joiei

make your own, it isn't that hard.

Hi jgm, I enjoyed meeting up with you guys at Bluestem after your dinner. KC is turning into a pretty decent food town. I will wander over to Wichita some time this summer for a little exploration.

Don't know that I worked in any restaurant kitchens that had stainless steel sheet pans. The standard always seemed to be the Chicago Metal aluminum sheets, both full and half sheet pan sizes. The price was the deciding factor every time. And the hot line guys would friggin' trash my pans that I used for the bake shop every time. They had no respect for anyone elses property. But with an after shift and all was forgiven.

A good bread shouldn't have to be served warm ← Unconundrum, I agree completely with you. And I do like to use a good fava bean spread occasionally.

It doesn't keep very long and what time you do keep it, it needs to be in a lightly warm place, not too hot or too cold. Don't plan on freezing it. Make what you need and any left over you really have to throw out. It is a sauce for immediate use. It is best if used right when it is made. By trying to hold it, you start running risks.

Dave and Stephen had three choices once the teams were set. Most admirable: Make the best of an unpleasant situation and perform at the best of their professional ability. Admirable: Refuse the assignment. Walk. Stephen can't really do this as he volunteered to work with Tiffani. Least Admirable: Show up drunk, not commit yourself fully, talk behind the chef's back. ← Most Entertaining: Show up drunk, act silly, talk behind chef's back. ← I know, like that does not happen in the real world. Please, high ideals are admirable, but in the real world, stuff happens and people will be just folks. I thought that showed real humaness for them to do that.

according to their website, the June Flavor of the month is Chocolate Covered Strawberries.

Hey Kent, the Moo runs a close second for me. One of these days, I will have to go to the plant in Broken Arrow, it is just down the freeway right before the Muskogee Turnpike starts. I know they ususally have a summer ice cream party sometime. Maybe that is what i should do, have an old fashioned ice cream social next sunday afternoon.

Making Texas Cows Proud Which flavor is your favorite? I prefer the Banana Split and the two ladies I work with always hanker for Wedding Cake. And if you don't have Blue Bell, well life isn't complete. There are those who will deride Blue Bell and opt for the Hagen 'Daz or Ben and Jerrys, but my preference is for this ice cream if it isn't home made. Now I am looking forward to trying that Cantalope and Cream when it comes out.

You confuse me, first you complain about the prices then you give a very positive review. I don't understand. How does one qualify a tasting menu by breaking down the price by the number of courses. In the last two days I have had two tasting menus. One at 12 courses for $100 and the other at 8 courses for $95. Either one, I would do again for those prices. Both had their strong points and their weak points, but trying to compare the cost of a salad course or a sorbetto course with the fish course or the meat course, it just does not work that way. A menu pricing does not break down that way. It is the total costs of the ingredients for everything that is used to compute the costs plus labor costs to produce that menu pricing. That is the way I have always been taught. If one does not care for a particular menu then mark it off as just that. If I find a restaurant that I do not care for inspite of the local prevailing opinion, I just don't go there. No use punishing myself. If I don't care for it and continue to go there, then that is my fault and I have no room to whine about it. What is wrong with the prices for what you were served. From the pictures, the portions were overlarge for a tasting menu. THe 12 course I had, the first 5 courses were just a one bite thing each. I am just trying to understand what the problem was.

I have the new book by Tom Fitzmorris now.

Tonight, I had my own collection. It was excellent. I will post more in detail after getting some sleep and getting back home. I did take notes. And the escargot, I would not let them take the dish away until I had sopped up all the juice out of that shell. THe last three times I have been in town, I have eaten at Bluestem. IF that is a rut, I think I like to be in this rut.

No damage done, the Shrimp Panang was very good with just the right balance of heat(I ordered medium heat) and coconut and peanut flavors. Now to rest up before dinner.

Okay, I am back in KC and ready. I am looking forward to tomorrow night. In the meantime, on Memorial Day Monday, there are a LOT of places that are closed for the day. I ended up at Firoella's in Overland Park - it was close to my hotel - and it was good. I ordered the pork burnt ends and the beef ribs and a ceasar salad, foregoing the fries and coleslaw. The BBQ sauce was a tad to vinegary for me personally, my brother would like it. Lunch Tuesday is looking to be Tonic, a new place for me. more later.

Last day in Omaha We spent time checking out the Lewis and Clark stuff, the monument on the bluffs outside of Council Bluffs was probably my favorite because of the view. For lunch we ended up at Ricks Boatyard Cafe on the riverfront. We went there for the view and casual atmosphere. We ordered the special of the day, BBQ pork sandwich with homemade chips. I was going to order the crab cakes but they had sold out because of the weekend. Then we went to Ted and Wally's and had ice cream. The I would rather eat chocolate than work was interesting, the vanilla was vanilla. But it was fun, they make the ice cream right there on premises in old fashioned ice cream makers with ice and rock salt. That was fun. I didn't make it to 13th street coffee, we spent too much time driving up to Ft Atchison. After this, I left for Kansas City. It was fun and if my brother stays there long enough with the construction project, then I will go back.

