prasantrin

Well, I guess nothing brings back memories of Old Beijing like a chicken wrap from KFC. What's in it? Chicken, hoisin sauce, cucumber, spring onions, and?? Anything else? Is it just a regular flour tortilla, or do they actually use paoping (sp?)?

Don't know about the others, but Bourdain quit (or so he said in a short interview for Time Magazine...or was it Newsweek?). He's not cooking professionally anymore (as far as I know), though, so perhaps he doesn't count?

A couple of more complete pictures of our osechi meal. These are pictures taken of pictures my neighbour gave me of the meal, so they're a bit blurry (I don't have a scanner, and I didn't want to ask her to email me the pictures). These are the three main boxes of food. And in this picture, you can see the tai before it was cut into, and all 5 boxes of food. Before my mother and I arrived, they had distributed most of the boxes into our individual osechi boxes. As I mentioned earlier, there were some things they cooked themselves that you won't see in the boxes. I might not have taken pictures of all of them, but I've already posted the pictures I did take.

I am terribly jealous of all the wonderful food, wonderful experiences, and most importantly, the (newfound?) camaraderie amongst the three of you. What a treat this was!

Maybe that's why they didn't call it "takoyaki"???

Let me add my thanks for your (collective) blogging. I always find that reading about other people's successes and struggles with weight loss helps motivate me with my own quest. It was really a pleasure spending this last week with all of you. (And now I'm trying to figure out how to go to San Diego to get me some food from Saigon!)

Ummm...I think that's nata de coco. Nata de coca might be a different kind of favourite...

Don'tthis topic on Filipino food. Not entirely about food, but you'll find some good information there, especially about food from different regions.

Four dishes that remind me of my childhood are garlic-pepper spareribs, pork corn balls, gkai pad gkaprow (thai chicken with basil), and grilled cheese sandwiches. I can make the first two, and the last one, but I've never been able to make gkai pad gkaprow like my dad's.

Rob, were you reading my mind about merging the two threads? I was trying to decide which one to post my question to, so I just picked the one with the most replies (which wasn't the one I started, but it had one more reply than mine did!). Ooooohhhh, an electric one! That might come in handy when I move back to Canada. I have a feeling that it won't work quite as well on an electric stove as on gas. It's about the same price that I paid for my stove top one. I think I got a bit ripped off there! I might have to just try making some coffee without the milk. Or perhaps I could just buy some espresso from Starbucks or something. That would probably be a better idea, rather than risk ruining my machine! BTW, I also noticed on their website that they say not to use detergent or abrasives on the Mukka, just to rinse it out and wipe with a soft sponge. So then how does one get all the milk stuff out?

I looked the recipe up. Looks easy, I just need to get some flax (I think I have some, but it's about 4 years old...). I punched in the ingredients for just the crust into Now You're Cooking, and it's 2.4 points per slice (based on 8 slices). Not bad, I think. As long as I don't use too much cheese, it shouldn't be too bad.

Randi--is the dough hook for your processor just the plastic blade? Or do you have a specialized dough hook? Your pizza crust looks really good. Did you use the recipe from Eat, Shrink, and Be Merry? I've never seen that show, btw, but my mother only gets the basic channels, so I never get to watch anything good when I'm visiting!

Well, 6 months later, you've probably fixed your problem, but browsing around the Bialetti website regarding my own problem, I found that for ceramic ranges, they suggest using med-high heat if starting from cold (ie. if the element is cold), or medium heat if the element is already hot. Then let it sit for one minute on the element once the coffee is made to heat it a bit more. Now for my question, has anyone used the Mukka without milk (or any other liquid)? I need some espresso to make tiramisu, so I thought I might just use coffee from my Mukka, if I can use the machine without putting any milk in the pot part. Their website cautions against using any other liquid but milk, but doesn't caution against not using any liquid at all.

I just checked out their website. So were you there for dinner or for lunch? I quite liked the concept of the solar system, but as a dessert, the flavours you described didn't seem that interesting to me. Do you know if there was a reason the chef chose the flavours he did? (in other words, why apple with dark chocolate for Jupiter, etc.) Also, did you dine alone, and if so, did you find they were any more or less welcoming? Just an aside, the cover page of your Sant Pau album takes forever and a day to download. Any chance of making your future album cover pages smaller?

kani kureem korokke or for the uninitiated, crab cream croquette. Sometimes even two!

So they're not residents of the US, they just got married there? I watched the video of the story, and I could tell they were from somewhere in Africa, though I didn't hear anything about their background. She did say that her dream as a child was to have a doll in her image, so she figured a wedding cake would be just as good. And apparently her daughter was a bit weirded out by it. "Mommy, why are they going to cut you?" I hope she doesn't have therapy bills for her daughter in her future!

I made some roasted cauliflower last night, and fresh out of the oven, they really did taste like french fries. But I left it on the counter overnight, and this morning, my kitchen/living room/dining room (all one room) smelled like fart. I fear for what these will do to me... But they're a good way of getting vegetables into someone who doesn't really like vegetables!

Today was a great day... 1/2 bag of peanut karinto 3 sausage rolls--or maybe 4 or 5--maybe even 6 1 mandarin orange some roasted cauliflower and kabocha 1 char siu bao (or maybe 2) 1/2 sticky rice in lotus leaf a couple of Hershey's Nuggets warmed milk with some Godiva chocolate Liqueur Bouchon quiche And a three or four hour nap this afternoon. I think that's it, but I'm going to have some warmed milk with peppermint essence and maybe Bailey's before going to bed. And I'm blaming my weight gain on PMS... ETA: 1 madeleine and 2 or 3 almond sembei ...and a banana ...and half a box of Pretz (salad flavour)

That's very possible. In Canada sometimes the Dr. Oetker products are in the spice section (which is usually near the baking section, anyway).

