Mayhaw Man

Brooksie's Dill Pickles Brooksie's Dill Pickles Brine 1 Quart White Vinegar 3 Quart DISTILLED Water 1 scant cup salt Cucumbers Fresh Dill Tabasco Peppers Garlic Many times the dill will be ready in your garden before the cucumbers. In that case you may preserve the dill by breaking into 2 inch pieces and putting into large jar and pouring mixed brine solution on it until covered. Keep this jar in a dark place and when the cucumbers are ready use the dill AND the brine, but remove the dill from the brine before boiling. There you go simple and easy. You will notice that the cucumbers are never blanched or par boiled, etc. The beans should not be either, although I have noticed that they really take 4 to 6 weeks, just a little longer than the cukes. Incidentally, the dill will keep until after the nuclear war (when there will be a great shortage of dill pickles and Mama's to make them) as long as it is kept in the dark 1 qt White Vinegar 3 qt DISTILLED Water 1 scant cup salt Cucumbers Fresh Dill Tabasco Peppers Garlic 1)Sterilize jars and pack into each jar beans or cucumbers (standing end on end) along with one large clove garlic, one tabasco or other small hot pepper, 1 dill stalk top 2)Heat brine to boiling and pour over cucumbers in jars. 3)Seal and Invert Jars until cool 4)Ready to eat in three or 4 weeks Keywords: Side, Kosher, Easy, Vegetables ( RG961 )

Brooksie's Dill Pickles Brooksie's Dill Pickles Brine 1 Quart White Vinegar 3 Quart DISTILLED Water 1 scant cup salt Cucumbers Fresh Dill Tabasco Peppers Garlic Many times the dill will be ready in your garden before the cucumbers. In that case you may preserve the dill by breaking into 2 inch pieces and putting into large jar and pouring mixed brine solution on it until covered. Keep this jar in a dark place and when the cucumbers are ready use the dill AND the brine, but remove the dill from the brine before boiling. There you go simple and easy. You will notice that the cucumbers are never blanched or par boiled, etc. The beans should not be either, although I have noticed that they really take 4 to 6 weeks, just a little longer than the cukes. Incidentally, the dill will keep until after the nuclear war (when there will be a great shortage of dill pickles and Mama's to make them) as long as it is kept in the dark 1 qt White Vinegar 3 qt DISTILLED Water 1 scant cup salt Cucumbers Fresh Dill Tabasco Peppers Garlic 1)Sterilize jars and pack into each jar beans or cucumbers (standing end on end) along with one large clove garlic, one tabasco or other small hot pepper, 1 dill stalk top 2)Heat brine to boiling and pour over cucumbers in jars. 3)Seal and Invert Jars until cool 4)Ready to eat in three or 4 weeks Keywords: Side, Kosher, Easy, Vegetables ( RG961 )

That sounds a little like one of my favorite WRONG snacks- From the bottom up Wheat Thin Smoked Salmon Cream Cheese Dollop of Pickapeppa Capers (as many as you can balance and still hit your mouth) Repeat as directed And I will eat the hell out of that famous bachelors delight-a whole hunk of cream cheese covered in Pickapeppa and stabbed at with triscuits or wheat thins. Goes well with pickled okra (really, it does, this is not one of my okra jokes )

Thank you Mark. Another beautiful read. A true pleasure. On a lighter note-What kind of act did Auntie Levin do with the poodles? Hoops? Dog Carts? Talking Dogs? This is the kind of knowledge that I seem to have an endless thirst for ( a major fault in my upbringing and a constant source of bemused dissappointment for my mother ).

There is a huge olive growing region in Northern Baja. Supposedly the Valle Guadalupe is one of the largest concentration of olive trees in the world. It is a really beautiful part of the country. Edited to say what I meant to say in the first place: The part of Baja where these grow would not be unlike some parts of Texas. It is a desert valley that recieves small anounts of rain during the year and is fairly temperate. It doesn't ever have a hard freeze, although in the summer it is fairly hot. I guess this is a good thing for the olives, as they are sure plentiful and healthy there. I am sre that successful cultivation is easily within the realm of possibility.

The stuff keeps in a sealed jar in the icebox for a really long time. We almost always end up using it all before it goes sour (although it does seem to oxidize pretty rapidly- not unlike a half consumed bottle of wine left corked and refrigerated- Not really bad, just not fresh tasting.

No apologies needed. I was just analyzing what I see as a cultural difference between city dwellers and country folk in Ireland. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong. It won't be the first time.

