jhlurie

Nope, you can't usually sue over parody.

Currently I'm reading one food book, "Shameless Exploitation in Pursuit of the Common Good" by Newman & Hotchner, which is indeed about the Salad dressing and pasta sauce king who used to act or something. Most of my reactions are here, in this thread. One thing I'll say here... Newman really is a wacko, no matter what you think of his acting or food. Mostly I'm reading this book for the comedy--the desire to see just how wacked Newman is. I'm not considering it a very serious read, although it does sidetrack a few times into substance almost by accident.

I don't know them offhand, but I'm sure you could call Mike's Deli and ask. This webpage seems to have contact info (at the bottom of the page).

Yes, the Yankee Stadium is indeed the greatest sandwich in the world! The "Albainian" is a pretty good alternative too, although its very different.

The problem is that the article entertains the ridiculous concept that people are ALL like sheep. In ye olden days they all drank expensive wine because it was the thing to do. These days they all poo-poo expensive wine because its now the thing to do. Hogwash. The non-sheep might be capable of understanding that a lot of expensive wine is pure hype and markup, but that other instances of it are entirely appropriate and worth every cent. The non-sheep might also believe that cheaper wine may be good enough to occasionally enjoy for the variety, since perusing excellence on the kind of theoretical schedule being suggested would cut out entire varieties of wine. Frankly elements of this article insult my intelligence. Do I really need to be told that X amount of experts would like expensive wine Y better than cheap wine Z? Of course I don't. I knew that.

Mad TV tonight had a hilarious parody of one of the frequent targets in this thread--The Olive Garden commercials. If Mad TV hasn't shown in your time zone yet, tune in. It's the very first skit.

Anyone besides me see Altoids Gum yet? The Altoids website doesn't even say it exists yet, but my local Seven-dash-Eleven had it. Very strong flavor, as expected. I also finally found Swoops, the chocolate shaped like potato chips, sans actual potato. I got the Reese's variety--although they also had Plain Hersey's Chocolate, Almond Joy, and York Peppermint varieties. The concept works surprisingly well. In the Peanut Butter variety, the Peanut Butter is kind of blended into a ripple through the middle of the "chip".

Apparently Native Americans and Jews have even more in common than the obvious, because I believe wood ash is an ingredient in hominy as well.

Mayo? How do you taste the meat?

Rosie... have you tried Felice in Oradell yet? It's run by the guy who runs the excellent Diner in Oradell. steakas - get thee to Kinchley's! Rosie, I'd like to hear the scoop on Christian's. All I know about it is that every few months somebody posts about it like it just opened up or something.

I don't think the conversation has veered, Mudpuppie. I think we are just distinguishing between capsicum tolerance and digestive accomodation. The fact that receptors for this may be all around the body is interesting, but hardly changes the fact that some people's problems ARE purely digestive in nature.

Good lord, they might as well have used Kraft Dinner (and really expensive ketchups). And Shatner? You guys know he was recycled from the U.S. version, right? Why would they bother after the response they got?

You have to be into that vibe--to understand that dressing and acting like a cross between Lestat the Vampire, David Bowie, that psychic guy who is always on the Spanish language channels here in the US, and Liberace is a STATEMENT, damnit! It's a statement that Chairman Kaga will NOT be categorized or stereotyped! Kaga!

Er... Thank you for that fascinating contribution.

re: ulcers -- Sigh. People around here REALLY can't tell when I'm joking, even WITH the smileys. I'm not really worried about ulcers. "Active lesion" is such an unpleasant phrase, by the way. re: diverticulitis -- more likely some day, since I've got a family history. As for the studies suggesting the digestive harmlessness of capsicum, I can understand that. I still think it has to have something to do with the oil content for many people, except for whoever has the kimchi-related problems like Katherine. Again, I think the er... "region" or timeline of the discomfort have to be key here. I know my grandfather, with his diverticulitis, took all of five minutes to react to spicy food, but I've seen people with other conditions take hours, and certainly the people who only have an "exit" problem with the stuff aren't on the same timeline.

