robyn

I assume St. Augustine is an overnight stop. Where will you be staying (I live in the area - might be able to recommend places depending on where you'll be)? My husband and I like A1A Aleworks - right in the heart of everything downtown on King Street. It's not a huge deal restaurant (not a dump either). Decent Floribean fusion food. Good microbrews (it's a microbrewery too). Forget Harry's. We sent my brother-in-law to the Georgia Pig a few weeks ago when he was driving home to Michigan. He said it was closed. Didn't say whether for good - or just a vacation. So I'd check. Robyn

What's a Dinner House - a chain? Where I live - the Jacksonville FL beaches area - just about every independent dinner restaurant here has gone out of business in the last couple of years due to chain restaurants. Robyn

Don't you love living in a society afraid to live... or possibly live... or potentially live... or occasoinaly live... or could have lived... Actually - if you're going to get into the science - as opposed to the rhetoric - what we're talking about here is processed meat - whether it's processed foie gras or bologna or hot dogs. The thing they have in common is that they're processed before they're sold to the consumer - and it's not expected that they will be cooked a lot (if at all) before they're eaten (cooking can eliminate a lot of problems in food). So if a place where these foods are prepared - whether it's a large factory - or a small home operation - has problems - the people eating the food are susceptible to problems - particularly listeria - which isn't at all benign. Robyn

If I'm reading this article correctly - meat grading was mandatory during WWII and the Korean War. Otherwise - it has been voluntary. Of course - I didn't write the article and can't vouch for it. Robyn

The point I failed to make adequately in my post was that this gentleman, in contrast to many folks in his age group, appeared not to have suffered that significant decline in his ability to discern subtle changes in taste or texture. He had no complaints about our fish or beef - only the chicken. I'm curious as to when the real shift to the type of mass production chicken farms occurred. I refer to the Tyson and Perdue style factories in which special feeds and techniques are used to pump out "full-sized" chickens in half that Mother Nature would take to grow them. I have to wonder if, as someone else has pointed out, the feed is an issue. I've purchased and prepared "free range" chicken within the past few years and found it to little different from regular grocery store chicken. Just last week I made fried chicken livers. I have customarily used the fresh ones that the gorcery store emat department had available. This time all I could get were Tyson brand frozen chicken livers. They had distinctly less flavor than the ones I've been using previously and I dont think it was just the fact that they were frozen. I don't think we're competent to assess what goes on with a particular really old person (I deal with lots of them several times a week when I visit my father-in-law's nursing home). It's said that "nostalgia" is the "good old days multiplied by a bad memory". The differences between this man's perceptions of chicken and beef might have been due to dentures - or perhaps it was just one of those things. I can barely figure out the people I deal with on a regular basis - much less people I've never met . I listen to elderly people complaining about food all the time - and everyone complains about something different (but all of them complain about something). The only common denominator I've been able to find is that older people tend to want to eat dishes that they're familar with - they're not big on experimenting. Robyn

Most people didn't grow up on farms in the 40's and 50's. My husband and I didn't. We both remember that the food at home and at restaurants (which we didn't visit very often) was - at best - mediocre - and both of our mothers were lousy cooks. I'm not sure what decade you're talking about when it comes to meat grading. If I'm reading my history correctly - meat grading wasn't mandatory for the most part until after the Korean War (except during WWII and the Korean War) - so if you're talking about the 30's - I doubt your recollection is accurate. And who ate a lot of meat during WW II (I am not old enough to remember rationing - I was born in 1947 - but my mother - born in 1920 - certainly is)? Look here for a history of meat grading in the US. Robyn

You were talking about chicken. I am a person who still eats chicken at fancy restaurants. Or fish (although - in a really fancy restaurant - the fish course might be served as a separate course after the appetizer and before the meat course). But I do love roasted chicken. Best chicken I ever had was at La Mere Blanc - bresse chicken - the most perfect roasted chicken in the world. Can't compare it with regular chicken - or even the "upscale" chicken you'll get at a fancy restaurant in the US. It's like comparing chocolate from Maison du Chocolate with a Hershey bar. On the other hand - I suspect the chicken the fellow in Syracuse was eating was pretty much the same chicken he'd been eating for a long time - and he just had more difficulty tasting what he was eating. I think you're right about the inability to compare apples with apples these days. Used to be that you would judge a chef by how he prepared something like a roasted chicken - or perhaps a fish with a simple sauce (like a beurre blanc). Once you knew he had mastered the basics - you would trust him on the new stuff. There are analogues in other disciplines. E.g., Picasso was a great figurative painter. So I always tried to learn all I could about his non-figurative work. Robyn

