Jensen

No bad thoughts about your mum here! I didn't realise until I moved out that bacon strips weren't 4" long (before they were cooked). My mum grew up with little money (and my dad grew up with even less) and, when I was growing up, money was always an issue. When my mum cooked bacon, she cut it in half to make it go further. I'm sure she still does. I remember one spring as a kid when we had a "family experiment" with vegetarianism. It wasn't until I was an adult that I realised that we just couldn't afford to buy meat for those months. If starch were associated in my brain as "being poor" (especially if I'd lived it, as it sounds like your mum did), I suspect I wouldn't eat much of it either.

The lack of conifers in the first photo makes me think "east coast" (or, at least, NOT "west coast"). Obviously, it's a fan of the Sterns...

I could be getting it mixed up with another African nation starting with the letter "N", but isn't Namibia a popular tourist destination for Europeans? I've several friends in Germany who've been there on holiday. I guess it depends on what area of the country you're going to but it's entirely possible that familiar foodstuffs might be attainable within the country.

Sheep heads may very well be illegal in the US, due to scrapie. Or not. As for Tony Bourdain tucking into stuff, it's entirely possible he was just being polite.

This dressing looks really interesting. Do you mind sharing how you made it? I could see the salad with dressing making a great standalone lunch for me (the Spouse doesn't care for chorizo ).

I remember bread and butter being served with meals when I was a young child. As an older kid (i.e., teenager), fresh vegetables were more available throughout the year and we mostly had salads with dinner instead (usually dressed with mayonnaise). Interestingly enough, when we have a dinner party, we ALWAYS have bread for the table. I never even realised that until this thread.

Thank you! I have a piece of beef in the freezer that I think would be well-matched with such a condiment. I might even make two versions of it: one with and one without chiles. Hmmmm...sounds like Saturday night dinner to me!

Prawncrackers, your condiment reminds me of a Hmong-style one I made not too long ago; it was made up of chiles, green onions, and Thai basil. Does the addition of oil make it last longer? I re-read the "Cold Noodle Dishes" Cook-off thread before making tonight's dinner. I just kind of winged it and made the following from some organic soba noodles the Spouse brought home from a business trip for me: Dinner was followed by a swim and then dessert: Haagen-Dazs vanilla bean ice cream (left), Haagen-Dazs dulce de leche ice cream (right), and ginger snaps.

How do we handle it? Even if the TV is on (which it is sometimes), it's not visible from either our kitchen table or the dining room table. Just in the past year, sometimes the Spawn and I will have our dinners in the TV room but only when the Spouse is away on business. That happens maybe once every other month. Typically, we all sit down to one of the tables and eat together. About three years ago, the Spawn started practising aikido. That meant that she was at the dojo until around 8:00 every night from Monday to Thursday. We just moved our dinner time to 8:01. The Spawn is not often involved in cooking dinner; I save the kid labour for clean-up. (Well, plus she's usually at the dojo during cooking time.) That being said, she gets included in the seemingly daily conundrum of "What should we have for dinner?" and often comes up with the winning idea. Last night's dinner (a ploughman's lunch-type affair) was entirely her idea. So, she is involved in the planning of dinner, just not in the implementation. We do eat out frequently (well, I think it's frequently) ... about once a week, maybe once every other week. Fast food is never a consideration; we don't care for it. So, is she overweight? According to a weight range chart I just tracked down, she is overweight by 2 pounds. Realistically, she could probably stand to lose 10. Ten pounds on a 5'10" amazon isn't bad though.

