Jason Perlow

Not at Ole Ole prices. Give me LOTS of Saffron. I hate nothing more than Paella that is stingy on saffron.

El Dorado is one of the better Demerera rums.

If you are willing to go to Newark, Ole Ole Warehouse has an open house sale once a month, we got a big one ounce tin of saffron from them for like 40 bucks. http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=14145&st=0

Nice writeup on NY Metro by Hal Rubenstein: http://nymetro.com/nymetro/food/reviews/re...9162/index.html

$19.00 a bottle for Pyrat Planters XO is a VERY good price. I bought a few bottles at $30 and I considered that to be aggressive. The Planters is in the squat bottle and the "Pistol" is in the thin tall bottle. Pistol should sell for cheaper than Planters XO, its not as aged.

Wow, I didnt know they grew such massive onions in Alaska.

So in Louisiana, the "Onion Top" is actually a type of shallot which doesnt bulb well?

I wonder if they mean baseballs or softballs. I've never seen an onion as big as a basketball. That would be one mother #$%^ big onion.

Or, a better way to look at this is all scallions are green onions, but not all green onions are scallions. Ok, I'm done.

BTW apparently most of the scallions/green onions grown in the state of Georgia are apparently Vidalia onions, in the infant stages. http://www.ces.uga.edu/pubcd/C821.htm also, from Texas A&M's website: http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/PLANTan...s/oniongro.html So it looks like I was wrong -- a "scallion" is actually different from "a green onion" even though they are used interchangeably. Note that I've never seen a larger, Vidalia-type green onion in the NY metro area, though. The closest thing I've seen are various kinds of leeks in Asian markets, and they typically carry "scallions" as well.

Are you saying that scallions and green onions are different things in the US? The would be in Australia as well, but in the UK Green onions are often very large scallions/spring onions, basically the Calçots of Catalan France. Oh, I forgot to say that I like bananna shallots as they are less of a pain in the arse to peel in quantity. No, scallions and green onions are the same things in the US, they are just called different things in different parts to the country. In New York scallion is the common vernacular where as in the American south, green onion is more commonly used. In Louisiana for example they are commonly referred to as "Onion tops" because the cajuns use primarily the top part of the Scallion.

Interesting, I've seen American Thai and Vietnamese restaurants use western-style shallots, and we've used them at home for making southeast asian dishes ourselves. I'll have to ask KT at Saigon Republic what she uses.

Black pepper is one of the oldest spices to be used and farmed in recorded history -- Its been said it was found more than 4000 years ago and started to be cultivated around 1000 BC. In the 5th century A.D., Roman writers reported that Attila the Hun demanded, among other things, 3,000 pounds of pepper in ransom for the city of Rome. So the reason why we use it is not really as important as just how key it has been to the enhancement of cusine and food since the very beginnings of recorded history.

Shallots are a key ingredient in Vietnamese food and Thai food. It can't be substituted for those cusines -- its a very important player in the dishes that use them (in both raw and cooked forms) and the flavors are distinct.

Costco has those yummy Aidell's sausages in stock. I highly recommend the chicken with apple sausage. Great grilled with some sauerkraut and mustard on a dog bun. They have a few other kinds that I really want to try. http://www.aidells.com/sausages/descriptions/ BTW, they recently had Boylan's cane sugar sodas by the case for $13, which was not a bad deal.

eGullet Q&A with Alton Brown, May 24-28, 2004. Click here for the Q&A forum Biography Alton Brown’s flair in the kitchen developed early with guidance from his mother and grandmother, a budding culinary talent he skillfully used later “as a way to get dates” in college. Switching gears as an adult, Alton spent a decade working as a cinematographer and video director, but realized that he spent all his time between shoots watching cooking shows, which he found to be dull and uninformative. Convinced that he could do better, Alton left the film business and moved to Vermont to train at the New England Culinary Institute in Montpelier, VT. Soon after, Alton tapped all of his training to create Good Eats, a smart and entertaining food show that blends wit with wisdom, history with pop culture, and science with common cooking sense. Alton not only writes and produces the shows but also stars in each offbeat episode on Food Network. Alton Brown’s first book, I’m Just Here for the Food, won the James Beard Foundation Award for Best Cookbook in the Reference category, and was one of the bestselling cookbooks of 2002, with over 165,000 copies now in print. It was also chosen by Amazon.com as one of the top 50 books of 2002 by both editors and readers. Alton Brown’s Gear for Your Kitchen, his long-awaited homage to tools and gadgetry, was published in September 2003 and is nominated for a James Beard Award for Best Cookbook in the Tools & Techniques category. Gear is an essential guide to all the “hardware” you need in the kitchen. Packed with practical advice and tips, Alton’s new book takes a look at what’s needed and what isn’t, what works and what doesn’t. It even includes 25 recipes and a six-month plan to overhaul your kitchen with the most effective, innovative and even surprising culinary tools available. Alton’s third book on baking, I’m Just Here for More Food, is due in bookstores October 2004. Also in October, read Alton’s second piece (on yeast) as a contributing editor for Bon Appetit Magazine. Food Network’s Good Eats airs Wednesday at 9:00 pm, 9:30 pm, 1:00 am, and 1:30 am. Plus, catch additional episodes Monday through Friday at 7:00 pm, Saturday at 8:30 am, and Sunday at 6:30 pm. All times ET/PT. Hosted by Alton Brown and now in its fifth season, Good Eats combines pop culture, comedy, kitchen science, and plain good eating. For more information on the show, visit the Food Network website. For more information on Alton Brown, visit altonbrown.com. ~~~ Five copies of Alton Brown’s Gear for Your Kitchen will be given away to Q&A participants.