I'm a shell collector. Just a guess. If you compare the eastern and western coasts of the Americas - the eastern coast has lots of sandy beaches - the western coast has rocks. The clams we like to eat live in sandy inter-tidal and sub-tidal waters close to shore. There aren't as many of those on the west coast as the east - and those that exist are frequently harder for shell and shellfish collectors to get to. There aren't many west coast beaches where you'd want to have a clambake - and that may be the reason why it's hard to get clams there. Robyn

Don't always take at face value what old people tell you. It is fairly well established that - in many people - sensory perceptions - including taste - diminish as age advances. The exact same chicken someone ate when he/she was 40 - and enjoyed a lot - could well be relatively tasteless when that person eats it at age 90 (especially if the person is wearing dentures). My husband and I have 3 elderly living parents. They would salt their food to death if they could without dying of congestive heart failure. As it is - they usually douse their food with something else (frequently lots of pepper) so they can taste something. Robyn

The "old days" aren't that old. On the customer's side - some public restaurants - like McSorley's in New York - didn't allow women until about 1970 - and it wasn't because it wanted to. And there are still many private clubs (eating and other types of clubs) that don't allow women - or blacks - or hispanics - or Jews - except in possibly a very token way. Many that did change their rules and the way they operate only did so in the 80's after they got a lot of pressure from large corporate clients that didn't want to look discriminatory (and a lot of those clients dropped their memberships - resulting in financial problems). But - when it comes to the real big-time - not the eating clubs in Miami whose business was suffering - all that discimination is still there. I wish it wasn't necessary to have this kind of website - but it is. And - even when you're allowed into a place - it doesn't mean you're welcomed. A year or two ago - a black Florida legislator went to a restaurant in Florida and was told he'd be served - but only if he sat in the back of the restaurant or ordered takeout (can't remember which). On the restaurant's side - I don't think much has changed at all. You rarely see a female server in a very fancy restaurant despite several lawsuits (for those of you who are big fans of Joe's Stone Crabs in Miami Beach - that lawsuit lasted a long time). Or a woman head chef - or line chef (at least in an open kitchen). There are more females with the title of "pastry chef" - but that's like corporate type organizations where women always get to be the secretary. Even in the pastry area - if women were equal - it wouldn't be necessary - as this month's Wine Spectator did - to distinguish between the cooking styles of female pastry chefs and male pastry chefs. We'd just be talking about the different styles of different pastry chefs. (BTW - the men were thought to be kind of wild - while the women were supposedly more restrained - IOW - they were stereotyping.) The same applies to black people. In the last 2 weeks - I have been to 2 pretty good restaurants where I live. Both had open kitchens. Saw 1 women in those kitchens (a pastry person of course) - and no black people (which is kind of unusual since the black population in this general area is probably over 30%). As for hispanics - didn't see any hispanics either. The only place you see them "in front" here is - believe it or not - Japanese sushi places. We have a very small Japanese population - and - when hispanics with certain facial features get dressed up in a certain way - they're thought to look Japanese. Sounds pretty stupid - but it really happens. And I don't think what I'm seeing here is unusual. When I go to a trendy restaurant in a big city - I usually see the same thing. The last 3 big deal restaurants I went to in NY were AD - Le Cirque 2000 - and Jean Georges. In Atlanta it was the Dining Room at the Ritz Carlton. LA was Wolfgang Puck's Place - in Beverly Hills and a few other places. Ditto with Chicago. I don't recall seeing a single black person in any of them (and even if there are one or two - what's the black population in these cities? - they're not exactly Utah). Heck - you know more people in the restaurant industry than I do. Why don't you ask the people you know why there aren't more women or black men working in restaurants "in the front" (it's not like they're all employed - there was an article in our "local" NYT this week which estimates the unemployment rate of black men in New York at about 50%). I have my own theories - but I'll keep them to myself for now. So - I guess as far as I'm concerned - we're still in the dark ages when it comes to restaurants. It is one of the last "good old boy" bastions left in the US. What makes you think that much has changed except a small part of the veneer? If you were planning to write that the old days were terrible - and today almost everything is "hunky-dory" - I think you'd be taking the wrong approach. Robyn P.S. I am 56 and my husband is 58. I have been fighting discrimination against women for about 40 years now. When it comes to eating - that started when I was told about my first law clerk's luncheon - but was also told I couldn't attend because the club at which it was held didn't allow women to eat there (and I clerked for the most liberal large law firm in Philadelphia). So I take all of this stuff pretty seriously. Please don't pretend that everything is swell now - because it isn't.

