chappie

You've got the wrong idea on the "dryer hose," and it's my fault probably for not describing it properly. What I intent to use is metal, pretty rigid when compressed but can be pulled apart. I'm not going to pull it apart. I'm not using either the plastic stuff or the real flimsy aluminum-coated stuff. This is all metal. Sort of like this, but the one I found at my hardware store looks even thicker. http://www.repairclinic.com/0081.asp?RccPartID=1012445

Your peanut butter has mouse saliva in it as well as thousands of bug particles. Your mint has bee and fly saliva on it. If you're worried, just rinse them before boiling -- which would also destroy any remaining saliva, anyway. Guess you're not interested in any recipes for spit gravy.

One more thing: if I do this, is there a way to add a thermometer on the receiving grill (large one) that will tell me the temperature inside? Something I could affix by drilling a small hole, for example? I want to do this right, get me butts and such down to a science. Also, any easily foraged or obtained additions like wild herbs or woods to add green to a smoking fire?

The editing early on in this season hedged toward making the viewer believe Hung was a lock. I think he's not making the final. When he's on, he's remarkable cocky; when he's being charbroiled he panicks so hard his hair goes limp, his entire face metamorphizes and his voice changes. I can picture him devolving into muttering, lunatic self-dialog as the episodes progress. But I still don't mind him and he makes for good television. Overall -- and I know it's early, with plenty of time for producers meddling and heating up tacky dramas -- I can't find anything really unlikable about Season 3. The one budding hate-fest between Joey and Howie was nipped in the bud instead of being cultivated to embarrassment like the Marcel hazing debacle of Season 2. I'm hoping things continue in this vein. With each week, Season 2 seems like a fading nightmare. (By the way my money has to be on Tre. They've kept him oddly low-key and out of the spotlight the last couple challenges, hinting at a big revival.)

My mom, a hopeless Food Network devotee, is tragically addicted to this show and will not make the switch to Top Chef despite my repeated proddings. This is a really, really bad show. I didn't see the finale. Rory was kind of cute, gums and all, but the rest of it washed right over me. The only thing I can honestly recall from the couple of episodes I squinted at were loads and loads of tears and those Food TV execs getting lots of face time on the judging panel. I might have to witness the end in rerun just to see the postmorem Emeril. What happened to him? Did he OD on the corn syrup used to sweeten his garbage supermarket sauces or inhale too many fumes from the Chinese sweatshops churning out his utterly laughable flimsy plastic signature cookware?

Publishing connections ... now that's what I like to hear. Seriously, they have Easy Rider and basically any other interest out there combined with babes in bikinis, so why not well-cut meats? I am already an editor and writer so it's almost a ready-made deal. Culinary venture capitalists, please send your investment checks immediately. Or food. Or rum.

I have thought on it some more and I think what I want to do is have my neighbor weld a fitting around both the small grill's top vent and the large grill's bottom vent, that will accept the tubing, which can then be cinched with a metal ring clamp. That way I can always remove the connector tube and still retain the original functionality of each grill. I'm going to talk with him tomorrow and hopefully soon I'll have some photos of the results.

Speaking of "beef porn," I always thought someone should do a racy, meat-enthusiast glossy mag, filled with ... um ... juicy? photos entitled ... wait for it ... "Carniwhore."

For three summers now, I've been smoking pork butts on a regular, large Weber grill. I've gotten excellent results, but it's quite tedious because, every time I need to check the fire, add wood chips, etc., I have to remove the butt, then the grate, then replace them before putting the lid back on. Here's my idea for a way around this. I also have a small Weber that sits low to the ground. I want to, using the thicker aluminum (the type you can extend out, but I'll keep it compacted for thickness) dryer vent tubing, connect the top vent of the small grill to the lower vent of the big one. That way the little grill can serve as my offset smoke box. My only quandry is how to affix the tubing in a temporary way so it can be removed between smokings. I'm thinking either some sort of fitting for both ends to which I can (using high-temp glue) affix magnetic stripping; or cut flanges out from the tubing and do the same; or attach fittings to both grills that accept the pipe firmly. Anyone seen this done before or have advice on how to make it work?

