Jason Perlow

I tried. I noticed they were eating the insanely spicy Death Rain potato chips I (and Markstevens) had brought. I asked them if they liked spicy food, they just sort of laughed (in that debutante actress on Iron Chef kind of way, with their hands over their mouth).

I'm working on uploading the super-hi-res originals to Imagestation. Bare with me.

please to uncompress them. they look like hell now, and they looked sooo good before. You wanna pay my 2000 dollar server bill when people hit this thread a couple of thousand times? No prob.

I had to do some file compression because the pictures were so huge. Slight loss of quality, but they still look pretty good.

You can see them one by one selectively at this url: http://www.egullet.com/pics/ Scroll down to the pictures labelled "njpigbbq- whatever" and click on each one at a time.

Pictures from the eGullet NJ Pig-BBQ & Potluck Note: The images here have been compressed to save bandwidth and to optimize load time. If you want to see the original full sized images, click here for the album on imagestation. Do not copy the imagestation images into eGullet. If you want to quote a picture, please use the version in this post. Thank you. Pictures by Jason Perlow Text by Rachel Perlow The Sites On the way to the potluck, you pass this great stand selling carved wooden statues... This is the Bear that Jason wants ($4000 ) This is the Waving Bear that Rachel wants ($1200, and cuter!) Bread for Sale at Bobolink Cheese for Sale at Bobolink The People Jonathan and Nina White, our gracious hosts Alan Z's son, Josh, juggles for our entertainment. Dumpling on the trampoline! (I missed that) Fink and some of the Chickens ("I'm gonna eat you little chickee...") Self Explanatory Lowell Saferstein looks dapper in his eGullet gear. Order yours now! Fink and Sarah enjoy a beer Lots o'pig eaters Tommy and Howard88 seem to be having fun. Herb enjoying a sangria as Elyse wonders "where oh where shall I put all my cookies?" jmcgrath heats up his ABT's Fink, oh so gingerly, placing some pig on Gary's plate pnapoli (I think) with cornbread Jonathan Sibley and his Pan Roasted Corn Does our new NY moderator like the pork? The tents brought welcome shade on this surprisingly warm day. The Savory Fink's Funky Roasted Pig, contains pork KatieLoeb's Moussaka Sarah's Baked Beans (HscottK helped) Double 0's Collard Greens Jonathan White's take on Mac & Cheese, made with Bobolink's own Dumpling's Dumplings johnh91011's Veddy veddy good Samosas I didn't get any. Double 0's Mac & Cheese. Mmm Velveeta-y. Rosie's Health Salad Some of sabg's grilled vegetables Rich Pawlak's Sundried Tomato Polenta Pizza Fruit Salad and Green Salads Suzanne F's Potato Salad The Sweet Dessert Table #1 (there were two) Dumpling's Apple Tart Tatin Rachel's Banana Pudding Lauren or Johnjohn's Brownies Liz Johnson's Dr. Pepper Cake jhlurie's store bought Baklava (but from a really great store!) Chocolate Cookies with White Chips (who made these?) Rachel's Rainbow Jello Mold <-- click for instructions Slkinsey's Bourbon Pecan Pie Dumpling's Strawberry Pie

Here's some more pics from our dinner this evening, our second visit. Note, because I didn't shoot these in natural sunlight like the others and I didn't use a flash, they came out like crap and I had to do a lot of post-processing in Photoshop. But it should give you a good idea of what these dishes are like. Sikok Esan Kratiem Sausage, the cubes of stuff include diced ginger, red onion and tiny little wedges of lemon (Very good) Chicken Curry Puffs (very good, but very strong palm sugar flavor) Thai Northern Tomato Dip, with Ground Chicken (excellent) Pad Gra Prow with Beef (chili and thai basil saute, ordered Thai Spicy, Very Good) Dumpling's Gang Keow Warn (Green Curry with Shrimp, very good, had nice array of different veggies in it) Pla Jeian (Red Snapper, nice assortment of veggies, very good) Pad Prew Wan with chicken, had sort of a mild sweet and sour flavor

I was gonna ask if anyone wanted to go there for dinner tonight, because we DO want to go back. So you went assuming they were open for lunch on Saturday? I wouldn't of made that assumption, dude. I'd go back, dude. Sour grapes is totally unbecoming on you, man.

Here are the dinner menus (1.5MB per image, high resolution, only download if you have a fast connection) Kratiem Dinner Menu Side 1 Kratiem Dinner Menu Side 2 They have a larger array of stuff including fish dishes during dinner.

Requires an abundance of little old Jewish guys who know how to make them properly, mostly. Though I've seen Italians (who were students of the little old Jewish guys who ended up buying out their bakeries when they retire) do a very good job as well.

