francie

I like mine with sauteed FENNEL.

fresh lychees make a good martini garnish vodka!

love my popcorn with cinnamon and brown sugar!

Ooh ooh! Instead of Doritos, the "Hint of Lime" Tostitos work, too. And definitely, definitely NOT with low fat sour cream.

Which goes great with some crispy French Fries!

And there is an eggplant dip I've made a few times topped with pine nuts... Pine Nuts.

I like to make Pad Thai with rice vermicelli noodles, which I always add peanuts to, so PEANUTS, it is.

Today, the after work snack was: Kettle Chips tortilla chips (they are extra thick and extra extra salty) with DIP DIP being 3 parts Polish mayo (extra tangy but not quite Miracle Whip) to one part ketchup with smashed garlic and dashes of Worchestershire. fattysaltyspicysweet And a glass of Cab Sauv. To class it up.

Beets! They taste like dirt. But they're the only abhorred-food-from-childhood that I still cannot tolerate, so that's a plus. I guess.

Has anyone tried Ocean 6 Seventeen for brunch?

Thanks all for the suggestions! And carswell, I love the idea of reducing it. My freezer does have minimally more room than my office closet Now to the thread on braising.... This should be fun. PS I would bring bottles of it to gatherings, but I can't seem to keep my big mouth shut and all of my friends have heard the woesome tale of the weak and watery Pinot. They don't want it.

To try and pare down a convoluted explanation of why I have 2 1/2 cases of mediocre wine (which needs to remain unnamed out of respect for the local vineyard from which it came) in my office closet, I will resort to point form: -this was a gift. If I had paid for it, I probably would have contemplated returning it, although it hasn't "turned" or anything like that. (ahem, please excuse the wine newbie lingo ). - it smells and tastes thin. As BF pointed out: "tastes like good wine, but with some vodka thrown in". - it has some sediment. - it did make a-ok sangria. I have probably horrified some of you with this request, but it seems a shame to waste it. Or, perhaps there is another forum I could try?

This year the BF and I are all alone; often we'll head out to Chilliwack and have a feast with my parents and sister, but this year they made "other plans" So, rather than do the turkey thing (which, frankly, I'm a little sick of. My father has worked for Lilydale for almost thirty years. That's a lot of free turkey), I decided to do a roast beef. The butcher at Windsor was so suprised I wasn't wanting turkey he declared he was giving me a discount non-turkey rate on my beef. (*note to self-- stock up on meats other than turkey two days before Thanksgiving) AND, I decided to bake my first pie, pumpkin of course. I'm not a huge sweets girl, so this was mostly for the BF's sake. For some ridiculous reason I decided to use the Cook's Illustrated method for pastry and filling, although I did make the recipe extra tedious by roasting and pureeing a pumpkin rather than using canned. Big whoop. I just put the pie into the oven NOW, having started this whole stupid thing at 11:00. grrr. This is why I do not like baking. We'll see if it was worth it. So. Roast beef, garlic mash, green beans, Nigella Lawson's onion gravy, some sauteed mushrooms, pumpkin pie. Oh, and either the 2003 Mouton Cadet Bourdeaux, or the 2003 Township 7 Syrah. The only two bottles we've got. I am a poor student, after all. Any opinions on either? Shepard's pie tomorrow.

Glorious, glorious Laksa from Hawker's Delight on Main. Perfect meal for the kind of day we're having: rain and more rain. It was also a very nice treat after completing my first mid-term of the semester.

Homer J. Simpson, per chance?