mizducky

Totally digging the vibe of this place. It's a Northeast US type of joint that holds major nostalgia for me. The griddle and the Fryolator and the soft serve and shake machines rule at those kind of joints. Also loving all the oatmeal stuff. In the winter when I'm making congee every day, sometimes I've been using rolled oats in the broth instead of rice. Need to try that with the un-squished oats one of these days ... only doing the start-them-overnight trick.

As the granddaughter of Eastern European Jewish immigrants, I grew up eating beef tongue on a regular basis, and loved it. We'd usually buy it already cooked and sliced from the deli for sandwich making, but every once in a long time my mom would buy a whole fresh beef tongue and cook it from scratch. My mom did a very simple preparation--simmer low-and-slow for a few hours in water to cover with some basic aromatics, usually nothing more than an onion stuck with cloves and a big bay leaf. (Nowadays, I'd probably also add some chunks of carrot and celery.) When the tongue was tender, my mom would haul it out of the water onto a big platter and I'd help her pick all the funny rubbery skin off of it. We'd maybe trim off some of the gnarlier bits off the root end, but she'd basically serve it as is, and slice it at the table. But true to my whole family's aversion to mixing sweet and savory, we *never* had it with a sugary glaze or a raisin sauce or any such thing--we'd just eat it plain. In a sandwich we liked it with spicy brown mustard on sturdy Jewish rye bread. Nobody in my family ever exhibited any horror over tongue looking like a tongue, so I didn't either--especially since it tasted so darned good! It was only in adulthood that I discovered other people were weirded out by the look or even the very idea of the stuff, so I've mostly had to do my tongue indulgences on my own. I was overjoyed to discover frozen whole beef tongue in my local 99 Ranch Market for way cheaper than in mainstream supermarkets (when I could even find it in the latter). And then there were all those tongues from other critters I hadn't even considered before--lamb, pork ... a whole new frontier of offal! I was also delighted to discover tacos de lengua. As to shopping tips/what to look for in a tongue at the market ... eh. It should look like a tongue, nu vhat else? No, seriously, I guess I never really thought about it other than commonsensical things like, if it's fresh, does it smell and look properly fresh. If it comes frozen, who the heck can tell what's up with it until it's defrosted?

I've only spent a little time in Central NY (visiting kid sister when she was attending SU), but I really liked what little I got to see. Looking forward to reading along, and would especially love to hear more about the local Cambodian/Vietnamese/Hmong community you mentioned.

Hmmm ... then it must be that my folks simply didn't know about it and therefore didn't buy it. (My folks never kept kosher, and enjoyed all kinds of traif including pork products, but the fact that they themselves didn't grow up with such foods would occasionally show up in situations like this.) Speaking of pork products ... yeah, that pork belly looks absolutely awesome.

Congrats on taking your AAA day in stride. There's something about blogs that invites technical malfunctions (I think it's called Murphy's Law). This is all giving me a severe metro NY nostalgia attack. Though I must confess I have no memory of ever eating pork roll growing up. Maybe it didn't make it over to Rockland County . . . ?

Snark attack - of those places, the only one I would eat in is Red Mill - and I am not even a burger fan. Maybe Kidd Valley, for a milkshake. Mae's and Mama's? Not even for free, and probably not even if you paid me. ← I agree with tsquare here. While the descriptions of the decor is (are?) spot on, the food at both Mae's and Mama's is awful. And I'm not squeamish about restaurant cleanliness per se, but Mae's lack of cleanliness makes me shudder. ← Well, all this saddens me, because it means that these places, especially Mae's, must have gone seriously downhill since I moved away from Seattle in 2002. In particular, I never noticed Mae's having any kind of cleanliness problem back when I used to eat there. Now if someone's going to respond that, no, they felt Mae's always sucked even five years ago, well then I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. Though I guess the point is now moot ... (pun seriously not intended ) In any case, my post seems to have provoked some more specific restaurant recommendations from current Seattle residents, so as far as I'm concerned my work is done here.

