[This photo is part of my 2011 Picture a Day project »]

I’m trying to perfect my recipe for chile-infused honey before posting it on Slice. Credit where due: It is 100% inspired by Mike’s Hot Honey, which is available online or from the bar at Paulie Gee’s.

I’m playing with the spice levels. The honey on its own is pretty damn hot. But on a recent pizza I drizzled it on, it wasn’t overpowering. The wife, though, said that the honey (again, on its own) was all heat — that it lost any other flavor components. On the pizza, though, I was able to discern the sweetness it added, and the spiciness was a slow burn. So I might be at the right power level. Still, I want to tweak before posting the definitive recipe.

I’m also a bit concerned about food safety issues. My original source for the technique was actually Serious Eats (imagine that!). But the commenters there brought up the possibility of botulism spores growing in the anaerobic environment of the honey.

Mike’s Hot Honey, I suspect, gets around this by using vinegar (you’ll see it listed on the label). From what I’ve read, heating the honey to 185°F for five minutes should be enough to kill any botulism microbes that could later produce botulism spores. To play it safe, I’d say that you should probably consume this honey within a few days of making it and trash any remaining at the end of a week.

My shipment of King Arthur Sir Lancelot flour came in yesterday, so I made pizza dough last night. I’m probably the worst at using the scientific method to find out what’s wrong with my pizza. I don’t really “control” for anything and end up changing the dough recipe, flour, kneading technique, and/or cooking method (any or all of those) from one pizza night to the next. With these ingredients I ended up using the Jeff Varasano dough recipe with KASL flour. I’ll probably do the skillet-broiler method for cooking when the dough is ready (it’s undergoing a 72-hour cold rise in the refrigerator as I type this.

Note, in case the wife is reading this: I did not use our Epices Roellinger sea salt in this dough. The recipe calls for 18 grams (about 1.5 tablespoons) — that’s too much to use such a precious commodity on. (We got it in Cancale, France, on our honeymoon, so it’s got sentimental as well as flavor value.)

* If you’ve noticed that I skipped 1/10/2010, it’s because the photo was pretty lame. I don’t think I’m going to blog every “Year in Photos” photo here on Kublog. My 365 Photos 2011 set on Flickr will serve as the official repository of year-in-photos images.

** Water not pictured.

These types of stations in Brooklyn are always interesting. I like how you can see the cutaway — how there’s subway life going on below a building or houses. The people in the windows above are probably quite oblivious to the comings and goings of the riders below them.

This photo is part of my attempt to take at least one photograph a day in 2011.

Inspired by SE’r PoorOldMama, we declared January 8 International Serious Eats Day and tried to spark a series of distributed, autonomous meet-ups of SE’rs across the U.S. and around the world.

At the NYC meet-up at Radegast Hall & Biergarten, we had easily more than 100 folks show up. At one point, we pretty much OWNED half the hall,* taking up three-plus tables.

These two women were sitting at one of the SE tables, and I sat down across from them, attempting to be an affable host. They had a box, which I began pawing. “What’s in here?!?”

“Cupcakes. It’s her birthday,” says the one on the left.

“Oh, wow! Happy birthday!”

How cool, I thought, that an SE’r would choose to celebrate her birthday with us during ISEDay.

“Did you make them?!?”

“Um, yeah. Do you want to see them?”

“Sure.”

The one on the left opens the box, and I start shooting pictures. I thank them and leave.

About an hour later, I’m chatting with SENY editor Carey Jones and her boyfriend. Carey’s like, “Um, did you know those two women with the cupcakes weren’t here for the meet-up?”

I AM MORTIFIED.

“It’s OK,” Carey’s BF says, “I explained to them what was going on. But they were pretty freaked out at first.”

So, if you’re reading this, ladies, I’m sorry for bugging you and freaking you out. My birthday gift to you is the weird story you had to tell your friends later that day.

* Many thanks to Radegast, whose hospitality in the face of such unexpected numbers was impeccable. The beer and food were great, too!

To say that this is not the most glamorous Date Night would be an understatement, but Claire had a craving for Mexican. We tossed around the idea of doing Taco Night at home with a box-taco mix, but we were slow getting out of the house. So down to the local Chinese Mexican place we went.

