mizducky

Several years ago I was temping in an office where there was a constant supply of the things. I'm not much into non-chocolate candy so I haven't sought them out before or since, but I liked 'em lots while they were available to me (for free). Even the flavors that grossed me out I still found at least entertaining, in a "I double-dog-dare-you-to-eat-that" kind of way. I think the flavors I disliked, in fact, had their effect on me specifically *because* they reproduced the target flavor so accurately. The buttered popcorn, for instance, had the exact same slightly-rancid tang as the fake-buttered popcorn I smell and avoid at movie theaters (I'm not much of a popcorn fan in any case). The pickle-flavored Jelly Bellys were scary that way too, as I recall.

I have nothing substantive to add to this thread, but after reading it from the beginning while making various chortling noises, all I can think of (besides butt!) is a paraphrase of a peculiar cheer from Mystery Science Theater 3000: "Look, look, look at my butt! Look, look, look at my butt! Look at my butt! Look at my butt! Look, look, look at my butt...! Loooooooook at my butt! Yay!" /the duck P.S.: Oh wait--now I'm pondering the immortal question: "Is a duck's butt watertight?" Or perhaps more germane to this thread, isn't it smokable too?

I am truly saddened to hear this. Best wishes to your wife for a speedy recovery. I am further saddened to note that, while you are admirably clear here and in the previous thread about how carefully you and your wife followed all procedures and recommendations and that this unfortunate result was unavoidable, the article you cite does try its damnedest to imply that the patients who got this side effect were somehow screwing up on their nutrition, followup, and compliance. In other words, I fear the medical community is once again laboring its utmost to whitewash any suggestion that the fault here might lie with them, their methods--and in this case, their headlong rush to make patients thin ASAP and at all costs, even at the risk of health problems far worse than those ascribed to obesity.

Ah. Allow me to introduce you to a few proseletizing carnivores: http://www.karlloren.com/human-raw-meat-diet.htm http://www.biblelife.org/stefansson1.htm And there are more out there (Google is fun.) And I would argue that certain followers of the Atkins/low carb movement do get on an evangelical wavelength about their meat-heavy ways. (And before anyone questions my picking on Adkinsites, (1) note I only said "some" of 'em; (2) I personally have done Adkins; while not solely responsible for my gout, it most definitely provoked my very first, and extremely painful, acute gout attack last year.)

Lessee ... to judge from recent eating habits, my three would be: Cheese Eggs Meat Admittedly pretty broad categories, but there you go ... Time was when I would have sworn up and down that I could not live without either coffee or booze. Well, due to health considerations, both coffee and booze have become once-in-a-blue-moon only treats in my life. But the Big Protein Three march on, and on, and on...

I am so totally *not* a vegetarian, but I never quite understand the ire and disdain the mention of any kind of vegetarianism or veganism seems to arouse in some folks. And lest folks on this thread feel a bit put on the spot by this statement, I don't only mean just here--I've seen it all over and everywhere. Surely there are vegans who are dumb about their veganism. I've seen 'em and heard 'em myself. But dumbness (alas) is an equal-opportunity phenomenon. I've seen and heard examples of people of every type of food preference, from full-on carnivores to full-on vegans, making what I would judge to be dumb statements and choices about their particular food choices; I've also witnessed examples from every position on the food-preference spectrum of wise and well-informed statements and choices. So why, I wonder, the especial ire aimed at the veg end of the spectrum? And if your response is "because vegans say and do such stupid things about their food choices," I would gently request that you please re-read the previous paragraph about my observation that such stupidity is not a unique aspect of veganism, and ask yourself in all seriousness whether stupid things sometimes said and done by some carnivores have ever tempted you to similarly dismiss all carnivores as stupid. Thank you.

First off, Mazel Tov on your wedding! It's been forever since I last drove the Big Sur, so I don't know how Nepenthe is currently doing foodwise, but you can't beat the view with a stick. (Plus there aren't a helluva lot of other dining options on the Big Sur Highway, if I recall correctly.) There's a whole assortment of threads on San Diego here on the boards--here's one that has focuses (though far from exclusively) on ocean-view dining: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...95&hl=san+diego And another whose focus is cheap-but-good eats (including taquerias): http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...91&hl=san+diego Again, as I said on a previous thread, I second everything in the immediately-above link about Point Loma Seafood, Hillcrest, and the bazillions of Asian eateries in and around Convoy Ave.

