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Thanks, EatLiver.COM:

Julie, a blogger over at Wine Me Dine Me Cincinnati, asked in this article if female bloggers are taken seriously. Here’s my reaction:

To be honest, I am not sure the gender of the blogger matters to me at all… Content rules. My selection of blogs to read is not influenced by the gender of the writer (it seems unlikely to me that I’d recommend a blog to someone just because, “it’s written by a man!”. If I recommended a blog to you in such a way, I imagine that your first question would be, “What’s the blog about?” — asking about the content).

In fact, of the blogs I read regularly (I have a giant list of feeds in my FeedDemon) that aren’t specifically gender-focused, I tend not to know the gender of the author in most cases. The content is what’s important and is the ultimate measure of the value of the blog in my world.

Also, though I cannot speak to the motiviations of your friend who said, “Does it really matter?” , I suspect that he was commenting on the fact that content, not gender, should determine if a blog is taken seriously. That being said, I feel it was short-sighted that the author of the local article did not include female bloggers, or any bloggers other than white males.

My short answer to the question of if female bloggers are taken seriously is the same answer to the question of if male bloggers are taken seriously: No. Bloggers are not taken seriously solely as a function of gender. If the content is good and should be taken seriously, then they are — and should be — taken seriously as bloggers. Regardless of gender.

Do I feel that people should or should not read my blog solely because of my gender? No. I hope to attract and keep them with my (infrequently-updated) content that happens to be written by a male.

The broader question — are bloggers taken seriously? — is a salient one even removing the gender issue. As a blogger of more than 12 years (and sysop of The Cafe’ BBS for years before that), I believe that bloggers are not taken as seriously as “traditional” journalists. And, in my opinion as a long-time blogger, that’s okay. I take my blogging seriously, but do not think that I am doing anything more than sharing my opinion with those who care to read it.

The oldest blogs (not counting “finger” .plans which date into the late 1970’s, but don’t fit into the widely-accepted definition of “blogs”) ON THE PLANET are less than 30 years old (the first “dot com” was registered in 1985). Just one example, I’ve got copies of GOURMET magazine from the 1950s in my house, and they’re not “early” issues! GOURMET was founding in the early 1940’s, I think, so they’re incredibly established and therefore have a longer, more enduring reputation to uphold. It’s far too easy to start a blog — no matter if one has the “chops” or not — and call oneself a ‘journalist’, expecting to be taken seriously.

Do I think this will always be the case? No, of course not. We’re exploring the web and blogging as new media and the validity of bloggers seems to be increasing. But just because one has a keyboard and a blank page, it doesn’t make one a writer any more than having a knife and a pan makes one a chef.

Wednesday, July 16 2008 was a Wine Dinner event at the Midwest Culinary Institute at Cincinnati State Technical and Community College. It was hosted by Chef Matt Winterrowd and the cooking staff of The Summit restaurant, and they did a great job.

First Course
Scallops with gnocchi and fava beans served with Basa Blanco Rueda 2007

Soft-shell crab

Second Course
Soft shell crab with black beans, avocado, lime and chilies with Vega Sindoa Chardonnay 2006

Roasted Pork

Third Course
Roasted Pork with tomatillo, jicama and plaintain with Tres Picos Garnacha 2006

Grilled Wagyu

Fourth Course
Grilled Wagyu Hanger Steak with Porcini, Polenta and Pecorino and kale with Bodegas Volver Tempranillo 2005 and Altos De Luzon 2004

Cheese course

Fifth Course
Cheese Tray of LaSerena, raw sheep, Spain
Drunken Goat, Spain
Mrs. Quickes Cheddar, England
Bleu d/Auvergne, France
and white chocolate truffle with Jorge Ordonez Especial Muscat 2005

Wendy's winning cake

This cake by Wendy just won Best Of Show at the Butler County Fair. Congratulations!

I think we can retire on the prize money.

You owe it to yourself to go here — quickly (before Sunday July 20, 2008 at midnight) — and watch this. Start at the beginning and enjoy!

Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog

Update: Dr. Horrible is no longer on the web free, but you can get the entire series for less than $5 at iTunes! Totally worth it.

I recently purchased a Dell Latitude XT Tablet PC, my first foray into the world of laptop/tablet PCs. I quickly noticed that the machine gets fairly warm during normal laptop operation, and that it sits fairly flat on my desk, making airflow underneath difficult. Plus the angle of the keyboard was flat and made long typing sessions a bit uncomfortable.

I tried to think of an inexpensive solution to these issues… I’d read about using wine corks to elevate the back of the machine, and even tried small pads of Post-It notes but nothing satisfied me.

That is, until I was cleaning out a closet and came across an old Jenga game. Judging from its position near the very back of the closet, up on a top shelf, it was apparent that it hadn’t been thought of, let alone played with in years. So I swiped a couple pieces from the game and placed them under the back corners of my XT. The pieces are nice and solid, they raise the machine just enough to make the keyboard more comfortable, and very, very inexpensive (you can probably get Jenga games at a second-hand shop for next to nothing — and who cares if the set is incomplete!).