Yes, the common orange daylillies are the ones. Around here they grow everywhere. As for the green tomato hornworms, here's a thread I started about the experience a few years back: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...=0entry962965

I grew up picking mulberries, wild raspberries, blackberries and mulberries (climbing the trees to get them and returning home with ink-stained feet that would remain so for weeks) growing up. Nowadays I like to gather daylilly buds and sautee them quickly with a little oil and S&P, sometimes add into a pasta dish. I'm fascinated by foraging, though, and want to learn a lot more about it. If anyone can recommend a great book or other resource for foraging in the Mid-Atlantic, I'd be grateful. All sorts of wild herbs and edibles out there. Recently I learned that the Queen Anne's Lace that growns along all our roadsides is the progenitor of the modern carrot. Its blossoms are also useful as an herb, but it's apparently quite important to identify the plant correctly, for it closely resembles the deadly water hemlock (which also grows in abundance around here). I've heard there are many culinary uses for cattails, but I've never tried them. I wonder if my green tomato hornworm experiment from a few years back is considered foraging? On that note, the marshes around my father's house are loaded with periwinkles, which I hear are cherished in other parts of the world. One time in Ocean City, Md. I used a plastic colander to sieve sand for a few hours until I'd filled it over halfway with coquinas, which I used to make a light and flavorful broth for sipping. Let's keep this thread alive.

Does anyone know if there is a place in the general Maryland/D.C./Northern Virginia region that serves authentic hotpot? My friend living in China raves about hotpot places there, says that on Saturdays they're full of working men drinking vast quantities of beer.

A year later. Willie returned from Guilin again for a visit with two jars of the really strong, salty, good stuff. His girlfriend over there swears the Guilin locally produced variety is the best around, and I wish I could import it here. I eat it with lots of non-asian dishes as well (including breakfast burritos with egg, roasted tomato relish and smoked jack cheese). Again, the brands I've purchased here tend to have an off, chemical taste.

Or when pureeing you could add in some crumbled bacon.

I've been going to O.C. Wasabi (oceanside, 33rd St. Coastal Highway) for about four years now for good sushi. Some of their fish is locally caught daily (including some excellent raw scallops) and the couple who runs it is very friendly. We like Bethany Blues for ribs and such, and there are always more gourmet options in Rehoboth, but ask around. Some of the places change hands frequently and the quality varies. We had one of the best meals I've ever eaten at Celsius one year, then returned two years later for wet, soggy softshell crabs and long-dead, inedible mussels swimming in thick, puckeringly salty sludge. Thrashers is a must. So is a late-night stop for a cheesesteak somewhere.

What kind of pickles are you using? Refrigerator pickles like Clausen, or those scary yellow pickles off the shelf?

Actually, that calzizza looks really, really good to me.

I haven't read through all of this thread yet, but my friend is getting married Saturday and I was wondering if there are any good quick infusions for something I could bring to the wedding and tuck into a freezer for the groomsmen and him to do a shot of late night.

Saw the Season 1 finale for the fourth or so time yesterday, and I must ammend one of my earlier comments to say Tiffany had a very honest and disarming exit interview. I liked it better than the "I'm a winner!" variety because she displayed the bitter taste of coming close to so much money (which she talked about needing) and falling short.

When you say "cork," I think you mean "quirk." But I guess I have seen some weird corks.

