Carrot Top

mojoman, there is more to this thread and the biting comments than meets the eye than when the thread is looked at in a simplistic fashion. Previously you mentioned that the philosophy here was not only moot but also bad. I disagree. I think the philosophy that is held within the corners of talk here is very interesting. Why do people watch football games? That's part of what interests me in terms of this show, for the same sort of thing is happening. And that, is human. It is not human in any way that really hurts anyone, it is not human in any truly ugly way, it is human in a way that people need and want. It also shows in an indirect way what people will accept in terms of personality and performance from others. The story as it is played out in terms of characters and plot also interests me. I love to see how people view this, each in their own individual and basically wonderful ways. This show is particularly confusing in terms of choosing any clear-cut winner till the end, just because of how it is set up and filmed. That means that different criteria than actual formal measurement of skills comes into choosing who one is going to pull for. If you do not see the very real humor in these posts, that is your right. If I do, that is my right. If I do not see the entertainment value you see in the show, that is my right. I really am not all that interested in food just plain by itself, whether it is of the most finessed and expensive sort or of the most basic. I understand those who are and think it's a fabulous thing to be interested in, obviously. But I am interested in how people relate to it - what it means to them. I understand food well enough - but do not choose to focus on it "as food" in terms of my own interest. Well, unless someone pays me to do so and pays me well.

No, we don't, but we should. Maybe we should put our heads together and start a publication? ← For me, it would be an honorable task but a dreary one. I would consider it if that cop could be my (working) partner as I travel through my assignated places, though. For how often have I thought: "These people should be arrested for serving this sh*t."

Wow. I hope he knows that honey is good for burns. Going commando? What is this "going commando"?

Oh. I had baklava for breakfast, too. More honey.

He's good with honey, too.

I am here in the land of milk and honey, at least metaphorically. Before me sits a scoop of yogurt, thick as ice cream, sitting in a bowl in a scoop well-rounded, creamy white and thick as French buttercream. Over the top of it and pooling around is golden Appalachian honey. Easiest thing in the world to make and it always tastes good. The yogurt itself is thicker than Fage and it costs the same for two pounds of it as a small container of Fage. Its name is Karnak. Grade A Plain Yogurt Village Style. And although Karnak sounds like something from Star Wars, it is not scary at all.

I have to admit, I wondered if indeed Those Who Inhabit This Thread (perhaps from here on in we can call ourselves TWITT though I am sure that thought will be challenged and under much debate if it indeed is even challenged at all but let me just say that the name is better than when I just hit the wrong key while trying to type the capital letters and ended up with the uncomplementary name of TWITS) were just harder to please than other folk. After all, there have been comments that the judges and producers know better than anyone here so should be free of any critical commentary that does not reflect pleasingly on them. At one time, I even felt sorry for the chefs myself under so much critical commentary and one may say the occasional rude remark let loose by this group, myself not excluded. So I decided to comparison-shop. First I went to the topic that seemed likely to have similar things to discuss - Iron Chef America. And lo! and behold! The first post: So without doing too much further research (though that first post was so delightful that I might just have to read the entire topic now!) it looks as if regardless of whether a television production company has seen fit to choose the people they do as judges and pay them, said judges are not considered to be free of ardent commentary by those who decide to spend time watching their performance, whether the television company pays them for being Judges with a capital J or not. The next thing that worried me was whether or not indeed, these challenges were just . . . well . . . stupid. Happily I saw another thread that might have answers for these Vitally Important Questions (maybe we can call these sorts of questions which seem to keep popping up VIQ's for short. They do have the lingering aftertaste in the mind of cough-drops of the Vicks variety so I think it fits). Here is that topic for anyone still following along with my lengthy discussion of not-too-much here this morning: Top Chef - What Would You Make? That topic has a total of nine answers compared to the four hundred and seventy-six logged on to this topic, with kalypso as clear winner to my mind of the challenge and I seriously would have kalypso cook for me any day, any day at all, based on that elegant and lengthy list of ideas. So I'm going to have to continue to think that the challenges are somewhat challenging in some way until the numbers of commentators so actively and pleasingly for the most part, to my mind, engaged in trouncing Top Chef in general with a few lovely, gentle thoughts here and there dotted around like capers in a glistening sauce . . . wait what was I saying? Oh yes. When the numbers come close to equaling themselves, then I'll think the challenges are easy, even at second-hand. Entertainment it is indeed, but perhaps not in the way intended, is how I feel about Top Chef. And anyone that enters into the world of performing for television surely must know (even those who stretch out in bikinis while not sharpening their knife enough to cut an onion) that the world of dreams displayed on a flickering screen which we call television takes no prisoners. Can't wait for Wednesday.

I wonder what would happen if local cops in various places decided it was time to arrest people who decided to serve carelessly prepared food. Apparently one cop got mad in just this situation, and this is what he did: Learn To Cook Right, Or Else. Thank you to the police officer who decided enough was enough. Thump it off, indeed. A new cooking procedure and obviously not one that works.