Do fish tacos count as sandwiches? If they do, I'd add those to my list.

My all-time favorite Sandwich hits: 1. Dunno if Formaggio's is still in that mini-mall (think it was called The Garage) in Harvard Square, Cambridge, but they used to make this sandwich that was to die for, of thickly-spread Boursin and really excellent rare roast beef on thick slabs of artisanal bread. 2. Any Carnegie Deli-style overstuffed sandwich, but especially one that contains beef tongue (yum!) as well as pastrami and/or corned beef, on really chewy authentic Jewish rye, with lots of spicy brown mustard. 3. Cuban sandwich. 'Nuff said. 4. When I can find a place that knows how to make a proper eggplant parmigiana sub, (i.e. one containing perfectly-cooked eggplant as opposed to overcooked off-flavored mush) it is a thing of beauty. 5. My family's invention (which I think I've described elsewhere on eGullet), the Stinkbomb Special: thick slices of liverwurst and raw onion on pumpernickle with lots o' spicy brown mustard. 6. Open-faced meatloaf sandwich, with lots of gravy, on white bread--one of the few times I fancy white bread in a sandwich, but in this case it's purely a gravy-sopping vehicle. Oh, such a glutton for animal protein I am. It's not like I don't appreciate the spendor of a BLT made with superior tomatoes, but give me a choice between that and just about any sandwich with at least an inch of sliced meat in it, and the rabbit-food just gets left in the dust.

I also think it depends on the type of mixed drink you're talking about. A Manhattan made with Knob Creek is IMO a thing of beauty, but I wouldn't waste the Knob Creek on a bourbon-and-coke. In the first instance one can taste the bourbon, in the second the cola blots out pretty much everything and so you might as well just use Jack Daniels. (This is totally assuming the bartender in question knows how to make a proper Manhattan, rather than a concoction that winds up tasting like a bad approximation of Jaegermeister, but that's a whine for another topic...)

Hiya, Susan! I am all about the budget dining here in (currently not-so-sunny) San Diego. Looks like this thread hits a lot of the highlights I would mention, but just want to reinforce what it says about Point Loma Seafood, Hillcrest, and the area around Convoy Ave. in Kearny Mesa (a.k.a. my backyard). As to brewpubs: I'm not much of a beer drinker, but I really dig the mellow atmosphere and the SoCal-style pub-grub at the Coronado Brewing Company, and their beers seem to be well-liked by those who know from beer. More about San Diego brewpubs here.

Please don't shoot the messenger ... just found it of some minor culinary interest ... I do buy vine tomatoes thinking, probably incorrectly, that they are more tasty .... ← Gifted Gourmet: As another poster who teed off on the shortcomings of the article, I just want to make it clear that all my snippiness was 100% meant for the article and none of it meant for the messenger. In fact, I thank you for giving me a fun article to throw spitballs at. And even though the article itself has obvious problems, the question it raises (or attempts to raise) about tomatoes is indeed quite interesting in its own right.

