SeaGal

My categories: Smash patty: 1/4 lb patty, American cheese, mayo, ketchup, lots of dill pickle chips, sliced bermuda onion, sliced tomato, iceberg lettuce, sesame seed bun. Gourmet Burger: 1/3-1/2 lb fresh ground beef patty, cooked medium rare: mayo, crispy bacon, blue cheese, red onion, sliced tomato, dill pickle slices, butter lettuce, brioche-type bun.

So does Original Pancake House.

I would think you could use it in many dishes that call for sauteed bacon or pancetta as a seasoning ingredient. I used it in a spring pea and lettuce soup I made and it was delicious. ← I'd be delighted if you'd supply an additional detail or two... ← It's a somewhat fussy and lengthy (but very tasty) recipe, which I'd be happy to PM you if you want it, but basically it consists of rendering the guanciale, using some of the fat to saute the mirepoix, and then simmering the strips of meat along with the peas, lettuce and other veg. I then removed the guanciale before pureeing the soup and adding cream and garnishes.

I would think you could use it in many dishes that call for sauteed bacon or pancetta as a seasoning ingredient. I used it in a spring pea and lettuce soup I made and it was delicious.

The other two chips are a Korean purple sweet potato and a yellow yam (that's what it was labeled at the Asian market I got them from anyway), which on further research may have been either a Japanese sweet potato (kotobuki) or a Jersey sweet potato.

While Abra wasn't too happy with the bread/jackfruit soup, many of us at the table loved it. It was served cold and was highly seasoned and oddly enough, provided a great counterpoint to the warm ginger and lemongrass soup--which was so good! The fritters reminded me of a spicy, tropical corn fritter and the red pepper jam was a perfect foil for them. The only problem for me, was that I got there later and so didn't get to try them warm. I'll bet they'd be even better hot out of the fryer.

Wendy, that watermelon gazpacho is gorgeous! Tiki glasses!

So much beautiful food! Ann_T: That prime rib looks so good, both before and after cooking. Nishla: Wow, squid 3-ways. The risotto may look scary, but I be it was good. The fried version looks delicious. The banana cake is beautiful. Catching up with several days of meals: One night last week (must have been a sunny day): Dungeness Crab and bay shrimp salad w/ dill, on a bed of red butter lettuce, cucumber and avocado. Lazy Friday supper: Antipasto--nothing fancy here, but some damn good Italian cheese from DeLaurenti's which name I can't remember since I threw the wrapping away . This was nibbled with wine while preparing: Pasta with green garlic and pancetta sprinkled with peccorino romano. My first experience with green garlic and it won't be my last. Saturday was Nigella night--recipes I've been meaning to try after watching one of her shows: Pork chops pounded viciously, dipped in dijon egg wash, dredged in pita bread crumbs and fried in a mixture of duck fat and veg oil. These chops were good sized to start with, but they were huge after the pounding. I had to use a frying pan for each as they wouldn't fit in the pan. And plated with Garlicky Spinach and Tomato Salad (to which I added some arugula). This was a pretty tasty combination and I'd probably try it again, although it was very messy what with the crumbs and frying oil etc. Nigella's rhubarb crumble awaiting the ice cream. Plated w/ ice cream And finally, Sunday night. Our very own rockdoggydog had a plethora of ramps and so I was the lucky recipient of a good sized bag of them. Having never cooked with them before, I decided to do a classic preparation so I sauteed some potatoes in pancetta and duck fat with the ramp heads, then added the ramp greens near the end. So good! Sauteed potatoes w/ ramps and pancetta, sauteed halibut, salad of fennel, cucumber, tomato w/ lemon dressing.

I hate it when that happens! However, it's comforting to know I'm not the only one whose meals don't always come out quite as well as I expect them to. (The zucchini looks really tasty).

I love reading this thread and I love Vietnamese food, so thought I'd post this here as well as over on the dinner thread. I added an additional picture of the raw materials: Pho ga or chicken pho. I made the broth last winter and froze it for convenience. While I love beef pho, we usually go out to get that, but I love pho ga when I'm under the weather or just craving comfort food. Ingredients, minus the yellow onion. Condiments, the best part! Pho ga Digging in! This thread is a real inspiration!

C. Sapidus: Those bahn mi look so good. I keep meaning to make them, maybe this was the inspiration I needed. What kind of roll did you use? Chufi: Your braised shallots are beautiful. Marlene: The biscuits are so flakey! We had a beautiful, warm spring day here in Seattle, so out comes the little Smokey Joe Weber. Grilled "Smart" chicken thighs (marinated in lemon, olive oil, sumac, garlic, coriander and cumin) with roasted red potatoes and salad of frisee, butter lettuce, arugula, fennel, parm and pine nuts w/ lemon vinaigrette. Inexpensive, but tasty white burgundy.

Beautiful chicken, David! Here's yesterday's dinner. A celebration for husband and I finally recovering and being able to eat "real" food again. Vietnamese-style pho ga or chicken pho. I made the broth last winter and froze it for convenience. While I love beef pho, we usually go out to get that, but I love pho ga when I'm under the weather. Condiments, the best part! Pho ga Digging in!

I love this cookbook and have cooked many times from it. Now I understand the toasted flour! Her pilaf recipes are all so good, but I've never tried the one with potatoes. Can't wait to see how it all turns out.

