ExtraMSG

It's all the pot-smoking in the PNW. Keeps it mellow.

I grew up in California and Oregon (in Eugene mostly, actually) and the "Hawaiian" or "Canadian Bacon and Pineapple" -- as it was just as often called -- was always an option at every pizza place of significance. I tried to google around find the origin, but couldn't. So I'll be interested if anyone finds some evidence. My guess would be California or Hawaii, but you never know.

I've only read the initial post and a couple pages worth of responses, but I thought I'd pass along my experience. CT's was the first 5 star restaurant I ever went to. I had been to plenty of 3 star restaurants and a couple 4 stars, including Tru a couple nights before. Since then, I've been to Inn at Little Washington, French Laundry, and Gary Danko's, plus several 4 star places that aren't far behind in providing a quality experience, such as The Mansion at Turtle Creek. The whole dining experience was impressive, clearly a step above any dining experience before. The level of service still is unmatched, I think. We had a fabulous captain. eg, at the end of the meal we had received some mignardises which included these small truffles which were fantastic. Some of the best truffles I'd ever had or have ever had (and this includes Gand's housemade truffles at Tru, which are fantastic). The captain was asking if there was anything else we wanted and I joked, "About 1000 more of of those truffles." The Captain didn't really laugh. He said something like, "Just a moment," and briskly left the table into the back. The murmering among our table started. Would he really be getting us more truffles? He must, maybe a couple more each. In a minute or two he returned. "We don't have 1000, sorry, but I hope 88 will do." Do? Hell, we were in heaven. 88 more truffles to split between the 5 of us. We also got a wonderful tour of the kitchen, without asking, and Trotter's studio for his TV show. They gave us nice copies of the menu. The captain answered a ton of questions about preparations and ingredients and never even needed to look at a notebook. btw, the bathroom issue was a bit of one for me. We were in the frontmost dining room. I think there's one upstairs or something, too. Right next to where people sit, practically, is a bathroom, the one I got shown to. I'm not sure if I went, or if I just sat down to pee. I hate the thought of people hearing me go to the bathroom and that door was much too close to the dining room for my comfort. You certainly wouldn't have wanted to have eaten some bad Indian for lunch. Could be quite embarassing. We did have one service blip. When we got there we had to wait for 15 minutes or more (after our reservation time) for our table without any explanation (it was the first seating) or anything to help us while our time. Also, none of us drank and I don't ever remember being pressured to buy anything in place of wine or anything like that. The portions are pretty normal, maybe even larger, than a lot of tasting menu formats. It is damn expensive, but that's normal for Chicago and that level of dining experience in other major cities. I'm a fat guy who likes to eat and I didn't come away hungry. In fact, I came away bloated and stuffed because I kept putting away roll after tasty roll (they had several different kinds to choose from). I do think that they had the worst food of the 5 star restaurants I've been to, though I've only got one experience to go on. There were several dishes that divided the table and one or two that I think failed. But that may be partly the more adventurous nature of his menus than some other 5 stars. I don't think food quality, especially just on taste, necessarily increases with the number of stars for a restaurant. And the marginal gains for food quality clearly diminish, I think, at all 5 star places. The best values are probably to be had at good 3 star and 4 star places that don't charge an arm and a leg, especially in cities like my hometown of Portland, where most 3 stars charge under $20 for all their entrees and still make good stuff. But I think the dining experience does increase quite proportionally, maybe even approaching exponentially, with the amount of stars. The experience at a place like Trotter's is really so far in the atmosphere compared to any 3 star place in Portland that the $25 three course meals I can get here would have to cost $2500 at a 5 star place to really capture the difference in quality of the overall dining experience. And I'm someone who the nuances of fine dining -- what silver and china and stemware are used, whether the captain refers to me by name, whether my chair is pulled out, etc -- are generally lost on.

