little ms foodie

Good morning!! Breakfast today was espresso and items we picked up at le Panier in the market yesterday. Pain au chocolate for Dayne and a croissant for me. I love good croissants! The kind that are crispy crunchy on the outside and make a big mess when you eat them. Plain is good, jam on them is also good! The ones that Costco makes are so fluffy it's a little irritating but I will buy those sometimes and keep them in the freezer. Off to make tea so I can read emails, posts, etc. Susan, I'm glad you are enjoying this! Thank you.

I guess I haven't come clean and confessed my love for dessert wines yet hu? Tonight I had a nice Sauternes that I picked up at the wine shop last night. It was really good!! A bit like apricots. I haven't had this one before, if anyone else has I'd be interested to know more about it. Goodnight! Wendy

Well if you come out in March it will be the 25 for $25 again!!! I appreciate your comments Bloviatrix!!

Champagne trumped??? NEVER! Glad it was good! salty crispy and chilled bubbles.... now thats a meal!!

No, I've never been there. I'm pretty sure it closed a few months ago. But there are so many bars and restaurants in this neighborhood that even if I went to a different one every day (and I don't), I wouldn't hit them all. It sure beats the Upper West Side, where I used to live, although I think the UWS has been gradually improving as a restaurant neighborhood for several years. It would be nice for your brother-in-law to join eGullet and post about more of his favorites on the New York Forum. Is he another foodie? ← Not really, he is more of an eMusicLover!! He actually works as a writer about pop culture, music, etc. Too bad about First. Next time we are in the Village I will certainly inquire of you for some new and happening places!

I have to speak up....I LIKE Godiva. I like the flavors of the creams and the truffles. And I love the chocolate dipped orange peel. THAT is my favorite!!!

Is she totally making me look good or what??? Yeah, yeah Della your $5 is in the mail! How was the rest of that Syrah from lunch yesterday? It's true though that we had a wine rack when we were 24ish(???) the racking system at that time was also alphabetical (I'm a bit of a control freak! ) and then the expensive bottles on the bottom. Those were the bottles my friends would hide from me to freak me out! One of the local wineries even had a case punch card that Della and I tried to fill!!! Espresso card, wine card, hey this is Seattle...it's all good!! Come to think of it, I remember our wine rack was in the dining room, in the SUN! Better than my apartment before where I kept them on top of the kitchen cupboards.......

Thanks Fritz, as you have read I'm sure I love Portland and the area. I'm keeping your wine makers in business for sure!!! Wendy

Hey! How were those bubbles??? Now you know when I'm in Paris and my friends and I drink champagne it is tres chic to eat Pringles with your sparkling. I'm not kidding!!!

Hi Pan! Hey my brother in law lives in the E village. Have you eaten at a restaurant called First? I think that's the name, I ate there last year. YUM! it was great. and they had tons of nice little flavored martinis! Also this last July before taking off to Europe we visited and ate at Via Della Place, we loved that also!! Great neighborhood and restaurants in that area. Wendy

Some groceries from the market The menu for dinner tonight is home made clam chowder, dungeness crab with butter and baguette. No very hard to do and soooo good to eat!!! To start we had some salami from Salumi that I picked up earlier in the week. Bread, mustard and cornichons with kir. Far left is spicy salami, middle is Salumi house (our favorite) and the last is oregeno. Yum! Many thanks to my husband for assembling this!! Once we had a little snack and relaxed a bit we started the chowder. Meez for the soup. The chowder doesn't take long. I had the fish market clean the crab so all I have to do is pop it in some simmering water. I like mine hot. Once that's going we add some milk to the chowder base and a little flour/milk to thicken a bit This is no fancy linen meal! We cover the table with newspaper. Put out crackers, small forks, bread, etc. mmm, dinner!!! we love crab and chowder. You get messy, you eat with your hands, there is lots of butter!!!! how can this NOT be good??? Our wine for the night, a Burgundy style chardonnay from WA. Quite good, has some herb tastes that I like! And candlelight tonight is brought to us by Cal Pep. Oh man this is a great place we had lunch at in Barcelona. No menu, no english, no tapas. We just asked them to bring us what they thought was good. Bottomless glasses of wine wine, fantastic food, great fun! That is a lunch we will never forget!! No dessert or cheese tonight, this is a very rich meal! We are going to veg out in front of the tv and finish the bottle of wine!