Since I won't be in Miami until a week after the food event - I'd like to hear the Ramsey story here at some point. I'll be in London later this spring and am planning to dine at one of his places. Just want to know what I'm getting into. If you can't find a place to have boat-drinks - give a holler. My brother lives on an island between Miami and Miami Beach and has 2 (boats). He and his wife aren't real food geeks (just amateurs) - but - being boaters - they sure know how to drink . Perhaps my impressions of the Miami Beach scene are wrong (I lived in Miami for 20+ years and always hated the Miami Beach scene) - but I think a better topic would be - How to Eat in Expensive Trendy Restaurants At Someone Else's Expense and Stay Fashionably Thin. Or - How to Bed A Really Thin Gorgeous Model if You're a Big Fat Middle Aged Guy. I am breaking with my tradition of hating Miami Beach next trip in mid-March and actually trying a (relatively) new restaurant there (Casa Tua). It is too bad the owner there now has a security guard to make sure that the staff/patrons don't steal more of the place settings (he lost $16,000/worth in the last year). Robyn

Robyn, where did you get that quote? Also, do you know if wine exports are subsumed under "food products"? Pan - I don't save all these web links (I'll try to be more careful in the future). This one was French - maybe the French department of commerce - something like that. I'd suspect that wine is either food or consumer products. It's definitely not aeronautics materials . France is one of the top 10 trading partners of the US - and I'm sure that the foodstuffs being discussed here are peanuts compared to the overall picture. When you deal with relatively large countries - boutique stuff of the type that's being discussed here isn't a large part of their international trade. On the other hand - with smaller countries - e.g., Israel - which is the 3rd largest foie gras country in the world - it is a big deal. Which is why a lot is going on there in terms of foie gras (SC of Israel outlawed production based on animal cruelty - but delayed implementation of its ruling due to possible dire economic impact). Robyn

You're in Europe and we in the US don't have Michelin. For what it's worth - when in Europe - I always found the 1 or 2 knife and fork Michelin ratings to be a sound way to find solid enjoyable meals. Robyn

I would agree with your first sentence 100% if you left out the word "nationalistic" - because I don't perceive "nationalism" in most of the food writing I read - just a lot of puffery. I mean - goodness gracious - Gourmet Magazine (or maybe it was Food & Wine) even managed to make the town where I live - Jacksonville FL - sound like a "food" destination. Which I can assure you is not the case (a golf destination yes - a food destination no). I can't tell you how many times my husband and I have been disappointed in recent years eating at restaurants in various places that were supposed to be "world class" - and - or at a minimum - excellent. I can count the times we were thrilled on less than one hand. And there are maybe 3 hands full of major disappointments. It gets a little depressing after a while. And - just to put my prejudices up front - when I think of a world class restaurant - I don't think of a place that serves me 25-35 mini-courses where half don't work. I think of a restaurant where I have the basic courses (appetizer, main, dessert, maybe also salad and/or cheese depending) - plus a few throw-aways - where *everything* works. At the last really excellent meal we had (not in Jacksonville) - it was a Wednesday - the place wasn't crowded - we were obviously having a good time - and the chef came out to us and asked us to try a bit of something he was working on. It wasn't a "course" - he was just asking for a critique - and we gave it to him (it was ready for "prime time"!). This chef happened to be French (although the restaurant was in the US) - and he subscribed to old fashioned notions of great restaurants. That great restaurants serve consistently great food to their customers - they don't experiment with something for the 2nd or 3rd time in the 14th course. I don't care whether the cuisine is old-fashioned - new-fangled - or something in-between (and your definitions may of course vary in terms of what's what here). It all has to *work*. Call me old-fashioned. But even though I'm not a great chef at home - I don't experiment with *my* guests. I serve them food I know will be at least very good. I learn and experiment on my own time. This doesn't even start to address service issues. Like the supposedly excellent expensive restaurant that is trying to turn its tables 3-4 times a night - which means your main course will probably arrive before you've eaten the last of your appetizer. I don't mind this in a local lunch joint where I'm spending $7.99. I very much mind it if the bill for dinner is expected to be over $200. Anyway - enough venting. What did you find odd about L'Esperance? I was only there once. Had made reservations when it had 2 stars - ate there after it received the 3rd (the first time around). I thought it was a lower end 2 star then - and frankly never understood the 3rd star. On the other hand - the prices were in line for what I ate (i.e., it wasn't priced like a 3 star either). So I wasn't disappointed. Robyn