That’s a Mexican joint run by Chinese folks. I guess I’ve been in NYC long enough that that does not sound weird. In fact, there are quite a number of these places now. The hallmark of a Chinese-run Mexican joint (besides the unconventional ethnic mashup) is the fresh tortilla machine. All these places have a tortilla press that spits out thin rounds of flour dough onto a griddle, a process you see happen before your eyes after you order.

The first such instance of this now-classic NYC restaurant genre seems to have appeared in 1991, when De Shi Zheng and his wife, Rose, opened the first Fresco Tortilla at 24th and Lexington. The New York Times has a good history of the place in this 1997 story by Anthony Ramirez.* The Zhengs own the original (which appears to be there still) and maybe a couple others (though the one on 42nd Street closed when the B of A building construction razed the block in the mid 2000s). But a legion of imitators has sprung up in the years since. Sounds kind of like the Ray’s/Original/Famous Ray’s pizzeria mystery. (You’ll notice, for instance, that the one near us is Fresca Tortillas whereas the Zhengs’ chain is Fresco Tortillas.)

Anyway, the thing I love about Fresca Tortillas (and the others like it) is that it pretty much tastes like the taco nights my mom used to do. I’m pretty sure they’re just getting a Lawry’s taco-seasoning mix (or, more likely, the industrial food-service equivalent from, say, Sysco) and flavoring the ground beef with that. And the shredded cheddar cheese, iceberg lettuce, and flavorless tomato is straight out of the white-Midwesterners-make-tacos playbook. So is the hard-shell taco. Gotta get it in the hard shell.

Once we finally get our house organized and cleaned so we can entertain, we’re going to do Taco Night here at the homestead. I want to serve it on our good china. Until then, we’ll have to be content with Frescas Tortillas.

* It’s somewhat remarkable in and of itself that Fresco/a Tortillas managed to get this much ink — the 1997 story I linked to above, and also a 1991 mention in the “$25 and Under” column by Eric Asimov, which is reprinted on the menus and hangs on the wall of the one I go to. These days, these places are fairly unremarkable and are shunned by “foodies,” but at one point — maybe just because of the unusual ethnic mashup — they warranted coverage. Then again, the Times is often pretty good about noticing quirky offbeat stories.

The Citigroup Center building (on the left, with the sloped roof) has a fascinating story. I’d explain it, but you can just go to Wikipedia to read it.

On the right, the oval-shape building is the Lipstick Building. It was designed in part by Philip Johnson and is where Bernie Madoff schemed his schemes.

OK … so I didn’t actually take this photo — but I art-directed it, so I think that counts. (Claire took it.) Plus, I took other photos today that I could have subbed in to this slot, so I’m still within the spirit of the project.

Here, I’m using the mini grater that Claire got me for Christmas from a cool little store in Soho called Kiosk. Here’s the description of the grater from the Kiosk site:

Ah…Italian invention! We were actually introduced to this grater by friends in Berlin. Brilliant. Great for those nights when you have to cook something but can’t even reach for the metal grater. Too much effort! We store our Parmesan inside of it in the fridge so it is always on standby. Our student life would have been saved with this one, it is never too late!

I’ve been doing the same — leaving it in the fridge with a chunk of cheese in it. I use it up fast enough that it doesn’t A) smell up the fridge or B) take on other fridge smells.

Has a sort of Star Wars feel. Or a very sinister Space Mountain vibe.

Inspired by the semi-dried cherry tomato topping at Di Fara, I did a trial run of semi-dried grape tomatoes (my market didn’t have the former in stock). Lesson learned here? Shoot before-and-after photos under the same lighting conditions. Duh. The top photo is shot under our range’s built-in fluorescent cooktop light, while the photo just above was shot under the incandescent oven bulb. I’ll make these again, at which point I’ll normalize the lighting in both shots.

I know Christmas is over, and New Year’s is already a thing of the past, but I liked this Christmas scene in the lobby of the Citibank building in Long Island City. Very corporate.

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I must seem like a beginning photography student, taking all these pictures of corrugated sheet metal.

What can I say? I like the colors.

