ExtraMSG

The Oregonian is like what you imagine food writing to be in the '50s -- Betty Crocker meets Family Home Journal or something. Every few weeks I decide I'll check it out to see if there's anything interesting and I realize, nope, there wasn't. I haven't ever checked out the Mercury's food stuff. Didn't even know they had a section. I do think the WW can be inconsistent, but at least you can get to know a reviewer and they actually seem to try to learn something about the place they're reviewing first. On the other hand, I've read reviews from the Oregonian where I've questioned whether the writer ever actually ate there. They just looked at the menu and said it sounded good or something. I start looking for the advertising in the paper at that point. Have you checked out Portland Monthly or Portland Tribune. I haven't read much of the Tribune yet, but noticed that they were online. I got the Portland Monthly food edition and it was a mixed bag. Some things were ridiculous, like their pick for best Mexican Tienda in town. But there was some useful information as well and they seem to be trying. They are rather new, afterall. Unfortunately, Jim Dixon doesn't write near enough for WW and appears to be selling too much olive oil making him feel like he's unable to review these places we need him to, I think.

Which is why what people should be concerning themselves with is not how much someone gets paid or whether their conditions meet our standards, but whether the Rule of Law is being upheld and whether they have basic rights of self-determination, such as the ability to make contracts, enforce those contracts even if they're poor and not powerful, change jobs, not sell their land if they don't want to, etc. These things are way more important than us assuming that earning 20 cents a day is bad or assuming that working in 100 degree heat is bad or that working at 14 in a factory is bad. The former items, the Rule of Law and basics of self-determination let these peoples figure it out for themselves.

They're currently $80/lb for whites at New Seasons. $128/lb at City Market. Maybe a pretty good value. I wish I could taste them side by side.

As an amateur magician in college, I can say that with parafilm, I can make a quarter disappear, but press n seal won't make a crappy casserole disappear. btw, I think press n seal works pretty well. I tried it out at Thanksgiving press-n-sealing the hell out of turkey, pie, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and so on. I do think I prefer normal plastic wrap for some things like cheese -- items where I want to wrap something tightly, multiple times, see what's being wrapped really well, and re-wrap it. But it's much better for most lidding options. I often have normal Saran wrap that won't cling to bowls. I'm not sure why it original Saran wrap clings to some and not others. If I didn't hate using the stuff so much I'd go test it. But one of my truly dreaded duties in the kitchen is sealing things with Saran wrap. Stupid static always has it trying to cling to something, usually itself. It's like putting tape on a cat's tail and watching it try to get it off, the tape sticking to one body part after another.

A little OT, but the cooking staff is selling their book around the country right now. Here's a light intereview with them in a local weekly: http://www.wweek.com/flatfiles/FoodDrink4592.lasso

Willamette Week on Tibetan food in Portland: http://www.wweek.com/flatfiles/FoodDrink4626.lasso

http://www.acsh.org/press/editorials/olestra073198.html http://www.acsh.org/press/releases/olestra.98.html

I don't know that I'm experienced enough to say. They smell great. Very potent. Also, I have a cold right now -- a soar throat -- which is throwing off my sense of taste a little. My sinuses are fine, though. I imagine some of your folks in California are experienced with Oregon white truffles enough to say how they compare to European truffles. Do you guys have any of the same species down there in N. California? You should see if Berkley Bowl is selling them. They have everything else on the planet.

Well, it's apparently truffle season and I've had the pleasure of purchasing local truffles at both New Sesons ($5/oz) and City Market ($7/oz). A one ounce truffle appears to be about the size of a quarter spun on its axis, maybe a little smaller. I'm using them to make truffle oil mainly and it seems you can make about 10 ozs of truffle oil with a one ounce truffle, but maybe more. That's just the ratio that I've tried so far and it worked. Just wanted to give Portlanders a heads-up. And the provacative title is just because I like plays on words and has no political intentions whatsoever.

If it really is a problem, I think it would be a mistake for the companies to remove the labeling because someone is going to get cramps and diarrhea and sue. Not that the warning labels really help that much. There was a warning on some sugar free peanut butter cups I bought a couple months ago, but I didn't notice it. Ate about 10 (they're the size of the minatures) over an hour of watching a movie and by the time the movie was over I was in the bathroom. Cramps and diarrhea that reminded me of salmonella, which I had in middle school. Many sugar free "treats" such as Jelly Bellies are pretty bad. It's an interesting practical joke to give people sugar free Jelly Bellies. A handful will put you in the bathroom for several hours. I used to eat olestra chips occasionally and never had too much problem. I did get gas which in my mind is almost worse than getting diarrhea. But I did have to eat a significant amount, like half a big bag. No anal leakage. (Is anyone reading this anymore?) I have to say, Olestra is good stuff. Chips with Olestra are 100 times better than baked chips and nearly as good as normal chips.

