Carrot Top

maher is the one who deserves credit for the thread, Reefpimp. I'd never start such a controversial topic. Good question about the other guys and whether they can be thought of in the same light. Mmm. I think so too. But it's always interesting to flip a question on its end to look at the other side of it, too. It is the strong emotional content of food and the urges of chefs who aspire to what we think of as art that makes the question valid. The answer to the question does finally shape how we eat everyday, too, in a sense. And how we think about food and ourselves and our world. His name is art, Rachel. Say it however you wish. Whatever way you choose, it will sound fascinating.

It could be seen that way, particularly in situations where the cultural histories are stripped out from underneath the act such as when the live fish is being served at "extreme" prices to people who are foreign to the concept of eating it - the whole act could be seen as that of an "acquisition" purchased with the focus being on the fact that one can afford to pay for this particular acquisition. It would be my guess that originally, though, that part of the reason for eating things that are live and squiggling (squiggling in a way that oysters don't even when they are alive) *in* the cultures in which this occurs is that eating these things is not meant to be just about freshness or just about eating the food itself. It is about eating in a way that affects not only the tastebuds and physical being but eating in a way that affects the emotional and philosophic being. When you face something alive, something that resembles "us" in the ways that it shows life, and face it down to then consume it while it is alive, something has to happen in that moment. In that moment, a question is in your face whether you ask it of yourself or not. As Fat Guy said It makes us ask who we are. There was a historic tribe who used to eat the bodies of their enemies after battle, with the greatest warriors of the winning tribe being allowed to eat the bodies of the greatest warriors of the other (losing) tribe. It was seen that the consuming of the bodies of their enemies would bring them their bravery and strength - it was a way of celebrating the win of the battle, giving honor to the enemy for their bravery, and then gaining that bravery in the eating all in one act. Seems to me that dining upon live and squiggling things falls in this sort of tradition. If you can sit and eat another live thing, face it down and consume it, it is as much a philosophic battle as it is "dining". The inner self has been fed as well as the physical. I can't imagine that this concept will become too wide-spread here in the US, though, in a land where mostly people like to see their meat and fish wrapped up in paper and plastic, far apart from looking as if it were ever "live". But I do think that it will be a part of the aspirational dining scene, and not just because of the cult of freshness.

There's something that happens to me when I taste something that is exceptional rather than run of the mill or even just plain good. I never thought, honestly, that this would happen to me in Blacksburg, Virginia - but it did, today. It was at a place I hadn't tried before though it's been open over a year. The space was vaguely unappealing to me from the front. There have been other places that have opened, places with more swashbuckle about them, that I've tried. Some have been good, some have been uneven in performance, some have been blah. Sitting down late this afternoon, a hot and sunny late summer afternoon, I thought that at least I'd have an okay glass of wine and some okay pizza. I was proved wrong, and had more than that. What happens to me when I taste something that is exceptional is that time suspends itself in an odd fashion. Time, suddenly becomes wrapped up in a bite, in a long taste, in a swallow, in an aftertaste. Being a rather particular and often quietly cranky person underneath the smile that is always on my face, I do not often taste something that I consider exceptional, so today I was totally taken aback. Time suspends itself in the bite, and after the swallowing there is an all-encompassing quiet that strikes me, a deep and unavoidable seriousness.It is as if Honor were invoked in the tasting, an honor that belonged to the cook and to the world. My smile disappears from my face. It feels as if something of serious and high intent happened, a wonderful zen-like thing. And I am caught in its trap, suspended like a bug in a spider's web, but not worried at all about being eaten, for it is me that is eating the magical thing. This all happened this evening at a place surprisingly called "Ceritano's Ristorante". Sitting at a table on the deck. The food was food that others make other places. Clams in a white wine sauce. Mushrooms stuffed with crabmeat. Nothing unusual for an Italian-American place anywhere. Brick-oven baked bread, as brick-oven pizza is their specialty. A cannoli came home with me. Soon I'll eat it. I can not wait to see if it resembles the other food I ate in being a Cannoli of Magic and Honorable Things.

