cakewalk

"What you eat is now a measure of your hipness" There ya go. Not picky. Hip.

Sometimes the avocadoes are hard as a rock and I want my guacamole NOW. (We don't all live in California, y'know.)

On a related but different note: Whole Foods makes gucamole which is quite good. I noticed recently that they now have something called "low-fat guacamole," and I was wondering about it because I've never heard of a low-fat avocado. It looks the same as their regular guacamole. So I read the ingredients (a regular Sherlock I am), and the secret low-fat ingredient here is: peas! So, it's not chemical stuff like the Herr's Guacamole, but it's not avocado, either. I can't imagine what it might taste like, even though it's the right color. So: is this "really" guacamole?

Breakfast is my favorite meal to eat out, as long as it's leisurely (e.g., no work that day). Fresh eggs, any style, but must include fried onions. Brioche toast. Home fries, french fries, any kind of fries. No pancakes! (It's a texture thing.) Endless coffee. New York Times crossword puzzle. Repeat until dinner. On work days I eat when I get to work: fruit, yogurt, granola. It's great in the summertime when there's wonderful different fruits to be had. At work they always laugh at me because I'll walk out of the kitchen with a bowl piled this high with cut-up fruit. I eat it at my desk all morning. Yum.

I made hamentaschen for the first time in years, and had varying results with the different types I made. The double chocolate hamentaschen dough gave me a lot of difficulty. Wouldn't roll out without falling apart, couldn't get it thin, etc. I used butter, I don't know if that was the reason or if it might have had something to do with the ground almonds added to the dough mixture. In any case, they didn't look too hot because the dough was on the thick side and sort of "patched" together, but they did taste damned good (Valhrona cocoa helped a bit on that end). I also made a "regular" hamentaschen dough, using canola oil for this recipe, which rolled out like a dream (it was a recipe I found on the web last year, which was called "Blue Ribbon Hamentaschen" because it won a blue ribbon at some contest or other.) For the filling I bastardized a recipe and used a combination of dried fruit (prunes, apricots, craisins) simmered together in OJ and honey, then added raisins, chopped almonds, some lemon juice, cinnamon and powdered ginger. These came out great, if I may say so myself. I made a lot (small ones, about 2 1/2-inches in diameter), brought them in to work and to my synagogue, where they were promptly devoured. I have eaten more hamentaschen in the past three days than I've eaten in the past three years. And I ain't done yet! Happy Purim!

Interesting. For me, a long ride is not much by comparison to what you're doing. Twenty miles is a biggie for me (but I'm hoping to increase that over the summer). Anyway, my question is: what's best to eat after a workout like that, carbs or protein? I usually crave the carbs, and pasta and potatoes sounds great to me, but I was recently working with a trainer (just for a few sessions) who kept stressing that high protein was ultimately better. Any thoughts? (I'd also stay away from anything spicy.)

But that's where the Pesach dishes go!! Alternatively, your idea sounds very nice.

Growing up it was always solid white tuna (didn't matter which brand, but chunk light was a no-no) in oil. I don't think water packed tuna existed when I was a kid (am I that old?). With Hellman's mayonnaise on Wonder bread. Nothing else, my mother just didn't do it. If she put some potato chips in the lunchbox that was heaven, because everyone knows that potato chips were made to add crunch to a tuna fish sandwich. I still love tuna sandwhiches as simply as they come. Only now it's usually water-packed, on some sort of whole grain bread. Hellman's still rules. I'll very what I add to the tuna, but it MUST have chopped onions. Potato chips are still good.

Just thought I'd bring this back up.

As in every language, word can have many connotations. So, the simplest translation of seder is order. It applies to Passover in the sense that you mention - the order of the service. The Passover seder follows a very specific progression as laid out in the Hagaddah. Just to expand on how this word has grown into "modernity," the modern Hebrew word for "okay" is "b'seder." The prefix "b" means "in," and the word "seder," as already noted, means "order." So when an Israeli shouts at you saying "b'seder, b'seder," he's saying "okay, okay." (Or, literally, "in order, in order," but that loses something in the translation.)

Sometimes the world seems to be split up into two types of people: those who can't swallow a bite when they're upset, and those who eat just about anything they see when they're upset. I am definitely a confirmed member of the latter group. In the initial stages of "upset-ness" anything is fair game, and it is usually pre-packaged, has tons of sugar and chocolate, and demands absolutely no effort on my part. As I start to regain some equilibrium, I start to cook. That's always a sign that I'm regaining control. So if you're actually thinking about cooking, well, sounds like you're doing A-OK.

I'm with you, Suzanne F. I stopped buying Stonyfield Farms a while ago because it changed so much.

I just figured I'd repeat this post from earlier in the thread. 'Cuz I posted it, and I figure it's referring to the same school (there can't be two).

I tried this last night as well. I had been reading about it somewhere (I can't remember where) and then this thread appeared. I sauted some onions in olive oil and added them to the cooked quinoa, which I had roasted for a few minutes before cooking as per package directions (smells great as it starts to roast, and they pop!) It was good, but I felt that the texture was very light and sort of insubstantial, and I think that takes some getting used to. Maybe I'm comparing it to rice and other grains rather than taking it on its own. I can easily sit down and eat a bowl of brown rice with nothing added to it (I love rice). I'm not so sure I could eat plain quinoa. But I'll keep experimenting. Its nutritional qualities are very attractive.

