Varmint

What do you want to accomplish with your meal? Food, atmosphere, crazy fun? If the food, what kind of food? What type of beverages? And how much money do you really want to spend? Sorry to ask so many questions, but when you're in the next lower tier, there are different experiences for different people. FWIW, I don't care too much for Pop's, although I appreciate Scott's work. Lantern is indeed a great place, and I'm looking to get back there soon.

Excellent report, Holly. In addition to the texture and flavor of the vegetables, were there any specific veggies that stood out for you?

I made a great tomato salad of 4 different types of heirlooms, some buffalo mozzarella, basil, EVOO, and sea salt. Yeah, it was damn good, but I'm getting tired of that. I think I actually prefer good feta in this type of salad over the mozzarella. What are some other good tomato salad ideas?

tomato, tomahto

Thank you, Chef Klapp, for this fantastic tale that makes me dislike you even more!!! The question is, when will the first Klapp School of Pizza be held????

Yes, all the veggies were very fresh. I can't wait to get back to Dillard!

Thank you for those great stories and your recipes. Excuse my use of the quotation marks, but I'm intrigued by your sauce recipe for the "authentic" Carolina barbecue. Having eaten at barbecue restaurants from the Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds to the mountains in Dillsboro, I've yet to experience a sauce that has vinegar, ketchup, worcestershire AND mustard. I have no doubt that such a combination is incredibly delicious, but is it authentic? On that note, what is your definition of authentic? Also, would you serve your sandwiches with slaw? How would you make your slaw?

Jaymes, I'll buy the ingredients if you make this for the pig pickin'. Mmmmmm. Tea .......... bourbon ............ citrus .............. pig.

That is awesome, Rachel!!! What a great find. The menu is priceless -- and no chicken fingers, either!

I actually did some superficial research to determine the origins of the children's menu, and I really couldn't find anything. A good google-master might come up with something, and I'd really appreciate knowing the answer to this question.

Aurora, be creative. Dispel the dilemma. What are our alternatives? You could all come to NC on October 11 -- I'll set up a couple of Heartland Only tables!!

I love the Bull City Burrito served at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park in Durham, NC (the Bulls were immortalized in the movie "Bull Durham" and are a Triple A minor league baseball team). Anyhow, the Bull City Burrito contains kielbasa, refried beans and sauerkraut. I'm usually not allowed to sleep in the same room as Mrs. Varmint on the nights I eat one of these suckers!

In the one lengthy Babbo thread that we had some time ago, tommy contemplated how much better Babbo would be if it were a Danny Meyer restaurant. I think that the people from "Peoria" are treated very well at Gramercy Tavern, where there are no unwritten rules of proper cosmopolitan decorum. If it works at GT and the other Meyer spots, why not Babbo?

It's so nice that y'all are talking about me! Hell, I'm from the sticks, and I'm planning to go to Babbo. We'll see how they treat me.

BTW, "Max" is this waiter who has the most cherubic face you'll ever see. He's probably in his late 20s, but he looks 16. Oh, and he's sweet on me!

This "peach cobbler" recipe has been around for ages -- I first saw it in an old southern cookbook from the 40s. It works well with cherries, berries, but peaches are where it's at for me. I don't cook the peaches, as I like the fresher flavor. I actually prefer to use salted butter, too, as the salt is somewhat concentrated in the crunchy crust of the dough, giving it a very nice contrast in flavor to the sweetness of the rest of the dish. The cobbler was a big hit with Weka and edemuth. I served it with vanilla bean ice cream and a raspberry sauce. This is a dish that is so simple that even Mrs. Varmint makes it from time to time!!!

OK, let's start with the Aaron Burr Beer and go alphabetically.

This dessert is just so darned pure. The flavors are clean, it's easy to make, and guests love it. I can't tell you how many times I've been asked what I added to the berries to make it taste so good -- they never believe me when I say, "sugar." Peaches do indeed make this a much more watery dish. I'm making a quick peach cobbler for dinner tonight -- I'm actually hosting a couple of eGulleteers!!

The beauty of CafePress is that they make the shirts as ordered. We don't get stuck with any excess, nor do we worry about not having enough. Rachel, will you coordinate with Michael and CafePress to get this thing started? Again, my preference would be not to make any profit off of these shirts. If we sell a bunch, we'll get back some money, which we can plow into the pig pickin'. Of course, if the consesus is that we include a profit in the price, we would plow that money into my costs. No big deal either way. FYI, the actual cost of these shirts is $13.99 for white and $14.99 for the gray. A sweatshirt (remember, this will be held in October) is $20.99. Standard shipping is $5.00.

I've edited the links so the images should come up fine, now. Michael, awesome, tremendous, fantastic. I'll donate all my eGullet salary to you for this effort! Question: What's in pink just above the pig's head outline? What's in pink before and after Pigstockpalooza? I love the way you did the "oo". I'm almost wondering if you could put a circle around it to make it look like a pig's snout. Nah, that's more work and not necessary at this time.

Sweet N Tart looks great to me! Let's go with it! Who will be our chaperones? We'll be lost little puppies. Plus, Mrs. Varmint has no idea of what she's getting into. She still doesn't quite understand this "eGullet thing."

Michael, I've got a month and a half before I turn 40 and go to NYC, so you have plenty of time. However, we need to get these things in the distribution cycle. Plus, I've decided to charge a buttload of money so I can profit off of them. OK, maybe not. Again, my plan is to put them on CafePress at cost. Thanks again for your awesome work on this. You've been designing like a madman, I've been eating barbecue like there's no tomorrow!!!

Great pictures, Sam. I just came from Hickory. Had I known you were in Black Mountain, I would have driven the extra hour to see you. Thanks a hell of a lot for the heads up! By the way, on my way back from Hickory, I stopped at Snook's again for a sandwich while I wasn't stuffed. It was awesome barbecue. The smoky brown bits of barbecue were perfect. I also got a pimento cheeseburger which was very good. They had sweet potato and chocolate cream cheese pie on today's menu, but I passed on those. I also stopped at Little Richard's in Winston-Salem, which is generally recognized as having great barbecue. Flavorless. It goes to show that you still have to have a fair amount of luck.

This is brilliant. Since it's my pig pickin', I'll make the following executive decisions: Keep the pig head outline. Fantastic. Keep the French and the English. Drop the "Too much pork for just one fork" -- that's a song from a local band, and this needs to be original, right? I could go either way with the Pigstockpalooza. Ah, what the fuck, keep it!!! Move the date and address to the back under Pigstockpalooza. Make sure that it's Raleigh, North Cackalacky, not just Cackalacky. I'd make the whole thing just a touch smaller. Otherwise, let's roll. Get this baby going!

Though it's possible to cook with gas and smoke with wood simultaneously. There's no particular advantage, as I understand it, to using wood as your heat source. The benefit comes from using wood as a source of smoke. Many barbecue places -- especially in Memphis -- produce terrific, smoky, old-fashioned-tasting barbecue by using gas-fired "pits" that have fireboxes in them to hold slowly smoldering wood. It's also possible to make very good (if not the best perhaps) barbecue using gas (or electric) heat and wood chips. Nevertheless, many of the barbecue establishments in North Carolina use absolutely NO smoke in their cooking. No wood, no chips, no smoke. I try to stay away from those places, of course.