I had a conference in Palm Desert before and I can understand why those places are filled. It was before I knew about Chowhound or Egullet (actually, it was before egullet), but most people don't know about those. It was hard to know which places were good and which weren't and the prices at many of the independent places were quite high. I'm not saying there's an excuse for locals, but for people just in out of town, it's a benefit knowing that you'll get something edible that won't empty your pocketbook. These type of places normally go out in the burbs where pickings are generally slim and chains are among the better restaurants, and there are families who need a place that's appropriate and has a child's menu. (People often forget -- and I don't even have a kid -- that the average Italian place, French bistro, or whatever, is a terrible place for a family to go; they require babysitters.) We just got our first PF Changs here in Portland. I've never been to one. When I've driven by, it seems to be slammed even though it's not catering to the suburbian community but the "enlightened" Pearl masses who supposedly should "know better".

Does anyone know the origin of the ham/canadian bacon and pineapple pizza? I can imagine it originating as spam and pineapple on Hawaii, but what's the real origin? Obviously the name could just be something some California businessman came up with, like Santa Fe being added to anything remotely southwestern as a marketing strategy. Weirdly, I was in Mexico this last week (Mazatlan) and there were these places called "Tortas Hawaii". I never checked one out and googling it couldn't find any solid description of what they serve. I'd be interested to know what a Hawaiian torta is. btw, pineapples are indiginous to South America, so it should be Brazilian or Bolivian pizza perhaps.

The problem in Portland is that walking distance away you have several places as good or better: Bastas, Tuscany Grill, Cafe Mingo, and Serrato.

I've never seen the "ivory" salmon advertised here in Portland. Maybe I just wasn't paying attention, though. Does anyone know the name for and/or have tried the sexless salmon I saw on an episode of Iron Chef? Supposedly they're very rare and have a better flavor.

I wasn't saying they were like Olive Garden, I was saying that their prices aren't that much more expensive and so they offer a nice alternative to one when you're with people who want Italian and you don't want crap. However, I find them rarely as good as the better Italian restaurants around town here in Portland. The best thing about them here in Portland, imo, is that they offer some decent breads and free valet parking in a part of town that can be tough to park in.

Il Fornaio can be a little inconsistent and boring, but they do offer a good alternative to an Olive Garden at a price that's reasonably close. And they do try to offer some regional dishes and some specials. I think I got a thing in the mail from them or email advertising Piemonte until mid November. They use "White Truffle Region" in the description, but then looking through the menu I only saw one item using white truffle oil.

When I started reading it I was getting excited. I was hoping it was going to be more of a survey of the smaller little places and how to find them. I'm thinking of being down that way this Christmas and, as always, would love to seek out great taquerias. Does anyone know of a good article or post surveying the LA taco scene? Are there areas in LA that have a good concentration of taquerias and taco stands and taco trucks, like Fruitvale in Oakland, Mission (to some extent) in SF, and Franklin in Sacramento, and are relatively safe at least during the day for a Russian Jew who speaks some Spanish?

To add to the tasting versus ala carte menu decision, we were definitely thinking afterwards that it was a mistake to order ala carte. The dishes seemed designed for tasting menu portions and seemed awkward at full size.

Got this email back from Peter at Andina on Peruvian cookbooks. (btw, you can see a report on this restaurant in the PacificNW forum): theabroma also sent me the info on a bookdealer: Good luck. I too am waiting to hear some reports on Peru.

A friend and I did a 5 day trip to the bay area this summer and included Fifth Floor. We had a pretty lousy experience. The food was inconsistent and the service was lacking. We were with my grandparents, experienced SF diners, and they said it was the worst high end dining experienced they've had and won't go back. How long did your dinner take? I'd have to go back and look at my report, but I think ours, not a tasting menu, was about 3 hours with some pretty lengthy waits in between courses. And it wasn't even a full house (weekday).

A search at Powell's books came up with this list: http://www.powells.com/search/DTSearch/sea...y=skeptopotamus If you get the full list you'll see Tastes of Peru there, but they don't have it in stock either. I've got a PM to another member about a source for Latin American cookbooks in Spanish -- some source in California. I'll try to post it if I get a response. I'll email Andina, too, and ask them for any suggestions.

Nasty joke follows: Taco Bell uses essentially caulking guns to spit out their food stuffs. Thus if you go there you are eating caulk and hence are a caulk sucker. Sorry, sometimes I just can't help the dirty double-entrendres.