I found another article in Leite's Culinaria: Laver Bread: Welsh Sea Biscuits by Gary Allen. It's nori? Incredible how different the final products are, made from the same thing! There's a link in that article to "Wales Direct" which sells laverbread in cans which notes: I would imagine that it must be much better fresh as most canned things are wont to be. It would be nice to try it fresh - the recipes you all mentioned above sound really good. That comment about cold laverbread with vinegar eaten in Cornwall startled me, for my grandmother used to serve cooked spinach with butter and cider vinegar (her father was from Cornwall) and usually by the time one got to eat it, it was cold, or at least room temp (but that probably was error not intent ).

Alimentum Online, Third Issue, for your pleasure. A sample: More on the site.

Here's the guy I think of as a "newer Euell", judiu. Fergus the Forager

Here's a link to some ideas.

I just came across mention of lava bread and cockles while searching something else. It certainly sparked my interest. Here are two links: Welsh Icons - Lava Bread The Secret Life of Cockles Has anyone here ever eaten lava bread and cockles?

There are only two children I know who have been headed towards being overweight (one would have called them "pleasingly plump" in past times rather than obese, or one would have mentioned that they were "big-boned") who were told by the doctor to lose weight and who succesfully did so. One was a girl (then eleven) who is a friend of my daughter's one a boy (also eleven at the time) who is a friend of my son's. Both were put on diets and exercise regimens. The girl was on a low-carb diet and started both ballet and cheerleading the same year where previously she had not been active in this way. Within a year she had brought herself to where the doctor was pleased and she was too. The boy became a vegetarian after discussion of options with his mother as that choice pleased him the most, and also became more physically active than he had been before, taking karate four times a week rather than two while also participating in the soccer team at school. In both cases, the parents were very involved in the entire process. They actively (then and now) act as coaches, support systems, aides-de-camp, and sometimes as diet cops when they feel they must. They make sure the diets are followed, they drive the kids to activities and back each day, they set up the household to assist in the goals they set. In either case, this has not been easy at times for the parents or for the children. The lines drawn have been pretty tight. Both children also have natural temperaments that do not buck or fight back. Both are naturally easy-going kids. Both have lost the weight they wanted to/needed to. Well, there's an example of two cases that I know that have worked.

Ah. But who really ever wants to put ooh la la aside? Just read Alchemists post full of the most marvellous masculine variety of ooh la la and having taken a taste, how could one want to walk away? Impossible. But actually I do say these sorts of things all the time and often nobody has any idea what I'm talking about so I don't really worry too much about it. .......................................... But to be serious for one brief moment, I was playing with words within my little Sunday afternoon essay. Here is the definition of demi-monde from the American Heritage Dictionary: Even with a real definition, using that word within the sentence I wrote doesn't make a tremendous amount of sense unless one can put oneself in a zen-like place of thinking where one is trying to escape two varying types of worlds in the same moment, but I decided to write it anyway just for the fun of it. Must have spent too much time over the stockpot in the past - braincells steamed a bit. But funny, anyhow, that this thread on temperament has lead back to writers with that dictionary definition of demi-monde. I wonder if it is catching.

When a working environment of any sort becomes known as "The Life" in everyday language, an impossible generalization and glossing-over of reality occurs. Things take on a narrative tenor with hints of romanticism lurking round the edges of a world surmised in the listener's mind as one with perhaps dangerous or at least unknown qualities, far apart from their own lives. The quality of Bohemian vs. Bourgeois enters the scene. People who work in restaurants are not different than people who work in the stock market, or in a factory, or even perhaps as prostitutes. They come in all sizes and shapes. They are female and male. Some have families that they put first, some put work first, some just don't put anything first but wander along doing their best to enjoy the day. The romantic image as attached to the restaurant life or to that of being a chef does allow one to use the excuse of certain personality traits if one wishes to, of course. These supposed personality traits have been a traditional refuge from whatever one wishes refuge from in other "artistic" mondes and demi-mondes (let's just slip on that little black silk negligee with those words, too - using monde and demi-monde rather than "worlds" gives a little shiver of pleasurable excitement that hints at a bit of the ooh la la of The Life) since forever. Great refuge if wanted, tossed round with black silk lingerie and clocks that don't work and calendars that can get lost when wanted. Ah, The Life.

