Saturday, November 19, 2005

GRILLED TEA-BRINED TURKEY WITH TEA-AND-LEMON GRAVY

For best flavor and moist, juicy meat, brine the turkey for 36 to 48 hours. If you are planning to brine it in a cooler, plan on needing extra ice. Kosher salt is preferred in most brine recipes for its pure flavor and because it dissolves quickly.

5 lemons, divided
18 Earl Grey tea bags
11 4-inch-long rosemary sprigs, divided
2 cups coarse kosher salt
1 1/2 cups (packed) golden brown sugar
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
12 cups ice cubes
2 turkey-size oven-roasting bags
1 22-pound turkey; neck, heart, and gizzard reserved for gravy

1 12 3/4x9x2-inch disposable aluminum pan
1 celery stalk, cut crosswise into 3-inch pieces
1 medium onion, quartered
1/4 cup olive oil

Tea-and-Lemon Gravy

Bring 6 1/2 quarts water to boil in large pot. Remove from heat. Using vegetable peeler, remove peel from 3 lemons (yellow part only). Add peel, tea bags, and 6 rosemary sprigs to water; steep 20 minutes. Remove tea bags. Add salt and sugar; stir to dissolve. Stir in lemon juice. Cool to lukewarm. Add ice to reduce temperature to below 45°F.

Place 1 roasting bag inside the second, forming 2 layers. Place inside large pot. Place turkey in roasting bags, breast side down. Pour brine over turkey. Tie bags tightly, eliminating any air pockets. Refrigerate 36 to 48 hours. Or, place bags into large cooler, pour brine over turkey, and tie bags securely. Pour ice over and around turkey in bags. Place lid securely on cooler. Check twice a day to ensure that turkey is covered with ice (some ice will melt). Remove top rack from grill. Place disposable aluminum baking pan in center of barbecue (if using 2-burner gas grill, place pan on 1 side of grill; if using 3-burner grill, place pan over center burner).

Prepare barbecue (medium-low heat). If using charcoal grill, arrange coals on each side of aluminum baking pan, dividing equally. (You will need to add about 6 briquettes to each side of aluminum pan every 30 minutes to maintain temperature while cooking turkey.) If using 3-burner gas grill, light burner(s) on left and right, leaving center burner(s) off. If using 2-burner gas grill, light burner on side opposite disposable pan. Insert instant-read thermometer into top vent of grill. Maintain temperature at around 350°F.

Drain turkey; discard brine. Pat turkey dry. Pierce 2 lemons all over with fork. Stuff turkey with lemons, 5 sprigs rosemary, celery, and onion. Tie legs together. Brush turkey all over with oil.

Place turkey directly on grill above aluminum pan. Close grill. Adjust temperature to maintain 350°F. Roast turkey until thermometer inserted into thickest part of thigh registers 175°F, about 3 hours. Transfer turkey to platter. Tent with foil. Allow to rest 30 minutes before carving (internal temperature will rise 5 to 10 degrees). Serve with gravy.

Makes 16 servings.

Bon Appétit
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November 2004


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Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Data mining hits pay dirt
http://www.nashvillecitypaper.com/index.cfm?section=51&screen=news&news_id=44031
By Don Mooradian, dmooradian@nashvillecitypaper.com
August 31, 2005

Welcome to the Information Age. Now what are we going to do with all that info, an amount so vast few humans can make sense of it?

Two Nashville companies are leading the way in new fields that have names such as data mining, text mining and knowledge discovery. These fields generally fall under the category of ?artificial intelligence.

Software has long been able to sort and organize information, but a new generation of software is going where no bytes have gone before. These programs are pinpointing customers for direct mail advertisers and fighting the war on terrorism. And some day soon they will help fight crime and cure disease.

Digital Reasoning Systems, on West End Avenue, recently landed a five-year, $7 million contract to provide its Interceptor Suite artificial intelligence (AI) software development and information-architecture services to the U.S. Army National Ground Intelligence Center for the fight against terrorism.

The software looks at enormous volumes of raw intelligence (much of it text) gathered through human and electronic sources. It finds patterns at the deepest levels of the content and then presents the information in a variety of formats. It helps enable analysts and policy-makers to quickly grasp the meaning and significance of information.

?Our company's goal is not to store data and move it around, but to start understanding the data itself. It is very important that you be able to find meaning in all this info, said Tim Estes, founder and chief executive officer of DRS. ?Not knowing something can cost money; cost lives.