Yes, that's quite puzzling, isn't it. Why did he agree? He agreed on the condition that his occupation was detailed. I think the motivation was simply to inform more of the Jewish portion of the Times' readership about shatnes. The Lord truly does work in mysterious ways, doesn't She? Gifted Gourmet, I await your responses. Thanks.

Yes, that's quite puzzling, isn't it. Why did he agree? I guess everyone (EVERYONE) really does want his 15 minutes, evil eye be damned. But you can e-mail the interviewer, and please keep us posted. I have a feeling you'll do a better job of it than I will.

It's not that. I'm a daily Times reader (and crossword puzzle doer). I am not amongst those who insist that the NY Times in an anti-semitic paper (it definitely is not, IMO). But this article irks me, mostly because it seems to have no real point but leads the reader to make all sorts of faulty conclusions. About Jews. And that does bother me. Can anyone come up with a reasonable idea of what this article is trying to say, if anything?

Possibly because it is a human interest story, and a Jewish one, at that ... would explain the NYT's purpose .... as for the interviewer's vegetarian meal? Perhaps so as not to offend Mr. Glustein should he be concerned about meat meals eaten outside his home? It's a glatt kosher restaurant. I don't see how the meat would offend Mr. Glustein any more than the vegetables. There's nothing "Jewish" about the story, except for the fact that Mr. Glustein is Jewish. It's not as if his Judaism has anything to do with the reasons he doesn't eat in restaurants. That's what one would expect, but it has nothing to do with it at all. However, people will somehow make that erroneous connection, as you just did. Sorry, but something about this article stinks.

My questions aren't to Mr. Glustein, but to the NY Times. What on earth was the point of this article? Can anybody shed some light on that question? Also -- they went to Le Marais and Mr. Glustein, true to form, had only a ginger ale. But the reporter had a vegetarian meal. Le Marais is a steak house, no?

It's almost hamentaschen time. They're sort of fruit cookies, depending on what you use for filling. Some people tell me I'm a fruit cookie.

The only spices in our home when I was growing up were salt and sweet paprika. That was it, really. Forget about garlic and olive oil, sheesh. My mother used mayonnaise when she made our tuna fish sandwiches for lunches to bring to school, there was simply no other purpose for the stuff. On Passover the Wesson oil became Planter's Peanut Oil, and that's as exotic as it got. Stuff that is or isn't kosher is not arbitrary, that's true. What is completely arbitrary is the stuff that IS kosher that many Jews won't touch anyway because it's somehow, well, "spoiled" is the good rabbi's word. In my family it was "hazzarai." Not literally (it literally means "not kosher"), but just because it's not something "we" would eat. Mayo with roast beef is perfectly kosher, but it's hazzarei anyway. Who needs it? Who eats that way? Not us, certainly. There are also a lot of animals that are kosher but were never raised for kosher slaughter. Deer, bison, etc. I think kosher bison is becoming more readily available (it is kosher, isn't it?). Duck and goose never came close to the popularity of chicken, even though they're just as kosher if killed properly. This is all stuff that my parents would have referred to as "hazzarai," kosher or not.

There was a great layer-cake recipe in the latest Bon Apetit. I was reading it last night as I was dropping off to sleep, and had pleasant dreams. Orange cream sort of stuff (I'm not good at remembering these details, I'd have to go back to the recipe.) Worth a look. I'm dying to try it, but I'm afraid I might sit down with a fork and eat the whole thing!

I don't think intention has anything to do with it at all. I intend a lot of my things to be a work of art, and I'm not referring to my cooking! However, despite my intentions, I don't think they'll bring in too much at auction. I wish I knew how to do the quote thing from several different posts all together. But I don't. So: "Trust me, when you play Canon in D for the thousandth time, only the most fanatical might call it 'art'. " Which begs the question: why do people play it for "the thousandth time"? "I've always enjoyed the painter Ad Reinhardt's take on this problem. It goes as follows: "The one thing to say about art is that it is one thing. Art is art-as-art and everything else is everything else. Art-as-art is nothing but art. Art is not what is not art." " I've never seen that quote before, but I think it's great. Perhaps it's as close as one can get to a definition of art. I can't see cooking or food as art. And I don't think that "denigrates" or "demeans" or "belittles" cooking in any way, shape or form. It is just something other than art. Although I'd think that the creation of a new and unique recipe might (I said MIGHT) come closer to an art form than the execution of that recipe.

My friend's son loves to eat uncooked pasta, especially lasagna noodles. Does that count?

Mmmmmmmangos! The first time I ever ate them was at a friend's house when I lived in Israel. I couldn't believe that anything could possibly taste that good all by itself. I was sure he must have made some kind of sauce or something to put on the fruit. He assured me (about 100 times) that all he did was cut up the fruit, that's how they tasted. Oh my. Worst, worst, worst: guavas. Revolting, both smell and taste. Yuk.