It's a coincidental, not a necessary connection. The issue is more about standards and care for those standards. Right now, the consumer is more concerned about the price of their beef than the cleanliness -- at least as a whole. If it started to be the case that everyone knew someone who had gotten violently ill from beef, that might change. But it's still rather rare. Traffic accidents are a huge problem, by comparison, and you don't see us switching to the monorail (what's that you say? monorail!) It's about balance and the market has decided that it's not enough of an issue to require raising the price of beef. You could think about it like airport security prior to 9-11. If we have a major, or several medium-level outbreaks of e coli that really pisses people off, or just scares them, then I'm sure the market would demand stricter regulations. Outbreaks in the past have caused companies, eg, Jack in the Box, to strictly enforce quality on their suppliers. I don't see much difference in quality, escept maybe in meats and fish sold, between a Wal-Mart and the higher-priced Safeway or a Winco and the higher-priced Albertson's. And I think CostCo shows that you can be cheap and sell good stuff. I agree with you here. But as a libertarian, I neither like laws favoring unions (such as not allowing employers to hire scabs or fire union workers) or companies (eg, requiring cooling off periods, laws not allowing unions to contract with employers to be union-only, etc). I'm all for sticking Wal-Mart's or Safeway's feet to the fire when they break the law, but if they're just tough business people, that's fine. But I disagree strongly, very strongly, that we as first-worlders or companies should be ashamed of the wages they pay in 3rd world countries or in exporting jobs. a) because their wages don't match our wages for equal work doesn't mean that the wages aren't good for them, b) service oriented jobs, such as financial and technical services, have been growing in the US much faster than manufacturing jobs have been shrinking; I'd much rather our country be working in offices than working in factories, c) why are so often the same people who lament greedy Americanism so worried about spreading the wealth, if that's what it is, anyway? d) the issue is still standards; it's not enough to assume that because Mexicans or Malaysians aren't on average as educated as Americans that they will make a poorer product, grow less healthy crops, or whatever; they still have the same brains and they can be taught what they need to be; what's necessary is standards from distributors and customers in the US.

One of the big factors for me is many of the bagged salads are pre-washed multiple times and ready to eat. Washing and drying greens is annoying and I refuse to buy a salad spinner. Salads are the quickest thing I make practically because of bagged greens.

To me it's a continuum. You need to know the basics of storage prior to preparing the ingredients, but also after preparing both for using the next day, eg, and for using that day. There's a decent amount of information out there on how to cut, chop, and fabricate ingredients. But there's nothing that covers some of these very practical matters like storage, especially after cutting/fabricating and par-cooking. I'm not so interested in how long to be safe. I'm more interested in how long before meaningful degradation in texture and flavor. I'm willing to do a lot of this because I've been thinking about this for a while -- a few months at least. In fact, if I had any credibility, I'd be willing to do enough work to actually write a book. But I don't have the credibility to sell the book.

As I was driving around between Whole Foods and City Market today I realized that it was NW Burnside not E Burnside so I decided to have dinner there. I got a table by myself and ordered the yak curry. The place is more pleasant inside than Lungta and much bigger, though still not big. There's plenty of parking. The couple who runs it are very nice, though they can get quite frazzled when they're busy. They weren't busy while I was there, but a party of 20 or so came in and that picked up their pace. Prices are higher here than lungta, but still fair. You can get a curry with bread or rice and choose mild, medium, or spicy. I chose spicy and the bread. The bread is interesting, like a folded roll that uncoils and peels apart. It's dotted with some sort of aromatic herb, but I'm not sure what. I enjoyed the bread, though. Different from the bread at Lungta, but I like both. The curry wasn't a big portion, but a fair portion. I think you'd probably get more at most other places serving curries, either Thai or Indian. Honestly, I couldn't tell the difference between the yak and beef that's been sitting around in my frig. It's a little tough, but other than that, very beefy, really. I think there's less of a difference between beef and that yak than there is between veal and beef. But it was decent. Still nothing special, though, but good. I ordered spicy, but I think they gave me mild. Some guy at the table next to mine was complaining about the heat so maybe they mixed up the spice on the orders. I wouldn't mind going there again, especially with friends so I could taste more dishes, but I don't feel a strong urge. I'd probably choose a decent Indian place in town first. There is a bigger menu here than Lungta. The address, btw, is 103 NW 21st Ave.

