Grub

The good thing about women not cooking anymore is that it makes it that much easier for us guys to impress a date. Okay, that's a damn goofy thing to say, but hey -- true. The bad thing about women not cooking anymore, is two-fold: Firstly, to uh, "un-learn" a skill, or rather to not learn a skill that normally has been learned, is a step down, not a step up. Granted, if men had been similarly disfavored in the gender gap, and had been forced to say, tinker with car mechanics in order to support the family, men might today pride themselves on their ignorance of automotive functionality, and consider that progress. But it would still be a step back. To know less is never progress. The second thing is, cooking is one of the few skills that are passed on from generation to generation in our civilized, Western societies. That makes it a very, very special skill. Of course, the upside is, this bonding experience no longer has to be an exclusively mother-daughter thing anymore. Sensitive stuff to talk about, so go figure that Ramsay's comments got people riled up, heheh.

Oh boy... This takes me back. To a misspent youth. I've got a great piece of culinary advice, but it's so dated, it probably would do you no good -- so I'll admit it, I'm just bringing this up in the hopes that anyone might know what I'm talking about... I spent a couple of weeks in this area -- in the 80s, when it was still called Yugoslavia. I was in Split, and distinctively remember Diocletian's palace (and how the forward-thinking architect had created a basement, that was an exact replica of the ground floor, thus ensuring that future generations would be able to enjoy the splendor of the palace, even if the ravages of time and warfare had destroyed the stuff on top -- and how the basement was a treasure throve since it had become a dump for the folks living in the palace). But most of our time (about two weeks) were spent on an island. Having googled the maps, I THINK it might have been Hvar, but I'm not at all certain. I don't think it was Brac, because I remember the island was outside another island. Thus, it could also have been Vis, or Krk. Wherever this was, the one culinary thing I can advice on, was a fantastic lamb dish that I had. It had to be ordered 24 hours in advance. The restaurant was an out-door kind of affair -- I wasn't much into food at all back then, so I never thought much about where any other dishes might have been prepared, but there was a big firepit; a big grill, where things were prepared... And this special lamb dish that we ordered (it was a two person dish) was made by digging up the coals, dumping an iron plate down, placing the lamb on top of that, and then covering it with an iron bell, or dome. Then the coals were raked back, and the whole thing was covered. I have no idea how many hours the thing sat there. Now that I've taken a serious interest in food, and cooking, I'd really like to know what the hell this dish was, because even if I know that I was just a young fool when I tasted it, I do remember that I thought it was fantastic. And of course the main purpose of ordering this dish, was to impress... And it worked, even for a group of young hooligans -- everyone noticed how there was some special deal going on over at the firepit; lotsa commotion as they dug the thing out, and then brought the meal to our table. My buddy and I desperately attempted to appear aloof while casually explaining that oh yeah, we just ordered this local dish that they tend to do so well on the island... I do know that about half of the crew placed an order for the dish that night, heheh. Good times. Well, if anyone knows where this might have been -- or of course, what the dish was -- I'd be sincerely grateful to know... One last thing I remember about the place, is that it had a nudist beach, and also a topless beach. These two beaches were separated by some cliffs, and ironically enough, there was a monastery up above it all -- I always thought that was particularly cruel on those poor monks.

Jebus. Pardon me, but damn, that's messed up -- I'm with Badiane on that one. Incidentally, does this raw food thing include meat, then? Or is it like Lisa Simpson's hero, the level six vegan, who doesn't eat anything that casts a shadow?

I don't like the notion that someone might be professionally disadvantaged or looked down upon, merely because of their accent -- that's simply linguistic racism. Of course, having an accent might make people percieve you in a more positive manner -- a French cook, an English intellectual, or (negatively) an English villain. Methinks Paula Deen just might utilize her accent to come across as a good ol Southern gal. You know, some ol gal who just takes life easy, enjoys cooking up some good ol Southern food, and I dunno, says "ya'll" a lot and does whatever a stereotypical good ol Souther gal is supposed to do. Methinks she's sort of overdoing it a bit. No, I tell a lie -- she's overdoing it a lot. If Paula Deen was Irish, her show would consist of her getting smashed on Guinness and going on about her lucky charms. She really is over the top.

Whoa, that is a helluva blog! Excellent culinary find. Thanks.

