Kevin72

Pino Luongo says that wild mushroom, chilies, and nepitella/mentuccia are a common prep in Tuscany.

My apologies; I think I scrolled too fast down the page and merged your post and Nathan's. So, good job twice, Nathan! And, get cooking, bigjas!

Great start, Nathan and bigjas! I have that same bottle ready to drink at some point this month, Nathan. Bigjas, I think the antipasti are all perfect and well in keeping with the spirit of the region. There's a similar roasted fish and potatoes recipe in either Roden's regional cookbook or Ada Boni's, and it includes cheese with the potatoes. Puglia seems to break the "cheese-n-fish" rule quite a bit. Puglia is probably my favorite Southern red producer. The couple times I've found whites they've been chardonnays and certainly nothing remarkable. But the reds I've found are reliable and affordable, and some are just out of this world. If any of you sees Due Palme, snap it up.

For the record, these places all close at a ridiculously early time on the weekends, I think maybe 7 or 7:30. We barely made it on our own trip. You're doing great! But feel free to go ahead and linger more on the description of how each place tasted . . . ETA: Nice touch on the maps. And, you're wife's a saint for going along on this quest. Do thank her on behalf of guys everywhere.

I made pettole once with leftover pepperonata and it was great; couldn't have been easier. The pepperonata stained the dough an orangish color. Hope to make some again this month!

I maintain that the episode where they had to hand crank their gelato is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. I hope they do more; those Toscana shows have been in reruns for two years now here.

Yeah, I think you have to specify "fatty" brisket or they default to the other cut, which can be dry. The fatty goes fast, though: they were sold out at both Smitty's and Kruez' when I went there. I'm already in awe of your eating capacity; I hit Smitty's and Kruez, got a similar sampler at each, and thought I was going to die afterwards. ETA: Your description of walking into Smitty's and being hit with that heat, then looking over and seeing the open pit just a couple feet away, is exactly what happened to me! Felt like I had stumbled into the engine room of a steam boat in the 19th century: guys in grey overalls and obnoxious moustaches shovelling coals into the fire . . .

All right, last Sicily-esque meal. Only three days too late. Started with linguine with a "salsa cruda" that has been discussed a couple times on this thread: my version is raw tomatoes, capers, red onion, celery, chili flakes, olive oil, red wine vinegar, and coarse sea salt. I let them all marinate together all day while I was at work. The whole dish is finished with chopped basil and mint. Since there's a similar recipe in Nancy Harmon Jenkins' Flavors of Puglia cookbook, I'll make the claim that this was a "crossover" dish. Then had a grilled flank steak with amogghiu, a mint and garlic dipping sauce: This was swiped from the cooking show Cucina Italia, hosted by Houston's own Damien Mandola and Johnny Carraba (yes, of Carraba's restaurants). There's a huge Italian restaurant empire in Houston owned by a large, intermingled family and Johnny and Damian are cousins, I think. Anyways, if you have access to this show ever, check it out: they're really funny and goofy, and alot of the recipes are actually pretty decent.

I think Murray's or some other cheese shop in NY does their own. The Mozarella Company, which usually gets a shout-out in the "resources" section of U.S.-published cookbooks, is based in Dallas and they do burrata from time to time. The one time I had it, it was good, but having also in the past month had the real deal in Puglia it just couldn't compare. Interestingly, the Mozz Company's product had more of a ricotta filling than the creamy filling of the Pugliese product.

Huh. That's too bad about de Tapas. We haven't been for dinner in a long time but another poster here had similar comments when he went recently also. Well, "back in the day" at least, the food was reliable, not mind-blowing, but always fun and satisfying, if nothing else. But it's always been empty when we've been, particularly during the week. They get a large late-night crowd though. Mercy was decent; servings were kinda small. But again, I guess if you're going solo . . .

The Garland/Richardson one. I haven't heard about the new concept but am already drooling in advance.

No, I totally second that suggestion. I forgot there was a Babe's out there. I'm going for the second time this Friday and can't wait! But all that food for one may be painful . . .

I've only seen it in NY. But, curiously during that very month of cooking, I did twice see "bottarga powder" in jars at two stores. It was still lavishly expensive though, and I didn't want to risk it.

