Malawry

Yes, it gets smoky in my house too, and the smoke hangs around like a haze for a couple of hours. I have no suggestions beyond cranking the crappy vent hood (which is all I have too) and cracking some windows, maybe turning on a fan. IMO, it's worth it for a good steak.

I just spent a very long day hitting about 8 places along Rockville Pike for stocking up home and preparing for some catering work. Thought I'd report some changes that I saw afoot...plus some that were simply new to me. For Kosher aficionados, it looks like Katz's (now marketing itself as Kosher Mart) is in the middle of being worked over. I saw a SUSHI COUNTER going in. The Katz's Kosher Kafe is now called something like Moti's. In addition to the deli sandwiches the Kafe carried, there are now Middle Eastern/Sephardic specialties, including a spit of shwarma that smelled wonderful. Some things have been moved around--the bakery is now situated where the wine was. Don't get me wrong, it's still a somewhat grungy supermarket with narrow aisles, but the cafe is especially improved in appearance and I'm optimistic for their future. (Kosher Mart is on Boiling Brook Parkway; from Rockville Pike northbound, turn right on Nicholson Lane and then right again at the light on Boiling Brook. Kosher Mart is in a shopping center on the right. Once upon a time, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals were located in a building almost immediately behind Kosher Mart--there's your Rockville trivia for the day.) That's Amore has closed, and a sign reads that a PGA Clubhouse restaurant is opening in its place. Wotta concept. I've never even heard of such a thing. I discovered a restaurant supply shop at 12141 Nebel Street: J&B Restaurant Equipment, tucked into the corner of an industrial strip center. Not a bad place to stock up on strainers, cutting boards and Cambros. They also carry some Asian restaurant crockery, so if you want inexpensive sushi plates or Chinese soup bowls, they're a good place to check out. From Rockville Pike Northbound, turn right on Randolph Road and right again on Nebel. 12141 is in a strip center on the left--the second or third one you come to. I hadn't been in the Gourmet Giant at Randolph and Rockville Pike in over a year. It too has been rearranged, making for a sometimes confusing layout. The lines were much shorter and faster than I'd seen before, and the self-checkout obviously has made a major impact in this regard. But then, I haven't been in on a Saturday afternoon in years. An employee actually stopped and asked me if I needed assistance as I surveyed aisle signage--that's not happened to me in any Giant since Royal Ahold purchased the chain. Later I saw a group of Giant execs crowded around the grab n go sandwich bin near the cheese shop, which may have impacted my service experiences today. I also have to say I have never seen the cheese shop there looking as spiffy as it did today. It looks a helluva lot more pleasant than the other Giants I'm familiar with closer to Silver Spring/Takoma Park. I have nothing new to report on A&J, but those pork dumplings and the garlic-cucumber salad sure made for a satisfying lunch between stops.

Oil: use it for a tomato vinaigrette.

Palena has fries? Ahem. Anyway. I have to say this was the first Food section in a while that I thoroughly enjoyed. Though when I was reading the Death by Chocolate piece, I kept saying to myself, "Wull, yeah, but that'll all be covered up by the frosting..."

I cook roasted tomatoes until they're completely and utterly pooped. Sometimes I let them go farther, until they're a little brown and wrinkly at the very edges. Both are terrific.

I definitely want an emulsifed sauce. People will be serving themselves on a buffet line and I can't count on them to stir the sauce well enough of it's a vinaigrette-type thing. Stagiaire, I was hoping something like that would work. Dano1, I didn't mean that the sauce would be sitting on a steam table for 2 hours. I meant more that there may be a max of 2 hours between when it's made and when it gets yanked from the line. I expect nearly everybody will be done with the buffet in under an hour. As I explained, the bride wants the sauces to be separate from the chicken breasts, and it's a buffet, so I can't just plate the chicken on a pilaf and send it out.

She definitely will not want a creamy or starchy sauce. As for avgolemono--won't the eggs in there make it hard to hold the sauce? I think of anything with eggs in it as distinctly a-la-minute... If I get desperate I'll probably make a veloute-based sauce (rather than a bechamel). But I'm pretty sure she meant something thinner and lighter than that.

I like to slow-roast my tomatoes--especially if they're past their prime or before their prime. I usually do it on the stovetop actually so I can enjoy the aroma and monitor their appearance. I cut them in half, de-seed them, and then roast them in a single layer in a pan with butter. I usually season them with s, p, microplaned garlic, and a fresh herb if I have one sitting around. I think tomatoes and butter are a transcendent combination--I prefer it to olive oil, though I'd never turn away the olive oil sort!

If I was making a lemon-caper sauce for chicken breasts, I figure I'd use the pan I cooked the breasts in, add a knob of butter and some shallots, saute, add chicken stock, reduce, squeeze in lemon juice and add capers, and finish with some butter until it was shiny. Then I'd decorate the chicken breasts with one or two thin slices of lemon and nappe the sauce on top; there'd probably be rice underneath to sop up some of the excess. Does this sound about right? Now, let's suppose your best friend is really into lemon-caper sauce on chicken breasts. So much so, she wants it on the buffet for her wedding. Which you are catering. In a week and a half. She's your best friend. Of course you said "yes." (She also wants BBQ sauce available for the kids, and plain breasts available for any dieters/low carbers, so the sauces will be on the side and not just prepped and poured over the chicken.) How would you make a lemon-caper sauce that was stable on a buffet? No splitting, no skin, no separated fat. Needs to be able to rest for, say, 2 hours (on a chafer, don't worry). Advice?

I think it's about time Judith Havemann left some kind of stamp on the section--it seemed pretty status-quo since she took over editing the Food pages. I look forward to seeing how this shakes out. Hopefully it won't turn into a Food-themed Sunday Source.

