Jaymes

Could you link to the one you use?

'River Roads' is in its 70th. Whomever it was that initially said "I know, let's put out a cookbook!" deserves a spot in the fundraising hall of fame.

Also in Columbia, MO, is Patric Chocolate And I thank Joiei for letting me know about this amazing chocolate.

Resurrecting this thread in the hopes someone out there has recently made a Tres Leches that they are particularly fond of.

I picked up my copy at Hebert's Specialty Meats here in Tulsa. (they are of the Turducken fame). Give Ed Richard a call, if he has one in stock he will probably send it to you. ← Still in print. Along with 'Talk About Good II.' Great book. Several people have mentioned it in this thread. You can order here: 'Talk About Good' - Amazon

Another one to consider is Talk About Good from the Lafayette Jr League. I use that for reference a lot. The recipes are very authentic. ← I really like those Junior League-type cookbooks. Especially fun to see who's on the cookbook committee, and then look for their recipes. Particularly good.

I agree with JAZ that the number one reason for dense burgers is overworking the meat. If you want to add any kind of seasonings, sprinkle them over and then lightly toss the meat around with a fork. Try to 'work' it as little as possible.

Ah, Sweet Jim. Just think what might have been.

My daughter worked her way through grad school waiting tables at a very nice restaurant where customer service was primo, so I asked her about this. She said that they're told to double-check the diet thing on all soda orders when diet isn't specifically mentioned. And, by the way, she also said that when people ask for sugar, they bring it, along with the Splenda, Sweet & Low, etc. And that nobody thus far has acted insulted.

Yes I could. But then we wouldn't have a thread that stretched into it's second page, with some people being exasperated with me. Where's the fun in that? ← You are my first ex-husband. I knew it.

Sounds like my first ex-husband. Mike, is that you?

I'll keep that in mind if I ever dine in the South. Is the person behind the pharmacy counter just trying to help when you go up and ask for condoms, and they respond with "small?" ← Assuming that this also happens to you with some regularity, I think you have similar options as to how to handle this problem: 1.) Patronize a different restaurant/pharmacy. 2.) Patronize that restaurant/pharmacy, but request a different waitress/clerk. 3.) Patronize that restaurant/pharmacy and that waitress/clerk, but assume no harm or insult is meant and overlook it and continue on with your life concentrating on real problems and truly large issues. 4.) Patronize that restaurant/pharmacy and that waitress/clerk, but next time, ask in a loud, confrontational, head-turning, attention-grabbing voice: "What's THAT supposed to mean? Are you trying to TELL me something? Are you INSINUATING something? Because I don't GODDAMM LIKE IT!" I figure that in either case, your problem will be solved and that waitress/clerk will never ask such an insulting, demeaning question again.

I think the waitress is just trying to get it right because things go amiss when it isn't. There are many kinds of Coke, you know, and in the south, the word "Coke" really means "soft drink." As in, "I think I'll have a Coke." "What kind of Coke do you want?" "Root beer." I'm not a fan of sweet beverages, wine or otherwise, with my meals. So at lunchtime, I usually drink unsweetened iced tea. If I just answer "tea" when the server asks what I want to drink, it can mean completely different things in different part of the country. This is one time I'd give that waitress the benefit of the doubt. She knows what happens when she screws up an order. Clarifying what you want is just her attempt to be sure she'd heard correctly, and she wants to be sure she's gotten it right. Besides, with the majority of this country overweight, it's not like she's unaccustomed to people of size and is either singling you out for special scorn and ridicule, or trying to send a message. As as for trying "to help" you, she undoubtedly has neither the time nor the interest to try to improve you, or any of the rest of her larger customers. If she did, she'd sure have her hands full, wouldn't she? In fact, I'd bet a lot of money that she doesn't give a rat's ass what size you are. She's probably tired and harried and just trying to get through her shift with the least number of mistakes possible.

I'll be honest, I don't think if I were having a dinner party for 10, enchiladas would probably be the last thing I'd make. I actually don't like cooking for over 8, but that's another story. If I were cooking for a crowd, I'd make a mole or some fabulous guisado thing or even tacos. But for myself or two to four people? As I think jmeeker suggested, once you get the rhythm down, it's a breeze. You can have the beans in your favorite clay pot, keeping warm for hours and a pre-made salad you dress at the table and then there's just the enchiladas. I tend to go left to right. Left burner oil, right burner sauce, counter with plates and to the right of that fillings on a bread board. . And again , not too much filling. The star is the chile sauce, followed by the tortillas. After cooking, I keep the oil in a beer bottle stopped with a cork and refrigerate it until the next session. Bits of sauce go into the chicken broth for a good soup. Sorry- I feel like I'm talking too much. There's no right or wrong but these are my tricks. ← Talking too much? Are you kidding? Never. You are kind and generous to share your techniques, your "tricks." Eating your enchiladas with your wonderful and fresh tortillas and sauces in your kitchen simply cannot be beaten. The main difference between the way you do it and the way I do it is volume. Yours is much better, my friend. Having dinner parties, primarily work-related, of anywhere from 12-100 people several times a month was no picnic. (Except that sometimes it was. One of my 'entertaining-a-large-crowd-in-an-average-sized home' tricks was, during the summer months, pack picnic baskets for groups of 6-8 complete with glasses and a bottle of wine, divide up the guests, give each group a basket and a blanket and send them out into to the back yard.) Not only is your food and the atmosphere in which you serve it absolutely sublime, it is a lot more relevant to the way most folks live, eat and entertain. So talk away! Please!

