racheld

'Twas a sigh of absolute pleasure and repletion. Hon, when I scream, you'll know it.

But perhaps Diogenes used that lantern to brew up a cuppa when he tired of the quest.

AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Cut off roots, braise the onions in chicken or beef stock, drain well, and nestle into a buttered gratin. Top with a nice gentle bechamel, top that with a scatter of cheese, and bake til golden. Braise as above, top with slices of brie or reblochon, rind and all, and bake in a very slow oven for thirty minutes or so, til the cheese oozes and the little bits of green peeking through are withering and shining a bit. Cut, confit, and serve for special meals during the holidays. Or make packets: Tear two pieces of foil, stack, butter a circle about the size of a salad plate. Lay out six or eight of the little onions on the butter, salt a bit, and top with with a nice thick pork chop or chicken breast. Salt, scatter thyme or a little curl of sage, top with sliced potatoes or baby carrots or several rings of red or gold bell pepper. Top with a spoonful of stock or fond or geleed cold stock. Or, heck, with a little spoonful right out of the Campbell's "Cream of" can. Fold up into a tight fold, with a little room left ballooned out for the steam to work, and bake for an hour at 325. Serve in the packet (be careful opening), with a salad, fruit salad, or green vegetable. Trim and wash the onions, then freeze in double Freezer bags, to make any of the above when needed.

And I---genuflections all round from an awed readership. I can't imagine the hours, the research, the cutting and peeling (ah---those artichokes!) and all the prep and scheduling and plain old hard WORK!!! It was a wonderful guidebook, with a lovely culmination and a glorious feast. Your words and pictures could be published RIGHT NOW as a manual for future banquets. No Lady of the Manor (Villa? Castle?) could have entertained with such lavish style, such sumptuous foodstuffs and such aplomb, had she a houseful of servants at the beck of her bejeweled fingertips. Now go take off your Impossible-To-Fill shoes, rest your tired feet, and let some ferret-love wash over you. Thanks for the fabulous week. Brava! Bravissima!!

Tagliatelle Bearnaise Floating IIIIIIIIIsland Sesame Anadama Cardoon Galactoboureko LAAAAAHHHHte Etouffee Caprese Okra Spatula Le Creuset Creeeeeamery Nan Vessie a la Greque Gastronome Fricassee Preserves Marmalade Citron Chinois

Dear Lord. Bourdain looks so pale in that white coat. And so CLEAN---like he's about to do a heart transplant. I hope he's feeling OK. And like WRITING some more. Now.

We had 'em---I hated 'em. I was in charge of all dishwashing during my teen years, and those things had to be scoured with salt, or lemon-and-salt, with no suds EVER. I just always hoped that the acidity of the lemon did the germ trick. And I love the look of a many-color-green salad, or one with tomatoes and red onion, or with paper-thin Vidalia and orange segments, shining through the clear sides of an unpatterned glass bowl. Perhaps it was your Mr. Perry who told the anecdote about the chef who was served salad by a host bragging of his own pristinely-preserved unwashed bowl. Host asked how he liked his salad, and chef replied, "Right off the top, please."

I watched that Tony B thing last night---was OK with the coca-chewing, slightly unnerved by the drinking of that fermented spit, but when they started on the guinea pig dinner---I had to cover my eyes, and STILL heard two frantic little whistles. You just stop that right now!! I'm still fragile. rachel, tottering away

Cottage cheese and peaches. Little Whackit rolls sprinkled with cinnamon sugar, rolled up, baked golden and topped with a melty mixture of cream cheese, powdered sugar, and vanilla. Crisp pepper-bacon. Cold milk in a frozen mug for Chris; third cup of frothy latte for me. October sunshine through the curtains. Norah on the Bose.

Andrew, I see you're in need of a sig line. . .

Little buttery roasted chickens, always warm, with crispy, salty skin. Bread-and-butter pudding studded with amaretto-soaked dried cherries, just like the one I baked for supper tonight. Ever-fresh, just-steamed green peas, gleaming with butter. Fresh Tagliatelle in a delicate tomato sauce with fresh basil. Vacherins and Pavlovas (lemon for me) and Sachertortes and Croquembouche for two. Raclette with ever-melty cheese and tiny red-skinned potatoes. Jalapeno/cheese cornbread muffins made by Miss Annie Mae's recipe. My Daughter's focaccia with olive oil, paper-thin tomatoes and onions, and seasalt. Croques Monseiur et Madame, with Gruyere or Fontina and thin, salty ham, just like we made in the fireplace of our first home. The Banana Ice Cream made on lazy Sunday afternoons when my children were small and still eager to turn the churn handle. Grandmother's Creamy Tomato Soup. Baby red potato salad with my Mom's homemade lime pickles, vidalias and fresh-from-the-hen eggs. Pots of pinto beans with great hunks of pink baked ham, simmered to impart equal tender creaminess to beans and ham alike. Platters and platters of our garden tomatoes, sliced and layered with basil and a drizzle each of Ligurian and Balsamic. Or with salt and dabs of Blue Plate mayo. Chris' long-cooked pulled pork, with tender pinkness imparted after overnight on the coals, and bits of crispy skin to punctuate the softness. Chris' smoked turkey breast on corn muffins with cranberry mayo. Miss Lucille's coconut cake, made with the deep golden yolks of eggs fresh from her henhouse---Seven minute frosting with the whites whipped to near-divinity stage, and coconut grated ten minutes ago. Cool salads of mixed greens, with a tart vinaigrette and skillet-toasted buttery croutons. Lo mein salad, with sesame dressing, slivers of shiny snow peas, tiny rings of scallion green, and slender white enoki threads. Plum Nuts Ice Cream, made by Sealtest long ago, and discontinued for some arcane reason---the Goblin Market fare I'd like to taste again. Any and everything from Lucy Vanel's Kitchen blog, with Commentary. My Mammaw's iced tea, in the big old heavy frosty goblets.