If anyone knows - why did Gordon Ramsey do a disappearing act at last year's festival (I read a little blurb about it on the internet while I was looking up something else - but couldn't find any details)? Robyn

So I'm not the only one who thinks Jewish holidays come in fairly inhumane bunches! And I thought I was the only one! Every year at the end of Passover and the when Simchat Torah is (finally) past I feel like I've survived the Bhutan Death March. I'm going to come out of the closet here. I HATE Pesach. I hate it more than you can imagine. It's a shitload of work, all of it thankless, and I end up putting my nicest stuff away for two weeks. I hate covering things in foil. I hate cleaning -- and since my cleaning lady is Polish, doesn't speak English, and doesn't understand chametz, she gets three weeks off so that I can do all of the cleaning myself. There is no joy in it for me. The only things I can say good about Pesach is that it only lasts 8 days and I don't have to cook for the seders because we go to Toledo, OH every year. If you get tired - for whatever reason - just cheat. Go a store - buy what you want - and put it in clever packages. If you have a reputation as a good cook - everyone will think your stuff is wonderful. By the way - they were doing a giveaway of hamantashen at our local Costco last weekend. We have a small Jewish community here - so they were touting them to shoppers as tasty cookies! Also - if you are tired - there are hotels (I know the ones in south Florida - but I'm sure they exist elsewhere) - that specialize in 1 week "Passover Vacations". So the holiday is really a holiday - not a forced march. Maybe it's not in the cards for this year - but think about it next year. I do not have a Kosher kitchen - so I don't do anywhere near as much as you do. But I know Passover is near when we get the "food message" from the nursing home in the mail (it's like a Miranda warning) - and we got it in the mail today. I am looking forward to the annual Purim party/festival at the nursing home. Sounds ridiculous when you think of a 94 year old Queen Esther - but it's a lot of fun. Robyn

Mostl of you must be really young. And big fans of Oliver Stone . I can remember similar bans of various French food products a domestic consumer or returning tourist might buy - both fresh and processed - going back over the course of the last 30 years. They were on and off - but mostly on. The last ban I specifically remember was the ban on fresh foie gras. That was the result of Newcastle's Disease - and it went on for decades. Diseases that might possibly affect birds are very scarey to domestic bird producers - no matter what country you're talking about. If this were really a political vendetta - as opposed to a public health issue - why pick on foie gras? Why not pick on something important? "French exports to the U.S. are mainly industrial products: capital goods (42%) - including aeronautics materials (25%), automotive parts (4%), and intermediary goods (23%). Consumer goods (17%) and food products (9%), traditionally associated with France, represent a far smaller proportion of French sales to the U.S." Robyn

My only concern about Casa Tua was reading a recent newspaper article about how the restaurant had docked all its employees $100 out of their pay checks for $16,000 in parts of table settings - especially napkins - that had simply disappeared in the last few months or so. This is the article. I can't imagine that would result in a happy staff. I think if pilferage has been a problem - it would have been more to the point to find out who was responsible (whether it was certain employees or patrons stuffing place settings in their purses). Robyn

