Catherine Iino

I recently bought a Charbroil Weber Kettle-knockoff, after years of loyalty to the originals. The Charbroil was on sale for about a third the price. The Charbroil is a little tinnier than the Weber but otherwise quite similar. It claims to have an adjustable grate that allows you to change the distance between the coals and the grill, but that feature is so absurdly designed as to be unusable. The thing is, we have the grill at a house near the ocean, where the salt air really does a number on anything metal, so even the Weber Kettles don't last long. If the Charbroil gets us through a couple of seasons, I'll be happy.

That was a perfect event. Good people, good places to explore, a good amount of time in each place, a delicious meal, fabulous ice coffee, even good weather. I am now convinced that Providence is the center of the food universe. For those who didn't go--among the items I came home with are lilac-colored yam flour (from the Philippines), red pepper paste (from Bulgaria), dried yellow potato pieces (from Peru) . . . a rainbow of foods I'd never seen before. Chris, we can't thank you enough. I'd be happy to help with the organization of another event. One question: what's the best way to store fresh galangal?

sus et al.-- Hi, all. We got back from PR on midnight Wednesday to find our house in unlivable condition. I won't bore you with the details, but I didn't have internet access until today. (Puerto Rico looks all the better by comparison!) I had a lovely time in Puerto Rico. I was in San Juan for four days; then we drove to Rincon for another four. Unfortunately, the conference that brought me to San Juan had almost inedible food. When I escaped on foodie adventures, I found some real treats. On the first day, I met someone who had lived in Puerto Rico on and off for quite a few years and recently moved there; he took me on a walking tour of Condado and Santurce. We hit the Mercado in Santurce (extremely generous portions of excellent batitas--is that the right name for the fruit shakes?) and a neighborhood restaurant called Bebo’s. We had the mofongo with crab and a goat stew, both very tasty. I'll write more about the place later; really enjoyed it. Our guide also highly recommended El Pescador near the Mercado, but we only walked into it, since it was about 10:30 in the morning. One lunchtime, we took a long walk down the beach from Condado to Pamela's, a lovely, more upscale restaurant right on the beach. I think someone mentioned it upthread. It was excellent. I had a very good fish sandwich with a variety of condiments; others at the table had the chicken and melted Manchego sandwich and the crab quesadilla (not actually called that on the menu). A highlight was the corncake appetizer we shared, with black beans, cheese, peppers. I would recommend Pamela’s highly. It was wonderful to actually sit at a table on the beach. Our last evening in the city, we had an expensive dinner at Pikayo, in the art museum--an extremely pleasant experience. The dining room is attractive and comfortable. The food was quite impressive overall. For our first course we tried the truffled cheese empanadillas, the alcapurrias, and a tuna tartare served on little crisp rice cakes. This last was outstanding, but unlike so many restaurants, the entrees were better than the appetizers. I had a dish of perfectly cooked shrimp served with a very refined mofongo, and my husband had a wonderful halibut topped with “Japanese squid”; we agreed that they were the best dishes we’d been served in a restaurant in quite a long time. The cheese flan I had for dessert was excellent; the other desserts at the table—key lime pie and a cheese soufflé (which had been ordered at the beginning) were not memorable. I can’t say we found any superb food on the west coast. Since we were there off season, a lot of places were closed, and the supply of fresh fish seemed limited. We had a nice meal at Capriccio in Anasco; again, my fish was expertly cooked, as was my husband’s pork stuffed with guava. And the people running the place, which is very small, were incredibly warm and welcoming. We ate there the first night, on the recommendation of one of our guidebooks, and we probably should have gone back. Instead, we had a very mediocre meal at in Mayaguez one night, and some good barbecued pork at a place called El Cerdito in Cielito—I think—served by the charming second-grade daughter of the chef and the hostess. The “Flying Pig” is quite new, and the menu says everything is made there; indeed the fried sweet potatoes and cole slaw seemed to be. I’m disappointed that I didn’t get a chance to try any of the lechon asado or more of the fritters. I was delighted to find that people in the restaurants were generally so friendly. Thanks again to all whose advice we studied.

sus- Thank you so much for your reply, and sorry it took me so long to say so; sometimes I don't seem to get notified of replies even when I've checked off that option. I am off for Puerto Rico tomorrow, with your reply printed out. It all sounds wonderful; I'll report back.

