be reasoned with in some logical fashion. A dog cannot. A dog does not care to learn your way of communication nor does the dog really care about what you want.

"Mom, I don't speak English. I speak dog."

Motivating the unmotivated: Mouse wakes up in the morning with a few things on his mind: I want to pee, I want to poop, I want to eat cat poop, and I want to find something to gnaw. While he didn't tell me that himself, I'm just going to guess that is what's on his mind. Dogs are not motivated to do what humans want them to do in general, and it certainly is true for some activities like competitive obedience. Some of the exercises in competitive obedience are pretty unnatural for a dog in the wild (ex. sitting perfectly still for one minute, heeling with precision, or retrieving an object with a jump in between). Teaching a dog that doesn't speak your language to be motivated to perform unnatural exercises in unpredictable environments is a pretty big feat. To do that requires a great deal of creativity in communication and motivation.

One thing that you'll learn in showing dogs is that the handler is wrong 99.99995% of the time. Let's just round that up to 100% of the time. I've learned in dog shows that I'm always wrong. Everything that doesn't go as planned is my fault. Either I gave the wrong hand signal, or maybe I set up dog up to miss a turn, or maybe I didn't proof my dog for a certain distraction, or I got flustered and made my dog misjudge my commands - it is always my fault. Being wrong in dog shows all the time makes taking responsibility for being wrong in other realms so much easier. I'll say it now. I'm human, and like all humans, I'm wrong from time to time. I try not to be wrong, and I try to fix my wrongs. But I'm pretty sure I'll mess up here and there.

There are more microcultures in dog shows than there are in the Center for Disease Control. I tried to break down all the groups, but that list just got out of control. There are at least 30 or more microcultures, and learning to navigate all these different microcultures is a challenge. But however it makes drives home the point that in order to work with all these groups of people with completely different attitudes, one must truly understand them and their motivations. This becomes even more important when companies try to market to these different groups. Marketing plans are not always generalizable.

Showing dogs has taught me deal with arbitrary rules and regulations. Dog show can be rules are pretty silly an useless. In a particular draft dog test, a dog can fail an entire test for moving their feet during the greet a stranger exercise. Yes, a dog could simply fail for shuffling their feet. Seems silly, but rules are rules. In competitive obedience, the handler is only allowed to give the dog one command. No where in practical life would you only give a dog a single command, but again, those are the rules. In dog shows, changing rules and regulations takes years, and by the time a rule has been changed, your dog has passed prime show time. I typically follow rules I don't agree with, but as is life.

"I like to eat cupcakes."

There is no one way, and there's no "expert." All dog are different, and all handlers are different. I don't believe there's a single one and only way to train a dog as I don't believe there's only one way to market or to use social media. Also, in dog training, I don't believe in experts. While there are many people who are extremely knowledgeable and highly experienced that I look to for mentorship, those people are always learning and changing their techniques. They do not claim to be experts, but they do claim to keep learning. I hope that I'll keep learning my entire life, and if I ever call myself an expert, someone please kick me.

Through showing dogs, it is nearly impossible to embarrass me. Let's just say that my lovely dog, Mouse, was a character, and he had embarrassed me in the ring to no end. From picking up a a piece of a mop and frolicking about the ring in his cart in front of the entire national club members to jumping a ring to pee on a tree, I'm not embarrassed anymore. Mouse is a dog, and he does things that dogs do. Life goes on, no matter how foolish your dog makes you look at a dog show.

I wasn't dancing. Mouse and the sheep almost tripped me. That's pretty typical. Photo by Yvonne Schoeber.

I'm accustomed to failure and criticism. I fail because I try. I've been asked many times how I manage to do so well in so many areas. The answer is 1. Because I'm type A and 2. Because before there were many successes, there were many failures. @Jason talks about this many times This week in Startup, and I think that it is a common motto for many people who try many ventures. Failures are a learning experience. Every failure leads you closer to success. Criticism can be a hard pill to swallow, but I've found that people who give me constructive criticism do it because they care and want me to succeed. If I wasn't given ways to improve, I'd stagnate and stay the same. If you hadn't seen Randy Pausch's Last Lecture on criticism, do so now.

Support is critical. Dog people are extremely supportive. Check out this card my trainer sent me when Mouse earned his companion dog title (below). My trainers are pretty darn awesome. In my group of friends in the dog community, we all treat each other like family. Even with friends across the country, they know that I'm available anytime of the day (literally) if they need me, and they are available anytime I need them. I remember being woken up one morning at 5 am to a phone call demanding that I evacuate to Virginia due to Hurricane Rita. If I didn't leave now and drive up to them, them were going to come down to get me. That's how much they cared, and that's how supportive they were. Another friend I met through my breed club was so supportive that two days prior to his passing, he emailed to congratulate my dog and I on our recent achievements. He never let on that his cancer had severely worsened, and even when he was the one in need of support; he thought of me first.

With that said, showing dogs makes you really reprioritize your life. For the most part, many of my mentors in the dog show world are older, and when working with an older population, death is inevitable. I would hazard to guess that I've lost at least 25 friends in the dog show world in the last seven years. When some of your strongest supporters and wisest mentors pass, it makes you really rethink your life and how you spend your time. One of my biggest influencers passed away from a heart attack on the day I gave a lecture about finding your mentor. That was kind of rough, but it makes me care a whole bunch less about little things and more about people.

Also, dogs are earnest. You can't fool a dog. They can tell when you are nervous, upset, or tired as they can read body language much better than humans can. You're better off being honest because your dog will be.

The Evolutionary Psychology of Online Trolls

2011-11-28T10:28:00.000-08:00

Ever wonder why some people are so mean online? One might argue that people are inherently evil and that being anonymous online without having to physically face others gives them the ability to engage in rude behavior. That's a classic social psychological phenomenon. When people are anonymous, they engage in behavior that they normally wouldn't. Common examples I use in class are the Ku Klux Klan. This group masked their identities and committed horrible crimes. Do you think that those Ku Klux Klan members would have committed those crimes if their faces were exposed? I'm going to guess not. This begs the question of transparency now. Why are people who do reveal their identities still big jerks on the internet? Why do some people make "hate" for the sake of hating something a sport?

My hunch is that this is because we aren't evolved to life in large groups. Our brains were evolved to live peacefully (relatively) in fairly small groups. Most anthropologists and psychologists I know use ~200 as rough estimate by looking at historical data and examining tribal groups today. We're not evolved to live in groups of 1,000,000,000,000 or whatever size city you happen to reside. Our brains just don't work that way. It is difficult to try to get with that many people. Rarely will I say this, but thank goodness for a larger infrastructure (government) that keeps us relatively well-behaved and functional.

Pre-1995, social groups were still relatively small. Enter the internet into that situation, and now we're talking about a different story. Online groups started on listservs, irc chat, and even *gasp* Yahoo groups. Now that we have Facebook, Twitter, and a plethora of other social networking sites, our social networks can be gigantic. I'm making no distinction between online and offline social networks as both are equally real and valid to me.

We now have a situation. We have brains that are evolved to peacefully live with about 200 people, yet we are in contact with hundred and thousands of new people every day. It doesn't take an anthropologist to see why our brains might have a meltdown and why some people misbehave. This perspective certainly doesn't jive well with mainstream views in social media. Social media takes on the perspective that we should have bigger and stronger social networks. HUGE social networks of people are what is important to personal brands and product brands. However, this perspective is not how our brains are designed to function.

I'm not debating on how we should change social media practices or how we could change brand management. I don't believe that many people in social media or in brand management on behalf a commercial brand cares about the human psyche and mental health. For most brands in social media, they are only interested in their bottom line. On the other hand, this post offers a different perspective on online trolling and impression management.

1. The ability to post your opinion in the form of an update, tweet, blog post, or video is a great tool that I love. I can put my opinion out there for everyone to see. However, the ability to post anything and everything can lead to an over inflated sense of self-importance. Some people think that just because they posted something on the Internet, that makes them right (correct) or worse, important. Your opinion is like your rectum. Everyone has one. Even @MouseTheDog has one, that doesn't mean is opinion is correct or important.

2. Sometimes those people post mean things just to start a riot (online or offline). I call them trolls. These are the people to inject themselves into online exchanges (in which they are not invited) simply for the sake of causing a disturbance. These trolls are the cancer of online communities. I had a student who told me he frequently did this just to see how upset people get. There are many of these types of people who say terrible rude things to others via Twitter, just for the sake of attention on themselves. I used to have a friend who would tell me outrageous drama just to make me or others feel bad. He reveled in starting drama, causing fights, and most of all, being in the center of it. Some people troll offline too! There are theories on what factors or mental disorders (narcissistic personality disorder) can lead to these behaviors, but I'm not going to talk about them in this post.

3. While it is difficult to ignore these trolls, you have to realize that in an ancestral environment, you might have never had contact with that jerk. If that jerk was in your group of 200, he or she would not be welcome for very long. The best thing to do from an evolutionary perspective is to block that jerk.

4. Conflict is inevitable in large groups. While it is sometimes possible to get along with people in smaller groups, conflict is inevitable. I'm in some very supportive and wonderful communities where dissatisfaction and conflict is very, very, very far and few between. However, once you start adding more people in those groups, conflicts will arise, and they may be ugly. This can be a great source of distress to some people as balance in attitude and sentiment is really important to some people. You can read up more on balance theory or cognitive dissonance. I admit that I used to find it distressing when people were fighting. Now that I've served on at least 20 boards over 30 some odd organizations, I'm pretty okay with conflict in groups. It will happen, and when it does, I'm not the one who is distressed. I've been told that I have high tolerance for conflict and frustration. Others say it seems like I don't care. It is simply that I view it has part of psychology. Conflict in larger groups will happen, and that doesn't mean that people are right or wrong for it. It just happens. Business should just move on.

5. Do you have to be friendly to everyone? Absolutely not! Apple is not necessarily a friendly brand. RIP Steve Jobs. They market to their followers, and they alienate all others. Dr. Youngme Moon has a section on them in her book, Different. I highly, highly recommend the book. *I got a copy free from the Business of Software Conference.* Mainstream marketers and even customers balk at Apple's attitudes and methods. However, it makes complete sense to me from an evolutionary perspective. Apple doesn't have to get along with everyone. Apple doesn't have to like everyone. However, Apple does a really darn good job of eliciting loyalty from their fans. Apple gets along with their smaller (you might be thinking smaller than what!) network, and that has paid off for them. They've decided that their fans are their *ancestral* social networks. And they ignore anyone who isn't in that network, much like we ought to ignore people who aren't in our networks.

The take away message from this post is: We don't all have to get along. We're not developed to get along with everyone, and that's okay. If some random troll (online or offline) tries to start drama with you, it is okay to ignore him/her. It isn't your problem that the troll has issues.

Dining with The Lone Star Paralysis Foundation @CarillonAustin @ChefJoshWatkins

2011-11-14T12:23:00.000-08:00

*I helped produce the Benefit for Daniel, and I was invited as a guest to The Lone Star Paralysis Foundation Vodka Dinner at the Carillon.

