Pontormo

The first link I found in a search seems as if it may be one of the most informative. It concerns Riso Nano Vialone Veronese, i.e. from basically the same area even if your type is supposed to be particularly coarse and stubby. Some of the recipes reflect Paula Wolfert's advice. Of course, the Veneto is known for risi e bisi; this is from Alberto and omits tomatoes. With one store located in my home town, Balducci's has recently started to carry three different types of Italian rice, including Vialone. I no longer have the box, so I am not sure of details. However, I paid around $4 for it.

You don't need a recipe specifically tailored to the use of this type of rice. Use it for risotto or any of the other Italian rice-based dishes you enjoy that call for a starchy short-grained rice as opposed to one with long grains. Before internet sales, the domination of Italian cookbooks in the publishing world, and growing specialization of titles devoted to regional cooking, or ones that evoke homey, rural comfort and authenticity, we in the US just had Arborio. Now there's more, including Carnaroli, black rice from Venice, etc. These fuel our desire for something new to consume and distinguish our refined knowledge from that of our neighbors. They're also good.

Chocolate mousse? Has anyone mentioned chicken with dumplings? Shepherd's pie is the meatloaf of the British side of my family, though they use ground beef rather than lamb. Never went out of style. The pot roast revival happened in the late 80's, I thought, and is still going strong. That's about the time that pie (courtesy of David Lynch) started to edge out tarts. Is anyone else making quiche anymore? It's hard to tell when it comes to Americans embracing foods from other countries for short periods of time, then casting them aside.* Same with focaccia. A decade ago, everyone was serving focaccia, if more elaborate than in Italy. The bakery section of Whole Foods produces a version of focaccia that it wraps in plastic, but it isn't at all appealing. One thing the store handles well is chicken pot pie. What has been extremely successful when it comes to recent revivals is gingerbread. It's the ultimate comfort food, warm with ice cold, chunky applesauce cooked with cider, cinnamon and a pinch of cardamom. A tall glass of milk. A quick look through Craig Claighborn or Silver Palate cookbooks should provide further clues. What about salmon au croute? Does anyone mold pastry around fish and bake it these days? I don't think I ever have. *AF, do not even think about it.

Pounce, thanks for answering my question. Currently my fridge holds buttermilk for baking/pancakes, skim milk for cereal, whole milk for coffee, light cream for a quiche, last week's yogurt, FAGE for starter and now 2% for making a new batch of yogurt. I didn't feel the need to buy the powdered milk. We'll see how it goes.

Shaya: You are putting the rest of us to shame! Your eggplant fritters look especially enticing.

Thanks for the information as well as the link to an amazing seed company!

So, I am going to scratch large container of plain yogurt off the grocery list and pick up 2% milk and one small FAGE to try to make some for myself. I will read through this thread more thoroughly than I have before I do, especially to evaluate what I might use as containers without making additional purchases. QUESTION: Why use powdered milk? Please direct me to the salient post if the virtues of using it appear in this thread already. However, I see some people using it along with their milk and starter yogurt and some doing without. I am inclined to do without. Thanks.

You're welcome! I forgot to recommend spaghetti carbonara as another thing to make with leftover fraction of a beaten egg. As you said in your original post, it's kind of hard for things to go wrong when you make muffins, so unless you're doing something drastic with ratio of dry to wet or eliminating sources for levening, I am sure tweaking would be fine, too. But here's the other thing. 3 eggs is a LOT for a dozen muffins, even when batter is made with meal and not just finer grains of flour. Most recipes call for 1-2 eggs. You could always look for a more convenient recipe online.

A large egg, beaten normally fills about a quarter of a cup. Half that amount. Using the egg shell to scoop, instead of a spoon, eases the process. Save what remains for another use. I just made meatballs for tapas a few days ago that required 1 T of egg. I saved what remained in a small empty jar. Had some leftover cooked rice, scallions, bell peppers... fried rice! Or half of a recipe for buttermilk pancakes. Mix with another egg for scrambled eggs...or make meatballs yourself!