My rhubarb is in full swing, so I finally read through this whole thread and found it, as egullet so often is, enlightening. I learned, for example, to love my green rhubarb and stop trying to make it red. I thought there was something wrong with my cultivation practices, but now I realize it's the Victoria strain and is meant to be green. Once I stopped adding berries to make it pink, I discovered that it is truly delicious--much more than the pink variety I also have growing. And once I got off the pink bandwagon, it actually occurred to me that apple pie, for example, is not pink. My eyes are open to new possibilities! I have not, however, been able to roast rhubarb to my liking. It ends up tasting salty and harsh to me, even with additional sweetening (and no added salt).

I recently discovered a new brand of yogurt that is really delicious, as bought or as a starter: Liberte. It's from Quebec, says it's made from Vermont milk, I buy it in Connecticut and Rhode Island. Ah, NAFTA.

Glorious Morning muffins--plenty of recipes on the web. Veggie cream cheese--probably won't give you the full 1/2 cup, but a step in the right direction. Huevos rancheros

When I grill chicken these days, I like to cut the breast pieces (i.e., breast halves) in half again; otherwise, they are disproportionately big. But you can easily wind up with some funky, rather graceless chunks of meat if you just hack them in half. Is there a traditional and/or elegant way to do this final cut?

Black raspberries grow almost wild here in southern New England. I have a large stand in Connecticut that requires very little care--just a few hours of pruning in the dormant season. My red raspberries are far less prolific and much moodier. They also seem to be troubled more by insects and other pests. That said, black raspberries do not have the delicacy of flavor the red ones have. They are, however, very good in their own right. And I read last year that they are among the healthiest of fruits, super high in anti-oxidants. If you've had black raspberry ice cream, which is a relatively common flavor around here, you have an idea of what they taste like. If you haven't--definitely make some.

Does egullet get a cut it we order these?

Thank you, nibbs. I'll be going to Puerto Rico in June, and your post really feels like advice from a friend. I'll probably have fewer mojitos, though.

Another bump: I'll be in Puerto Rico in the middle of June. I've never been before. I'll be at a conference in San Juan for a few days but would like to spend some time in other parts of the island. I'd be grateful for any recommendations of places, restaurants, markets, and experiences not to be missed. Thanks in advance!

I'll be in Puerto Rico in the middle of June. Thanks to all the posters already, and keep those recommendations coming!

My thanks to you and best wishes to your family. It truly was a feast. Ooh, one more question: does the cook say "gotchisosama" along with everyone else? My family said gotchisosama and itadakemasu (when we didn't say "gesegnete mahlzeit"--my father's family was from Japan, my mother's from Germany), but I'm not sure whether gotchisosama is thanking the cook or a larger power. Have a very good week.

I can't believe I'm replying to this. But the peeve that is a pet of mine is price stickers on individual pieces of fruit. I remove them, sometimes with great trouble, in an attempt to maintain the illusion that the fruit is not an industrial commodity.

I heartily second all the praise for your blog. And thank you for doing this while acting as a single parent. For about 15 years after the birth of my first daughter, I felt that parenthood--even with a spouse on hand--was an excuse for not inviting guests to our house, much less an entire egullet's worth of guests. All the shops in your photos look so wonderful. When you get a chance to answer, can you talk a little bit about the sake chocolate cake and the sake chocolate? And a question from way back in the blog: you said your children are not old enough for wasabi. About what age would a Japanese child start to eat wasabi? And is it just a matter of taste, or is it considered unhealthy for young children?

Ah, that's why Americans by Japanese cars--because one can keep driving them that long.

All your responses are really interesting. Thanks, Mizducky, for the reference to Feeding America. I'd forgotten about that wonderful site (now I've bookmarked it). The paragraph you linked to surprises me quite a bit. I never watched the Little House television series, but I read the books religiously as a a child and to my children. Laura's family was mostly too poor for Pa to be eating steak and eggs, but the descriptions of Almanzo's bountiful breakfasts--yes, after hours of hard farm labor--formed my romantic image of breakfast. So--is our contemporary high-carb, high-dairy idea of breakfast due to the wiles of the modern food industry? If so, they've been remarkably successful. I think we share a very strong understanding of what breakfast is in the U.S., whether or not we actually eat that way. And it's interesting to me that it seems to be stronger than our ideas about the other meals and snacks of the day. That said, I'm ready to head to Malaysia for some roti canai. Yunnermeier et al.--are there foods that a Malaysian would say are just not breakfast food?

