prasantrin

Sorry, I forgot about replying for a couple of days! I use the fig and olive tapenade recipe on David Lebovitz's website. It's really great! I usually use less olive oil--maybe 1/3 cup or a little more, but that's mostly because I was trying to cut calories. If you want more vegetables without doing roasted ones, what about something like caponata or a spin on ratatouille? Caponata would be well-suited for an Italian-American crowd, and you could make it ahead, so you won't have to worry about stinking up the place the day of. You could also use either as a topping for crostini (what's the difference between crostini and bruschetta? Are they the same?). About the fig and olive tapenade, you can also do it as crostini with a schmear of soft goat cheese. I love grilled sandwiches with soft goat cheese and fig and olive tapenade!

Do you know of any place that does "traditional" Peking/Beijing duck, where the first course is skin-only with paoping? Most modern places have a good portion of fat and meat along with the skin which is, to me, a big no-no. I've not been to mainland China, but a very popular place in Hong Kong known for their Beijing duck was like that, too. And practically no one carves tableside, either. FWIW, the best duck I've had has been in Bangkok. You can get amazing old-style Beijing duck there.

Thanks! I'm hoping for some biscuits this weekend made with my freshly-rendered lard!

If one is using a slow cooker, is it really necessary to add water? I've got 1kg of backfat in there right now on high, and I thought I'd omit the water since things cooked in slow cookers tend to end up watery, anyway. Bad idea?

Do you have a recipe? It sounds awesome!

Two new kitkats--vegetable and fruit juice (or something like that), and some kind of one with red bean and kinako. Ohagi? I've not tried either, yet. I only bought one of the vegetable and fruit juice (for my colleague--I really don't think I'll be interested in it), and two of the ohagi (one for each of us!). And more exciting news for me. . . yuzu pure! I love pure, and I think I'll love the yuzu one! I didn't have time to pick up a bag, yet, but I'll do it soon! And finally. . . Chocolate-covered karinto. OMG it's good. I wish the karinto were thicker, but they're still really really good. Too bad they're so expensive (from Royce).

Did you use a regular muffin cup, or mini-tart pans? I'm just wondering which might provide a better texture.

The first post in Pie Pastry Crust Demo has his pictorial, but I can't find where the original was posted. And then there's this one--my favourite--where An American Attempts to Make English Pork Pie. But if you send me some pie, your attempt could be my favourite, too!

and that And implies that her beouf bourguinon recipe has perhaps more steps than are entirely necessary. Is it worth learning to do things "Julia's Way"? FWIW, the reason Julia Child did not appreciate Julie's blog was because she felt Julia was "not very serious." I guess if you can't/won't be serious about it, then her book is not the right one for you (general "you").

I want to compliment you on your pie making, but I can't until I try one. Please send me one of each pie, and I will test them for you and give you an unbiased opinion on the fabulousness of your pies. Really, cool takkyubin is only Y650! I love meat pies, and I never did make any after jackal's pork pie pictorial. Have you ever tried Ameyoko-cho Center Building for lamb? The wet-market type place in the basement was where we used to go for lamb/mutton. There's still a stall that sells it, or at least there was last May.

I dont' think that has anything to do with it. If it weren't clean, and if the service weren't good, Japanese people wouldn't go to a place like that. Japanese people like MF because of the atmosphere--it projects elegance and seems to epitomize the civilized western world (that's my take on the popularity, anyway). FWIW, I love MF--at least the Japanese versions of it (I've only been to the Kobe, Kyoto, and the now defunct Osaka branches), but I wouldn't go there for Chinese teas, or even Japanese teas. Indian, yes. Flavoured teas, yes. Waiters in white linen suits, yes. Chinese and Japanese teas--not likely.