Laser surgery for red pepper intolerance? Just a joke, right? For me, the worst is a good strong kimchi, so it's the pepper powder, definitely no oil in there. Yes, but for argument's sake lets say that you divide the digestive timeline into vague stages--let's say 1 through 5. 1 is immediately after you eat, 2 is within the next hour after the meal, 3 is the next 4 hours or so after that, 4 is the rest of the time it's in your body, and 5 is the time it leaves your body. So which number or numbers are the ones representing where and how spicy food "gets" you? 0, I guess would represent people who get sick to their stomach just looking at or smelling the food. This entirely unscientific breakdown is totally arbitrary, so let's not debate it too much. It just seems easier than talking about body parts and fire rings.

I'm pretty sure that ulcers are not caused by what you eat (or drink), they're a viral infection so you don't need to worry about chilli induced ulcers. No, I mean the ulcer which makes me not able to eat spicy food. Stress will cause the ulcer well enough. And for those poor souls who suffer from some kind of "ring of fire" syndrome on a regular basis, I can't really suggest much more than aggressive use of aloe vera or possibly laser surgery. Actually I have to wonder how much the reactions on the elimination end (this discussion is definitely NOT making me hungry) are tied to digestion. Will better digested capsicum eliminate itself in a kinder fashion? Is it the oil in chili oil making it's way... er... south... in such a hasty fashion or will this happen equally with solid spice?

Obviously there are several elements to a tolerance. One is a palate for spicyness and one is a stomach for it. And I suspect the "stomach" part consists of different symptoms for different people. Of course we should be specific to start. By "spicy" I'm assuming we mean an effect from capsicum--from chilis--as opposed to garlicky, gingery, numbing (as from sichuan peppercorn), or merely an "overly complex" taste from the use of too many kinds of spices for someone's tastes. And of course a perception of "greasiness" often mixes with a reaction to "spicyness" and exacerbates it or confuses people. I've got pretty good tolerance for both the palate and "stomach" portions, but I'll add "so far" since I'm just waiting for that ulcer to hurt my tolerance. I'm trying to recall what medical conditions I've heard of that lead to instances of stomach issues with spicyness, and I think there are quite a number of them. I mean what... everything from allergies, to diverticulitis, to hemorrhoids, I'd imagine. Thus I doubt there is one "cure".

"Hee hee hee!" Guess we didn't have that kind of intelligent analysis.

Wouldn't they be more likely to smuggle rice IN to Japan? I believe Japan still bans all importing of rice, thus if someone were "smuggling" that would seem to yield better results. Then again, if we are talking about the small quantity someone could fit into a suitcase, perhaps it would more likely go the other way. Look what westerners are sometimes willing to pay for Japanese beef.

Here are some older discussions of Iron Chef, including several about the much maligned U.S. version.

I went about a month ago and enjoyed it. It's true that it's chopped meat served on white toast smeared with processed cheese spread. But it's cooked in an interesting fashion, and particularly with "the works" it... er... works. I didn't think it was the best Hamburger I'd ever had, not even remotely, but it was very good and fairly unique. I was also lucky enough to go around 3:45PM, right when they are least busy, and hardly waited at all. My other big temptation was to ask the owner exactly at what point they switched from yelling at people when they carved their initials into the walls, counters, tables, floors, ceilings, fixtures, etc., to ignoring that behavior, to eventually encouraging it. It must have been an interesting process.

No, only the Beatles catalog. This song was much later in McCartney's career (which is one of the reasons it sucks ).

Mamster, under the strange alternate identity of "MATTHEW AMSTER-BURTON" has apparently written for the Seattle Times. Maybe he can sell them on this idea. Do any of your regions have distict differences between Thai restaurants which serve "fancy-plate" food and "homestyle" food? (my own terminology...)

Well Mamster would be the best person to question about PacNW Thai food, obviously, but I think one thing which has been established here is that the "authenticity" argument gets much more, er... bullshitty (for lack of a better term), with Thai food than most other cuisines, because Thai food is already a huge hybrid of other influences, plus is also extremely diverse between its own regional dishes. And nowhere in the US are you likely to get 90% of what's served in Thailand, although that's more a comment about variety as opposed to "quality" or "authenticity". As predictable as this argument is... I'm guessing the only way to find the "best" Thai food in the US is to play a game of "follow the immigrants". I'd imagine that places with large Thai populations would tend to produce the MOST Thai restaurants numerically, and therefore probably the most "authentic" ones, if you believe the occasionally maligned concept that people of a certain background tend to eat the most authentic versions of their own food.