prasantrin

I love Ann Arbor, and I'd love to visit Cleveland (especially after seeing the pics of the previous Gathering there), but I'm still hoping someone from MSP will step up. It's such a great city that doesn't get enough exposure or credit. Or if Kentucky can be considered part of the Heartland, I vote for Kentucky. Isn't racheld in Kentucky? hint hint. . . eta: oops. racheld is in Indiana, but that would be good, too!

To add, I like that they don't base their final opinion on their cooking. For Mexican Kitchen, for example, they both recommended the book although none of their dishes turned out very well. And for Thai Food, most of the dishes didn't turn out very well, one recommended the book and the other didn't, and they're both very clear about their reasons. I liked the garlic episode when they couldn't put out the sterno. The guest chef said after (I'm paraphrasing), "I could have helped them, but it was just so funny."

At the end of the Mexican Kitchen review, they asked the chef, "Do you think it's the book or our inexperience?" And she replied, "I think it's your inexperience." :lol:

I don't know how many of you are familiar with the Canadian show "The Shopping Bags" (Anna Wallner and Kristina Matisic have also appeared on one of the American morning shows doing the types of reviews they do on Shipping Bags), but the hosts have another show called "Anna and Kristina's Grocery Bag". They choose a cookbook and make a few recipes out of it. Then a local chef comes over for dinner and rates their cooking (when they do Mangoes and Curry Leaves, Vikram Vij and his wife are the taste testers). I've been enjoying the show. Neither of them are particularly adept at cooking, but they do an admirable job and show both the successes and the failures (Anna Wallner just blended a silicone spatula into her mole). Right now they're doing Mexican (Rick Bayless' Mexican Kitchen) and they just did Thai (David Thompson's Thai Food). Lots of bleeping going on. They also do The French Laundry (which I'm dying to see given their very amateur cooking skills) and other books and styles of cooking. Season 1 books and their reviews Season 2 books with their reviews

It's farther than your immediate area, but you could try the one in Bellingham (call first, of course). I know for certain they sell Kisses at the Costco stores in Japan, and most of our stock comes from the US.

What did you try and what did you like?

Doesn't Costco carry Hershey's Kisses? I don't think I've seen Hugs, though.

I just wanted to say that I really kicked your butt with this one. You are soooo far behind! More food!

The day after our Crum Farm visit, we headed back out in that direction to Kansas State University in Manhattan. For some reason I thought it was only an hour away from KC, but it was more like 2 hours. Oops. We mainly just wanted to see the place because my dad did some graduate work out there, but when we found out there was a Dairy Bar, we wanted to go shopping, too. They've got a little store with freezers and coolers at the back filled with products the students put out. All sorts of hard-to-find (for us) beef and pork products as well as standard cuts. We picked up some skirt steak, bacon, lots of cheese (cheddar, monterey jack, and pepper jack) and I can't remember what else. I don't know about quality (I don't think the meat is organic and there's no mention of how the animals are raised), but it was sort of interesting. They also have diary products like butter (all out when we were there), cheeses (the cheddar was packed just a couple of days earlier), milk (chocolate milk only came in a 1 litre or imperial equivalent container, so I couldn't try it), and ice cream. The ice cream is so-so. I don't know if it's worth the two-hour trip--we had wanted to go out there after Crum Farm but the store is closed on Sundays--but it was sort of interesting. Manhattan is pretty limited in terms of restaurants, so we went to Texas Star which is the brother of Hibachi Hut (they're right next to each other and share an entrance). Food was find, but not worth two-hours driving time just to eat there. The only reason I'm mentioning it is because of the root beer. They had root beer on the menu, so I asked what kind of root beer they had. The server replied, "Actually, we just got rid of the root beer and got diet Dr. Pepper instead." ?!??!?!?! I was soooo sad! What's up with Dr. Pepper in KC/MO? Where's the root beer love? I always thought root beer was an American favourite, but I think it's more popular in Canada than the US.

