lperry

A huge bag of Hershey's miniatures, Mounds and Almond Joy bars, Tootsie Pops, and crayons. I let them choose three or four pieces, and the little ones always pick the crayons. Oh to be young and free of the need for chocolate... Of course, the best thing about buying Halloween candy is that you get to eat all the leftovers !

Uh oh. The risotto police are going to take me down. I make it in a pressure cooker. No stirring at all!

Cheetos. The crunchy kind. I eat about half the bag then lick the crusty orange stuff off my fingers. I also take some crap for a swedish fish habit.

Butternut squash is really nice in risotto. It's a good cool weather dish, I think. You can also use butternut in the place of pumpkin in pretty much any recipe including pie. A butternut pie made with a roasted squash is fantastic. Also, my latest Food and Wine had a nice recipe from Mario Batali for cavatelli with spicy winter squash. You might need to get one of those cute Villaware cavatelli makers, but hey, everyone needs more gadgets .

I've been looking on Craigslist for housing - I just checked and couldn't find anything on food coops. Finding one may be a problem, but creating one is very doable! There is one large conglomerate that sells to food buying groups in Virginia and Maryland. It's called the Federation of Ohio River Cooperatives. I found it listed and recommended on a few sites run by people who have formed buying groups. Unfortunately, they don't have a website.

I buy most of my food from farmer's markets and specialty ethnic grocery stores, so that makes me feel better. Thank you to everyone for the listing and discussion of stores in several threads. I also checked out eatwashington.com and found some interesting things. It's so nice to have this resource - usually I spend the first few months in a new place shopping every store to try to find what I need.

Hello - I'm going to be moving to the DC area within the next month, so I've been lurking around in the DC boards, and I have to say, I'm a little afraid of what I'm going to find in terms of groceries! I'm used to Florida produce (year round) and good grocery stores. One thing I haven't seen mentioned is a food buying co-op for DC. Not a co-op store, but a buying group that gets together once a month to put in an order to a big company. I have been in groups like this in Florida and Illinois, and it was great. We ordered from the same companies that stock the local Whole Foods sorts of stores - all you need is a minimum order. I don't use many packaged foods, but I loved the rices, nuts, dried wild mushrooms, freshly milled organic flour (bread baking is an absolute pleasure with this), fresh dried beans, sea salts etc. Then there is the fresh organic produce. We got organic, quality, fresh food at wholesale prices. Has anyone heard of a group like this in the DC area?

You can make a wonderful fresh saffron pasta and then add saffron to a cream sauce with delicate additions like baby artichokes and peas. I'm so jealous!

How about the Camellia Grill for the NO breakfast? Pecan waffles, omelettes, and atmosphere.

I like to make lots of filled pastas at a time. Ravioli, tortellini, gyoza etc. I usually make a few batches, cook some for dinner, then freeze the rest of them individually on sheet pans and then put them in the freezer in ziplock bags and try to remember to use them before they get freezerburned. I'd like to take advantage of my pasta making moods and turn out loads of them and then freeze them in vacuum sealed bags for longer storage. Here's my question. Will a vacuum sealer work with little frozen chunky pieces like that? I was worried about the sharp edges on the frozen pasta, and about all the air being sucked out from between the pieces. Thanks- Linda

Karo syrup is made from corn, cane syrup is made from sugar cane. Brown sugar recipes may be authentic for some areas, but I've never seen them in Florida or North Georgia. Anyone's Grandma make a brown sugar pie? You could sub in cane syrup, but be sure to taste it first. It has a distinctive strong flavor. You may want to go half and half. I don't know where to get wild pecans other than off the trees. If you are looking for them and someone claims to be selling them, they are smaller than commercial varieties with a denser, oilier texture. If the vendor will let you taste, they have a much more full and intense flavor. Man. I'm gonna go make me a pie. -Linda

For more years than I can remember, my Grandmother has grown sugar cane and pecans. The cane gets sent through an old cast iron grinder/press that once was operated by a mule - now it's hooked up to the axle of a tractor. The juice is boiled down into syrup in a huge kettle, and all sorts of people show up and sit on benches to watch, chat, and wait so they can get their bottle of syrup for the year. I will admit that cane syrup is an aquired taste that I have never grown to appreciate as much as my Mom's generation, but I do put a bit of it into pecan pies every time I make one. The pecans come from the trees growing just outside the fields where the cane grows. The play of the strong cane flavor against the toasty sugared pecans is just heavenly. I can't imagine a holiday dinner without pecan pie. I think it is just an ingrained part of the culture. If Thanksgiving came and there was no pecan pie, everybody would wonder what tragedy had brought forth such an unthinkable occurrence. It would be discussed for years. "Remember that Thanksgiving when we didn't have the pecan pie?" (Followed by the shaking of heads and looks of chagrin). I have never had a pecan pie outside of the south that tasted "right." The nuts never taste quite as they should. I agree with Fifi. The hybrid varieties may be easy to shell, but they will never capture the intensity of flavor in nuts from the wild trees.

