divalasvegas

I admit that I've been lusting after Le Creuset, especially after reading through this wonderful discussion on this eGullet thread: Le Creuset: Worth the Price? Why? Versus Lodge? However, it is extremely expensive, IMHO (which will probably not stop me from purchasing a piece, anyway). My question, is do you think all of these "imitators" will cause Le Creuset to start lowering their prices to remain competitive? I sure hope so, especially if, as has been said previously, there are no major discernible differences in the resultant dish prepared.

I agree BryanZ, doesn't make a lot of sense to me either. But as srhcb said $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ and the fact that, sad to say, there are so many people today who can't taste the difference.

Bless you moosnsqrl. I saw this same episode today and wondered the same thing as Blondelle. I love great recipes for inexpensive cuts of meat. Question though, seems like a lot of cloves. Do you think this would dominate the dish? I could always use less, but usually prefer to follow a recipe as written the first time.

I've never been a big fan of the Cosmo. It's okay, but I don't understand the adulation that this cocktail has come to enjoy. However, I think that if you like Cosmos you'll like this. It's a drink made with Absolut Citron (1 jigger), Triple Sec (1/2 ounce) (I actually tried substituing Gran Marnier to "improve" it, but it really didn't), Creme de Cassis (one teaspoon or to taste) and ruby red grapefruit juice (a couple of ounces), the latter of which I never drink. This my variation on a cocktail made by Emeril Lagasse TVFN except his calls for ruby red grapefruit juice cocktail, but I think that would make it too sweet. I moisten the rim with lemon and dip it into raw sugar crystals. I think it's delicious and has a greater depth of flavor and more substantial mouth feel than the Cosmo IMHO.

I most definitely could not. I think that everyone has his/her own personal threshold of kitchen carnage. I can cut up whole poultry, gut and fillet whole fish, prep chitterlings (not the most pleasant thing in the world), or cut the faces off of live soft shell crabs. But that's it. I have no illusions as to how meat, fish or poultry gets to my table. Bleeding it in my kitchen? No way. Ditto for skinning anything.

Diva Las Vegas: I am glad you like this recipe. As you can see from my pictures, I only use a frying pan to make Chinese food. I don't even own a wok. For explanations... see this post. ← OMG. I'm amazed by two things: 1) the fact that I got so wrapped up in your pictures, the recipe and your explanations of the cooking techniques, and what ingredients you used, I completely missed the fact that you were using a frying pan, and 2) after clicking on the link you included how you said that the first thing a lot of people do before they attempt to prepare Chinese food is to go out and get a wok! LOL That's was exactly my thinking. I happily stand corrected.

This looks so wonderful and so easy hzrt8w. I don't have a wok right now. Can this be made in a regular frying pan? I know, I know I need to get a good wok. BTW, what is your wok made of exactly? Is it the traditional Chinese hammered stainless steel?

Hello again Magus. Sorry to hear that Plan A fell through, but I was totally unsurprised that you have a plan B. You seem to be someone with a can-do spirit. As for your answer to my suggestion for naming your burger after my screen moniker, Dressed to the 9's as in the Original Number 9!? Hmmmm. I love the color scheme of your logo. Would it be too over the top to adapt that to the exterior colors of the cargo trailer? The logo could be on the side of the trailer done with a white background using the antiqued gold and burgundy red for a border and the lettering. You have my deepest admiration and best wishes.

Hi Magus. I'm so glad to here that you are forging ahead with your plans. I must address your last point first. Regarding your use of a trailer, which I think is a spectacular idea, what stigma are you speaking of? Are people where you live snobbish about such things? Unless I missed it upthread, it's not clear on the kind of demographic you expect: working class, immigrants, minorities, basic middle class good guys/gals, the rich and terminally hip? Or a mixture of all of the above? I can only say that a trailer would not deter me whatsoever. The only thing that would deter me right up front about any eating establishment is hygiene and it sounds that you have that covered, due to your previous successful experiences. Frankly I think that with those wonderful smells billowing in the air of burgers sizzling, people will be flocking to Old Number 9 like lemmings. Go with your gut and I think your gut its telling you to go with the trailer. Sounds like the "brick and mortar" may be more headache, and money, for you than it's worth. As usual Shalmanese's comments are dead on. Also, once you have established a set menu--do you have an idea of what the final menu will look like, btw?--would you consider serving burgers in different sizes, a la a mini-size like a "White Castle"-type burger; a regular 4 or 5 ounce burger; and maybe a monster burger, 8-10 ounces? This would be down the road, after you are well established, of course. One request: could I be the first egulleteer to have a burger named after me? The "divalasvegas" burger could have so many tasty possibilities! All the best to you.