We are delighted to announce that Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page will be joining us for a Q&A on Sept 24th 2003. Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page are the husband-and-wife author team behind the 1996 James Beard Award-winning book Becoming a Chef: With Recipes and Reflections from America's Leading Chefs (1995), Culinary Artistry (1996), Dining Out: Secrets from America's Leading Critics, Chefs and Restaurateurs (1998), and Chef's Night Out: From Four-Star Restaurants to Neighborhood Favorites: 100 Top Chefs Tell You Where (and How!) to Enjoy America's Best (2001). They have two new books coming out in October 2003: The New American Chef: Cooking with the Best of Flavors and Techniques from Around the World (which advance reviews called a "brilliant" "groundbreaking," "glorious work" that is "perhaps their best book yet") and a revised edition of Becoming A Chef. They are co-hosts of the show "Chef's Night Out" on Taxi Vu, which airs in the backseats of New York City taxicabs and has featured chefs ranging from Terrance Brennan (Artisanal, Picholine, and Terrance Brennan's Seafood and Chop House) to Diane Forley and Michael Otsuka (Verbena, Bar Demi) to Amy Scherber (Amy's Bread) to Tom Valenti (Ouest) on where they like to eat on their nights off. Called "the brightest young author team on the culinary scene today" on National Public Radio, Dornenburg and Page have been featured extensively in the media, from "The Today Show" to the Food Network to CNN Headline News, as well as other TV and radio shows nationwide. Their books, cited as "the best place to experience the cult of the New American chef" by The New Yorker, have received wide coverage in publications including American Way, Bon Appetit, The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, The Detroit News, Gourmet, New York magazine, The New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine, Newsweek, Playboy, The San Francisco Chronicle, Time Out: New York, Town & Country, and The Washington Post. Married since 1990, the couple lives in New York City.

Ellen, did you have any Mongolian Beef when you were in Mongolia? Thats a real dish, right?

Ellen: Did you find any Mongolians that looked like this?

Steven, pick up like 4 or 5 packages of hamburger rolls or loaves of white bread at costco for the pulled pork, if you can. I dont think anyone is bringing regular whitebread type stuff. Herb: If you want to pick up some nice bread as well, please do. But some of us like the crappy white trash bread with the pulled pork.

Big Mac Xtreme? So its like a double quarter pounder but a Big Mac? Wow. I gotta get me one of those. Must fit in very well with their new Healthy Lifestyles campaign

Check out the Kratiem thread: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?act=ST&f=5&t=28110 This is a Thai restaurant you do NOT want to miss. The owner confirmed that yes, in fact, they are same people as Thai Chef. What boggles my mind is that he told me that Thai Chef in Englewood will be even MORE high-end dining than Kratiem, if it is to be believed. Scary.

Rachel and I went to Kratiem Asian Fusion Restaurant today in Englewood -- Its been open less than a week. I must say, I am VERY impressed with this place -- the decor, the food, the presentation, all well within NYC standards for a high-end Thai restaurant. The flavors were multi-dimensional, although nothing came out ridiculously spicy (I intend to ask them to up the ante next time) but because pictures usually speak louder than words: Exterior of restaurant on Palisade Ave Interior shot of dining room Kratiem's version of thai dumplings (Kharnom Jib) Tom Kha Gai soup, very flavorful, with great mix of sour, spicyness. Spicy Duck Salad (I was told this was very good) Mussel Appetizer (excellent) Panang Curry with Pork (excellent) Larb Gai -- this will meet with the Tommy Seal of Approval. Fantastic. Pad Thai -- an excellent rendition but next time I will ask them to make it spicier than normal. Banana with Sticky Rice topped with Ice Cream on Banana Leaf If you have a serious broadband connection here is the full Appetizer and Main Section of the menu. These are the lunch menus, the dinner menus are a few dollars more expensive per main dish. Bergen County has needed a real world class upper end Thai restaurant for a while. This is it. I spoke to one of the owners, aptly named Tommy, about the relationship between Thai Chef and this restaurant, in order to finally get the correct story. He confirmed for me that they are the same family, same owners, and that Thai Chef in Englewood will be more formal than Kratiem is and even MORE high end, if it is to be believed. Two high end Thai places in Englewood owned by the same people? We'll have to see. At the very least, you don't want to miss out on Kratiem. With Saigon Republic, Kratiem and Thai Chef all in the same town, Englewood is about to become little Southeast Asia.

A two part question, Ugo. 1. What sort table manners and etiquette existed when you were a taster? 2. What do you think of the way that food is wasted today?

Wow. Cool. Bird.

Blood Orange Juice, Pineapple Juice, Rum and some club soda/seltzer. You could also try making a Flaming Orange Gully with it.

95 points for Plantation 1992 and 94 for Mount Gay Extra Old? I dunno.

There are no upgrades this weekend. Probably next.

Kazakhstan, by comparison, is a FAR more high advanced country than Mongolia is. While it is an independent nation its home to the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Russia's (and the former USSR's) equivalent to Cape Canaveral. It was also until very recently the third most powerful nuclear power in the entire world, since it was home to many of the USSR's former ICBM launch facilities. The country also has 5 nuclear power plants.

damn. I was hoping they were ADULT happy meals. You know, with motorized electric toys in them.

Actually, there appears only to be 5 "Extraordinary" (4 star) restaurants in the NYT database: ADNY, Bouley, Daniel, JG, Le Bernardin. Lespinasse was a 4-star at the time of its closure. NYT Best Restaurants List (note, this list is pretty outdated, there are quite a few closed restaurants on this list and many new ones aren't on it, or have upgraded/downgrade ratings since this was done)