NulloModo

Wow, it sounds absolutely wonderful. After hearing you mention this book from time to time I have to say that out of every book I have heard talk of on eGullet, this is the one I most want to read You should approach your mother for permission to scan the pages and upload them for ummm posterity and all..... ;)

So what then are the feelings on seafood enchiladas? Is it heresy to fill them with shrimp/lobster/fish whatever, and use a lighter cream based sauce over top?

Moussaka

Also collard/mustard greens are great even solo. Stew them over low heat for hours with some ham hock and chopped up bacon tossed into the pot... and serve them in a big bowl with vinegar and fresh chopped onion drizzled overtop. Everything that goes in is cheap, and while it takes a while, it can do it almost all unattended.

Carby foods (rice, wheat, oats, potatoes, corn, beans, fruit, etc.) have basically supported most of human civilization for the last 10,000 years or so. For most of that time, most people were not overweight. Carbs are not the problem. Not to take this thread off-topic, the problem isn't neccessarily the starches that we eat, but the sugars. True sugars have always been a part of our diets over the years, but in recent (last 20/30 years or so) history sugar consumption has positively skyrocketed in western cultures. Refined sugar is found in tons of products, is super easy to come by and cheap, is found in kids juice drinks, in every snack food, in almost every low fat product, etc. Add to the fact how much soda many people drink and you can see how we just let way too much sugar into our diets. Also it doesn't help that many of the carbs that used to be wholesome (made fresh from wheat, potatoes, etc in the form of breads and pastas) are now most commonly consumed coated in trans-fats, sugars, and tons of oil in the form of chips and crackers or coated in grease and sugar in the form of snack cakes, etc. Now, to keep this on track: With regard to curry and stir-fry I sometimes use real recipes, but often I will just take a meat that I have on hand (I happened to have thin sliced pork chops the other night, so they got cut into thin strips for stir-fry), some veggies I have (I had some bok-choy, shitaki mushrooms, serrano chiles, and shallots), and some spices (I had five spice, bird chiles, garlic, and well, tons of other stuff, but I kept it pretty simple here), so I just heated up some sesame oil till very hot, tossed it all together, stirred till it looked done, and enjoyed. Curries can work the same way, take some meat, brown it, add your spices/veggies/cream/etc and stir till mixed then just let it simmer until the flavors blend. If you are trying to avoid carby rice you can make a very passable alternative by grating cauliflower and seasoning basmati style after cooking it and draining it.

Quick curries, stews, and stir frys are great. Very tasty, can take advantage of any produce and or meats you happen to have laying around, only dirty one pot, cook mostly unattended or very quickly, and let you experience the flavors and interactions of a bunch of different spices.

What made it Moroccan? Spices? Cooking Technique? I'd say the spices. The eggplant salad recipe is simply known as 'Morrocan Eggplant Salad'. I had it at a middle eastern restaurant that afternoon and liked it so much that I tried to recreate it that evening. If you do a google search for moroccan eggplant salad, you will get bunches of hits. The beef roast was an on the fly endeavor, based on some spices I saw intended for a moroccan chicken dish. I took chopped shallots, cilantro, garlic, lemon juice, cumin, soy sauce, rice vinegar, turmeric, some chiles, and some other assorted things (can't remember it all off the top of my head) stuck it in a dish and braised it while I let the eggplant salad (basically eggplant, paprika, cumin, and tomato with some other spices) stew down into the delicious soft mass it eventually became.