I watched Tony's Sicilian adventures and thoroughly enjoyed it. The food, of course, looked amazing as did the architecture. I especially liked Tony pointing out that the male statues were "hung like hamsters." World class chef, globetrotter, successful author and art critic, all wrapped up in one! How cool was it for the President (theirs, not ours) to hang out with him and dine with him. If that was prearranged then I'm awestruck by the connections the man has. However, I'm torn as to what was most impressive: a) him climbing 100 feet up a cliff and maybe jumping to his possible grisly death? Or b) him shoving a palmful of assorted mystery meat from various animals into his mouth served by a man with his bare hands from a covered, steaming basket? Why was it covered exactly? Do we really want to know? The thought of him contemplating cracking his head open and being feasted on by those he has previously feasted on, fantastic. Tony Bourdain and the circle of life. Next week: exotic Las Vegas. I can't wait.

Although I've never had their brunch--only been there for lunch--several people whose opinions I trust have told me that Georgia Brown's on 15th Street downtown serves a fabulous brunch. Check out their brunch menu here. Georgia Brown Brunch Menu Those who've had it tell me that there's so much to choose from on the brunch buffet that you never get to eat your entree. Wow, that Mai Tai on their menu sounds pretty tasty. Also, there's Bubba Muscogee's Restaurant on Rhode Island Avenue, N.E. Address and directions here: Bubba Muscogee's Absolutely nothing fancy. I've eaten there many times, but not brunch, and always left with a smile on my face. The fried chicken is amazing. I couldn't find a menu online, so better check if they serve breakfast food. And like Holly said, do not write off Ben's Chili Bowl.

Thanks so much judiu. First of all, so sorry to hear about your house fire. It's terrible to lose things precious to us. And thanks for giving me a name for this dish. 45 minutes? Wow. I guess I shouldn't complain about my 20 minute prep. Megan thank you for the recipe sources. I really want to do this dish justice and you've made that possible. Take care. ← First, you're very welcome. Second, YEHAW! Amazon actually has the Nero Wolfe Cook Book and will be sending it out shortly. Shoulda looked ther in the first place. When I receive it I'll make a point of p.m.ing you that recipe;watch the How Many Cookbooks thread for more info. ← Thanks a bunch judiu and I'm glad you'll at least be able to replace the book you lost. Yum. I can't wait.

Thanks so much judiu. First of all, so sorry to hear about your house fire. It's terrible to lose things precious to us. And thanks for giving me a name for this dish. 45 minutes? Wow. I guess I shouldn't complain about my 20 minute prep. Megan thank you for the recipe sources. I really want to do this dish justice and you've made that possible. Take care.

I'm calling on all gilders to please provide information on the egg dish I made above. I winged it, actually. As I said, they were good, but I was doing this from memory and would really like a proper recipe and the name of this dish. I know it's supposed to take a long time to prepare, at least much longer than regular scrambled eggs, but 20 minutes did seem too long. Thanks. And keep lily gilding.

Oh thanks everyone for adding to this thread. I was inspired to post because of a recent reference to lily gilding by racheld goddess of lily gilding. Keep 'em coming.

I'd like to add an "unintentional" gilding of the lily this past weekend. I'd been craving just a simple toasted bagel, with a bit of butter and cream cheese, maybe a little lox. That's really all I wanted. Just a quick trip to the grocery store. Well, I bought of the above (except for the butter, which I already had at home), but since it was Sunday I decided that maybe I could fancy it up a bit. So, in addition to the lox I bought smoked trout and whitefish. Then I decided that some tomatoes and onions might be quite tasty on the side. So I got those too. Orange juice and a couple of other things and I'm on my way home. It's early afternoon by now so I'm thinking, well this is really brunch for me so I definitely need some eggs but I wanted something more special than just scrambled eggs. Better get some cream and chives for what I had in mind. I think those eggs called for caviar as well, but forget about the good black caviar on my budget so I got salmon caviar. I remembered a recipe I saw demonstrated by David Rosengarten. He was the guest chef on Sara Moulton's long gone (and very missed) Cooking Live show. Essentially it's eggs that are beaten with cream and a bit of salt--fresh pepper is added when plated--poured into a metal bowl over boiling water in which butter has been melted first. And then you gently stir and stir and stir in a back and forth and folding type motion until the eggs become luscious and curd-like. He gave the name for these eggs but I can't remember it. Anyway before doing the eggs I got everything else ready: sliced the tomatoes and onions, sprinkled them with some capers since they looked a little "naked" and set them aside, plated the fish with the cream cheese. Moved on to the eggs. I'm doing all of this from memory so maybe that's why the cooking process for three eggs took ALMOST 20 MINUTES! I'm sure they weren't as good as David Rosengarten's but they were damned good, all curdy and rich and kind of pretty, too. So here's what my simple bagel, cream cheese and lox mutated into: Creamy, curdy eggs topped with snipped chives Toasted bagel (plain, of course) with butter AND cream cheese Lox, smoked whitefish and trout Salmon caviar Sliced onions and tomatoes with capers and homemade vinaigrette and a dollop of mayo Orange juice and coffee, with Sweet 'n' Low, of course (just kidding) Whew. All eaten at a very leisurely pace with the Sunday paper. Yum. Any other lily gilders out there tonight?