I make the concentrate all the time. I am still using the little funnel/cork/filter set up we got as a weddin present. The only thing I use the concentrate for is to make iced coffee (which I love). Hot coffee from this is too inconsistent for regular use. When I am making just one cup (especially at work) I use a press. Are you just interested or did someone foist off a kit on you?

I lived in Enfield, Meath for a while putting together a brewery while working for this Good Idea Gone Really Bad. It is hard to imagine that rural Irishmen will have any more respect for this law than they do for the pub closing rules. My local was the bar in my hotel (one of three pubs in town) and the after hours drinking was rampant and flagrant. Close the shutters, watch for the Guardai, and use the backdoor. In theory, the only people that can drink after hours in Ireland are people who are drinking in the hotel where they are staying, so anyone else was illegally consuming pints. THe law did not seem to have much effect on the publican (a lovely woman) or her clientele. I'm thinking that this will be more or less self enforced in the cities and that in small towns it will be winked at.

Scoop One I was at the Fairgrounds Racecourse in New Orleans on Sunday afternoon and virtually the entire front of house staff from Jacques Imo's in New Orleans was there as well (it was Victoria's birthday and a horse named Victoria's Somethingorother won the second race. I hit the exacta (32.50) and the staff won as well ). THey report that the place in New York is doing well business wise and that Jack is pleased with the progress in the service dept. I hope they do well as there is not exactly a great track record of guys from New Orleans making it up there for long stretches.

Useless-Green bean cutter to "french" green beans Useful-Cuisinart recieved when I was married (1983). Still going strong (four or five bowls and I don't know how many blades later). It has recieved use probably four or five times a week for twenty years. Nothing fuzzy about it's logic either-pulse or on. That's it (and that is enough!)

If you are in the neighborhood-These guys do an awesome job on Fried Chicken and just to keep it on topic-you can get it to go!

Popeye's! While I will say that it can be a bit salty (their spice mixes for the whole world are made about a mile from where I sit in this huge new plant. You can read about it here) I really like the chicken when I am feeling lazy and don't want to do it myself. (but on the other hand there is a gas station right down the road from my house that actually has PAN FRIED chicken and it is awesome!). Popeye's red beans are really good (on any scale of measurement-homemade or not). They were developed by Warren LeRuth of LeRuth's (an old mainstay on the West Bank of the RIver across from New Orleans that was closed after he passed). THey are really creamy and have a nice spice to them, perhaps it is because they have lard in them that they are so good.

Actually, leaking gas pipelines are a HUGE problem in Louisiana. Many of the well to compressor lines are low pressure and a leak can go undetected for a very long time. In Northern Ouachita Parish (look for a town called Sterlington on the map, just North of Monroe) there is an area where more gas pipelines cross/connect/get compressed than anywhere else in the world (some of these are to transport local gas and some are high pressure transmission lines moving gas from Texas and the Gulf Coast to the Northeaster part of the US). Maps of this are look like pick up stix. Transmission lines are high pressure and they pay very careful attention to those, but the low pressure lines fall into the problem of the production companies and many of these companies failed or were sold years ago and are now in the hands of third and fourth hand owners and are not well cared for at all. You can't imagine how many of these lines there are (this is the largest low pressure/shallow gas field in the world and has been in production since 1913). THere are literally over thousands and thousands of wells (many of them abandoned and long forgotten) in a very small area in the Northern part of the parish. Much of South Louisiana has exactly the same problem, only it is exacerbated by the fact that many of these lines are under water (as is a hell of a lot of SOuth Louisiana).

I was at a conference yesterday being held in conjunction with the Tennessee Williams Festival (I am writing a long report about it, but briefly it was Sara Moulton and John Edge chatting about all kinds of stuff-including eGullet (briefly)-much more interesting that it sounds) and was told-by one of the three people that would know for sure if this is true about Uglesich's closing and was told that no, it was not. They are not closing. Anthony has a cookbook coming out and is going to be doing a fair amount of traveling-he will not be there very much but the place will be open.

My Condolences. That's awful. Hopefully he will come out on top with the pipeline guys. On the bright side, this is working out to be a good year for crawfish (although, once again, not really very good for the farmers and fishermen). I had them Friday and then again on Sunday. Size is mixed a little bit, but the quality is high.

My Favorites (this a highly opinionated list-I hope that we can get you some more opinions than mine). THis is much like asking "Who is your favorite child?" You might have an answer, but you know that it is wrong to admit it or to tell anybody. Oyster PoBoys- R and O Seafood Casamento's Mike Andersons Seafood Baked Oysters-Mosca's-Oysters Mosca Galitoire's - Rockefeller Mr. B's-BBQ'd oyster poboy-Only at the Fairgrounds during Jazz Fest Raw Acme Oyster House (some prefer Felix's, across the street) Fairgrounds Race Course (closed yesterday until Thanksgiving) Grilled- Drago's (worth the tip just for this dish-simple and awesome-while there knock it back with some Yugoslav Pear Brandy-they are the actual importers for the stuff (although you can now get it at Dorignac's) and it is amazingly good. Fried- Bozo's Uglesitch's R and O Seafood Hope this works for you. I am sure some more bi valve lovers will jump in here.