This one, of my longtime friends Charlie and Jeff, was too good not to include. I haven’t seen these guys in a long time, and it was good to catch up a bit.

This is how I always think of these two—making bizarre inside jokes and causing lots of laughter among themselves and friends.

I went to see a play in preview called Being Audrey on Friday night. My friend Sarah is one of the producers (Transport Group).

Oh so conveniently, it happened that Tonda, one of the many new pizzerias to open in the last week, is just across the street.

I tweeted Kathryn and Dan to see if they wanted to meet up for a quick dinner, as they’re fairly close to Tonda and can always be counted on for food scouting.

The staff turned down the lights right after we sat down, and Kathryn was like, “Um, did they know you were coming and wanted to foil your shots?”

But then she remembered a hack she read about—using an iPhone screen to illuminate the scene.

“It works better with two iPhones,” she said, but the single phone did the trick. Who knew!

As far as Tonda goes, I’ll have to go back a couple more times before really giving it a write-up, but I’m reserving judgment for now.

I’m on a quest to find the best gyro in New York. The Greek Corner was recommended somewhere as not "the best" but at least a good one. It was actually pretty good. It’s conveniently close to the office.

We took in a subtenant in the office and had to rearrange. That meant taking all the books off the bookshelves before moving them. We stupidly stacked them on the table—the same table we needed to move the next day, necessitating more book shuffling.

The Chia Obama seems to have a design flaw. The water seeps out too quickly, so the top of his head is relatively less moist than the bottom. Subsequently, his “hair” grows better toward the bottom but not on top.

I wonder if the president would be pleased to know that his Chia likeness exhibits male pattern baldness.

This photo and the last one will reveal a bit of a not-so-scandalous secret. I don’t really blog these photos to Kublog the day I take them. Often, I do them in batches and then timestamp them for the date they were taken on.

As you can see, this photo is from the same session as the March 28 photo. I’m doing two karaoke pictures in a row because I was damaged enough the next day that I didn’t even think of picking up the camera. And, technically, this still counts, since it was taken shortly after midnight on March 29.

For self-portraits, I’ve set my camera’s custom self-timer mode to shoot five photos with a two-second delay between each. While singing, I set the camera to self-timer, and balanced it on a glass. It managed to take some crappy photos before someone grabbed it and took this one.

We went to Duet 48 on East 48th and Second Avenue. It was the nicest karaoke den I’ve been to yet. Attending: Dan, Katie, Jori, Matty, Michele, T. J., Beth, Erik, and Justin.

As part of my job, I have to take photos for the food-blogging I do. So I try to avoid using them for “365″ shots. But sometimes I forget to take a separate non-work-related photo and have to rely on something I shot for one of the sites.

At least this one isn’t food itself. And I kinda like the lighting in it. Taken during the friends-and-family-and-neighborhood preview night at Anselmo’s Coal Oven Pizza.

On the way back from league bowling night at The Gutter.

Another shot of the Gowanus Canal, this time from Union Street looking south. I took this on the way home from having dinner with some friends and former coworkers at Martha Stewart Living.

Rafiqi’s street carts are redoing their menus. I caught the guys in action on a photo shoot.

Currently, dishes are pictured on the carts’ menus in Styrofoam containers. The new visual menus will feature plated food instead.

I think it actually sold more than lottery tickets, but it would be funny if there were a store that only sold scratchers and Powerball.

Taken on the way back from a burger-scouting mission at The Half King.

Taken while returning home from a pizza-scouting mission in Carroll Gardens. I love the Gowanus Canal and the area around it.

Like many people of my age and kind, I’m fascinated with decay and desolate industrial areas. I’m also fascinated by water and can sit and look at bodies of water for—if not hours—a long time.

I would love to live alongside the Gowanus Canal if it weren’t so polluted and didn’t have the potential to smell so bad.

The red on the pilings is from the glow of a warning light.

I like dogs. I really do think they have therapeutic qualities, and I feel much calmer around them.

Therefore, it’s nice to see them on subways.

“So What’cha Want,” Beastie Boys

Earlier in the day I noticed once again that the MTA has been re-covering the old orange and yellow train seats with an overlay of that ugly new blue color that you see in the new R160 cars. It looks hideous.