Simply perfect.

And a warm welcome to eG, Ross!!

I just LOVE this!!! An unexpected chapter, with the lusty, out-there flavor of the first, and no previews of the morning delight awaiting. I'll bet you just cranked it out wordstream, with the experienced ease of shooting doughnuts into hot grease. (And did you mantra each one into the vat, chanting a whispered "toroid---toroid" under your breath?)---I'll find it difficult to look at one without the word picture for a while. Daughter's donut man is Denny, and it's hard to think of the bakery without thinking, "Denny Does the Donuts." This is refreshing, the being able to back-and-forth with the writer on personal points in the piece. We usually just give our compliments, then our own perspectives on this and that on the subject, but the craving for MOREMORE is being met here. The pieces which are complete in themselves are perfect as they are, presented round like warm apples in the hand, but the expectation and promise of further adventures---that's the dangle of an even sweeter apple, bringing us back for an anticipatory peek and another comment on the comments, ad infinitum. This is one of my favorite threads---skeins? yarns? on eG, and I could read a new one every day. Having new viewpoints and added episodes just makes this outstanding. I've never worked a motel kitchen, never tended bar, never delivered dinner to a lady en deshabille (she, not I), but there's a decided deja vu lurking in every paragraph. From what Maggie hinted (or did you---can't remember) there's a bit of "watching America change" in the chapters to come, and speaking merely from a personal standpoint---do you remember where you were in March, 1965?

Imitation is the sincerest. . . I borrowed yours, and it's only right that it should come home.

I'm gone for one day, and all this good stuff happens. Frrrrrumph. And Hooray. You touched a lot of memories for me, down to the casket company, which our little town had as well, though none of our family ever worked there. And we're right close to Richmond---close enough to run over for dinner---wish I'd known about Miller's before now. We just went to Hagerstown for a birthday dinner at Weliver's last week---it's the "destination place" now for home-cooking. (Scalloped cabbage and watermelon pickles--MMMMM). I, too, received my first potload of books in a dubious fashion, though the gift outweighed by tons any transgressions of the giver. I just know they set me on my path of voracious reading, and I'll never fail to bless her for that. And once, through NO fault of my fastidious, clean-living Mammaw, her no-account sister took me on a Sunday-morning cash collection at her own nefarious establishment. I was four, and didn't know any better than to talk about the pretty ladies and their beautiful, silky nightgowns when I got home. This and other clues tell me that we have a similar background in a lot of ways, though separated by a lotta geography. Looking forward to any and all installments---You gotta love a man with such a checkered past. rachel PS---It's a One-Eyed Sandwich.

I check this thread every time it's near the top---that means something's been added, and I always hope it's another of your marvelous meals. You may have seen your name mentioned in a couple of threads lately---one mention of a party I did recently, and another on "what can I do with endive." For the party, I made your port-glazed walnuts, and reduced the glaze. A mixture of chevre, cracked pepper and dried cherries went into the lovely little pale velvety endive spears, with a walnut half laid on for garnish. Just before the big round platter went to the buffet, I drizzled a few drops of the reduction down the length of the stuffing. Beautiful, and they ate up every bite. One gentleman even swiped a couple of the tiny whole center buds, too small for stuffing, which I had stood like little trees in the center of the platter. I didn't see him eat them, but imagine that he did.

Lovely. This will be a wonderful glimpse into a time and place only heard of. We knew it would be a banquet of some sort, but this is just the best. It will further serve to unwhack my chronology, as we spent yesterday at Feast of the Hunter's Moon, back in 1770's Indiana, when life was HARD, and cooking was NO FUN at all. A knife and a big black pot, if you were lucky, right out there on the ground, with a smoky fire and smothery clothes. Will you dress as chef/serving wench, or as ladyhostess in all her finery? And will you be in the kitchen for the duration, or out at table with your guests? The sweet memories of Rosie and Tillie, our two ferrets, bless you for sharing your own.

Thank you, thank you for this wonderful glimpse into a land far away and a life so luscious. The rain makes the magnificent landscape even more beautiful, and the people are timeless inhabitants of a glorious, richly-hued painting. You've portrayed all your days in relation to the foods and wines which are everyday sustenance to your region, and it's been nourishing, even through the printed page and camera lens. Your adopted home could be now, or yesterday, or the best of both. Just lovely.

An elderly uncle used to pay me the compliment of, "Rachel could sweep the flo-ah and cook it, and it would taste wonderful." Lucy could toss her Scrabble tiles into the air and they would rain down poetry.

I've been known to do this very thing with a BIG dinner napkin when Chris and the kids start joking at the table in a restaurant. I can't run, but I CAN hide. These pictures are priceless. And what was the difference in the three sets of truffles on the table---the prices varied quite a bit, with no discernible variation in shape, size or color. I've never tasted a truffle, either, come to think of it.

I think the place is having a GRAND party tonight, if the great list of meats and sides a-cookin' at this moment is to be believed. And a man who says "Slaw made" means business---he's gotta be getting the meat ready for that sandwich. Congratulations, Big Hoss!!!!

At my first glance, it resembles a soup kitchen on a loaves-and-fishes scale. And I swear I can see nuns' feet.

I like hard ones like these. ←