What do people eat for breakfast in Brazil, Peru, and Argentina? They've all got significant culinary traditions.

I actually think Chevy's is pretty decent Mexican-American food. It's better than most Mexican places serving up combination platters of tacos, enchiladas, beans and rice. I think it's better Mexican than Olive Garden is Italian, eg. There are some good Mexican chains in Texas, too. Remember, though, they're not trying to serve Mexican food, they're trying to serve a regional American cuisine. I just got back from Mazatlan. I was interested to see that in Mazatlan the locals have really adopted a lot of American influence in their food. I'm not talking about the places in the tourist areas. I mean actual places where you almost never see a gringo. Places where everyone stopped and stared to surprised to see me. Nachos, eg, the crappy ballpark kind with velveeta style cheese sauce and jarred jalapenos was common. So were wheat flour tortillas. Even the tortillerias made them. And hot dog and hamburger carts were as common, maybe moreso, than taco stands. I was amazed. It was much more pronounced than Puerto Vallarta. There were probably fewer such places in even the tourist sections of PV. Talking with a lot of the locals, though, many of those that work in the tourist areas have lived, even for only a month, in the US. The one thing I love though, and you find this even in cities like Guadalajara and Mexico, is that they wrap their hot dogs in bacon and then serve them usually with grilled jalapenos. You have to respect a culture that truly understands that even a pork dish can use bacon. But anyway, they've definitely taken a liking to some of the Americanizations of their foods. (And pizza was extremely popular.)

Superior to you and me, sure, but that's not the same as saying they are "superior" in some absolute sense. I go through this all the time. I'm in Oregon, btw. We have about a 10% Latino population in Portland area (probably more in the metro and towards the Salem area) with some very good taquerias and taco trucks, even a whole town (Woodburn, OR) that has been converted to taquerias and tiendas. And I have a very good basis for comparison having traveled in Mexico for food and in Texas and California in search of good taqueria food. I have too many friends who I've introduced to taquerias, including my wife, who prefer even Taco Bell. I'm taking these people to the very best taquerias in town and still they'd rather go to Taco Bell. It may seem sad to you and me, but I tend to think this is going to be the average response in the US, especially if you move more towards the NE and Midwest where even Taco Bell can seem exotic.

Yeah, I don't drink, but some dishes were fantastic. eg, at FG, the pozole verde I had was awesome. But then they toss some overcooked pork tenderloin on top for no apparent reason except maybe to justify the price of the dish. And they bring you out some pretty mediocre chips, which they charge you for, along with a couple thimbles full of salsa that taste like it came out of one of his jars. At Topolo things were a little better, I think, at least at justifying their price, but still inconsistent. The cajeta was fabulous, though. Damn. If you haven't made that from his books you should jump on it. Though I haven't been to his restaurant enough to make a defniitive judgment, my experience was that it was pretty good stuff, a little overpriced, but not as good on average as the authentic Mexican we have here in Portland through Cafe Azul and to a lesser extent La Calaca Comelona and Taqueria Nueve (which is not actually a taqueria).

It's relative. There is a significant, noticeable difference between fresh tortillas and factory tortillas, and a noticeable difference between fresh tortillas made with masa harina and fresh tortillas made from fresh masa. Though I do find it interesting to think that factory made burgers, grown beef, cut fries, etc, would be evil, but factory tortillas would be good. But it's beside the point anyway. The more important issue is whether someone can get something quickly with a certain level of consistency that they're happy with by going to BK, or Carl's Jr, or McDonald's, or Wendy's, or Taco Bell. I think they can. Some will say that they'd do better by going to some local chain or mom and pop burger joint, like In and Out in California or Burgerville in Oregon. Maybe. But how are people supposed to just know that. It's easy to discover that BK meets a certain level of quality anywhere and everywhere. Like I said, you randomly choose a Mexican place and it's a crap shoot for twice the bucks. Sit someone down at Les Halles for steak and fries for over triple the meal price at BK and even if they like it more, they probably won't think it's worth the extra dough. I deal with this daily whether it's choosing a place to eat lunch with friends, going out to dinner with family, or just making a meal for my wife. The chains serve a very useful purpose. Are they the best option, especially for people like myself? No. But they work well for a lot of people. PS I do like Bayless' books. I own three. I didn't like his shows much. And I thought his restaurants were only decent with some misguided (and expensive) dishes. He may be overhyped and full of crap, but on the face of it, I think what he's done is no big deal.

