mizducky

Hi Bill-- The armchair-sociologist in me is always fascinated by community transitions. I'm intrigued at the transitions you imply about Moab--I'm guessing from the apple orchards that the town started out as a Mormon farm settlement before its reinvention as a destination for outdoors-minded tourists. I'm hoping and guessing that transition will show up in your culinary adventures this week. Are there any dining spots that reflect older pre-tourist Moab? (Or were its founders not much for any kind of dining outside the home?) I'm also mightily looking forward to any further Native American cookery you wind up showing us. And of course, any pictures of the countryside you sneak in will be heartily appreciated.

You know what? I don't remember when I learned to make mashed potatoes, but it was certainly well along into adulthood because it was one of those things my mom just never, ever made. Not sure why. I don't particularly recall her making instant "mashed potatoes" either. And she sure didn't shy away from other potato dishes--we had baked potatoes all the time. For whatever reason, mashed just wasn't on her culinary radar scope somehow, and thus it wasn't on mine either for a good long while. If I were to hazard a guess, my mom probably didn't grow up eating mashed potatoes either (I think her immigrant parents were more into potato kugels and latkes). As a young bride, Mom did teach herself a number of all-American dishes out of her 1950s Betty Crocker and Better Homes and Gardens cookbooks. But knowing her food quirks well, I'd be willing to bet cash money that she looked at all the butter and cream and gravy in the mashed potato recipes in those books, had one of her odd little diet-freak attacks, and vetoed them. All the odder since baked potatoes with all the stuff we'd put on them wasn't particularly slimming--let alone kugels and latkes, though she'd make those very infrequently. Ahhh yes--food behavior is frequently illogical ... Anyway--yeah, no home-mashed potatoes for me until I was well along in years. And I still do it very seldom, and still prefer them baked or roasted or whatever. Even though I do like the occasional side of mashed in restaurants.

It's been a pleasure, my dear! (Give Jean-Luc a few ear-strokes for me! )

You know you're an eGulleteer when ... ... one of your favorite recreational activities is going out to dinner with a bunch of other on-line foodies, so that the whole party can share the joys of ordering a bunch of wild stuff, photographing every dish, gossipping non-stop about restaurants and food, and chuckling at other diners' bemused looks.

I just posted about this about a week ago in another topic, but I'm too lazy to go find it just now ... I grew up with all-gas ranges, and my biggest adjustment when confronted by my first all-electric range was not the burners, but the oven and broiler. Whereas with most home gas ranges, the broiler is in a drawer/slide-out contraption under the main oven compartment (so it can share the oven's heating unit), most home electric ranges have a second heating element in the roof of the oven just for broiling. You're supposed to fire up the broiler element, and position your pan full o' food under it on the topmost oven shelf. At least for all electrics I've seen, you also have to leave the oven door slightly ajar while broiling for proper air circulation. This all may well be way-old news to lots of folks, but back then it was sure new news to me! I well remember going to broil something for the first time on my first electric range, pulling open the drawer underneath the oven, and going "Huh?? Where the hell did the broiler go?!?!?!?"

You reminded me of the one instance in which my mother actively encouraged me to play with my food. I clearly remember her demonstrating how to make "canals" in my oatmeal by pouring a little milk over it and then dragging a spoon through it so that the milk would collect in the resulting trenches--and the relish with which she would tell me that she used to do this all the time when she was a kid.

Time was when I too would just inhale peanut butter by the spoonful straight from the jar. Not something I can get away with doing anymore but, dang, that was some good eating. I think my all-time favorite use of peanut butter is in that classic super-simple recipe for no-bake "cookies" (actually more like confections) from the back of the Hershey's unsweetened cocoa box. This recipe appears to be a close paraphrase. It's been quite a long while, but I used to make gado-gado using peanut butter in the sauce--which is admittedly a not-so-authentic shortcut, but I remember it being pretty darned yummy all the same. (Oddly, I don't care for PBJ sandwiches all that much. Dunno why. Probably because I would much rather have a sammich built on animal protein.)

And then, there is always this little literary classic. These days, my "playing" with food is mostly of a utilitarian sort--the product itself, while often quite pleasing, is not especially playful, but the experimenting and exploring required to create it most definitely is. An exception: my lovely Peep Treets. Erm ... and oh yeah, as mentioned in another recent topic, there have been certain experiments, over the years, with certain confections apocryphally ascribed to Alice B. Toklas ...

I smell a possible new topic: "FN Shows Most Amenable to MST3K Treatment." (The challenge, of course, will be to keep it relevant to food and eGullet, as opposed to totally spinning off on quirks of the host, etc.). I personally don't have the bandwidth to start such a topic, but I'm not above inciting someone else ...

