Priscilla

Oh it's like that, then? I'd have to say, canteloupe.

Toby, sorry about the you heard I was just channeling a British soap opera character there for a second. You didn't miss a post about the bread. The bread the Consort made was not the two-dough one you describe, which sounds beautiful. Is it from one of Madeleine's books? She's got a very good if brief bread section in In Madeleine's Kitchen, where the three-day starter formula is described. Over the years it has produced the best bread I've made.

Crikey! Oh the humanity makes its return and it's about effing time, too. Supermarket wine purchasement, a privilege reserved for adults I do not take for granted.

And, MUCH to its credit, it does not come off the stage and it does not sit on your lap. And doesn't sing ALW songs, neither.

Wilfrid's inferring something. I, however, am explicitly asking what did you do with some of these other ingredients. (Little ah, suffix, problem corrected.)

Yes, Andy, worthy writeup. I have enjoyed the cookbook, elsewhere wrote something akin to FoodMan's noting the beauty of the book itself. Just a high-quality package in entirety. While the beyond-reproach Marcella Hazan perhaps prepared the ground for the Mario Batali juggernaut of recent years, Mario's juxtaposition of hard-nosedness with bonhomie is irresistible. And his dishes make sense, and work, too. Especially for a cook with a foundation built on Marcella's own hard-nosedness--I've found them to be complementary.

Liza a great, evocative writeup, and NOT just because of the ambitious cat. The heart-shaped ristra hanging on my front door pulses with pride.

All this talk about buche is likely to send me to the taqueria right quick here, even though once there I'll get cabeza. But the Consort sometimes gets buche, along with his lengua. Last evening, scallopine of pork with Marsala, after a Mario Batali recipe, with those red onions he Mario likes so well. I've never seen anybody cook with red onions as much as Mario does. Small earthy-flavored white potatoes roasted whole with olive oil and rosemary, sea salt and pepper. Nice Romaine salad with a new-to-me Balsamic vinegar dribbled from a pretty little bottle which would be almost worthy of perfume. Bread, very good bread, made by the Consort, you heard, from Madeleine Kamman's three-day starter bread recipe. And: Courtesy Toby's passing along a Margaret Pilgrim recipe, pears, adorable little Boscs, baked with heavy cream and then copious shavings of Parmigiano overall at the end. What an incredible flavor profile. A heavenly dish. Just beautiful and delicious.

Yes, I'll give it a go, of course. I just like things to earn their keep, you know what I mean? Thank you for telling your Wondra stories, Jaymes!

Jaymes, you're making a compelling case for my "should I" question. It was the characteristics of the startlingly good crust, described up there about the fried oysters on vacation, that has remained with me. I'm thinking Wondra oughta find a place in my pantry. Margaret, how did you come to use Wondra as the flour for panko'd fish? Do you use it for dredging other things too? And the baking pans...wonder if Wondra's granulated texture helps in releasing? Suzanne, your restaurant experience resonates with Jayme's conversation with the chef at the dinner party. I think everybody IS doing it. Do you mean you're weaning yourself away from ap to Wondra?

Jaymes, why is this? And how did you acquire the preference?

Seems like it, anyways. Wondra Instantized Flour, its 1963 origin described here on the General Mills flour website, was indicated for dredging scallopine in a Mario Batali recipe I was reading the other day, and I was reminded how exotic a product this is, to me. Not to everyone--Wondra is a commonplace for some cooks, I know--I remember seeing the blue-and-white canister in friend's mother's kitchens, for instance. And I have heard cooks remarking on how they wouldn't make gravy with anything else. I've used it only once that I can recall, gathering ingredients to pan-fry some local oysters in a coastal Washington state vacation cabin, and the small size of the package seemed just right. The surprise was the coating on the oysters turned out to be extra good, light and crisp and with a sort of sandy texture unlike any regular-flour coating I'd ever prepared. So, Wondra. Instantized Flour. Who uses it and what for and should I, too?

Ellen, I thought I saw two different ads for this sort of product last week sometime on FoodTV...but I thought it was just me, typically not paying too much attention to the commercials, and in this interim of days have found myself pondering and pondering--WERE there two different colors, WERE there two different prices, DID one have a baby-size of itself on offer and another with cheap-ass plastic implements instead? Did I imagine all this? When I was a child I thought I imagined H.R. Pufnstuf for a time, so there is precedent. But you have set my mind at ease. Thank you.

Srhcb, very good points. The WWII experience (and the heightened expectations it encouraged) of the returning G.I.s is something not often enough discussed. Those with WWII-age dads and uncles and so forth can attest to the phenomenon from a personal point of view. From a wider lens, the effect on American arts and letters is clear. I do not discount Julia Child's influence on American home cooks. To be certain, she holds a unique position of prominence. But the ground was fertile; Julia herself, I think, has said when she began cooking classes in Paris they were populated by Americans using G.I. bill education benefits. But the point about cookbooks in general is indisputable. The best ones tell us much MUCH more than how to prepare a certain dish.

