phaelon56

One of the best and most detailed recountings of coffee's origins and the most likely explanation for how it came to be brewed (rather than smoked) is found in this excerpt from the coffee history page found on the Ethiopian culture site Selamta.net . Their section on Ethiopian Recipes is also quite informative. Not surprisingly... coffee beans from Yemen are among the very few that are considered to be "heirloom" varieties - still grown, harvested and processed by the most traditional methods and in terms of flavor profile - much wilder, earthier and less predictable (in a good way) than the more common Arabica varieties that have been refined over the centuries through agricultural and cross-breeding techniques. From a more generalized "how in the heck did peopel figure out that you could eat it?" perspectov e I found much of interest in this relatively new book - which by chance I finished reading yesterday Brutal Journey: The Epic Story of the First Crossing of North America From the review: Much of what they were "reduced to calling food" was introduced to them by the indigenous peoples with whom they found shelter (or in some cases were enslaved by). The context was the often harsh and inhospitable Gulf Coast region from Florida to Texas and beyond. The groups who introduced them to these foods were more gatherers than hunters. The levels of famine and starvation that peridocially affected these cultures were such that, by necessity, they were sometimes forced to try eating anything that might conceivably ward off death by starvation. I think this is a natural process - fraught with peril but somehow genetically encoded when thgins get bad enough. There was even mention of one group that sometimes ate deer dung. Why? The evdience indicates that certain animals that could not customarily digest grasses were able to do so temporarily if they ate the grass after consuming the deer dung. I imagine that some enzynmatic magic was at work but I find thsi endlessly intriguing.

Thomas Keller uses Illy pods for the espresso at Cafe Bouchon. It's not a stretch from there to frozen Sysco fries. And I'll bet the frites he makes from frozen stuff are far closer to fresh cut frites than the espresso is the the real deal. The Illy pod espresso at Cafe Bouchon is as atrocious as pod espresso is in other non-Keller establishments.

I had a rectangular 1/2" thick stone from Williams-Sonoma for years and was content with it but just had to try a 3/4" thick stone when I spotted one at my local Italian imports store. They carry the Villaware brand and I've been quite pleased with mine. I think the extra thickness makes a difference in the consistency of my results but that's a totally unscientific observation. My brother inherited my other stone but cracked it by taking it in and out of the oven too many times and subjectting it to the heat stress of rapid temperature change. Mine stays in the bottom of the oven at all times - the very bottom below the lowest rack. On rare occasions I take it out (at room temp when the oven has been off) and srub it with a stiff brush and water. It looks like heck from all the burned bits of this and that but works great. My primary application is for pizza - for that reason I'd opt for the round next time but Amazon has both the round and rectangular at good prices with free two day shipping: round Villlaware pizza stone rectangular Villaware pizza stone

I once had similar problems as well as having a crust texture that wasn't what I sought. Based on input I received from previous threads in this forum I did the following: - Reduced the amount of yeast in my dough mixture to about 1/3 of what I had been using. - Made my dough mixture on the wet side. - Did minimal kneading of only five minutes or so and then used the long cold rise method of leaving the dough in a greased covered bowl in the fridge overnight; punctuated by occasionally removing it to punch down and fold back on itself. - Stretched my dough instead of rolling it. - Put my pizza stone on the bottom of the (gas) oven below the bottom shelf. I too have found that the oven can be turned down a few degrees but at 475 F my thin crust pies cook in six minutes. And they cook quite evenly including the center and the edges of the crust.

I just had to try the Freschetta after reading this thread. DiGino used to be my "go-to" pizza for something I could keep in the freezer and just toss in the oven when the mood hit. I have a number of personal justifications for occasional use of frozen pizza: 1) Convenience - can cook it any time - even late when pizza delivery is not available 2) Portion size - I can whack one in half and just bake half of a 12" pizza - I've never had any luck re-heating left-over slizes of already cooked frozen pizza and even with pizzeria pies I prefer it fresh cooked 3) Economy - we don't all have buckets of money - I can get DiGiorno Supreme in a 2-pack at BJ's or Sam's Club for under $10. $5 for a loaded 12" pie is way cheaper than paying $10 plus tax, delivery fee and tip for a pizzeria 12" loaded - which will costs me about $13 if I tip the delivery man $1 (and I usually give them $1.50 or $2) So - in the interest of science I tried the Freschetta Supreme this [past weekend. I think the pepperoni and sausage are less greasy than and unlike DiGiorno I wasn't burping the next day with an aftertaste of those items. The cheese and sauce appeared to be of similar flavor profile and quality but the crust cooked more evenly. My biggest issue with DeGiorno was that cooking it long enough to get the center of the crust completely cooked resulted in some scorching of the cheese and crust along the outer edge - not so with the Freschetta. IMO the DiGiorno has a slightly yeastier taste and better texture on the parts of the crust that cook correctly but the uneven nature of the cooking pushes it well into second place for me now that I've tried the Freschetta. I've tried Tony's, Red Baron and few others but for me the problem is that they try to emulate a what a thinner crust pizzeria style pie is all about and fail sadly in comparison. The Freschetta and DeGiorno are in a category that is different for me - more like a sort of bread dough with toppings that's eaten with knife and fork - not at all like traditional pizza. As for Boboli style pizza - I've tried it but found the price/value proposition to be lacking. It cost far more than frozen pizza - and tasted batter but still nto as good as fresh made pizza.