You'll be on restaurant row, then, as TexNewMex pointed out. So, on the one hand, you'll have any number of restaurants to choose from, on the other, a sizeable percentage will be chains. Still, there's some gems: De Tapas is an old fave of ours', though we haven't been in some months and it's been said here on eG that it seems a little worse for wear of late. Beltline and Sakowitz. Around the corner from de Tapas is Saffron House, a good Indian place we had an eG event at last fall. Mi Piaci is pretty good Italian, also close to de Tapas. Further east down Beltline (you cross I-75 and it becomes Main Street, I think) when it crosses Greenville Avenue, there's a large Chinese/Vietnamese district with a number of good restaurants, chief among them Caravelle, a spacious restaurant with two kitchens, one for Chinese food and one for Vietnamese. I haven't been to Sheba, either, but have it on the radar to try soon as well.

Welcome to the boards, TNM, and what an ambitious project to introduce yourself with! I'm really looking forward to it. Man, I lived in Lewisville for 3 years and lamented the whole time the fact that we couldn't find a reliable breakfast place. How did we miss Wecks?

When I visited Germany with my college roommate, he said that ketchup with curry was the essential condiment for one of their sausages (weiswurst? I think it was all white, but not bratwurst). We bought some from a kiosk and it was easy to see why they went together.

I thought he did a stellar job showcasing the human side of the hot button immigration issue in the Texas Border episode, and he's never been one to shy away from touchy political subjects before. I'd imagine, given the tone of his writeups and interviews, that it will be more of the same here.

It is with passages like the one I took the above peice from that make us really love and enjoy Marlena De Blasi's "A Taste of Southern Italy". She is so dramatic and romantic and fun. The plums are not peeled, they are slipped out of their skin. The flame is not high, it is lively! ← Yeah, and anchovies are "relieved of their heads" . . . have you checked out the Puglia chapter yet? Great recipes there, but the prose get a bit thick, too, what with them "supping like fatted babes" at one point.

How long ago were you in San Fran? It has a huge Italian community, I thought . . .

The street locations in your title were cut off: where on Belltine will you be? It goes all over and through Dallas.

And cannoce, scie, scampi . . . yeah, that's almost another thread: the wealth of seafood Italy has that we don't. Though I wonder if it's just that Americans aren't really adventurous seafood eaters and we have access to a whole wealth of similar seafood on our own shores if there was just demand for it.

How funny; I had just come up with the idea the other day to suggest that once we've covered all the regions we do a bonus "Italian Immigrant" month.

Great topic! First, what's come on the market (in Texas, at least) just since I started cooking in earnest over the past decade: Fennel Baby Artichokes Radicchio Broccoli rabe Blood oranges went from fleeting sighting in a remote gourmet store to regularly and routinely available at the average grocery store in the span of a couple years. 7 years ago, I was amazed to find Tuscan Kale at a Health food store in Denton, Texas, the same afternoon after I saw a Molto Mario episode based on that green. It's still amazing how readily available it is here. And of course, as Pontormo pointed out, just the range and variety of produce items has increased: 4-5 different types of eggplant, peppers from all over, the recent appearance of purple artichokes, tomato varietals . . . I keep waiting to walk into my store here one day and see puntarelle, the bitter green beloved in Rome and other points in Southern Italy, but no luck. It's supposed easy to grow. Produce we get, but in less than desirable quality: favas (almost always have "rust" on the pods or black dots) and porcini, which, on top of being shrivelled, blackened, and slimy, are usually $70/lb when I do see them. I want to support my market for carrying these items, but not at that price. Someone needs to double-time domestically cultivating those. I had planned on starting a vegetable garden this year with favas in mind to be my first attempt, but got lazy and put it off another year. Good thing too: with this heat and drought I'd pretty much have a big crop of heartbreak right now and nothing else.

Not that you're continuing the experiment, but maybe the batter should be applied after the blanching but before the final high temp cook? And, going only on Arby's experience here, but I'll bet the seasoning has some sugar in there, too.

I was considering making a topic for this after being disappointed yet again by the heirlooms we've been getting at our local gourmet shop. Yellow and orange ones seem to be particularly flavorless. I decided to re-evaluate my own suppositions of heirloom tomatoes when they were still being sold at Christmas last year . . .