SuzySushi

You can buy a wok ring for a couple of bucks at any market that sells Asian cookware. That'll hold a curved-bottom wok stable over an electric burner. These days, some woks are made with slightly flatter bottoms, just for electric burners.

I'm also of the fruit crisp fall-backs, because I almost always have the ingredients in the house. Another good one is clafoutis, basically a pancake batter (eggs, milk, flour, sugar) with whatever available fruit thrown in. Cherries are traditional, but canned lychees are particularly good!

Oooh, oooh, me, me!!!! Yesterday we had a three-family Tempura Party at a friend's house. The hostess provided the shrimp and tempura batter, I prepared the vegetables, and the third friend (whose wife had to work that day) brought soft drinks and dessert. Veggies were: kabocha (I nuked the whole kabocha 2 minutes for easier slicing, then cut in half lengthwise, then crosswise and into 1/3" thick vertical slices), green beans, white sweet potato, onion, Oriental eggplant (too long to fan-cut, so I sliced them diagonally), and shiso leaves. Everything cooked perfectly and was tender by the time the batter turned golden. Another favorite of mine is kabocha - aka pumpkin - flan, which is incredible!

Mmmmm..... fondue (which is back in style!), croquettes (which I'd entirely forgotten about too!), rumaki (anyone for bacon-wrapped prunes, while we're at it?)..... And when was the last time a restaurant brought out a basket of popovers, which was one of the first things I remember learning to make in home-ec class? A favorite of my husband's that you never see on menus anymore is Lobster Thermidor.

Of the restaurants listed above, my leaning would be to go with Alan Wong's, because it is the most "Hawaiian" of those listed. Chef Mavro's, La Mer, and Padovani's are heavily French, while Hoku's is European-worldwide-fusion. If you want dining with a superb sunset view (sunset is between 6:30 - 7:00 these days), try Roy's in the Hawaii Kai suburbs and ask for a table on the lanai. But be warned: Roy's is extremely loud.

Besides the examples mentioned above, brightening the color of purple foods (like red cabbage) by adding vinegar or lemon juice during cooking, or else they turn out blue!

That's one I've heard from my Japanese friends. You're supposed to rub the two cut sides together until you produce white froth. Is your mom Japanese?

- When you find yourself planning vacations around places you can shop for food! (Well... let's see, if we have a stopover in X city, maybe we can take a taxi to Y ethnic grocery store and still be back in time to catch the connecting flight without unloading our luggage... )

My first post... glad to have discovered you guys! My mother was a decent baker but a terrible cook. Her hamburgers were like hockey pucks. But her real piece de resistance was overcooked spaghetti topped with ketchup rather than pasta sauce. When, years later, I happened to mention that everyone else uses pasta sauce -- not ketchup -- on spaghetti, she looked at me quizzically and asked, "But what do they do with the rest of the can?"