Hi Magus. There's a thread here at eGullet on White Manna. White Manna Discussion Take care.

It's a pretty soft filling, similar to a lemon curd. If it's served cold, I don't think it would be a problem. You may need to add gelatin, but if you add too much, it might get rubbery. I use a nut-crumb crust, which stays crunchy. If you want or need to use a pastry crust, consider a chocolate or white-chocolate lining before you pour in the lemon cream. I don't think the proportions need to be changed; you may not even need the gelatin (except see my felling about question #1). Full-fat lemon custard will be rich. You could consider folding in some zest of lemon or lime for contrast with your lemon curd. Let me know how it turns out. ← Thanks for all your help Jay. Regarding your responses: 1) I think your original recipe sounds perfect, including the gelatin. I'm looking for a texture somewhere between a lemon cream and a cheesecake, so if it's a little firm, it's okay. The only change I might make is to substitute vanilla extract for the almond extract. 2) I will definitely be using a pastry crust, so I think your idea for using the a white-chocolate lining will work great. 3) I agree; I was thinking of adding some zest to the bottom cream layer. As for the other layer, I'll be using a pretty standard recipe for the lemon layer of a lemon meringue pie which uses less butter and egg yolks than a lemon curd, but I'll be tasting and adjusting as I go along. I guess it's no secret now that I really love lemons. Again I appreciate all of your advice and I'll report back with the results.

That sounds like a delicious recipe Jay. I've been looking for an easy lemon cream pie filling recipe and this sounds perfect. A couple of questions for you or anyone else here: One of my favorite pies, if not the favorite is lemon meringue pie. What I was thinking of was a two-layer pie. The bottom layer would be your lemon cream recipe. On top of that would be the standard lemon curd type filling that one would find in a lemon meringue pie. Lastly, there would be the meringue on top. 1) Do you think that the bottom cream layer, once adquately chilled, would support the top two so that when cut you would see distinct layers and nothing "squished" on the bottom or have uneven layers? 2) Since this pie would have to be assembled in three stages, what would you do to ensure that the crust isn't ruined. When I say stages, I'm thinking that one would first prepare the lemon cream pie, chill, then top with the cooled lemon curd mixture and chill again, and then top with meringue and brown in a very hot oven. 3) Just for my own tastes, I would be more inclined to use regular cream cheese, sour cream, and sweetened condensed milk. Do you think proportions would need to be adjusted or more lemon juice added to cut the extra richness? Thanks.

I agree with Shalmanese's colorfully made point upthread. Also, if you serve a portobella burger as a vegetarian option, will you have a dedicated portion of your grill just for that? You really don't need the headache of vegetarians complaining that their burger has come in contact with beef grease and I'm sure space is a premium. As an aside, there's a bbq joint near me that serves pretty decent bbq. I once ordered greens as a side order and noticed that they tasted pretty terrible. I asked the proprieter if she used any pork products in her greens and she said no because of her vegetarian customers (her exact words). Why vegetarians would frequent a bbq joint is beyond me. Haven't been back there in a while. As always, I wish you the greatest of success. Edited to correct my misspelling of Shalmanese's name. Sorry.

