cakewalk

"Baby don't you cry Gonna make a pie Gonna make a pie with A heart in the middle ..." Very sweet movie. She just loves making pies, and especially inventing new pies. She brings a pie with pink and white marshmallows to her doctor, and in an explanation later in the movie she says she made that pie up when she was nine years old and she was going through her "mermaid phase." And her pies all seem to reflect whatever her current "phase" might be.

Which Whole Foods? What brand is it? I didn't know they had kosher chickens! I usually get Empire because it's so ubiquitous, but I'm very ready to change! I make semi-regular trips to Fairway as well, both for the prices and the choices. I live in the Hell's Kitchen area and the closest supermarket is a Food Emporium. I go there for convenience, but they really suck, both in terms of quality and price. I sometimes go to the Styles' market on 9th and 41st, especially for the avocadoes (which are sometimes 75 cents apiece, an absolute steal in this neck of the woods. And they're good, too.) I belong to a CSA which will soon start giving us green stuff. I like that. And I like Whole Foods on occasion because I can always buy something that I haven't the faintest idea what it is. Same with small specialty markets. Then I google it, or look it up on eGullet. It also depends a lot on which neighborhood I happen to be in for whatever reason -- I'll usually end up going into a food store at some point, wherever I happen to be.

Thanks jsmith, but alas, no ice cream maker. (Much too dangerous a piece of equipment for the likes of me ) But I know it is an ice cream flavor I will try if I find it somewhere "out there" somewhere (and I'm bound to do so.)

Not too long ago I was reading on eGullet about Chinese sesame paste. I had never heard of it, discovered that it is most definitely NOT the same thing as tahini, and since I love anything having to do with sesame seeds I figured I better buy some. So I was at Kalustyan's the other day and, there on the shelf right next to the Chinese sesame paste was Chinese black sesame paste. Of course I bought both. But I'm having some difficulty finding recipes for the black sesame paste. Apparently it is most often used in dessert recipes, and I have found many interesting and amusing things on the web, such as: "Black sesame paste is the greatest gift to the human race. Black sesame paste is the light of enlightenment, it is the dawn of civilization, it is the pinnacle of the human spirit. Without black sesame paste, society and all that we value as good and decent would crumble. Without black sesame paste, we tumble into a dark age. Paste-less savages would crush beauty and grace under their hairy unkempt feet. Without black sesame paste, we are quite simply doomed, we may as well roll the credits and put up a big sign reading "The End" so any passing aliens might know we are a race on the long road to ruin, not worth saving because we quite simply do not have any black sesame paste." (sirisimran.livejournal.com -- But there were no recipes there. Apparently he was working on his doctorate and subsisting on black sesame paste straight up.) So, can anyone help out with information about and/or recipes using black sesame paste? I would greatly appreciate it.

I love my Lodge pans, and the price of course can't be beat. But one way in which they've been "working around" that lasts-forever stuff is by making cast iron pans in every shape imaginable. You need a cast iron pan for very small, small, medium, large, and very large, of course. And then you need individual cast iron souffle pans. Of course. And if you want your omelettes to be triangular, well there's a cast iron pan for that too. I'm always wondering what shape they'll come out with next, I do love their mother-of-invention attitude. Does Lodge make anything besides cast iron pans?

Oh my. I'm sure they are a distinct minority in your personal world (I am not being facetious), but they are certainly not a distinct minority in general. Goodness, I wish it were true what you say!! I see too too many parents making the assumption that everyone must admire their perfect child (or pet, yes, alas) no matter what they might have done (she says as she wipes splashed soup from her eyes.) Now isn't that cute? Admit it.

I agree with everyone else who said that the side dishes are usually enough for most veggies. Matzah and haroset usually does it for me. (But I have an amazing ability to continue to eat well after I am no longer hungry.) Also, they may not be so interested in the food (it happens sometimes) as in the ritual.

I was wondering what the next sound bite was gonna be. Why do I get the feeling that "ethical purchasing" is on its way to becoming a meaningless phrase (if it didn't actually start out that way)? Am I just being cynical? (Moi?)

