andiesenji

Two slices of a hearty bread, probably homemade as I do a lot of baking, lightly toasted. Each slice spread with home made peanut butter (or half cashew butter) Add to and press into the PB on one or both slices the following: crumbled very crisp bacon toasted onion bits or carmelized onion toasted seeds, either sesame, sunflower or pumpkin To one slice add a layer of bread and butter pickles (also homemade) well drained. Place the other slice on the one with the pickles, press down and cut diagonally into quarters. Excellent with a cup of strong, black tea...

If anyone is interested, Sam's Club has the Deluxe model with the extra large water tank for $66.63. They also have the coffees, 2 bags to a box, each box 6.68.

I would slice it very thin, spread with duxelles, roll it up, heat it briefly and eat it with fresh French bread.

Really, then I must be remembering something totally different. I do recall an episode with a potato pancake or maybe it was a rostii, but wasn't the show in color by then? The episode I recall was right at the beginning of the second season, they now had an overhead mirror to show what was happening in the pots and pans and it made her look left-handed and it looked like her pinned on insignia was on the wrong size. An uncooked chicken slid off a platter. The next show was the one where she had the three big fish, actually medium, large and huge, lined up on the counter and used her knife to point out the various parts of the fish. I thought the camerman was a little twitchy during that episode. On another episode she held a large fish up in the air with both hands and mimed it swimming. She didn't drop it.

Also, one of the best things I did was have overhead receptacles put in over the stove, at either end of the exhaust hood. This makes it so much easier to use an immersion blender in a pot on the stovetop without dragging the cord through something or catching it on a pot handle. I have one of those retractable key ring things screwed into the hood next to each elec. receptacle and have an alligator clip on the key hook. I clamp this onto the cord so it gives enough for me to pull it down to the stovetop but keeps the slack taught and the cord from dipping into whatever I am cooking. I also had all the receptacles were the GFCI type, which means they have a built-in breaker. These are much, much safer, particularly in a kitchen. See it here In my old kitchen I had a fire when a coffeemaker shorted out and it could have been serious but the alarm went off. (I have the combination, smoke, heat and fumes type) and I was able to put it out myself. Even then I had fire extinguishers in the kitchen. Now I am required to by law. Better to be safe than sorry......... They are very cheap when you consider the expense of a fire.

I went out early this morning to get some shopping finished before the heat became too much and on my way home, I had just pulled off the freeway and was driving down my road and the news came on with that as the lead story. I got a big lump in my throat and had to pull off the road because I couldn't see for the tears. She did have a very long and extremely productive life and I think that she did exactly what she wanted to do. She had no regrets but was never tooting her own horn about how much she had done. She didn't need to, others did it, and rightly so. Back in the days when The French Chef first was shown, most people were content with cooking as their mother's had before them, rarely going out on a limb and trying something new. Garlic was anathema and the only people who cooked with olive oil were "those foreigners" (as I heard someone say about a third-generation Italian family). It was before the days of the cholesterol scare but many people used margarine as it was touted as being good and also cheaper. Those old shows, in black and white, inspired me to learn more about cooking in general. I had been a baker for some time but there is a world of difference between baking and cooking. Baking must be precise but cooking allows for intuition and innovation. She taught this and so much more, particularly about being relaxed when something unforseen happens - as when a chicken fell on the floor and she grabbed it up and said it can happen to anyone, washed and wiped it and went on with the demonstration. I was in San Antonio, perhaps ten years ago, for a string of dog shows with a couple of free days between. A friend mentioned that he had a couple of passes to a taping of a show with Julia Child and Graham Kerr and would I like to go? Silly question. Of course I went and afterward ordered a print of the tape and the slip jacket was signed by Julia and Graham. It was simple serendipity, me being in the right place at the right time. It is one of my treasured moments. She touched uncountable lives and I know that there are many, many chefs and others in the world of food, that are what they are because of Julia. She had a rare talent for inspiring people to do better than they ever thought they could. She will be missed, on an astronomical scale.