That's exactly the taste experience I had RebelRose; you've described it perfectly. I recently achieved the opposite results a couple of months ago when I ordered an apple tarte (served cold with ice cream, but that's another issue) and definitely the wrong dessert wine. The waiter, though very nice, didn't have a clue as to which dessert wine I should order and just kept saying that they were all "good." I believe the word tawny was part of the name of the wine, so I winged it. Bad choice. The wonderful pairing of the other dessert/wine I described above was not realized here. The fruity qualities of the wine did not blend at all with the apple flavor and I had to finish the dessert with coffee and the wine by itself. The word tawny seemed to imply something more caramel-like. Since wrong pairings are a total waste of money and an unhappy ending to a meal, I've been looking into various wine pairing guides online. I found a website with some interesting resources. Food and Wine Guide There a several links on this site. The one called Allied Domecq Wine's Food and Wine Pairing I found (at least to my novice's eye) particularly informative, although of course they're only suggesting wines from their winery. At least I hope it will help me avoid throwing money down the drain. All opinions, suggestions, guidance are deeply appreciated.

Port is the best known red dessert wine but there are plenty of others: Banuyls, Riversaltes and Maury from France; Licor de Tannat from Uruguay; Mavrodaphne from Greece; and Ridge's Zinfandel Essence from California. In Italy, some Recioto-di-Valpolicella are quite sweet; Tuscans make semi-sweet wine from aleatico (Antinori's is quite successful); and in the Alto Adige, Alois Lageder makes a trippy Moscato Rosa. And so on. Not to mention all the imitation "ports" made around the globe. ← Thanks carswell. I wish I could be more descriptive. Alas, that was two years ago. I guess it's time to go home and tear up the place for the menu they gave me. I remember that the staff was very friendly and down to earth about explaining what we were drinking at the time (they even accidentally on purpose gave me a second dessert wine). I recall saying something insightful and sophisticated when I first tasted the wine such as "Wow, this is really great!" Obviously I need a little advice on how to describe what I've tasted as well.

Well, encouraged by Rebel Rose and in spite of my wine ignorance here's my take on dessert wine. I cannot recall the name of a dessert wine I had about 2 years ago, so perhaps someone here could give me some guidance as to what type of wine I enjoyed so thoroughly. At an upscale Italian restaurant in Minneapolis, I had the tasting menu. I requested and received the menu for that evening, but misplaced it. Anyway, I think all of the food/wine pairings worked, but on different levels. A couple were just okay, a couple were very good, but the dessert/wine pairing was so incredible I can almost taste it now. It was a lemon tart with, I think, a hazlenut or pine nut crust, topped with huckleberries. It was my first taste of those berries; like blueberries on steriods, IMHO. This was paired with a glass of what I would guess was a type of port. It was a vibrant red with deep berry aromas (sorry I don't have the wine-geek words to better describe it). I would take a bite of the tart and a taste of the wine and together they were beyond amazing. Alone they were delicious; but together they became something else altogether. The restaurant was D'Amico Cucina, I think. I think my verdict from my limited experience is that I really enjoy wine with dessert. Again, just need a little guidance. Are the only dessert wines that are red ports? Or are there other dessert wines that are red as well?

Hello again Magnus. I think that the points made here about everyone's admiration for your devotion to quality are dead on. No one here wants to eat at yet another place that "taste's" like all they care about is the bottom line. However, because I am so excited for you and your vision, I must reiterate Shalmanese's point about cost. Have you figured out, to your satisfaction, how much money EACH DAY you are in operation you will have to make to: Just to break even, as in take care of you and yours, as well as all of every possible thing that you might be conceivably responsible for, both forseeable and not: rent, insurance (insurance costs that many savvy business owners never imagined), taxes at all levels, workman's comp, some bizarro turn in events, i.e., burger sales going way down after another Oprah vs. meat industry battle publicity disaster, cold feet by investor relatives/friends, and other financial issues that only a psychic friend could foresee? And, let alone make a profit? Actually, although I decry the decline of Food Network programming, have you ever watched one of their newer shows, "Recipe for Success?" As someone who has never been in the for-profit end of the food industry, I think that this show is a pretty good one and tells some cautionary tales for those hoping to start off on their own in the food business. You seem to have a) given a lot of forethought to your dream; and, b) come to just the right place (eG) for all of the good advice I've seen given to you. As I have said before, all the best to you. Edited for spelling

Thanks Daniel for the great review (and BBQ Porn) of a place not too far from where I live. I'll have to check it out. However, ...................... No fair rolling through my hometown and not stopping by to say hello! Really, though, as everyone else here has said thanks for taking us along on your journeys. With everything going on in NOLA and other parts South, this roadtrip has been very special indeed.