Tried to go there for lunch, but I had remembered it as E 21st and Burnside for whatever reason and drove around getting pissed off until I decided I'd just try the one over on Sandy, Lungta. It's at 4644 NE Sandy and has a little parking in the back. It's a small little place, maybe 10 tables. For lunch they had a buffet for just under $6. There were about 6 items on the buffet. I got a to-go menu and the entrees are all under $10 with noodle dishes significantly under $10, closer to $5 or $6. The dishes seem very much like a mixture of Chinese and Indian. Maybe that's not accurate. What it really seems like is that there are Chinese dishes and/or there are Indian dishes. The buffet had a mixture with a chow mein, a chicken curry, a beef and potato soup with noodles, some sauteed zucchini with Indian spices, Tibetan flatbread, rice, some sort of salad-like thing of shredded carrots and another vegetable in a sort of tangy dressing, and lentil soup. I tried everything but the lentil soup and the chow mein. One problem is under-salting. It's not a big problem because there's salt on the table. But I think some people would be wondering why their food has no flavor, not realizing it needs salt. This isn't just me, either. I went to lunch with my wife and even she had to salt it and she never salts anything. I also had a little chile sauce they had on the table to spice it up. It's potent stuff with little tiny spoonfuls making a huge difference. The chicken curry was decent, though nothing special. Same with the beef and potato soup. The zucchini were okay for what they were. I liked the flatbread pretty well. Very soft and spongy with a slight crust on the outside. They're about 3 or 4 inches across and a little more than half an inch thick. I ate almost no rice because I preferred eating my curry with the bread instead. The little salad thing wasn't that great. My wife had the chow mein and wasn't impressed. Overall, it's okay, but I won't hurry to go for dinner. If I'm in the neighborhood, it might be worth another try since the dinner menu is more interesting than the buffet, probably better quality, and has good prices. They're open M-S for lunch 11:30 to 2:30, buffets on weekdays. They're open 5:30 to 9:00 for dinner. You can find an intro to Tibetan food here: http://www.travelchinaguide.com/essential/.../food-drink.htm.

If it were to be done, probably the best way would be to gather a set of 5 or 10 "researchers" who would gather the information over a year or so. You'd want consistent conditions, I think, between ingredients so that if someone were to adjust, they could adjust rather uniformly. You'd probably want each person to have a digital thermometer in his frig and in his freezer. Then you could take notes on each item each day. You'd want to have extra of the items so you could taste them maybe each day and take notes as well. A digital camera would be awesome as well so that you could take pictures. I went to Powell's Cooks and Gardeners today and looked through some of their books such as Food for Fifty, Gisslen's Advanced Professional and Essentials of Professional Cooking, Peterson's Vegetables, and others. None were that great for my purpose. The best were probably Gisslen's books, although just for vegetables, Peterson's book wasn't that bad. (As an aside, I've heard people laud Food for Fifty, but I don't understand why. It's mostly recipes when what you really need, I would think, are more general instructions on how to cook for fifty. And the book is expensive.) The Peterson book mostly had really good information on how to prepare vegetables and how to store them prior to prep, but really no information on how to store them after prep or after par-cooking. The Gisslen's Advanced book had good information on preparing your mise en place for all the recipes and the Essentials book had good information on a wide range of subjects including mise en place. In fact, I'm really tempted to buy that book, especially since they had a used copy. But I couldn't find anything like what I think would be a very useful book for home cooks and professionals.

A useful website, thanks, but the government is always overly protective, plus I'm more interested in how it tastes still and how its texture is, rather than if it will kill me.

Is there a book that covers storage, preparation of ingredients prior to cooking, par-cooking, and storage after prep and par-cooking? I would love to see a book that has a section on fruits, vegetables, meat, poultry, fish, even stocks, sauces, pastry sauces, and so on that says you can, eg: * Dice a carrot and keep it in a tightly wrapped plastic bag in a refrigerator between 40 and 45 degrees for up to 1 day if used raw, 3 days if used for roasting, and 14 days for stewing. Or roast diced carrot 10 minutes in 350 oven to be used in soups, sauces, and sautees storing in sealed plastic container for up to 3 days in the refrigerator. * Roast chicken to 165 degrees and store wrapped in tin foil and plastic in a refrigerator between 40 and 45 degrees for up to 2 days to be used raw in salads, 5 days to be used in casseroles and other twice-cooked dishes, or 7 days for soups and stews. Can be stored in the freezer for casseroles, soups, and stews for up to 3 months. That sort of thing. I'm just making this stuff up as examples. Is the Professional Chef the closest there is to that or is there something better? The PC seems to cover fabrication and use of ingredients well, but not always storage or what you can prepare ahead and how far ahead without much degradation. In fact, a book that actually tested the degradation of storage techniques would be a godsend since most information seems to be old chef's tales passed down.