It is not just the prices that are good, but the price for the quality of the product. I can get salmon here for those prices, but not that salmon. The same is true for most of the other seafood, but then I don't live on the coast. If I want really good seafood I get it shipped to me and pay accordingly. On the other hand I get great lamb, pork, beefalo and free-range chicken locally. ← I totally understand what you are saying. Is it ok if I insert our family mantra here? FRIENDS DON'T LET FRIENDS EAT FARMED SALMON! Wild, wild, wild!! ask your restaurants and don't order it otherwise. They add COLOR to those farmed fish to make them pink!!

You know, shopping is hard work!!! cocktails for the shoppers!! Gin and tonic for Dayne, Grey Goose martini for me. sunset for two!! How much better would you say our prices are John?? Deborah, they didn't have any chocolate ones with fancy sprinkles. He said the early bird get the chocolate!

Let's go shopping for dinner! Yes!! Local people really do shop at Pike Place Market . When I wasn't working I would actually wait until days when it rained so there wouldn't be as many tourists! haha! I have found that going after 3pm is a good time too. We got there about 3:30pm. There is this great little stand that makes mini donuts that we love. It is so funny! The donuts are hot and in a brown paper bag. We get a half dozen mixed to fuel our shopping! Then we head to DeLaurenti's for some canned items. This is an Italian grocery store that has been in the market forever. They have a fantastic meat and cheese counter. From here it's time to pick out a crab! I normally don't buy from the guys at the very front of the market because they are the one's throwing fish and are more expensive. Today the guy offered me a taste of the crab, said it just came in this morning so I said ok. He twisted a leg off one of then and just slammed it on the counter against his fist. It cracked perfectly in half and he held the nice 'forearm' part out to me. It was soooo sweet!! This is the one we picked, it's about 2 pounds. More of the fresh seafood in the market today Off to get some herbs and produce A stop into Le Panier, a great French bakery for some bread and breakfast goodies. Then the market creamery for butter and quail eggs, the eggs aren't for tonight. We are going to play with them this weekend, Susan and Russ along with Mr. Bourdain inspired me! Ok, done with the shopping.......

Hi Foodie-Girl!!! I'm kindof a fanatic about menu planning and shopping lists. Otherwise I have a tendancy to just buy, buy, buy! We normally do all of our shopping on Saturdays. First we go to our local farmer's market and then we go to the WholePaycheck. We create menus from Sat-Fri excluding days we have plans to eat out. Originally I had plans for tonight but I decided to cancel them so we could do a bit more cooking. We will make our menu items in order of perishability of ingrediants. BTW folks, I just have to say a big thank you to everyone not only for all the nice comments but for NOT commenting on my spelling!!! eG really needs spellcheck!

But I don't work on the AVE!! Dinner is a surprise!!!! shopping for it will start in 1 hour 10 mins. It's a truely Northwest Meal. hmmm, I don't remember saying that we had LEARNED anything about wine, just that we drink a lot of it! haha! Really what we know comes from going and talking to these wineries. I have been visiting wineries since I was about 23. buying cases of wines with friends and trying to remember things about grapes, regions, methods, etc. I know nothing about many wines and just this week learned a bit about this Pouilly Fuisse I've been enjoying. I look up things on the web and read a bit in Food and Wine. I, like many Americans I assume, have a hard time learning the grape variatels that we call our wines by in the states and the appelations and regions that wine is named for elsewhere. I am constantly trying though!

that is a great illustration!! Thanks for posting it eunny, I'm going to print it off and stick it in my kitchen. I am bad at carving chickens too, both butchering them as well as cooked carving. With cooked birds I like to just cut out the backbone and the 1/4 them. Each guest gets a 1/4. Perfect and very non messy!!

