Carrot Top

You are right, Fifi (as you so often are)...I do love this story! But are you certain, now, thinking back on it...that it wasn't Mayhaw Man in an albatoss suit posing as one of those birds...trying to see if you had any pickled okra in your picnic basket...

Good question. I don't think it can be separated. Part of the intent of the original question was to attempt to define what would make a meal 'the greatest' for people, and to find a common thread of context if there was one. I'm curious about this both in a professional and personal sense, having been responsible for preparing the context and the meal itself many many times, and usually aiming (if not too tired) to have 'this one' be 'the best one'. There were negligible mentions of dining solo throughout the discussion... This could be due to the fact that many people just plain do not enjoy it, or it could be that the consensus of the contributors was so strongly weighed towards the idea of companionship as a vital part of the meal that some people who feel otherwise, would not post for fear of being the 'odd duck'. Companionship, locale, fresh air and physical exercise, and hospitality, (the feeling of being exceptionally well taken care of), were all mentioned as part of these 'best meal' experiences. And touches of serendipity, too. Besides, of course, the technique, knowledge, and skills of the chef. It was also interesting to me to see that there were no writings of real hunger...the sort that gnaws the belly...in any of these writings. (You know, they say hunger is the best sauce...) Again, either this is a very lucky group or else nobody is mentioning it due to it being different than the norm. These are all fascinating to me to read and thank you all for sharing!

Not so much to 'counter', exactly...for if one is in a situation where there is that 'ambiance', created by having other people around, that is absolutely wonderful. It was a real question, though, that I was asking, although I phrased it flippantly. I'm pretty sure that I am not the only person in the world that... did not grow up surrounded by loving family whose influence would leave a legacy of wonderful food memories, and am also quite sure that I am not the only person who has lived a somewhat isolated life at times due to a variety of circumstances that can affect people. Many people at different times in their lives are alone for many reasons. Some of these could be: having to geographically relocate often, health problems, personal crises such as divorce.... Just putting my two cents in, that's all, for something I really feel, that the best meal of one's life actually could be experienced solo...and just wondering if anyone else had had the same experience and was willing to share their experience.

Hmmm. Well, you know...I've realized for some time now that I am definitely odd...but am I the only person who has truly enjoyed a meal in solitude...communing only with the tastes?! Ouch. It might be that during the meals that I have enjoyed in company with friends or family my intent to ensure that either the food or the ambiance or whatever was just so 'right' (gosh, I dunno who put me in charge...it's always been a mystery...) that that particular attitude disallowed that the best meals were in company. Certainly the atmosphere is fuller with people around...but just to taste and enjoy...for me solo can be better. And not having to get dressed up and sit in odd chairs that are sometimes uncomfortable is better too. Fussy, huh? But at least I'm a cheap date it seems!

Mmm. Liverwurst and beets, yes...Scandanavian. Very healthy too! Add a couple of shots of aquavit and that will keep you warm all winter...

Yes they serve them, but they haven't yet learned how to make them. So true. One might say that about their burgers, too, though... (Sorry to slide off-thread, this was too good a chance to resist! )

moreso, probably. Oh please stop making me laugh. It is interrupting my lunch....

Oy. The great thing about eGullet is that it offers forums (and blogs) for everyone...there are forums about celebrity chefs, celebrities who are not chefs but who apparently eat and have to pay for it, home cooks, 'foodies', and even forums on gourmet or not-so-gourmet dogs. eGullet is here for us to discuss and describe and learn about food through our highly individual lives. Danielle's life at this moment is particulary interesting to me not through her child, or because of her child... but because of the fact that a very young child is (by the neccesity of the fact that it needs care, can not feed or take care of itself yet) almost a living part of the person who has charge of taking care of it. As they say, it's a tough job but someone's gotta do it. Someone did it for each one of us, or we would not be here to play on the computer. Some people have shared wonderful stories of their childhood foods and the love that was served up along with it...this is that action, seen in 'real time'. Dylan will have stories for eGullet in the future. And as Alice Toklas said 'What is sauce for the goose may be sauce for the gander, but it is not neccesarily sauce for the chicken, the duck, the turkey, or the Guinea hen.' Thanks for taking the time to do this blog this week, Danielle. Those photos are making me hungry!

You must have done a good job, to have him calling for cooking advice! There were so many hilarious mispronounciations of things that I have already forgotten...and my children are only (only?) ten and twelve years old....but the one phrase that sticks in my mind is one my son used for several years. When announcing that he was hungry, he would add...'Mom, I want something Hot and Tasty and something Cold and Sweet!' (Sounded like he was on his way to creating his own fast food restaurant with the motto ready-made....) He still likes that combo. Food's gotta be hot and tasty and drink's gotta be cold and sweet or disappointment is lurking....