With the giving season upon us, you might be looking for organizations that need some holiday funds or warm body volunteers. The Lone Star Paralysis Foundation is an organization that I recently got to know through an unfortunate accident. One thing that I noticed about the Lone Star Paralysis Foundation was the immense (and I mean IMMENSE) passion and unwavering focus on the organization's goals. In meeting many of the board members, I was bombarded with warm greetings and huge smiles. Dang, that is one happy, yet intensely focused board. Since I hadn't mentioned it yet, the mission of the organization is "to cure spinal cord paralysis through funding research, advanced recovery, and community outreach."

Photo by John M. P. Knox.

Daniel Curtis is looking fantastic. If you haven't met Daniel (donations for his recovery accepted here) yet, you should soon!

Another thing that you might not know about the board is that they front all their expenses. All donations go directly to their cause, and not to pay for incurred expenses. As a member and current/past board members for a number of organizations, that is not an easy thing to do. Expenses can range from air fare, hotel rooms, and car rentals. To take on those expenses out of one's own pocket in addition to serving an organization with time is a testament to the board's dedication. Though I'm not closely involved with the Lone Star Paralysis Foundation, I certainly appreciate and look up to their board members. Every time board members of the foundation speak, there's not a dry eye in the crowd. These people are exceptionally moving.

There are several ways that you can donate to this wonderful organization by hosting events, donating to their raffles, or by directly donating cash. You can also donate by ordering the Carl Miller’s Layered Chunky Queso at Jack Allen's Kitchen. The queso is green chile pork, queso and guacamole served with a basket of chips. Also, don't you know that all food that supports non-profits is calorie free? *statement not empirically tested.

Photo courtesy of Bread and Butter PR.

Throughout the year, the Lone Star Paralysis Foundation hosts a number of events including a vodka pairing dinner. This year's dinner was sponsored by Tito's and held at the Carillon. You probably know by now that I'm a HUGE fan of the Carillon and Chef Josh Watkins. We've got a surprise for you in store on Dec. 9th, 2011. Hang tight for more information. Also, hang tight for a baby Watkins on the way. Don't forget to congratulate Chef Josh and his lovely wife, Sarah on their upcoming family addition!

Photo by John M. P. Knox.

The Vodka Pairing Dinner dinner started off with some creative cocktails.

Photo by John M. P. Knox.

The first course was Heirloom Tomato Salad with Sweet Corn, Balsamic Cream, and Garlic Croutons. Aren't the colors of this dish just fantastic?

Photo by John M. P. Knox.

Here's a photo of best friends, Chef Josh Watkins and Daniel Curtis. I'm excited to report that Daniel (donations for his recovery accepted here) is recovering well. Last I saw him, he was kicking, literally!

Photo by John M. P. Knox.

Board member Doug English (YES! The football player!) and members present one of the raffle items, a painting of Doug in his Longhorn uniform. If you want to give to an organization that will really make a difference, please keep the Lone Star Paralysis Foundation in mind. I can attest that any donation you make will make an impact and that your help will be greatly appreciated. Happy Giving!

Roadblocks to Fans and Followers: Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behavior

2011-11-10T20:02:00.000-08:00

You might have guessed from my business cards and blog posts that I'm an avid QR code user. While the technology isn't brand new and the adoption rate is still up in the air, I still urge people to use them. The idea for this blog post began when I noticed that many businesses have the Twitter or Facebook logo in their advertising. It looks something like this.   You might not think anything about it, but the social psychologist in my says "Why?"

You see the name of the business and two widely and easily recognizable logo. You might think "the business wants people to know that they are on Twitter and Facebook." Even though smart phones and internet access 24/7 is a reality for many of us, having to look up someone's Twitter handle or to search for them on Facebook (I still think the Facebook iphone app is wonky) is cumbersome and a roadblock to adoption.

You might also think that having the Twitter and the Facebook logo on advertising assets is branding you as a tech hip business, but it is really branding for Twitter and Facebook. You pasting their logos for free on your ads. That's great for them, I'm sure.   If you've taken a social psychology course, you might have been exposed the Theory of Planned Behavior by Icek Ajzen. According to Ajzen, planned behaviors such as planning to follow a brand on social media services goes through a series of complicated steps. In a tiny nutshell, a person must endorse the behavior, the normative belief (perception of other people's beliefs) must endorse the behavior, and the person much also believe that the behavior is within his/her control. Those are factors that feed into intention that may actually feed into executing the behavior.

*Used with permission. Read up on the Theory of Planned Behavior here.

So, if only your brand name with a Twitter or Facebook logo appear on advertising, this process of getting people to follow you is complicated. Here's some examples I found in a magazine. I personally find the logos in print to be frustrating.   I can't click the print advertising. I can't double tap a newspaper to go to a URL.

First, people have to notice it and intend on following you. Then people have to go through the entire process of pulling out their phones, deciding whether or not use the appropriate app to search for your brand or to do a Google search for the link to your profile. And then they have to actually find it. Having a person go through the search process can be annoying, especially of the Twitter handle is nothing like the brand name or SEO for the brand name is pretty horrific. If the person searching doesn't include the words "Twitter" or "Facebook" in the search, it can be an even more painful process. After the search process, the people have to decide whether or not they like you. If the search process was painful, they probably won't like you as much. If the person has to remember to search for your profile on a desktop computer, the process becomes even longer.

With a QR code (or even URL), many steps of the process that would have to go through Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behavior are cut out completely.   Here's some examples of better ways of integrating social media with print or non-digital advertising.

The take away message from this post is that there are already enough road blocks to desired behavior. You can remove some of those roadblocks by giving your audience an easy way to find you on social media, even in traditional advertising.

Farm to Table @LakeWayResort and Sustainable Food Center Autumn Harvest @LaCondesaAustin

2011-11-09T14:46:00.001-08:00

A big thanks to Josey's and Chef Jeff Axline for having me over for dinner. Eating local and sustainable is a pretty popular movement these days. If you haven't heard of the reasons why you might want to start eating locally and sustainably, it is high time to get a move on it! Josey's is doing a weekly Farm to Table Dinner that changes every week. The weekly dinner is at Wednesday Nights starting at 5:30 pm. This meal is a steal at just $25 for locally sourced ingredients. Take a look at the November 2nd menu.

Chef Jeff Axline purchases the ingredients himself at the downtown Saturday morning market. He goes incognito (sorta, not really) so don't expect recognize him quickly.

The meal starts with fluffy biscuits with butter. Nothing says Texas like warm biscuits.

This salad was my sister's favorite part of the meal. Grilled Texas Pears served with organic arugula, shaved Van Sormon cheese, French Breakfast Radish, Poached Farmer's Egg, and a Fig Vinaigrette. The grilled pears was my absolute favorite part of the dish. I love grilled fruit (pineapple, strawberries, and peaches), and these pears were no exception. The pears were sweet and smoky which contrasted well with the bitter greens.

The second dish was my favorite - Pan Roasted Copper Shoals Red Drum with baby squash, sweet peppers, green beans, tomato fumet, and sweet herbs. Taiwanese cooking at home consisted of whole fish skin-on. Living on the coast made having crispy skin on fish a regular dinner item when I was growing up. It has somewhat of a comfort food quality for me. I know, I have the most unusual comfort food preferences. This fish skin was wonderfully executed and seasoned. The red drum was from Copper Shoals Farm located in Palacios, TX.

The dessert course was a rich version of a classic - Pumpkin Pie with House Made Buttery Crust served with Persimmon Mascarpone Cream and Persimmon puree. Adding persimmon flavor to sinful mascarpone cream can only be good. Did I mention that I love persimmons?

If you're looking for another Farm to Table event, the Sustainable Food Center Chef Series Austin Harvest is right around the corner. On Nov. 12th, you'll get to taste food from:

Tyson Cole, executive chef at Uchi and Uchiko
Andrew Weissman, executive chef of Il Sogno, The Sandbar, and The Luxury
James Holmes & Andrew Francisco of Olivia
Shawn Cirkiel, executive chef at Parkside and Backspace
Jason Donoho and Andrew Macarthur of Fino and Asti
Todd Duplechan of forthcoming Lenoir
Monica Glenn of Uchi Houston
Rene Ortiz of La Condesa

I attended the Spring Bounty Series, and it was pretty fantastic. If you want to be amazing by local chefs and local produce, get tickets for Sunday, Nov. 12th. You'll love it!

GABF 2011: Denver's Cow Parade and Botanical Garden

2011-11-08T10:59:00.000-08:00

No Great American Beer Festival trip is complete without checking out some local fun. As usual, a pit stop to Snooze was in order.

Snooze never disappoints. While some might claim that Syrup is better, Snooze is my favorite. I absolutely LOVE their pancakes.

Austin is currently having a cow parade, and so was Denver! Here's some cows on mall.

This cow has stamps from other locations who were currently having cow parades.

But why no stamp of Austin, TX?

And one from the rear.

During our trip, we met with @PintsandPanels for a bite at Pat's. Pat's turned out to be a Philly cheese steak place that was filled with Philly (the baseball team) fans. The cheesesteaks were pretty delicious, and extremely inexpensive. This was a Biggie which was four 6 inch long sandwiches and chips for just under $14. This is another place that I'd love to visit again.

I saw these unique plants while going on a walk. These things were fuzzy. No joke.

Texas might have BBQ, salsa, and queso, but Denver has green chile. Green chile is one of my favorite foods, and Denver sure does have a plethora of it.

On Sunday afternoon, we took a stroll down to the Denver Botanical Gardens. Enjoy!

Lily pads bigger than your face!

I wound up finding those fuzzy plants at the Denver Botanical Gardens. They are called Lamb's Ears, and I'm infatuated with the idea of having them in the garden!

This is my view sometimes.

GABF 2011: Sam Adam's LongShot Contest Brunch

2011-11-04T14:25:00.000-07:00

One of the best parts of the Great American Beer Festival is the Saturday morning brunch with Sam Adams. Each year, the brunch is in conjunction with the LongShot Contest. The LongShot Contest, in short, is a homebrew contest that rewards the winner with a chance to brew the recipe at a distribution level. The beer is then packaged and sold in the 2012 LongShot six-pack.

Here's the three finalists for the LongShot Competition.

We started the morning with tasting each of the beers and submitting our votes. Derf's Secret Alt brewed by Joe Formanek was the winner this year. Congrats to Joe!

Round one of the brunch buffet. Lobster hollandaise, little neck clams, stout ice cream, French toast, and some pumpkin stout. Again, this is just round one. Needless to say, I stuffed myself silly at this brunch.

Not only was the food extremely tasty, I thought it was presented in a really creative fashion. The ice cream container was frozen into a block of ice. Within that block of ice, there were tiny frozen pumpkins and buds. A woman sitting close to me said it was a very traditional Swedish way of presenting food, and I thought it was cute (come on, tiny pumpkins?) and creative.

I couldn't help taking multiple photos of the ice.

