LaurieA-B

My daughter and I have had no trouble with any of these (one year old and still breastfeeding). I ate plenty of spicy food, and my usual amount of garlic and onions. I did avoid large amounts of chocolate, and stopped eating shellfish because she got a diaper rash after I'd had mussels. I wouldn't eliminate anything you usually eat out of hand. Heather and snowangel are right on about the snacks and finger foods. I really ate constantly during the first few months. Muffins and quick breads, cut-up fresh fruits and vegetables, cheese, crackers, yogurt, whatever she likes. Every day Matthew fixed plates of cheese, salami, and fruit to place next to the armchair that baby and I lived in. (The thing that never left my side was the hospital water pitcher, which had a spout for a straw and held a lot of ice water. Bring one home with you. It was my best friend.)

Yes, our hotel in Bangkok served that very intensely colored orange juice every morning, and then I saw street vendors squeezing it from small oranges that looked like limes. I thought it was delicious. The first place I tried mango with sticky rice was Sara-Jane's in Bangkok. The atmosphere is kind of odd (it's in an office building, and has a very Western-type decor), but the dessert and all their Isaan dishes were very, very delicious. Eat well in Bangkok!

Lucia, in addition to the temperature decrease, I recommend Alice Medrich's cooling tip. When you remove the brownies from the oven, immediately pop the pan into a larger shallow pan of ice water. Leave to cool. This gives the brownies a wonderful dense fudgy texture. We always do this, with Medrich's New Classic Brownies recipe (from Cookies and Brownies). While I understand wanting a break, I hope you'll make and post about the Chocolate Caramel Tarts, because I've been wanting to try that recipe. Happy new year.

While I'm not trying to teach my daughter table manners yet (she is one year old), I've already started pondering what manners are important for her to learn. And I'm sure she's already learning them from watching her father and me. I think many of the etiquette rules have become archaic; I do not think it important to spoon soup away from yourself, for example. So what manners are important? I think: placing your napkin in your lap; chewing with your mouth closed; asking politely for items to be passed; not making rude comments about the food; clearing your dishes at the end of the meal (at home, possibly in other homes, depending on the situation). That's all that comes to mind right now. And I hope these manners will be learned with a minimum of explicit instruction. I'm not going to lecture her about things like breaking off a small piece of bread and buttering only that piece. My parents avoided explicit instruction, for the most part. The only thing I remember getting lectured about was the rude comments. We were allowed to say "I don't care for that," or "No, thank you," but "Ew, gross!" was forbidden. It really set off my dad if one of us said the meal my mom had cooked was gross. The funny thing is that, while we were all guilty of bad manners at home (throwing food at sibling, etc.) we always managed to have perfect manners during our rare restaurant visits. My family (six kids) rarely ate out and the nicest place we went to was Denny's. But boy, did we behave well at Denny's.

trillium, thanks for posting. We've been wondering whether you were in Asia and are glad to hear from you. Mercy Corps is a well regarded relief organization based in Portland, Oregon, and I read in the Oregonian yesterday that they have already sent people and supplies to Asia.

I was brought up on classic steak and potato pasties (in Portland, Oregon) because my father is the son of a Cornishwoman. They were a special treat we had a couple of times a year, my dad's favorite. When Matthew and I visited Penzance three years ago, I thrilled to the delicious fragrance on every street. Of course homebaked pasties are the best (and my cousin obliged with some for dinner on our first night), but I found even shop pasties delectable. I was surprised to see all the variations for sale. I remember tuna and sweetcorn as well as chicken curry. But at home we always have steak and potato. Diced steak, NOT ground meat; I don't think of ground meat as a real pasty. Regarding too much potato, my granny wrote, "Grandma’s pasties were really a throw back to the war years – when meat was very scarce – So she never got over the habit of using too much potato." I haven't measured but I'd guess that we use about half meat, half potato in ours. I'm including one of my grandmother's recipes here, as she wrote it. But the best way to make a pasty is to have a lesson from someone with experience. I think she specifies shortening/margarine because she didn't always have access to good lard in the U.S. Matthew used freshly rendered leaf lard the last time we made pasties, with good results. The Pasty Book by Hettie Merrick is an interesting history with good recipes.

I would totally go for Dick's, because the other places all have vegetarian options. At Dick's you MUST have a burger. Once you're fully recovered, get a fabulous bacon cheeseburger from Red Mill. (We live right around the corner from Deluxe, and I haven't tried their burger but I know Matthew likes it.)

elswinger, I'm surprised that you've ever gotten a special order at Dick's. Matthew checked it out when we first moved here in 1996 (he had an In 'n' Out habit in California) and quickly learned that they didn't do special orders (so he never goes there). After not touching a hamburger for at least 15 years, I developed a cheeseburger habit during my pregnancy last year. Now I grab a cheeseburger after school at least once a week from Dick's on Broadway. Many, many times I have heard customers denied a special order. It's the Dick's deal: "instant service" because everything's already made. My only problem with Dick's is that as a public-school employee, I disagree with the owner's politics. So far the lure of the cheeseburger has overcome my qualms. (I never, ever go to Jack in the Box because the Broadway location seems repulsive. Even when it's clean it looks filthy.)

January 13 is my birthday! Traditional Taiwanese Banquet sounds great; will it be exactly like Eat Drink Man Woman?

Hey nightscotsman: I just hunted up this thread because I was thinking of baking the spicy cocoa cookies (that's how good they are, I recall them clearly from two years ago). Two questions: what's the source of this recipe? And are the quantities listed here the full recipe or the half recipe (that is, if I want a half recipe should I havle what's here, or is it already halved)?

