Rachel Perlow

Good sausage. BAD canned tasteless watery don't waste your money mushrooms. Decent pizza. I'd take a winning little league team there in a heartbeat.

If you are able to find short lines, just stand on them. All the food that we sampled was great, so you can't go wrong. By the end of the day, all the booths ran out of food, or came pretty close, and yes, they actually ran out of cue'pons. We were there for the last hour and a half, and by 5:15 the lines were shortening but several of the booths were out of food. The Blue Smoke dessert booth had run out of everything but vanilla ice cream. But it was some of the best vanilla ice cream. Mmm. My thoughts on the meat: Ed Mitchel's -- kick ass seasoning (very peppery) and meat tenderness, texture. However, there was a lot of crackling mixed in. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of crackling, so take this with your grain of salt, but I thought crackling was supposed to be crispy crunchy like pork rinds. This was hard crunchy, like peanut brittle. Be careful you don't break a tooth! We didn't eat it as a sandwich (it's the picture with all the potato rolls on top in Ellen's photo essay), but with the cole slaw. Great cole slaw -- not mayonnaisey at all, but not too tart either. Blue Smoke – Huge, tender, juicy KC ribs. Really, really good. Sauce basted on finished product. Very happy. But I don’t get the pickle chips? R.U.B. BBQ – Very marbled beef brisket. We were chatting with Mrs. RUB and I mentioned that it was almost gelatinous and she said “Well, you’re not eating it with any sauce. The sauce cuts the fattiness.” So she gets us some sauce and we try it with the sauce. And it does cut the fat a little. I mention that I’m surprised their sauce is a little sweet, I thought it would be more vinegary. And she told me they made it sweet for the NY crowd. I said, next year, serve it like you would at home. All this is not to say that it was not great BBQ brisket. I was mostly telling this story to let you know that they thought they had to modify their sauce for New Yorkers. I guess they think New Yorkers can’t handle a little zing? Memphis Championship Barbecue (Las Vegas) / Mike Mills' 17th Street Bar & Grill (Illinois) – Baby back ribs and BBQ beans. The ribs were good. Nice, meaty, dry rubbed ribs. The thing here is the beans. Fabulous beans. And I’m not a BBQ beans fan. They use five kinds of beans: white, pinto, red kidney, butterbean. Hmm, I have to go look at the pint I managed to get to go as we were leaving at 6 o’clock… I think Darin Yunek (chef from Memphis Championship Barbecue in Las Vegas) said the fifth was navy beans. I asked if they cook the beans individually (for proper doneness) and then mix them with the sauce, but he said, “No, they’re all cooked together.” They soak their beans, btw, so I told him about the eGullet dried beans method. Mmm. Beans. The blobby stuff to the lower right that doesn't look like a bean is meat. It was such a beautiful, and I mean fabulous day, weather-wise, too. I wish I could be there tomorrow. I missed whatever they were making with the white barbecue sauce. Jason has instructions to try that tomorrow.

I like blanched gailon (chinese broccoli) with a drizzle of oyster sauce. That would be a nice simiple preparation to compare the two sauces.

Wait, the above math is wrong. It takes 3.2 lbs of dry milk to equal 8 gallons milk. However, the conclusion is still correct, the recipe calls for 2.5 times the amount of dry milk needed to make the volume of liquid called for.

So, the box is 9.6 oz, or ~272 grams. A serving is 23 grams, 12 servings in a box. So, you need 13.33 boxes to be 8 lbs of dry milk, which still yields 12 gallons. Therefore, actually, it doesn't matter what the box weighs. You still need more milk protein to the volume of liquid than plain skim milk would have.

OK -- more informaiton on the NetGrocer site. The box is 9.6 oz. What a PITA the math is going to be now!

Wait, something isn't right here. First off, solids, when dissolved into a liquid don't measure up equal to the liquid. I'm not saying that right. What I mean is that 1/3 cup dry milk + 2/3 cup water is less than 1 cup (8 oz) milk. However, Dave is right about the volume of liquid needed. Except that 6 gallons milk plus 2 gallons water is too watery. 8 lbs dry milk + 6 gallons water yields milk that is more “milky” than watery. 8 lbs dry milk should yield 12 gallons liquid milk. So, the decision needs to be, which is more important, the volume of liquid or the protein and other components of the dry milk? The volume is correct, you need 8 gallons liquid. But if the solids are an important aspect of the recipe than my earlier assertion that you should use a higher milk solids product, like Skim Plus. Jason, do you have 8 gallons of milk on hand? If not, and you’re going to a store anyway, you may want to just get the dry milk. Edit to say that I couldn't find the package size information on that online link. Anyone have a box of dry milk at home?

Another reason to move!

That sounds like a roast beef to me, not a pot roast. I've always thought of pot roast as a braised dish, where the meat is completely cooked through and very tender.

Just to clarify, that was an 8-pack of C2 for $2.99. Target also had the baby sized six pack (8 oz cans) for $1.99.

