Neapolitan niche
02.10.11
As I stood on the patio of Capriccio Saratoga, I wondered briefly if I'd made a mistake bringing my whole family to dinner. Granted, this was essentially a pizza joint, and my children have been eating at white-tablecloth restaurants since they could chew solid food. But as I peeked inside, I realized the wooden tables were very close together and too small for even the smallest drawing pads, and the crowd seemed very adult and subdued.
I was even more worried when the hostess led my 5- and 8-year-olds to a table in the center of the room, inches from two other parties who didn't make eye contact when we had to bump chairs to get ourselves seated.
I needn't have worried. Within minutes of our arrival, a white-coated gentleman appeared with a big smile, two globs of raw pizza dough, and instructions for the children to treat it just like clay. He even kept that smile a few minutes later when my daughter's enthusiastic ministrations upon said pizza clay resulted in a shattered bread plate. Our genial host turned out to be chef Henry Ciccone , who has three young children of his own, and I suspect a fair amount of experience with the perils of family dining.
Source: Albany Times Union
Spouting Off
22.09.11
I have more questions than answers lately. Life is full of "why's" and not enough answers. Today's burning question is this: Why is it so hard to remove the double spout on my portafilter? I have a really nice single spout that is collecting dust and I want to add it to the bottom of my Quick Mill Silvano's portafilter. The handle that comes with the machine has a double spout mounted on it from the factory. I use small shot glasses from Bodum which I think would work better with the single spout. After all I am making only one shot glass worth of espresso at a time.
Seems like the answer to this one would be simple - just take off the double spout and install the single spout and call it a day. There is the rub though. The double spout appears to my untrained eye to be welded on at the very least. Super glue might be added to the threads or mixed in with the greenish locktite looking stuff. Or maybe the portafilter is cast with this double spout attached as part of the mold. This last option seems most likely after futzing around for the better part of fifteen minutes this evening.
Source: ROASTe (blog)