NulloModo

I always cook chicken rather thoroughly, perhaps to the point of overdone. I don't care for many white fish (at least not the preparations I have sampled) so I usually stick woth Salmon or Tuna steaks, which are OK to serve a little more rare, which is how I like them. Shellfish I am still experimenting with, trying to find that magical place between dry and worn out, and raw. I have to say I think I did my scallops about perfectly with regard to doneness. With beef however, the rarer the better. Brown crusty exterior with a nice red juicy, sometimes practically raw, interior. Sure there is some blood in there I guess, but also a lot of juices, and hey, it is tasty. When I cook beef for others I generally survey the group about how they like it, and cook it on the rare side of what I come back with, after all, if you want it done more, you can toss your portion back in for a bit, but you can't uncook meat.

I know this is the dinner thread, but I just made a breakfast that I just have to share: Bacon, Onion, Jalepeno, and Okra Frittata. Who would have thought Okra would have gone so well in a breakfast dish? It was wonderful. Next time I will try to find a red chile pepper to give some more color contrast to the dish.

Robyn: Now, were these veggies going to be served raw or cooked? If everything is going to get cooked anyways, I don't see why it would matter if you chopped bloody beef, raw chicken, veggies, and an apple for a pie for desert all on the same board, they are all going into the oven or the skillet so anything that is transmitted from one to the other is going to still end up dead.

With regard to the first comment: If Keller had a traditionalist salad on the menu, why not? His place and function is to serve guests the food as they request it. With regards to the second: I personally hardly ever order entree sauces on the side, unless I have previous experience with the dish in question at the restaurant in question and the amount of sauce is just too great. This has only happened, IMO, however, at chains, as I recall I have a couple dishes at Olive Garden and Macaroni Grill that require this treatment, and if sauced with more discretion than the kitchen tends to do, can be somewhat palatable. I will also order sides of sauces that don't come with a dish, for adding to other side dishes occasionally, but that is another matter. I don't see what is wrong with ordering up some blue cheese dressing or barbecue sauce for the dipping of french fries, or to pour on some mashed potatoes.

I rarely send things back, in fact, the only time I ever do is when meat comes out blatantly cooked in a manner which is not what I requested, and even then if it is over-done (how hard is it to cook something rare, come on). However, I see no problem in sending something back if you truly do not like the taste of it and will not eat it, but in this case you still ordered it, and if it was prepared properly and you simply didn't like it, you should still pay for it.

oooh, Kingston... one of my favorite little towns. A good friend of mine goes to Queens U, so I have gotten to visit quite a few times. I can't say I have ever shopped for cheese while there, but at least with that great LCBO you have, you won't have any trouble finding wines to pair with the cheeses ;).

Zilla, I'm sure you are capable of dressing a salad properly, but alas, so many restaurants are not. Plus, as most of us do not dine most of the time at very fancy places, we have to deal with the mainsteam restaurants and cooks who often don't care about the exact proper ratios in their salads. If more servers would offer to bring out little sample tastes of some of the dressings that would also be a great help, relieving the fear of ordering a salad glazed in something truly atrocious to your taste buds.

Rare burgers (blend of 80/20 beef and sirloin, of Amish origin) topped with Amiish sourced blue cheese, Amish bacon, and some onion confit (onions not necessarily grown by the Amish). Chile Relleno stuffed with Amish made yoghurt longhorn cheese. Can you tell I visited the Amish farmer's market today?

This is interesting that most people are agreeing that restaurants use too much dressing... this brings up a point I have been thinking about recently: Has mainstreamed U.S. society been brainwashed so much by processed and fast foods that they do not appreciate the taste of good wholesome foods any longer? Is the excess of dressing meant to cover up the taste of the vegetables, which many customers might not like? Is this preponderance of dressing part of the same culinary phenomenon as those who drench any ground meat with ketchup, and any grilled meat with BBQ or steak sauce?

Shortening is trans fatty acids. Although Atkins has been publicizing the dangers of trans fatty acids for quite some time, it has only been in the last year or two that the rest of the nutritional world has chimed in. Hydrogenated oil is bad news. Oh, gotcha, so it is just more of a general health issue than one pertaining to weight-loss. Which, btw, is the same reason that nutrasweet isn't popular on Atkins (also had a tendancy to cause sugar cravings). If you are really baking to cater towards hardcore LC needs, avoid the granulated splenda, and use the liquid form. The Granulated is suspended in a Dextrose base, which has a carb content, while the liquid is pure sucralose.

The biggest reason that _I_ do it, and the reason that I think most do, is that often times salads come out positively drenched in the dressing, so that it smothers up every bit of vegetable flavor underneath of it. Ordering it on the side allows you to control how much you put on. A more recent reason: Since I am now losing weight on a low-carb approach I make a point to limit sugar intake in all forms. If I ask a server if such and such a dressing has a high sugar content, they usually have no clue, and make something up. Even the basics such as blue cheese, ranch, vinagrettes, etc, can have hugely varying sugar contents. I would much rather order it on the side so that I can taste a little bit and gauge whether or not it tastes too sweet before it comes out swimming all over my salad.