Glazed ham. Sweet potato biscuits. Butter & honey, together again. Nice Romaine with buttermilk dressing. 1996 Storrs Zinfandel from Santa Cruz of all places--really good!

Every time I read this topic title I think it oughta be Dietary Religious Laws. Dunno, probably just me.

Foodman that sounds like a good menu. What was the recipe source for your Tres Leches? Yesterday, New Year's Day, superultratrad black-eyed peas--bell pepper, celery, garlic, onion, parsley, classic Southernish. Rice. Coleslaw. Also, in the Consort's personal interest of boding steak over the coming year, prime-grade porterhouse, first time purchasing prime grade for home use. (Not Certified Angus.) Cooked in the verrrrry hot 12-inch All-Clad, outtake fans outtaking as fast as their little legs could carry them, salt, pepper. Emitted very clear, very good-smelling fat. Achieved very good crustage. Buttery, beefy. Possibly, quite possibly, worth the price differential from the usual CAB choice.

For road trips we have those little coil immersion heaters. Brings water to an actual boil, making drinkable tea possible. I suppose they could be used for other liquids as well, and boiling water for other things other than tea. If necessary.

OK, I made Jaymes's Caramel Corn this evening. Everyone is correct--what a good recipe--thank you so much, Jaymes! Those clear instructions are a gift. What a treat and fun to make. I used peanuts in this batch, for a Cracker-Jacksy flavor profile, because some of it I'm bringing to my Mom and she's got a lot of nostalgia for how Cracker Jacks tasted when she was a little girl. I predict she'll be pleasantly surprised.

Yikes, sounds good, Robert and Toby. Toby: The big favas or the littler ones? The sort of eating you describe, Robert, further developing a simple preparation over multiple meals, takes both a lot of thought and (in a way) not much thought. Not to mean carelessness--one must be able to look forward to the next day's treatment of something already enjoyed. Decent cooks whether from the New World or the Old Country do what it takes to assure a good dish, or else they are not, decent. To be happy to eat this way is to reject, at least for a time, the relentless pursuit of culinary novelty, subconsciously, or unconsciously, or maybe 100% purposefully, I think. Not to say I, as a cook, don't wake from my liminal state with ideas for dishes to cook or places to go; happens all the time. A privilege of the cook, deciding WHAT to cook, and exploring, and recreating, and all that. But extracting the pleasure and the truth from a pot of beans is also a privilege, and an important part of cooking, for me.

Yeow! I am so taking my medicine today. Dried beans ARE an affectation, or maybe, an anachronism. But it is just so cool to do the Italo-PNW Jim Dixon thing, and bung some cannellinis and into the old Emile Henry bean pot with some sage leaves and garlic and olive oil and salt and into the oven and forget about it and then open to find--something really good. Also a part of cooking, that sort of thing.

Suvir has so majorly thrown down the gauntlet on this I'm wracked with self-doubt. I am/was sure that I very much preferred cooked-from-dry ceci garbanzos chick peas, for instance, although I do keep canned around for instant hummus. There are a couple of ceci-based soups from Marcella Hazan that are favorites of mine, and I have never prepared them with canned beans. Maybe I oughta give it a try, though, with Suvir is staking so much on this claim, plus, I do endeavor to be openminded. There has been mention of avoiding sugar in canned beans, but what I don't like the taste of is citric acid, which seems to be in nearly every brand. (I have this problem with mustards, too, and search continually for those without this additive.) In Middle Eastern and Indian stores one can buy canned beans with just water and salt. And rinse rinse rinse, still, even with no citric acid. Also, as Malawry said, there is a world of difference between a high-turnover market's dried beans and pulses and those from a regular supermarket. For the beans I use the most frequently and have the most comparative cooking knowledge of, pintos, for example, the superiority of the bulk ones from the natural-foods store is striking. Flavor- and texture-wise. Middle Eastern and Indian markets are good sources for dried beans, too, as well as the aforementioned canned.

Nice big CAB chuck cut, braised with some very nice shallots, little garlic, sage only a bit withered from the what passes for cold weather, bay, s & p, red wine. Carrots bunged in with a hour to go. Squares of thick bacon rendered, reserved, big cremini quarters sauteed in pan where bacon had been, garni. Braising liquid reduced, garni added. Popovers.

Late Stealth™ burger dinner with a friend who joined us last-minutedly. Stealth burgers, the burgers with the radar-evading cheese inside©. Nice Stella blue cheese for the grownups, Regulation Medium Tillamook Cheddar for the under-12 set. Frites, twice-fried. All the usual garni suspects. (Beef was a Certified Angus chuck roast run twice through the old KA grinder...very nice amount of fat-to-lean, very well-behaving in the cooking. CAB continues to have good flavor, for supermarket beef.)

Malawry what do you think of tilapia. Last evening, didn't cook!!! Take-in takeaway selection of banh mi...SO good, especially my especial fave, sardine with extra chiles and onion. But you really can't argue with any of 'em, they're all good. Little hit of sugarcane juice before defaulting to barely drinkable Argentinian Malbec.