Susan in FL

Marie-Louise, I was just propped up in bed reading my new Food and Wine which came in the mail today, and when I saw page 28, I thought of you. It's a recipe to go with Zinfandel, Seared Duck with Fig Sauce. Do you have the November magazine yet?

We had roasted cauliflower tonight! We sliced and roasted a whole head and the two of us ate it all. Waiting for the other stuff to get done, it cooked longer than usual, and I think it was the best batch yet (tossed in EVOO and melted butter and S&P).

No, you're not. I think it would go well, but I think red wine would go better. As usual it's a matter of preference. I probably overstated the case against the Champagne with the cheesesteak. I do like Champagne with lots of food, and without.

I love menu planning, and I think of it as one of my strongest skills. We almost always have multicourse meals on weekends, for the two of us, and I would venture to say we always do when we have company. However, I take quite a bit of time, to look through recipes, think it out, etc. I think that is part of the fun. So I'll take some time and give some thought to your questions! Cool.

I agree, and I agree!If I had an extra $100. to spare, I surely would be one of the poor saps to fall for the ploy, if I had an equally good red wine to drink with it.

Nullo, does Bridgeville (down in slower lower DelaWhere?) they still have the Apple/Scrapple festival in the fall?

Thank you for posting the recipe, and so quickly, Linda. Yes, I suspect maybe it is one of those Southern Things. Like you, I'll use frozen corn rather than canned for the kernels. I'll make this next time my son visits. He will love it.

M., do you go mushroom hunting?

Welcome "back"! I'm glad this has started out as a week better than last for you. I remain so totally awestruck, all the time, by your delicious-looking food and your photography of it. And, what a great presentation for the chicken... chicken atop pearl couscous atop a sauce, I want to borrow that idea. I hope you will do an eG food blog. Please?

You all reminded me of the canned product I use more than anything, tomatoes... But of course! I sort of forgot about them. To me, canned tomatoes -- whole, diced, whatever is called for -- vs. fresh is like dried pasta vs. fresh... for certain uses they are preferable to fresh. I don't know what that is. Do tell, please. Agreed! Yes. I've seen both spellings... I'll try to remember to look that up. Maybe it's like a Dan Quayle thing. Like most, aside from the canned vegetables we're mentioning, I go for frozen if I don't get fresh. Good one, Robyn. Actually, I have some, including canned potatoes left from the hurricanes, and to go one step further with confessions, once in a great while, as a throw-back from my childhood, I like to fry some of those for breakfast. They are OK if you think of them as something totally different from potatoes, like a whole n'other food. True all these canned things are salty, but I'm bad about salt (meaning, I like it). After liking the collards so much, I'll try those.

Kris, I am happy to see you are doing another blog. I wasn't following eG's food blogs as much when you did it before, and I looked over your previous one a few months ago. I will read it more thoroughly now, and then follow this one with great interest. I used to love to read your posts on the Dinner! thread, and miss them since you haven't been posting there for a while. This week will be fun.

I've always claimed not to like canned vegetables, and mostly that's true, but after cooking Glory brand canned seasoned collard greens tonight, and really liking them, I was reminded again never to say "never" or "always." These were good. I also like Goya brand beans, if I'm not using dried beans. Anybody else know about this Glory brand, or any other exceptions to the rule that canned vegetables usually don't taste like more than the can?

No, but I sure am glad you posted this. I will do! Thanks.

Zeb, I'm glad you posted here again. After your other post was removed, I was going to contact you, but I couldn't remember who made the post which included lyrics to the song! Thanks for the follow up.

Suzi, I'll cook for you, if you cook for me. Percy, we bought this particular jar of caviar when we were shopping for nonperishable food in preparation for the hurricanes. ( Bottled water, wine, Spam, black beans, spaghettios, caviar...!!) We ate almost everything else we bought, between Charley and Frances (we didn't loose power during Jeanne), and now that it looks like we won't have anymore hurricanes for a while, and we're finally making some headway in the clean-up, we thought it would be fitting to eat it! Your lamb dinner sounded good! I was off today and made even more headway cleaning up. It has been next to impossible getting repairs done, so I went to work on the torn screen of our porch with DUCK TAPE!! I love that stuff. The leak... well we will just have to stick a bucket there when it rains. But, after three hours of work on the porch today, we can now eat dinner out there again! After Mojitos to celebrate, we had: Rotisserie chicken on the grill, which was rubbed before grilling with cumin, salt and pepper Potatoes Bravas Canned Glory brand seasoned collard greens (!) Black beans with sour cream, chopped onion, and chopped avocado Syrah Life is good!

We had some Romanoff black whitefish "caviar" left from having bought it as hurricane food for Frances. So we had it as a first course tonight, after yet another day of hurricane clean-up, on slices of potato and sour cream, with Andre bubbly. Since our food in the freezer partially thawed during the power outages of the hurricanes, we've been trying to eat everything. Tonight we had some strips of ostrich steaks which I made into a sort of ostrich scallopine dish. Actually, it was quite good. With it was baby zucchini cooked with garlic and rosemary, and a salad of beefsteak tomatoes and fresh mozzarella. Pardon the picture... it is quite unattractive compared to how good it tasted! Edited to add that we had Pinot Noir with the ostrich.

