Susan in FL

The subject of food at work, and the various roles of food in our workplaces -- the workplaces of those of us whose day jobs are not in the food industry in any way -- is very interesting to me. But more on that later, perhaps. I was a school social worker for 13 years just before my retirement, and this is so reminiscent of that! School jobs were the only ones in which I always kept candy, in both stashes, and some sitting out. Kids would come in and say, "Can I have some candy, miss??" Teachers would come into my office and collapse into the couch, and without speaking, stuff some into their mouths...

WOW. That is truly beautiful, Alinka. Sounds delicious - and what a great shot! ← WOW. What she said. Hot soups are one reason to hope for a few weeks of cool weather during the winter, even here. I've never made borscht of any kind. I have to add it to my never ending list. Is it served chilled sometimes, or did I dream that? I love beets.

Kathy, it looks delicious, and it's beautiful. You've moved this up a notch on my priority list.

My mother-in-law lives in Charleston when she is not here in FL with my sister-in-law. Though she doesn't dine out much, I'll check to see if I can get some ideas from her. The last time we visited, I really liked the mall!

Happy Anniversary to you both! And what a sweet way to announce the gift of Studio Kitchen and express an anniversary greeting... That is well deserving of an Awwwww..... (I've long been regularly checking Chris's profile page to see the pictures of Bebe in larger size than an avatar, and going Awwwww, then too. What a beautiful child!)

Wow, thank you for the vote of confidence. The words "made with butter" about pastry also got to me... I'll give it a try. Oh my, I said that publicly. For both you and Susan: I found that the quick puff pastry recipe from Julia Child (Julia Child and Company) is great. VERY easy to make.. I don't know if either of you have acess to that recipe, but it is worth looking it up. ← Megan, at least you have baking skills going for you! And thanks for that idea. I thought I had Julia Child and Company among my Julia books, but it is the -with Master Chefs one. Anyway, I'll settle on one of these easy recipes, and will report back. Oh my... He sure is back. Congrats to you both! I was just thinking I would comment to you about that picture of your plated dinner when I read that Dayne photographed it. That looks really good! Was it hot or chilled? Last night we pulled from our fridge alllll the leftovers and set them on the counter, and each of us picked what we wanted. I had the mashed potatoes & celery root, the lentil & celery root salad, and some of the salmon pate' (with chopped raw onions on top). Russ had chicken and the pasta; for a pasta sauce he used the mushroom mixture and a dab of some unidentified sauce. I drank Chardonnay and he drank Zinfandel.

Last night on the way home I went to the bigger seafood market of my two favorites, having decided that I was going to buy what looked best to me... fresh, and frozen included. I passed up lots of frozen lobster tails and Dungeonus crabs [i can't spell right now], and Alaskan king crab legs, etc. I bought fresh sushi-grade yellowfin tuna and local clams, and put together a seared tuna and pasta dish with uncooked puttanesca-style sauce with clams. I made a salad, too. The photographing was significant in that, with Russ's encouragement, I tried Megan Blocker's style of photography and used one of those 3-tier reading lights on the food. It is so dark at dinner time now. Some still turned out yellow, and others turned out quite well. I must say I did like this salad picture using Megan's method.

NO. Just kidding... sort of. I am scared of anything that hints of making pastry or dough or baking. But your question is well taken, and I will read your thread on making pastry. We have made some dough things, but the emphasis there is on the "we." If Russ leads and I follow, I am willing. Thanks! I really should try to overcome this aversion to making all things baked.

Good! Glad you're interested, and I would like to hear about some of the Oregon Pinots that you tasted. If you post/posted to another topic about them, please let me know where. Wild Horse Pinot Noir has always been one of our favorite wines, but the Wild Horse Unbridled is a special bottling that I had never heard of. It was not part of the routine tastings. It was listed on the tasting list as one with a charge, but if you paid for a taste of it, you got the Riedel glass with the Wild Horse insignia. When I expressed my interest in tasting it, they just gave me a free taste, and I immediately decided to buy a bottle. So that's the background for the California Pinot Noir. It was soft and round -- much softer and rounder than the Oregon. A wine like this could be my favorite wine of all time for sipping, just drinking. Overall, it was my favorite of the two. Having said that, it seems weird to then say that the Oregon Pinot Noir was better with the food, but it was! The Cricklewood from Willamette Valley, as I said, I had never heard of. It just met the criteria when I went shopping locally for another wine for this dinner. It was more earthy, which was great with the mushroom thingie. It was more focused and riper. We commented often during dinner about how much better the Oregon matched up with the food, but I kept going back and sipping on the delicious California, and liking it better. Oh what a wonderful dilemna to experience. The fruit in the Wild Horse was more up front, too. I don't want to sound as if I'm trying to be Miles in Sideways, but damn I do love good Pinot Noir, and it's worth it to drink ten or fifteen mediocre ones to get one or two sublime examples like this. One more interesting thing... The Oregon Pinot was better than the California with everything except dessert. With that, for us, the Wild Horse just jumped right out and grabbed the chocolate raspberry brownie.

That sounds & looks like a wonderful combo! any speacial seasonings? ← It is a great combo -- in fact, we are having leftovers tonight and I get to eat what's left of that. This is the recipe that I used for the idea of ingredients, but didn't measure. Most of the time I like less vinaigrette or dressing than recipes call for. We decided that the next time we have lentils and celeriac, we will either skip the blue cheese or cut back on the proportion or use a milder blue cheese. It almost overwhelmed the rest of it.