I remember reading that you are currently in charge of putting these products into standardized recipe forms...the first question I have is, are you intending to translate this recipe into either weight definitions or larger measure definitions i.e. quarts, etc. instead of cups...? Those are some heavy duty production quantities. Do you refrigerate the batter after mixing and scoop as needed for daily production...or scoop and freeze...or is that actually the daily production level? My first instinct is to aim for checking the levels of leavening. The more you batch it, the more this needs adjustment. But it has been a long time since I've done even close to that level of production of a muffin, so maybe I can give you a reference that could save you some time. (Unless, of course, the right person happens to log onto eGullet and sort it all out, which is entirely possible! ) The Culinary Institute of America has a website which not only has links to a free online standardized recipe costing program that can be downloaded which may include similar recipes in bulk quantities, but also a catalog of the professional courses they offer, which include baking. The instructors are quite interested and helpful, I've found, in this program...if you are motivated enough to call and ask the administrator who the 'right person to ask' would be, you likely could get a good answer from that instructor. The website is ciaprochef.com Good luck!

Mmm. Both wonderful vegetables...you are lucky to find them! I seem to have Italian food on my mind in thinking of them. I remember an excellent pasta dish eaten in Florence many years ago...baby artichokes lightly browned and tossed together in a sauce that included chopped tomatoes and onions, served over spagetti....and then another, fava beans 'guanciale' cooked with bits of bacon cooked till crisp, then add chopped onions and fava beans...a bit of white wine...yum. Another recipe is coming to mind...fava beans and baby artichokes blanched then tossed together with sauteed morels or other wild mushrooms...a bit of fresh mint perhaps or even some chopped sauteed fennel bulb...with a risotto Milanese... a lovely meal!

Sounds like it will be a fun week for us all to read, Danielle. Please, in the midst of all the wonderful food and tastes, don't leave out the parts where the very real and demanding care of your beautiful and charming daughter intereferes...it will make all us other mothers smile with rememberance and understanding!

That Roald Dahl cookbook is great fun to read (jeez I can't believe the price, so inexpensive!) We've borrowed it from the library several times and have made a couple of the recipes in there. It is still not my ten year old son's favorite cookbook though. That space is filled by 'The Eat-A-Bug Cookbook' by David George Gordon. It says on the cover that it covers 'The Essentials of Bug Cookery...from Soup to Gnats'. We have not made anything from this book yet... the ingredients such as one-half cup Western Thatching Ants are not easy to come by, and I refuse to help him search the neighborhood for them. An enjoyable read, though...!

OK I'll confess. I started this thread just to get some real good stories. And boy, was it ever a success. Each of these is a gleaming little jewel in its own way, and I've read each with a satisfied sigh, as I am sure many other readers have. I could not think of what the best meal of my life was. I do know what the best 'food experience' of my life was, but it was not a meal. It was riding my bike at seven years old, with a new 'transistor radio' hanging on the handlebars, sometime around 1963, eating cotton candy which had been bought at the local Mom and Pop store. It was ultimate joy. Other times have been my first taste of homemade bread with good cheddar cheese, the first roast beef sandwich from a New York Jewish Deli, steak at Peter Lugers, a carpaccio of salmon at le Bernadin, a pile of three sorts of caviar at Petrossians with champagne to slurp along, and a marvel of a ripe Reblochon bought on a market street in Paris. But it all pales compared to this meal: A tomato salad. It goes without saying that the tomato must be perfect and from a good garden. A hint of red onion so very finely slivered...olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. Good crusty bread warmed, to wipe the plate. It should be eaten in bed, surrounded by books, with the TV set on low, showing Law and Order. I considered whether this meal would be better experienced in that state that happens once in a rare while...the state of marital bliss. But then decided...no! This meal is best if you can sit smack dab in the middle of the bed while you can freely rumple the covers whichever way you please. Wear a t-shirt, and feel free to drip a bit of yummy stuff on it. It adds to the experience. Ahhhhh...heaven. That, is the closest I can imagine, to the best meal of my life.

Hmmm. It is not so much the taste of the dragonfruit that is good but maybe the texture, to me.... It is available once in a rare while here (in southwestern Virginia) because the small city I live in has an international population drawn to the university here. Tamarind, in my experience in living here and there in the US, is more widely available. It used to be that you could only find it in the Hispanic grocery stores, but now it is more often found in the usual chain groceries.... Indonesia, huh? Now there is a land of many fascinating tastes! P.S. That photo of a soursop almost looks 'painterly'. However that photo was taken, it did something special to the subject.