In addition to Tempura, you might want to try its Indian cousin, the pakora. Pakoras have cumin spice in the batter mixture. Cauliflower, broccoli, squash and potatoes make great pakoras. http://www.indianchild.com/vegetable_pakora_recipe.htm http://www.whats4eats.com/recipes/r_ap_pakora.html The flour (besan) that they use is made of chickpeas.

I can assure you, you don't want to do this. I successfully grew some of these a few summers ago, and well, lets just say, they aren't really usable in food. I ended up putting mine in the food drier and grinding it into chile powder... and mixing it with WEAKER chiles. Stuff is way, way, way too hot. Jason, thanks for the heads up. I'm not one of those "I've eaten chiles so hot that I pissed blood for a week and went blind in my left eye" macho chest beating types. It's just that I was very disappointed in my orange Habaneros last year. Kansas may not be offer the right growing conditions. Mine were pretty weak. Weak enough that I could pop half a chile in my mouth and chew it up -- NOT something you're supposed to be able to do with any Habanero, though the fruity flavor was quite nice. I was hoping that by going with the Red Savina I might get close to what a Habanero is supposed to be. And =Mark='s Habanero ice cream is calling to me. Chad You may have been watering them too much. Chiles make more capsaicin when the plants are stressed -- and they like the weather VERY hot. You want to water them no more than once a day -- having a sprinkler system or better yet, a drip irrigator that goes off for a half hour in the morning is what you need. On EXTREMELY parched, hot days, you want to water them twice, but you really shouldnt do this that often. Its okay if the plants get a little on the wilty side by the end of the day, especially when they start bearing fruit. Orange habaneros can be very hot if you grow them in this manner. I've also grown Chocolate Habaneros and they can be pretty damn hot as well. Basically anything in the Chianese family that the habenero comes from is going to blow your head off if you grow it under the right conditions. However the savina -- I can assure you, they don't work well with food.

RZ Centenario is nice but it is not the same kind of rum as Pyrat. Its much more viscous and sweet. Its closer to a cognac than a rum, its very premium, very aged stuff. Try Ron Pampero Anniversario, Matusalem Anejo Reserva, Barbancourt 5 Star, Ron Del Barrelito 3 Star, Appleton Extra or one of the various Demerera rums from Guyana. If you can get one, get a Rhum Agricole like Rhum Saint James -- Its from Martinique, which is in the the East Indies like Anguilla where Pyrat is from. All the notable Rhums are from Martinique, but they are very hard to come by in the US. A domestic rum, called CANE from New Orleans Rum, which comes from Louisiana and is made from Louisiana black strap molasses and cane syrup, has a very simliar flavor profile to Pyrat. Another rum from Australia that was recently imported into the US, Inner Circle, is also very good. BTW of all the premium caribbean rums, I find Pyrat to be one of the most overpriced, and its not particularly aged at that, most of the rums in it aren't more than 6 years old.

Kirin Ichiban is brewed in Los Angeles under contract by Anheuser-Busch ... but I don't know if the beer exists domestically in Japan, though. EDIT: Kirin Ichiban "First Press" and Ichiban Shibori exist in Japan, but they are not the same beers.

Gary, can you explain the significance of this type of green tea?

Aright, now I -HAVE- to eat there to see what is really going on.

a SATISFACTORY?

You and me both. I'm a serious Trek addict, and I TRIED to drink one of these at "Quark's Bar" at the Hilton Las Vegas. After the first sip, I told them to take it away and bring me a Rum and Coke! BTW, the "Klingon Blood Wine" is not much better.

Being somewhat something of a purist, I find some of the "flavored" beers out there to be a bit strange, so I shy away from buying them. If I want something fruity and not-beer, I'll go with Hard Cider. What flavored beers do you like, or don't like? Brooklyn Brewery's "Post Road" Pumpkin Ale with pumpkin-pie spices, the stuff coming out of Dogfish Head, and all the various Lambic fruitbeers and those beers with Honey added to the brewing process are some of those that comes to mind.