lovebenton0

Redsugar, for the Székely (or Szeged) Gulyás, which contains drained sauerkraut and is thickened with a sour-cream-&-flour paste: Is that a basic beef/potato/onion/paprika gulya with the drained sauerkraut added near the end of cooking before the sour cream/flour paste addition? Any other particular spices added?

I use Tiparos fish sauce, which I much prefer, recommended to me by snowangel. My SIL gave me a bottle of Lucky brand, which is also produced in Thailand, but it seems sweeter and not as rich. I don't like it as well as the Tiparo. May find something to use it for. Maybe good plant food?

So you do sleep?!! It floors me that despite everything we hear in the US about being a nation with too many obese people the fast food industry just finds new ways to "make it bigger" -- and sells more of it all the time! It floors me that people really like that crisco shortening cake icing on grocery store b/day cakes. It floors me that no one thought to start that Tater Tot thread before Jason's genius stepped in to absolve us of our gulity pleasure.

The polenta thread has had me going, so I made some polenta early today, chilled then sliced and fried quickly. Seared some chopped broccoli in butter/EVOO, dumped that in eggs with fresh picked lemon basil and a shake of my ground dried cayenne. Poured over polenta in small cast iron skillet for individual frittatas. Huffed up nicely. Topped with mozz, under the broiler for a minute, then finished with sliced scallions and fresh cut garlic chives. Simple salad of torn Romaine hearts and croutons with a drizzle of EVOO/basalmic, and a dusting of grated Parm. Friday night frittatas.

I don't know them all. Do you? Does anyone? French, Italian, Thai, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, Japanese, Chinese, African, Vietnamese, Southern US, basic and exotic . . . The list goes on. I'm starting this thread as a resource. I have a couple of good glossary links I have used to start it off. Tallyrand's professional techniques epicurious dictionary This was prompted by patti's post with a link to French culinary terms (with audio pronunciation ) on mrsadm Is it OK to be here? thread to start this one. Maybe you know of more culinary term links. Maybe you know more terms -- or you have a specific question about a culinary term that you can't locate elsewhere. We don't have to stick with just links, do we? Jump in and ask. Jump in and explain. We can get there from here.

Uhhhhhhhhh. . . Central Market? Yes, may I help you? Um, I read this guy thought you're apples this year were mealy garbage. Who is this? What apples? Just some reader person, just thought you ought to know. click. There, Kevin. All done.

For dinner last night -- just good comfort food -- hot and soupy with lots o' cornbread sticks and wedgies. There was rice for anyone that wanted it -- I declined, wanted all that broth staying liquid -- but my mr, the rice addict, and guest each had a big scoop. Blackeye pea soup with pecan-smoked pork . . . roasted red Anas from the garden, golden sauteed sweet onion and garlic, ginger, beer, smoky pork stock, and healthy splash of apple cider. Served it up with my C&J's Tabasco Sauce for that extra warm touch. And sour cream/roasted green chili/sharp cheddar corn sticks and wedgies. For dunkin' and munchin'. I hope Paula's Cornish Hen recipe is online somewhere; I don't have the cookbook. It looks so good. If I can't find it, I might be asking you to tell me about it... ← PM me if you can't find this, Susan. Your library may have the book and you can source book several places online also. I did, and love it! And yes, Paula's new edition of The Cooking of Southwest France is expected to be out next September.

I love to cook. But cooking through grief and pain, through loss, is as snowangel put it so exactly right "a balm." It is the ticket to my "place" of solace, of energy focused outward, of yes, fuel for body and soul, and yes, exercise for my mind. I may not want to eat, but I need to cook. When I lost my father, I cooked, once home from the hospital and the sadly afters. I cooked like we were expecting a houseful of people which was not the case at our house but I needed to let go and and I went to my "place." I found out I lost my grandmother when out of state at in-laws house. My SIL and I spent all that night long in the kitchen talking about our grandmothers, while she made ravioli, and I baked Italian bread. We drank coffee and ate cannoli, and cried. She had never met my grandmother but she knew what I needed -- to focus my energy on something I could share with with the family, to be free enough to live in her kitchen. When I was told that yes, my hearing was permanently lost; I went deaf in one ear, oh so suddenly. It was Thanksgiving week and I had invited a few friends from grad school who would still be in town to come join me. When the "yes you are deaf" bell tolled they offered to take me out to dinner, or to come cook for me. But what I wanted and needed was to cook for them, to make something beautiful and good. To say to myself, I can do this. I am still me, different, not less, still me. Many other changes came barreling down over the past several years, and through it all my kitchen was there. I drove my poor mom nuts when she came to take care of me after major cranial surgery, because as soon as I could I was in the kitchen, clutching onto the counters and stumbling around, but I was cooking. It was simple food, it was whatever I could manage. It was once again saying, yes I'm different now, but I'm still me, I still can find my place. I can stil do this thing I love.

Oh Rachel, yes, that is sad. I think that SMA must have changed much since I was there.

eunny, that sounds wonderful! I would eat egg yolks (oh so forbidden a pleasure ) for that.

Gack!