Yeah, definitely salsa verde -- great stuff, that. Am I the only one who's ever gotten the idea to add a little bit of orange zest to it? It's like a magic ingredient that REALLY picks it up and elevates it. People really like it, and ask about the recipe when I do that -- of course, I always do it, heheh.

Well, not to divert from the topic of transcendental awfulness, but this whole thing about food touching seems just a little odd to me (incidentally, the article does address this very issue: "...if you retain any of your childhood aversion to foods touching, the Famous Bowls will send you shrieking into traffic.") How do "I don't like foods TOUCHING!"-people cope with hamburgers? Wut about gyros, hotdogs, shepherd's pie, salmon coulibiac, beef Wellington, tourines, Jamaican beef patties, Devonshire and Cornish pasties? How bout a simple freakin' sandwich? Touchie-touchie-touchie all over the place, there.

Beautiful veal shanks... Absolutely luscious. Great stuff so far.

Hiya -- welcome! I'm really fond of salmon. I particularly like the fillet -- it's the easiest thing in the world to prepare: season with salt and pepper, pop it on some tin foil and place in the oven for about 10-12 minutes on full heat broil. Lift it off the skin (which will stick to the foil -- or if you want to keep the skin, just drip some olive oil on the tin foil before placing the salmon on it) and serve it. As simple as that is, you can easily add other flavors to it, without making that much extra effort: I often add some grated ginger and orange zest. You can also just pan fry it skin side down, which is what I did today -- nothing but salt and pepper: Then of course, there's the grill -- salmon always look (and of course, tastes) great with some nice grill marks: You can also go slightly upscale and wrap it in prosciutto: And you can make some much fancier things (that is, fancier LOOKING, but still fairly simple to prepare), like a puff pastry-wrapped Salmon Coulibiac: or like so: And finally, if you have a few hours to spare on a weekend, you can always smoke some:

This LA Times article is hilarious... The Verdict: Oink! (Registration required, but here's the bugmenot login: Username thribwell@yahoo.com; Password thribinator) I particularly love the phrase, "transcendently awful."

Heather -- idiot; child. I caught this earlier episode (Number three, I think), where the red team won and were rewarded with a day out on a yacth, and the blue team had to do the laundry. When the gals got back, they decided to rub it in... Now, that's totally uncalled for, but of course it's a TV reality show, so fair game, of course. I woulda thought the punishment vs. the reward would have been more than enough, and that rubbing it in would be just a sign of a generally petty and/or insecure nature... Now, it should be pointed out that one of the guys made an idiotic comment about women being better at doing laundry, and whoever said that was a retard, and certainly a misogynist, but that was said before the red team returned -- that was while they were struggling with the laundry. What happened next was fucking pathetic on Heather's part... Not the rubbing in part, though: Heather really went for it. She shook her money maker, baby -- in the parlance of our time -- in their faces. That's not pathetic. It's not fucking pathetic. It's just a little cruel. A little vicious. That's all. And that's cool -- it's a TV reality show. When Garrett responded with some idiotic jibe about well, you bitches better have my dinner ready when I'm done with this day's hard work, well, what can I say -- what a retard... It was primitive and stupid. But they had already lost, been given a humiliating task to carry out -- and now their competitors came back to rub it in, and Heather was really getting into it, shaking her ass at them. If she'd just laughed it off, I woulda thought she was a damn cool chick. Seeing her completely freak out from that jibe, after everything, well, she's an idiot. Her freaking out about the chauvinistic nature of his comment made her look like a child. Caint have yer cake and eat it, babe.

Hehehe, I figured, "This won't end well" when I saw that comment -- but I see it's gone now. So I'll just say this, for the record -- I am amused by the "gold-plated, monkey-navigated rocket-sled" comment. Wouldn't wanna be in that situation, but damn, kudos on keeping a cheerful disposition about things, Tony. Very cool. Hope you get some good footage, and some great publicity -- but more importantly, some good food. And obviously, most important of all, I do hope you've got enough ice for those mojitos. You'll be outta there lickety-split, Inch Allah & Elohim, dude. Good luck.