He said the traditional approach is for programme"
Welcome to the Information Age. Now what are we going to do with all that info, an amount so vast few humans can make sense of it?

Two Nashville companies are leading the way in new fields that have names such as ?data mining,? ?text mining? and ?knowledge discovery.? These fields generally fall under the category of ?artificial intelligence.?

Software has long been able to sort and organize information, but a new generation of software is going where no bytes have gone before. These programs are pinpointing customers for direct mail advertisers and fighting the war on terrorism. And some day soon they will help fight crime and cure disease.

Digital Reasoning Systems, on West End Avenue, recently landed a five-year, $7 million contract to provide its Interceptor Suite artificial intelligence (AI) software development and information-architecture services to the U.S. Army National Ground Intelligence Center for the fight against terrorism.

The software looks at enormous volumes of raw intelligence (much of it text) gathered through human and electronic sources. It finds patterns at the deepest levels of the content and then presents the information in a variety of formats. It helps enable analysts and policy-makers to quickly grasp the meaning and significance of information.

?Our company?s goal is not to store data and move it around, but to start understanding the data itself. It is very important that you be able to find meaning in all this info,? said Tim Estes, founder and chief executive officer of DRS. ?Not knowing something can cost money; cost lives.?

He said the traditional approach is for programme"

Friday, June 03, 2005

How To Use a Shovel

"Yeah, well the world needs ditchdiggers too"--Judge Smales, Caddyshack

There seems to be a tremendous bias in this country against manual labor. Many people that I've met could learn something from the most simple of tools - the shovel.

I cannot find any references to when the shovel was actually "invented". It must go back to ancient times, but if some student of archeology could provide more background it would be appreciated.

There are two tricks to using a shovel:

1) You must work hard. Really no way around it. Even creative uses of angles and pressure points cannot remove the effort around accomplishing your goal. For example, when planning a shrub the hole always has to be wider and deeper than you first imagine. Inevitably, you must dig longer than expected. Even in the dead of winter you'll break a good sweat - or you are not working hard enough.

2) You need to know how to reverse the blade to get a right angle dig into the earth - or you work too hard. People that try to dig without an occasional flip and downward jab generally do not reach their goal. Worse yet, they hire someone to do it for them. Pure laziness.

The real challenge comes when digging a proper ditch. A good ditch is straight with symmetrical sides. It is deep enough to accomplish your task - but not so deep as to waste effort. A ditch most likely is for drainage or for holding some sort of pipe or electrical wire. Regardless, you should treat it with respect. Unlike many tasks in life a ditch has a start, a finish and a purpose. Ask yourself how many things the typical white collar worker does during the day that cannot pass that test?

So the next time you see someone using a shovel please treat them with respect. They likely are doing something in the long run more important that you are and certainly are working hard - what more can you ask?

Friday, May 13, 2005

Vanderbilt Student Communications - Thank You to "The Tunnel"

I recently received an alumni newspaper from Vanderbilt Student Communications. What, you may ask, is VSC? This is the non-for-profit holding group for the student newspapers, radio station, television, etc. at Vanderbilt. Pretty boring stuff to most.

I graduated in 1993 after working for the newspaper, The Vanderbilt Hustler, and other publications as a photographer and writer for all four years of college. (Scared my mother to death when I came home telling her I was a photographer for the Hustler). Again, you likely are tempted to add "and didn't date much" to "pretty boring stuff."

We somewhat affectionately referred to ourselves as "tunnel rats" since we never saw the light of day from working in the bottom of Sarratt Student Center. Most other people didn’t refer to us as anything.

My hands stunk almost permanently from film chemicals. Negatives wound in pitch black to an old boom box containing a Yes mixed tape (don’t know where either came from) with the LED's blacked out with tape. Developer (pushing T-Max films way beyond 400), stop bath and then fixer. Then repeat for the prints. Speed was everything - it was a matter of pride who could guess the exposure and then develop, wave by the stop bath and slam into the fixer. Test strips were for pansies. Digital cameras were a myth.

I haven't really touched a camera since.

Then I tried to write a bit. I really stunk at basic reporting but found some satisfaction in opinion and humor writing. Most were tongue-in-cheek adolescent ramblings. But there were a few I remain proud of today - stories brought up in philosophy classes. Stories that emptied the stands of a literary magazine. A few articles that got me threatened and more that got me laughed as a fool - deservedly so.