Inspired by the deep fried nivana thread I had: Baby portobella mushrooms rolled in an egg wash, then a mixture of crushed garlic, grated parmesan cheese, sage, and cayenne, then deep fried to dark brown golden perfection.

Why do you want to stay away from shortening? I have found a good synergy is splenda and saccharin.

Throw a bunch of any one thing into a deep fryer without first testing out a little bit of it to see how much it foams up.... Tossed in about two cups work of Daikon slices and the resulting volcanic eruption coated my stove top, my counter top, the side of my fridge, and a good portion of my kitchen floor with near boiling peanut oil....

Hmmm, so maybe you would need to first perforate your lobster? I imagine a live lobster, quickly bludgeoned with a plank which has four or five sharp nails sticking out of it, and then immediately tossed into near boiling oil could at the same time be a wonderful form of stress relief, graphically entertaining, and quite tasty.

I am actually pretty bad about this stuff. If I use a pan and it can be easily rinsed, it will just be rinsed and put right back into the cupboard again to be used again, instead of into the dishwasher. My cutting board usually goes through the same process, regardless of what was cut on it, as long as it washes of with a quick scour in hot water, it is clean to go again. I have given myself food poisoning once, but it wasn't due to food safety as much as undercooked pork. What was funny is that as I was eating it I was thinking at the same time: wow, this is very flavorful sausage, and, wow, I've never had a sausage before that remained pink inside when fully cooked, I wonder what kind of dye or spice they used.... That was a very unpleasant weekend.

You could always expand on fried mozerella cheese sticks with other types of cheese. Why not fried battered chunks of parmesan? Or Roquefort, Camembert, Gorgonzola, balls of Mascarpone or cream cheese, Gruyere, Roubochon, or any other cheeses you fancy? Deep fried turnip slices are quite good. Also try onion rings battered in crushed up pork rinds instead of bread crumbs, gives it a nice hint of bacony flavor. Slices of pepperoni turn wonderfully crunchy and yummy when deep fried. Kale also gets quite crunchy, and is tasty deep fried till crisp then lightly salted and vinegared. I really want to try to toss a lobster into a deep fryer now.... But really, if you can deep fry a soft shell crab, whynot a lobster?

should they be? that's an interesting point. personally, i rarely order dessert, not that this is normal. but i'm betting more people don't order dessert than don't order dinner. I think Tommy is onto something here. I am not saying that dessert is a lower form of the culinary arts than savory/dinner dishes, but it is a _different_ form. When I go out for dinner I am wanting dinner, not dessert. If I get an odd pang for something sweet I may have a dessert with dinner, but it will always be more of an afterthought than the main focus. On the other hand, if I were truly craving something sweet, I would go to a place specializing in dessert items, a bakery, an ice cream parlor, or something along those lines, in which the dessert is given all of the attention as that is the entire focus of the place. I see no problem with a restaurant wanting to have high quality dessert offerings, but on the same note if a restaurant had no dessert offerings, or just a token 'defrost and serve' set, it wouldn't make me any less likely to eat there, as the dessert is simply not a focus of mine when considering dinner.

Thursday Night: Chorizo and Shrimp Gumbo (with a blend of all of the chiles I had laying around).

I am certainly not a fan of fixed price dinners that include a dessert - as 95% of the time I have absolutely no desire to eat a dessert of any kind and have no desire to pay for one. That being said, I have always liked the approach by which the dessert menu is seperate, but simply left present on the table, maybe combined with the wine list or a list of fine spirits/coffees availible.

While speaking of grits, does anyone have any experience with Soy Grits?

Wednesday Night: Doesn't really have a name, but: Grind up some almonds and place in the bottom of a muffin tin. In a large bowl mix 6 oz blue cheese, 2 egg yolks, 4tbs butter, 3/4 cup onion confit, 1/2 lb of bacon, crumbled and cooked, 6 oz of raw spinach wilted and lightly pan fried in the bacon grease. Stir it all up in the bowl, then pour equal amounts in the muffin tins over the ground almonds. Bake at 375 for 25/30 minutes. Eat and enjoy.

oh..the horror! the horror! this sounds like something that should be banned. Heh.... those were my entire experience with tamales until a couple years ago.... I always thought that was what a tamale was supposed to be like. They really aren't that bad if you don't expect them to be anything like a tamale

Hehe, well, if it is all sillyness I absolutely have no problem with it. For a moment perhaps I missed the tone in the typing and thought some here actually felt some dishes weren't worth having just because they were 'old hat' or a bit too commonly seen on menus.

Tuesday Night: Sauteed Scallops wrapped in Bacon Spinach Sauteed in bacon/scallop fat with onion and bleu cheese.