I buy a lot of that type of stuff at The Container Store. If there's one near you, they have some great and affordable food packaging ideas. I try to go the huge sale the day after Christmas and stock up for future gift-giving. Everything they sell is usually online too.

Young ginger is the BEST for candying. If you're feeling ambitious.

Nope, I wouldn't spend that much. I think my parents spent that much on a Turduckhen from Louisiana one year though. But that was a cooked product, which is a little different. A plain brined turkey is pretty good eatin' if cooked properly, and I can't see how it could get much better for more money. I mean, we're not talking wagyu beef here.

Thanks for the clarification. You ladies had me worried for you there!

With catering, I require a 50% deposit to "reserve the date," 25% a month before, and the remaining 25% with the guarantee. If it's planned less than a month out, it's 75% to reserve the date and the remaining 25% with the guarantee. That way I have some money in hand before I am even obligated to get started on the event. If I don't get a check, I just gently hint that I have other interest in the person's date. But then I'm a one-woman shop and am not yet in a position to book more than one event at the same time. A week before the wedding for 100% of the cake expense seems extremely risky to me.

My personal experience has been that the Ateco tips hold up a little better in the long run than the Wilton tips do.

Tonight: Coconut-chicken Thai-style soup Custardy crisp-edged tofu with peanut sauce Glazed chicken drumsticks Broccoli Later, I'll eat yet another honeycrisp apple for dessert. I just can't get enough!

Yes, Sabg, that's all there is to it. Sometimes I add onion to it as well. It's especially good with some kind of sauce with fruit to it. If you go to my personal website (in my signature file), you'll see the strudel plated with frisee and gooseberries.

I often stretch duck confit like one might stretch bacon. A single leg, shredded, is plenty for four or five appetizer frisee salads with toasted nuts, for example. I also like to combine it with sauteed cabbage and carrots and roll it into buttered filo dough for a duck strudel. This way you can have your duck confit and not worry so much about the fat content.

I was never denied alcohol as a child. We always had wine at dinner on Friday nights (Shabbat). If my father had a cocktail in his hand and I asked what it was, he'd tell me patiently and always offer me a sip. I'd usually try it and tell him I didn't like it. I never saw them drunk--they both were fairly moderate drinkers and they both shared a distaste for the company of those who imbibe to excess. Once when I was 9 we went out to a fancy Italian restaurant for my birthday and my parents ordered wine. The server started to put a glass down at my place and I said, "No, thank you, I will not be drinking tonight." This story still kills my mother. Dad once engaged me when I was coming in from a date when I was in high school--he was pouring himself a nightcap and invited me to join him at the bar. We sat on the floor and he pulled out every bottle in there and explained what it was, how it was made, and where and when he bought it. (Many of the bottles came from my parents' honeymoon, or international vacations they'd taken together.) We were down there for over an hour talking about what alcohol was. It's one of the warmest memories I have of that high school period of my life. I didn't start drinking much until after I turned 21 because it held no mystique for me. If I'd wanted to, I could have poured myself a glass of wine or a cocktail anytime I was at home and nobody would have cared. I just didn't have a taste for it until I got a little older. I was mystified by my high school and college classmates who got trashed on a regular basis. Substance abuse held absolutely no appeal for me. My husband has a family history of alcoholism, and now that I'm pregnant I know we'll have to wait and see what our child's genes seem to be like--if the child develops a propensity for other addictions or what. But we've agreed that I will be the one to take charge of alcohol education. My spouse doesn't drink at all, ever, but then he never had healthy alcohol behaviors modeled for him. I plan to maintain the public bar in my house after the baby is born, to continue to order wine with dinner, to continue to offer friends a cocktail when they visit. And I plan to give my child the same education I was offered--straight, no-nonsense information, without any puritanical denial or sense of the forbidden.

I have found that cheaper store-brand flour works well, but it tends to require sifting before use--it's a little more likely to be bunched up in little flour "pills" than the national brands. Sometimes I have the same problem with store-brand sugar, as well. IMO, butter is the last thing to skimp on. I can understand not using Plugra or Land O' Lakes, but margarine is far inferior to the real deal. I buy most of my unsalted butter from Costco where it's not as expensive, and stock up on Plugra at Trader Joe's for special occasions.

Has anybody tried the new French vanilla Milanos? I love the vanilla flavor, but I thought they were too sweet.

FWIW, I was the one who mentioned Joy of Cooking--not the baker. The technique she described over the phone to me sounded a lot like the images I've seen in my copy of the book. I'll call back later and ask what the tier sizes are.

Well, it's a good thing ya'll are giving me all this advice, because I just called the baker for the tiered wedding cake and they basically gave me bupkes (that's nada) for information. They just said not to serve the top tier (which the bride and groom want me to serve, but whatever) and that I should cut in a diagram similar to the one that appears in Joy of Cooking: cut pieces from the exterior in a circle, leaving the center intact, and then cut the center circle in the same way. She says the two tiers will serve their 80 guests, but couldn't tell me how many slices I should get per tier. Sigh. I'll probably print out some of the Wilton and Earlene guides and take a good look at the cake once it's delivered and figure it out on my own. There will be no dessert table, they are only serving the cake and some fresh fruit, so I really do need to get 80 servings out of this thing. I'm a bit baffled that they seemed unprepared for my request for a cutting guide.

Chris, it needs to be enough fat that you can easily pick it up with your spoon. Not swimming in fat or anything. BTW I don't use a smoking hot pan for this technique--nothing red-hot, or IMO the fat will get that charred flavor and then you'll just spread it all over your steak. Just medium-hot on a standard stove--hot enough to make a sizzle noise and sear and create maillard reactions, not so hot the fat gets acrid.