I personally nominate Belize as having a "Worst" local cuisine.

Their web site listed as the hotels participants in their summer BBQ event. That is the only place I saw names associated with the kitchen. Having worked in a Mobile 5-star kitchen myself, it does make a difference. The 5 stars is a step up over the 5 diamonds.

What are the 3 best places for BBQ in Las Vegas? I want to be ready and I love BBQ. I know there are top flight places and I want to taste bbq.

Omaha day two Well, our schedule had to be changed a bit today. No biggie. We did make it to the brew pub which was way out in big box land. Brother said the beer on tap was pretty good, but the food was nothing special. It is the Upstream Brewing Company. Then we just drove around a lot. Found what was probably the old Italian neighborhood below 10th. Came across Orsi's, went in to see the bakery but it turned out to be a pizza take out, smelled wonderful. THere sure are a lot of steakhouses (old style like from the 40s and 50s in this neighborhood. I did check out the former Blackstone hotel and it is strictly offices, in fact the company my brother works for, it is their headquarters in Omaha. One building that I didn't expect and was surprised by when I saw it was the Mutual of Omaha. It caught me completely off guard. A homer moment? For dinner we ended up at Vivace in the Old Market. We sat outside and the service was pretty good. I ordered hummus as a starter and I do not know what the food runner brought me the first time, but it was not hummus. Scott, our waiter immediately removed it and brought out the correct dish. It was actually pretty good. A nice balance of flavors. My brother ordered the flatiron steak and I ordered the chicken piccata. The piccata was lacking, there was no artichokes, no onions, no asparagus. It was served with garlic mashed potatos and they were on the cool side. The sauted summer squash and zukes was not very exciting. The sauce on the chicken was pretty good. My brother said the flatiron tasted good but was not as hot as it could of been. They did offer desserts for the appetizer mix up. I was totally unimpressed with almost everything except Scott's service. He and I had a discussion about the fact that there was no nice dry rose on the wine menu. Not the white zinfindel stuff but a nice rose from cote de provence or Bandol. The weather just called for one. Over all, I would not go back nor would I recommend it to anyone. edited to add that the iced latte at the 13th Street Coffee has been good both times I have been there.

THe Blackstone Hotel is now an office building As for the Reuben Sandwich, you can either check for ratings here or add your own ratings. I am running into one small problem, it seems most places are going to be closed on Memorial Day, so we will have a bit of challenge to stay out of chain land. But we shall see.

First Impressions This afternoon after arriving in Omaha, I wandered from my hotel down to the 13th Street coffee shop and had a pretty good iced latte. After meeting my brother we went to Delices and ordered an iced latte, not as good as the other one, he had a cup of coffee that he could not drink, he said it was one of the worst he has had in a long time with an eclair which he said was excellent. ??? For dinner, we went to the Flatiron Cafe. We shared an order of the Portobello mushroom fires with sweet thai chile sauce over a little asian slaw. They tasted like there was possibly nuts in the breading, very good flavor with the cool slaw. My brother had the olive oil poached halibut with fresh mozzarella vinagrette, roasted tomato salad and jerusalem artichoke puree, it was served steaming hot and was very good with the puree. I ordered a special of roasted sea bass over an asian slaw with tempura nori roll. THe sea bass was cooked perfectly, tender and moist. It was over a bed of the same asian slaw as on the mushroom plate, which I did not mind all that much and was drizzled with a just slightly sweeted soy based sauce. The service was efficient, not overly friendly, and got the job done. I liked having the windows on both sides of the pie shaped room, lots of light and seeing beyond the inside of the restaurant. The desserts offered didn't do it for me so we passed. THe only problem we had, the cream curdled in a cup of coffee, so they immediately brought a fresh cup and some fresh cream. Over all, a bit pricey, but presentations and tastes were worth it. Plus, we had seafood in Omaha. Tomorrow, we are going to try a brew pub for brunch and dinner is still up in the air. My brother keeps taking about the buffet at the Horseshoe casino. He was a real sport for dinner tonight, so I will have to return the favor tomorrow. Plus, I might get a tour of the power plant that he is working on. later, gaters

I came across a mint flavored water at Target, it was not sweetened. I enjoy it as an occasional change. I know I could infuse my own water, but not having fresh mint available all the time makes this a handy option.

I love the recipe for the Napolitano; one small problem, I do not have a silver knife to check for doneness. I did not think that eggs and silver went together very well. At least in my experience. When I worked at Ocean Reef Club in Key Largo, we did flans for the seafood buffet every week and they were gobbled up.

a hearty congratulations to you for what looked like a very nice luncheon. And you got it done. It will probably something he and his family will remember for a long time. And thanks for keeping us involved, at one point, I was wanting to wipe the sweat from my brow reading your posts. Well done.

I never realized this was such a controversial thing. A restaurant I worked at in the early 90's in Pensacola, Fl did this on all their menus. I never thought about it twice. All dollar amounts were rounded, no off dollar prices.