Tag Archives: Boxcar Press on Twitter

Poutine According to Anthony

Posted on by
5

Along with being our esteemed pre-press expert in our platemaking department, Anthony is also our resident expert in all things poutine. Wondering what poutine is and how you can enjoy some of your very own? Anthony is here to the rescue. Poutine is a traditional Canadian dish, originating in Quebec and it involves three basic ingredients near and dear to many people’s hearts – fries, cheese and gravy.

Now, our sources tell us that the best place to get poutine is in Montreal, naturally, at a place called Peel Pub. While you can get poutine in Upstate NY, our restaurateurs are sadly not up to par with the Canadian originators of this fine delicacy. If you’re in Syracuse, you can check out Empire Brewing Company, where they serve up poutine that Anthony gives a rating of “okay”, but he notes that their fries are sliced too thickly. Therein lies the secret to good poutine, folks – thin cut steak fries.

Bearing that in mind, Anthony suggests you cook up some poutine of your own instead of risking a run-in with bad poutine out in the wild. You’ll need steak fries, remembering to ensure they are thinly sliced so you have more surface area to coat with your cheese and gravy. On top of the fries goes a big pile of shredded cheddar cheese – Anthony prefers mild although he notes you might want consider sharp cheddar if you’re into that kind of thing. Drench your cheese-topped fries with beef gravy and you’ll have awesome poutine in no time. Anthony’s secret is that you’ve really got to have warm fries, cold cheese and then warm gravy on top, in that order. If you’re wondering, yes, it’s imperative that your cheese be cold in order for the flavors to meld properly. Traditional poutine often uses cheese curd, so you could give that a whirl, too, but Anthony suggests you give the shredded cheddar a go first. Hungry yet? We are! The entire Boxcar office is now thinking about poutine.

Oh, if you’re not already, you should probably be following Boxcar Press on Twitter where Boxcar Press founder Harold Kyle happily shares endless insight into all things letterpress and occasionally, on days like today, poutine as well.

{Photo from Splitbrain.org}

Boxcar Press Letterpress Platemaking – Free Shipping, Faster Service + Your Feedback

Posted on by
Reply

There are some exciting changes going on here at the old Boxcar – we’re now offering free shipping and faster service to better serve our platemaking customers. Hooray! And while we’re at it, we’d love to get your feedback! Tell us what you think: take our high tech, 4 minute survey and we’ll happily plant a tree for every survey participant. (Oh and you can now follow Boxcar on Twitter, too!)

Free 2-Day Shipping

Be gone, shipping charges! That’s so 2008. We now offer free 2-day UPS shipping on all domestic platemaking orders over 90 square inches.(Edit: As of August 15th, 2014, our minimum platemaking eligibility is 120 square inches) That’s less than 8.5 x 11, if you don’t have a calculator handy! (View our international or other shipping charges)

One Day Turnaround On All Orders!

One day rushes, get out of here! Our standard turnaround is now one day, which means:

* if you send in your order and your ready-to-go files by 5:59 p.m. EST, we’ll ship your order on the next business day. (see new turnaround chart here)
* same day turnaround rushes are still available if you submit your files by 1 p.m. EST (see pricing here)
* if your files aren’t ready to go, keep in mind this may delay your ship date (unless you request that we process your plate no matter what seems wrong with the file)

Questions about any of these changes? Let us know and we’re happy to help!

How to Reach Us (it’s easy, trust us!)

(A happy note: we have finally fired our auto-attendant for our phones. You now get to talk to a real live person when you call during our business hours, 9 a.m.to 6 p.m. EST. Hooray!)

Cathy Smith, Customer Accounts Manager
existing orders & ordering questions • pre-press file prep questions
letterpress printing questions • plate problems • troubleshooting • supply needs
cathy@boxcarpress.com • 315-473-0930 x12Anthony Allen, Prepress Manager
file problems on existing orders
anthony@boxcarpress.com • 315-473-0930 x13

Julie Salzar-Smith, Admin Assistant
billing questions or concerns
julie@boxcarpress.com • 315-473-0930 x14

Kim Stevens, Operations Manager
praise or complaints
kim@boxcarpress.com • 315-473-0930 x15

Cyd Converse, Blog Editor
get your print shop profiled on our blog
share good news and printing samples that we’ll post on our blog
cynthia@boxcarpress.com • 315-473-0930 x19

We like planting trees for you.

Remember, for every platemaking order you place over $100, we plant a tree with American Forests. Over its lifetime, each new tree planted will absorb roughly 740 pounds of carbon dioxide. Go trees!

Need coaching, tutoring, or one on one help for preparing your letterpress files?

We’ve been doing prepress for letterpress for a decade now, and we love helping out both new and old printers & designers overcome technical challenges to create the perfect pre-press files. If you’re new to the polymer world, or if you simply hate file prep, give Cathy a shout out (cathy@boxcarpress.com, 315-473-0930 x 12), and we’ll find ways to make the file prep process a breeze for you. (You also might want to take a look at our file prep tips and our FAQ’s on our web site).

We want to hear your thoughts (and we want to plant you a tree too)

We know Boxcar Press wouldn’t exist without you, so we’ll be honest—we love each and every one of you guys. We admire your enthusiasm for letterpress and we share your passion for cool heavy machinery. And we care a whole lot about what you think. We hope that you share your thoughts, great ideas, and disappointments with us whenever you can—but wouldn’t it be fun to also fill out a high-tech survey about how we’re doing? All you need to do is go here by August 8. It’ll take about 4 minutes of your time, and in return, we’ll plant a tree in your honor with American Forests. Thanks!

Get profiled on the Boxcar Blog!

One of our favorite things to do is recognize our platemaking customers and the great letterpress printing they create with our plates. We’d love to profile your print shop and your work on our blog! Drop an email to cynthia@boxcarpress.com if you’re interested, and check out previous customer profiles on our blog here.

At Boxcar, it’s all about letterpress and the printers who love old presses as much as we do…

Boxcar Press began 10 years ago, with a guy named Harold, a polymer washout brush, a tray full of warm water, a dream about an easy-to-use printing base, a few rescued presses, poetry, and a lot of caffeine. When employee #2 (Debbie, Harold’s wife) joined Boxcar in 2000, Harold was still hand processing plates himself in the basement sink of their Syracuse, NY house and keeping track of orders on a white board. There were no order forms (or auto-attendants either!). Our little company has changed a bit since then. We’ve learned a lot. We have order forms now. Our home is now 12,000 square feet of space in an old artist warehouse in Syracuse, New York, and we have a team of employees here that keep your happiness close at heart. We’ve processed tens of thousands of plates for thousands of letterpress shops internationally. We’ve fallen more deeply in love with letterpress and this cool printing community. And we’ve had the amazing experience of helping shops, both large and small, figure out how to get their hulking cast iron presses to print well. But we’re still the same friendly folks at heart who love coffee and who are doing what we do because we love letterpress.