I think you may have answered your own questions. Successful restaurants that are full nearly every night are staffed and organized accordingly. Less successful places that still hang in there for years by having a moderate but steady flow of regulars and a bump up in covers on weekend nights may have learned from sad experience that in order to maintain some semblance of quality - not to mention avoiding pissing people off by running out of too many items - they need to have a limited menu. Add to that the fact that your regulars are quite often going to be the very people who don't dine out on Valentine's or Day New Year's Eve. It then becomes far more difficult to to plan purchasing unless you limit the menu. As for pricing... too bad it's not like it was when I worked in Ithaca - a college town. If you went out to eat on Commencement Weekend, Homecoming Weekend, Parent's Weekend etc. most of the better local dining establishments would provide you with their standard menu (and the regular prices) if you informed them of the fact that you were a local. But for Valentine's day and New year's Eve? Forget about it - the price was the price and the "special menu" was the only one available.

Is there a particular part of Manhattan that ypu prefer to stay in?

This thread certainly brought up memories. The Singapore Sling was a glorious early waystop on my road to lushdom. I drank them in Matthew's Mug - the circa 1975 disco/tavern in the basement of the student center at Vassar College. Yes - not only was drinking tolerated - it was actually subsidized by the college, work/study employees ran the bar and prices were lower than in the off-campus bars. In that year, the first of my heavy drinking years, I often began the evening with a few stiff sweet drinks before switching to beer - a more affordable option. The Singapore Slings were predominately gin... cherry brand was definitely a component and I remember a hint of lemon but suspect it was from fresh squeezed lemon. It's unquestionable that pineapple juice was not included. My early evening Slings were eventually supplanted by the "Rum Float" - a rum sour with about two ounces of Meyer's dark floated on the top by pouring it over the back of a bar spoon. But the fond memories remain....

Whejn I was a kid my mom made applesauce from scratch every fall when apples were cheap (and seasonal versus today's market where they are in the stores all year long). She always made the applesauce using a food mill just like that one but I dont recall hers having discs with different hole sizes. It's very useful because it delivers consistent intermediate textures to the finished product.

Coffiend - needs no explanation I think. Frappalicious - how any thick cold drink tastes if it's made the right way Charbucked - hardly original but I use it to describe any cup of coffee that tastes burnt

I have eaten it on a number of occasions as prepared by friends in their homes or alternately as take-out dinners at two different local restaurants. The styles I've tried are Puerto Rican, Dominican and Haitian - all are very similar. Onions, tomatoes, sofrito or some other herb mixture is included and it's sort of stewed in the pan in a braising fashion. Wish I could say more but I've only eaten it and wasn't there when it was being prepared. I have seen it with garbanzo beans and also chunks of cooked potato included. My Haitian friend advises that the salt cod sold in a wooden box is typically far less bony and of better quality than the big pieces that are stacked up like piles of kindling. I also noted that her preparation was far less salty than the others I tried and more to my liking for that reason (and I liked it very much). IIRC she soaks it three times, changing the water after each soak and doing a final rinse before cooking.

It's the factory outlet store for Syracuse China - a large restaurant china manufacturer here in town (they also made "fine china' for many years but are now out of that business). The six pieces that I grabbed for Spinnner were the last ones in the store - but they have seconds, overstocks or discontinued items showing up in there from the factory on an ongoing basis. The problem is that they have no on-line presence - you just have to show up in there periodically to see what's available. If you pass through this way during the summer it's the best time - they set up an outdoor tent during July and August and the selection gets bigger in addition to the prices dropping even lower.

Yes... some great vintages of Bordeaux as well as many other good wines were stored in the wine vault at that "landmark" restaurant. That wine vault was actually a genuine bank vault left over from the 1860's when the Gridley Building was first constructed and housed a bank. When I was a kid there was a porno book store on the ground level where the restaurant later opened and the front side of the building had a White Tower hamburger stand attached to it (yes that is White Tower - NOT White Castle). By the late 1960's the upper floors had no windows and a bunch of pigeons flying in and out of the abandoned space. Downtown Syracuse has not regained all of its former glory but it's a darn sight better than it was back then. My very first restaurant biz job, of which I have fond memories, was working there as a busboy. The owner and his brother were a class act and great employers but times changed and their food/menu did not. Despite a fairly good location it appears to be one of those doomed spots - a half dozen or more restaurants have come and gone in that space since then and none have lasted more than a year or so.