I'm going to use this the next time I serve something appropriate. I just need to find tiny pumpkins! A big thanks to Sam Adams for having us at the LongShot Contest. It is just about the perfect way to start the final day of the Great American Beer Festival.

GABF 2011: Farm to Table Pavilion's Tasty Bites

2011-11-03T15:24:00.000-07:00

The popularity of food and beer pairings is still growing. It was evidence by the swarm of people in the Farm to Table Pavilion at the Great American Beer Festival. The food this year looked fantastic, but I had to run around quickly to take photos of it before the sun went down. Lighting inside the building can be a problem for photos. This year's pavilion was so crowded that I was unable to get any photos of the food next to their proper descriptions or next to the appropriately paired beer. Nonetheless, the food I tasted was pretty darn good. Next year, I shall try to arrive earlier and bust my way through the crowds like a hungry honey badger.

This came from a pig. Enough said.

This was one of my favorite offerings. A lamb burger on an incredibly soft bun.

Lamb belly. Like pork belly, but with lamb. This was also pretty fantastic.

I don't think I actually got to eat one of these.

Chorizo on a stick. I remember it being tasty, and I remember it being served with some Dogfish beer.

This was really fantastic. I grabbed one as during my first round of photos. I'm sure it had a fancy proper name that I didn't remember. I remember it being like a sweet cream custard with chocolate and brittle.

I didn't get to have one of these.

Or any of these.

I didn't get to try any of these either.

Or this. I'm one sad blogger. All photos, very little tasting. However, the ones I did try were pretty fantastic.

This little guy gets the cutest boy at GABF award. What a cutie pie!

And here's a picture for Rich from New Holland Brewing. We met at Tales of the Cocktail a few months prior. Did you know that New Holland also makes spirits? They have one called Hopquila that is made with hops!

GABF 2011: Media Lunch and Denver Tour

2011-11-02T11:57:00.000-07:00

One of the best parts of attending the Great American Beer Festival is the media lunch and the bus tour. It is a great opportunity to meet with other writers in a low-key environment. The festival sessions themselves are too busy, crowded, and distracting to have a meaningful conversation with other people. Unfortunately for me, this year, my nose has dried out completely to the point of suffering from nose bleeds. It is a pretty common symptom during altitude changes. I can't give you a very detailed description of the food and beer, but I'll try my best.

The first course was roasted carpaccio beet salad with fennel, green apples, goat cheese, and bacon served with a vinaigrette.

The next course was grains of paradise seared lamb loin and ginger forbidden rice with apricots and cranberries. Despite having a non-functioning palate, I could taste the grains of paradise on the incredibly tender lamb. It reminded me of some type of Asian spices.

For dessert, we had pumpkin bread pudding topped with Ska Ten Pin Porter Caramel sauce and Lefthand ESB Ice Cream.

One of my favorite parts about the lunch was the American Artisan Cheese Plate. The cheese lover in me is very, very, happy. The cheeses were Point Reyes Original Blue and Toma, the Beecher's Handmade Flagsheep, and Cowgirl Creamery's Mr. Tam. My favorite cheese was the Toma. I wanted to eat everyone else's too. Did I mention that I loved cheese?

The bus tour this year took us to Strange Brewing and Highland Taps. Our stop at Strange Brewing was quite rushed, so I don't have any photos of it. However, we had a few more minutes at Highland Taps. We got to try some tasty appetizers, Oskar Blues beer, and Odell's beer. We were told by someone to try to the duck fat fries. So I asked for a basket to share with the other attendees, which was a fantastic decision on my part. The fries were served with a truffled aoili. I've had my fair share of duck fat fries, and they tend to be rather limp, though tasty. These fries were almost like a really good Belgium fry. Light crispy outside, and light steaming inside. They were pretty darn awesome, and they are so far my favorite duck fat fries. Highland Taps is going to be on my list of places to visit again.

One of the lovely brews served was the Odell Bourbon Barrel Aged Stout. It was dark, bold, sweet, and smooth with chocolately, caramely, and vanilla flavors. This is a pretty fantastically executed oak aged beer. I would love to have this beer on a cold winter night. Thanks to GABF and the City of Denver for the lunch and tour of some local joints.

GABF 2011: The Fantastic Oskar Blues Farm Tour

2011-11-01T07:43:00.000-07:00

For the Great American Beer Festival this year, I had planned a very short visit to Denver so I could spend more time with my new puppy at home. When I saw that there was a series of Oskar Blues tours, I decided to change my flight to allow for an extra day, and I have no regrets about it!

This was the first year for Oskar Blues to host people at the Hop Farm, and it is brand new. If Oskar Blues puts on bus tours again, I'd go again. Tickets for the all day affair were a very affordable $25. Best $25 you'll spend. *I was invited to attend as a media guest.

This is not the bus that we took down to the farm, but I'm sure it would be equally as fun. Woohoo!

We arrived on the farm after a a lovely bus ride from the Falling Rock in Denver. The entrance had beautiful flowers to welcome us. This was a welcome sight as Texas's vegetation was and still is mostly dead.

On the walk to the hop fields, we passed by Ya Ya's (Dale's mother) Garden to see some GIANT pumpkins. It is difficult to get a sense of the size. However, Farmer Geoff estimated it at about 500 lbs or so. It was probably the size of shopping cart.

Farmer Geoff demonstrates just how big the pumpkins can get. After a brief introduction at the farm, everyone loaded up onto a trailer and went for a ride behind the tractor. Just a word of advice, do not wear panty hose and sit on bales of hay. Just trust me on this one.

We were introduced to the crew, I mean herd. These are black angus cattle who are know for being particularly friendly. Farmer Geoff says that they don't use dogs for herding, but rather, the cattle are so friendly that they walk around and follow ~~the food~~ you.

I did pet some of the friendly heiffers, and they were hungry. They kept looking at our bales of hay.

This wasn't just a brunch on a farm. This was brunch with all the bells and whistles on it.

Coffee with your Oskar Blues Hot Sauce? I could not have asked for a more perfect day. The weather was beautiful, and the company was fantastic! The plethora of beer samples was also quite nice.

Oskar Blues has some of the best brew pub food. When I visited them at the Beer Bloggers Conference 2010, their mac and cheese inspired me to make many batches of mac and cheese at home. The expanding girth of my rear end is proof. For breakfast, we had sausage on grits, spinach frittata, pork belly, briskey, and a cheesecake blitz covered in blueberry compote. All this was served with beermosas - orange juice and Mama's Little Yella Pils.

Food so good that even the insects came out for a snack.

One of the best parts about this tour was that Mama Ya Ya (Dale's mother) served us home tapped (get it?) maple syrup. This farm is pretty amazing as much of the refuse from the brewery gets used on the farm. Much of our meal came from the restaurant, and the farm where possible. Having maple syrup that came from the farm was the cherry on top. Also, Ya Ya was about the sweetest and cutest woman. I told Dale I wanted to take her home and to be my mother.

Here's a photo of what we've been waiting for. This beer is called HGH, as in home grown hops. The hops used in this beer came right from the farm. Is that not pretty awesome or what?

After leaving the Hop Farm, we arrived at the brewery, only to be spoiled. Here's a 4 oz pour of the Ten Fidy. This is my favorite Oskar Blues beer. It is a bold, unrelenting beer that makes you want to say, "DAMN IT, Thank GOD (whichever one you worship) for the freedom to make beer!"

If that wasn't enough, the tour bus took us to Liquids and Solids where they had a smoked porter called the Honey Badger on tap. It is served with a meat stick make out of one of the heifers on the Hop Farm. This beer doesn't give a @^!*$. This beer takes what it wants. I'm working hard on getting this beer to Texas. Let's cross our fingers that it happens!

A big thanks to Oskar Blues for inviting me out for such a wonderful time. Cheers!

Film + Food + Focused on Good for Lights. Camera. Help. @NPFilm Nov. 4th.

2011-10-30T20:01:00.000-07:00

It should be no surprise to anyone that the food community and food awareness in Austin is snowballing. It should also be no surprise that the communities are joining together. With the Austin Film Festival in our rear view mirrors, here's another event combing film, food, and good.

At this fantastic affair (one that you're significant other will approve!), you'll get to taste delicious locally, sustainably grown food from across Austin, prepared by gourmet locavore chefs. You'll get to watch short films about important food issues. And you'll get to learn from local food community leaders about the causes they support and how film has elevated the discussion. The event is on Nov. 4th from 6-9 pm at CTC Gardens (just east of I35 on Cesar Chavez). Tickets are $20 online, and you can also donate directly to Lights. Camera. Help. if you like! Get your tickets here: http://bit.ly/FFFoG

This event will feature The Wine & Food Foundation of Texas, The Sustainable Food Center, Farmhouse Delivery, The Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance, in.gredients, the Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy, Johnson's Backyard Garden, Slow Money Texas, Slow Food Austin, Greenling Organic Delivery, and HOPE Farmer's Market.

With Delicious Food, Wine, and Specialty Drinks from:
Deep Eddy Vodka, The Wine & Food Foundation of Texas, Amy Ramm of the Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy, Amanda Love- the Barefoot Cook, Amity Bakery, Pie Fixes Everything, Pate Letelier, austiNuts and more

Film + Food insights from:
Elizabeth Winslow of Farmhouse Delivery, Brad Stufflebeam of the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance, Brian Nunnery of in.gredients, and more.

Get your tickets: http://bit.ly/FFFoG

Proceeds benefit all programs of Lights. Camera. Help.!

*I'm friends with the founders of Lights. Camera. Help. I'll be attending the event. And so should you!

Film and Food Festival with Eye Candy- Oct. 19th

2011-10-17T13:07:00.000-07:00

You know else is what's coming around the corner? The Film and Food Festival on Wednesday, Oct. 19th from 7-10 pm at the Driskill. I was lucky to be invited as a guest at the Film and Food Festival last year, and I must say, this event did not disappoint. Tickets this year are $90 for the public and $75 for AFF Members and Badge Holders. Proceeds from the ticket sales and event auctions benefit Austin Film Festival's Young Filmmakers Program, which was founded to encourage students, ages 9-18, to explore their literacy skills through the arts of screenwriting and film making. Programs are offered free through AISD schools and partner organizations. For more info, you can follow Austin Film Festival on Facebook at facebook.com/AustinFilmFestival and on Twitter @austinfilmfest.

When you do make it to the event, I'll be at the Carillon table. Don't forget to come by and say "Hi!"

I know, you might be thinking, how is this different from the other food events going on now? Scroll down to the very bottom and you'll see.

Here's some of Chef Tony's lovely desserts.

Tony makes some of the most darling and tasty petite fours.

Swan cream puffs with chocolate.

Pumpkin chocolate cheesecake. These are incredibly cute.

Roasted pork tenderlion.

Rabbit Rillette with mustard.

And after all the great eats, I even got to meet Edward Burns. Yep. That'll do. This festival comes with some nice eye candy.

