JasonZ

I tried this with several airlines, with no luck. I just take a minimal subset of knives and send them with the checked baggage, and pray . Or you could have a cheaper but still decent set just for this purpose. ← Pre 9/11, I was lucky enough to have the flight crew on SAS help get a set of knives home for me. I had just purchased them and my checked baggage was already checked ... The offending box was taped, labeled, and given to the airline at the ticket sales area. They got it to the flight crew, who then got it to me past immigration but before customs. Don't know if it would happen today -- it's a far different world. I'd go ahead and pack in my checked baggage (I use plastic sheaths that snap shut around each blade and then place the knives in a plastic see-through case. No danger of cutting anyone unless they go out of their way to open the sheaths, but easy to do a visual inspection) ... or if I'm really worried, ship by FedEx or UPS.

You can also use a vegetable stock or a mushroom stock ... adds another layer of flavor and intensity to the finished product. I use Deborah Madison's Fancy Mushroom Stock recipe from her Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone book ... Regards, Jason

"oy, siz schver tzu zein a yid" ("oh, it's hard to be a Jew", in Yiddish) ... My mother never used carmelized onions or tehini on latkes, but I'm sure Herve This can explain why reading your story brought back memories ... and aromas ... ... and I still grate my potatoes by hand and read the debates over onions ... no onions ... Thanks, Fat Guy ... and may all your labors be as easy and as tasty as these latkes sound like they were! JasonZ

Says nothing about feed, so a cow fed ground up beef spines, at risk for BSE ("Mad Cow Disease"), but not containing "artificial ingredients, coloring ingredients, or chemical preservatives" meets the proposed definition of "natural", as does a farmed salmon fed coloring to make its flesh look sashimi quality ... ... and if an antibiotic is manufactured using recombinant DNA technology, so it comes from a yeast or bacteria ... that also is "natural"? Guess I'll have to provide comments -- thanks for providing the URL!! Regards, Jason

Agreed -- the safety and quality of the food supply should be everyone's concern ... shame it takes disasters like the spinach and Taco Bell events to make people pay attention. Regards, Jason

FatGuy is ... whatever he wants to be ... 'cause he does have seniority Guess I'll just be anonymous and disgruntled!!

Here I am, thinking about mild Calorie Restriction, and you're doing heavenly items like this!! Beautiful food, gorgeous photos!!

Can I be the representative anonymous, disgruntled second-rate critic? ....

Glad you got what you needed ... just to second 1st oriental, they seem to have galangal fresh all the time ... I've not seen kaffir lime leaves, either fresh or frozen there. Regards, Jasonz

Sounds good ... will do ... Regards, Jason

I love soups and have all three of the books you mentioned. If restricted to that list, I'd go with Peterson. I also have and love Deborah Madison's Vegetable Soups from Deborah Madison's Kitchen as well as the soup recipes in her more general book Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. Obviously, these are limited to vegetarian recipes. If your friend is a fan of Italian, you might want to look at Domeinca Marchetti's The Glorious Soups and Stews of Italy. We used it for several recipes in last month's "The Cuisine of Tuscany" thread and it is both authentic, beautifully illustrated, and delicious ... Finally, if your friend likes stews as much as soups, you may want to look at Molly Stevens' All About Braising: The Art of Uncomplicated Cooking. Good luck!!

Copies are available at Alibris, both new and used, including a signed, 1st ed, 1st printing, as well as Jessica's Biscuit, new only, and the usual (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders) ... Prices seem to be from $9.70 (used) to 19.60 (new) to $80 ... right now Alibris is least expensive. Regards, JasonZ

Lots of great comments about Kasper's "The Splendid Table" ... but what about her other book "The Italian Country Table", also with about 200 recipe and also focused on E-R? Does anyone know this book? As for continuing, I'm definitely in favor of this community continuing ... I can't contribute photos (kitchen is being remodeled), but I am an active reader and hope to become an active contributor ...

... and at about $60 million a cover, Alain can lay claim to the most expensive, most exclusive seating in the world (or out of this world ) ... and that's before the bar bill ...

I was in college 66-70 and then medical school 70-74. How many memories your two installments brought back -- thank you for remembering, for being literate enough to write about it and being visual enough to photograph it. I was in engineering in college, and several of my friends either volunteered for Nam or dropped out of school and were snarfed up by their draft boards ... there were lots of letters coming back ... and then they were coming back ... some intact and some not ... some physically disrupted and some mentally dislocated. Forty years later, we seem not to have learned very much from our time in SE Asia ... we're still shipping back boys who will never be the same ... and leaving a country thinking they were far better off before we showed up to liberate them. As Peter, Paul, and Mary said, "When will they ever learn? ...". I can hardly wait for Part 3 ... and 4 ... and more ... keep 'em coming, Chef!

You can't be serious... ← Fat Guy's running for President ... and with 3.1 million votes already, he's ahead of most of the would-be candidates! If only politicians could be as forthright as food critics!