How often does and adult go out and willingly buy, cook and eat food they know they don’t like? They don’t. If you cooked dinner for your father and you knew he didn’t like what you cooked, would you tell him to eat what he is being served or go hungry? No. Most of the time children are at the mercy of adults when it comes to food. Kids are people too and I think their individual tastes should be taken into consideration when meals are planned - It’s the considerate, loving and respectful thing to do. Forcing a kid to eat something he/she doesn’t like only does one thing – makes them afraid to try anything new for fear of being forced to eat it if they don’t like it. This is completely counterproductive. I don’t make pb&j or any other thing when I make something for dinner that one of my kids doesn’t like, (and I have four of them and they are all different) but I would rather take a little extra time in my planning and preparation to make sure there is a little extra of something I know they DO like as part of a meal that I know they don’t care for. And the nice thing is I will usually get a secret “thanks Mom” from the one who knows he was covered. I also ask my kids often - what they want to eat, what they want to try, what sounds good, lets try something new. It’s amazing what kids will eat when they have a say in the matter, (and I am not talking about crap, they know McDonalds is not an option). My children are not spoiled, but they know I care about their opinion and I care what they eat, and I know that they appreciate that. Geez, I love my kids. I think I'll go make all their favorite dinners! (Because I know what they all are.) We are talking about different things here. If a kid has tried a certain thing multiple times and really really hates it, of course you shouldn't make a point to cook it all the time and include that ingredient in every dish of the meal, that would be mean. But at the same time, even though kids are people, they don't really know what they like and dislike yet. They have strong opinions, but no foundation for them. There is a difference between leaving mushrooms out of a particular dish from time to time because you have a dinner guest who prefers the dish without them, and having a kid who won't take a bite of something because he sees a mushroom, and although he has never tried one, won't eat it because he thinks it is icky. So you keep serving those dishes with mushrooms up for the kid until one day finally he tries one, and at least at that point he can start to form an opinion about whether or not he likes mushrooms. In no way do I expect everyone to like everything, after all, there are some things that I don't particularly care for out there, but I also remember that when I was younger I had some random and illogical aversions to certain foods (okra I remember being a big one) and if my parents hadn't constantly pushed me to try them I might have never actually discovered that they taste good.

Moroccan braised beef roast Moroccan hot eggplant salad

Sunday's haul: Big bag of Vidalia onions Big bag of Shallots (yay, only .99 a lb) Serrano Chiles Jalapeno Chiles Red and Green Italian Frying Peppers Cilantro Eggplant Fresh Garlic Bok Choy Fresh Tomatos

Not a big fan of peanut butter in general, although I don't dislike it either, I am simply not drawn to it. I used to really enjoy a brand called 'Bama' when I was visiting my grandmother when I was a child. Nowadays I much prefer the flavor of tahini or soy nut butter to peanut butter.

They should taste like asparagus? Mine tasted like... .well, they didn't really taste like anything, but they smelled nice. The complete lack of flavor combined with high price was going to have me simply write them off, but it seems as if they really should be enjoyable... maybe I will have another go.

Well, of course I am not talking about shoving beets into the mouth of a child screaming in protest. It has to be to a degree all about how it is approached. Children come into the world as a relatively blank slate, they do not yet have prejudices, they have to learn these. If they are exposed to new foods often, and shown these foods in ways that treat them as every day ordinairy fare, and not as something that they should be wary about, or that they would even think about saying 'no, this is too weird' too, then they should have no reason to avoid them when they show up at the table, correct? If a child is never served blue box macaroni in cheese or McDonald's happy meals, then that child will never turn to these foods as a safety net. I work as a teacher, and two of the classes I teach are appreciation of the performing arts. Most 12 year olds come into my classes with the attitude that they will not like ballet, opera, orchestral music, or many of the other things we study no matter what I do. Still, I must expose them to it, and although many continue to shrug it off, some are swayed and really start to enjoy it, and of course some enjoy it from the beginning. If I were to bend to their wills and teach G-Unit instead of Tchaikovsky I would be reinforcing their prejudice against ballet, the symphony, and opera. With children in food I imagine it has to work the same way, my children will be exposed to the arts in all forms, to all forms of food, to different cultural experiences, and to objective discussions of philosophy, politics, and religion (as well as whatever else comes along) from a very young age. If a child is brought up in an environment steeped in culture and a wide variety of experiences then that is what will become normal for him, and he will not run the risk of becoming a carbon copy bland and boring uncultured uncouth uneducated specimen just like at least 90% of the kids that I see today. In no way do I advocate abuse, I simply see that children learn an awful lot from their parents and the environment in which they are raised. The parents must be consistently enthusiastic about education and exploration of new experiences such that the children become this way as well.

That is an interesting point you brought up, and I think I should comment on it. I realize that my comment may have come off as insensitive, which is not the way I intended it to be. I realize that in certain cultures animals are treated as higher beings than in a traditional western home. If I had dinner guests who practiced the Hindu religion I certainly wouldn't serve them beef and tell them to deal with it. However, when it comes to my children, they will be raised accordingly to western cultural beliefs, because that is where we will be. If we lived in India or Thailand it may be different, but I don't see that happening. I will of course teach them that it is important to respect the beliefs of others, even if they happen to be different than our own, but while they are under the age of 18 and living in my home, they will not be given the option of adopting those beliefs themselves. My parents were fairly draconian in my upbringing, and although I resented it at the time, I realize now how important it was in shaping me into who I am, and into preparing me for the world to be a successful person.