I think the resident Seattleites on the board have done a great job of covering all the more haute cuisine places over the years, but here are a few places more on the fun-and-funky side that you might want to consider: Mae's Phinney Ridge Cafe has lots of fun silly cow decor, and cinnamon rolls that should make Cinnabon hang its head in shame. Also on Phinney Ridge is Red Mill Burgers, whose burgers are fabulous. The Kidd Valley locally-based burger chain is also quite good, and has more outposts than Red Mill--their deep fried mushrooms are fab, and they make great milkshakes. Seattle, IMO, is not all that strong on Mexican cuisine, but Mama's Mexican Kitchen in Belltown (another interesting neighborhood to explore) is great fun--lots of funky campy decor, heavy on the velvet Elvis painting type kitsch.

I do! Though I have a confession: since I grew up with shrimp carefully stripped of heads, shells, and everything, I've never been quite sure of the etiquette, say, in Chinese restaurants when presented with cooked whole head-and-shell-on shrimp. Especially when they've been dipped in a spicy coating, shell head and all, and fried, my assumption has been that you're meant to eat the whole thing, so I've crunched away happily ... and none of the waiters have looked at me funny yet ...

In terms of cra-zee Halloween decor (including a bunch of food-related wackiness, so I'm still sort of on-topic ), I strenuously recommend Archie McPhee in Ballard. Both adults and kidling will also probably dig the Fremont Troll. Pity you won't be in town for Trolloween. Both Ballard and Fremont are fun neighborhoods to wander around in general, with a number of interesting shops and eateries, though both were rapidly gentrifying when I moved away five years ago so I don't know if they're as fun as I remember them being ...

Hmmm....I need to poke around local markets for some tamarind soup base! Miz Ducky, do you think E would give fish head soup a shot? ← Oh dear. I think I'd never hear the end of that one. FWIW, I've seen the tamarind soup base in a number of Asian grocery stores around here.

Yay! Barbeque and bikes! Two things that I've never done myself but always admired. So where in north Jersey are you, again? And are you taking part in any motorcycle travel during the course of this blog?

So glad this topic got unearthed! I did this quick pictorial of making fish-head sinigang soup in my last foodblog (scroll down a screenful or two). Yep, fish heads are fun eating.

It's been a long time since I last visited the city, but my brain is somehow insisting that is indeed a westward view on the GW Bridge. And that second photo looks so familiar, somehow--probably because I grew up in Rockland County, with lots of ponds and lakes around that look very much like that one ... Meanwhile, a little creative Googling turned up this listing of motorcycle runs in New York State. Note the two runs happening within the time period of the upcoming blog. Hmmmm ...

I meant to respond to this when you posted it over in the Weight Watchers topic before life got hectic on me -- that looks and sounds majorly yum! On one recent super-hot and humid evening when the idea of turning on the stove made my skin crawl, I had myself a simple bowl of cold shirataki noodles garnished with dark soy sauce, sesame oil, and thinly sliced green onions. I must be getting used to konnyaku--or else I lucked out and bought an especially soft brand of shirataki--because the texture was just pleasantly bouncy in my mouth. Just the right thing in this weather.

Yep, I've stumbled across that site while searching for something or other, and greatly enjoyed it. A search of eGullet shows that, while it's been mentioned previously, it's not had a topic of its own before--so now it does!

Chiming in here belatedly to say that, as a child of the Greater New York metro area, I'm totally enjoying your blog, and the Jersey vibe. Especially that Jefferson Diner--boy do I ever miss those Jersey diners out here on the Left Coast!

Congrats on the adventure! If you seriously only have a small shoebox worth of luggage space you can dedicate to foodstuffs, I'd say you might want to hit one of those places (online or brick-and-mortar) that sell dehydrated foods--mainly catering to backpackers and/or survivalists. Actually, when I used to go car-camping I'd always pack along a bag of dehydrated mixed-vegetable mix I'd get from the local food co-op. They could perk up almost anything. Definitely bring spices--and I'd say, preferably whole, not ground, plus appropriate hand-powered grinding gizmos. If you can spare room for a few bulkier items, my go-tos would be dried mushrooms and dried chiles. Plus several flavors of bouillon cubes. I don't know what if any access you'll have to flour, but it would be nice to have some kind of leavening agent along just in case.