Yes, Roald Dahl uses food as a theme in almost anything I can think that he wrote, so why not consider the writings food-related! He also wrote a cookbook for children based on yucky looking and sounding things to cook which were actually edible. Lovely. Really, I mean it. Ask any seven year old boy. Eating bugs is fun.

Mmm. I dunno. I have a hard time thinking of her as that. To me, she is and will always remain what my (then) six-year old son called her when she first became well-known: Jennifer Low-Pants

Here, I'll add myself to the Hall of Shame. It is even a worse perversion than yours, Soba. My mother used to serve (fancy word there, huh?) Franco American Spagetti. The kind in the can, no meatballs, just gooey spagetti drenched in a soupy mess of a orangy-red dyed sauce. Every once in a rare while I get a terrible hankering for it. I buy it, trying to hide it under other things in the grocery cart. As I approach my house, my mouth starts watering and it is all I can do to not eat the stuff cold out of the can. A brief microwaving later and I am sated. Adding insult to injury, it is impossible to eat this stuff without dripping or splattering it on yourself. Impossible.

The title you wrote for this made me laugh...sounded like a disco song from the 70's. Then the photos continued my little fantasy by looking like some one sort of left over from the 70's who just took a few too many drugs... I love dragonfruit and tamarind. Wonderful photos and a nice reminder to get to stop by that section of the supermarket and pick up some....

Spagetti and meatballs...is also something that is fun and 'educational' to make with your kids. Not to mention that this is one instance where they truly can be very helpful even if they are quite young, as the mechanics are simple and the supervision level low. As you are standing there making the sauce and chopping anything that needs chopping, just give out directions like 'Get the big bowl, etc etc'...and so on, through the entire process of having them make the meatballs. The only time they may need assistance is with cracking the egg... It keeps them busy and they LOVE shaping the meatballs. I have them put the finished product on sheetpans....in this house it is neccesary to have two separate ones so brother and sister who are only a year and a half apart in age don't fight over space...! Then we bake them lightly in the oven before popping them into the sauce to finish. My favorite sauce (which is not made all that often because I detest detail-oriented grocery shopping) is made with browned spareribs and garlic which are then braised with chopped Italian tomatoes...the sauce is finished with cut pieces of Italian sausage and the meatballs simmered in the sauce for another twenty minutes or so with some chopped oregano and parsley tossed in for the last five minutes of cooking. Comfort food. And it freezes well.

This Central Park mushroom education thing has been going on for at least (oh please, I cannot believe that I know this...) thirty years. Look in New York Magazine in the section of 'Things to Do'. It is usually listed there.

What food-related books are you currently reading? Do you read more than one at a time? If it is a cookbook, do you tend to scan it or do you thoroughly read it... Are you enjoying the book you are reading at the moment? Any comments on it? I'm reading 'Much Depends on Dinner' by Margaret Visser and am enjoying it though it is a bit of a slower read than some others I've read due to the concentration level required to think through the historic and sociologic references. Usually I read two or three books at the same time but am running short on titles I have an urge for... I do tend to scan traditional cookbooks rather than read though I used to gobble up every word. Tell us what is on your reading table!

Gosh, Behemoth...I was reading your post with such intent fascination and so quickly that for a minute I thought you wrote 'the massive portions of vinyl siding at Applebee's'...

Mmm. A feast. The only thing I could remember about Penn. Dutch cooking is that you must have 'seven sweets and seven sours' on the table (shades of the Seven Samurai and the Seven Sisters... yikes) and a dish called Schnitz un Knepp which is dried apples cooked with country ham and dumplings. Surely a whole roast fresh ham replete with cracklings would not be out of order, though...

Steven, I am in agreement with that too. You need the numbers, the demographics. As Maybelline mentioned (and I really had to laugh at thinking of hearing this in what I guess might be her marvellous Southern drawl)...you need the Guidos. Listen, I don't mean this in any insulting way to anyone, please. I've been both rich and poor and am half-WASP half Jewish and have been married to an Italian. AND at the present moment I stay home and raise children. Nope, not in a hip urban area! And as for the numbers hitting the New Orleans/ or Las Vegas areas...that is just a different form of culture, isn't it. A different form of Art, of Money, of Fashion (ooh la la) and of Design. But there still is that edge. Not the New York edge, but an in your face edge nonetheless... And it's that edge that must be captured in designing that sort of menu...IF that is truly what the client means when rapidly throwing out that phrase. I must say this topic is almost as wonderful as religion or politics for a good debate!