Alex

Welcome to eGullet, Hannah. How did you learn about us? A good number of eG'ers have done food writing, so I suspect you'll hear from some of us before long. In addition to the Food Blogs Kim mentioned, you might want to check out The Daily Gullet. There's also the amusing Daily Gullet Competitions. Neither has been active for quite some time, but they're a fun time suck read. The eGullet Culinary Institute can be an excellent resource for you. Many of us are, ahem, older, so our education about food and food writing began well before the Internet age. I would encourage you to start reading as much food writing as time allows. There's food writing without, or mostly without, recipes (Jeffrey Steingarten, Bill Buford, M.F.K. Fisher, etc.). Then there are "food books" with related recipes (e.g., Hot Sour Salty Sweet). And don't forget cookbooks with good writing, such as Yotam Ottolenghi's Jerusalem.

Amelia's Farm Fresh Cookies

Same thing today.

Sounds like it gives Malort a run for its money.

We have an excessive number of mugs, even after a significant Goodwill donation. Here are our most-used. In order, we have: Wistful kitty. Colorful fish (benefiting Save the Children). Weird kitty. Waechtersbach -- two made in West Germany (!), two in Spain. They're a bit less orang-y in real life. Denby, bought before I knew whay Denby was. Bennington Pottery -- a gift from a friend in the 80s. A promo mug from our favorite local NPR station. We used to have more. Two hand-painted mugs from Poland. One Mikasa, Arabella pattern. Promo mug for a local free-form radio station. Silent kitty.

Right.

Nigiri sushi (nigirizushi) is your first sentence. Sashimi is your second sentence, but rice is not necessarily involved, although sometimes there'll be a bowl on the side. Sashimi also can be beef or other meat.

I had a Taylor and Ng mug, too! I had forgotten all about it. It was the one with the fornicating rabbits. Wish I still had it. There might have been a cat mug, too. (Picture courtesy Poshmark)

What is this leftover garlic bread of which you speak?

Then there's the $17.99 2019 Ch. Puech-Haut Argali Rosé, from the Languedoc, 60% Grenache, 40% Cinsault. Very pale pink, it led off with mixed red fruit and, per Ms. Alex, a bit of apricot, with a nice mineral finish. Its acidity made it a much better accompaniment for food (in this case, penne with tuna, anchovies, tomatoes, pine nuts, and raisins).

Please forgive the out-of-focus picture; I usually snap better than that. First up is an inexpensive ($7.19 after half-case discount) 2019 Famille Perrin Rosé, a CDR blend. (The Perrin family owns Château Beaucastel.) Orange-y pink in the glass, it's not just fruit-forward, but fruit-in-your-face. A quick hit of berry (mostly strawberry) gives way to a sort of generic tropical fruit (Ms. Alex thought mostly mango), followed by a weird and unexpected but not entirely unpleasant finish of coconut. This would be a more than acceptable porch rosé.

Hello, Carol. @Franci, who knows a whole lot about baking, also lives in South Florida. Here's a mention in the NY Times, from when she lived there.

As you might have seen already, this one is rated 4.8/5 (from 367 ratings), has a sheath, and looks cool.

Airline meals for sale: The Guardian (Australia) taste tests for us.

Here's a nice array of pictures from Patrick Smith, of Ask the Pilot fame.

Is wine part of the occasion? If so, a spectacular bottle could be the focus of the meal, and you could choose your food accordingly. Otherwise, I recommend not overtaxing your neurons about this. It's such an ideal season for vegetables, I'd emphasize those. There's corn, tomatoes, eggplant, cauliflower, greens, summer squash, fresh herbs... A simple marinated, grilled flank steak, sliced thinly across the grain (and sprinkled with Maldon sea salt, if you have any at home you could bring), would set off the vegetables nicely.

Well, à chacun son goût. I think the s'more is one of the great inventions of the 20th century.

...aka the Prince spaghetti boy. This is one of the nicest obits I've ever read.

Today only at Woot -- Blendtec Classic 575 blender (black unit only), new, full warranty, for $189.99 + $6 shipping (free for Amazon Prime) + tax.

Thank you! For anyone who's interested, this is the page about their vineyards. That was an interesting comment about Enthusiast viz-à-viz Spectator. Another favorite Old Mission Peninsula winery is 2 Lads. Their Fouch Vineyard Riesling is excellent.

What to Drink with What You Eat (one of my favorite beverage-related books) says that seafood in general is a notable match, but especially sardines, and even more so if they've been grilled, which the authors deem a "Holy Grail" classic pairing. Other specific fish and seafood also were frequently recommended by their wine experts: fried calamari, steamed clams, crab and crab cakes, grilled or fried fish, mussels, and seafood stew. Salad (I assume with a vinaigrette) also was a recommended pairing, probably because of the wine's high acidity and light body.

Left Foot Charley is one of Northwest Michigan's best wineries. Their 2011 Dry Riesling was featured in Eric Asimov's January 6, 2014, article about "winter wines" (but go figure, it's not really about wines made for winter drinking). Last night, Ms Alex and I cracked open (literally -- it was a screw top) a bottle of their 2017 Dry Riesling (here -- scroll down a little bit) -- 89 points from Wine Enthusiast, $18/bottle. We had similar impressions of the wine when tasted w/o food, of stone fruit and citrus: peach and lime for me, apricot and grapefruit for Ms Alex. We both detected perhaps a scintilla of residual sugar, but fruit certainly dominated. It was an excellent match for our dinner of pork tenderloin with Nobu's black cod marinade, sautéed cucumber with garlic and dill, and rice pilaf.

It's August 10, 2003. I see a reference to eGullet in a long article in the New York Times, "A Laboratory of Taste," which ranges far and wide but focuses on progressive cuisine in Spain. In the second paragraph is a quote from Charlie Trotter -- OK, I know him -- followed by one from Thomas Keller (ditto). I keep reading, and at the end of the next paragraph is: (Here's a 2003 eGullet thread about Trio.) Trotter was the big dog in Chicago at the time, but I knew that Achatz had worked at both Charlie Trotter's and The French Laundry, so I say to myself, "Self, what is this eGullet of which he speaks?" I order it up via the intertubes and commence browsing. After a succession of "Oh, this is interesting!" threads, what should I see but this one, about the first Heartland Gathering, in, of all places, Grand Rapids. (Unfortunately, all of the pictures were lost in a software changeover.) I sign up that very day, send a PM to MatthewB offering my assistance, and the rest, as they say, is histrionic. Or something like that.

The article, with video

Looks like it'd be worth watching just for the soundtrack.