See, I found Stephen patently absurd, from his ties to his endless self-promoting superlatives. What was his closing soliloqy, something about "I will probably have a large influence on the industry" or something (side note: why is it no one leaves with a simple "I blew it today; this sucked" and instead we get all these Stuart Smalley affirmations?). But he could, apparently, cook and in retrospect I found him only a fraction as annoying as Ilan, who seems more of a phony with each rerun episode. Because I'm home during the day, I've seen both seasons at least twice now, and the more I watch the softer I grow about Marcel and the more I tend to dislike Ilan's persona on camera. Marcel certainly comes off as a self-centered, anti-social kind of guy, but I get the feeling that if you knew him well, a lot of his banter would go in one ear and out the other. He probably takes his doses of ragging from friends, then backs it up. The problem was, the show seemed to instigate and revel in the frat-mob mentality against him. The people who look the worst aren't him being a young goober, they're the ones who gang up and try to "put him in his place." While the floor chokehold obviously overstepped the boundaries, it's no less embarrassing than the big Frank lug acting like he's 16 and tough about a toothbrush. I'm rambling here. I hope Season 3 is more like Season 1 and less like 2. Two was painful television most of the time. (Oh yeah, I also really detested the "Deadly Sins" episode, but mostly because of the overdone act by the um ... actress ... Debi Mazar. Again, trying to come off as cool like a schoolgirl talking raunchy. She wanted to make sure we the proletariat know she lives the swinging life. We get it. You're rich, you're hollywood. Thanks.)

I recommend resending the letter to the CEO of the company cc'ed to various vice presidents, etc. There are numerous online financial research site (Hoover's was one, but I don't know what their free search offers anymore) that can help you find the proper names and addresses. I haven't written to a food company before, but I was on a tear a few years back with a series of thoughtful, slightly wry letters complaining about subpar products. Usually "rugged" shoes that fell apart in no time, but once I wrote Swiss Army Brands about three watches I'd owned that all broke easily, failing to live up to the company's solid image. In each case, I received a prompt reply and usually an arrangement for a free replacement whatever. In Swiss Army's case (and I had documented each watch's faults), the CEO mailed me two free watches to replace the ones that I lost when their bands snapped, plus an addressed FedEx envelope to send in the one I still had for repairs. I'm not saying they'll mail you some chicken dinners, but with a letter that good, you're likely to get a personal and interesting reply if you send it somewhere other than the auto-response customer service center.

As a native Shoreboy, it is with some irony that I both make a decent crabcake yet personally consider the dish sort of a waste of good crab. I would much rather sit down to a picnic table, armed solely with a a razor-sharp crab or paring knife, and tackle a pile of hot steamed beauties accompanied by pickles, cheese and beer. When I do make them, I like to caramelize some fresh sweet corn in butter, add a little chipotle in adobo and onion or shallot, then mix with lump crab, mayo, mustard, soft breadcrumbs, a dash of worcestershire and Old Bay. No measurements. Form into patties, chill to set and sautee in butter. The best I've had in a restaurant are at the dark and anachronistic Robert Morris Inn in Oxford. I haven't been there in years but their legendary crabcakes back then were the only reason to go. Like oysters and lobster, crabcakes also were once humble food -- certainly not $18 chef's creations. I've talked to people from watermen's families, and many tell a similar story: that fresh fish, crabs and the harvest from a large vegetable garden fed a family in the summer; meanwhile, women would pick surplus crab and make crabcakes to freeze for winter. I don't know if this is the definitive history of the dish, but it's at least one of its simpler origins on the Eastern Shore. (Edited to change "very good" to decent. I reread it this morning and thought, "How smug and unsubstantiated." Just after posting last night my dad called me and offered me a dozen leftover crabs, very light, but I picked them out and made three crabcakes to eat later.)

For those outside the Maryland, Delaware, Virginia region, Royal Farms is a gas station/convenience store much like Wawa, but with more hot food options including some mean fried chicken they prepare all day long. I don't frequent these places often, but on the advice of a friend, I discovered the Royal Farms hot chicken sub yesterday. As the months pass and I start developing a noticeable layer of schmaltz, I may regret this encounter through sobs of salty, molten chicken fat. Basically, they take a large, fried breast, pull off all the meat and -- this is the clincher -- skin, and jam it into a roll to be accompanied by your selected toppings. I chose white American cheese, mayo, lettuce and pickles. It was loaded with still-hot, moist breast meat, but the crispy layers of skin are what made me growl while choking it back in all of 90 seconds. Even the ensuing heartburn was somehow delicious.