Check out this Thermador cooktop which is what I would get today instead of the cooktop I do have. I like the star burners much better than the ring shape. This has enough output to cook with a wok. I have a separate wok burner which I rarely use because it throws out too much heat for me.

Regarding reusing jars. The Atlas jars, in which some commercial spagetti sauces, salsas, marinades and some fruits, are regular canning jars with the double-threads which fit regular Ball or Kerr canning lids. One or two companies use the wide-mouth jars and again, these fit the wide-mouth lids. all of these companies have labels that are plastic film and not fired on so they can be removed - I use acetone but try the regular nail polish remover which melts the plastic. I have friends who are more than happy to save these jars for me in return for some of my canning product. In fact, when I got home from work yesterday there was a cardboard box full of canning jars next to my back door with a little note that said, "I can see your tomatoes are coming along well so you can probably use these when you make your marinara sauce, hint, hint, hint!" Maggie. Thrift shops are a good place to look and you can always ask the volunteer ladies to save you a certain type of item. I have an arrangement with a couple of charity thrift shops that I will take all the cookbooks they get as well as all the canning equipment and odd old kitchen gadgets and utensils. They know I am good for it and one will even deliver. I give them a regular donation every 6 months even if I don't have anything for me to buy. The things I don't want and which are in good condition and useful, basic utensils, I donate to the women's and children's shelter which they pass on to women who are trying to start a new life and have nothing.

Recipe Source, once known as SOAR, has 39 recipes for summer squash listed. Squash recipes These should take you through the rest of the summer! A note about the site: I began looking for recipes at the old SOAR site soon after it came online in 1993. My daughter, a Berkeley graduate, told me about it and at that time I had Compuserv which charged by the hour. I spent a lot of money looking for recipes and consider it well spent. When you want a large selection of recipes for a particular food item this is the place to look. I am sure that some day in the not too distant future RecipeGullet will be as vast and as varied. However for now, it is nice to have this vast resource at our fingertips.

The absolute best way to clean a blade type grinder is this way, and it works better than Martha Stewart's - I have been doing this since before Martha was ever heard of. I used the same routine to clean my blender between grinding dry stuff (washing was not an option because it would take too long to dry and I needed it to grind something else.) Place two heaping tablespoons of dry baking soda in the grinder. Add 3 broken saltine crackers. Apply the top and run the grinder, shaking it up and down and turning it upside down and back a couple of times (holding the top on, of course). Dump the powder out and wipe with a dry paper towel. This will remove oils from grinding coffee beans and spices, will polish the interior and will also kill any lingering odor from spices or coffee, etc. This works and is simple. Grinding raw rice is really tough on the blades and will dull them ater a time. I collect antique electric appliances and I use a barely damp cloth and dry baking soda to remove the burnt on grease that in some cases is nearly 80 years old. This is the only thing I use because it will not scratch or dull the chrome on these early beauties.

See this measuring liquid/dry And this conversion table\ And this one more conversion tables and note the lone Australian tablespoon which is 20 ml instead of the 16 ml in the U.S. and the 15 ml in the U.K. a pint in the U.K. is 20 U.K. oz, while in the U.S. it is 16 "fluid" U.S. oz. So much for the old saying, "A pint's a pound, the world around." Because the volume of liquid changes slightly at differing altitudes a more accurate measurement is obtained by weighing liquids. In a laboratory, liquids as well as solids are usually weighed when precise measurements are required.

I haven't tried any except the dark roast but one of the girls in the office is using the medium. She likes it and has gone through a lot of the pods. Target had a good supply of the dark roast but most places tell me they can't keep it on the shelf, it is gone almost as soon as they put it out. We only use two pods at a time. My boss used two pods for a single shot. They like it because it is fresh every time, the coffee drinkers among us think that brewed coffee goes stale within a few minutes. Do post what your experiences are with the other pods.

crookneck, straightneck, etc., are similar in flavor to all other summer squash. They may begin to shrivel a bit but they should be picked before they get too big and the seeds develop a hard skin. I try and catch them when the bulb part is about 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 inch in diameter and the neck is about half that size. Slice thin and saute in garlic butter with celery and corn. Slice very thin and pickle as you would for bread and butter pickles, i.e., sweet and sour flavor. They take on the flavor of whatever they are with I also like summer squash and green beans in combination. They are related to but unlike gourds (the decorative things) they are edible. In fact they are considered an edible gourd. You can test the squash with a fingernail. A nail should penetrate easily this will not happen with a gourd.