Win Tickets to La Dolce Vita, Thursday Oct. 13th

2011-10-05T09:16:00.000-07:00

La Dolce Vita. Living the Sweet Life. And yes, I do live the sweet life from time to time. You too, can live the sweet life for a while on Thursday, Oct.13, 2012. That sweet life includes tasting food from some of the finest chefs in the area and sipping on artisan spirits and fine wines. Purchase Tickets here. This year, you can also win a taste of the sweet life by supporting the 2012 participating restaurants and wineries. The contest begins on Thursday, September 22 and ends on Sunday, October 9, 2011, and the winner will be announced on Monday, October 10.

The rules of this contest has three parts:

1. Entrants must check-in on Foursquare.
2. Share their experience on Twitter by tagging @LaDolceVitaAtx.
3. Include the hashtag #ilpalio to be qualified as a contestant.

The contestant who dines and drinks at the most participating restaurants and wineries during the weeks prior to the event will be deemed the winner and receive two free tickets to the event ($250 value). List of participating restaurants and wineries below.

PARTICIPATING A Taste of Italy in Austin Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas

RESTAURANTS: Andiamo Ristorante Austin Cake Ball

Blue Star Cafeteria Cannoli Joes

Chez Zee American Bistro Cho Sushi

Cuatro’s Creative Creations

Cuvée Coffee Contigo Austin

Driskell Grill & Bar East Side Showroom

Eddie V’s Prime Seafood Eleven Plates & Wine

Flemings Steakhouse Imperia

J. Black’s Feel Good Lounge Judges’ Hill Restaurant

Kerbey Lane Café La Sombra Bar and Grill

Malaga Tapas and Bar Maudie’s Tex-Mex

Moonshine Patio Bar & Grill The Melting Pot Restaurant

NoRTH Modern Italian Cuisine Objects of Confection

Paggi House Palmer’s Restaurant Bar & Courtyard

Parkside Ranch 616

Satay Restaurant Sao Paulo’s Restaurant

Get Sum Dim Sum Siena Ristorante Toscana

Sterling Affairs Catering SugarPOP Sweet Shop

Sugar Tooth Bakery SWB Southwest Bistro at the Hyatt

Tacodeli Taj Palace Indian Restaurant

Taj Mahal Indian Cuisine TenOak Bourbon House + Lounge

Texas Coffee Traders The Backspace

The Belmont The Carillon Restaurant

The Roaring Fork Urban: An American Grill

VIVO Lake Creek Word of Mouth Catering

Zed’s Restaurant Whole Foods Market Lamar Culinary Center

WINE & SPIRITS Becker Vineyards Brennan Wineries

PARTICIPANTS: Fall Creek Vineyards Inwood Estates Vineyards

Llano Estacado Winery McPherson Cellars

Paula’s Texas Spirits Pedernales Cellars

Pleasant Hill Winery Republic Tequila

The Vineyard at Florence TipsyTexan

Torre De Pietra Vineyards The Vineyard at Florence

Twin Liquors

And now for some photos from last year. *I attended as a media guest.

Sweet cars go along with the sweet life. Wasn't it gracious of me to lend them my daily driver for the event?

And there's my other car. Not only is does this event have fantastic food and drink, the location is pretty awesome.

Lamb chops from Roaring Fork. This and the green chile pork stew are probably my two favorite dishes at the Roaring Fork.

And the carving of a large piece of meat always makes me happy.

I found some macarons towards the end of the night.

And then there were these things. I'm not exactly sure what they were meant to be called, but they were 1. neat 2. different 3. purple and 4. slightly creepy.

Photo courtesy of Bread and Butter PR.
I'd have more photos of the event, but I was likely too busy stuffing my face to take photos before the sun went down. That is the sweet life. Hope to see ya there!

Ghirardelli's Pairing Party is more of a Chocolate Feast

2011-10-03T09:22:00.000-07:00

Blog post and party sponsored by Ghirardelli.

To celebrate Ghirardelli's support to the National Breast Cancer Foundation, Leslie Sbrocco (@BeaThirstyGirl) has teamed up with Ghirardelli's to throw chocolate pairing parties. After the parities, Ghirardelli Chocolate and ThirstyGirl.com will host a live tasting party and Tweet Chat on Intense Dark™ chocolate to be held Wednesday, October 5, 2011 at 5 PM PST/8 PM EST. They'll be tasting four varieties of IntenseDark—Evening Dream®, Twilight Delight™, Midnight Reverie® and Toffee Interlude®—and creating and sharing food and wine pairings.

Here's some photos and recipes from my fun party. Unfortunately, as the party host, I didn't have an opportunity to try many of the pairings. However, guests' feedback was pretty clear. The Sea Salt Soiree was the crowd favorite. I would also guess by the amount of spirits that we went through, Paula's Texas Orange was also a favorite. A big thanks to @SowGrowEatLive for bringing by some scotch to pair with the chocolates as well.

Photo by John M. P. Knox.

Photo by John M. P. Knox. There were a few gorgeous pairing kits filled with chocolate, wine charms, and almonds. The packages put Tiffany jewelry boxes to shame.

Photo by John M. P. Knox. Just a few of the bottles we enjoyed with the chocolate.

Photo by John M. P. Knox. Chocolate and salt are a lovely combination. It isn't a big surprise that salty olives with chocolate could be a hit.

Since our party was around a meal time. I decided to make some meaty goodness in addition to the cheese plate. I used this recipe for chocolate honey ribs from The Food Site with a few tweaks. Instead of melted chocolate, I used cocoa powder to make sure that it was gluten free. I also used gluten free soy sauce instead of regular soy sauce, and added a few dashes of liquid smoke. Instead of regular ribs, I used pork riblets. I really enjoyed the ribs and the sweet fatty goodness the honey and chocolate brought.

I also made the Vietnamese goat recipe from Goat: Meat, Milk, and Cheese by Bruce WeinStien. This photo was taken just half way through the cooking process. I used two sides of goat ribs for this delicious recipe, and boy was it! I would highly, highly, highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to start using more goat in their cooking. The flavors of sweet onion, pungent fish sauce, nutty browned garlic, and spicy chiles married with falling off the bone flavorful meat was a darn fantastic dish. I can't wait to use the same recipe with different cuts of meat.

Ghirardelli full house!

Are those people having fun? The answer is yes. Highly likely yes.

Just a few weeks prior to this party, @CookingEngineer introduced several of us to the Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream recipes. That introduction turned into massive homemade ice cream making marathon in the Austin area. The @CookingEngineer and I made several versions of the darkest chocolate ice cream recipe with varying levels of intensity and coffee flavors. And ironically enough, my favorite ice cream of the spread was the hatch chile ice cream. Big thanks to @CookingEngineer for bringing so many delicious ice creams.

The perfect shirt for this party. Chocolate + marshmallows + graham crackers = win. No big surprise who came wearing it!

We didn't just pair chocolate with beverages; we also had chocolate in beverages. @MadameCocoa was kind enough to bring two batches of Chocolate Liqueur - a whiskey version and a vodka version. It is a Christopher Elbow recipe that you can make at home, and it is FANTASTIC! If you don't feel like making it yourself, @MadameCocoa is happy to make them for you for $25 each. That is probably the perfect Holiday gift for the chocolate and beverage lover in your life. Thanks to @MadameCocoa for bringing it!

Little @VestaTheDog had fun with @Bepkoboy sans chocolate.

How to Get AND Keep Sponsorships

2011-09-25T13:01:00.000-07:00

Sponsorships can come in many forms. But most often, it means that a company gives in-kind or in cash to offset an organization or event. I've been on both sides of these partnership - asking for sponsorships and giving sponsorships. This post a kind of a how to after being on both sides of a fence. I started seeking sponsorships when I started producing dog sport events way back in the day. I got a variety of in-kind sponsorships from canine preventative medication, dog foods, and branded toys. When I started putting on food events, I started to get cash sponsorships as well as in-kind sponsorships.

Over the last few years, I've given quite a bit to many organizations and causes. I've been asked to give my services or time to help execute events, which is conceptually the same as a sponsorship from the perspective of a small business. I'm sponsoring in giving my time and services. For some large events, I've spent as much as 60 hours for individual causes without pay, and I've worked with some brands testing many iterations of recipes out of my pocket. Sometimes I get recognized as a sponsor, but most of the time, I don't get anything at all.

Needless to say, my giving pool is currently dry, and I've been declining requests for pro-bono consulting or products. I've found that increasingly, people and organizations have presented a self-entitled attitude. Not only is that attitude a major turn off, it discourages me from ever working with that person or group. I'm a person. I do not have endless personal funds to give to non-profits. I have a family and friends that I would like to see. I am not obligated to give my time away. Now don't get me wrong. There are many instances in which I am happy to help, and I volunteer my time and my services without being approached. I do still enjoy helping causes and friends, but I'm much more selective in what I do these days.

Regardless of what kind of sponsorship you're seeking or planning on giving, the following rules come in handy.

1. Keep your ego in check. Don't assume that everyone knows the mission of your organization or cares for that matter. To be blunt, your organization may seem awesome in your eyes. However, others might not have such rosy feelings about it. If you're contacting someone you don't know, be sure to introduce yourself and your organization. Don't make the person hunt on the Google machine for what your organization does. Don't also make the person expend time trying to decide if your organization fits their goals and philosophy. The more time someone has to look up who you are, the higher the likelihood they'll just chunk your email into spam.

2. Be nice. I always try to start and end an email with a thanks. You have no idea what other responsibilities the other person has. Even responding to your email to say "no," is still a few extra minutes that other person doesn't have. Just to give you an idea, to entertain a sponsorship proposal, I spend at least 15-20 minutes looking over the person's online presence, relationships that person has, potential impact it has on my business, and thinking about the sponsorship arrangements. Even if I do decline, that's 15-20 minutes I've invested. Your time is valuable, and so is mine. Please respect it.

3. Bring something to the table. This is a Randy Pausch line. What do you or your organization bring to the table? Make sure that you are explicit in what the sponsorship offers the other person. I field sponsorship requests frequently, and a HUGE lacking in many of the proposals is what do I get out of it? Many proposals have plenty of "this is what we need," but rarely is there a strong case for "this what your sponsorship can do for you." And "your name will appear on the website" is not a great incentive for me. I've had my name all over the place, and I can't think of a single time where it got me anything. I'm sorry, but altruism is out the window when you're asking for a commitment.

4. Quit using the "we're a non-profit" line. This may seem offensive, but I'm tired of hearing that line when I'm being hit up for sponsorships. There are hundreds of non-profits in Austin. I could be giving my resources to any of the other non-profits. Why is your non-profit more important than the others? If you want my time and services, I need a compelling reason. Additionally, I already have a list of non-profits that I personally support. Unless you have a compelling case, that line doesn't move the needle for me. Also, just because I support some non-profits, it doesn't mean I have to support them all. When I hear that "But you helped *insert name of non-profit here,* you can help us" line, it makes me think that the non-profit is very self-entitled. You can guarantee that's going to be a "NO!"