I've found that wrapping mushrooms in something absorbent, like a paper towel, and then wrapping them in platic works pretty well. It's similar to how they're wrapped at the store (they're covered in plastic with that little maxi-pad like thing you find in packages of meat to soak up the juices underneath). Just plastic often makes them soggy. Just a paper bag often dries them out. That's my experience.

Obviously you could do something like a rib roast with roasted potatoes. But you could also make finger foods using steak and potatoes. eg, relatively common are slices of beef wrapped around asparagus, or in Thai/Vietnamese wrapped around lemongrass. You could wrap beef around roasted or fried spears of seasoned potatoes, too. The question's a little broad. Do you have a direction you'd like to go? Are you looking for what goes with steak and potatoes or advice on whether 17 people would be better served by finger foods or steak and potatoes? Or what?

I remember that episode of The Simpsons. Classic.

And it's not their real Christmas dinner. It's a pre-Christmas Christmas dinner. I was originally thinking Mexican/Latin American Christmas, but I've done that for Thanksgiving before. My wife was thinking Victorian, but then I started pointing out things like the various British puddings and she quickly changed her tune.

A few things to catch myself up on this thread: 1) Thank goodness someone said this: It's one of things I kept thinking reading over the last few pages of new posts. Whenever an industry supplants another, such as the rise of the mega stores, there is a time in a capitalistic society where competitors must reposition themselves and re-emerge. The '80s and '90s are probably the decades most of you should be complaining about. We've been seeing a re-emergence of fine foods -- the popularity of the food network, the new celebrity chefs, Sur La Table, Whole Foods, the farmer's market, and so on. I don't think FG is right to say we should give up on these small businesses. I think we should just expect them to reposition themselves in the marketplace, to focus more, and provide services that are more difficult for the megastores to give. That said, the megastores will try to compete if they can. Safeway and Kroger have started offering real parmeggiano-reggiano in the last couple years, eg. They've started house brands of upscale breads, pasta sauces, salsas, and the like. That's what's great about capitalism, these companies push each other. Personally, I think that there's been an increase in quality at the restaurant chains over the years, too. Places like Applebees and Olive Garden are offering better and more interesting food and more nutritional choices. 2) What is it that most of you find to be moral/immoral food choices? There's some confusion here. Is it nutrition-based, flavor-based, environmental-based, or what? So many of you talk of evil this and evil that, but without much clarity, it seems, as to what makes that thing bad. 3) Why do so many see their preferences as Good and others' preferences as Bad? Is it any more important that I buy my pants from a boutique that makes their own clothes than I buy my apples from the orchard? I buy my pants from Target and they are clearly lower quality than the pants I could get from other stores. Am I an idiot for not spending even $10 more to buy better pants, that maybe even look a little nicer from another store? Is the person who buys supermarket mozzarella any more of an idiot for not spending the extra on fresh? The extra quality of my pants just isn't that important to me, not even one penny more important. I don't think it's a matter of education for most people. I just think they aren't people for whom one penny more would be worth buying that "finer" mozzarella. Brillat-Savarin talks about the taste-deaf, comparing them to the tone-deaf, deaf, and blind. But I don't even think that's the case. I think many people can tell the difference, but they just don't care and don't want to care. As tommy says, he doesn't want to watch football no matter how easy or cheap it is. 4) A lot of that TV watching, remember, is after people eat. People often want to eat as soon as possible after they get home, at least by 7 pm. Then they get 3 hours of TV in and just want to relax. If makin a meal means getting home at 6, getting the meal on the table by 8, having everything finished and cleaned by 9:30p and then getting to bed at 10, that's not a choice they're willing to make. It's not just a matter of choosing TV or home-cooked meals. A lot of these people do still make Sunday dinners when they have lots of extra time. When I was a kid, we often ate dinner at 9pm because we were poor enough that we had to cook our meals. There's a lot less involved in getting pizza and for most people, I think they actually like Pizza Hut better than whatever they'd make. Plus, I don't think what people generaly make at home is any more nutritious than what they're buying out. They're making tacos, hamburgers, cheesy pasta, and the like anyway.

We here in Oregon have a weird situation where we have both very high national numbers for obesity and for people who say they are hungry. Squeat, doesn't California, and especially San Francisco, have some of the highest expenditures for social services in the country?

Oysters? Really? How do people prepare oysters for Christmas? Doesn't seem very family friendly, but I'm intrigued.