Don't want to stray off the topic of cooking, but I think this does pertain to the subject... I feel pretty iffy about the argument that his employees are loyal to him, and how they're not forced to work for him -- similar arguments could be used about an abusive marriage, and they don't hold water there either. Being abusive is no more a sign that a chef cares about work, anymore than a husband's abuse being a sign that he cares about his wife -- it's just a sign that he is an abusive person, period. Is being civil a sign that you don't care about work? Of course not! It isn't a sign that you care more about work, nor are more of a perfectionist either. Towards the end of Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain explains that all the uh, colorful behavior he's described so far, isn't the par for all good kitchens... He then goes on to praise Scott Bryan for running a far superior kitchen than himself, and describes how calm and collected the atmosphere is -- no shouting and screaming, no running around, no nonsense. Just calm, quiet efficiency.

Yeah, absolutely! Before I started taking a serious interest in cooking, I bought a lot of those things Trader Joe's would carry -- Tasty Bites I think. Vacuum packed things. They were kind of pricey, but very tasty. I used them mostly for camping trips, for which they were absolutely perfect -- I mean, even if it came out of a space age vacuum plastic bag, it sure was far more impressive to dish out some veggie dishes like amazingly flavorful Dahl or Bombay Potatoes, than some old grilled sausages -- even amongst people who really, really like meat. This stuff wasn't frozen though -- just some special packaging with some kinda explanation about how it was scientific or developed by NASA or something along those lines. Haven't had that stuff in years, though.

Heheh excellent use of a quote, that. Proves a point, too. Good one. And yeah, that was Twain.

Methinks there's something wrong with Gordon Ramsay -- he's entertaining to watch, but there's clearly something very wrong with him. I don't mind people using all the words in the English language, but when you constantly hurl abuse at people who work for you, there is either something wrong those employees, or something wrong with you. For the Hell's Kitchen show, I can accept that those cooks are clueless and deserving of a good talking-to, but in the Boiling Point you see him treat his own employees even worse. Only two conclusion can be drawn from this: his employees are even worse cooks than the Hell's Kitchen crowd -- clearly not the case. The only other conclusion is also the only logical one: that there's something really badly wrong with Ramsay himself. In Boiling Point he was caught on camera grabbing employees by their collars and physically dragged them away from their workstations, hurling abuse at them and telling them to stay in the corner -- when he was done, they'd meekly shuffle back to the line and continue working. What the holy hell kinda pathological behavior is THAT? And that was just what he did when the cameras were there... The food critic A. A. Gill described Ramsay as a classical example of a bully: he torments those he has control over, but if anyone over whom he has no control comes after him, he gets utterly paranoid. The initial, British version of Hell's Kitchen featured famous people, including a politician who revealed in her autobiography that she once had an affair with the British prime minister, and Ramsay decided to bring this up to insult her... Since she'd written about it, it wasn't like a big secret or anything -- but it sure as hell didn't have anything to do with her ability to cook.

That was really, really very good.

Yeah, it's a steak that's been pounded flat (typically with the smooth side of the mallet, but depending on the quality of the meat, the notched side can be used to tenderize the meat if need be), and then coated and fried like you'd do a typical southern fried chicken. It's good eats. I've always wondered about ordering chicken fried chicken, but I'm thinking I'd get my ass kicked for something like that

Ah, okay I think I get it. It's like the Japanese movie/flower/word Tampopo being spelled "tanpopo" in Hiragana but expected to be pronounced "tampopo," simply because an "n" that preceeds "p" or "b" has -- as you say -- a sort of aspirated quality to it, so it is always pronounced "m." And while it properly should be spelled Tanpopo in Roman letters, it is spelled Tampopo, simply because unlike Japanese, Roman script has an "m," and those who speak languages that use Roman script cannot be expected to be familiar with such details of Japanese scripts and pronounciations. I've also seen some menus describe Vindaloo as Bindaloo, which is understandable considering V and B are so similar when pronounced, but probably not good for business in a British establishment. Now, this bit I don't understand -- if Phool Gobhi is Cauliflower and Patta Gobhi is Cabbage, why would Gobhi be used to generically describe both? They're quite different vegetables.

That's really cool you cooked it. And yeah, that does make sense, to cook the potatoes more. I think I'll make a note of that on my own recipe. Oooh, that never occurred to me -- even if it seems completely obvious now that you point it out. However, why is that 'H' required in gobhi? Is it a regional thing? I mean, the movie spells it gobi, right?

Well, no. Who is it?

For a Chef, Hollandaise, Coq au vin, a vinagrette, an omelette -- although since I heard of this "test" of a chef, it has always bugged me that it is such a damn set-up for failure. An omelette is just eggs. And that's fine. But what if I was put to such a challenge? I don't like overcomplicating things, but hey, I can't see me making an omelette without some smoked gouda and a few slivers of red onion. That's hard -- I don't know how to test a Chef. A cook, I guess the best test is -- can she/he make something you enjoy eating?