Reminds me that I heard that old song "Spiders and Snakes" just the other night. Have you informed your young men that this particular noisemaking skill is doomed to *not* impress any love-interests they might be contemplating? (You could even suggest that picking up a few constructive kitchen skills might be a much faster route to romance... )

All the activity in this topic inspired me to make some yogurt myself. I actually got good results using entirely reconstituted nonfat dry milk--the secret, I learned a good ways back, is to mix up the milk a good day or three beforehand, and let it sit in the fridge; I think this lets every last bit of the dry milk dissolve, cutting way down on that funky dry-milk off-flavor. I added an additional 3rd-ish of a cup of dry milk while I was heating the batch to 180 deg F. Cooled the saucepan in a sinkful of cold tap water. Used Mountain High lowfat yogurt, lightly beaten, as my starter--1/2 cup of that in 1 quart of liquid milk. Tempered the starter first with a couple spoonfuls of the warm milk, then mixed it all thorougly, and poured it into an empty yogurt container I'd saved for the purpose. Incubated it for a few hours in an oven heated at 200 deg F for about 30 seconds then shut off; then left it just sitting out on the counter, lightly covered, overnight (it was definitely incubation temperature in my apartment!) Resulting yogurt is creamy, thick, a little viscous, with a nice mild flavor. I'm satisfied with it--just had a cupful for breakfast. It's been a long time since I last made yogurt, but now that I've successfully gotten back on that bicycle and ridden it, I think next time I'll make a bigger batch and make at least some of it into yogurt cheese/kefir.

They look good, but it occurs to me that I've never asked precisely what "shocked" means. Very quickly sauteed at high heat? ← To shock food means to quickly cool it down, usually by dropping it into a large volume of iced water, right after fetching the food out of a high-heat cooking process. This is done to immediately stop all further cooking from carryover heat. Vegetables especially stay crisp and brightly-colored when you do this. (And you get to splash lots of water all over. )

Arrrg. I am normally a pacifist, but I confess to sometimes fantasizing about slapping these ageists upside the head with the nearest copy of "Mastering the Art of French Cooking"--and then demanding that they recite Julia's age when she first entered the profession. (And then slapping them again, repeatedly, until they come up with the correct answer.)

Greetings, your majesty! Any chance you might make an expedition across the Hudson this week to visit my childhood hometown, Nyack? (It still kind of boggles my mind to know that there is now fine dining going on there, as well as live music and antiques and what-all--when I was in high school in the early 1970s, all those chichi cafes and shops were nothing but a bunch of decrepit and/or vacant storefronts.) (Edited because sometimes I kan't spel)

I almost forgot--if there's tartar sauce or horseradish sauce available, I like those as a nice change of pace.

I'm pooped and don't have the energy to do the full-fledged camera thing, so I'll give you a verbal on tonight's creation. I set out to make a totally mushroom soup with no dairy or starch, and boy did it ever taste like a million bucks, but wow did it look unsightly. Base was a boatload of supermarket button mushrooms (they were on special), sliced and sweated in a little olive oil till super-tender, spiked with about two ounces of dried mixed European shrooms, reconstituted. This then got simmered with a generous amount of sweated chopped onion, minced garlic, S&P, a scant tsp. of dried tarragon, a little glug of red wine vinegar, the cup of mushroom soaking liquid, and a generous tsp of veg base dissolved in a cup of water. I pureed most of the concoction in the blender--it got a lovely light mousse-like consistency. At the last minute before taking it off the heat, I decided to shred and halve a whole package of enoki I had sitting around, raw, and fold the whole lot into the puree. I really like how this concoction turned out in terms of taste and mouthfeel--the still-crunchy threads of enoki in the soft puree was really interesting. But--an attractive dish it most definitely was not. Pureed well-stewed shrooms look like deep brown baby poop. What it looked like with the enoki mixed in, I hesitate to put into words, but leave to your imagination. Hint: Euw. I ate it anyway, I was that pleased with the flavor. This idea is definitely a keeper; I just need to come up with a way to make it more presentable. Maybe just content myself with a sprinkle of enoki on top, not a whole bale of it mixed in. Those little packages of enoki are deceptive--it's amazing how many of the little buggers are packed in there once you start pulling them apart a bit. (Going off to get another bowl of the shrooms...)

I am majorly envious of your plum tree. The little Damsons are my favorite plum in the whole universe, and now that you mention it I've yet to see them in any of the markets I shop in San Diego. I grew up just eating them as-is out of hand, no cooking, no sweetening, nuthin' but plum. No other variety of plum turns me on quite like these little guys.

Charming. Does her manager know that she's sneering at customers' purchases right at the point of sale? Oh wait--this is a store you say you keep promising yourself you'll never shop at again ... now I'm projecting that perhaps the management doesn't give a damn about their cashiers' lack of manners ... Sorry--off-topic tangent, I realize, but grocery employees who obviously disrespect the food they're handling bugs the crap out of me--it's like, geez, if you hate food that much, why the hell are you working here? Hauling this post back on-topic: I just now, only ten minutes ago, consumed a sandwich of a couple of boneless skinless chicken thighs, grilled on the ol' George Foreman and stuffed into a whole wheat pita. I periodically buy a whole tray of BSCTs and bag 'em up by threes or so for the freezer--alternatively, I buy one of those big ol' bags of IQF BSCTs and stash that away. Great "healthy" sandwich fare. I tend to leave a lot of the tiniest fat deposits intact on the bits o' bird when cooking 'em, especially when grilling (or pseudo-grilling) them; I like the additional richness and umami of the browned melted fat. Once in a very blue moon (i.e. when there's a ridiculous sale, and no other animal protein in the market looks particularly appealing), I'll buy BSCBs and give them the same treatment. In that case, leaving the little bits of fat in place for grilling helps a good bit with enriching the meat. It also amuses me to imagine certain healthy-eating pundits flipping out over this, protesting that I'm majorly undoing the "health" benefits of the skin-off meat.