All right, nice suprise! I did not guess correctly this time. This will be fun. C U L8r.

Last night, one course , we ate our first Smart Chicken, which I first heard about in this thread. We roasted it the Marcella way, with two lemons. Still on a celery root kick, we had a lentil and celery root salad with it.

Looks delicious as usual, Megan! And it seems as though your pictures are getting better and better..... Are you by any chance getting hooked (like I am) on food photography? I love that cheese, and I never thought of using it on pasta like that. Yum. ...Next time I buy some, will do! Daniel, sensational menu! Looks wonderful, as always.

Ah yes, but don't forget the clothes drying racks, used by some in the Pasta Cook-off! For Russ and me, that is the best thing.

Why does she do that? (I am imagining that it's her job, for restaurant displays or something...?) Thanks for the link and info about bento. ...I would say you have that "essential skill," Kris! One more question for now: Is it a custom in Japan for people to separate like you did when families have dinner get-togethers -- a table for kids, a table for men, and a table for women? That would be unusual for us. When our kids were young and we got together with friends who had kids, we used to sometimes seat them together at a separate table or feed them first, but the men and the women never split up like that. Again, great-looking food and a fine blog by both of you!

Nice Asian market! Thanks for the pictures.

Rachel, nice... I enjoyed reading that. <Raising hand halfway> Once in a while my mom served salad with that set, but I think she got over it. The mini-clones always seemed sticky when they were supposedly clean.

Kathy, now I have the recipes for two of your beautiful creations printed out and waiting for trial, the Beignets and the Dutch Babies. Russ made us breakfast burritos this morning. Mmm-mmm good.

Thanks, Chufi. By the way, I was going to make some comments about the wines, but I wasn't sure how much interest there might be here. Maybe I'll do that on the Wine Forum, but if anyone has any questions, please ask. Talk about impressive! ...Chufi, you did all that, even making the dough? That is awesome.

Thanks, Matt, will do the Google. Wow, looks beautiful and delicious. Are there some very great services I could render? I can do meals such as that for just the two of us, but there is no way I can pull it off when we have company. I would be a nervous wreck, and mess stuff up for sure. Impressive!

We finished dessert, and finished cleaning up, just a little before 11:30 last night... just in time to watch SNL on TV and do a little eG-ing, but not in time for my senses to be in gear enough to post about dinner. First a couple of pictures of dinner prep work: poaching salmon for the pate' getting ready to process, before the addition of butter, cream cheese, and seasonings to the mixture five different kinds of mushrooms! and in the background, the last stage of making demi-glace The snacking was done just standing around while we were prepping stuff and cooking. In between each course, we did kitchen clean-up and last-minute cooking before serving. Later I commented about nice it was to clean up as we went along, and Russ reminded me that we had no choice or we would have run out of equipment and counter space! The table, ready to begin the sit-down meal: note the TV remote, in hand, in the upper right corner The wines, perhaps this was mid-way though the meal: And the meal, in progression: salmon pate' and accompaniments sauteed mushrooms with a touch of roasted garlic in a puffed pastry shell (yes, Pepperidge Farm) & the pastry "top" drizzled with white truffle oil pan roasted duck breast on rosemary red currant wine sauce and rosemary & garlic zucchini and squash seared lamb rib chops, finished with verjuice; mashed red potatoes & celery root with Roaring 40's blue cheese; and crisp-tender baby Brussels sprouts Parmigiano Reggiano, French Camenbert, and Gorgonzola Dolce for the cheese course, with pear slices, bittersweet chocolate [to taste with the Dolce blue cheese], a piece of toast, and an orchid blossum picked from our yard Panera Bread's Chocolate Raspberry Brownie

That is pretty! That sounds luscious. I love beef with gamey flavor. Is it naked, glistening in the photo, or was it rubbed with something? What is Aligot?

Just discovered this thread... Y'all have just about covered everything I do, but I'll be paying attention in case I can come up with something original to add later! Same here... when tomatoes are to be "seeded, peeled, and diced-[or-whatever]" for a recipe or specific use or for effect is what I'm referring to... I often seed but don't peel. Routinely, neither do I. Wow, all this about tomato treatment. I refrigerate them when like someone else mentioned, they are about to turn to mush sitting out on my counter. But of course! But at least it also ruins their texture. ← I just recently read in a magazine or someplace that it's a kitchen myth about a refridge sucking the flavor out of them, but that it does change their texture. I've never taste-tested refrigerated tomatoes versus non-refrigerated tomatoes, but maybe they are like wine -- served too cold you don't get all the flavor. Dana, funny this is mentioned. Last night prepping for dinner I washed them like that and commented that "they" say you're not supposed to. My husband said he thought that rule came about because once upon a time, the sink was full on both sides, one for washing dishes, and the other for the washed dishes that were drip-drying. That was the case last night.

This thread is so interesting, having evolved into salad habits past and present! Ellen, I just LOL'ed so much that Russ said "what???" and wanted to hear what got me laughing heartily before noon. You write so well. That's a publishable essay!

I have a hard time when I go to someones's home for dinner and they have Waldorf Salad or some sort of Jello salad. I know that doesn't set well with lots of eG people here who take pride in such creations, but I just can't eat it... and would have to resort to faking it somehow if it were served to me and I couldn't politely decline. That's about the only food I can think of that I can't stomach, and it's what comes to mind when I'm asked about the worst dish I've ever had.