Before we moved here we used to drive through town and I would think "what a cute little place" about Maxwell's but never stopped to eat. By the time we moved here, they were advertising for a chef, rather desperately, including putting up a big hand-written sign in the window. That, along with the fact that it is housed in the same building as the place that sells guns and gold with a huge day-glo orange sign decorated with camoflauge pattern that sat out in the front of the place, made me not ever decide to wander in there. After searching for a chef for some time (apparently unsuccesfully) they tried to sell it. Nobody bit, and I do think they were even willing to do owner financing. I don't remember ever seeing more than two diners in the place, and it basically became considered the place where cheating husbands took cheating wives for lunch from around the area. Just this year it closed for good. I went into Vincents once to look at the menu, space, and to smell the food. ( ) I didn't stay but I'd say your assessment is correct. It's impossible for me to be even close to objective about Italian-American restaurants though, for I compare them to the ones I used to eat in often in the Little Italys of lower Manhattan and Brooklyn and if they don't come close to meeting the criteria that's in my mind as far as menu selection, ambiance, and pre-sit-down aroma, I have no pity at all and can not summon the smallest shred. So living where I do, I can not remember the last time I had food at an Italian-American restaurant. Oh. They just closed this year, too. There's a new Italian place called "Napoli's" which has opening in the shopping center across from Kroger on Main Street in the space where first the Vietnamese then the Thai then the Turkish places each closed after about a year. The quality there will depend on who happens to be cooking that day. Usually I'll head to Roanoke for Nawab. The breads are generally good at India Garden and the veg dishes, too, for being within the geographic area you describe above.

Actually, upon further thought, if it weren't for this thread and the truly amusing commentary held within it I would have stopped watching Top Chef a long time ago. So thanks, all those whom have contributed not only to my own fun , but also to adding that one person extra viewing who will increase ratings of the show.

Well, I was one of those posters you mention so I'll answer for myself. You must have misunderstood if you thought I conjectured that Colicchio would not be able to do it better. I commented that it would be fun to see him try it. I also do not think that I said I was more qualified than he to judge it. However, I have been a professional chef functioning specifically as an Executive Chef in a fine-food situation so decided to risk saying what I said, which was said in good fun, to another person whom I understand is also a professional chef. I do agree that some of these posts are hilarious, though. Entertaining and funny. More appealing to me at many times than the show has been. So let's hear it for the peanut gallery! A resounding cheer to all funny posters! Yaaaaay!

Oh yes. There's that. Civilization and culture reduced to a Slurpee.

You're in fine fettle this morning, Rachel. It is Sunday, indeed, and time to Testify. Yeah. But my problem with them was that the promise was that we would be shown the most glamorous crowd in Miami. I kept waiting, looking, seeking and desirous of such a thing. 'Nuf said.

I'm glad you wrote this, for that had been my best guess as to the road this place had taken. The way the manager reacted to my comments almost spelled it out to anyone knowledgeable about restaurant operations, without directly saying it. Yes, it seems the food is mere window-dressing in some places. Get 'em drunk (and I assure you, everyone around us was very drunk including a beautiful young college student at the table of eight next to us whose very loudly-rendered story of what her boyfriend liked and didn't like in bed not only had my throat closing as I watched my own fifteen-year old daughter listen to her, watching an example of how a fine young lady acts in public at a "nice" restaurant, and trying to deal with that, but also had two of the young men at the table leaving it after rolling their eyes repeatedly) and the food becomes fodder to sop. It does seem to be a pattern followed too often in my opinion. Do the food well at first then skate along downgrading it bit by bit while floating along on past reputation. Blech. Tawdry, really, no matter what the price tag attached. I dislike the pretense. If a place is all about beer, just admit it and break out the pretzels. But on the other hand, it seems like my take on this is not the majority's take on it, for the place is packed, as are all the other places that do the same thing (bar scene masked as "nice" restaurant).

Beer, bait and cigarettes. Gas and stamps. Considered this way, any produce is mere frippery. Cheap loaves of white bread in bright colored wrappers and milk for which prayer is required to have it stay fresh more than three hours after its purchase. The illiterate finding a way to make a living, without the peering eye of disdain. A few sorts of "penny candy" in large dusty plastic jars. I think the price for "penny candy" now lingers between fifteen and twenty cents. I expected your area to have country stores, SB, because to me it is the land of Paul Bunyan. Tall tales abound, and where tall tales hail from (just as they do in the South, but the flavor is different, not Bunyan-esque) one must have country stores as counter-point. There's simply no other way. The places hold onto the odd corners of romance and small human stories that have absolutely nothing to do with Accomplishment with a capital A or the posing that accompanies it. That music will be gone. All that will be left is the Seven-Eleven and the Mall, Fresh Market and everyone striving to be Paris Hilton or her male counterpart. Whoever that is. We'll be a land that mirrors TV rather than TV (or I think it used to be literature?) mirroring us. We will eat what the TV tells us is most delightful and will not be able to discern or comprehend any sort of life that is not media-created. Jolly today, aren't I.