Now, I keep a couple Jenga pieces on the desk in my office and at home, and I threw a couple into both of my travel bags, so I’ve always got them with me and ready to use.

Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I’ll have a long beard by the time I read them.

– Arnold Lobel

On June 24, 2008, version 2.1 of the hydrocolloid recipe collection edited by Martin Lersch was released. This excellent collection is a useful (and free!) resource for those of us interested in molecular gastronomy. See below for download links for the PDF of the current version as well as the previous two versions. A PDF reader is required to view or print this document. (Please see the note below about printing.)

Lersch describes this new version, excerpted from his blog post:

This new version includes corrections of typos, minor additions to the property tables, plus an important update in the gelatin section and a recipe for agar filtration.

Thanks to feedback from a reader there is also recipe now for agar filtration (based on a Spanish forum post). This works just like gelatin filtration, but is much faster. Apparently you get more or less the same results with regard to clarity, flavor and color.

If printing the collection, make sure the hydrocolloid properties table is rotated so it prints correctly. This table is presented in landscape format. The right most column of the first page is gelatin - if you don’t see it, try printing these pages again. The pages are optimized for printing on A4. If printing on Letter sized paper, make sure you check the “resize” or “fit to paper” option in your pdf reader.

Lersch, from the Forward of the new edition:

A hydrocolloid can simply be defined as a substance that forms a gel in contact with water. Such substances include both polysaccharides and proteins which are capable of one or more of the following: thickening and gelling aqueous solutions, stabilizing foams, emulsions and dispersions and preventing crystallization of saturated water or sugar solutions.

In the recent years there has been a tremendous interest in molecular gastronomy. Part of this interest has been directed towards the “new” hydrocolloids. The term “new” includes hydrocolloids such as gellan and xanthan which are a result of relatively recent research, but also hydrocolloids such as agar which has been unknown in western cooking, but used in Asia for decades. One fortunate consequence of the increased interest in molecular gastronomy and hydrocolloids is that hydrocolloids that were previously only available to the food industry have become available in small quantities at a reasonable price. A less fortunate consequence however is that many have come to regard molecular gastronomy as synonymous with the use of hydrocolloids to prepare foams and spheres. I should therefore emphasize that molecular gastronomy is not limited to the use of hydrocolloids and that it is not the intention of this collection of recipes to define molecular gastronomy.

Along with the increased interest in hydrocolloids for texture modification there is a growing scepticism to using “chemicals” in the kitchen. Many have come to view hydrocolloids as unnatural and even unhealthy ingredients. It should therefore be stressed that the hydrocolloids described in this collection are all of biological origin. All have been purified, some have been processed, but nevertheless the raw material used is of either marine, plant, animal or microbial origin. Furthermore hydrocolloids can contribute significantly to the public health as they allow the reduction of fat and/or sugar content without loosing the desired mouth feel. The hydrocolloids themselves have a low calorific value and are generally used at very low concentrations.

One major challenge (at least for an amateur cook) is to find recipes and directions to utilize the “new” hydrocolloids. When purchasing hydrocolloids, typically only a few recipes are included. Personally I like to browse several recipes to get an idea of the different possibilities when cooking. Therefore I have collected a number of recipes which utilize hydrocolloids ranging from agar to xanthan. In addition to these some recipes with lecithin (not technically a hydrocolloid) have been included. Recipes for foams that do not call for addition of hydrocolloids have also been included for completeness. Some cornstarch recipes have been included to illustrate it’s properties at different consentrations. Recipes where flour is the only hydrocolloid do not fall within the scope of this collection as these are sufficiently covered by other cook books.

All recipes have been changed to SI units which are the ones preferred by the scientific community (and hopefully soon by the cooks as well). In doing so there is always uncertainty related to the conversion of volume to weight, especially powders. As far as possible, brand names have been replaced by generic names. Almost all recipes have been edited and some have been shortened significantly. To allow easy comparison of recipes the amount of hydrocolloid used is also shown as mass percentages and the recipes are ranked in an ascending order. In some recipes, obvious mistakes have been corrected. But unfortunately, the recipes have not been tested, so there is no guarantee that they actually work as intended and that the directions are complete, accurate and correct. It appears as if some of the recipes are not optimized with regard to proper dispersion and hydration of the hydrocolloids which again will influence the amount of hydrocolloid used. It is therefore advisable to always consult other similar recipes or the table with the hydrocolloid properties. The recipes have been collected from various printed and electronic sources and every attempt has been made to give the source of the recipes.

Since recipes can neither be patented nor copyrighted, every reader should feel free to download, print, use, modify, and further develop the recipes contained in this compilation. The latest version will be available for download from this page and will also be announced on Khymos blog. I would like to thank readers for giving me feedback and suggestions on how to improve the collection. Feedback, comments, corrections and new recipes are always welcome to webmaster at  khymos dot org.

Download:

• Texture - A hydrocolloid recipe collection (version 2.1, June 2008) - 1.6 Mb
• Texture - A hydrocolloid recipe collection (version 2, May 2008) - 1.8 Mb
• Hydrocolloid recipe collection (version 1, August 2007) - 433 kB