That's a beautiful pot, but why do you prefer cast iron to porcelain and clay pots and what is it about these cast iron pots that you would want to dedicate several of them to various teas? I'm curious as to the answer, as well. In Japan tetsubin are rarely used for brewing water much less for making tea (and then it's the lined tetsubin that are used). I've always seen the use of tetsubin for brewing tea as a Western affectation, but I'm curious if people really see a benefit (flavour-wise) to using tetsubin. The only benefit I can think of would be that it holds heat longer, but that would not necessarily improve the flavour of the tea (particularly since Japanese teas should be brewed in smaller amounts for best flavour).

Another member went on one of her tours and posted about it here. Guess you must have missed it.

What measurements of tea and water are you using? And what temperature of water? Ideally, it's 10grams to 80mL of 60C water for gyokuro vs 10grams to 210mL of 80C water for sencha. The brewing time is a wee bit longer than sencha--90 seconds vs sencha's 60 seconds. To me, gyokuro is smoother and less astringent than sencha, so it's either your brewing method or the quality of gyokuro you're using.

I'm confused about a couple of things. 1) What exactly do you mean by "VIP"? Looking at what you have, I don't get a feeling of either VIP or champagne taste. 2) How is it being served? You say "hospitality/a light dinner", but will it be served cocktail-style? Will there be plates, cutlery, and tables and chairs available for everyone? I'm just wondering how the shrimp and rice will be served. If it's more cocktail-style, sausage rolls are always welcome. If it's slightly more vip-ish, use puff pastry and homemade sausage meat (I just use ground pork and penzey's breakfast sausage spice mix--sometimes I add asparagus or red/orange/yellow peppers to add colour). If it's a little more low-brow, use pillsbury crescent rolls and hot dogs. The puff pastry version is less labour-intensive than the pillsbury version, because you can make big rolls and just cut several pieces from each one, rather than rolling hot dogs individually. For the dips, I'd go with fig and olive tapenade and some kind of cream cheese/walnut/olive combination (when I had my tea party, someone recommended her recipe, and it was a huge hit with my guests) and the hummus, but I'd skip the ranch dressing. Spanakopita always goes over well, or tyropitakia. You could also do a version with mushrooms, like a mushroom streudel. Quiche? If you use premade shells, it's not so labour intensive. What about juice or some kind of fruit punch? With the exception of water, nothing on the beverage list is particularly healthful (wine is debatable). All of the above can be made ahead of time, and can be served at room temperature if reheating become problematic.

We don't know that he wasn't going to donate the money from the outset. It's very possible his plans were only announced because of the fuss made, but the intent to donate may have always been there. Regardless, why should he have had to state it up front? To ward off the vitriol of self-righteous foodies who think they're more ethical than god?

Once prolific poster Lorna Yee developed a gluten-free lemon raspberry cake recipe. She has pretty high standards with regards to her baking, so I would assume it's a good recipe.

Try e-mailing the sake maker to see if he carries them. FWIW, I try bring my wine carrier (the one like you describe) with me when I think I'm going to buy stuff like that. Very cheap at BevMo. Another option is to get a box from a liquor store in Vancouver (one that still has the cardboard inserts that separate the wine). Put your bottles in the middle section, then fill the rest with crumpled newspaper or something similar. I had to do that last summer, and it did a very good job of protecting my bottles (of bbq sauce ). The only problem was that since it was a box that once carried wine, I think it encouraged the Department of Transportation (or whatever it's called in the US0 to inspect it in transit. Nothing was taken since, though.