That is interesting, and I see where it is coming from to a degree, but I can't say that I agree with it. When I have children they will most certainly be exposed to a wide variety of foods. I will not be one of these parents who will cook macaroni and cheese endlessly if they do not like what is for dinner. They will either eat what is being served, or they will go hungry. I am assuming the eating of what is served will eventually win over. I am simply disturbed by the fact that many children today feel they have more rights than they actually do. Obedience to one's parents seems to be becoming lost, and children feel that they can say 'I'm not going to do that because I don't want to' without repercussion. With regards to vegetarianism, I have to completely disagree with the author's comments. I could most definately argue with a child who feels it is cruel to eat animals. Human beings were put on this eart omnivorous, we are designed and built to subsist on the flesh of plant and animal alike. Any child of mine who gets it into his head that animals have souls or rights will have that idea quickly squashed out.

Soup is a big gray area that is true... I would definately call Pho and Wonton Soup soups. Why? Anything that is served in a bowl with a very runny broth is a soup. I would say that chowders are therefore a subset of soup, as are noodle soups, wonton soups, and most definately Bouillabaise. A close relative to soups I would say are Stews, with the only big difference being viscocity, a stew you could serve on a plate if you really wanted to, a soup has to be served in a bowl.

That is an interesting set of restrictions. I have heard tale of low-carb diets helping couples conceive who had previously been unable to do so, but it seems a bit odd that this diet bans some simple carbs (pasta and bread) but allows others (rice and potatoes) nutritionally speaking, aren't they about the same? You could search out a lot of low-carb recipe websites, as they go along well with many of your needs, you simply have to sub white meats for the reds, but everything else (no sugar, no bread or pasta, caffeine, alcohol, and fruits all used in extreme moderation) should be spot on for you.

There's an idea. But just toss out the jello. I'd rather eat a bowl of salt and pepper. An undisclosed amount of time ago I was in a state of mental, ummm, expansion due to certain other aromatic substances, and stumbled into my kitchen to find the glory of my peppermill and salt grinder. I sat for what felt like hours, but could hav ebeen minutes, just grinding handfulls of salt and pepper into my palm, and eating them straight. Such an explosion of flavor in my mouth each time... followed by sneezing and coughing, gulping down a glass of water, and then repeating the entire process again...

Ooooohhhhhh..... I want one.... So, this Cookshack electric job, since it is electric, and insulated, do you suppose it would be safe to use on a wood apartment balcony?

An eating restriction is actually what made me decide to learn how to cook, and what brought me to e-gullet. Up until last september I couldn't cook a thing, I would nuke frozen dinners, order in, eat out, or maybe just maybe toss something prepared but frozen into a skillet and heat it up to eat. This resulted in me growing from an already fairly large size to nearly 400 lbs, clearly, something had to be done. I bit the bullet and jumped onto the Atkins plan, and now, 8 months later and 170 lbs gone so far, I have gone back to talk to my parents to have them teach me recipes they knew and that I had always loved, bought and started to work my way through 'How To Cook EVerything', started to work my way through the green leafy produce section at the grocery store, realized that the produce at my grocery store was utter shit, and started to work my way through the produce at the local farmer's market. I have been reading every recipe I can find, and cooking something brand new virtually every night. I am learning what various spices taste like, that I can actually make something that tastes better than what I can get at Friday's, and that cooking is fun! I don't see the severe carb restriction as a roadblock, but instead as a starting point. When composing anything, whether it be a meal, a piece of music, a photograph, whatever, it is 100x easier to get things started if you have some guidelines. Since I will eventually be able to add whole grains and even sugar and flour back into my diet in moderation, I know that I will eventually tackle the joys and challenges of traditional baking. For the time being I have having tons of fun with savory dishes, and also learning how to make some pretty decent low-carb baked goods by balancing soy flours, protein isolates, whey proteins and extracts, nut flours, seeds, and other such random ingredients. I also think it is fun that I am learning about all of this pretty much as it is drafted, low-carb baking being such as new practice and all. So for me, if it wasn't for a restriction (albeit self-imposed) I would have most likely never discovered the joy of cooking in general.