I would make an artichoke/pancetta/ caramelized onion puff pastry tart. Quick and easy. Roll, saute, fill and bake. Then corn chowder with the corn, bacon, stock, and potatoes etc. Corn chowder is good as an evening summer meal even if it is hot . . . The sausage can be cut or rolled into bite size pieces, put on a skewer with onions and peppers if you have them or just plain if you don't, and grilled slowly. .............................. Or you could use the sausage, broken up and browned with lots of onions, to fill the tart with the addition of mozzarella. And make a corn and bean and artichoke salad tossed with frizzled pancetta and vinaigrette . .............................. I would find a friend with a freezer for the extra glace and stock. Of course you could always make jellied madrilene but that's probably pretty passe.

I knew there was something nagging in the back of my head at that term. From "Cassell's Dictionary of Slang": Well, well. A sixth definition must be added, obviously.

I'm glad that the required well-phrased defense of Oklahoma piqued you to a first post, annabelle. And I was thinking about those huckleberries all day yesterday, too. Had to eat blueberries instead from North Carolina and they were obviously grown to be shipped, because they tasted like little purple cotton balls.

Mmm . . . it tastes better than Propel, to me. As far as the cost goes, I think the last bottle of 30 multi-vitamins I bought cost around twelve dollars or so. It would take two bottles of the "50/50" variety of Vitamin Water at a dollar fifty or so per bottle to equal that so at three dollars a day times thirty days that makes ninety dollars a month. That's just for one person. When you consider that now my son also likes this stuff, if we all drink it that makes two hundred seventy dollars a month in Vitamin Water. See what I mean? I used to need to make money so I could afford to live in New York City. Now my life has devolved to the point where I need to make money to buy Vitamin Water. It does taste good, though. Sigh.

No, but you reminded me that my daughter is now hooked on Vitamin Water and I love it too, though I regret the price of it as it seems silly to me to pay for water, though I do. It tastes like light koolade. And it seems to promise a full days worth of vitamins in each bottle, but read closely as it really does not and some basic things are missing, like enough calcium. It seems to be an up and coming thing. Coca-Cola Co. just bought the brand recently . . . . . . and it has some fabulous television ads. Pretty good stuff. And no, it does not make me queasy when drinking it. Just worried about why I am spending money on water.

Oh, honey . . . I still love canned spaghetti. But you know I make sure to *hide* when I eat it.

My method of keeping the milk at the right temp for becoming yogurt is a combination high-tech/low tech bundle: Place it on top of the cable-TV box with a knitted wooly winter cap over it.

Maybe that's where the idea of using ketchup on eggs came from. *Anything*, to help choke down the things.