I was actually able to locate six of this exact plate for Spinner and it cost him all of $12.90 plus shipping for the set of six. There are many downsides to living ina small snow-bound town such as this but having a restaurant china factory and outlet store where cool plates are a couple dollars apiece is nice. I'm hoping that Spinner will post back here with a picture of whatever cool dish he served to his sweetheart on these!

For those just dying to know more about Beef on Weck... there's a fair amount of discussion starting with this post on the Garbage Plate thread.

The absolute worst had to be back in the day when I worked one summer in the main dining room at a well known historic local hotel now closed - hint - the name was eponymous with the name of my hometown. My first party on the first day I waited table happened to include former NYC mayor John Lindsay - five or six years out of office at that point but still looked like a movie star. He ordered the chicken salad for lunch - it was served in a half coconut shell. We bussed our own tables at lunch and the line cook flipped when he saw me start to throw away the shell. I was not so politely informed that the shell needed to go through the dishwasher as it was considered to be "re-usable" - this was the shell including the coconut meat. Yuck! A close second - not repugnant from a health standpoint but far more common than some folks might think - is the practice of "blending" liquor. This is usually practiced in smaller independent taverns but I suspect it happen in some restaurant liquor operations here and there as well. And it's not urban myth - I've seen it first hand and we also had one local tavern owener who was nailed by the NY state ABC for doing it. "Blending" is done either by wholesale substitution of a cheaper liquor for a more expensive one - pouring the cheap liquour into empty bottles of a more expensive brand - or by mixing a cheaper brand or brands with the better grade to achieve something that tastes close enough to fool most people but costs less per ounce.

Exceptionally high quality hot dogs (made from beef, pork and veal) from several German immigrant sausage makers were and still are a staple in central NY state. The white hot or "coney" variety (with veal and pork only) are the style that is not completely unique to this area but is very regionalized in the US - showing up only in a few specific pockets here and there. The truly unique food that is specific to my town and not well known even in communities as close as 75 to 100 miles away is the salt potato. Yorkstaters Blogspot has some info on this delightful food as well as discussion of Beef on Weck (a Buffalo NY area specialty) and grape pie (a pie made from Concord grapes and a dessert specific to the upper Finger Lakes area). The following quote from yorkstaters is attributed to our local Salt Museum but no author is referenced: Almost correct. Onondaga Lake is not saline water but there are enormous underground salt deposits in the area. Salt ponds near the lake supplied the briny water - the rest of the story is true. And, according to my mom, my late grandfather wrote much of the interpretive historical material that is used by the Salt Museum but I'm sure he didn't write this one (he was a stickler for historical accuracy). My mom and all eight of her siblings actually learned to swim in the salt ponds - which were converted to public swimming areas after the salt industry folded. Salt potatoes are popular enough - and profitable enough - food to have created a "knock-off" scandal with our recent and infamous Salt Potato Wars And the quantities are not a typo. The local market is estimated to consume about 2 million five pound bags of salt potatoes per year - and most of that gets scarfed down between Memorial Day and Labor Day!

I had a bottom freezer unit once - left in a house that I had purchased - and loved it. It was old and eventually went belly up. Since then my experience has tended to be with top freezer models because I seem to keep ending up getting them for free (more or less - the most recent house I purchased had a brand new stiove and fridge - neither of which I'm that fond of but they were part of the deal). As for side-by-sides - my experience has been with the narrower variety that had ice maker, water in the door etc. and IMHO the configurationw as not as space efficient as top or bottom freezer models I've used. And yes I'll admit that a larger model likely solves all the problems but many of us have limitations on both space and budget that make a larger side-by-side impractical or impossible (my kitchen has a 31" fridge space and to make it bigger I'd have to cut the counter and remove my peculiar little 24" undersized dishwasher).

Sad to say that MELT is gone. I think they lasted about ten months. Good concept and great food but the location and their space limitations doomed them.

What you're missing out on is bottom-freezer! Side-by-side is a woefully poor design. Not enough room for large or bulky items in the freezer side or on the fridge side. Bottom freezer makes so much sense. Most of us spend far less time going in and out of the freezer than we do in the fridge. Why be hunching over or bending down so often when you don't need to? I remain bafffled as to why there are so few bottom freezer models on the market.