My favorite color is orange, and I also think orange and yellow are nice colors to wake up to. Subsequently my bathroom towels are mostly orange and yellow. I like going onto the subway and seeing this bright, cheerful color scheme.

So on the way home very late that night, I was on a car with very few people and figured I’d document the old seats for the day when they’re either all re-covered or this model of car is replaced by R160s.

I had a few shots of empty seats and then got the idea to place the camera beneath a bench to shoot the opposite side of the car.

It looks like someone here saw what I was up to.

In the gold band, it says, "Full growth in 1 to 2 weeks."

Wish we could say the same about the economy.

I’ve always liked this weirdly styled model. It looks like it’s ready to go nose-over.

The single cheeseburger at Petey’s Burger. I liked the double cheeseburger there more.

The New York Botanical Garden Orchid Show.

Another BMW 2002 in my neighborhood. This one is often parked in front of the Tea Lounge on Union Street.

Nice vintage signage on West 26th Street.

Bowling during league night at The Gutter in Williamsburg/Greenpoint.

This is perhaps the lamest "365 Photo" I’ve ever taken.

This is a half-eaten Egg McMuffin from the McDonald’s just around the corner. It was sitting on an air conditioner cage outside a building. I tried to do a macro shot. It was blurry. I figured I’d take another photo later in the day.

I forgot to.

So this is what we’re stuck with. Enjoy!

It’s black until you put hot liquid in it. Then the bingo balls are revealed. It’s a lame 365, but there you go.

365.68: Me, Recombobulating, originally uploaded by Adam “Slice” Kuban.

The folks at General George Mitchell International Airport (MKE) certainly have a sense of humor: Airport Draws Smiles with “Recombobulation Area”

Airport Director C. Barry Bateman thought the sign would be funny, so airport workers crafted it in their maintenance shop, [airport spokeswoman Pat] Rowe said. “We work really hard here, but it’s also important to have some fun.”

365.67: Milwaukee Art Museum, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

If my info is still correct, the Calatrava Addition at the Milwaukee Museum of Art is the only Santiago Calatrava building in the U.S. It’s nice to see how the city has embraced this signature building, and, if the in-flight magazine I read is correct, it has spurred a bit of an architectural renaissance in Milwaukee. People there are apparently much more willing to support out-of-the-ordinary buildings now.

365.66: Maria’s Pizza, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

Maria’s Pizza is simply awesome. I’ll blog about it on Slice later. It was a comforting end to a depressing day that started with the funeral early this morning. It rained all day and was cold—just above freezing. So capping the day with Maria’s, a pizza I grew up eating, was nice.

365.65: Motel Hall, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

Well, my paternal grandmother died early on the morning of March 2. C. and I flew in to Milwaukee for the funeral on Saturday morning. This is the motel we’re all staying in. I thought this was a fairly typical motel scene.

Many of my family members on my father’s side are staying here, too—his brother and sister and several of my cousins.

365.64: Driving, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

Coming back from bowling. Took out a Toyota Matrix via Zipcar. Scored a 166 tonight. My highest in a while. Still doesn’t come close to my onetime 180 average when I bowled on a youth league in grade school.

365.63: Snickers, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

I had a better photo for today, but someone didn’t want me to make the photo public, even though it didn’t show her face. Granted, it was more about what else was in the photo than her headless body.

365.62: Snowy Night, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

Yeah. It’s another lame shot. I realized I hadn’t taken anything today and shot this on the way back to my apartment. In this weather, I didn’t feel like ranging wide and far to find something better.

365.61: Sixth Avenue and 28th Street, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

What a nasty day.

This is a brownfield site on 42nd Street near the Hudson. They don’t seem to be making much progress cleaning it up.

Taken while driving to Pennsylvania. My paternal grandmother, who’s in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s in Lancaster, has stopped eating and drinking. This might be one of the last times I get to see her, sadly.

It’s Our Pleasure to Serve You, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

I’m on a prescription for something called a “Z pak”—an antibiotic—along with some sort of cortisone. Doctor says I should be feeling better in a couple of days.