5. Again, be nice to your sponsors. Sponsors are the ones that fund many events, and it may seem obvious, but be NICE to your sponsors. If someone asked me for product, services, or cash, and then treated me poorly, I would never work with them again. I'm a person, and I try to be a nice person. While I'm not surprised by the poor treatment people give to their sponsors, it is appalling every time.

6. Accept declines gracefully. Please understand that not all organizations or businesses have the funds and effort to give. Even if they say "no," thank them and move on. There's nothing worse than a nasty email or phone calls. Even worse are the threats about public guilt trips. I've heard stories of groups pulling the "if you don't sponsor us, I'll tweet bad things about you" line. That is disgusting behavior, and I'd call them out on it publicly. Entitlement needs to be smashed with a giant hammer.

7. Even if you are unhappy, approach the problem diplomatically and offer a solution. I did pro-bono work (upwards of 60 hours) for an organization that had numerous major issues. One of the biggest ones was how they treated pro-bono providers and volunteers. Even though this organization was wrought with falling membership over the last five years and loss of brand sponsorships, they had the nerve to yell at me for their own shortcomings. Their conference attendance had fallen by more than half since 2005. I won't name that group, but if you ask me specific questions about the experience, I am completely transparent. Treating people who give you their services with rudeness is a surefire way to ruin your reputation. Unfortunately, the members of the organization were an absolute delight. It was the administration that needed a severe reality check. This was a particularly emotionally draining experience for me as the lovely members kept asking me why I did not officially join the organization. I couldn't bear to say that their administrators were completely jerks running the organization into the ground.

8. Don't be squirrelly. I've brought cupcakes to events before, and people would literally steal them. People would walk behind me, grab them, and run off. A certain person in particular would do it repeatedly at events. He would make a big effort to NOT make eye contact with me. Creepy. If you can't look me in the eye, you probably shouldn't be taking my things. I'd confront him in person, but he keeps running away from me.

9. Think about the demographics. Does your event or cause fit into the sponsors' demographics? If you're making high end custom decor products for bridal showers, you probably don't want to sponsor decor for an elementary school graduation. Those elementary school kids don't care about your products. Their parents probably don't care about the decor, and those elementary school kids aren't going to be purchasing your products anytime soon. Make sure your demographics fits the demographics of the sponsors. No one wants to spend time and effort on non-target audiences.

10. Make sure you truly thank your sponsors. I'm not talking about just giving them recognition. I'm talking about thanking them with a hand-written note or a phone call. When it comes down to it, we're all people. We want to feel appreciated and valued. If you don't value your sponsors, don't ask for their resources. If you can't thank them, then you don't deserve them.

11. Give more than you can receive. This is a personal philosophy of mine. I try to give to my sponsors more than I can receive. If that means I give them more media coverage than agree upon, so be it. I often spend months developing a relationship with a sponsor before I approach them with a sponsorship opportunity. In many cases, that translates into people looking to sponsor or give to me before I ever approach them. Relationships are the foundation of all business. Don't neglect to give to those before you start receiving.

12. Show gratitude for even the smallest gesture. Today, Sept. 16th, I met a little girl who could teach us all a lesson. I was shopping, and a little girl (about 7 years old) and her mother were in front of me in the checkout line. Her mother didn't have enough money to afford their purchases by eight cents. I was zoning out until I heard the mother tell the little girl that the had to put their things back. I don't even know what they were buying, but I gave the cashier the eight cents. The little girl and mother were so ecstatic and overwhelmed with joy, that they kept thanking me. To me, eight cents was just a tiny gesture. Eight cents to teach a child caring for others is such an inexpensive investment that I didn't even blink. But what struck me was the amount of gratitude for such a tiny gesture. People and organizations should learn a lesson from that little girl. Showing gratitude for even small acts of kindness goes a long way. I should start practicing random acts of gratitude.

I could tell you sponsorship and pro-bono horror stories all day long. I worked over 100 hours raising money for an organizations in the past, and today, they pretend not to know me. You can probably guess how that makes me feel. You can probably also guess why I have stopped conversing with them, and I don't attend their events. For another group, I invested $400 out of my pocket to keep their club afloat. When I was a teaching assistant in grad school, $400 was almost half of my monthly stipend. The response I got was "we didn't care about you anyways." I don't even pay dues to them anymore, and I've been approached numerous times about why I left the group. It doesn't take a psychologist to guess how I feel about them now. I have no sympathy for groups who behave in such rude ways.

I've had many sponsorships, and I truly thank them for their support. If I've ever made any of them feel unappreciated, I should be given a swift kick. On the other hand, when organizations and people make me feel unappreciated, they are added to my blacklist of organizations to never support. I hope that my transparent and unfiltered views helps others when navigating sponsorships. As someone on both sides of the table, I'm pretty sensitive to the needs of both sides. I did not sugar coat this blog post. You might be offended, and that's okay. You might realize that your behavior isn't very nice.

Taiwanese Pork Belly - ARUGH for Talk Like a Pirate Day

2011-09-19T16:00:00.000-07:00

The King of Flavor. The Godfather of Charcuterie. The Mistress of Breakfast. Those are just some random names I made up for Pork Belly, otherwise known as Bacon. Most people were introduced to pork belly in the form of thin (relatively) slices of bacon. Coming from a different cultural background, I was first introduced to pork belly in the form of thick pieces cooked in sauces and served with sticky white rice. This recipe is for my family's version of Taiwanese Pork Belly. It is often called Taiwanese Pork Belly Stew or Braised Pork Belly. The stew portion of this recipe can be served with a wide variety of carbohydrates including rice or noodles.

**My mother called me after watching this video. We differ on the interpretation of this recipe, with hers being "the right way" and mine being an "evolution of the right way." Nonetheless, here we go. My mother says that you shouldn't mix the pork belly and ground pork. Either make the dish with only pork belly or only ground pork. My mother also says that the size of the dried mushrooms should match the size of the meat. If you use pork belly, cut the mushrooms to the size of the pork belly. If you use ground pork, mince the dried mushrooms finely.

Taiwanese Pork Belly Stew
Feeds 12-16.
Ingredients:

2 lbs of pork belly (I would say, the more the better)
2 lb ground pork
1 cup dried mushrooms (rehydrated in warm water for at least an hour before use)
2 tablespoons fried shallots (available at any Asian grocery market)
2 teaspoons of Five spice powder
2/3 cup dark soy sauce (depending on your personal preference)
10 cloves of peeled garlic
1 teaspoon of sugar
Pinch of ground white pepper
Water (save water used for soaking dried mushrooms for extra flavor)
Optional: 6-12 hard boiled eggs, already peeled
Optional: Salt if you really need it.

Steps:
1. Remove mushrooms from the water and slice or dice into bite size pieces. I like to slice mine into ribbons. My mother likes to dice hers into quarter inch chunks. Make sure to discard the stem portion into your bokashi bin or composter. The stem is tough and very unpleasant to eat, though they are great for giving your dinner guests a great jaw workout. Set the sliced/diced mushrooms aside.

2. Slice or dice the pork belly into bite size pieces. Again, much of this is personal preference. I like mine to be about two inches long and about 3/4 inch thick. I think it makes for a prettier presentation. Some restaurant likes to dice their pork belly into smaller 1/2 inch by 1/2 inch chunks. I think that makes for a more home style look and feel to the presentation of the dish. Don't fret of the size of your pork belly pieces. Let the fat do the the flavor talking.

3. Heat a large skillet or pot (at least 8 quarts or so). When hot, place the pork belly in the pan to get a nice sear on it. Flip the pork belly over once it is crispy. If your pork belly is in smaller chunks, sautée in the hot skillet like you would to render bacon, but don't render. Some fat will come out, and that fat will be lovely. Simply crisp it at high heat and leave it be.

4. There are two variations at this step, but both will yield similar outcomes. My mother likes to add in the raw ground pork and garlic cloves at this stage, break it up into chunks with a spoon, and then to move onto step 5. I like to add raw ground pork and garlic at this stage, fry it up so that the fat from the pork belly coats the garlic and ground pork, and then move on. I like to fry the raw ground pork because I like to make sure my ground pork is really done, and I like the nutty flavors of fried garlic. I think traditional Taiwanese food purists would prefer the sweet mellow flavor of garlic cooked over low heat over the nutty flavors over higher heat. To each their own.

5. Add the soy sauce, mushroom pieces, five spice powder, and pepper into the skillet. Traditional Taiwanese dishes are slightly sweet, so you can add a teaspoon of sugar if you like. Some people find it odd, but HEY! I'm Taiwanese. We're descendants of pirates and political dissenters. Don't talk smack about our food. Also add enough water to cover the meat, and allow it to come to a simmer. I would highly recommend using the mushroom soaking water to add a depth of flavor to the stew.

6. Simmer for at least 60 minutes or so taking care to mix it up once in a while. You want to make sure that the soy flavors permeate the fat of the pork belly.

7. Taste and decide if it needs more water, salt, soy, or pepper. Keep in mind that this is something that you'll eat with a carbohydrate, so it should be a little on the saltier side. But the final flavor profile is really up to your personal preference. The soupy part should still be relatively dark with soy at the point. If you want to add hard boiled eggs to the stew, do it now. You'll want to add them whole, and make sure they are covered with the soup. Allow to simmer for another 15-30 minutes until the eggs are tinted with the soy sauce. The pork belly should be soft and melt right into steamed rice.

8. Remove from heat and serve with rice or over noodles. Top with green onion and a sprig of cilantro.

*This dish freezes well. Once the stew has cooled, you can place it in the fridge to solidify the fat. Skim off the fat, transfer into storage containers, and freeze until later use. The texture of the egg whites will change once frozen, but not in a bad way. It tends to get layer-y, but still totally delicious.

Taiwanese Pork Belly Noodle Soup
This has got to be one of the easiest recipes ever, besides Rachel Ray's lemon sorbet recipe.

Ingredients

4 cups of Taiwanese Pork Belly Stew (or about half of the previous recipe)
4 cups of water
1 lb of noodles (cooked until al dente)
Garnishes of scallion and cilantro

Combine the 4 cups of Taiwanese Pork Belly Stew and 4 cups of water into a large pot. Heat until simmering. Add the cooked pasta, simmer for 60 seconds, and turn off the heat. Adjust the flavor of the soup by adding more water or more soy sauce to suit your flavor preferences. Serve with scallion and cilantro for a pretty pop of color.

*My mother would recommend that you use Asian style noodles that come in a box at the Asian grocery store. I used whole wheat spaghetti pasta for the photos. It doesn't really matter what kind you use, but you'll be less Taiwanese if you don't follow my mother's advice.

*I had this with a Brooklyn Brown, and it was tasty. I think it would also pair nicely with a Chimay Reserve, Dogfish Head Burton Baton, or even an IPA to contrast with the sweetness of the soup.

Ghirardelli's Intense Dark to benefit the National Breast Cancer Foundation

2011-09-11T13:35:00.000-07:00

This blog post and chocolate tasting party was sponsored by Ghirardelli. I am paid to host the party.