Once again, Slate underwhelms me with its lackadaisical article-writing. Why an author would make a point of boasting, in print, of his lack of expertise in the area he's writing about totally escapes me. Dude, at least call in an expert on tomatoes if you can't bring yourself to even taste one! or if you're going to rely on Google to be your expert, go at least a little bit deeper than just the second hit you got! And above all, don't waste my time with a bunch of handwaving about how the important issue here is the economics. Yep, the economics are important--but if you don't give a shit about the actual product in question, why in the name of all that's still meaningful in journalism is your editor letting you write about it?!? Sorry, had to get that off my chest. This kind of thing is obviously a real pet peeve of mine. Anyway, I did the same Google search as the article's author did, found the same hit he did ... and then went a little futher as he didn't bother to do (sorry, still annoyed about him!), to this page: In other words, there's a bit more to the story than just the longer the vine stays attached, the more nutrition and flavor stays in the tomato. There's also the bit that the standard tasteless tomato is actually picked green and then gassed into pseudo-ripeness, and the relative costs attached to the two methods. (Yes, I know ethylene is a natural gaseous emission of ripening fruit. That doesn't make its application to manufacture "ripe" tomatoes off the vine any less unnatural.) I have tried the various vine-ripened tomatoes in the market, both with the vine attached and those just with the notation "vine-ripened" on the package. IMO both are at least some kind of improvement over the styrofoam-tasting gassed tomatoes. However, as far as I can tell they're still of the same genetic seed-stock as the styrofoam tomatoes, so I don't think any of them will ever have the flavor of, say, an heirloom tomato lovingly ripened on the vine in one's own garden (or, for those who, like me, have the Black Thumb of Death when it comes to growing any kind of plant, from a friend's garden or the local farmers market). But when I don't have a gardening friend or a farmer's market handy, going with the vine tomatoes is a better option than the lowest-common-denominator 'mater. P.S. When all other store tomatoes look totally wretched, I've learned to go with cherry or grape tomatoes instead. Even without the vine-ripened bit, they manage to pack a good bit more flavor than the alternatives.

Despite the fact that I can ill-afford a cross-country trip at this point in time ... dayum. You folks are tempting the living blazes out of me. Maybe I can rationalize it by making a side-trip to Greensboro to visit my sister and nephews. Haven't seen them in a good couple of years ...

I guess the Tangletown location must have opened since I moved away from Seattle (good lord, has it been almost three years ago already?!?), but I always adored the fish and chips at the original Capitol Hill location--wonderful fluffy beer-batter on the fish, they had. And while I'm not much of a beer-drinker, I always made an exception for the yummy Elysian brews.

Heh. I was going to go on about beef tongue again, as a Jewish delicacy I grew up loving but which sends the uninitiated screaming out of the room ... but of course all you folks are initiated into the Cult of Offal so it doesn't have that effect on you. Now ... how about chitlins? The very idea of that sends some folk round the bend. I confess I've never had the stuff ... but I just adore stuffed kishke, so I figure I'd be okay with it. (Come to think of it, stuffed kishke probably would freak the uninitiated too...)

Thanks, fifi! This wuz fun! (Heh. Now I need to get my paws on some field guides to the local flora and fauna...)

I'm having trouble remembering exact firsts too, partly because there has been so many of them ... lessee ... trying to think of stories with more to them than just "I tried it for the first time and I liked it..." Okay, here's one ... my first major exposure to Japanese cuisine was sometime in the early 1980s. I was hanging with a circle of friends who would make a yearly weekend-long pilgrimage from Boston out to western MA for the Tanglewood Music Festival. A core group would always cap off the weekend of music and good food by heading west instead of back east to Boston on Sunday afternoon, until they crossed over into New York State and came to a Japanese restaurant out that direction--I no longer remember the name or even the town, it's been so long. But I went with this core group and experienced a formal tatami-room Japanese dinner for the very first time, and was totally charmed. I've since had tastier Japanese food (though this place was no slouch), but that first experience of the ambiance really stayed with me.

A little creative googling shows a photo of Phil's here: click ← Wow - you guys are great! I'll wait to confirm with the ex, but damn if that don't look like it. And in the right neighborhood, too! Now I'm nostalgic for diner food... edited to add - I just GoogleMapped Phil's and see that the Chandler & Vineland address sits RIGHT on a railroad line so it might be the place. Keeping fingers crossed... ← Now see, that place looks like the real deal ... albeit a very run-down real deal. Alas, the site touregsand found mentions that the place is closed, with a "For Rent" sign in the window.

