Mayhaw Man

And that would mean that tonight, if you stand on St Charles Avenue at the appropriate time, you will be able to see the first parade of the season-The Phorty Phunny Phellows-who will take the traditional route along a closed streetcar line and greet merrymakers and well wishers along the way. It's really a traditional deal and well worth the effort if you happen to be in New Orleans tonight. Semi Action Photos of the Phorty Phunny Phellows As far as king cakes go, there was some spirited discussion in "The Best King Cakes in the City"

Nah -- nothing good to eat here. Bring some pralines and Cafe Du Monde and rough it out! ← Good thinking! I will, of course, be prepared for the worst and hoping for the best.

I'll be there all week (in SF Sat through Thurs). at the GourmetFoodMall.com booth #1081. Is there anything to eat in San Francisco? I know it's not New Orleans, so my hopes aren't too high, but surely there must be someplace decent. I will also be making some sort of attempt at documenting the thing online, and I take terrible photos, so if any of you have cameras there and feel link emailing me the photos, I will be glad to include them in the thread. I look forward to putting some faces on some of the text I have been reading for the past couple of years. Brooks

You are good to go. We had a bit of a cold snap over Christmas, but it's bacfk in the seventies and the prices are still good. Enjoy!

You won't have any trouble finding someplace to eat. It's a tourist town and a town where the locals eat out alot. Things are generally open a bit more that in other places. Gambit Fall Rest Guide by Neighborhood Restaurant Guide By Cuisine Brett Anderson's Top 100 (you can trust him. He gets it) THese have the hours listed for most of the places that you might be interested in. Have a great time. With any luck the weather will be great. The crawfish are starting to come in and they are cheap. Oysters have been really good this fall, as well.

Ice cream, chocolate, whatever. It's all a sleight of hand trick. What I HATE is a pound of coffee that is not a pound of coffee. I don't want twelve or thirteen ounces of the stuff. I want a pound! Why do they do that? Because lots of people just grab the bag and throw it in the cart. They then get home and three days later realize that they are out of coffee again (yes, dearhearts, I drink that much of the stuff-probably more). This is a plot and when I get to the bottom of it heads will roll. Roll, I tell you!

I hope that placed based foods will become more and more a part of the North American food diaspora as people become more aware of how much difference climate can make on a food. It's a good thing. Fritz Maytag is, by any standard, a hell of an interesting guy. Without Fritz and a couple of other guys, the microbrewery movement in the 80's and most notably mid 90's likely would never have occurred. Fritz started making "American Whiskey" long before the current crop of American small batch distilleries showed up. Now he's back to his roots-working in the midwest near where his family has been in the appliance business for a hundred years or so. They are making cheese of incredibly high quality and marketing it to people who are interested in who made the stuff that they are putting into their bodies and where the food came from. I hope that the trend continues. I would love to see Texas Grapefruit on the shelf with Louisiana Navels and Alabama Satsumas. Arkansas, Louisiana, Texas, and California rice, Oregon, California, Wisconsin, Iowa, Louisiana cheeses labled seperately and served as distinct products that are interesting as a group or standing alone.

Grits are the only hot cereal my brothers and I ever ate growing up. We did occasionally have oatmeal, but we all preferred grits with butter and black pepper. I had some this morning, as a matter of fact. Served up with pride at Waffle House.

The turduckens from Poche's in Breaux Bridge are good. They are packed well, show up on time, and the stuffing is great. I had one of these over the holidays and it was really good. The stuffing was top notch and not greasy at all. While they are from Texas (as are Hebert's-due to USDA rules-it's complicated, don't ask), they are made by a couple of guys from Louisiana.

As I type this I am enjoying some Texas Caviar made from this recipe. I also added some of this fine pickeled okra to really top it off. It's easy to make, keeps great in the ice box, and will last for a week or so if kept covered. It's also fun to serve to yankees. They make fun of it. They look at you sadly while considering your sad culinary state. And then they eat it all. Very satisfying.

Mardi Gras is very early this yea, Feb 5. We do not have final four or any other large sporting events scheduled, so other than the usual conventions, there is not much going on until the Jazz Festival on the last weekend in April and the first weekend in May. Anytime in Feb, Mar, or early April should work nicely. You can always find a good room, downtown, for under $150 by doing a bit of Priceline type shopping. Another good way to find a room is to call the hotels, individually, and see what kind of packeages that they have going. These almost always involve a weekend stay, but you will find that you can get lots of extra stuff along with the deal (Zoo, Aquarium, swamp tours, museums, breakfast, free drinks, etc.). Many of these packages will often come with an airfare tie in, so it is a good idea to do some shopping outside of the bid sites. Also, if you are willing to take a risk that you might not get the exact hotel that you want (but a very nice, very convenient one), and you know that you are choosing a week when there is not some huge convention in town (Convention Schedule-also a useful site), you can start hitting the auction sites a few days ahead and really save some money. I know people (lots of them) who got downtown rooms (Hilton, Hyatt, etc.) last year DURING the Jazz Festival for under $90 per night. You will, no problem, be assured of getting a room at a bargain and probably find a serious bargain, depending on how long you are willing to wait. You will alwasy want to make any reservations for restaurants long in advance for hot places, as contary to what many people think, locals can keep most of these places booked without any tourist help, so you have to plan ahead. Let us know what works out.