I would always choose leftovers from dinner for breakfast--but it's still clear to me that it's not supposed to be breakfast. That's what I am trying to get at--our underlying idea of what makes breakfast breakfast.

Hiroyuki's terrific food blog includes photos and descriptions of some wonderful, multicourse breakfasts, including marinated fish, pickles, and meatballs. I posted the following: "It seems to me that in Japanese cuisine, the distinction between foods appropriate for breakfast and foods for other meals might be less strong than, say, most American's feel. I myself am not a fan of American breakfast foods in general (I agree that granola is better as a snack food), but my husband winces when I nibble on a piece of chicken or fish-that's-not-lox for breakfast. What Japanese foods would be taboo at breakfast?" Of course, my husband would not be taken aback by sausage or bacon or pickled herring at breakfast, although we don't generally have those things. He would think it odd for us to have pancakes for dinner. (I'm using him as a straw man, here.) Leftover pizza for breakfast has a whiff of transgression about it. So . . . I started wondering whether there are various levels of differentiation between meals among cuisines. And whether there are any syntactical rules to be found. I don't think it's the level of spiciness or blandness, exactly. Alliums might figure in the American rules. Fattiness? Sweetness? Why do we associate eggs with breakfast and chickens with dinner?

Wonderful blog. I just found it this morning. I hope your wife is doing better. I, too, love the milk carton ideas. Those cartons can't be recycled in my town, so it's great idea to reuse them. You may have started a movement! It seems to me that in Japanese cuisine, the distinction between foods appropriate for breakfast and foods for other meals might be less strong than, say, most American's feel. I myself am not a fan of American breakfast foods in general (I agree that granola is better as a snack food), but my husband winces when I nibble on a piece of chicken or fish-that's-not-lox for breakfast. What Japanese foods would be taboo at breakfast? I was also wondering: when your children (who seem to be impressively competent) made the cake, did they do it in the countertop oven? Or do you buy the cake layers and assemble them with the filling and frosting and fruit?

Thank you for posting this, pax. It does worry me. And damn, I was just about to make some pork confit, inspired by another thread. Guess I'll wait.

So I came across this thread this morning, and I sez to myself, I have fava beans, I have chickpeas, I have a lot of parsley and scallions I should use up, I have some homemade chubz (pita) in the freezer, I'll make falafel tonight! Obviously, I didn't have 14 hours to soak the beans; I boiled the beans (separately) for one minute and then left them to soak for the rest of the afternoon. I used foodman's recipe in recipe gullet. Absolutely delicious! Best ever! Thank you all. What I didn't have in the house was lettuce or tahini. Inspired by Chefcrash's pickles, I made a much quicker wilted slaw out of salted-and-squeezed red cabbage, dressed with olive oil and lemon juice. And I made a sauce with just drained yogurt, garlic, and salt. We ate the falafel in the chubz with these two accompaniments, and it was excellent. I think I liked the combination as well as the lettuce and tahini sauce I usually use. My favas were the big, brown-skinned ones they sell at my Italian grocery store. Popping them out of the skins was kind of amusing, but I will definitely look for skinless, split ones for the future.

Dorie Greenspan has a really nice overview of different kinds of butter on her blog http://www.doriegreenspan.com/

One more vote for highly polished granite. An unexpected benefit for us--besides not staining or scratching, etc.--is that it reflects quite a bit of light. We have a very grainy granite of medium shade--a lot of movement, as someone said. It really does bounce back a lot of light. Two points: we have granite only on the island around our range. Another island has a butcher block top, and two counters, both with sinks, have dark formica. You don't need to have granite everywhere even if you want it somewhere. It's great for putting down hot pots and rolling pastry, not so great for breakable dishes. The other point is that I loved going to the stone yard and picking out the actual slab of granite we would use. As I said, ours has quite an uneven grain and all sorts of colors. It was great fun to find it, and I recommend the experience highly.