The bad news is that there are even MORE bad red sauce joints in town now than there were then. Paisan's (I'm sure we're talking about the same place 'cause it did open back around the mid 90's) is close to being the worst of the bunch and they're still in business! The good news: we have a few newcomers that are actually fairly good - Francesca's Cucina on North Salina and Asti Cafe just down the block from them - and Grimaldi's Luna Park out in netherworld also known as the Carrier Circle Hotel Zone. Luna Park has a talented young chef, a Tuscan influenced menu and, if I recall correctly, the dinner menu has nary a red sauce item on it.

No. The chains will never die out - at least not in my lifetime (I'm guessing I have abouty another 50 years of life left in me). But I do think a time will come in which some of them will either have to or will choose to evolve interms of their approach. IMO it's unrealistic to think that chains will suddenly start "buying lcoal" or "cooking seasonally". The economies of scale and centralized distroubtion are among the basic business tenets to which they subscribe and on which their profitability is based. But I do think some of them may start offering more organic, free range, hormone free etc. etc. etc. offerings. I also don't think chains are inherently evil. I've eaten at most of them at some point or another and don't care for most of them base simply on my taste if food and cooking styles. But I do recognize when they're doing a good job in relative terms. I live in a town with an abundance of Italian-American red sauce style restaurants. So - why is Carraba's so popular here? It's because the food and service is better than 90% of the independents in the area. But when it comes to diners.... 90% of our local diners (many of which are not all that great) are as good as Denny's but cheaper.

Australia also happens to be one of the few markets in the worldf where Starbucks closed a significant number of stores within the first five years of having opened them. I think it was roughly 10 out of 35 that they shut down due to poor levels of revenue. There are dramatic cultural differences between the US and Australia and I think an awareness of the value of locally grown foodstuffs and independent businesses may be among them. As for US chains? They have highly efficient business models and deep pockets. As consumer tastes chaneg and evolve, whether it be due to increased sophistication or even as a reaction to food borne illnesses, the chains will figure out how to reposition themselves, adjust their product offering and then have the money to market accordingly. Here in Syracuse the local market hasn't been able or willing (not sure which) to support a true seafood restaurant for years. The arrival of Bonefish Grill (owned by the Outback/Carraba's people) proved that the market is there. But the insanely high entry costs, even in this undervalued market, make it unlikely that any local independent operator will try to compete. I went to Bonefish at the behest of date who wanted to eat there and was surprised to have one of the better pieces of fish I've ever had in a restaurant). And guess who's trying to compete head to head with Bonegfish? None other than the kings of frozen, season-butter drenched, microwaved "seafood". Yes... Red Lobster. Here's a snippet from the Red Lobster Web Site describing their new "fresh fish" offering:

Adjustable drafting tables typically go from around the 35" to 37" heighty at lowest upt o about 48" at the highest. The cheapies use friction knobs on tubes for manual height adjustment but starting in the $600 price range you'lll get a pneumatic cylinder system with foot pedal activated adjustment - aking to what a good drafting chair has. Most come with a melamine top but can easily accept other tops on the same frame. What remains unknown in most of the specs at first glance is how much weight they'll support.

I live in Syracuse NY - a traditionally blue collar rust belt city that has had a rocky transition to a more tech and service based economy as our industrial manufacturing base eroded and withered during the 80's and 90's. With a city of 150,000 and another 200,000 or so in all the outlying suburbs one might think we'd have at least a moderate market for a restaurant delivery system like the one Marie described upthread. But two different people have attempted to launch such a service locally and met with no success (both folded within a year). I see several factors in this - applicable to this market and maybe or maybe not applicable to others: 1) The overall charges for getting dinner this way were relatively high percentagewise compared to the actual cost of the meals. 2) In a community like this many people want dinner from a restaurant specifically beause they want to get out of the house - not stay at home. 3) There is a perceived reduction in value because you're not getting the ambiance of the restaurant, service at the table or someone to do the dishes - yet by the time you pay the delivery charges and tip to the driver you're paying as much or more than you would if you ate out and tipped a server. 4) Upscale supermarket chains like Wegman's have a vast assortment of "meals ready to cook or heat" that are far less cost efficient than cooking from scratch but far cheaper than restaurant delivery. The quality - in some cases - is not nearly as good as what you'd get from the right restaurant but for most folks around here it's "good enough". 5) There's a perception - often correct because our brutal winters last about five months - that food suffers during delivery. It's just never going to be as good as it woudl be if you ate it in the restaurant. This set of factors may also be a reason why the "make your own meals to take home" concept has done very well here during the year that it's been open. We have a Make and Take Gourmet franchise locally that has done so well that the owners are adding another three or four locations locally. It's not appealing to me (on the rare occasison that I'd have time to assemble a meal I'd rather do it from scratch at home in my own kitchen) - but having spoken with people who use the service - I understand the appeal.