With temperatures dropping from the high 100's and October around the corner, it is time to start thinking about Breast Cancer Awareness Month. This year Ghirardelli is kicking it up by supporting the National Breast Cancer Foundation. From Sept. 1, 2011 through the end of December 2011, Ghirardelli will donate $1 to the National Breast Cancer Foundation for every purchase of specially marked pink ribbon packages of Ghirardelli Intense Dark. These specially marked chocolate bars will be available at grocery stores and specialty retailers nationwide.

Courtesy of Ghirardelli

To celebrate Ghirardelli's support to the National Breast Cancer Foundation, Leslie Sbrocco (@BeaThirstyGirl) has teamed up with Ghirardelli's to throw chocolate pairing parties. After the parities, Ghirardelli Chocolate and ThirstyGirl.com will host a live tasting party and Tweet Chat on Intense Dark™ chocolate to be held Wednesday, October 5, 2011 at 5 PM PST/8 PM EST. They'll be tasting four varieties of IntenseDark—Evening Dream®, Twilight Delight™, Midnight Reverie® and Toffee Interlude®—and creating and sharing food and wine pairings.

Courtesy of Ghirardelli

Ghirardelli is supporting the National Breast Cancer Foundation (NBCF). From September 1 through the end of December 2011, specially marked pink ribbon packages of Ghirardelli Intense Dark™ found at grocery and specialty retailers nationwide will carry a pink ribbon code worth a $1 donation to the NBCF (up to $100,000 total donation). Follow @BeAThirstyGirl and the hashtag #TGTaste to learn more about this fun event.

Above were some photos of pairings that I'll be having at my party. Chocolate smores, chocolate and cheese, and chocolate with wine, and chocolate with root beers are all popular pairings, but I'm going to bring a little twist to my pairing party. I'll be pairing the darker chocolates with pungent cheeses and salty olives. I love the chocolate and salt combination, especially salty truffles. In addition to pairing, I'll also be making some chocolate pork riblets based off of this recipe. Pork, cheese, olives, and chocolate; it may sound odd, but it could be a winner.

There will be a wonderful surprise in addition to the chocolate pairings. Michael Chu (@cookingengineer) brought over some pecan praline ice cream he made using the Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream recipe, and it was fantastic! It was so good, that several other friends bought the book of recipes. At my party, we'll have two versions of the Jeni's Splendid darkest chocolate ice cream. Michael Chu will be making the recipe using a home ice cream maker, specifically the Kitchen Aid that attaches to a mixer. I will be serving a hand churned recipe. For those who are coming to the party, it will be awesome!

And if you'd like another way to enjoy chocolate while benefiting disease awareness, pencil in the Austin Chocolate Festival on Oct. 15-16th. The festival has raised $5,000 for the Austin Affiliate of Susan G. Komen, and this year's festival will benefit Multiple Sclerosis (MS) awareness. See the photo below for a little preview for the festival. Photo by John M. P. Knox.

Again, don't forget to Follow @BeAThirstyGirl and #TGTaste on Wednesday, October 5, 2011 at 5 PM PST/8 PM EST.

Homemade Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream

2011-08-24T09:01:00.000-07:00

You might have seen the recent buzz, and it is true. Graeter's Ice Cream is now in HEB's. To launch in their new market, Graeter's Ice Cream sent several bloggers some samples of their French Pot ice cream. The French pot method isn't easy, and it makes only two gallons at a time. A French pot spins around a blade as the ice cream freezes and thus scraping the sides, as opposed to the blade spinning inside of a pot (which is like many home ice cream machines). I'm not sure how different the French pot method is to other commercial methods, but I will tell you that I was really intrigued by the chocolate adding process. In tasting the ice creams, the chocolate was like random pieces of ganche as opposed to consistent small pieces of chocolate. And this I liked. According to their website, someone hand mixed low-melting temperature chocolate into the two gallons of ice cream at a time.

So, I decided to make some ice cream myself and to play around with different methods. Here's how I did it. The recipes didn't come from anywhere in particular. I made a typical custard using ratios I normally would for crème brûlée or curd, and then I added whatever I liked. This is the first time I have made ice cream at home, but I've many plenty of custards. Please note that there were plenty of trials and errors. Please adjust the recipe to how you see fit.

Mint Chocolate Ice Cream sans ice cream machine

32 ounces of heavy cream
8 oz milk
6 yolks
1 pinch salt
3/4 cup white sugar (I don't like overly sweet ice cream)
Giant handful of fresh mint (I grabbed about 15 long vines from the garden)
green food coloring
24 ounces chocolate (semi-sweet, however much you like. I like a plethora of chocolate.)
1/3 cup raw cocoa nibs (optional)

1. Heat the heavy cream, milk, sugar, and salt in a large pot. After washing the mint, I spanked it hard. Literally. I spanked it, and then dropped it into the pot to steep. Use more mint if you like it really minty, and use less if you like it more subtle. You can add mint extract too if you like. I used a whisk to kind of muddle the mint in the mixture.

2. Add the egg yolks one at a time making sure to thoroughly mix it in. Keep whisking while the mixture heats up. I use a thermometer every time I make custards or curds just because I don't trust myself using the back of the spoon method. I may get too impatient and take it off the heat too soon. Most custard recipes say to heat until 170 degrees, but I always go to 180 degrees. Make sure the thermometer isn't sitting on the bottom or sides of the pot so that it gets an accurate temperature reading of the mixture. Add food coloring here if you like. Makes sure you keep whisking.

3. Once it up to 180 degrees, remove from heat and strain to remove the mint and other bits that might not have mixed in well. After straining, I put the mixture onto an ice bath. That would mean putting the bowl of the mixture into an even bigger bowl filled with ice and water. That will help the mixture cool faster. At this point, I put custard into the fridge to chill.

4. Note: If you have an ice cream maker, now is the time to put the mixture into the ice cream maker. Many hours later, @windaddict gets home, and we decided to freeze the ice cream in the fashion that he wants. I know that many, many websites recommend this, but I will not do this method again. It is messy, and it did not work well. For this method, you put the mixture in a ziploc bag, and then into another bag (to protect your ice cream from the salt water), and then into another bag that you fill with ice and salt. You're supposed to knead or to roll it around to freeze it.
@windaddict insisted that we throw it around like a football to mix it up. First, the bag gets really cold and wet so that makes it difficult to throw and to catch. I'm sure someone's fingernail put a hole in the bags so everything started leaking. And with the leaking, I now know what it is like to have ice cream all over the driveway.

5. It is best if you skip step 4. If you don't have an ice cream machine, you can use this method. Place the mixture (in a bowl) into the freezer for about two hours. Take out the bowl, scrape down the sides with a spatula and mix it up. Your goal is to break up all the ice crystals. If you have a hand mixer, now is the time to use it. You want the mixture to be smooth and free of ice crystals in the end. Place it back in the freezer. Take it out in about an hour, and mix again. Repeat this process until the ice cream is getting pretty thick and you feel like you have gotten out all of the ice crystals. You can serve the ice cream now if you like.

6. To add the chocolate, I melted it in the microwave, and then I drizzled it into the half frozen mixture. I mixed it in with a spatula rapidly so that the chocolate frozen in to in even pieces. There were small shards of chocolate. There were huge chunks of chocolate. If you don't like it that way, you can use chocolate chips or some other method. Making many small shards of chocolate in the ice cream has multiple benefits though. Homemade ice cream will usually have more ice crystals than commercial ice creams. The texture of 10000 shards of chocolate masks the texture of ice crystals in the ice cream. That's my little trick to hiding less than creamy ice cream texture.

7. I also added raw cacao nibs to my ice cream (optional). And here's how I cracked them. I used a citrus juicer, smashed several pods at a time, and then I picked out the shells by hand. I added about 1/3 cup of raw cacao nibs to the ice cream. Peeling the nibs isn't easy. Mix nibs into the ice cream.

8. Once you are satisfied with the texture of your ice cream, transfer it into an airtight container for deep freezing. Enjoy!

A big thanks to Graeter's Ice Cream for inspiring to make ice cream at home and for all the wonderful samples.

New idea for saving water in the Drought of 2011

2011-08-15T19:07:00.000-07:00

This Summer has been unbearable. Temperatures during the day have been well over 100 degrees, and they have been up to 109 degrees on several of those days. Additionally, Austin hasn't received significant rainfall over the last several months. Sure, we've gotten a drizzle or a 30 thunderstorm, but there's nothing that is barely wets the ground. Instead of writing up a blog post about how the temperature and lack of rain has affect the produce supply and our personal gardens, here's a post about how to conserve water. We can't change the temperatures outside. We can't make it rain. I've tried rain dancing, washing the car, and washing the dogs. None of them have worked. But here's something you can do.

I've been pretty conservative in how I use resources my entire life. Be it cash, gas, food, electricity, or water, I'm pretty careful on how I use things that are scarce. This is easy method is nothing new, and my parents have been doing this for several years. Conservation and bargaining are somewhat of a sport in my family. It usually takes a few minutes for water for the shower to get hot. Do you know where that "not-hot-enough-for-a-shower" water is going? Down the drain. You're literally throwing away perfectly good water due to the temperature of the water.

Instead of throwing out the water, I have a simple bucket system set up to collect cool water that is run for while waiting for hot water. The water can be used for a variety of things, but I use it for flushing the toilet. There are two methods of flushing the toilet.

1. Remove the lid of the toilet tank. Flush the toilet with the handle as normal. Pour water into the tank quickly until it is full. Replace lid on the toilet tank.

2. Pour water slowly into the toilet bowl taking care to not make huge splashes for obvious reasons. The toilet should flush normally. Pour more water into the bowl very slowly to refill it.

Congrats! You've just re-purposed some water that would have otherwise gone down the drain. You can also use the water for watering your garden or washing the dog, but this is by far the most efficient repurposing.

My system consists of a standard 5 gallon bucket and a 5 gallon Tubtrugs. Tubtrugs can be purchased online, and I've seen them at the Natural Gardener in Austin, TX. If I take a bath, in which the bathtub is full, I scoop water out of it with the buckets to use for flushing.

You'll notice that there is a little water in the tub. Sometimes water from the faucet doesn't always have fall directly into the bucket or tubtrug. I use the flexible tubtrug to scoop up the water by flattening one side. A drop of water saved is a drop of water earned. The tubtrug was one of my Christmas gifts last year, and it is right up there next to the hori-hori and the tube wringer. I love all three tools.

Repurposing this water only takes me about 20-40 seconds per use. It isn't closely related to food, but water does affect our food.

8 tips on how to give a Fantastically Terrible Talk

2011-08-08T11:21:00.000-07:00

I'm a hedonist. I fully admit that I like things that are pleasurable. I like talks. Wait, not I LOVE talks. I love informative talks, talks that make me self reflect, talks that teach me, talks that inspire me, and talks that make me laugh. But most of all, I like pleasurable talks. By pleasurable, I mean that the talk is well presented. Having spent four years in speech, drama, and debate, and seven years judging speech, drama, and debate, I recognize that I probably have high expectations for public speaking. But I also view this from the perspective that my time is valuable. If I'm going to spend 20-30 minutes driving to a location and then parking my car to see a talk, it better be worth my time.