The texture is not as perfect as right out of the pan, but it is still very good. Honestly, if they didn't turn out well, I wouldn't serve them to dozens of guests, you know? I have a lot of serving platters and glasses and dishes and centerpiece items and other bric-a-brac for Mexican-themed dinner parties, so I do that a lot and I think they're pretty good. I get lots of compliments and there are never any left. I do try to buy best-quality and freshest tortillas. The only time I have trouble is when I get kinda lazy and fry them too long in the oil. They get tough. But I've never had them fall apart in the baking pan. And there's just no other way that I've found to serve enchiladas as the main course at a large dinner party. However, like I said, I'm really talking about simply reheating them for ease of serving, not doing any lengthy cooking.

I think this is the method I need to try next time I make enchiladas. Which could actually be soon. I still have sauce. And tortillas. And even some chicken. If I get a good smooth workflow, this may actually be better than baking since it should yield a plate of food in less time. ← Yes. However, it doesn't work when enchiladas are your main course at dinner for ten. And up. That'd be 30 enchiladas at minimum. And as much as I adore Ranchito, and Dios knows I do, I think even at his house, the frijoles would be cold by the time the last guest got his enchiladas. I routinely had dinner parties for 10, 20, 30, and more. Way more. I suppose if you want to do enchiladas and didn't want to put them in the oven, you could do them as an appetizer rather than the main. But that's still a lot of time-consuming enchiladas to be standing there frying while your guests are out on the back patio sucking down the margaritas and having a good time.

They seem to have taken considerable steps to correct their policies, but it may be more due to threat of lawsuits than fear of loss of business. I had no idea about their employment practices until I read this thread and did a little googling. I drive the highways a lot and frequently stop there when I'm in the middle of nowhere and have few options. Their restaurants are always packed. I feel pretty strongly that although some of their customers probably don't care, or perhaps even agree with their policies, the vast majority, perhaps 90%, like me, have no idea.

You can go either way. I do love the tang of tomatillos. But here's a quick and simple green chile sauce: Green Chile Sauce 12 medium green chile peppers (of course, fresh are way best, but if you must....), peeled, seeded, deveined and chopped 2 medium tomatoes (or 1 cup canned tomatoes), chopped 1 medium onion, chopped 2 small garlic cloves, smashed and chopped 1 tsp salt Roast chiles over gas burners, or on outdoor grill, or under broiler until blistered. Put into plastic baggies and allow steam to permeate. This makes the chiles easy to peel. Remove peel, core, seeds, and visible veins. (Edit: Should have added that if you are using canned green chiles, you don't have to take this step of roasting, peeling, etc.) Chop into half-inch pieces. Place into saucepan and add tomatoes, onion, salt and garlic. Pour in enough water just to cover and simmer ten minutes. (If you wish, in addition to roasting the chiles, you can roast or grill the tomatoes, onion and garlic to give the whole thing a more smoky flavor.)