Today I use bullet point memos, Visio diagram and Blackberry-length emails. This is easily the longest thing I've written in ten years that doesn't involve a budget spreadsheet or SQL to query a database.

But...

I learned to love the elegance of black and white photography. Several will remember a picture I took of the ball popping out of Corey Harris' arms on the LSU goal line - it captures a moment better than any video.

I also saw arguably the best sports in Vanderbilt history from the best seat in the house - on the sidelines.

I learned to love the written word - and respect the power each word can have to hurt and to heal.

I learned how to get people talking and, at the same time, how to begin dealing with my basic introversion.

I discovered a work ethic that I didn't know I had - and that work should have a passion and purpose (because the money stunk).

I learned that despite what professors said, they did give you better grades for well-formatted documents. Thank you PageMaker.

I became enthralled with how technology could actually be used in the real world. Certainly few of my classes prepared me for life outside of the West End corridor.

I learned accounting was hard - and waiting until the last minute was no way to run a business.

I made friends that I still keep in touch with. Not well enough, I might add. But I respect them because we all went through it together and they taught me a lot.

I didn’t do so well in class - my grades were less than spectacular. (I think I once wrote "if you take the square root of my GPA it doesn't change that much”). My parents were none too thrilled.

Also, despite a variety of rumors, nothing ever happened in the darkroom - but not for a lack of trying.

But...

That stupid newspaper taught me about desktop publishing, networking, pre-press, people management and production schedules - things vital to modern marketing success.

I brought in the first film scanners and proper network for file sharing. Remember, this was 1993 - there was only one book on the whole campus library system about the Internet (Zen and the Art of the Internet - Divinity Library in a three ring binder - I know because I checked it out). God only knows how many hours I wasted playing with this stuff.

Why tell this story? In 1995, another Vanderbilt grad and I started a direct mail agency with no money and a computer split on our credit cards. While he sold and wrote copy I started doing the design (badly), networking (better) and database work (pretty good at the time if I may say so myself). It was just two people then and, weirdly, the tunnel knowledge - from tech to working with people to basic accounting - starting showing up as a guide in our business.

Long story short, exactly ten years later we had fourteen million dollars in profitable sales, ninety employees and sold to a large publicly traded database marketing company. We did it by building a team and that was eerily familiar at times to “the tunnel” - especially since our office space stunk. There are certainly better entrepreneurial stories, but I am proud of mine nonetheless.

To make it absolutely clear, without my time in the tunnel, nothing would have ever started.

Too rarely in life, because of this damn work ethic, have I stopped to look around and reflect. Even less frequently do I say "thank you" to people and organizations. Well, without VSC my path in life would be wildly different - just maybe as good but no way as interesting.

So, thank you to all the names I remember but won’t embarrass and also to those I don’t recall. Also, to all of you out there just leaving the tunnel - trust me the hard work will pay off.

Oh, and there is hope. My wife is a beautiful, intelligent sorority girl from Vanderbilt that never understood the pointless inside-joke personals in the back of the Hustler. She married me anyway.

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

For Intuit, 'unanswered prayers' spell success | Newsmakers | CNET News.com

This is an outstanding interview with Scott Cook of Intuit, the maker of Quicken and Quickbooks. More businesses should study and learn from them as they understand the art of serving the customer and promoting a culture of creative risk taking.

Sunday, May 01, 2005

Well, Technorati has Graves Matters listed as the 1,119,625th most read blogging news source today. Still ahead of CBS News but we have a lot of opportunity to increase readership...

Sunday, April 17, 2005

Great blog for common-sense approaches to work http://michaelhyatt.blogs.com/

I recently had the opportunity to have lunch with Michael. I cannot tell you how impressive to have a CEO that tries new things with technology while at the same time focusing on real ways to get real work done. Just proof there is always much to learn in business and life from leaders around us!

Sunday, January 30, 2005

While I hesitate to post a website called "justsocks.com" I would like to share info about "INGenius" socks. These socks have built in liners and are the most comfortable I've ever worn hiking. Highly recommended!

http://www.justsocks.com/catalog/ingenius.cfm


(No offense to justsocks.com, but it just rings too much of 1999 - I am sure you are making money now, though!)