Mustard. Any kind of mustard. Preferably spicy brown, but even yellow ballpark mustard wins out over ketchup every time. I'm one of those wackos who puts mustard on my burgers too. In fact, I majorly avoid ketchup whenever I can--just way too sweet for my taste preferences. Oh yeah--if malt vinegar is available, I'll sometimes use that instead of mustard. But only sometimes. Mustard is just one of my favorite condiments in the universe altogether.

Some of my Capitol Hill friends were apparently early and highly-vocal initiates into the Cult of Top Pot from the very beginning. I still don't know whether to be jealous or relieved (for the sake of my waistline) that the whole Top Pot thing did not get rolling until after I'd moved away. Speaking of envy: any way you could Fedex a few samples of that pork belly dish down to San Diego?

Hi, Milagai--once again, I think we're actually on the same wavelength here ... Just for the record: the "complete protein" myth was long ago exploded by nutritionists - your body does all the combining needed all by itself, from various plant based foods eaten over the day. You DONT have to actually create combinations in every dish you cook. Most vegetarian cuisines however do have strong traditions of food combinations - e.g. dal and chapatis, beans and rice, etc. that just go together, and that effortlessly do this work for you.....You'd never eat dal or beans just by themselves (for a meal I mean, not one of those raiding-the-fridge-at-midnight snacks)..... ← Oh, I've totally known that for years too. Even "Diet for a Small Planet" lady Frances Moore Lappe recanted on her original obsession with protein-complementarity in subsequent editions of her book. But I still think it's kinda neat when a non-traditional dish just does the protein-complementing thing as an unforced result of its ingredients, the way a traditional dish evolved over centuries would do. JMHO: Of all the possible evils, I'd rather have the mock whatevers than be presented with fish, chicken, things made with beef stock, or be told "you can just pick the turkey out, right?".....(all actually happened to me)..... baby steps...... OTOH: I've been afflicted more times than I can count by people (both meater and veggie) who dislike and pick out and throw away all kinds of lovely vegetables - from asparagus to tomatoes, who are deeply suspicious of beans, and who won't eat analogs either, what DO they eat? ← Totally agreed that there are much more distressing situations a vegetarian can confront than being served yet another Gardenburger! I confess, though, that this is partly my own foodie streak just reacting to boring food in general, going "man, there's so much greater room for inventiveness here! Why not go for the gusto instead of taking the no-thought way out? Especially when the gusto would be just a hair more effort than simply buying a prefab veg-slab! " To be fair, though, I find myself thinking similar thoughts about lots of omnivore fare too. It's one thing when it's unplanned or an emergency or something, but hey, if someone's gone to the trouble to invite people over in advance... well, yeah, it's lovely to hang out and all, but ... jeez, don't tell me you feed yourselves this same boring food all the time, too! You poor people! Maybe I need to cook for you sometime! Which leads to my also having long wondered about those picky eaters (of any food philosophy) who seem to never willingly consume a (non-starchy) vegetable ever--how they don't come down with deficiency diseases I'll never understand.

Did you like the coffee at Zoka when you lived here? That's another coffee shop I really enjoy. ← Y'know, I never wound up getting familiar with Zoka, for the admittedly dumb-sounding reason that I became so stuck on Vivace, I kinda lacked the motivation to explore further.

Yeah, but it's also $tarbuck's home base, so ... there you go. Actually, when I lived up there I would even choose a Starbucks over an SBC shop--some of the most wretched excuses for coffee drinks it had ever been my dubious "pleasure" to consume. Now you're talking! The Vivace Roasteria was my personal favorite when I lived up there--in fact, for a couple of years I lived only a five minute walk away. Or perhaps more accurately, a five minutes walk there, and more like a two-minute jet-flight back! Their roast will definitely put hair on your chest--dayum! Oh ghod, the loveable Loveless. Now I'm *really* having major Seattle nostalgia.

If it makes you feel any better, I clearly remember my first run-in with the exact opposite of your problem. I grew up in households with exclusively gas ranges--it wasn't until I was an adult on my own in my first apartment that I encountered my very first all-electric range. Imagine my surprise when I bought a steak, brought it home, pulled open the drawer under the oven ... and found it was just a drawer! Where the *#@& was the goddamn broiler?!?!??? I finally found some documentation somewhere explaining that electric ovens have their broiler element in the top of the main oven compartment, plus the whole boondoggle of needing to keep the oven door ajar while broiling. Still, for years afterward I was perplexed as to why manufacturers of electric ovens insisted on putting that "non-functional broiler drawer" on their ovens anyway.

OOOOOOOOH!!! Boneless turkey thighs!!!! Want want want!!! Composing myself somewhat: what store did you see these in, sister-duck? (Hoping it was a chain grocery with outposts in my town ... )