Suzanne F

Or maybe you just need to eat them in the right circumstances with the right person.

I'll have to ask my friends at Juilliard, Boston Conservatory, and NEC who teaches that last subject -- surely not they. Sam and Kathleen: Didn't Don Giuliani* make it illegal to have ferrets as pets? What happens if you get busted, as just happened to that guy with the monkeys? *Ever since he left Donna Donna for Donna Judy, the comparison is so much more apt, n'est-ce pas? (Don't worry, Soba, I'll explain it later if no one else does first.) Back on topic: so Chipotle is worth trying?

The double shell stays very crisp. And all by itself, the shell is delicious. Come to think of it, if they would just sell the shell, they'd do fine.

Yeah, isn't that Deborah Voigt business the pits? I mean, I could see it with that ballerina, but a SOPRANO? Who made her reputation on that role? Fire that director, is what I say. Kathleen, YOU have nothing to worry about in that department. Looking at that spaghetti, I can see why you let Sam hang around. YUM!

Wow! Thanks, already. I read about the dinner at Karam and definitely want to try it, so it's great to know I'll be close. Breweries Strip clubs Giuliani A question: how do you guys define "walking distance"? Because to me, that's anything up to a couple of miles, depending on the weather. Remember that where I come from, it's foolish to drive (pace Fat Guy ). I mean, if there are sidewalks, it's walkable. And maybe even if there aren't, so long as it's not all highway.

Damn straight. But I've found that if I let them get juuuuuuuuuuuust ripe, and keep them in the bottom bin in the fridge, they hold all right for as much as 2 weeks. And the guac I made tonight also had (please don't shoot me ): lime juice minced scallion minced garlic finely diced roasted red pepper chopped pickled jalapenos chopped cilantro chopped recao minced Kalamata olives S & P & smoked paprika The olives were a mistake: way too assertive.

Chef did rewrite a bit, but not much. The only thing I had to do with the text was make sure the conversions from metric to US were correct, change the names of ingredients from British to Merkin, convert a few out-and-out Britishisms (e.g. "wayhey") and correct any errors I found of whatever sort (including errors in the original ; I forget which recipe had them, not many though). But I can attest that the American version is NOT a bowdlerization. If anything worse happened to the text, it was after I finished copyediting. (For the record, I was not the first copyeditor on this project. But whoever WAS, didn't know that "strong flour" is our bread flour, and that you ABSOLUTELY CAN NOT substitute light corn syrup for golden syrup -- or that golden syrup IS available here. Just to mention 2 of the egregious errors I had to fix.)

That's meant to clean off any impurities. Just as you might do the same with veal bones when making a white veal stock: removing the loose bits of protein that would cloud the stock otherwise. What I'm used to is bringing a whole chicken, plus flavorings, to a boil, then turning off the heat and letting the chicken sit in the water until cool. Again, the idea is to not let gunk come off the meat into the broth. And anyway, Chinese chicken stocks are delicate rather than hearty.

I'm back! as it's getting closer. We're arriving on Friday, 3/26 (plane supposed to land about 8pm) and will be leaving Wednesday morning, 3/31. Not sure yet what days HWOE may want to shepherd a group, but I'm looking at the posts here and on PortlandFood.org. This will be a mini-vacation for me, so other than Sunday morning, I'll be out and about. Any suggestions for sights to see (food or otherwise) will be gratefully accepted. It's been 10 years since I was last in Portland, so I imagine there must be more than Yamhill Market.

Isn't that one of Steve Hanson's places, from before he started going upscale? Which means it's probably fairly reliable but not particularly exciting.

Congrats on the cookin'! I loved your description of the sauce "blorting" -- how soon can we get that into a dictionary? It's perfect. You and Sam work at the same place? How can you stand it? (Although I guess you don't have to see each other during the workday. ) Oh . . . come to think of it, HWOE and I did (that's how we met), although not once we hooked up together.

That's sad.

My final report on this: Yesterday morning (more than 48 hours after purchase), the last of the cream puffs were finally finished. Damned if the bottom crust didn't still have some crunch to it! (Although the top of the puff was a total sog.) The filling had indeed increased slightly more in flavor, but in the end the overwhelming impression was of whipped cream. HWOE finally ate one, and said, "Hey, this is really good!" There you have it, folks, the definitive review. From someone who does not analyze his food but simply eats and enjoys. BTW, as a bizarre, NYC-is-just-another-small-town occurrence: we were at City Center 3 times this weekend to see Paul Taylor Dance Company, and on our way in to one performance I noticed in the lobby the woman who I was sure had been right behind me on line at Beard Papa's. She eventually sat in the same section as we did, and when I went up to her and asked, "Didn't we stand next to each other on the creampuff line?" she laughed and acknowledged, yes, we had. Ach, NY is SUCH as small town.

Absolutely! Where's the correlation with, say, Tom Yam? And don't you go telling me that just soup.

Wait a moment, please. Another Yank asking for an explanation: Marco_Polo mentioned a "PBB" -- huh? surely not Peanut Butter and Bacon? Carry on.

One for each Lil Varmint? Skim milk keeps a lot longer. Of course, then you've got skim milk for a longer time. Well, it doesn't take that long to get used to.

Excuse me, sir, the question was not directed at you, I believe. We can wait for the blogger herself to return and answer (even though she'll say exactly the same thing. )

I finally made it the other night. YES!!!!! (I used a lower temperature and longer time, only because I was making other stuff at the same time.) When I worked at the late Zeppole, we did a roasted cauliflower-broccoli-red onion antipasto -- all three tossed together with olive oil, S&P, and roasted in the pizza oven at very high temperature. That was good, but this is better.

Dunno -- but they are so pretty! And IMO have better flavor than butternut, which is soooooooooo overused.

Otto has a funghi-and-Taleggio pizza that is pretty damn good. My guess is that almost any meltable cheese would work -- just depends on what flavor you want. Of course, the cheese has to be able to take high heat without separating. Hmm, I've got several pizza doughs available -- this calls for some experimentation.

Thanks, Marlene! And to all who added their comments -- this has been a great blog for learning about kids, snacking behavior world-wide, showers. bergerk, you've already made a great start!

Happy Purim to all! There's supposed to be a Rabbi Ribeye piece about hamantaschen on The Daily Gullet, but it's a bit slow in appearing. Hope y'all won't mind reading it when you're all stuffed to the gills with the dainty little things (HA! dainty? My grandma's sure weren't! )

Thanks for taking this on, Kathleen! It will be great to hear someone ELSE's opinion of Sam's prowess -- in the kitchen, I mean.

Pan: so what? Please don't turn this into a Sam Sifton bashing session just because he doesn't know as much as you do about this specific subject. Remember that MOST people don't know any of that stuff, either. They (and I include myself) want an idea of what the food tastes like, what the ambience is -- that's the information on which I base my decision to try a place (or not). The write-up did a good job on that, I think.

Next day update: after a night in the fridge, the top of the pastry is pretty soggy, but the bottom with the pie crust is still nice and crunchy. The filling is ever so slightly more flavorful, but still not much. I hope I can get HWOE to eat at least one of the two remaining puffs. There's no nutrition labelling, but these things can't be low-fat or in any way healthy.