Some good news!! I've been looking for Old Dutch, and still only found bags of the relatively new BBQ flavour on the shelves--the one with the black band. I was disappointed and I sent off another e-mail to Old Dutch which of course was ignored. (Hello?!?!??! Customer service? The idea of service is to, at the very least respond, even if it's just to say "Tough luck.") Then I was at Zellers yesterday. What do I spy but a box of the old Bar-B-Q flavour! I bought one, just one because they may have trying to trick me. Got home and opened my box, and then took out one silver (they're silver now!) bag. Mmmmmm. . . . memories of childhood. All I needed to complete the experience was a can of Hires root beer (where can I get that in Winnipeg?). Remember, Bar-B-Q is the way to go. None of that BBQ crap!

In all fairness to you, some accents are very difficult to understand no matter how tolerant you try to be. I find in my work (ESL teacher) that Vietnamese, Thai, and some subcontinental speakers of ESL have pronunciation problems and/or accents which are very difficult to understand (and very difficult for the speakers to overcome). I'm very good at understanding non-standard English, and even I have a lot of trouble with those accents.

Oink oink!

I had planned on asking you if you wanted to go once we arrived at the venue (it was just a few minutes away by car, so we could have gone and come back whenever you had a brief respite from cooking), but I forgot once I saw the cheeses and the focaccia. Sorry!

I was at a restaurant with a Japanese friend and there was a choice between rice or fries for the side. The Japanese don't have the "f" sound (labio-dental affricate) in their sound system, so although she ordered fries, it sounded like "rice" to the waitress (I understood her perfectly, but I'm used to Japanese English). The waitress was really pissed off when she had to bring the order back.

Marmish and I went to Christopher Elbow while in town for the Heartland Gathering. I picked up some drinking chocolate, chocolate-covered almonds, one each of the spiced and fleur de sel turtles, and a box of four chocolates--caramel with fleur de sel, Venezuelan spiced caramel, yuzu, and one more that I don't see on his website (from the insert in my box I think it was hazelnut, but I vaguely remember it having "praline" in the title, as well, and it was square). I thought I'd try one, so I started with the yuzu. Smooth, delicately flavoured, and not too sweet. I decided I needed to try another one, so I tried the maybe-hazelnut. Oh my god, I should have saved that one for last. Again, perfectly sweetened, and very smooth. Had to try another one--went for the Venezuelan spiced caramel. Perfect again. So I had to try the last one--fleur de sel. Four for four--a home run. Perfection in every piece. I'm often disappointed with chocolate, even high-end ones. I find the fillings to be too sweet or the shells to be too bitter, but Christopher Elbow chocolates really are perfect. I wish I could go back and pick some up for friends in Japan. They would suit Japanese taste buds perfectly. I hope he opens in Japan soon! (Like before March 2010, when I leave!) Now I wish I had bought a bigger box and tried one of each flavour. I still have the two turtles left, but now I think I should eat them slowly and try to savour them. But I really want to eat them now!

Winnipeg? No way! Who'd want to go to Winnipeg? We could win for the most boring uninspired Heartland Gathering.