Well let's see... According to Nestle's website, VeryBestBaking.com, 1/3 cup dry milk used to make 1 cup reconstituted milk, that's probably 7 oz water? I don't know how much that is by weight. And my head isn't ready to do the math. But wouldn't you just use 6 gallons of milk? If anything, use Skim Plus, as it tastes like milk with added dry milk to me.

You are right to stay on my good side! What did the grateful couple bring in?

Hmm, Saturday is an all-day class. Is there a lunch break? Do you all eat lunch together, bring lunch in? It would be great if you could bring something healthy in that all could share. If not, you could suggest next week be a potluck where everyone brings in something to share with the class. This could be as a follow-up to when you steer the instructor into recommending healthier food choices. I thought you could discuss gestational diabetes or something. Like say that your doctor has advocated avoiding junk food to help your wife avoid getting it, and it would be great if everyone in the class could help her by not bringing in chips, etc. You're not really lying because you're not saying she has it, and you may be helping to educate others along the way.

Be sure to give us a follow-up after you've talked with the instructor tomorrow. Hint: show up early so you can discuss it before class rather than afterwards. She might think to discuss it with the class during that session. If you wait to discuss it till afterwards, then no hope of progress for the snack offerings at the following Thursday session.

I use the Foodsaver Pro II Model. You should be able to get it NIB on eBay for ~200 vs. $300 on the Tilia website. Here's a link to eGullet's FoodSaver thread.

Instead of addressing all the people in the class, why not discuss this with the instructor? Or, if you do want to bring it up to the class, is there a question/answer period where you can ask for nutrition advice? You obviously don't need the advice, but perhaps the question will educate some of the others.

Take stock of what you have in your pantry, fridge and freezer. I could probably not shop for a month, if I had to. I'd just have bare shelves at the end of that time. If you give us a list of what you have available already, we could probably come up with a lot of ideas for you. But it sounds to me like you'll be eating a lot of soup!

Sounds like an interesting book. Here's a link for anyone thinking of purchasing it: The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson.

One point on this, Sam. I can imagine the four star area to the right, but I believe it wouldn't have the overlapping subset, it would be clearly to the right of the three star food. To be four star, a restaurant should be four star in all categories. I think that if Babbo just had a more relaxed waiting area (i.e. didn't have tables reserved for walk-ins (maybe just keep the bar walk-in friendly), it would be 3 1/2 stars.

But isn't that the inherent problem with the star system? Reviews in the same publication are often written by different people with different tastes. So, if Bruni was a fan of hard rock music (his first and most emphatic complaint) would he have given Babbo four stars? No, because he also noted many other atmospheric issues, as others outlined above.

Do you still ice the burn, or just put lavender oil on it? Is it actually oily? Or, is it used afterwards to help heal the skin/scar?

Extra stupidity alert: last night I had preheated one end of my double burner cast iron griddle/grill plate. This was to keep stock hot that was being held in a pyrex measuring cup. Later, I needed to turn over the griddle to use the grill, that went fine, the front was still cool, no issue. However, it wasn't quite as far forward as I liked. Guessed yet? I had flipped the thing top to bottom, so the hot part was now in the front. Dumb ass that I was, I grabbed the handle to adjust it. OUCH! Hand straight under running cold water then onto a bowl of ice water, for hours. I was expecting to have blisters on the pads of two fingers and the thumb of my right hand (I'm experienced with burns of this type, unfortunately). However, keeping my hand in the ice water for as long as I did must have done the trick. Although I needed lots of tylenol last night for the pain, this morning the skin just feels a little numb and stiffened, rather than blistered -- no, it's not 3rd degree, I know the difference. Anyway, Jason yelled at me for not having potholders next to the stove, but I'm sure I would have made this brilliant move regardless. ICE THOSE BURNS IMMEDIATELY PEOPLE. And for way longer than is comfortable. PS -- I had all my mise en place ready, so Jason was able to follow the recipe for Israeli Couscous Risotto without too much help from me.

Nuts with flour and starch in the ingredients? Are these flavored or something? Sounds like you need a different source for your nuts.

Yes, it is just as ludicrous as calling the Giants and Jets NY teams instead of NJ, where they actually play. I wonder, do the players pay their taxes to NJ or NY? But to get back on subject, there are a lot of places we liked along Rt 10. Besides American Grill and Penang, we enjoyed going to Tratoria Toscana, Bella Rosa, Don Jose, East Tokyo (love that bowling alley adjacent setting), the Whippany Diner (not the Golden Touch, blech), Mr. Chu, Bogey's, Nikko, even Il Capriccio (Jason loved the food, I can't stand the garishness of the exterior decor). We just don't get to these places anymore being that we don't live in the area anymore. I think Jason was referencing the other types of places on Rt 10, like Macaroni Grill, Chili's, Chevys, and the fast food places like Taco Bell, McD's, BK, etc.

Cheesecake swirl brownies, this recipe looks good.