Med Mix next to J&M, supposedly the best falafal in town.

ok, before viewing the next pictures all of you must take this online oath: Under no circumstances will you reveal that you saw pictures of the sun shining in Seattle. As the entire world knows it ALWAYS rains in Seattle! We like the world thinking that!! As I mentioned before I work in an area called Pioneer Square. It is the oldest area of Seattle. The streets are lined with storefronts in old buildings. There are a ton of bars, shops, restaurants, etc. Whenever it's nice out I like to walk down the street and get lunch. Today I was in the mood for gyros!! Yum, I love them. And a bottle of water. I always drink water. there are 2 bottles of water on my desk and one in my gym bag (which is probably getting dusty this week! ) The gyros is lamb. The place I get them from says they were voted Seattle's best, I don't think it's the BEST but it is good! It's half gone. I usually eat at my desk while surfing the net. Since I can't type and eat at the same time.....back to my gyros!

I like those tags, too. I tend to go through them rather quickly. I also want to know as much about the grape varietal as possible, so I came up with a table that I created in Word. The figure below is one I use for Cabernet Franc. I make five folds in it and tape it to the tab. First column contains: Winery, Vintage, Applelation, Grape Varietal, and the year I want to consume it. Second column contains: Typical aromas and flavors I can expect from this varietal as well as what to expect as the wine ages (bottle age). Third column contains: Mouth feel, Characteristics, Style, and any interesting tidbits. Fourth column contains: Primary match or main ingredient to serve with this wine and if there's room in this column, the Accompanying components or supporting ingredients to go with the Primary match. Fifth column contains: Typical match, which is the dish that works best with this type of wine. Also known as includes names of the same varietal from other regions, and It's all about explains what this varietal is all about in 25 letters or less. The last column is the same for all my varietals: What makes wine taste milder, which is good to know when you open a bottle and find that it isn't meeting your expecations. And What makes wine taste stronger, for when you have a great bottle and want to get the most out of it. ← You win!!! That is really cool! btw Really Nice! I hope you realize that when we have dinner next Monday your food will be photographed! Didn't know what you were in for did you?? Wendy

Ooh, this is such a smart idea. I have never been able to figure out a convenient manner for keeping track of the wines we've purchased and drunk. I am going to try this method. Mulcahy, I use these tags which are reusable and come with a dry erase pen. The reason I find it helpful to tag our wine is some of it really needs to sit a few years, I can write the optimal drinking time on the tag and then I don't have to remember. The other thing is the we buy wine in a wide variety of prices. I hate it when we have had a few bottles at a dinner party and then go to open another, everyone is already a little tipsy and ooops! we open a $60 bottle because I can't remember the price of one vs. another. Do you know what I mean? We certainly can't afford to drink our most expensive wines with grilled cheese! I like to know when I'm opening a special bottle and give some info on it to the drinkers. All in all I have a very bad memory, this helps me out!!!

I agree that there are times when I am surprised that I will like a certain 'stinky' cheese and the next time I try the same one I get that ammonia taste. Obviously it is a storage and aging situation a lot of the time. No need to blame the poor wonderful cheeses!!! Wendy

hmmm, double post....operator error?? taking care of it now!

Hi John! We buy a lot of wine from local wineshops and also at Whole Paycheck and even the QFC sometimes. In fact I like to make Kir with a Savoie white wine and Whole Paycheck is the only one that carries it. We buy it by the case and get a 10% discount. One can not drink by OR and WA wine alone! We love gettting wines from the wineries though because we like getting to know about the winery, the winemaker, the growers, etc. We feel better about spending $25-$60 on a bottle of wine when we know the passion these people have. And of course it never hurts to give us tastes! I do feel very lucky to live in a city which really prides itself on using local sources. Dayne and I will be going shopping for dinner tonight later today and will show off one of the better known markets in Seattle.

This is where I keep most of the glassware and serveware. The built-in in the dining room is one of my favorite parts of the house. The wedding china is on top, we don't have everything in the set yet but are close. I like having a space for all the cookbooks, although it won't be big enough in a year or two! There are closed cupboards on each side, one is our liquor cabinet and barware. The one on the other side holds candle holders and extra smaller serving dishes. The glassware The bottom shelf holds our Riedel glasses, they are the Vinum Extreme. We love them but they are huge! They take a lot of room and bottles of wine seem to empty faster when using them. Our champagne glasses and cognac glasses are also Riedel but not the same line. I think I am addicted to glassware and serving stuff! It's so pretty and it's fun to use. I just wish we had more room for it all!! the other thing I really like about this cabinet is that there are plate rims at the back so you can stand plates up and they won't slip out.