Well jbraynolds, the evidence seems to be showing something different. It may seem like insignificant movement to you, but as Bob learned, it takes baby steps. Baby steps to roasted vegetables. Baby steps to a crusty roll. Baby steps to a salad instead of fries. Etc. I think it's ridiculous a) to want these companies to transform themselives either entirely or overnight, and b) to expect people on a regular basis to cook at home or eat at restaurants that charge enough they can make food that you deem acceptable.

Sure, but I can come up with all kinds of hypothetical counter-examples. The main one is that Zagat is a resource for the same type of people are surveyed for it. It's a cross-section of those people. Therefore, their opinions should be a better match than the opinion of an "expert" who has a specific palate. A good example is something like foie gras. Most people will not like foie gras almost no matter how it's prepared. Some foodie reviewer, however, may love the stuff, may praise a place because they got the best foie gras they've ever had there. That gives no help whatsoever to the average person -- even the average avid Zagat diner -- who may never enjoy foie gras. Ultimately, food is a matter of taste, not experience. Being experienced does not necessarily make you a better judge of food for the masses but for others with your similar experience. An exception might be with an especially good writer. eg, I have quite different taste in movies, often, from Roger Ebert. However, he has the ability to indicate whether a movie is one I will like because he is a good writer who reviews movies in such a way as to let me judge whether I would like a movie whether he likes it or not.

But then, according to Les Halles' website, you get $15.50 for some chopped raw beef and fries. But I'm sure those fries are made of the magical fruit, the more you eat, the more you...lose weight. btw, didn't I just see you eat a weiner in a wonder bun from a twirly mahjig the other day? Also, I couldn't find a policy regarding a cola-cutoff for non height-weight proportionate children in your restaurant.... BK and McDonald's don't suck. Some of their stuff sucks, some doesn't. I don't go to fast food chains that often, but occasionally, at my little brothers' prompting or from the prompting of my wife or some friends. I prefer some of the lesser chains -- Carl's Jr or Arby's, eg. But there's usually something on the menu at the others that doesn't suck. It may be mediocre, but it doesn't suck. I was stuck in the LAX airport for a couple hours paying way too much to read egullet and my email on their internet kiosks trying to hammer out replies on a faulty keyboard when I read your (bourdain's) comments. Fortuitously, the only fast food in the Alaska terminal was BK so I decided to try the Santa Fe chicken sandwich. It was way overpriced at $4, but it wasn't bad. I had my wife taste it, too, and besides the fact that she doesn't like chiles, she liked it. I was actually surprised at how decent it was from the descriptions here. The roll was rather crusty, a big step above most fast food places, more like the fresh rolls you'd get at a Subway or Quizno's. The sauce wasn't overbearing -- which is one of my biggest complaints with the ranch-morphic and ketchuponaise world of a lot of fast food. The peppers and onions actually had some depth to their flavor. They weren't just sweet or tangy. They tasted roasted. The chicken itself did seem processed, but what the hell is wrong with that? Isn't that what charcuterie is? Would you complain if they were serving pate? The question is how it tastes, and it tastes like chicken. In fact, to the extent it didn't taste like chicken was because it was actually moist and tender, a real problem for grilled or sauteed chicken breast. Could I make better. Sure. Could you? Probably. Could Bayless? Yeah, but from my experience at his restaurants he'd probably fuck it up eventually. But could most people? Doubtful. Most people can't cook crap. Or more accurately, that's what they can cook, merely crap. Give them a chicken breast and it's either going to end up undercooked or overcooked. And they probably won't brine it to ensure it stays moist. Further, pick a random low cost restaurant -- a greasy spoon, a Mexican joint, a burger hut, whatever. Chances are you're going to pay twice as much for a meal as you would at BK and you're going to get mediocre to bad food. At BK you'll get it quick, relatively cheap, and you'll be assured that it will meet at least a certain minimum level of quality -- and something you know that you at least find decent will be on the menu no matter what country, no matter what locale. Really? Fresh masa has to be ground out of lime-water cooked maize that then has the sheath removed. But maybe we can cut a corner and use masa harina. That takes 30 minutes to hydrate, then you must press and griddle the tortillas for a few minutes each. So we use premade tortillas. Pozole requires a good stock. That takes time. A tamal takes about 45 minutes to steam. They masa issue again arises, even moreso here, especially since you need to whip it to the right consistency with some lard. Then the effort involved in wrapping a tamal. Try teaching that one to high school kids. Burgers and hot dogs seem a hell of a lot easier and quicker. btw, do you think if you grabbed 10 people off the street and randomly chose a taqueria and had them eat a carne asada taco or a carnitas taco they would like it better or worse than *whatever* Taco Bell had to offer? I tend to think they would choose the latter. Maybe you mean something other than "what people like" for "good". This is such bullshit hyperbole. a) food just isn't that important; the biggest problem with Bayless and his compadres at CC is that they buy into this same faulty notion. If there are good guys and bad guys in regards to food, it is governments who put up impediments to people being fed, not whether we choose Les Halles over Burger King. I need to start a business selling decals with Calvin (or maybe AB) pissing on the BK logo because the rhetoric is getting just as loony as the Ford vs Chevy folks. b) even if you buy into the BS about good guys and bad guys in the restaurant world, what's so wrong with moderation, progression, and not making the perfect the enemy of the good? Why can't someone say, "I think this is a step in the right direction"? Do you make no compromises? You don't have to agree with them to at least acknowledge the intent.