Perhaps there should be some kind of portioning change in recipegullet for those that are unaware of this fact.

You're right. Down here it would be more like-"Psst, Hey man, ya wanna buy a COW?"

I, for one, pretty much admire the Japanese protectionist policies regarding rice. Ultimately they only protect the farmer-but who is to say that is a bad thing? Japan has a finite (and pretty small) amount of arable land suitable for rice production and were the tariffs on foriegn imports lifted the Japanese rice industry would likely become a fondly remembered dream. Southeast Aisa and the US can supply rice that most Japanese would find acceptable (in blind tests anyway) and they can certainly supply it cheaper (labor costs in SOutheast Aisa keep the price low and in the US-ironically-federal price supports and huge mechanized farming operations make it possible for American Agribusiness to export tremendous amounts of low priced, extremely high quality rice. The result of this situation is much like what we have here in Louisiana and the US in general with sugar produced from cane. Were it not for some pretty serious tariffs, there would be NO sugar industry in South La. The farmers could not possibly compete with the competition from South of the border. The Domino plants in Houston and New Orleans would be refining Mexican raw sugar in a New York minute if the tariffs were listed and they could buy the raw product from MX and Central America. What is that lame old saw? "We're really sorry, it's just business". It's all about what a people consider to the most important and apparently the Japanese have chosen (if by no other means than the willingness to pay stunning prices for a daily staple) the Japanese rice industry as something that they are willing to bite the bullet on. An entire US Senate election here in Louisiana just turned on the issue of sugar tariffs and price supports. Like the Japanese and their situation with rice farmers, very few natives here in La. know any sugar cane guys personally but it is somehow comforting to know that the sugar farmers are there and that our food is being made with the same local stuff our grandparents and great grandparents used.

We're going to the middle of nowhere in Manitoba fishing in July and I believe that that all important "new gear that you really don't need but probably should have" phase of his life has begun (this lasts many men forever-it is impossible to have too much money or fishing gear-although the two-sadly-rarely occur at the same time to the same person ) Anyway, I'm sure that most of it will go to Bass Pro Shop and Cabela's.

This piece out of yesterday's Picayune gives anyone with any interest a pretty good breakdown on the current crawfish market. These low prices are great for the consumers, but at some point (last year it was around $1.00US per pound) the farmers just quit going to get em out of the field. It's not worth it. Same situation with the shrimp industry down here. Those guys just can't make a buck anymore. There are lots of shrimpers who have boats that haven't left the dock in a year. With fuel prices at their recent peak and shrimp prices in the tank (not to mention the pressure from Southeast Aisian imports-which is a factor in both the shrimp and the crawfish markets) what else can they do? There are guys (thank the Lord) that still run their boats and sell them direct to the market, bypassing the wholesalers. There is PLENTY of money in this, but it is alot more work and tends to be a family affair. My shrimp guy sells the shrimp that his brother has caught the night before. They are cheap and unbelievably fresh, but unlike what many of you by, they have not been sized. It is a pretty mixed bag, but as long as you don't mind going through them and sizing them yourself they are a phenomenal deal.

Tampopo Maybe the most erotic food movie ever produced. I love the egg scene. Talk about your food porn.

Torakris- How do you say Happy Birthday in Japanese? In english we say HAPPY BIRTHDAY! And I hope that you are having one.

I think that we pretty much do leave our money in Washington, it's just that most of us don't get to visit very often. Miles, the 14 year old is son the tea and homemade cookie concession. I gather that it is going pretty well. I need to post the recipe that he used to make that tea. It has fresh orange juice, mint out of my yard, and simple syrup (it is not, however, particularly sweet by local standards). It came out of a Baptist Church Cookbook from Bastrop LA printed in the thirties. I should approach them about a reprint as it really is a great piece of work in the antique-the way we cooked in the South when we were all dirt poor- category. The chocolate chips and the cowboy cookies are out of The Cotton Country Collection (Jr League of Monroe, LA-still in print). I am at work until 1 cst. and then I will go wander around. The weather is great. We get about 6 weeks of this per year-3 in the Spring and 3 in the Fall-the rest of the time it is hot as hell and rains alot (56 +inches) or it is cool and rains alot, not much in between.