I don't think that the staff's confusion over what you wanted when you asked for your order "off the grill [broiler]" is relegated to that specific location. When I have asked for this before I was likewise greeted with confused stares and the repetition of my request (apprehensively) into the checkstand order mike. After the counter staff was finally able to translate my words into non-BK speak and transmit them, with a questioning look, to the current floor manager the broiler was fired up (I'm not sure what the instructions were as they were not given in English); but for the first time I saw my burger actually cooked at BK. I almost found it somewhat thrilling to acutually see fire in the kitchen. Likewise I experienced about a 4-minute wait for the food - but it was noticeably better. Not better than could be made at home, but better nonetheless. I may be wrong...and someone should test this...but I thought that I saw a notation on the receipt regarding the fact that the order had to be made a la minute (I vaguely recall something like "GRL"), it's been a while, though - and it also may have been notation for something else. In some ways it would make sense if they were to give some special identification to orders that had to be cooked to order because I would think that they would want to track how many orders get held up for cooking in order to plot and plan how much of a given item to prepare before 'rush' times. With regards to rushes: During my (brief, egads I couldn't stand that job) employment at McDonalds when I was about 15, the common practice for orders which came in for fresh cooked during rush hours was to just serve up the burgers/chicken/etc from the steam box anyway, and just slap the bun/etc on fresh. Never did I ever witness a customer catching on this wasn't cooked when the ordered it. If a customer actually ordered something cooked fresh during the non-rush hours, we were more than happy to oblige however.

Interesting.... perhaps I shall try to cook some shallots, and in a pan next to them, some onions, and then compare the tastes cooked.... The raw shallots didn't taste bad, but they certainly didn't taste mild and subtle, perhaps the cooking brings it out....

And to think Acme has been selling me false Munster for all these years... Actually, today I had to buy up some new spices, which took me by the Newark co-op. Having heard that they offer some quality cheese, I took a look, ended up picking up a Goat's Milk Cheddar, a garlic and basil infused Gouda, and a wedge of Manchego. Wow oh wow, what have I been missing, what a world exists beyond Acme and Cabot brand cheese... The Goat's Milk Cheddar is perhaps the best cheddar I have ever had, it had a nice sharp bite, but no acrid taste to burn the back of one's mouth such as other sharp cheddars I have tasted. It also had a nice dry firm texture, very flavorful. The basil and garlic infused gouda was creamy, full-flavored, and had sweet overtones due to the basil, a cheese I could eat a whole wedge of without anything else... But the star of the show was the Manchego... Dry in texture, almost like a parmesan, with a dark rind (that I probably shouldn't have eaten, but did anyway, it tasted good), and such a nice flavor! I lack a cheese vocabulary, but I tasted something almost citrussy, as well as peppery, and just good dry cheese taste to top it off.... I Am a big fan of this one. I think I will have to sample some of my good local cheeses now.... but maybe fromages.com isn't so far off.

Hiya, I have always enjoyed the flavor of all manner of onions, but time and time again on this board I see reference to shallots. Now, I am aware that shallots are a smaller, much more expensive version of an onion, but that is about where it ends. All of the online material I have found seems to infer that shallots are more tender and mild than onions, but after picking some up in the grocery store and promptly eating them once home (yes, raw) I felt that the taste was far more similar to a strong spanish onion than to a mild sweet onion like a Vidalia. What do you do with shallots? Should I use them as I would onions? Does it make a difference? Are there dishes that would turn out much better through the use of shallot instead of onion, or vice versa?

I haven't had an Angus burger at BK, but I have had many of the LC Angus burgers at Hardees (which yes, is the same company as Carls Jr), and they are probably the best national chain fastfood burger out there, at least in my experience. The 2/3 lbs burger is definately meal sized and very filling, and Hardees serves it up without any steak sauce. Also i believe it is a Hardees policy, or at least one at the one local to me, to make everything fresh off the grill, no burgers are pre-cooked and placed in warming trays or steam heaters. Now, while this is probably the best fast food burger, you can still get a markedly better burger at some mainstream chain joints, like Friday's (also on the Angus bandwagon btw) who can at least cook your burger medium rare if you ask. On that same note however, I'm not sure if I would trust Hardees to cook my burger medium rare, so perhaps it is better that they just don't offer... Also, at least from what I have had, you can still get a very good fresh burger that tastes just as good, if not better, from certain local chains such as Fatburger or In&Out in CA, or Jake's here in DE.