Works better if the chicken is frozen and taken out of the freezer about 1/2 hour before processing. Or, just use the chef's knife or cleaver. ← Another note: I cut any meat I grind in FP into largish chunks, only use pulse mode, one to two seconds at a time. Have no trouble grinding any meat that way. Very nice for pork and beef, much better than pre-ground IMHO. Larb on!

It varies, but I usually use Mario Batali's recipe from The Babbo Cookbook for the raviolis. it is very simple, roasted butternut squach, egg, parm. the sauce is also easy, just brown the butter, toss in some sage leaves and coarsly chopped roasted hazelnuts. Toss the cooked raviolis in there. Do let me know if you need more detailed instructions and I will check my book(s) when I get home. Elie ← Thanks! Sounds simple and heavenly. Before I bug you further I'll try to see if I can find Batali's ravioli recipe.

This discussion started on the TX garden thread but thought I'd post it here also since it is appropriate. Recipe for my Eggplant Parmesan (Oven-style) I finally added to Recipe Gullet. ← Fifi, I couldn't find it, my patience wore out -- but we were discussing the EVOO spray I do on the oven fried eggplant for the EP (and other o-f vegs) and you had commented if you could only find an olive oil sprayer that actually worked. Well, even if you don't use the product -- it's so cheap who cares! -- just buy a bottle of the Parkay Fat Free spray (in butter/margarine section) and fill bottle with EVOO or OO. The sprayer works great for that. I have tried other brands of the same kind of product but this sprayer for some reason works best. I've filled the bottles now with all my fav oils! And just to be currently OT, I got a couple recipes for Eggplant Torshi and Eggplant Torshi-e Liteh (pickled eggplant, traditional Persian) from buttercup that I'm definitely going to use some of the eggplant for that is hanging out in the garden right now! Torshis are heavy with herbs, but not sweet picklings of veg, with cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, cumin seed, and ginger; some recipes (the Liteh) go the basil/coriander/mint/tarragon route. But this looks like something I need to add to the pantry. Will definitely report on this experiment.

My oh my! That all sounds good! Just started a slowcooking pot of blackeyed peas with smoked pork, baby carrots, sweet onion, and roasted red Anas, garlic, stock and beer -- my Tabasco sauce to shake on and warm it up even more. Pot o' rice on the side, roasted green chili/cheese cornbread sticks for dunkin'. Mmm-mmmm! The braised roast is next. Just had to do something earthy and soupy for tonight. Elie, care to share your recipe or source for the butternut squash ravioli? And Mabelline, damn! Wish I was on your trading list! I love to use smoked foods (meats I put in cold storage to use later -- like the smoked pork for today -- and smoked vegs too) in cold weather meals. They do add a warming comfort to the cold weather soups and stews. I do some smoky stock from 'que meats/bones when possible to have on hand.

I did ask them the variety but have not heard back from them on that. I should ask again, perhaps they have remembered what it is by now. As hard and fast as these have set in they probably would cover my house if they were closer. Where they are right now I'd be happy for them to take over that rock wall. The MX petunias above them are tough and the two could just fight it out. Started out with a few of the MX petunias when we bought the house in '99 and this year they overran the moonflower vines that I had growing there for several years. No moonflowers. MX P also leaped to two new spots along adjacent rock wall below the veg garden. But they are welcome there between the lantanas and some pretty pink flowering thing that holds its own as well. Looking at different PF varieties (and remembering my own from years in Houston) it appears to me that some are much more obvious in the crown of thorn characteristic. I used to know the symbolic legend that went with the passionflower, but do not remember it now. I need to google on that. Just a sucker for symbolism, I am. A link to the the iconographer in me. Well, I'm in Central TX and these vines are wrapped around the rose bush that is sitting right out the sun, full day sun from morning to evening, with only a cloudy day to shade it. Certainly has not inhibited it at all! So I say it's worth a good shot. There are so many varieties of passionvine and some are very similar to each other in appearance.

Cooking has always been a "place in my soul and mind" that I can turn to energize myself, to give me joy in creating, and share that with the people I love. For me it is not any specific food, but more the ability to go to the food on hand anytime and let that place take over, focusing me outward into activity and the pleasures of handling foods, the process of concentrating my energy on that. This is more important to me now than ever before as I am essentially housebound and cooking/baking not only fuels body and soul, but exercises my mind. Of course, eG is also my mind gym, and exercise buddy.