*I made these pretty drawings in paint to disguise the identities of the speakers.

So here's some tips on how and how NOT to give a good presentation.

1. Appearances are important. You might argue that looks have nothing to do with the content, but face the truth. Pretty things are more attractive. A beautifully presented dish is going to be recieved better than a dish that is not. Would you eat an Uchi shag roll if it was run through a blender with a cup of sake and a tablespoon of wasabi? I'm going to guess not, because it is going to look hideous! Would like to read a blog post that was written in this font at 10 point? Probably not. It is difficult to read. The same thing will happen if you look like a complete slob on stage. I'm not telling you that you should be dressed in a suit, but I am saying that if you look like a mess, you're going to have a more difficult time getting the crowd to take you seriously.

2. For a spectacularly terrible presentation, don't have a prepared theme or story. While it is true that some people can wing it and that some panels are completely unpredictable, but please for the love of Thespius, show up with a theme at least. Know your story, your angle, and have some idea of what you're going to share with the audience. There's nothing worse than going to a talk where the speaker seems to have the attitude of "I'm here to talk. I'm not sure about what." That stinks of unpreparedness.

3. Apologize if you need to during your presentation. Let's say you trip over a cord and unplug the projector. Apologize for that and move on. But do NOT start the presentation by saying "Sorry, I'm a really terrible speaker." "Sorry, I didn't sleep last night because I was wasted." or "Sorry, I'm ill prepared for this presentation." The first excuse makes the audience think "the organizers should have found someone who is a good speaker." The other two excuses make people think that you don't have any respect for their time. Instead of working on a thoughtful presentation, you decided that you had other priorities in your life. The least you could have done was to let the organizer know that you are not able to give the speech.

If you are a terrible speaker, you don't have to tell the audience. Public speaking can be stressful, and even the most polished speakers make mistakes. The audience will understand, and they'll still like you even if you say "um........." or "er................", or totally blank out. Trust me. It'll all be okay. Also, you might think you are a terrible speaker, when in reality you are a great speaker. Don't fret!

4. Separate the umbilical cord tethering you to the powerpoint slide or online video. At some venues, there will be technical failures, and you should be prepared for it. If you cannot give your presentation without the use of a power point, then maybe you aren't ready to give your presentation. While photographs and video are worth 10,000,000,000,000 words, the last resort is to describe it verbally. You can do such a good job describing the photos and videos that the lack thereof is a moot point. I recently attended a talk that was centered around video and photography media. The AV was okay, but the lighting in the room made the video and photographs presented look pretty washed out and unrecognizable. Instead of killing the presentation, it actually make the presentation a million times better because the focus was on the content that the speakers shared, not the video and photographs. The content was so interesting and compelling that the focus of the presentation (photographs and video) didn't matter. Also, the story telling skills of the speakers were so compelling that it did bring tears to the eyes of the audience. Now THAT'S a good presentation.

6. We don't want to hang out with you while you surf the web or think out loud. A presentation should be just that, a presentation. A presentation should not be a brainstorming session, a web searching session, or a train of thought session. I recently went to a talk in which the presenter made a number of mistakes, but this was his fatal mistake. Instead of having a prepared presentation, he plugged in a laptop (after 25 minutes of failed attempts) and talked to us about his feelings about some people he met and their websites. There was no theme to the train of thought, and I learned zero. I can browse the internet at home, thanks. That talk made over half the attendees leave, and I tried repeatedly to use non-verbal communication to get him to stop and go home. The only reason why I didn't leave was because I sponsored the refreshments, and I wanted to take home my dishes.

7. Watch your tone. I once started a presentation on a happy note, and the person I introduced killed the mood. She was nervous, anxious, pleading, and all around negative. It killed the energy in the room. Oops. People can pick up how you feel via mirror neurons. If you don't want to be giving the presentation, your attendees probably don't want to be there either. If you make remarks about hating the local university's mascot and colors, the crowd will probably hate you too. Instead, put away all your ill-feelings and wear a smile.

8. Don't forget your filter. This one will make you seem as if you are bit unstable. A topic that you're speaking about might get your riled up, and it is great to have that passion. However, if you become so emotional that you seem like you've gone off your rocker or start attacking (physically or verbally) the audience, it is perhaps time to learn how to control the expression of your emotions. I get very uncomfortable when speakers start going off on a diatribe or I feel as if they might physically hurt someone. Never going back to one of those.

Eleven Things I Learned at Tales of the Cocktail #TOTC

2011-07-29T11:11:00.000-07:00

This year, I finally did it. I visited Tales of the Cocktail for the first time. Tales has always conflicted with the Houston Reliant Dog Show so every year, it is clear that the dogs came first. This year however, I split my time between Tales and the dog show. Here's the list of things I learned as a first timer, and with full disclosure, I did work with Tenneyson Absinthe, St. Germain Elderflower, and Balconies Brimstone during this trip. Luckily, I was invited to stay with Beth Bellanti during Tales. I also found this event to be quite interesting, because from a brand's perspective, this event should be geared towards building relationships with ambassadors (craft cocktail enthusiasts, bartenders, and etc...). However some of the events were set up like a branding event with the goal of acquiring new consumers. I only had time to attend several complimentary events, but that was my impression from the limited time spent at Tales.

Balconies Brimstone caramels? It's a layer of shortbread, Brimstone caramel, chocolate, and smoked salt. Thank you to @lisaiscooking for the inspiration and to @laboite_atx for the salt!

1. The adult beverage laws are ~~nonexistant~~ loose. You can drink in the streets. Bars can serve 24/7. Coming from Austin, I was a little weirded out that people were walking around with open containers. "Wait, you can do that?" That makes for set ups like the St. Germain bar on a bike (see below) legal. You can ride around handing out drinks. Even though the laws are loose, one should practice common sense and do not over indulge.

2. ~~Drinking~~ Tasting starts early. Take part in the Kahlua coffee bar in the morning. The morning I went, churros were served with the coffee. Iced, Latte, Cappacuino, or plain, Kahlua will take care of your caffeine needs.

3. It wasn't as hot in New Orleans this year as everyone had warned me, but it was humid! Bring an umbrella as the locals say that it rains quite frequently, and wear some walking shoes. Also, bring sun block as you'll be mostly walking in downtown.

4. Eat at the Clover Grill. As the Tex part of @TipsyTexan would say, "it is legit." Also, I love the way they marketed their ice cream. Go ahead. Have 9 inches of fun and yum. However, be aware that much of the marketing in New Orleans in overly sexualized, and given what I study, I have a pretty high tolerance. Just be aware that it isn't kid friendly, and referring to sexual acts or body parts in all contexts is pretty normal. Also, don't be surprised if you see half naked men and women in the streets at all hours.

5. When in New Orleans, eat the food. Beware that even lunch can set you back $15-$20, but I'd splurge anyways. I'd highly recommend the muffaletta at Cochon Butcher. When you aren't splurging, there are plenty of complimentary events at Tales that serve food.

6. Some brands ~~have an endless marketing budget~~ recognize the need for brand awareness. I attended the William and Grant Party at the National War Museum, and their party made anything I've seen look like child's play. Bars were set up all over the gigantic museum along with a hot dog cart outside and raw shucked oysters inside. Singers and dancers were on stage. A photobooth was set up in one of the exhibits. Farm animals were brought to the party for what I think was a Farm to Bar demonstration of sorts. I milked a cow named Cassie (below).

Other brands blocked off entire streets to build their parties, and one brand even transformed a street into a beach completely with sand. I hope no one is asking about the ROI on that one.

7. Watch out for the horses. Horses are all over New Orleans giving buggy rides to as part of the police department. Watch out as they are large animals that might accidentally run into you, kick you, step on you, or leave you a nice pile of fertilizer.

8. Other random tips: AT&T service in New Orleans was spotty at best. It kept going in and out randomly. So you might have to resort to old fashioned means of navigation, like using a hard copy map or asking for directions.

9. Hotel service generally stinks. Most of the hotel staff was unhelpful when it came to directions. I would ask the doorman if he knew where a particular restaurant was located, and he acted as if he had never heard of it. The restaurant was a 30 second walk away. A Tales volunteer and I asked a hotel staff member at the Monteleone about the location of a room inside the hotel, and she did not know. I'm unsure if hotel staff across the city truly didn't know about rooms and other businesses in New Orleans or if they were trying hard to be really unhelpful. Nonetheless, it isn't very much like traditional Southern hospitality.

10. If you can avoid it, don't drive. Driving and parking in the French Quarter is only slightly easier than driving in Taiwan during rush hour. I left my car at the hotel valet (in which they managed to drain a new battery), and I opted to walk. Next time, I will not be leaving my car at that hotel valet. See number 9: poor hotel service. I'll also add that all the valets left my lifeless car in the middle of their drive for two hours without offering to help. Even passerby's offered to help me. I managed to fix the problem myself.

11. The attendees there can be extra amorous and need a good cattle prod to keep them away. I met two men who I assumed were a romantic couple given their behaviors, but it took some strong words and defensive moves to get the message across that I was not interested. I spoke to a married (heterosexual) couple at Tales who also had the same problem even with their partner physically present and trying to ward off the advances. If I go to Tales again, I'm bringing some neutering devices and lowering the device engagement threshold. No, I'm not joking. When you see the hemostats come out, you better start running.

#Benefit4Daniel @MeetatTexas and the Austin Food Community Scrapbook

2011-07-05T08:05:00.001-07:00

Tickets and donation for Benefit4Daniel link here.
SUBMIT stories to Austin Food Community Scrapbook here.

In a world where we think human connections are giving way to online interaction and everyone is in the rat race, stories about love and community are becoming farther and fewer between. But that’s not the case in Austin, TX. You might have heard about it. The Music Capital of the World. The Allergy Capital of the world. Silicon Valley of Texas. Those are just a few names for our ever evolving city with a small town feel.

Lovely Ladies of Derby Day 2011. From L to R, @CakeAustin, Paula from Paula's Spirits, Valerie the Forager, @KristiFarm2tbl, and myself. Photo Courtesy of @CakeAustin.

People in Austin are nice. Being weird is cool, and talking to strangers is the norm. But I’d like claim that Austin is a daaaaamn nice community. Austin takes Southern Hospitality to another level. We’re not just polite and cordial. We’ve loving, huggy, and smiley. The International Association of Culinary Professionals conference was recently in Austin, and repeatedly, I heard people muttering, “Wow. People here are nice/helpful.” I’m glad that the local Austin food community got to give a little taste of Austin to the out-of-towners because that’s not always the case. I’ve been in many other communities where you had to watch out for who was stabbing your back. You know that someone was doing it, but you weren’t sure who it was this time.

At a food bloggers pot luck circa ~2009. From L to R, Jette, @TastyTouring, @AdamHolzband, @PennyDelosantos, and @TacoJournalism.