I couldn't agree with you more. As I said in my piece, the world would be a better place if it if it could be a bit more like the world that exists for 7 days every year, on Gentilly Blvd. in New Orleans: I was wrong about the rain this year, but it really doesn't rain that often. I am looking for the recipes. I suspect most of them are in back issues of Offbeat and Gambit, and I have a giant box full of Jazz Fest Issues of both of those, so let me look tonight.

I do all of the usual stuff, but have added a dish that is now a regular on New Years day. I highly reccomend it. Blackeyed pea fritters with Red Pepper Relish Easy to make. Warning! Don't use fresh peas. Follow the recipe.

It looks delicious. Nice work. Next week we'll tackle ettoufee. Get some shrimp, you'll need about 2 lbs., eh?. Now, as for the use of the vegetables. If you look at the photo of the "veg done" , you will notice that they look like I have added liquid-well, I haven't. The vegetables are cooked covered, which does two things-it prevents them from burning and it also retains all of that delicious liquid that would normally just steam out of them into the atmosphere and be wasted. That probably makes up for the difference in color and clarity. It looks great.

Go with Dave's recipe. Use the shallots. Those were great photographs! Did you find them on some food website or were they taken by a pro?

A quiet, unassuming man in South Louisiana knew. That's who.

Merry Christmas Everyone! I kind of forgot to mention what kind of squash, but I bet it turns out great. I'll be around this afternoon, Marlene, if you have any burning questions that need to be answered in "Brookspeak". Dave will be available for translation after that.

"aboout"-Canadian pronunciation, eh? Well, I was afraid that there was an entirely different reason that they called it "#2".

Yes, it should just barely stick together and you should still be able to see the lovely little hunks of butter. I roll is out all the way before I put it in the fridge, that wway I can just unwrap it and throw it gently into the pan. Martha and I both do this, although I suspect that I made more pie crusts than she has lately. And Pan, I bought a 1/2 gallon of #2 amber. All of it has gone on biscuits and pancakes up to this point. I may use more of it for baking after this. Really worked well.

Marlene, If your pie turns out anything like mine, you are going to love it. I might not do it this way forever, but the maple syrup addition was right on time. Delicious. The only change I might want to make is to use a less refined grade of syrup, at least I think that I want to do that. I am going on the assumption that the lesser grades are more strongly flavored and more viscous as well-but of course I am basing that assumption on the various grades of cane syrup. No photos. Both cameras have gone North to document Santa Claus's arrival in the Delta, where it is supposed to be 16F tonight-about as cold as it ever gets.

I always reccomend a case of Noche Bueno if you can find it. Usually, the best way, is to call the local Modelo Distributor and find out who bought a bunch of it. Distributors only get it in limited supplies and can only get it once, so you have to shop early. It's the best product they make, even better than Negro Modelo. Samichlaus is always a fine choice. It'll keep you warm, or, even if you are not warm, you won't care!

Friday morning I hope to see five or six of his cousins lying in the cold water at my feet, shot full of holes. And with any luck, again on Sunday and Sunday p.m. All of the results will end up in a pot. I love ducks more than any other wild game.

Dean is sound asleep in North Carolina, and so by the time he reads this it will be too late for him to object to this obvious, but ultimately important, bit of grandstanding. While Dave and I certainly admire and appreciate our Canadian friends attempts at prper frying methods for the noble bird, we feel that there must be more of an even playing field comparison between deep frying and pan frying. Therefore, I am happy to announce...... The First Annual Pig Picking Fried Chicken Throwdown! This no holds barred, cage (it is in fact, going to be inside of a cage-if you count a fence on the tennis court) match will take place sometime on Saturday during Varmint's World Famous Pig Pickin. Dave and I will square off on opposite sides of the net and fry chicken until the best man is left standing. He has agreed to this, in the true spirit of manliness and competition, and the wagering can begin as soon as the oddsmakers do the analysis and set the pre fry odds. A team of semi sober and semi honest judges will be appointed and their decision will be final, well, maybe final. Any disagreements will be settled by some kind of entertaining and eccentric contest. May the best fryer win. Good luck, Dave. You'll need it. .

No No! I think it was my fault. I should have cooked it longer, and I needed a lid. But Brooks, I loved it. I really did. ← Too late. The damage is done. I am a sensitive, new age kind of redneck hippie dude.

See if I send you any more recipes. Huurrrummmpphhhh!