Thought provoking topic, Melissa. Not a new thing for you! Both parents were from the Midwest -- Illinois and Ohio, so that was a definite influence. Dad was in the Navy so that jumping also around inserted more regional cuisines into the kitchen. He learned to love to grill out when they were stationed in CA, where I was born. My dad really liked the hot stuff he was exposed to in AZ, and more later when we moved to TX. The fact that he had little ability to smell and taste meant texture was important in meal considerations. I learned to kick up the spice fairly early on because of that. Going out to Mexican restaurants and bbq was on the list. No pizzas at our house! "Taste like damn cardboard!" was dad's evaluation of them. Food at home when I was a little girl was for the most part basic, good middle American with lots of roasted or broiled chickens, pot roasts, liver and onions, swiss steak kind of meals. Also the occasional interjection of something "ethnic" you know, like spaghetti! Chili too, and goulash. But the menu was also always loaded with lots of veggies, fresh fruits and salads. Maternal grandmother lived on a farm by the time I knew her, and had a lot of fresh farm produce available to her in Ohio when my mother was growing up also. Lucky there. I was not even vaguely aware that fried food existed until age seven when we had guests and went out to the new Youngblood's Restaurant in town. First ever fried chicken livers for me -- and still one of the few things I will actually fry. mmmm. ("Fried" bologna doesn't count -- my first stove cooking experience at age six.) I started cooking pot roasts, and chicken, and meatloaf, lots of veggies, etc., about age nine after cooking became more my job when mother had to go work. Then new stepfather was a home gourmet cook, and delighted me to no end when he wanted to teach me how to do more complex meals. I was about 11 at the time, so had some basic kitchen experience already. Suddenly I was preparing escargot in garlic butter, curries, wild rice-stuffed chicken legs, artichokes, making my own salad dressings, molded aspics . . . . So my food world expolded wide open! Dad married a PA Dutch woman (my mom) and more flooded in! Then we moved to Detroit, my dad and all moved to Chicago and a whole 'nother world of fish/seafood and Italian food opened up. I'm just a sponge. I absorb everything from every place I have lived. For a while I have tended to cook a lot of Thai, Asian, Middle Eastern and of course Tex-Mex and interior Mexican cuisine (lived in SMA one summer and was off and on in MX for two years), also Cajun, and the smoker gets driven at least twice a week most of the year. But then I still love the one pot soups and stews, liver and onions, foods of the Midwest. And catfish, cornbread, greens, etc. (two years in AL ) Damn, if you come to our house you just never will know what I'm likely to feed you!

We eat and cook seasonally most of time. For us that means about oh, I don't know, say eight months of warm and hot weather foods. So when the seasons are due to change I am longing to switch into a new food phase. New vegetables, new cooking methods, trying new recipes and experiments that are geared to the new season. Mmmmmm . . . . maybe . . . braising! I have a nice chunk o' beef that is singing warm and comforting tunes to me now. Sear me, braise me, long and lovingly! Days spent in a warm kitchen baking bread. Visions of hearty one pot meals. A shift from preparing meals of the past season. An evening out relishing a rich, heavy dinner. What are you craving to eat and cook now?

I freeze it also, since I don't use that much butter I feel safer that I'm not wasting my money on it when I do buy it.

I've eaten chestnuts roasted and in dressing, but the last time I lived in chestnut country I was two feet tall. What the hell is chestnut puree? And why? Other than that oddity, your T-Day sounds like lots of fun. I would LOVE to have the sweet potato cinnamon roll and sweet potato with plantains and pecans recipes! Are you willing to give them out? ← amccomb, I'm very willing to share the SP cinnamon roll recipe and the SP plantain/pecan recipe. Thanks for asking. I'll post them a little later. I think I watched too much history into the wee, wee hours last night and need a nap first.

Definitely a larb day today for me. I have some nice chuck roast to grind, a chilly damp day and the time to do the toasted rice powder. And with this chill some of my basil is saying eat me now!

I love these suggestions. Thanks to everyone. These fruits are like thin-walled peppers -- just a few seeds inside, not pulpy or anything. Is this what everyone else has been referring to also? These leaped off the fence we share with neighbors, planted by them last year, into my yard and just took off this year on their own. (I love when that happens! ) Because of that I did not know the variety for sure. Some are edible and some are definitely not. So I asked before I chomped, he said he ate them all the time. OMG you should see their beautiful yard. I call them my arboretum neighbors, and they just munch their way through the gardening tasks daily. Anyway, that endorsement encouraged me to try them, not what I expected. But then none of my other passionflowers I've grown had ever produced fruit like this. I've eaten them, just popping them like grapes, and have had no ill effects. But I can tell they will definitely benefit by additional sweetening. Any comments?

OMG! Someone else remembers these! I don't know how that started but they were the summer thing when I was a teen living outside Detroit. Not to neglect personal odd chocolate covered experiences in TX . . . When we were kids we were actually given some of these chocolate covered bugs (probably a different company ) for Christmas one year. They came in a little clear box, candy squares wrapped in pretty colored foil, clearly labelled as Chocolate Covered Ants, Baby Bees, Grasshoppers. And yes, as I remember it we all tried at least one of something. They were similar to those mini Krackle bars. Won't that make you think next time you bite into one of those. Carolyn, I just noticed your post on the ants. I found a bunch of recipes for these little treats too while looking for a link. And how about chocolate tequila bombs? Liquid centers.

Key limes are by far my preferred lime for everyday use. They are small, yes, so you get less juice per fruit, but you will be surprised how juicy the little suckers are. Juice of Key lime packs more flavor drop per drop to my tongue than the regular ol' big boys. Good idea, andie, about nuking them. I always just roll them on the counter with the palm of my hand, but I'll have to try that.