Comment by fsckboy | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fsckboy | Hacker News Reader

>“Oh my God, I hate bananas,” she says, turning toward her tablemates, “but we should totally order it anyway!” They haven’t even finished their appetizers.

there is nothing wrong with talking about an exciting dessert before you've finished your appetizers, what is wrong with this person?

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now, I don't get many chances to tell my flambé story, it's not like the subject comes up very often.

I was at a ridiculously overpriced resort up around Santa Barbara, and we dined in the house restaurant. Mostly we order things compatible with red wine, and one of our selections on this occasion was the Filet Mignon; not my preferred cut at all but it was what they had.

So, it arrived tableside on a little cart, and the waiter proceeded to flambe it to within an inch of its life (by which I mean an inch past that boundary) and the whole performance, specialty of the really old waiter, seemed so old fashioned it jogged my memory I got to thinking "isn't this Steak Diane?" which I somehow remember from my childhood, along with rumaki.

It was late, kitchen was closing, too much other food, and we didn't want to make a fuss, so we let them serve us the piece of shoe leather. But I did ask to see the menu again just to refresh my memory and figure out what happened. And, there was the Filet Mignon, and there was the Steak Diane, and then it struck me! I know what happened.

When I ordered the Filet Mignon, they must have heard "I'd like the flaming one"...

>what is wrong with this person?

Two common kinds of foolishness are:

1. There is no right way to do a thing

2. You must never deviate from the right way of doing the thing

Many foodies derive a misplaced pride from preaching #2.

Some desserts need to be ordered ahead of the meal. The best chocolate soufflé in Chicago was served at La Sardine (now closed), but needed 45 minutes to prepare.

I suppose, then, that it really should be ordered ahead of the meal. Sounds like that would be the right way to do it.

To the #2 point, if the goal is to do a "fresh take on something," by all means, experiment. But if the diner expects exactly what's on the menu, say, traditional chicken pot pie, then I'd say yes; there's only one right way to do it.

Again, the whole issue can be avoided if the menu item reads: "Chef's take on traditional Chicken Pot Pie" Then you can add cumin or whatever.

I'm not so sure I agree with that. Even with chicken pot pie, there are absolutely a few different variations that (in my opinion) are equally valid- most notably, there's the question of whether it needs to have a crust underneath the filling or not. How thick should the filling be? I've had chicken pot pies where the filling is almost a soup, and ones where it's almost firm enough to pick up and eat a slice. Do you use traditional pie crust or a layer of puff pastry on top- or maybe nestle biscuits on top? Should I use potatoes or not, because that'll affect how hearty and filling it is? How about peas? I'll grant that if I use turkey I should call it "turkey pot pie", but what about Cornish game hen? What if I use parsnips instead of carrots?

Then there are different forms- what if I didn't make it in a pie tin, but folded the dough into a half-circle like a hand pie? Or perhaps a rectangle? It might be more accurate to call this a "chicken hand pie" but then you have the ironic problem that a diner might be more willing to order it if they understand that it's really a chicken pot pie in a different shape.

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I know I'm being a bit pedantic here, but here's the thing- you're not wrong in spirit. But I think it's overly reductive to say "yes; there's only one right way to do it".

IMO, it's sort of more like the difference between a cover of a song vs. a remix of a song. In the same way, there's a sliding scale here- a cover of a song might be an attempt to perfectly duplicate the original, or it might be similar but a different artist's take, or it might be a completely different genre (but preserving the song's structure). A remix is a different song entirely that borrows elements of the original.

> a half-circle like a hand pie

Interesting term "hand pie". Is that like a pastie[1]?

Here in Australia, a single-person pie is typically considered a hand pie because they are frequently eaten that way (holding the pie and taking bites out of it) for casual dining. [2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastie

[2] https://westsidetoday-enki-v2.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/up...

this isn't a "foodie" making some judgment of when you should order dessert, it's a restaurant worker dreading having to do the performance of the flambé for the nth time this week (or evening)

Never heard of Steak Diane before, but it seems like it would be tasty.

But, using filet for the dish does seem like a waste, kind of like making a whisky and cola with Buffalo Trace or a cosmo with Grey Goose.

It's my understanding that the filet is preferred for dishes like this because it's not the 'top shelf' product that it is often made out to be

Steak au poivre, for instance, is traditionally prepared with the filet

Now using a ribeye, I would consider that a waste

it's because filet has very little flavor of its own

Try some A5 wagyu and report back on that.

That's totally different, comparing A5 wagyu filet to normal prime filet is ridiculous.

Oh. OK.

Especially when the grades+breeds you're using to describe the meats are specifically describing fat content.

It's like saying "I don't like slim milk because it's low-fat" and responding "try Whole milk". Yeah, no duh, that's the whole conversation.

Sigh. The term used was "filet." A ridiculous generalization was posted and corrected with a perfectly-cromulent counterexample, which was duly downvoted for triggering someone's cognitive dissonance. Life goes on.

Insult me however you’d like, but I’d almost always prefer a filet over ribeye (or any other cut).

It has become very faddish in the past ten years or so to claim that any steak without tons of fat has "no flavor" [sic].

Of course fine filet has tons of flavor – it's clean and intensely beefy and very tender – it's my preferred cut as well. But I don't need every bite of meat I eat to be drowning in fat.

it's not just fat, compare for example to an outside skirt steak, it is no more fatty but much more flavorful

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