This person is an ex-pat in Zurich, and she has just the info you need! In German and French (at least that's what is on the Dr. Oetker packages)

What can I do with pork belly (no skin) that is almost all fat? I used most of a slab of belly to make char siu, but the rest is probably 90% fat, 10% meat. I love pork fat, but since I'm supposed to be watching my fat-intake, I just couldn't use it. Should I just render it to make lard? I should add that I don't have any smoking equipment, so bacon would be out. I think it would still be too fatty for bacon, anyway.

In Winnipeg there's a Chinese/Vietnamese grocery store called "Dong Thai". Because my name is so unusual, though, I try not to make fun of other people's names. My name isn't nearly as funny as "Dong", though.

I'm very fortunate to have such generous neighbours who love to share meals with me! They really are wonderful people--an old Nishinomiya family who have lived on the same property for hundreds of years. They built the apartment in which I live (it's a small building, with only four apartments, and it's right behind their house) specifically for the foreign English teachers at my school, so in the past, they often invited us over for special meals. My first summer here I attended a barbeque extravaganza at their house (I used to have pictures up somehwere--meats and vegetables from all over Japan, etc.), and the following Christmas, they had a chef come to their home and prepare a luxurious Italian meal (complete with truffles!). I still get invited over sometimes, though my co-workers have not been so fortunate. I guess I've been lucky with tai. I've only spent o-shogatsu in Japan twice (the first was about 14 years ago), but I've always had tai. I don't really care for it that much (and this version was very very dry), but I always feel honoured when my hosts offer it to me. My first New Year's was also my first experience with ikura at a friend's house (in rural Shiga--her family owned a golf course out there). Another friend (also a Canadian) and I didn't know it was expensive, and to my embarrassment, we ate almost the whole dish of it! But I realized my love for it then! We had Kansai-style (I think they said it was Kansai-style) o-zoni, too, but I didn't get a picture. It was sweeter than o-zoni I've had before. My neighbour made it herself, and she even cut the red carrots (which I didn't know were indigenous to Japan, or so they told me) into flower-like shapes.

Here I go again!!! Happy New Year! I’m only 11 days late—not nearly as late as I was for Christmas! January 1st, my mother went to mass while I went to the gym (notice another trend here?). My gym was open Jan. 1, but closed Jan. 2-4, so I figured I should start my new year out right! Maybe this will bode well for my resolution to get back to my pre-summer gym attendance. Or not… After we each returned home, we went to Mondoyakujin, also called Tokoji. Mondoyakujin (Japanese link, brief English explanation here) is a little bit famous in my area, but in my four years of living just a 5-minute walk away, I had never been there. Technically, I still haven’t been there because we only went that way for one thing…the food stalls, specifically the takoyaki stall! I don’t know why my mother loves takoyaki so much, but every time she comes to Japan, she has to have takoyaki. The stall we went to had just run out before we got there, so we had to wait about 10 minutes for a new batch (there were other customers ahead of us, too). While she waited in line, I went to get some cotton candy (just a 5-minute wait). I returned in time to find this… Look how happy she is! This version had fairly large pieces of tako, too. After getting the takoyaki, we returned home. We were just a few minutes downhill from the temple, but my mother’s back and knee were bothering her, so we left. And that was our New Year’s Day! On January 2, we went to my neighbour’s house to celebrate the new year with them. Much food was involved, of course! For Randi, a sort of non-blurry picture of me! Not taken by my mother, of course. It’s still not a very clear picture, but it’s better than the other ones! We each got our own little box of food. Almost everything was purchased—one of those department store osechi things, but a few things were made by my neighbour (she’s also my landlord, by the way). I know the kuromame were made by her, but I’m not sure about the other things. There was plenty of other food, too And it can’t be New Year’s without tai! This is tai, right? We had already eaten some of it, so they flipped the skin back so I could take a prettier picture . Then we had tea. Jasmine tea. I’d never seen jasmine tea like this before, but the back of the bottle said “jasmine”, so it must have been jasmine. We really enjoyed it, and now I’m on the search for some whole jasmine tea (but then I also need to get a glass tea pot in which to brew it ) We also had some goodies from Tokyo—these were all very good, especially the meringue! And we were lucky enough to be given the rest of the box to take home! Also in the box were sembei with different New Year’s pictures stamped in them, and some delicious dehydrated apple slices (no pictures of the apple slices). I just have a few more shots, but those will have to wait until next week as I don’t have a card reader at home.

Craaaaaaappppp!!!!! I just lost my New Year's post! I'm annoyed! Do we have an "annoyed" smiley that isn't a smiley? Randi--I found another picture that isn't so blurry, and I put it in my New Year's post, but since that has disappeared, you'll just have to wait a little bit longer! Except it's still not a great picture--backlighting and all... Hiroyuki--is that the same warabi as the warabi in warabi mochi? Isn't it somewhat carcinogenic? I thought the egg thing was tofu, but it tasted more like egg to me. The pineapple was a bit out of place, but what was the red fruit? I didn't think it was ume, because it was bumpy, and it was very sweet. I didn't think the food was very bland. I rather liked it, except for the mushy soba and the spongy koyadofu. I was thinking that I should eat like that every day. I would lose weight for sure! But I don't think I could eat more than two meals in a row of it... Now I'm going to try to compose my New Year's post again in such a way not to lose the whole frickin' thing if my IE dies again.