The Austin food (and beer community) for that matter is awesome beyond belief. The heart and souls of its members is even more pure than thrice filtered water. While members have their disagreements from time to time, this community bands together for the greater good. From Austin Bakes for Japan to Sustainable Food efforts, and to my own Cupcake Smackdown, it is unbelievable how supportive the community is to one another. Addie Broyles gave a panel discussion on the Austin Food Blogger community at SXSW 2011. The take away message is that even though bloggers are technically competitors with each other, a supportive community can help all bloggers. We are the poster children of rising tides raises all boats. This isn’t just about food bloggers; it is about the many other people in the food community.

Tragedy struck our community when an active member suffered a serious accident. Daniel Curtis, 28, was the behind the scenes man making sure that many events at the Carillon and AT&T Executive Education Center were executed seamlessly. This man not only worked hard behind the scenes, but he was truly a friend to us all. In line with the Austin culture, the community is coming together to throw Daniel a huge fundraising party. This event brings together many talented chefs and local vendors in a way that is bittersweet. Bitter than one of our own is suffering, but sweet that the community is banding in such a way to support him.

Join us on Wednesday, July 13th to celebrate the Austin Food Community, and to share camaraderie over fabulous food, drinks, and company. Even if you can't make it to the event, any donation is greatly appreciated. A very special thank you to all the chefs, bartenders, vendors, and amazing staff for putting this one. Ticket and donation link here.

With Austin earning national nods for our food community, I wanted a way to capture the community into one centralized location. Locals know what makes us a community, but I feel that out-of-towners don't get a comprehensive view. I'm starting a side project that can be conceptualized as an Austin Food Community Virtual Scrapbook. It is essentially a collection of blog posts, tweets, submitted stories, photos, or videos about the Austin Food Community. It will be a resource for people to use when describing the Austin Food community, and our scrapbook so we can reflect on how we change over the years. I'm only kicking myself for not doing this earlier. In the last three years, many stories and events have already been forgotten or were never written down. From the Austin Bakes for Japan campaign, to 24 Hours of Cooking, and to my own Cupcake Smackdown, these are acts of community that make Austin AWESOME!

SUBMIT stories here. https://spreadsheets.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?hl=en_US&formkey=dFZCaHRWRHNFLVQ5VmxRRXJ4RWttcFE6MQ#gid=0

If you'd like to volunteer at the event, sign up here.

This project will be on-going, and I'm not quite sure where the final product will rest yet. It will be used at Daniel's Benefit, and start off as a blog post on my blog. It is my intention to keep it somewhere public so we can all enjoy it. I'll start with the first submission.

Here's a photo of @BroylesA and myself at La Dolce Vita in 2009. I love Addie because she can smile and throw grapes at the same time!

Cupcake Smackdown 3.0 Wrap up post

2011-06-15T07:34:00.000-07:00

The party may be over, and from the looks of the photos, Cupcake Smackdown 3.0 was a blast (pun intended!). The estimated attendance this year was 1,500 humans and 30 canines who gathered to enjoy cupcakes, local craft beer, bbq, shooting green pigs, and the photo booth. Hungry Todd Rungy also broke a record of eating 6 sugar free cupcake in under 59.2 seconds to raise awareness for diabetes. While the goal of Cupcake Smackdown(s) is to provide a community event to promote local businesses, the event also serves as a case study in social media. For the last three years, Cupcake Smackdown was organized and promoted via social media only. While we have received our fair share of earned traditional media (radio and television news), zero advertising dollars were spent on the event. It can be done.

A giant thanks to all of our sponsors (listed below) for making this event happen. And a special thanks for all the breweries for providing delicious local craft beers at our parties. I encourage everyone to check them out and to keep supporting our local breweries. If you don't see them our your favorite bar, a little gentle coaxing can sometimes get more craft beers on the menu.

There isn't enough space to post all the Cupcake Smackdown photos taken by Annie Ray, but here's the link to them. I had a serious problem of trying to pick the cutest ones to include in this post.

For a Twitter stream of the #cupcakeriot happenings, you can visit our KeepStream here: http://keepstream.com/MisoHungry/hashtag-cupcakeriot-3-dot-0

Photo by John M.P. Knox (@hopsafari)

There's me. Dressed like a pig. Being shot with cupcakes. Oink, Oink! Photo courtesy of @AndreaSchulle

Here's a list of blog posts, videos, and radio links about Cupcake Smackdown (to add yours, email or tweet me):

http://youstayhoppyaustin.blogspot.com/2011/06/june-state-beer-challenge-day-6.html

http://thatsuperawesomeblog.com/2011/06/13/a-few-things-2/

http://www.austintxonthecheap.com/?p=7400

http://www.ginnysaustin.com/?p=1152

http://matadornetwork.com/radar/cupcake-smackdown-austin/

http://austinbeergeek.blogspot.com/2011/06/big-weekend-ahead-for-beer-lovers.html

http://www.freefuninaustin.com/2011/06/cupcake-smackdown-on-saturday.html

http://todo.nowaustin.com/event/411348

http://www.livemom.com/2011/06/03/the-weekenders-events-for-austin-families-june3-5-2011/

http://omssstar.blogspot.com/2011/06/austinist-daily-beirut-part-one-of.html

http://diabetesupdate.blogspot.com/2011/06/ada-eat-cupcakes-for-cure-or-why-you.html

http://www.thesmartkitchenblog.com/2011/06/cupcakeriot-cupcake-smackdown-30.html?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeed

http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com/2011/05/june-4th-cupcake-smackdown-in-austin.html

http://austinist.com/2011/06/02/cupcake_smackdown_30_this_saturday.php

http://www.austin360.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/food2/entries/2011/05/27/how_to_take_advantage_of_inter.html

https://blindedbythebite.wordpress.com/2011/06/09/gluten-free-iacp-recap-blinded-by-the-bite-turns-1-year-old/

http://twitter.com/#!/1queenofspoons/statuses/76285094138093568

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/lonely-gourmet/2011/05/30/lonely-gourmet-friday-radio-feast-special

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVYoCvh5YZk

http://places.blogspot.com/2011/06/tasting-and-launching-austins-best.html

And a GIANT thank you to all of our sponsors:

A special thank you to @ChevyTexan for sponsoring the official #cupcakeriot vehicle. I was completely spoiled by this fully loaded GMC Denali. I did not want to give it back.

The Denali had one of those cool windshield displays. Pretty awesome.

Photo by John M. P. Knox (@hopsafari)

#IACP Austin 2011 - Great food, New Connections, and Entertaining Seminars

2011-06-14T06:30:00.000-07:00

You might have seem the blur. The blur of a bunch of chef coats running through town a few weeks ago. That was the International Association of Culinary Professionals. While the conference has come and gone, the effect that some of the speakers have still stay with us. I didn't get to attend many of the sessions as I was on the host committee, but here's a few of my highlights from the conference.

1. Photos from Three Hot Chefs. I think I don't need words to describe this.

Beautifully vibrant dishes.

Look at that color!

Tyson Cole and staff do some plating.

Chef Brad from Public NY.

Chef Philly and Chef Paul from Uchiko.

2. Denise Vivaldo's late night session on food styling was absolutely hilarious. My goodness, that woman was hilarious. Her presentation of information kept the crowd roaring well past midnight. Also, she brought her attendees milk and Oreo cookies. My favorite line from her was "that showing the ends of pasta was a scandal."

3. Penny De Los Santos and Daniel Klein gave a wonderful morning session on how to craft a story. The take away message was to be transparent and get to know your subject. Be vulnerable and authentic. And once you really fall in love with your subject, the photos or videos will come. Penny had a room full of attendees crying at 9 am when she told her story about following a woman make barbacoa. Yes, the story was that good. And I can't retell it because I'll just butcher it.

4. Kathy Kasey's "It's Better to be Bitter" inspired me to think more about bitters in my cooking. I know 10000x more about bitters now, and I'm pretty excited that we had vodka and bourbon at 10 am. My favorite bitters concoction was ginger ale, ice, bourbon, and two types (I used the chocolate mole bitters). Two really important things I learned about cocktails were 1. how to properly smell bitters and 2. how to flame an orange peel. To properly smell a bitter, put a few drops in your hands, clap, and then inhale your hands. To flame an orange peel, the make sure you warm the orange with the flame first, and then spritz the oil (squeeze the peel) over the flame. Rub the peel around the rim of the glass.

Ya know, for research.

My favorite bitters of the day.

Setting things (orange peels) on fire is always fun.

5. The Opening reception event was pretty amazing. Even if I did get bitten by a monkey. Literally. No joke. Picture of the evil critter below. It was someone's pet. It was not part of the IACP.

Win tix to MIXAustin: Cool your haute bodies with Summer cocktails

2011-06-09T11:56:00.000-07:00

Austinites have to face the truth. We're in the heat of Summer now, and the @ChevyTexan Denali I had for the week registered the temperature at 105 degrees (June 5th). My own car doesn't have a temperature read out for the weather, but I'm going to hazard to guess that the rest of the Summer will be able the same - Texas Hot. Some cocktails might change your tune though.

Google Places is presenting MIX: Celebrate Texas Cocktails on Friday, June 17th, and I am a fan. I've been dabbing in the cocktail culture for several years now, and it is apparent that Austin is blazing through as the "hot and haute" cocktail mecca. The MIX: Celebrate Texas Cocktails celebrates Texas spirits at the Texas Federation of Women's Clubs. Custom-made libations from the crafty hands of local mixologists and fresh ingredients from Whole Foods will be served from 9 pm until midnight. Cocktails will served with yummy freshly baked mmmpanadas, sandwiches from Sugar Shack BBQ, and gastro pub fare from J. Black's. JWG Photography will be capturing the fun!

Liquor sponsors include: SAVVY Handcrafted Vodka, Pecan Street Rum, Deep Eddy Sweet Tea Vodka, Deep Eddy Vodka, Enchanted Rock Vodka,

Treaty Oak Platinum Rum, Republic Tequila, Tequila Ambhar, Paula's Texas Spirits, Tito's Handmade Vodka, Railean Rum, Graham's Texas Tea, and Dripping Springs Vodka.

Tickets are currently on sale for $50 until noon on Friday, June 17 or $60 at the door; price includes drinks and food for the evening. Purchase tickets at http://www.mixaustin.net/tickets.html.

To WIN a pair of tickets to the festivities: you can enter by posting the names of three of my favorite cocktail bars in Austin. It isn't difficult to find which ones are my favorites! @Mousethedog will pick a winner on Tuesday the 14th at noon.

Photo by Cory Ryan courtesy of POM PR.

Date: Friday, June 17th, 9pm until Midnight.

Location: Texas Federation of Women's Clubs, 2312 San Gabriel, Austin, TX 78705.

For more information, please visit: http://www.mixaustin.net/.

FB Event: https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/event.php?eid=135665289841831

Twitter: #MIXtexas

A portion of MIX proceeds will benefit Austin Involved, Austin's newest volunteer movement. Members of Austin Involved have the opportunity to learn about local nonprofits, vote for their choice of inspiring organizations, and give a small donation of time and money as cohesive group in order to make a larger impact. http://austininvolved.org/