I have been worm composting for many years. Very little goes down the garbage disposal. It is amazing how quickly the worms can break down stuff as tough as watermelon rind, corn cobs, etc. I have 6 huge tubs which have a screen that sets on legs in the bottom. The worm castings work their way down through the coarse screen and can be raked out because I have cut a hatch in one side of the tub at the bottom. I have a barrel on a low platform, put the castings in that with water and some blood meal or bone meal or other additive that might be needed then turn the tap and drain the "tea" into a bucket for application to plants that need a bit of extra nutrition.

I have made pesto with the Siam Queen spicy basil, with lemon basil, cinnamon basil and also with cilantro, with parsley, also have included lovage leaves, summer savory along with the basil as well as salad burnet which has the flavor of cucumbers (and which reseeds itself with abandon all over the yard). Also shiso, both green and red. I use the classic parmesan cheese - reggiano, of course, but also romano, asiago, occasionally adding a bit of sap sago and some other hard grating cheeses. Since I can get pine nuts locally (from people who go up into the Sierras to gather them and shell them, I use a lot more of them than other nuts. I have made a wonderful pesto with cinnamon basil and macadamia nuts, slow roasted garlic (carmelized) and Sbrinz, a Swiss grating cheese - someone gave me a big chunk and I had to use it up...... It was a glorious combination. I have a friend on the Big Island who sends me broken mac nuts from a local grower. By the way, regarding freezing stuff in ice cube trays - - - if you take a sheet of plastic wrap, lay it over the ice cube tray then push it down into the cube sections, leaving a little slack between them, you can fill them and when frozen cut the plastic wrap to separate the cubes and keep the little cubes, with the plastic wrap intact around each one, in a large ziploc bag. This way they will not stick together and the plastic ice cube trays do not get permanently "flavored".... This is a very good thing when you want to avoid a garlic flavor to your fruit purees.

Where do you live? I am surprised that your local supermarkets do not carry them. Every super market in which I shop carries at least the basic selection of canning jars, sometimes on sale at a pretty good price, usually at the end of the season which is when I stock up. Last fall Albertsons had a great (unadvertised) sale and I bought every case on the shelf and asked for more from the stockroom. I had three baskets full wheeled out to my van.

I would like to add something about thyme. A wonderful cultivar with great culinary applications is lemon thyme. It is an excellent culinary plant, has lovely foliage, slightly larger leaves than French or English thyme. It is not as hardy, will not survive at temperatures much below freezing so needs to be potted and brought inside during hard freezes. The flavor is exceptional, the lemon flavor is subtle but obvious and it is a wonderful seasoning for almost any meat, but particularly good with lamb as well as with chicken and duck or goose. I have stuffed it and a small boiling onion inside squab and game hens and the flavor has added a great deal to the (in my opinion) rather insipid flavor of these small fowl. I also grow lime thyme which has the fragrance of lime but not much lime flavor.

That is a lovely gift. I wouldn't turn them down. It really helps when you know the habits of the recipient. The following isn't exactly a hostess gift but was fun. One of my friends had to put her life on hold and turn her bakery over to her employees for several months while she relocated to her daughter's place and helped her through the aftermath of a tornado in which her husband was killed when their home was destroyed. She called me and a couple of other friends to let us know the day she was due back asked if one of us would pick her up at the airport and suggested we get together at her place for dinner. My other friends and I got together and bought a couple of crates full of the perishable staples one needs to stock up on after a long time away from home. Butter, eggs, bacon, milk, cheeses, fresh vegetables, salad fixings. I had a key to her place and we went there early that morning and did a little cleaning and freshening, stocked the fridge and made sure everything was shipshape. We then went to LAX to pick her up and drove her home. We hung around the van waiting for her to get into the house and find our surprise. She was speechless. Instead of going out to dinner, we ordered pizza so she could relax and rest that evening.