The people at the Korean grocery were really helpful. I went in with notes from you all (thanks) and they found the yut and gave me a bottle of mirin for the matsul. So I made it with the "right" ingredients. I cooked the beans uncovered, although I do think a drop lid would have made them cook a little more evenly before the soy sauce mixture went in. This would mean less stirring = less loss of wrinkly bean skins. The dish that I originally had in the restaurant was not so sweet and didn't have the sesame seeds. I like this one with the sticky syrup and seeds better.

YUM! Thank you for all the help! -Linda Edited to say: My next attempt at Korean food will be a Kimchee. Once again, eGullet to the rescue with the kimchee thread...

I did my Master's work in a marsh on the west coast of Florida, and we often added glasswort to our camping dinners. All you have to do is walk out in the intracoastal and pick it yourself (usual warnings about location and pollution apply). Grab some friends and go wading this weekend. It is peppery in flavor with an incredible crisp-tender texture. We put it in salads and even cooked in in a few stir fry dishes. I remember a student from California gawking at the vast expanses of this "weed" for which he had paid exorbitant prices in Berkeley.

Hala (four restaurants, two with stores) has great Middle Eastern groceries and food. They supply a lot of the local stores with breads. Check out bestofjax.com. It has some useful listings.

The beans are soaking. I'll report back later. Can't wait!

Shopping for food? The only problem is that Jax is HUGE so there are many small neighborhoods with good markets. It all really depends on where you are. In Mandarin, try the Fresh Market for nice breads and cheeses. Native Sun carries organic produce. The Asia Supermarket just down the road has produce deliveries on Thursdays and gets in great stuff including greens, burdock root, taro, etc. For Korean and Mexican groceries (I know, it's a weird combo, but you'll learn about Jacksonville soon enough ) (I can say that since I grew up in Orange Park.... ) try World Food on Art Museum Drive at Beach. This is a GREAT market and people are really helpful here if you find something interesting and want to know how to cook it. Everyone has hit the higher end places, so I'll go for the lower price lunch and dinner places. For Italian from Italian immigrants, try Sarnelli's or Santorini's in Orange Park. I agree with La Nopalera for Mexican. Thai Garden in OP by I295 is good and has a decent wine list for here. I've recently moved back home after years away at university and grad school in bigger markets including New Orleans. All I can say is that you CAN get good food here, you just need to hunt sometimes. I'll add more as I think of it - I just saw this post. -Linda

This is interesting. I have never heard of a "drop lid." I assume this is to promote even cooking? Also, what's up with the old nail?

Thank you!

Years ago at a Korean restaurant I was served a black soybean dish with all those lovely little pickled things at the beginning of a meal. Since that time, I've tried to find a recipe, and I've asked every Korean person I know how to make it. I almost always hear, "Oh yeah, those are great. My Mom/Grandmother makes them. I don't know how to make them." I recently saw bags of black soybeans at a Korean grocery in Jacksonville, and I asked a few customers and the guy at the checkout about preparing this dish. Again, everybody knew about it, but nobody knew how to make it. Does someone have a recipe? Or is it just one of those simple cook the beans and toss with salt and vinegar sorts of things? Thanks - Linda

I agree with the Arkansas Black. I've never seen them any place but farmer's markets. My second choice is Winesap.

I just had the same "problem" with pears. I made spiced pears, a pear and cranberry chutney, and pear and chestnut preserves. The rest got dried in the dehydrator. Apples are great dried as well. You can rehydrate them this winter in tasty liquids and use them in anything from savory relishes to desserts like pies or crumbles.

It is safe as long as everything is sterilized as before. Everybody has done it at one time or another due to a poor set. That's usually how I find out that my thermometer is no longer working . -Linda

Thank you to everyone for your ideas. I look forward to many chestnut-filled meals. The peeling problem I was having was with that inner skin. I always make an X in the shell and try to pierce the inner skin so it will peel back with the shell, but it tends to cling, and having to peel them hot (and lots at a time) has never been my favorite task. I've tried the boiling water technique with ones that had really sticky inner skins after I had already roasted and peeled off the outer shell. It does work on cooked ones, but you still have to get everything peeled off while they are hot. A friend who works in a restaurant tells me that I need to develop asbestos fingers. Maybe the problem is not with the chestnuts - it may be operator error .