We used to live at Grove Isle. Had some differences with the developer - and left almost 10 years ago. No matter how good the restaurant there is - I don't think my husband would set foot there again. We have been to Casa Juancho. I agree - it's good (at least it was last time I was there - but I haven't been there for a while). Robyn

I'll be down in Miami in March - and I made a reservation at Casa Tua in Miami Beach. I'd like to know if anyone has been there - and what did you think? Robyn

Maybe 5 or 10 - or 20 years down the road - this facility will have a specialist in acupunture. Today - well the image of these (on average) 90 year old Jewish people - quite a few of whom were born in Europe - just makes me want to giggle . It's a generation gap thing. Robyn

Yup . I mentioned this thread to my husband last night - and he said "what - you're allowed to do that???). And I said - why not - there are threads about what people weigh - and bariatric surgery - why not constipation? After all - you can have the best food - either at home or in a restaurant - and - if your body is out of sorts - what's the point? The point is eating good food - and feeling good! My mother-in-law had terrible health problems before she died - and one of them was strictures in her esophagus. So she couldn't get down a lot of food - or any food if it wasn't soft. So she hated to eat - she actually was afraid to eat because of the unpleasant aftermath a lot of times. And she lost her enjoyment of eating after drinking 900 cans of Ensure. One of the best things I ever did for her was - the Christmas Eve before she died - I made a buffet which included a lot of delicious soft easy to swallow foods - like noodle kugel (which she had never had before - Chanukah was the same time as Christmas that year). And everyone remarked that she ate like a pig (mind you - she weighed about 90 pounds at that point) - and she really enjoyed it. So I think bringing all our collective food knowledge to bear on the problems that lots and lots of people (not only the elderly) have with eating is a good application of our knowledge. Robyn

Hi Dumpling - I personally don't rule out what you're doing. But the rules in this nursing home (I think they're state or federal laws) - are that the residents can't use anything with medicinal qualities (or even have them in their rooms) unless they're dispensed through the nursing home pharmacy. Makes sense. Because you're talking about a population of about 200 residents who are each probably taking an average of 10 meds a day. So you need the in-house doc and the pharmacist to evaluate all the possible drug interactions. And I'm not sure the professionals (doc and pharmacist) would do that unless they were dealing with FDA approved drug inserts. I think they'd run into all kinds of problems - including potential malpractice issues - if they did otherwise. As for the exercise - they have exercise classes at least 3 days a week - 2 levels. One for people with severe mobility problems. One for people without. Conducted by trained PT people. Wouldn't surprise me if they incorporated some of the techniques you're talking about into their programs. Western medicine isn't that bad either. When we brought my FIL here 18 months ago in an ambulance from a hospital in North Carolina - he was a mess. Couldn't walk. Could barely talk. He couldn't read. He didn't know who the president was. My husband's sister was very mad that we had brought him here - because she had given him up for dead - and wanted him to spend his "last days" near her. He's far from perfect now - but he's enjoying the SI Swimsuit Issue and the latest Sopranos we brought over last week . So we're pretty happy. Still - East and West both have something to learn from each other. Are you Chinese? I have read articles about senior facilities - both assisted living and skilled nursing - particularly on the west coast of the US - which specialize in the needs and cultural desires of elderly Chinese people. Sounds like a good idea to me. Just like this Jewish facility serves the needs and cultural desires of elderly Jewish people. But I will have to leave it to the medical professionals to integrate Eastern and Western medical approaches (and I think that is an ongoing process). Robyn

I'm sure the lack of exercise due to inability to walk isn't helping. My husband's favorite "keep regular" thing was running - and - when he had to give it up - it took him a while to find substitute activities that served the same purpose. My FIL would kill to be able to eat a pickle (he can't because of the salt restrictions). I think everyone is doing their best here (and I want to thank everyone for all of the ideas you've given us). As we can all see from this thread - this problem is far from uncommon in the infirm elderly. And there is - unfortunately - no "magic bullet". Robyn

Oh dear. I read this so very much the wrong way the first time. The nurses can look into his drawers - we'll check his drawers . Robyn