The Tallest Poppy has received a lot of buzz since it opened, not least because it's in a seedy-ish area of town right next to a seedy hotel. On Sundays they have brunch served family-style. It's $25 including taxes and the service charge, and you've pretty much got no choice in what you get. The theme the day we went was "Pancake Surprise" or something like that. Cornbread. Latke on the left, "surprise pancake" on the right. I think the surprise was sweet potato, or perhaps that it was undercooked. I think we had smoothies served at this point, but I cant' remember. Main course--two types of sausage, bacon, overcooked poached eggs, bacon-wrapped water chestnuts, and challah. This is enough for three people. The bacon was like ordinary cheap-quality supermarket bacon, and one of the sausages was very dry (I liked the spiciness of the other one, though). I thought the challah was really dry, too. Unfortunately, one of my party didn't eat meat products from animals with legs and she forgot to mention it to the waitstaff. Oops. She was OK with just eating the egg and part of the challah that didn't touch meat, but they very kindly made her a vegetable dish, and my mother and I got to eat her share of the meat. Dessert was a fabulous fruit crisp served with ordinary supermarket ice cream from a carton. No picture. Everything above was included in the price, along with coffee (unlimited refills) or juice (I'm not sure if you get refills of that). They may have tea, but they didn't offer any, so I don't know for sure. The food was decent. Nothing to rave about, but I'd probably return, though not very often.

Went back to Kum Koon the day before I left. We tried some of the new items. They were all pretty good, and I'd order some of them again. Pork and shrimp dumplings. They look like xiaolongbao, but they're not. There was one other main ingredient in the name, but I can't remember now. Maybe ginger? This was something like tsing tsang bao??? I liked the bao, but didn't care for the filling. It wasn't bad, but I just prefer more meat (actually, I just prefer cha siu bao). And this was similar to hum soi gok, but it was steamed in leaves. We really liked this one. And just for comparison's sake, look at KKG's hum sui gok compared to Victoria Seafood's.

My flight was a whopping 2 hours late (we stopped just after pulling away from the gate for about an hour, then had to wait for a new plane), but luckily, my aunt checked Air Canada, so we arrived at the baggage carousels at the same time! We went to Sun Sui Wah around 11 or 11:30. It wasn't terribly busy (but there were quite a few people there), so we didn't have to wait at a table at all. We limited our order to 7 things--cha siu bao, hum soi gok, chee cheung fan, lo bak go, har gau, and two other things. . .gailan with oyster sauce and. . . something else. Or maybe we just had 6. Oh, sticky rice in lotus leaves! The highlight was the lo bak go. It's generally not one of my favourites, but they did it very well. It wasn't pasty like some lo bak go can be. My aunt and her friend liked the sticky rice in lotus leaves (nor mai gai), but I didn't care for it as much. The filling had some unusual (to me) ingredients for nor mai gai. We all liked the gailan a lot. When it first arrived, all we saw was some blanched gailan with just an itsy bitsy bit of sauce. The others expressed their disappointment, and I tried to rationalize it by saying the gailan must have been very good, so they did not want to overwhelm it with sauce. After we tried it, we decided I was right! (Even though I just made it up.) The gailan was perfectly cooked, and it lacked the bitterness that gailan often has. The hum soi gok--my favourite dim sum item--was a disappointment. The filling was OK, but the outside was soggy. It was as though they had fried it earlier and then just microwaved it. Oh well. I thought the cha siu bao was OK, but they use sliced cha siu and I prefer cubed. Both my aunt and her friend said the cha siu bao at New Town Bakery was better. New Town is owned by ethnic Chinese Filipinos, though, so it could just be that their cha siu bao's flavour profile is more familiar to my aunt (my mother's side of the family is Filipino, part ethnic Chinese). They offered to take me to New Town, but since my flight was so late, I didn't want to risk not getting back to the airport in time (traffic in that area is a little busy!). Thanks for the suggestions! I hope to try more of them next time!

I miss Crum Farm, too, and the Crums! That really was the highlight for me--not just because the food was great, but the Crums were so warm and welcoming. My mom really enjoyed talking to Mr. Crum (Jim?). Marmish--did you notice you were promoted to principal?

[irony]Greeaaaaattttt!!!![/irony] Nice picture of me chowing down on a rib. I'd like to think they used it because everyone else had bbq sauce on their faces!

He's got a picture of Kerry's curry up!

Didn't you add more flour and water after the initial sit in the fridge? When I make Neapolitan-style pizza dough, I start like you did, then after an overnight, I add more flour and water. Then it sits overnight again in the fridge (or more or less than overnight, depending on when I want to eat it).