Tonight's dinner was designed to beat the heat. We're a day or two into one of our hot spells (meaning triple digit temperatures and little or no Delta breeze to cool us off at night). Even though it might seem counterintuitive at first blush, that meant dinner al fresco! Our setting was "Poolside": And the meal: Moving clockwise from the Corona, we have: Pugliese bread and Canadian stone wheat thins; English Stilton, Marin French Cheese Company's Triple Creme Brie, Canadian cheddar (ignore the custard cup in the background...it's my high tech lap counting system); grilled CA* steak, rare; Watanabe Farms' heirloom zebra tomatoes (green, yellow, and red); black grapes and plums; Hami melon; dill pickles, cornichons, and pickled onion. * CA == cheap ass My choices: The Corona was mine and the Spawn had some Virgil's Microbrewed Rootbeer. She chose her glassware with a political message in mind: And, because we laugh in the face of danger, dinner was immediately followed by a dip in the pool. A pox on your 30 minutes!

Chefadamg, now that sounds like my ideal fish taco. Mmmmm

I think for me, the two eGullet foods that have changed my life (and sometimes helped me impress people) are: * Jaymes' salsa * Chufi's stamppot (the link goes to the Dutch Cooking thread since the whole thing is incredible)

Are you able (and willing) to take some photos of your urban coop? I have a spot in my garden that used to be home to an aviary. We had to take a tree out right near there and I think it might just be big enough for a chicken coop. (Of course, whether the Spouse would let me get chickens is another story.) (Oh, and keeping the whippets calm about them might be a chore but they're in their own yard.) I'm pretty sure I can have chickens here, since Fair Oaks is home to a gazillion feral chickens.

JGM, welcome to Sacramento! Our usual summertime fare involves a lot of barbecued things. Even things I would normally bake get done on the gas grill. (See below for instructions on turning your gas grill into a medium-hot oven.) Lots of salads but not necessarily ones involving lettuce. Corn salad is one of my favourites; I make it with raw corn, cut off the cob, diced tomatoes, diced red onion, diced cucumbers, cilantro, jalapenos (if you're so inclined), and lots of lime juice. Greek salad makes a great meal-sized salad. As someone mentioned, hot foods do indeed cool you down. Or maybe they just change your perception of the exterior heat. Who cares that it's 115 outside when it's 1115 inside your mouth? Other tips: use a crock pot outside. Use one of those portable roaster thingies outside. For that matter, any small appliance that does the cooking for you can be used outside. (Note to self: move rice cooker outside.) You can cook stuff on the stove in the morning for assembly as a cold dinner later. So, if you want a Nicoise-inspired salad, steam the green beans and boil the potatoes and eggs in the morning. Then, all you have to do assemble things in the heat of the day. (Keeping in mind that any meat proteins you include in the salad will be cooked on the grill...outside.) And, I'm sure you know this already but make sure you keep well-hydrated. Lots of water, lots of iced tea, anything. Oven Directions: Crinkle some sheets of tinfoil so that they are kind of lumpy. Remove the grates from your gas grill and turn it on. On our three burner Weber, the front and back are on low and the middle one is off. Once the temperature has stabilised (somewhere around 375-380), put the tinfoil lumpies down and replace the grates. Voila! an oven...

Lovely rant, Cookie (may I call you Cookie?). Calling it "democratization" is so kind. I like to think of it as "pandering to the lowest common denominator". Okay, maybe that was a little harsh but, remember, I didn't sleep well last night and now I'm grumpy. This democratization process is usually what triggers regulation which, in turn, REALLY sets the lowest possible bar. Hobbes can add "tasteless" to his list...

My two favourites are Greek salad (just say NO to lettuce in Greek salad!) and an Asian-flavoured cucumber salad. For the former, chop cucumbers, tomatoes, green peppers, and sweet onions to roughly the same size (3/4", maybe?). Add in some black olives (oil-cured being my current fave). Sprinkle with oregano (the real stuff, not that Mexican pretender) and then dress with oil and vinegar (1 part oil to 3 parts vinegar). Mix it all up and let it steep. Just before serving, I add feta cheese to taste. For the latter, peel the cucumbers then quarter lengthwise and seed them. Mix a dressing made up of soy sauce, rice vinegar, a wee bit of ginger, and some sesame oil. Toss the cukes with the dressing and then sprinkle with roasted sesame seeds.