The thing about enchiladas that many folks don't get is that you should make them with all cooked ingredients that don't require additional baking. When I make a large number for dinner parties, I do bake them, but just so that enchiladas for, say, ten folks all arrive hot at the table at the same time, not because I want them to do any more cooking. If I'm preparing enchiladas for just a few guests, I don't bake them at all. I don't know about the CI oven method, but for my chicken enchiladas with red sauce, which I do make for a lot of dinner parties and want them to all arrive hot at the table at the same time, I do stick them in the oven to heat up. Whether you roll the enchiladas or just fold them over and put them into your baking dish, you definitely are going to make a mess, but it's not a "huge mess" as you say. What I do (as I said upthread) is to get my large shallow baking/serving pan and set it on the counter beside my stove. Then I have my skillet on the closest burner to the counter, the sauce simmering in a pan just behind it. I get a glass pie pan and put it on the counter directly in front of me. And I have the bowls with all the "fixin's" right there handy, too. I ladle some sauce into the pie pan, and also smear some around on the bottom of my baking dish. Then I take the tongs and assemble my enchiladas, one at a time, thusly: Dip one tortilla into the skillet with the hot oil, let it sizzle a few seconds (say 4 or 5), then into the pie pan where, with my fingers, I smear the sauce around to be certain the tortilla is completely sauced. (Cooks more deft than I simply hang onto the tortilla with their tongs and dip it first into the hot oil and then into the saucepan. I can do it if I focus, but invariably at least one or two will soften too much and tear apart in the sauce. With the 'pie pan' method, I don't have to worry about it.) Then into the baking dish, where I add my filling, fold the sauced tortilla over it, and snuggle it up next to the side of the pan, or next to the previous enchilada. You can roll them if you'd like, and sometimes I do. I repeat these steps until the pan is filled. Then I ladle more sauce over. Sometimes I sprinkle with a little white cheese, or some onions, or whatever. If I'm doing this right at dinner time and I have my large and hungry family waiting, I'll go ahead and stick the dish into a hot oven for about 15 minutes just, as I say, to heat through while I finish preparing the rest of the meal. That's simply because it's easier for me to have the enchiladas all arrive at the table at the same time so I can sit down and eat, too, rather than standing over the stove making them for each individual person. It's not because the enchiladas actually require any more cooking. If I'm making them for a party, I'll often make them a day ahead, then cover the dish tightly with plastic and put it into the fridge to wait for serving time. Then into a hot oven for 20 minutes or so, just to heat through. There is no heavy gloppy sauce or anything else that requires extensive baking. Yes, I've made something of a mess, but it's no worse than the mess from any multi-step cooking. My spaghetti sauce usually requires more cleanup than the enchiladas.

You're not the only one. Lemon squares/bars are my very favorite, and one thing I simply cannot resist.

Many great ideas in this previous thread: Good ideas for a baking sale (Including a nifty recipe for doggy treats!) And even more in this thread: Bake sale impaired, what sells? Pretty creative stuff.

Methodologies aside, perhaps the backlash is due to a bit of jealousy? ← Jealously probably always enters into this kind of thing. But I think her better-than-thou attitude has brought her most of this. Julia Child, for example, was certainly successful by any standard. And she was on a mission, too, like Alice. Her mission also was to improve the cooking of the nation. But I don't recall anyone feeling such intense dislike for Julia Child. In fact, everyone seems to feel nothing but fondness for and gratitude to her. What do you suppose is the difference?

I think a lot of communities and kids would be so lucky to have someone preach to them about healthy eating. She may be condescending to those who should know better - but that's because they should know better. ← I'm sure you've spent some time in your life going to various schools. And in those schools were good people that were trying to teach you good things, things you needed to know. Some of those teachers undoubtedly did a great job. They were caring and generous and accepting and kind with their knowledge and made you feel good and valued about what they were sharing with you, what you were learning. While some others were arrogant and condescending and made you feel bad about yourself and stupid and in many ways lesser than they. From which did you learn more? "Communities and kids" might be "so lucky" as to have Alice preaching to them, but the very fact that there is this backlash tells me that her methods could be far more effective if her manner were less imperious.

You mention a lot of personalities, many of them equally ubiquitous and annoying. But none so damn preachy. And condescending. I'm tired of Alice Waters. Certainly I recognize and honor her many contributions. But now I wish she'd just give it a rest already. You could have added Carlo Petrini to your list. I think that's more comparable.

Although I've never had really great "Texas-style brisket" anywhere outside of Central Texas (and unfortunately that includes the rest of Texas) and therefore would argue vigorously that it's distinct from the heavy, sweet, syrupy "red sauce" BBQ elsewhere, I'd agree that it's not as different from the others as is the North Carolina vinegar-based pork BBQ. Frankly, and I say this as someone that's lived in Texas and Missouri and belongs to the Kansas City Barbecue Society and has even taken their BBQ Judging class, the one I'd skip is Kansas City. I know it's famous, and that they actually think they're something unique there, but the truth is that the Kansas City BBQ tradition was started by a good ol' boy from Texas. I've eaten at all the famous joints and while I'll certainly agree it's tasty and the ribs are probably on average better, and the burnt ends come close, the brisket, generally speaking, is nowhere nearly so good. And since, as I say, a Texan started the Kansas City tradition, it's very similar. The main difference I can tell (other than the brisket being better in Texas) is that Kansas City seems to love that thick sauce, often so heavy and sweet that it probably should be called BBQ syrup rather than sauce. In Central Texas, many joints don't serve sauce at all, believing, correctly, that heavy sauces just hide the flavor of perfectly-smoked meat. And I've never once in Kansas City had anything even close to the snap, crackle and pop and juicy flavor of the famous smoked sausages of Central Texas. As Doc-G specifically mentioned that his company manufacturers sausage, that settles the tie. So I'd agree with Fantasmagoria in so far as getting to North Carolina. Obviously, it'd be best to hit all the barbecue Meccas but, blasphemous though it may be, if I had to skip one, it'd be Kansas City.