Oh my ... while the only one of the restaurants on that stretch of highway in Saugus that I ever visited was the infamous Hilltop Steak House, I do have fond memories of all those over-the-top buildings, including the Kowloon. As to my own experience: as a nice Jewish grrl growing up in the suburbs of New York City, the main ethnic cuisines I got exposed to outside of my own were Italian and Chinese. Italian usually meant pizza--especially what the local pizza joints called Sicilian style pizza, an oblong pie with thick doughy crust, usually cut into square pieces. Once in a very great while my folks would take us kids to a somewhat more upscale Italian restaurant--white tablecloths, lots of red gravy, lots of garlic. At home, my mom occasionally made really tasty (if perhaps inauthentic) chicken cacciatore and eggplant parmagiana. We also had fun putting together our own antipasto trays, gettin' wacky with the salami and provolone and lotsa little cans of Progresso stuff (my mom and I shared an unholy passion for Progresso's canned caponata). Even though I grew up to find out there was lots more to Italian food than that, I still have fond memories of the red-gravy Italian-American joints...and that Progresso caponata (haven't seen it for years). I experienced a lot of the same Jewish mystique for Chinese-American food documented so intriguingly in this article. In particular, my very first memory of ever being taken to a for-real restaurant is from when I was barely two years old, when my folks took me to this Cantonese joint in Pearl River (Rockland County) called the China Pearl. I loved the white tablecloths and the colored lights--it made me feel all growed up. Apparently my folks weren't even sure I'd like Chinese food, so they ordered me a hamburger--I distinctly remember thinking it funny that the burger came on white Wonder-style bread. I don't remember actually tasting any of my elders' Chinese entrees at that meal, but that must have happened because that was the last hamburger I ever had at a Chinese joint--on subsequent visits I was fighting for my share of the shrimp and lobster sauce with the best of 'em. When I was older I was taken on expeditions to New York City's Chinatown, which seemed the height of exotic cosmopolitanism to me; I was also enough aware of my own poor immigrant forebears that I felt some kind of admittedly-naive solidarity with this other immigrant community housed so close to the ghetto where my mom grew up. And then when I hit college age and moved to Boston, I plunged into the partly student-driven mystique for Szechuan restaurants, whose food may not have been all that more authentic than the Cantonese joints I grew up on, but we Anglo students sorta thought they were.

Howsabout this for a nice scientific article on coquinas? (Note: fixed what I figured had to be a typo in the article--it had "clown" instead of "down"--while these little clams are cute, I don't think they're given to clowning around. )

This list is really fascinating, but this East Coast grrl is a little confused. Are any of these diners in the classic East Coast diner-style building? Y'know, the type of pre-fab building designed to look like an old Pullman railroad dining car, with lots of chrome and/or sheet aluminum? You see, while the menu and general ambiance is an important criterion, to me it still isn't really a *true* diner unless it's housed in that long narrow sorta-bullet-shaped building with all the metal. Not that I wouldn't totally enjoy any of these other lovely dives, but it's the chrome Pullman-car look that really gets my nostalgia-senses aroused. So--any of those here in California? (Erm, any authentic ones, I mean--yeah, I'm afraid that I don't really count modern attempts to "re-create" the diner look in a totally-new building either. And yeah, I know I'm being picky. )

Soundview Cafe in Pike Place Market also has an excellent water view, but again can't vouch for the quality of their coffee--especially since it's been a long time since I last was there. Now in terms of street-scene/people-watching views--and IMO the best damn espresso in Seattle--you can't beat Espresso Vivace's sidewalk cafe location on Broadway in Capitol Hill.

Everyone else has pretty much hit everything I would have suggested, except for this: do the guests of honor have any favorite foods that really warm their hearts? Coming up with a finger-food version of one of their faves would be a really lovely gesture. Otherwise--homey stuff all the way. I bet that however many devilled eggs you might decide to make, they will *all* be inhaled.

Despite my earlier protestations that I wasn't much of an urban forager, this blog keeps reminding me of lots of foraging I did do when I was a kid. The lower Hudson River Valley where I grew up had tons and tons of raspberries. I used to ride my bike along the path down by the riverbank, stopping frequently to pick and eat berries. There were respectable thickets of them even right across the street from my house. Honeysuckle were everywhere too. We all used to pick and suck on the blossoms while waiting for the school bus. (We'd bite off the little green base of the flower and suck out the nectar as if the flower were one of those little wax bottles of sugar-syrup.) And sorrel ... heh. Seemed like whatever part of our family's lawn that wasn't crabgrass, was sorrel. I used to pick and chew on it occasionally. My mom told me it was the main ingredient of an Eastern-European Jewish soup called schav, but we never made the stuff--even though picking enough sorrel to make the soup might have solved my dad's lawn problem.