Makes me wish I patronized the restaurant so that I could boycott it now. Ideally I'd like to see the delivery people of other restaurants join forces with these guys. (So much for my ideals.) I don't understand how the owner could try to get them to sign something attesting to the fact that he does pay them minimum wage. If it were true, wouldn't the pay stubs and time sheets speak for themselves? (But I do wish they'd stop riding on the sidewalks and going the wrong way on one-way streets.)

WOW!! Good for you, on all counts!! And I know there's some good reading ahead.

← Wow. My head is spinning at the thought of how long it might have taken for this process to evolve. This entire blog is great reading, thanks.

Wish I was an English muffin 'Bout to make the most out of a toaster I'd ease myself down Coming up brown ... I can't get that song out of my head since I saw the title of this thread. Although I prefer strawberry jam to boysenberry. (But I realize it doesn't fit the music.)

Liver. You can do your whole bloody (hee hee) thesis on liver. Vile texture, vile smell, vile color, just plain vile. And guavas. I don't like the texture, but mostly it's the smell that gets to me. It's overpowering and nauseating. I've hated liver since I was a child. I never even heard of guavas until I was an adult, and I hated the smell even before I knew where the odor was coming from. (I thought there was something rotten in the apartment. Turns out my roommate bought a bunch of guavas.) I used to hate olives, and now I love them. I don't know how that happened, but I won't look a gift horse in the mouth.

I make a very simple tomato sauce, but the big thing is: no onions! Canned tomatoes (usually Muir Glen, not fire-roasted), plenty of fresh garlic in a bit of olive oil, salt, fresh herbs (oregano or basil are best), cook about 30-45 minutes, but no onions!! I have found that adding onions makes this a different sauce altogether, and it is much better without. (And I love onions!) Edit: fire-roasted, not smoked!

I just bought a bunch of beautiful asparagus last night, and I was sitting here at the computer sipping my coffee and thinking about what I might do with them because I'm ready for lunch and I know they will figure in there somehow. I think they're going to find their way into the omelette I'm planning.

I thought the article was lame because the whole point of having cold cereal at night is that you don't have to cook anything -- you just pour cereal and milk into a bowl and eat. Polenta with eggs is wonderful, but it takes doing. But aside from that, I remember salivating over the photo. As to cereal and milk as a nighttime snack -- no. But cereal and milk for dinner (slice in a banana if it's not too ripe) when I'm too lazy/tired to make anything? You betcha. Barbara's Oat Squares being the cereal of choice.

No leaps. Crawls. Lots of dead stops in between crawls. Then some more crawling. Seems fast in hindsight. I'm always amazed that for the longest time the whites who settled North America thought tomatoes were poisonous, until the Native Americans taught them otherwise. Somebody upthread mentioned that poisonous foods must have been learned very quickly and remembered very clearly. Very understandably.

Hmmm. I'm a supertaster.

Sorry to side-track this a bit, but is there a difference between Chinese sesame paste and tehina? I mean, sesame ground to paste, how different can it be?

Boy, am I glad to read that. I was starting to get a little nervous. I used to try to do the list thing, but I would usually forget to take it with me so I just gave it up. I go shopping and I buy what looks good. I live alone, so I have a bit of leeway here. I also rarely want to eat much when I get home. At that stage I usually have no desire to cook or prepare anything, and most of the things I buy need some sort of cooking or preparation. Unless it's ice cream. If I buy ice cream, it often doesn't even make it into the freezer. (I try not to buy ice cream.) Planning ahead is not my strong point.

#3 is Coal Miner's Daughter?

"Diva"? 1981 film directed by Jean-Jacques Beineix ← Or that Truffot film, I can't think of the name, with the kid from The 400 Blows semi-grown up. Edit: not Fellini, Truffot (sp)

Hadn't eaten sardines in years, but recently I've been eating them quite a bit because I'm training for a long bike ride, and this is fast no-fuss protein when I need it. They're much better than what I remember. In fact, sometimes they're darn good, like with onions, tomatoes and some balsamic vinegar. And I don't know if I'm allowed to say this but, um, I was looking through Chowhound a couple of days ago and someone had done a rather vast survey of many different brands of canned sardines (40, IIRC) and he gave a pretty detailed report of his results. Worth looking at, I think. Portuguese sardines won hands-down.

Almost anything by Woody Allen.