Kim WB

done. Cool. A craft project!

A reminder about BYO: This is a BYO event. Bring the beverage of your choice for your consumption...and perhaps a bit extra for others to sample if you choose. If you have signed up to contribute a beverage for the potluck, however, please bring enough for the group. Also, just a reminder to bring non-alcoholic beverages for the hour or so before the drive home There are a few folks bringing bottled water, and I think that if anyone wants to add to their contribution, a case or 12 pack of iced tea or water or soda "for the road" might be appreciated. If you could being it cold and iced, that would be helpful. There are 52 confirmed as of 11am Tuesday. Pleae confirm via PM to Kim WB if you have not done so already...number of guests, and confriming your dish. Jon/Mark/ Parking A team: I have real estate signs already on ground sticks...I can cover them with white paper, and then you can bring a marker to add info and arrows. Let me know. Suzi, sorry you can't make it but I know you enjoy your bird..er....HAWK watching. Edit: Tommy's declined to be hoodwinked into helping people park. Rachel

Hi Michael... I saw clear-ish tinted ones at Linens and Things at the middle of August, and saw these pretty red ones this past week at Bed Bath and Beyond. The tube pan retails at $21.99, I also got the loaf pan for $16.99. Further observation, the scallops on the tube pan had cake all stuck up in them, and whilethe center was undercooked, the outer rim was TOO golden brown. I'll give them another shot, maybe more if I hear good suggestions here, but otherwise I'm back to my Calphalon baking pans. *edited to add that I am actually a COOKIE baker, but not a cake/pie /bread baker...just to clarify my origiginal post.

Hello all, please indulge a novice baker. Today is my 40th b-day ( having a big bashe in two weeks!) and last week, in preperation for making my b-day cake, I treated myself to a silicone baking dish..scalloped tube pan, red kitchenaid, to be exact. I am not a baker..to the point where I need to remove my pasta or grinder attachments to the stand mixer in order to dig up the pastry whisk thing. I do Christmas cookies, an occassional tart shell for savories, and a cake or two each year. One of my standards is a lemon pound cake with lemon glaze..can't get much simplier than that...anyway, I made it today...yikes! 1. Cooked it 10 minutes longer than in my regular tube pan...undercooked in the middle. 2. Nothing sticks? This cake stuck and ripped of the entire bottome...was that due to undercooking or what? I let the cake cool in the pan. 3. Cakes, to me, need form. there is just no form to these pans. I'm ready to say I'm unimpressed, but I know my lack of baking skills might contribute...comments?longer?

If you were to freeze beef, what would be the optimal way to defrost it to minimize t he inevitable loss of juices? Micro? in the fridge..on the counter?

In light of Mark's weather report, what's our tent count? I have two I can bring.

Hello. I am officialy in charge of confirming attendees, and coming up with a final count. Please PM to confirm your attendance, # of guests, and that you are bringing the dish you specified. At the end of the week, anyone who has not PM'd me will be contacted via e-mail or PM...so confirming to me now in a PM will save me some work down the road. I am taking this job seriously. I am not even smiling as I type this. Not even a little grin. Really Please. Make my life just a smidgen easier, PM me today with your info!

In reading your background, I'm sure that you have had the opportunity to meet some wonderful chefs...many who were cooking and creating before the "star chef" culture we have now...do you have any memorable anectodes, or is there a chef who you feel elevated Soul cuisine...is there anyone you admired and never had the opportunity to meet?

I'm back on the wasabi peas kick. I'm having a diet coke, and am waiting to determine if I need to drive my 13 year old anywhere tonight..if he can get a ride both ways to the roller rink, I'm going to switch to a Corona.

Except that good Peking duck doesn't include any of the things you mention. The duck is not fried, it is roasted, and you should have primarily if not exclusively the crispy skin. There is no "plum" sauce, it should be served with hoisin sauce, which includes no plums. And it should be augmented with threads of pungent green onion, not bland cucumber. I think that many Chinese restaurants that are "less than authentic", shall we say, serve Crispy Aromatic Duck, which has the fried skin and traditionally served with Plum Sauce, even though they market it as Peking Duck. You are correct, Peking Duck is roasted. However, since both dishes are served similiarly, in that they come with panckakes, thin sliced greens, and meat and skin seperated, some restaurants assume no one will tell the difference. Therefore a consumer might have eaten Aromatic Duck instead of Peking Duck, but thought it was the Peking.

honey, nothing is as much fun as when you were 21! It's a long ranch style bar, I know what you mean..it changes from an Italian to an Irish name every few years...the catch is..those few hundred yards of road are PPB income producing ticket heavens! Drive carefully if you do go there! I think its Irish now, McCann's or some such...have your last call athe B'way Bar andGrill...they have a packaged goods store to get you through the night!

