baophac

why no one talks about Mr Steer burgers? (I recently started to eat beef again so I need all pointers on 'good' vs 'ok')

For the food porn or for American citizenship? ; P ← I have a green card thank you but I should have said 'for your dedication to making me drool uncomfortably at work'.

I am not into the female population but will you marry me ?

While testing the preparation of the Arpege egg for an ucomping party, I stumbled on the maple syrup egg salad. Ok it's more a dessert but the preparation is similar. Start with a hard boiled egg, take the yolk, cool it down and mix in unsalted butter and maply syrup. Fold in fresh whipped cream and pipe it into the egg white halves.

To give a different perspective, we have rice every meal at home. We also order steamed (white) rice at the chinese restaurant. One time my parents said that it's not a complete meal if there isn't rice. Even if we have pho or other noodle soups at home, there will be steamed rice and some vegetable dish along with the meal. I don't know if this is because my parents were poor when they were kids and maybe comfort/home food for them == rice + vegetables. When I eat vietnamese dishes, any kind of starch will do but I prefer the rice vermicelli (a more detailed post on this later). My brother doesn't feed his kid rice but he eats rice about 3 meals a week. My sister has rice only with asian dishes. In some families, they always make a full cooker worth of rice and then leave it on warm until it is finished or dried out (and then it becomes fried rice). This is something that is expected to be always available, no matter what time of the day. rice for breakfast - a sunny side up egg with maggi, reheated leftovers, a quick vegetable stirfry, reheated soup broth with small amount of rice rice in a snack or light meal - cold cooked vegetables with a bit of nuoc mam (fish sauce) [not nuoc cham which is another beast altogether and I may have another detailed post about it too ] Noodles aren't a staple like rice in Vietnamese cuisine. They are eaten as part of a specific soup or dish. You can't just have noodles in place of rice arbitrarily. A bit of background: Parents are born, raised, educated and married in Vietnam. Kids are born in Vietnam but raised and educated in Canada. One is married to a chinese wife, one to an american man, one forever unmarried. I'm the foodie of the house but I don't cook vietnamese.

I always get a laugh when I see people struggling with chopsticks and plates. If all I get is a plate to eat on, it's forks all the way. If you have soup in your meal, is it easy to keep the bowl for eating after or you have to fight with the waitperson ?

I don't have the skill or equipment to make babas. Is there anything I can buy that would have a similar texture? Sponge cake ?

volunteering for food ? can i bring my own bib ?

Sight the March magazines are being removed today so I totally missed out on this issue. Do you think I can get old issues from a Canadian distributor?

I have not found a good patisserie in Montreal since i came back. I used to buy at Patisserie Belge but their quality went down the drain and I have had too many 'old' cake. I used to buy croissants exclusively there too but no longer. I like the Premiere Moisson shop on Sherbrooke near Mackay and their 'Pointe au beurre' (apple pie) is to die for. It's like eating butter. Duc de Lorraine on Chemin de la Cote-des-Neiges north of Queen Mary Road is an old favorite but I have not been back yet.

I wish there are copies to be bought! I went to 4 different Multimags/LPI and they were all sold out!

Good morning Mr Baltas. I was wondering if you will cater to the people who have restrictions in their diet. It could be simple as having items which are 'vegan' or 'gluten free'. On a personal note I did not find tofu as an ingredient as I like to dress it as I would a slice of turkey in a sandwich. Any plans for Canada ? Etoilewich in Quebec, or maybe not .

random thoughts I am not sure if you want Number 9 to be a theme to your burgers ? The #1 burger could be plain. The Original #9 Burger would be your favorite combo. Here are some themes around #9: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9_(number) As for the e-gullet reference we could come up with The e-gullet burger. I would like a 35% fat burger with roma tomatoes and pepperjack cheese please.

I had left over Dijon mustard one day and having eaten too many pork chops the previous week I decided to improvise. The ingredients on special at the store were Chinese cabbage and spinach. I started by toasting whole cloves of garlic in my non-stick wok pan and started to throw in the chopped cabbage and mustard. After the cabbage have been well coated, I add the spinach and continue cooking at high heat for 5 more minutes. It was really by accident that I found the combination of slightly burned dijon mustard + toasted garlic made the whole dish somewhat sweet. The sugar in the mustard preparatin and the caramelization of the garlic contributed to this new recipe!

I have been a fan of Mr Bourdain after reading Kitchen Confidential. I liked him even more after watching A Cook's Tour (ACT). I am now reading the ACT book. This Travel Channel show is nothing like what I have seen from Mr Bourdain in the past and that's both a good and a bad thing. The bad thing is that it's not ACT and so there is a LOT LESS information given out about the food. This is why I found the Paris and Iceland shows somewhat insulting at first. It was insulting because I was expecting a lot more of Mr Bourdain and I was getting 1/10 of it. All the scripted scenes and the catacombs skit was uninteresting and somewhat annoying. I really wanted to know more about Iceland as it is completly unknown to me but the entire episode made me not want to visit the country at all! The whole spa treatment in Iceland could have been given to us in a 30 second footnote. This last example may have revealed that Mr Bourdain is not really an exciting travel guide; if he's not talking about food, he doesn't show the excitement and it translates into boring/bad TV. Overall I think it is the 'vision' of the Travel Channel that makes this show not an overwhelming success. The New Jersey episode on the other hand is a lot more like ACT. There was a good amount of information given out and it makes me want to visit New Jersey next time I go see my brother in Manhattan. The good thing about this new concept/show is that we get to see how Mr Bourdain behaves on camera in a different setting. He's not always talking about food and he's not in a kitchen all the time. Whether you like it or hate it, it's something that we would never see on Food TV because they are too food focused. I do thank the Travel Channel for carrying this show because it gives us viewers a chance to discover new things about Mr Bourdain. I find myself watching ACT shows over and over because it's like reading a reference document: you can't remember all the dishes that are shown in one episode. For No Reservations, I would never want to watch the first 2 episodes again. Personally I would not wish to see Mr Bourdain 'branch out' like this again. Would this show be better if it was in a 30 minute format? Can Mr Bourdain carry a 1 hour show by himself?