Although not specifically on topic, there was a very interesting article published on the CNN website a few days ago" article

Not that I completely disagree, especially when it comes to food, but you could also say that our culture is one of freedom to choose, even if the choice is known or suspected to be a poor one? ← I don't actually agree that "freedom of choice" applies unfettered to the market. In my world view, that freedom applies only to moral and/or ethical decisions and is tied more to individual responsibility rather than individual consumerism. The choices available to the consumer are always limited or defined by the suppliers. Undoubtedly, some choices can be market-driven but, unless universal access to all commodities is available, "freedom of choice" is just a nice idea.

More on cage-free egg collection here: click

According to the Encyclopedia of agricultural, food, and biological engineering (portions of which are available thanks to Google Books: click):

I can't believe it but I was thinking about this topic for an hour and a half this morning; yep, from 3:15 am to 4:45 am, my mind was filled with thoughts about eggs and how they are a reflection of our society as a whole. Fortunately, a conclusion was made and I was able to go back to sleep. The conclusion? we are doomed to have all good things co-opted by businessmen and eventually ruined. Our culture is one of growth...and bigger is always better. Business success is measured by how much you can sell, how much you can grow, how much of the market you can corner; in all things, more is better. Personal success is measured by how much you can consume; how much buying power do you have? Again, more is better. Now let's think about the eggs. "Free range" and "cage free" and all those animal husbandry philosophies do not reflect the ideals of the free market or a supply and demand economy. The sort of animal husbandry from which these eggs spring is based in something entirely different...I didn't quite articulate this aspect of the egg world during my insomnia. For simplicity's sake, let's just say that, for whatever reasons, the animal husbandry producing "the good stuff" is based in quality, not quantity. And the free market responds to "the good stuff" (in this case, tastier eggs) by creating demand. Suddenly, what started out as a desire to produce quality eggs becomes a business opportunity. The demand must be met! We must increase supply! Thus, the businessmen take over "free range" eggs and, in order to convert the original concept of chickens leading chickeny lives, hunting grubs and scratching in the dirt into something that fits better into our consumption-based world, the concept of "free range" becomes "well, they can go out that little door if they want but we've got them so crammed in here so that we can meet our production quotas that if they were to try, it would be like a Who concert in here". There is a fundamental disconnect between the ideals that spawn "the good stuff" and the society that makes them widely available; this disconnect is a great chasm that cannot be overcome. And where does that leave us? Well, it leaves us in a world of overcrowded chicken barns (but nary a cage in sight!), monoculture crops, and global climate change. Bah. (Stay tuned. There will be more discussion about the clash of traditional foodways and modern consumerism after nap time...)

Barbara, which grocery store? Is it a local chain I would recognise?

This article from the August 1 edition of the SF Chronicle makes an interesting counterpoint to the NYT article: Pastured eggs catching on I had the opportunity to buy some pastured eggs last week; whilst on a field trip to the coast, I picked up a dozen eggs from Marin Sun Farms. I'm pleased to say that their flavour was indiscernable from the eggs I buy at my local farmer's market (affectionately known as "blessed eggs" due to the farmer's habit of bestowing blessings on his customers...you have to say 'blessed' as two syllables though). My local eggs are labelled only as "certified organic" and "free-range" but the farmer has Polaroids of "his girls" posted in his stall. While their yard is not as scenic as the one on the Marin Sun website, there are no cages visible. The way this food marketing is heading is disturbing. "Cage free" just means "crammed into a big barn"; "free range" means "said sardine-chickens have access to a single little door but are not encouraged to go outside". Don't get me started on "vegetarian hens"!

My guess is Ann on Vancouver Island.

When I was first married, we canned a lot of low acid foods. Generally, we would freeze vegetables (they taste better) but we canned a lot of salmon and what we called "jug meat"...the trim from butchering deer. One year we put up 54 pints of salmon; we gave salmon as Christmas gifts that year! We're still alive.