Rachel Perlow

Don't forget to dig through your freezer. Even your fridge freezer. However, in my chest freezer last night, I found stir fried kale that I stuck in there back when I was still part of a produce co-op -- which means it is at least a year old. However, I had vacuum sealed it so it was very good just reheated in the microwave. I also found a half a cooked turkey breast, also vacuum sealed, that will get us through at least two lunches and an attempt to recreate the turkey hash we tried at Charlie's Sandwich Shoppe in Boston. Another nice side dish last night was Annie's Bunny Mac & Cheese, a step up from Kraft Dinner, which we supplemented with extra cheddar and frozen peas. Ideas inspired by your list: the ham & cheese ends can be used as omelet or quiche fillings Some of the veal breast could be used in a stir fry with broccoli and celery Left over tilapia and some mashed potato combined into fish cakes (or ham or turkey for croquettes)

We tried to go to Sally's and then Pepe's not realizing that neither is open for lunch. So, we ended up having a hamburger at Louis' Lunch followed by falafel at Mamoun's. An excellent specimen of falafel, highly seasoned patties, rather than balls, with plenty of lettuce, ripe tomatoes and tahini. We also picked up some interesting home made middle eastern candy. It is gelatinous, with a kind of marshmallow chewiness, studded with an assortment of nuts. PS - thank heavens for GPS! We use the Magellan version 750NAV Plus (same version found in Hertz rental cars). It enabled us to be spontaneous, change plans, and go off the major highways without worry.

What a shame, your sweet potato pie is so good, I would have bought one from you.

Yes, that's how we originally heard of them. Everyone was very nice. Oh and burger club notes: their default is a perfectly medium rare burger, served piping hot. Nice beefy flavor, could have used a little more salt. Juiciness of beef, grilled onion and tomato slice easily compensated for lack of commercial condiment.

Not "every which way" only in the medium-thick crusted variety. The regular pizza was good, but nothing like Kinchley's thin-crusted in NJ, and the "white" sicilian was unique, but doesn't beat out DiFara's artichoke pie in any way.

I liked Big Red Tomato the couple times I've been there. It's worth it if there's no line and you can easily find a parking space. If you can't and there's a wait, then I agree with Jon that it's not worth it. I didn't find Ciao Bella "mediocre" but definitely not worth waiting in line for.

Very good food, but more expensive than you'd think.

Hope your last day was successful, Elyse. We were driving home from Boston, sorry we missed it.

Deb, where are you located? If not France, I doubt the croissants you bought were as good as those they can get at home. Perhaps they'd appreciate tasting one of your areas regional specialties instead?

Spanish: Patatas Bravas or Ajillo, Tortilla de Patatas

hmm, difara's. not a bad idea....how's parking there, in case i drive up? It's street parking and a busy area, but the time we went there we managed to find a space. You might have to circle the area for a few minutes though.

I call Spanikopita. I'll also probably make a few other flavors besides the traditional spinach pie, possibly mushroom and/or tomato, like what JosephB (?) made for the NJ Pig Potluck. Phyllo Pies.

My pet peeve? Jason frequently orders a bottle of sparkling water (Pellegrino, whatever, this is not the restaurant pet peeve (but it is a husband pet peeve )). I make it clear to the beverage order taker (not always the waiter or server or busboy), that I prefer regular ice water. First peeve, when his bubbly water arrives, they attempt to pour me some. Second peeve, when waitron comes around and refills his glass and then attempts to refill my water glass (water glass is usually a tumbler, often a sparkling water glass is closer to a wine glass) with his bottled. Third and most annoying peeve, when I have to flag the busboy or whomever is making the rounds filling water glasses to give me more water -- they usually don't stop at our table because there's a bottle of water on it. Grr. There's this local chinese/japanese joint in our town. It is nicer than the average chinese restaurant. Their default water, that they just give you without saying anything about it, is seltzer. The busboys walk around with pitchers of seltzer with lemon or lime slices in it instead of ice water. First off they have this pretention that this is classier than regular water, and second they look all confused when I ask for still water. Am I the only person in the world who doesn't like the taste of carbonated water? How else are you supposed to spell shitake?