It's funny how so often it's all about style. Much more so than it being about the substance of the thing. But style can often define substance. When I first was a professional chef, I loved that chef coat. Even though they didn't have them in my size back then. I looked rather smurfish, with all those rolled up sleeves and floppy bulkiness enveloping me. Now, of course, they make chef's coats (and very elegant ones, too) to fit even three and four year old children. (I can see them now, in front of their plastic play kitchens, trying to mimic Gordon Ramsay as the teddy bears hover, bow, and rush around making plastic little dishes of food.) (Now there's a business opportunity not yet mined - making the traditional plastic play fruit and vegetables and eggs and such into plastic play "foodie" items. A towering stacked salad, a foam of something-or-other, little dark green leaves of plastic mesclun . . . ahhh. Start 'em young. But that's a different topic.) Later when I was an executive chef those bulky chef's coats became tiring to me. The uniform I wanted to wear was the corporate suit. So as often as possible, I did. In certain environments, executive chefs spend a lot of time out of the kitchen not cooking but feeding the people they intend to have dine at their tables in other ways - fussing over menus, fussing over fussing over menus, fussing over how to possibly procure all the things that are needed for the menus, fussing over the cooks who are fussing over each other and the food vendors and the executive chef . . . so as often as possible, I did not wear the chef coat. It was there, I could put it on (most importantly, put it on with an apron which helps keep all that lovely food off of the rest of the clothes one wears) when I went into the kitchen, but it was not my badge of chef-ness. That resided within me somewhere, though it wanted to wear other clothes, clothes that I saw as having more potential. Wearing those clothes, the Tahari suits and silk blouses, wearing that uniform that style, eventually became what I did wear when the next transition was made from exec chef to corp manager/VP. Style matters. Style says substance in ways, or hints at it. It can also be a laughable thing, as when the wearer has absolutely nothing to bring to what one has draped on oneself as defining uniform. Uniforms define vocation, and the owners of vocation are territorial. Can you do the job? Wear the uniform if you like it. There will of course be some big territorial dogs that might like to come round and bark if you're not in their pack. Bark right back. As a matter of fact, lift your leg on them if you please. "Chef" is an action word, it is a verb as well as a title. Some people are chefs that don't use the title in daily use. I never did when I was one, my own name seemed better. The notion of hearing "Chef Karen" hollered through the kitchen seemed ludicrous. Though I know some guys like, love, the idea of hearing their name attached to "Chef" being hollered out. Rob, wear the chef's coat in your commercial kitchen. If it looks good, if it gives the right impression for what you are doing at this moment, if it keeps the rest of your clothes from being spattered with food - there's no law that says you shouldn't. You should. Just remember, the dog that pisses the highest is top dog. Aim high.

As for the nausea? I wa told that taking them at night help. No go. Then I just wake up nauseated........ ← Mm mm mm. Tina Turner and we three. What's love got to do with it, I ask you. We don't need no stinkin' pills.

I am of the school that buys vitamins then stares at them on the counter till their expiration date is past. Then I throw them out and sooner or later buy more and do the same thing. The children take gummy vites in the winter months and sometimes I will have one too for the fun of it, though they claim I am stealing their vitamins when I do so I have to hide in the kitchen and eat one very quickly! They taste pretty good and do seem to help quicken recovery from common colds, particularly if they take one regular gummy vite and another gummy vite with echinacea in it. The dark cherry ones are the best. Something odd happens often when I do take real vitamins - they make me nauseous, sort of like the same feeling you can get from drinking tea with a very high tannin level. I've heard that this does happen to other people, from doctors. It's not just me. It is difficult to think of the concept of someone taking handfuls of vitamins each day if they don't really *have* to.

One has to wonder whether this is how he feels it or whether this is how the editors or publishers shaped it. Very nice post for your initial foray into eG, dharold.

I don't know what they were, divalasvegas. All I know is that I got away from them as quickly as possible. But considering my recent experiences with suck-y food out there in the world, I have now decided that the answer of "time and money" just does not cut it. It is not an adequate response. Currently, I am quite certain that the answer to the question of "why does so much food suck?" lies in String Theory. Alternate dimensions, existing side-by-side with our own. How those people that make suck-y food ever fell into the other dimensions can not be explained yet, but surely with time an answer will come.

I take one bite from the center. Maybe another. Then starting at the left edge, I nibble that round and round so that the left edge has been neatly demolished. Then I do a bit of typewriter left to right. Then a bit of typewriter right to left on the other side. This is no mere arbitrary biting, I assure you. It is all part of a Plan. Then all the other parts are devoured just as I please, with whatever part that looks most appealing being bitten off first. I do not use those little corn holder things on the ends, those little plastic yellow skewer-forks that look like cute instruments of torture and doom. Though I do like to have several scattered about in the kitchen drawer, just because.