Here is the best explanation of arrowrood I have ever come across. I have been using it for 50 years and it is excellent for many applications. It has the advantage of not breaking as cornstarch will do if heated beyond a certain point. It also thickens at a lower temperature so is perfect for delicate things that need only the briefest of heating.

I wouldn't exactly call it hot, but rather spicy and not as cloyingly sweet as the commerical varieties. If you ever have tried Fentimen's, it is very similar, with a lot of ginger flavor but without the back of the tongue sear that you get with some of the new crop of ginger beers/ales. I like it far better than Vernor's.

When my kids were home we had two refrigerators, one was the kids, free for all, the other had a lock (as did the big freezer). We kept theirs stocked with all kinds of things that kids like but anything that I was saving for a job or anything that was very expensive, was in the locked fridge or freezer, otherwise they would eat frozen cookie dough and various other things that were not good for them. Now I live alone and my housekeeper knows that certain things are off limits. At the office I have a locked, fireproof file cabinet that holds things that are MINE alone. Anything in the kitchen cabinets are fair game. I have one section in the fridge that is off limits and people are good about putting their names on their own stuff. Some stuff is communal property and we all add to it as the supply dwindles. There is a jar of peppadews in the office fridge that has the lid taped down because those are mine, mine, mine....

I never take flowers anywhere. I have some allergies to certain ones and I know a lot of people who also have problems. When I invite people to dinner or for some event I always give them a heads up and ask that they not bring or send flowers. The same goes for potpourri and scented candles. I don't give or get anything that might have an effect on the enjoyment of food. Several years ago soon after getting the kitchen of my dreams, I gave a dinner party for which I had prepared a beautiful starter with fois gras. Unfortunately, one of my guests brought a date who was so marinated in perfume that no one could taste the delicate fois gras and I was furious because of the monumental waste of a serious amount of money. Rather than ruin the entire dinner I moved everything outside to the deck where, even though it was not terrible warm, at least there was a chance that the outside air could carry the scent away. However that was not the end of it. I then caught this idiot in my bathroom, smoking a cigarette, and that was the last straw. I have a severe allergy to tobacco and everyone I know knows about it. The fact that this woman had asked earlier if she could smoke and was told no, and the reason why, didn't seem to make an impression, nor did the fact that I could become seriously ill because of it. In my opinion, most people do not always consider the effect that scented things can have on the tasting of food, or of wines for those that drink, and of course for many years smoking was a normal thing to do. I never smoked but have been told by many people who have and stopped, that foods tasted so much better to them after they got it all out of their systems. Many more subtle flavors were noted. Often they finally "got" why other people raved about certain foods. One long-time friend never could see why I would get so excited about truffles when the season began and couldn't understand at all why I would spend so much on a little black lump that seemed so innocuous. Then she quit smoking and a year or so later happened to be visiting when I received a shipment of truffles by overnight delivery. As soon as I opened the package she wanted to know what it was. I prepared the classic scrambled eggs with truffle for dinner and she was hooked. She had eaten them before but had never experienced the effect. My rant is now ended too....

I forgot to mention that Stewart's sodas are often sold at rather unusual places. There is a ice/dry ice dealer that also sells ice cream and etc. products to local mobile vendors (catering trucks and etc) that sells several brands such as Stewart's, Jolt, Nehi, Virgil's, Jones soda and Dr. Brown's by the case only and at a pretty good discount. I know he sells to several little mom & pop stores and to the produce market. He also sells beer in kegs only. The thing to do is check the yellow pages in your area and call around. The distributors will generally be happy to provide you with the names of the retailers who carry their products. This is the way I have tracked down some hard to find items locally. Hope this has given you some ideas.

Yes, the health food store in my town carries it as well as Stewart's cream soda, strawberry, orange and cream and grape plus a couple of other flavors. They also carry another brand of birch beer and the best lemon lime soda I have ever tried, wish I could remember the name. Trader Joes used to carry it but I haven't noticed it lately.

see my earlier post regarding fermented lemonade.