Recently, I've started seeing milk products in pint-sized plastic bottles in San Diego stores. I think it started with flavored milks (chocolate, etc.), but I've sometimes seen plain milk in them too, especially in convenience stores. They tend to have those brightly-colored wrap-around plastic labels. I'm guessing that one motivation for the packaging, besides convenience, is to try to appeal to kids by marketing the stuff a little more like soft drinks.

Thanks, tejon -- I think I've pretty much won the "too much of a fuss" battle, by pretty much playing the angle you suggest above. Now we've moved on to . . . other issues. Such as deciphering taste preferences that even the prefer-er himself can't quite explain. For instance: why does E. dismiss as "stale-tasting" peanuts that taste perfectly fresh and okay to me, that even came right out of a freshly-opened can of Planters? I have two theories on this: 1) unbeknownst to E, his taste buds are not what they used to be, and thus lots of things taste more muted that he recalls (I know for a fact that his sense of smell has become almost nil, and as we all know, knocking out the sense of smell can't help but have a massive effect on sense of taste); 2) he's misremembering which kind of nuts he used to buy, and instead of plain old roasted/salted peanuts, it's something like those honey-roasted nuts (I tried asking him about this but it's useless, he doesn't remember, and suggestions of flavored or coated nuts only seems to confuse him more). It's kind of expensive to keep buying different sorts of peanuts in the hope that I'll hit it right, especially since normally I don't eat 'em, so they'll either go to waste, or go to my waist, both of which options I detest. So, I think I'll wait until the honey-roasted peanuts go on sale and spring 'em on him--I figure even if those aren't what he used to get, the sweetness factor couldn't hurt. After all, as somebody (forgive me, Somebody, for forgetting who you are!) observed, the sense of sweet is often the last to remain after all the other flavor-sensing tastebuds have conked out.

I'll bet the sauce is on the sweet side. ← Heh. I'd be willing to go in on that bet with you. In fact, the other night I had a resounding success with a home-made vinaigrette salad dressing -- which I spiked with honey. He loved it. Just a spoonful of sugar (or other sweetener) makes the veggies go down ... A few nights previous to that, I made a super-simple fast skillet braise of chicken thighs -- browned them off, sauteed up some onions and garlic, deglazed with a canful of whole tomatoes in their juice, seasoned to taste, tucked the chicken back in, and let it simmer till done. Served it over whole-wheat couscous. He inhaled that. I'm beginning to discover that he really likes the Italian/Mediterranean flavor profile -- tomatoes/garlic/olive oil. My inner foodie can definitely go to town on that. Heh. He has sworn he can't stand either zucchini or eggplant. But as those vegetables are really wretched if miscooked--and miscooking happens to them frequently--I'm willing to bet cash money that he only hates them because he's never had them cooked right. So one of these days I'm planning to make my never-fail roast-vegetable ratatouille recipe, and see how that goes. I figure if I put in enough tomatoes and garlic, he'll be none the wiser.

Looks like you have plenty of great advice! Only thing I have to add: personally I find it realy helpful to get a reference-taste of a dish before I cook it for the first time, so I have an idea of what I'm aiming for. If you'd like a hit of already-cooked duck before cooking your very first, your nearest Chinese grocery is a great, relatively inexpensive resource. P.S. Duck takes to five-spice and other Chinese seasonings like ... okay, people are going to throw things at me if I write "a duck to water," but, damn ...