A block in from the inlet, in PPB, is Broadway Bar and grill. Great chicken wings, assorted fried-type slightly -soused NJ bar food...but head and shoulders above the rest..except. perhaps, that I was slighltly soused at the time. No. really. a good way to call it a night. Known for pushing the last call , too. ps last time I was in Seaside, I had a few !!?? beers and traded some drunk guy a million tickets for $20 bucks. All three kids came home with a mini bicycle, which was the prize du jour that year. They were working on their "beach money" to win enough tickets, and admirably set out to plan that they would pool their money and get a bike for all of them..even the little one who could harldy roll the skee ball into the 30 pointer..so that bar negotiation went a long way to helping their cause...ain't nothing like the NJ boardwalk, and though my children might travel far, I am convinced that these years rolling wooden balls and eating superior ( Marrazzo's) pizza will make thenm finer human beings...look what it did to me and Tommy! ( porkroll at Stubby's in PPleasant every morning, goes without saying!)

Wegman's has total, in the natural food section, delivered on Fridays. I'm in Princeton...the Pathmark on Route One in West Windsor is going to be a whole foods...where are you located?

I exercised like a madwoman this week, and have eaten rather low cal all week..tonight, hunger set in. I satiated myself with a marinated London Broil ( flank steak) on the grill, baked pot with full fat sour cream, and a big ass ceasar salad with anchovies! We're on our second bottle of Jordan 99, and I've moved onto wasabi peas, my new "almost healthy" snack. I went to Sam's Club today to stock up for the kids lunches, so wasabi peas ARE the low cal alternative when one considers all the individually wrapped oreos and cereal bars and go-go yogurts and such that I'm currently stocked with!

enjoying the blog..have you ever put the grapes in the freezer for 45 min or so, to give them some crunch?

I have restaurnat mats in the cooking area of my kitchen...the black ones with the holes in them. You just lift them up and sweep under them every other day, and hose them down every month.I hose them down in the summer, stick them in the shower in the winter. Plus, they make a big difference when you are standing in front of the stovetop or sink or prepping..really comfortable. This works asthetically ( I know I did not spell that right) because I have a white/black/stainless kitchen with a battleship grey floor.

And regarding dumplings, there are what I call the "soupy " ones, and the "meatier" ones...are there more precise descriptive names for these? Also, are the same wheat based wrappers used?

This, indeed, is what I aspire to. I seems I am always hungry, and so the simply THINKING about does not suffice.

David just left the NY Rest Group in June...and considered a few options before choosing this one. The construction is underway, and I think David is going to be very happy to be back in the front of the stove. In addition to his Executive Chef position with NYRG, he's been involved during the last few years in product development, which did keep his "creative" side fairly busy, but there's just no replacement for being in the kitchen. I also know that he had gotten quite a bit of support for his decision to leave NYRG...while the well known chefs are indeed competitive, there is also a support network there...especially the "old guys" that were all cooks and sous together during 1985-1990. AS I type, he's in Greece with our almost-16 year old son.

On Friday, I had to drive my son Connor from the beach in Avalon, which is 20 miles north of Cape May to Fort Lee, just a bridge south of the NY border. He was off to JFK and 12 days in Croatia, Greece and Italy. So food and wine were on my mind..except when I was stuck on the turnpike in a jam, due to the closed Western extension...ANYWAY....each exit, each town name..little e-gullet bells were ringing, restaurants and shops that were noted on e-gullet, and over my years of reading posts, without realizing it..I've absored a LOT of jersey knowledge. Palisades Park..I'm thinking Korean. Edison..I'm wondering if the new WEgman's opened..Parkway entrance, thinking RN and the Orchard place Helena S. goes to...Cherry Hill, thinking about Katie's Loeb's sushi place...passing Hammonton, thinking blueberries..all in all, the trip north was filled with lectures to my son on how to NOT be an obnoxious american..but the ride home was amazingly food and e-gullet oriented. And this was, to note, BEFORE the strip club thread...which would have changed the long drive, I'm sure! Does anyone find themselves using "e-gullet geography"?

oh, not a connesuer, at all...but Rita's Green Apple is really good...um...did I just do an e-gullet blunder? Is Rita's the Domino's pizza of Water Ices?

Lays has a guacamole flavored chip that I have only seen down at the beach in NJ, not in central NJ where I live. Strong Cilantro flavor. I like them, but no one else in my family does, and I can't afford the calories to keep them around and eat them all!

You'll soon realize that the NJ Board looks at anything south of New Brunswick as suspicious! Even thought Trenton is the middle of the state, they consider it south Jersey. I'm at the beach in August, Avalon, otherwise I'd love to meet you all. Have a great time.

Ah, I'm at the beach house with NO computer access...the newly installed cable DOES NOT WORK!!! I just came back to Princeton to check on things, am missing the culinary classes and all the updates on the Pig..I could just cry! Yes, I'll adjust water accordingly. Jugs are most certainly coming with me. Warning, these jugs might hold a lot, but for they record, they don't stand up by themselves anymore. They'll need support.

Funny, these two dishes are part of ewaht defines a diner to me...The short list of foods I'd order at a diner include:breakfasts, BLT's, Souvlakis or gyros.