Boo hoo. I'm upset that no one has congratulated me on my idea that Verbena-NZ should make a Tunnel of Fudge Cake. I think it is a fabulous idea and I even included a link and no one is validating me.

I'm curious and don't remember reading it before on this huge thread, but is the restaurant warned in advance that the large party reservation are all planning on ordering burgers? Elyse, is the reservation made under your name or eGullet? Is it possible that a dozen burger orders all coming in at the same time might effect the doneness of a few of those burgers, as opposed to when a more normal 2 or 4 top comes in and maybe not everyone orders burgers.

Loved that movie. Anyway, for those wanting Puttanesca without making it yourself... I recently participated in a focus group panel for the marketing of a new line of "gourmet" pasta sauces. It included a tasting and I liked their puttanesca sauce the best. For part 2 of the tasting you compared your favorite flavor of their sauce to a few other brands versions of the same flavor. I still liked the original brand, but Whole Foods 365 brand was a little bit better. More whole olives, more capers, more flavor.

Well I've been working on the idea of doing a fudge type cake with a liquid center.....now this isn't anything new BUT I'm after a recipe that will allow the center to hold{or not carry on cooking} Every one that I've tried to date still carries on cooking. I've even tried putting a seperate center in{ganache} so that it remains liquid. There you go........anyone got or seen anything that'll do what I'm looking for!! I think you should make a Tunnel Fudge Cake. Edited to include link to the 1966 Pillsbury Bakeoff winning recipe.

Put out your notebook for people to "Sign Up for Elyse's Email Updates." Even if you aren't in a new market yet, you could always send out a mass email with a cookie recipe in it once a month or so.

Oh sure, I know I'm playing it up a little. And of course, I meant French outside of France, not Paris. Italian outside of Italy. The examples you cited may have better Chinese, but do they all also have Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, Thai, etc., as well as French, Italian, Etheopean, Indian, etc. That's the thing -- so those Asian cities have better Asian food, they don't have everything else too.

I wouldn't do much unless they placed orders. Make sure they have your cards next week -- maybe you could start mail ordering -- or get emails so you can notify people of where you are next selling stuff.

This conversation brought to mind an episode of the British show, "Chef!" -- the one where Gareth goes to Lyon to represent England in a big international cooking competition. Towards the end of the episode he grumbles as he "only" receives second place in Category A, third place in Category B, and second place in Category C. Meanwhile various countries recieve first prizes, and he hardly notices. He is flabergasted when he receives the Grand Prize as best overall (because he was awarded a prize in every category we are to presume). This is what NYC is like. Yes, it might not have the best French food in the world, obviously Paris gets first prize there, but it gets 2nd or 3rd place. Hmm, for Chinese food outside of China, maybe San Francisco gets 1st place, but NYC gets 2nd. Same with Japanese, Korean, Lebanese, Italian, etc. The pinnacle of a particular fare might not be available in NYC, but there's a very good to excellent example of almost every cuisine you can think of in the Big Apple. You go to another place in the world and are amazed by the local cuisine, but you may get tired of it after less than a week -- but where else to go? It is for it's breadth, the diversity and the quality of this variety that NYC is the most interesting and possibly the best place to eat in the world.

Yes, the server (one of the ones that recognized us) offered them to us (probably not realizing we'd had them before), then to the party of three down the counter. They were disappointed in not being able to have any of the sweet potato pie, as I had gotten the last slice.

I've fixed the pictures, thanks.

I know you were going for expediency, but there's a wealth of pizza info on eGullet already. A simple search for 'best pizza' (limiting the search to the NJ forum, with the date range changed to 'any') will yield several useful threads, including one about DeLorenzo's Tomato Pies.

Yeah, he made them again. "Bacon Chocolate Chip Cookies. Now with more Bacon!" A girl down the counter from me was sceptical but pleasantly surprised.