Now, you see, I would consider anything left in its own habitat as "organic". If we pollute that habitat, the fish (or wild turkey or boar) may not be particularly healthy to eat, but it has lived its life as its predecessors have, it has hunted for its own food, and lived its life without the overt (key word) control of man ... whether it is still healthy to eat is another question. The example that sticks in my mind is the salmon from Lake Michigan, which used to have PCP from polluted water in its subcutaneous fat; these fish were not farmed or controlled in any other way by man, and were thus "wild game". They hunted for their food and lived naturally, which ultimately led to their being polluted and being "unhealthy", but "organic" in the USDA definition. I think governmental agencies should not be allowed to redefine words which are already in common use and in the dictionary ... I now longer know what "natural" or "organic" mean ...

don't know about "free range" (most fruits don't wander around much!), but if it exists, you'll find "organic Kool Ade" at Whole Foods ... no one else would even think of such a product. Kool Ade has to be full of high fructose corn syrup, fructose, sucrose, etc., all of which can be "organic", i.e., derived from natural products raised without synthetic pesticides or fertilizers, as well as anti-caking agents, emulsifiers, etc. In addition, under certain circumstances, "artificial flavors" can be "organic" if you can make a product from organic corn or soybeans that tastes like orange or blueberry, your ingredient meets the definition of organic ... amazing what can fit under the USDA's "organic" umbrella. Good luck!!

If it passes muster with Emiglio or his kin, it's good enough for me, whether it's from the USA or Italy. My only fear with USA products is that our USDA seems to think that unpateurized cheeses and cured hams that haven't killed anyone in centuries "might be dangerous", while our corn-fed feedlot cattle full of hormones and antibiotics can be labeled "natural" and "no preservatives"!! Seems like the lunatics are running the asylum.

Vanilla. From beans, not extracted with alcohol. changes the taste, but adds no sugar.

Michael Pollan, in the "Omnivore's Dilemma" (OD), has an excellent discussion of these issues, in the section on industrial agriculture. His discussion of organic is divided into "industrial organic" and what I would call "local, small-scale" organic ... industrial organic is typified by many of the same "efficiencies" that characterize "industrial agriculture". The problem is that the word "organic" has been hijacked by the USDA, who now defines organic based on its own agenda, and not what people think or have always believed it should be. Is a farmed fish that eats "organically fed" meat (chicken, beef) or "organic corn" to be considered "organic"? I don't recall seeing beds of corn on the ocean floor, with fish grazing on them ... and yet, fish are now being genetically modified (as were cattle a few years ago) to be able to eat foods they were never intended to eat.... Since reading OD, I've decided I will only eat wild caught fish, or fish that have been fed their natural foodstuffs ... and will go for community sustainable agriculture, rather than the Whole Foods version of organic, which simply tries to avoid pesticides and fertilizers, but is otherwise indistinguishable from industrial food.... the word "organic" has become as useless as the term "low fat" or the word "natural" -- meaningless in accurately describing anything we care about. As for BSE, yes, it results from feeding parts of the nervous system (spinal cord or brain matter) from an animal to the same species. Are there likely to be versions that can cross species -- I would think so. Does the USDA really care? When you're killing 400 cattle an hour in an industrial slaughterhouse and killing poultry even faster, can you really be sure what part is going where? I love meat, but this is enough to either make me a vegetarian .... or a hunter/forager. Europe wisely banned many of the practices common in US agriculture. Maybe when the new Congress arrives in January, food safety (not from terrorists but from our own capitalists) should be a high priority.

I'd second Vetri ... and if you'd like to head out of town, Nectar in Berwyn. Ask for a table next to the Dalai Lama's reserved table ... gives you more privacy. Happy Birthday, BTW ...

Peony: Wonderful photo, simple recipe and a great way to make a cake! Thanks for sharing. You are right about ovalette -- it's not generally available in the US, although it can be ordered and shipped in. Several good references via Google. Sounds like there is no good substitute, since baking powder is more a rising agent than a softener ... My usual baking sources also don't have any suggestions ... It seems to be used heavily in Malaysian and Singaporean cuisine ... any idea what it would be called in Mandarin or Malaysian? I looked in Copeland Marks' "Exotic Kitchens of Indonesia" and "Exotic Kitchens of Malaysia" as well as Periplus World Cookbooks' "The Food of Indonesia" and found several steamed cake recipes, but none with information about ovalette or a substitute. Regards, Jason

As a Canadian, you should add to your list "Susur: A Culinary Biography" by Susur Lee. The second half is recipes, but the first half is truly a biography and culinary philosophy ... his life story turns out to be as exciting as his food is ... The other one I'd add to your list is Michael Pollen's "Omnivore's Dilemma". He's a fab writer and the story of what is behind the food we eat (or decide not to eat) is a wonderful story, told by a wonderful storyteller ... There are eGullet topics for both of these, just do a search and you'll come to them. Sounds like your life might be a bit out of the ordinary as well ... how far out of Winnipeg are you? Do you interact much with other chefs? How do you hone your cuisine and your skills? Regards, JasonZ

Most of my cookbook purchases this year have been of classics, not of newly published recipe books. A clear exception is Locatelli's "Made in Italy" -- I'd second the previous opinion on it. Great philosophy, goreous pictures, and wonderful recipes. It's a keepr. I'm waiting for Fuscia's Hunan book -- I have it on order here, but debated ordering it from amazon.co.uk, so I could get it earlier. Why can a book publish in the UK in mid-August 2006 and not be out in the US until mid-Feb 2007? Her first book, on Sichuan cuisine, was fabulous. I have Pollen's book on order, but I understand it's as good as Botany of Desire, which was a fabulous food book in at least a few chapters. Marco Pierre White -- White Slave -- not a cookbook, but a cook's retrospective tour of a life. As much psychological insight as factual biography. A good read, but not one I'll re-read ... certainly better than many other "celeb chef's bios", this one is actually seriously contemplative at times, as Marco tries to understand for himself (and tell us) what really shaped him, and why he behaved the way he did, both in the "bad boy" sense and in the "award winning, driven chef" sense. I liked it -- but after my friennds are done reading it, it will go on eBay.