I am not an experienced fig person. This was only my second time to make something with fresh figs, and the first time they were in an entree. I made this up. I made a criss-cross cut in the stem end, kind of like I do with brussels sprouts. I put a piece of parchment paper on a cookie sheet and oiled it. Then I put the figs on there, and sprinkled them generously with raw sugar/turbinado, and broiled them until caramelized. Ahead of time, I set out the mascarpone to get to room temperature. We had a half bottle size bottle of Sauternes in the fridge and I added a little of that to the mascarpone, and some powdered sugar and whipped it. I toast pine nuts ahead and keep them on hand all the time. (We use them a lot and my husband, and my kids when they visit, like them so much, they would eat them as snacks if would let them. But, I don't let them.) To serve, I put a glob of the mascarpone on the plate and then the figs. Then I poured the liquid that collected from broiling the figs over top, and then topped with the toasted pine nuts. And, we drank the rest of the Sauternes with it. The Osso Buco... Actually, I threw away the recipe I used as a guide, after I made it. It was pretty much a classic recipe, modified a little. I had some homemade stock on hand and used that, instead of a mixture of canned low salt beef broth and canned low salt chicken broth, as the recipe called for. I used both fresh lemon zest and fresh orange zest. I almost used fresh tomato instead of canned diced, but at the last minute, I decided to follow that part of the recipe. I'm sorry not to have something more definite to tell you. Email or PM me if maybe I can be of more help to you. That sounds really good. I'll keep an eye out for that one. I love Shiraz. It's often like Pinot Noir to us, in that we like it with lots of foods.

Whatta song! I can't believe we, even my husband, had never heard of this song. He even likes country music. Now we are going to try to find it on one of the sites where he downloads music (legal, he pays for it!!! )so we can hear what it sounds like. Thanks, Susan, formerly from DE, where in my opinion scrapple is better than PA scrapple

Thanks, Suzanne. That would be a good reference for me, as we are developing more of a taste for them than we used to have. They are much more a part of Florida style food and our cooking now than during our previous life up north.

I'm not sure if this is the usual way for stuffing peppers with ground beef or whatever, but it's the only way I knew growing up. My mom always used to stuff the peppers with ground meat she had already browned (browned with the chopped onion and garlic and herbs and all that usual stuff); let that mixture cool a bit; then add to that two or three lightly beaten eggs with grated parmigiano or romano cheese; and then stuff the peppers with that wet-with-egg mixture. She cooked them stove top, by starting with the cut side down in a very hot skillet, searing them to seal the openings of the peppers by the egg. After browning all over, turn down the heat, add some tomato sauce, and let them simmer until the egg is cooked, but it's still moist inside. This was sooooo good. I stuff peppers this way maybe once a year, and it is real good, but like a few of these unique handed-down recipes, it never tastes exactly like hers.

Robyn, my sympathy to you, your husband, and body parts. It's interesting that you mention this now. For the past two or three weeks maybe, I've been seeing a greater selection of peppers in Publix. I've seen Poblanos that are beautiful and large enough for even me to stuff them and I bought some and did. I've also seen Cubanelles, but I will use caution if I buy any of them, thanks to your post. Another change besides the larger variety is that they are labeled, which is helpful to people like me who don't recognize what many peppers are beyond bells and jalapenos.

Truffle oil; fresh basil; a deglazing pan of brown bits, garlic, and wine, reducing... There really aren't many food smells that I don't like -- none enough to list, anyway.

Dessert...

Most often I order online from Marky's Caviar, in Miami. I always use something in the pan when I sear foie gras. If oil, it's usually canola and sometimes it's Ghee, as you can see.

Thank you, Percy. It looks delicious and beautiful. The pictures of the eggs are great! I find myself just sitting and staring at the photos. I'll look in the store for the kind of potatoes you used, and if I can't find those, I'll use frozen. Thank you for the compliment on my posts and for the instructions on linking to specific posts! This past week was my (every other) week to work evenings, which is usually out, over dinner. So, the two nights before last were out, and last night was take-out. After a 90 degree, lower humidity, clear and beautiful day, we would love to have grilled outside and eaten on the porch tonight; however, our monster grill is still on the porch after the last hurricane. My husband is suffering from a bout of gout, and I can't move that thing outside by myself, so I cooked indoors. We still haven't gotten the repairs on the porch, including the screen, but tomorrow I am going out there with duck tape. I am the Duck Tape Queen, and I will make it work, temporarily. This is a great time of the year here in Florida and now that maybe the hurricanes are over, I am dying to get back out outside for meals. So anyway, tonight we had: Melon and prosciutto and Prosecco Osso Bucco A "pie" of caramelized savoy cabbage atop polenta Steamed and buttered baby zucchini and yellow squash Salad: cucumbers and onions Salice Salentino Still to come, a dessert of figs and mascarpone cream I have been forgetting and I am going to try to remember to post what wine we've had with our dinners. I think some are interested in that. I am. Unless it was an oh-ma-god good wine worth posting the vintner and vintage and all that, I'll just post the variety.