I finally got my pictures up from the weekend. It's all Kansas City, though not all eG stuff. I got a lot of pictures at Crum Farm, but not much of the other eating. Oops. Pictures are on flickr. I want to add my and my mother's thanks to the organizers--it was a fantastic weekend. Crum Farm was our favourite meal. The food was great as was the company, but the setting and the Crum family (including my new friend "Buddy" and my new human friend Isaac) really made the meal special. Saturday's dinner was spectacular, and Toby's cheese course was outstanding. Being cheese-deprived in Japan, I really took advantage of the abundance in volume and variety offered. Yes, I'm a pig! And Toby was especially kind in picking up 4 kinds of root beer for me to try! Lost Trail was the winner of the night, and Foster's was the loser ("natural" doesn't belong next to "root beer"). I didn't try the diet one which I think was Virgil's. The special Virgil's was in a really cool bottle, and it was second in my taste tests. And Tom needn't have worried about the focaccia being lost next to the other crackers and bread. Once I saw the focaccia was out, I used it exclusively as a carrier for my cheeses, and I ate some naked (the focaccia, not me) just to appreciate the beauty of it. I got most of the leftovers of the second batch of focaccia. First my mother took about 1/3 of the batch, and then I went back and took about 2/3 of what was left. There was still a little left, and Tom offered it to me, but I was too embarrassed to take it, so I said, "No no, it's OK, we have lots." My mother wanted to take the rest, too, but she was also too ashamed to do it. Then today we were talking, and we said, "We should have just taken it! Who cares if we looked like pigs!" And I for one appreciated the break between Kerry's curry and Edsel (and Tom's) meat dish. I was approaching explosion, and the break helped the food in my stomach digest a little, so I could make room for more food and dessert!

Long Bar actually uses a mixer for their Singapore Sling. You can buy it in any number of stores, and you just add pineapple juice. Singapore Airlines offers it for sale on many of their international flights (and they also offer the drink as part of their beverage service). I've been told you can get the bartender to mix you one up fresh if he's not busy and if he feels like it, but I've not tried it.

We were at Niche on Wednesday. Thoroughly enjoyed our meal, and will post more about it when I've recovered from the Heartland Gathering.

There's always room for root beer milk ← I've got some of their chocolate milk, too (and another kind--I like tasting chocolate milks almost as much as root beers).

After dropping off Kerry and marmish, my mother and I made a run to Foo's Frozen Custard and had ice cream. Then I had a Shatto's root beer milk. I guess we still had a bit of room after all that bbq!

I guessed you missed the "No photos" sign at Central Food Court. I think most of the big malls in BKK forbid photos, primarily because of the internal terrorist acts. But I often sneak them in. I'm only taking pictures of food, after all! For Singapore I'd also recommend Chubby Hubby (though he mostly does high-end French or the like, so it's not as helpful with "local" cuisine), and Travelling Hungry Boy.

Smiling Johnny is still as friendly as ever! It's amazing they've been able to keep some of their staff for so long. There are three or four people who have been with Jeff for 20 or so years. Is Golden Terrace the one that used to be Marigold? Marion Warhaft raved about the place, so my mother went and said it was terrible. Oh, the new chef at KK is from a part of different part of China (I can't remember which now)--that's why they have so many new items. If you need any help with your dim sum party, I'm always available! I hope hum soi gok is on the menu. . .

First meal out this summer was dim sum at Kum Koon. As reliable as usual. Interestingly, when we arrived at 11-ish, most of the tables occupied were occupied by caucasians. Ten or fifteen years ago, you'd have seen very few caucasians at dim sum, especially in the early hours. They've got a new chef, and have a lot of new dishes. We didn't try any of them this time, but will do so the next time. They had something similar to curry puffs, but filled with papaya (kok was in the name, but I can't remember the rest). Something else like a black crepe rolled up--made with black sesame seeds. The third new thing I remember was something wrapped in a green leaf. It looked like a steamed white cake in a leaf. It was savoury--filled with chicken or pork??? The spicy chicken feet don't taste the same, my mother said. She said they weren't bad, just different from what she was expecting. Same goes for the cha siu in the cha siu bao. Not bad, but different. I'm not sure yet if I like the changes. Hum soi gok was as good as usual, as were the coconut buns! And the sticky rice in lotus leaves!

Just the other day (no more than a week ago), I stumbled upon something you had written and I thought, "I wonder why Bryan never goes to Asia." In all the times I've been to BKK, I've never been to Aw taw kaw (or however you choose to transliterate it). I really must go! Can't wait to see more food, especially in Vietnam--the only country you visited which I haven't. And I hope you managed to get yum pla dook foo in Thailand, and roti in Chiang Mai! I want to see them!