Jaysus, I just spent five minutes staring at the name "Bill Buford"... I just ordered "Amongst the Thugs" for a World Cup- and "Green Street Hooligans"-watching friend the other week. Damn strange.

Proper, strong English vinegar on chips (uh, fries) is excellent -- the kind that if you were to put your nose over it and inhale the aromas, your face would just shrivel -- now, that's the stuff. Can't get it over here though

Eh, okay... As requested, diva... I assume this raclette is an electric cooking contraption that melts cheese, and I have no idea what else such a device could be used for. I've only ever had raclette once in my life, and I was seriously unhappy about it. I do appologize for not having any constructive advice to offer here, but if nothing else, maybe you'll find my raclette story funny. This happened in Geneva, while I worked for a California-based company. I always like to check out the local things, and was utterly disgusted when some moron dragged us into -- of all things -- a damn Mexican restaurant (that included a horrible mariachi band, wearing sombreros). So when a German collegue claimed he knew a great local place, about a dozen of us tagged along -- and we were served raclette. This was supposed to be local, authentic stuff, the German assured us. We were stoked... Then, we all recieved a white dinner-plate each, with a number written with some kind of a grease pencil, on the rim. In the middle of the plate, there was some melted cheese. We also got a pickle, and a boiled potato each. And we all assumed that this was some kind of a starter... I mean, we didn't want to be impolite -- it looked kinda hokey: a pickle, a spud and a blob of melted cheese -- so we figured hey, this is different, this is something we've not experienced before, this is great if you really like pickles and potatoes and melted cheese -- but the main course will surely be something really excellent, right...? Then, the staff took away our numbered plates (we thought the number thing was kinda odd, but didn't think much else of it). We were all drinking and chatting away, and as odd as this starter seemed, no one said anything about it. But then, when the waiters returned, and placed the same, numbered plates in front of us, with a new blob of melted cheese, every single head on the table turned towards the poor German... No one actually said anything -- but I'm sure our facial expressions said more than enough. So he kind of recoiled in his seat, as if he had been accused of something horrible, and said, "What? They bring you as much as you want!" while pointing at the plate. I have no idea why he brought us to this raclette place, nor if this is a typical way for Swiss restaurants to serve it. What I do know is, after the tradeshow was over, we had a big dinner, and everyone had to sign up for their food preferences: steak, or raclette. The decision was obvious, of course -- boring old everyday steak, or exotic and sophisticated and elegant Swiss Raqluette, whatever that might be, right? So everyone went for it -- except for the dozen or so of us, who'd been to that raclette joint earlier in the week. I thought that surely there must have been something wrong -- that the restaurant was some kind of a dive, or generally horrible place, and that their uh, method of preparing raclette was really abnormal -- surely, the place we'd booked our big dinner at, wouldn't be just serving melted blobs of cheese on a platter, with a damn spud and pickle on the side, right? But nobody were willing to chance it. We all went with the steak option. Now, these end-of-the-show dinners are supposed to be a way for the managment to give thanks to the employees -- a good meal, and a reasonable, but limited amount of drink. A morale booster, within reason. But there's always the chance of some uh, "unfiltered, spontaneous feedback" escaping a drunk engineer who's just put in an 80-hour week to make the company look good at the tradeshow, while watching sales and marketing pukes sneak off early, or the executives standing around doing nothing at all if best, or making horrible decisions at worst... So sometimes things go wrong. In this case, the raclette almost caused a riot. If it hadn't been for the dozen or so of us who ordered the steaks, maybe it wouldn't have happened. But seeing some of us digging into some nice, juicy steaks, while they were served a continous string of plates with melted cheese (with a boiled tater and a pickle) was more than they could handle. The workers demanded steak, damnit! So the chiefs went to the restaurant management and demanded every steak in the house -- which they got, but it still wasn't enough for everybody. So they did the next best thing, which was to open the bar. Which of course was the worst thing they could have done. I'm still ashamed of the picture that was taken of me, with a promotional bag for a Finish beer called something like Lappin Kuulta on my head, while wearing lipstick. But I'm kinda proud that I got the same picture of our beard-wearing CEO sporting the same. So eh, don't talk to me about raclette!