Did you, Fat Guy, or anyone else ever see that (I think it was on PBS) story about aquaculture in the desert. They're these big self-contained fish farms that are highly environmentally sound (based on how they described them). I can't remember too many details, but I remember thinking how amazing it was.

There's a big difference between farm-raising salmon and mussels, though. Farm-raised salmon hasn't gone through the selection process nor the natural life cycle that apparently has such an effect on it. Still though, even being in the PNW where there are *lots* of Salmon and steelhead runs nearby, I often purchase farm-raised. Most of it, if relatively fresh, is like mediocre hatchery fish or hatchery salmon that's been sitting around for a while. It's not the best stuff for simple preparations, but with a sauce or dredged in flour and fried with some seasoning it's quite edible. I have a real salmon sensitivity, though. Generally, I can't stand the flavor. And if it's been sitting in the fridge for a day or two, no way. Copper River salmon that's quite fresh is the only stuff I've been able to truly enjoy besides some extremely fresh local stuff. I've even done taste tests between varieties with my friends and wife. It's quite noticeable. I think salmon, trout, and steelhead more than most fish have a broad range of quality that can move from one level to the next in a hurry. Just the change in temperature from cold streams to temperate streams can make a pretty significant difference in flavor in my experience. There are three issues, though: the gastronomic, the political, and the economic. Gastronomically, I think farm-raised is on average noticeably worse. But even with that, people who like salmon will still enjoy many of its great features. I think most of the political arguments against farm-raised salmon are internally inconsistent or just red herrings about practicalities that can almost always be fixed. And economically, farm-raised salmon seems to be much better. It's generally much cheaper, usually half the price almost even here in the PNW where we have decent access to ocean and stream salmon. And it's probably a much more efficient use of resources. Here in Portland we were getting Copper River sockeye for $5/lb near the end of the run. I could write a book on 1001 ways to mutilate tasty salmon. One of the great things here for a bbq when the salmon is running is going down near the dams and picking up whole salmon freshly caught by the tribes. They have special fishing rights on the Columbia River and you can get damn cheap whole salmon less than an hour old, sometimes straight off the line (or out of the nets as the case may be). You can buy a 50 lb chinook for less than $100. The only problem is trying to fit one in a bbq.