Matthew made us each a cup of the Herme/Steingarten chocolat chaud last night, to top off Thanksgiving. It was so perfect that I now feel there's little point to tasting any more. But I will try Dilettante, at least, since it's right down the street. Thanks for all the recommendations. The Herme recipe uses both chopped chocolate and cocoa powder. One conclusion I've made is that decent hot chocolate cannot be made with chocolate syrup, which is what many of the coffeehouses appear to use. If anyone needs a PM with the Herme recipe, let me know. Or click here. Definitely one of the best uses for an immersion blender.

Last night I was waiting for a bus in front of Seattle's Best Coffee, so ordered their hot chocolate, which is called (pretentiously) Cocoa Trio. It is advertised as a blend of milk, dark, and white chocolate, and came topped with an enormous swirl of whipped cream, drizzled with chocolate syrup and sprinkled with white chocolate shards. Looked pretty, but once I got past the whipped cream the drink was in anemic in flavor and appearance.

It closed in the last year or two, the space taken over by a teriyaki spot (of course). Welcome to egullet, tarragon. seawakim, could you tell us some breads that you've tried and are not what you want? Have you tasted the usual rustic breads, Grand Central, Essential, etc.?

(double post)

There's a series called World Snacks books, written by Amy Wilson Sanger, that includes First Book of Sushi, Yum Yum Dim Sum, Hola Jalapeno, and Let's Nosh. My daughter enjoys them and we've given them to lots of other kids. There's also Maisy Makes Gingerbread, which would be fun with a gingerbread man cookie cutter. Strega Nona (you know, with the pasta pot) is available in board/picture book. Cookbooks: I like Mollie Katzen's Pretend Soup a lot. It has a text version and then a picture version of every recipe, and they're good recipes. I wouldn't get Cunningham's Cooking with Children for this age, mainly because it doesn't have many photos. It's a great introductory cooking class, though. For the age you're talking about, I'd definitely go for things with lots of colorful pictures. The Dorling Kindersley books have some of the silly recipes that snowangel mentioned, but they're really fun. The Williams-Sonoma books are well regarded by parents I've talked to.

Coincidentally, I just sampled Vivace's this evening; after starting this thread, figured I'd better do some sampling. I thought it was pleasant but unremarkable. According to the menu they use Guittard. The coffee whipped cream was the best part. Yes, the Steingarten recipe is the Pierre Herme recipe that I mentioned above. It's in It Must've Been Something I Ate.

Here's a link to Matthew's review (hopefully you can read this without registration). I especially enjoyed their wonderful fried breads, and they have all sorts of delicious Taiwanese dishes. I've been hoping Rocky would put a group together ever since he described past Rocking Wok banquets when we met at Salumi this summer. Whatever date you choose, Matthew and I will try to be there. We're pretty flexible except for Christmas/New Year's week.

This is a wintertime topic. Anywhere you can recommend for excellent hot chocolate? The only one I could find discussed here is Le Pichet's, which I've tried, and it's delicious but not drinkable. It's extremely rich, like liquid chocolate mousse. I'm looking for a deliciously chocolatey drink that's a beverage, not a dessert. The one I tried most recently was at Top Pot, and it was unsatisfactory, more like warm vaguely chocolate-flavored milk. With all the coffeehouses in town, I'm sure someone is making a good hot chocolate. Suggestions welcomed. (Matthew makes a fabulous hot chocolate from Pierre Herme's recipe, but I'd like somewhere to get a good one while away from home.)

Here's the Dahlia Bakery holiday menu.

Ore-Ida Crispy Crowns (same as tots, only flatter): potatoes, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil (soybean and/or canola), salt, precooked wheat flour, yellow corn flour, natural flavoring, dehydrated onions, maltodextrin, autolyzed yeast, dextrose, disodium dihydrogen pyrophosphate (to retain natural color). This thread inspired me to buy tots for the first time in years. We had some the other night with roasted halibut. Tonight, on my own for dinner, I baked a pan of crispy crowns at 450. Tipped into a shallow bowl, topped with grated cheddar, back in the oven for a moment. Added salsa and sour cream. Tasted good...

In the book Candyfreak, Steve Almond visits several American candy factories (small compared to Hershey or Nestle, but still mass-produced) and emphasizes how amazing the candy tastes when it's freshly made on the factory floor. I'm a fan of the Reese's peanut butter cup and always find that the seasonal ones (Christmas tree, Easter egg, etc.) taste better, presumably because they are manufactured, delivered, and eaten within a shorter time frame than the cups.

French: Cafe Campagne brunch (not fancy but delicious) or Le Pichet (same). As for hotel restaurants, the Georgian Room has more feeling of "occasion" than most Seattle restaurants, and the one time I went there the food was excellent and more creative than I expected.

We love the sticky buns. Trying to remember the three usual flavors: pear almond, caramel pecan, and a chocolate nut. They also sometimes have special flavors. One Saturday we tried a savory bun, Gruyere and wild mushroom, that was extremely buttery and delicious. They have a website, but no content on it yet. I heard the woman, who I think is Carolyn, telling a customer that they are trying out bun-selling with the plan to open a shop in the future.

Red Line received great reviews in the Seattle Times and The Stranger last week. Matthew, Iris, and I have been there several times during the last few months, and we really like it. Bright, open space with a busy street view, free wireless, and good food. It's just an extremely pleasant restaurant. On our first visit I had a turkey sandwich and potato salad. Not a "wow" meal, but everything tasted fresh and delicious. When I was there last week I had the sandwich of the day, chicken blue cheese, and enjoyed it. They have coffee, cereal, and pastries for breakfast, and are open into the evening. Definitely recommended. Also on Capitol Hill, did you catch that a new restaurant will open in the Cassis space?

The Herbfarm isn't in Seattle, either.