Sorry for the absence -- life got hectic again for awhile ... Since last I posted, I've had some nice successes, some misses, and a few "huh?!?" moments -- all very illuminating if sometimes a little confusing. Unexpected (and delightful) sucess was the "chili." The spice profile was a bit unusual--let's see, I did cumin, cinnamon, allspice, paprika ... a touch of white pepper. Salt. Notice what's missing? No actual chile heat whatsoever. Not even cayenne. This in a base of browned ground beef, kidney beans, canned tomatoes. He loved this--went for seconds, hunted down the container of leftovers the next day--he almost never goes after leftovers on his own, the only other times I can remember have been for fresh beets and those Bush's baked beans. Very interesting. (It was damn tasty stuff, if I do say so myself.) Meanwhile ... remember how E. got my inner foodie all excited by averring that he liked offal meats like heart? Even more specifically, he kept mentioning fondly this recipe for braised heart stuffed with prunes that was in his 1970s era (I think) McCall's cookbook. So I was overjoyed to find whole stuffable pork hearts at a new-to-me Mexican supermarket. (For San Diegans: this was the mighty Northgate Market down the 43rd St. exit off the I-805. kalypso, and mmm-yoso, you're right, this place is the shiznit.) I made the dish -- it was fine crock-pot fodder on one of these recent hot humid days. IMO it came out pretty damn good, and this from a woman who had been ambivalent about sweet fruit in savory meat dishes--the prunes got jammy and molasses-like, great contrast with the very lean meat. But E., who had been so enthusiastic about this stuff, was strangely neutral about the dish. He tried to respond to my questions why, but couldn't seem to put his finger on it. Eventually, he offered the following: "Somehow it's putting me off to be eating the heart of a living creature." Yep. This was one of my "huh?!?" moments. He wasn't trying to be funny, as far as I can see. My guess is that he just said the first thing that came into his head to cover for the fact that he really didn't know why the dish wasn't grabbing him. The even wackier thing was that a few weeks earlier I had served him sliced beef heart (came that way from the mainstream supermarket meat department), and he had liked it lots ... and then asked me about doing the stuffed heart recipe. Who knows, maybe now, years later and in a different phase of life, the idea of eating an identifiably whole heart was indeed striking him weird. (The pork hearts were small, so I just sliced them in half for presentation. I thought they looked cute--who knew?) Anyway ... I may yet serve him heart again--hell, it's cheap, lean, and tasty--only maybe I'll slice it up again. Or cube it in a stew. And if, once again, he asks me to make the stuffed heart recipe again, well ... I may have to fight hard not to fall over laughing. Another "huh?!?" moment, but ultimately more helpful: a few days ago, E. asked me why I hadn't made spaghetti for him yet. "Ummmmm ... because you told me you didn't like macaroni because the assisted living place served to you way too often?" Turns out that "macaroni," in E.'s lexicon, specifically refers to elbow macaroni, especially in a salad. Oh! Okay, we can work with that . . . so tonight, for another hot-weather low-impact meal, I served a good jarred sauce (Classico roasted tomato garlic) over some spaghetti, with raw veggies on the side. He raved about the sauce--it blew his mind to see large chunks of tomato in a sauce, I guess all he'd ever had was Ragu (ick). So all's well that ends well, eh? Meanwhile, I've been keeping my own more adventurous palate satisfied mostly by slipping out for pho or sushi or tacos de lengua or bibimbap. A couple different times I hit up the local Korean market for panchan to go. And before the weather got so hot recently, I even made myself congee a couple different times. I haven't tried to offer any of these things to E. yet--I don't envision him ever taking a liking to kimchee or fermented bean curd. But some of the milder stuff, sooner or later, I may offer and see if he takes me up on it.

Brava diva! You play a most adorable drunk. And the eagerness of all those market stallers to have their photo taken is also sweet -- and refreshing! Love the photos of dinners on checked tablecloths. That last one looked like it came right out of an Old Master's still life.

What a cool adventure you're living! Happy blogging--looking forward to it!

Fabulous blog, sir. Many thanks for the lovely tour of your fair city. (Even though that Moxie cocktail gave me The Fear. )