What a fascinating blog! I've really enjoyed reading through and catching up. Unfortunately I missed out on the potluck at Abra's when you were here last year, but I always enjoy reading your blogs and posts on the Dinner thread. It's very inspiring that you've chosen to make so many things you've never tried before. Those sweetbreads, which I love but have never made, looked awesome! And the gnocchi look beautiful...and delicious. As far as what you're prepping for dinner, it looks like there's saffron in your poaching broth, which leads me to think Middle Eastern, Moroccan or Spanish. (really narrowed down, huh?) But the toasted flour is throwing me off. Some sort of dry roux? There's a Filipino desert called polovoron that calls for toasted flour. I'm stumped.

Bruce: Tinga Poblana Porn! I made this recently and it’s a keeper for us too. Wendy: That strawberry dessert pic deserves some kind of an award. The whole dinner looks just lovely. And Dayne’s biscuits rock! (that sounds bad doesn’t it?) Shaya: Beautiful burger and fries. Ann T: Your chicken pot pie looks so tasty. Is that puff pastry? Also, would you tell what was in the black olive and tomato relish (in addition to the obvious, of course) on the halibut? Hiroyuki: Lovely meal and presentation--esp love the sheen on the fried herring. Prawncrakers: What a spread! Potatoes w/ sausage and cheese, yum! Mr. SeaGal and I had the joy of a shared stomach bug this week, so all our meals have been themes and variations on the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce and toast) along with some homemade chicken stock for “variety”. Finally, in desperation, I decided to risk branching out and made a simple leek and potato soup (minus the cream and pepper). It tasted like ambrosia after all the deprivation, but looked like pale yellow baby food, so no pictures!! I’ve been living vicariously looking at all your beautiful meals! *edited to correct silly errors!

rooftop1000: that lamb looks delicious! Shaya: I want those profiteroles. Octaveman: I had a ginormous artichoke tonight too--buy my cat doesn't have Rocky's eyes and was totally disinterested..... Kim: Thanks for the welcome--glad I'm not the only one late to the party. Ummm, triffle. Rocky: Wow, it's a mathematic equation: pork x pork x pork = pork cubed!! Chufi: Is that shrimp chips garnishing your indonesian salad? Here's a dinner from Friday--comfort food!: Antipasto salad: Buccatini al'amaticiana *edited for spelling

So, after a couple of years of lurking on this thread and drooling at all the gorgeous pictures, I'm going to make my virgin attempt at posting a picture of my dinner.....please be gentle. Here's dinner from a couple of nights ago. Duck fat rubbed, roasted cornish game hens with pan sauce, rice pilaf and lemon butter green beans. White burgundy.

I like to sprinkle it on pork chops, lamb and fish before grilling or broiling. I make oven fries with olive oil, garlic, S & P and sumac sprinkled on before roasting in a hot oven. It's also good on salads that have tomatoes, parsley and/or feta cheese in them.

I have a large tub of duck fat left over from confit I made last November. Inspired by this thread, I rubbed a couple of supermarket Cornish hens with it before roasting at 450 degrees. Wow! They were great! I'll try this again next time I roast a chicken.

I was also there with Wendy for lunch and, as she said, it was not good. It reminded me of what a school lunchroom or hospital cafeteria would come up with if they tried to do Asian/Latin/Caribbean fusion. Yuck! I had the Caribbean bento which came with the bay shrimp ceviche mentioned by LMF. It was a slightly bitter, gooey, bland concoction stuffed into an orange shell and looked and tasted like it had been sitting around for quite a while. The "jerK" chicken had no noticable spice at all--not even salt . The ceasar salad was over-dressed and ok, except it was wilted as if it had been dressed earlier in the day. The curry chicken was edible, but overly salty (I love salt) and tasted kind of like you'd expect a spice-packet curry to taste. There were also 3 tostones that might have been good if they'd been warm, but they were kind of chewy. The best bite I had was a taste of LMF's churrasco steak from the Latin bento which came with a nice onion relish. I was surprised that it was so bad as I'd read that it was pretty good and Nancy Leson gave it a pretty good review. Looking back at her review, I did order the one thing she suggested avoiding, but I wasn't wowed by any of the other food I tasted either.

Zeppole is correct and they are truly delicious at Tavolata. Sandy, thanks for the great report and pictures. It was a real pleasure meeting you and sharing some of our NW food and drink with you. (We also drank a Sancerre with the first courses, no recollection of year or appelation.)

I cool my stock fairly quickly by filling the sink with water and ice and then putting frozen blue ice packs in it (I always keep several of them frozen in my freezer). Then, I place the stock pot (unless I'm using my monster stock pot in which case I'll tranfer it to 2 smaller containers) right into the sink and rotate either the pot or the ice packs surrounding it from time to time. It usually cools to room temperature in about 1/2 hour or so and then I put it into smaller containers and refrigerate it. After it's completely cooled, I then freeze whatever stock I won't be using up within a couple of days.

Huh, so I guess there really is a reason to go to the soulless suburban wasteland that is the U Village. ← Oddly enough, the U Village QFC's butcher counter is pretty darn good. I also buy the kurobota pork chops from QFC...in fact, that's the only pork chops I buy any more. Sometimes I brine them, sometimes not, but I cook them like Rocky does. They're expensive, but totally worth it. They do turn out a little less done near the bone, but I don't mind that. I do believe that if you buy bone in pork chops, picking up the bone and gnawing on it is a requirement....

Mmmmm, carnitas! (_8^(1),,,, *edited to add drooling symbols

My parents used to make sauerkraut and indeed it was just brined, cured cabbage, lovely to eat "raw", but often cooked with weiners or pork chops. Some of the jarred, cold packed varieties sold in stores may be raw, such as Bubbies and Claussen. Claussen's website says all their pickles are packed raw, which is why they're stored in the cold case. Both of these taste more like fresh sauerkraut to me. The stuff in cans is definitely not raw, as canned goods are heated in the canning process.