So no one else create(s/d) dolls or any other kinds of toys from edible substances? The reference to tapioca pudding reminds me of peeled grapes used in haunted houses to feel like eyeballs. * * * Carolyn, we're waiting for the pictures. At least, shape something cute out of home-made cheese.

I thought this thread might be relevant now.

Want to dine on authentic ragu? Then Bologna just simply won't do! "A Napoli, vai!" Where they top pizza pie With a cheese bufalese, impromptu. "To Naples, go!"

1. Heated up in the oven, the meatballs with peaches are even better the second time around when the garlic in the former is subtly apparent. Please, do try this recipe. 2. Took advantage of the oven to make the toast with chocolate (El Rey, 73.5 %), olive oil and fleur de sel. Perfect toast. Salt, olive oil, rich sweet goo, crunch. "Polvo del mar, la lengua di ti recibe un beso de la noche marina... ...el sabor central del infinito." (Pablo Neruda, "Ode to Salt.") "Dust of the sea, the tongue receives a kiss of the night sea from you...the inward flavor of the infinite." Trans. Robert Bly

Well, now you have one yourself . Yes, 2 Amy's is the reason I had to qualify what I said about Paradiso. Really, not that good in Philly? Too "Americanized"?

Oops. Forgot to add that the chocolate-eggplant I first saw was in a copy of this where it appeared rather dramatically as a timbale or dome shape, most likely made in a bowl that was inverted. The exterior was coated in what looked like a thick, shiny chocolate ganache. I don't own the book, so I can't tell you more.

Pizza Napoletana: I am so glad you wrote this because it explains a lot. Until fairly recently here in Washington, D.C., the best place to get pizza was Pizza Paradiso (I beg your pardon, please, for the ignorant quote from The Washingtonian you'll find on this Web site). One of the things I never liked was the fact that the pizzas with tomato toppings are made with unadorned canned plum tomatoes. They are imported, though, I don't know if they were San Marzano. But the topping definitely contains big pieces of the canned tomato; it's never completely pulverized. I always thought it would be far better with a true sauce since it tasted so raw and well, canned. I guess the owner of my local pizzeria was being more authentic than some other places. Still, is there more to what you do to your beautiful pies than just crush the tomatoes? What about fresh tomatoes--or do you feel ones available in the UK (? ) are inferior? P.S. Kevin, La Valle is the brand of pomodorini sold locally. This is just the first web site I found.

Timely topic since I just bowed to peer pressure and bought my first bottle of Sriracha this weekend and put it in the fridge next to the same company's chili garlic paste. Both bottles bear labels indicating how many preservatives the condiments contain, and do not mention refrigeration, but I just wanted to be safe. There is no such thing as common knowledge, according to Raymond Williams. Anything we assume everyone knows indicates our cultural biases. So, when I looked at the article I was kind of amused by how ignorant the journalist thought the general public is. Come on, who needs to be told this kind of thing? Then, again, look at my first paragraph. I once gave a rather large jar of a home-made pesto-like sauce to a colleague as a present around the holidays, knowing she didn't cook and loved pasta. I thought writing down all the ingredients: Italian parsley, garlic, pine nuts, Parmigiano Reggiano, etc. was all the information she needed, but I was wrong. She put it in the cupboard and had to throw it out.

Don't get all excited. This is just a deserved word of praise to Hathor for a wonderful introduction, illustrated with the bufale and bufali that she and Ore made famous. Okay, to make reading this worth the trip to the Italian forum, here's a nice little slide show of sorts demonstrating how to make mozzarella di bufala from scratch. Kevin, I don't quite get what you said about Marcella's gripe unless the pasta water you added to your dish was in defiance. However, bravo for your status as the first to document a meal in this region. And thanks, Elie, again, for more tips! I will consult J.S. to make pizza dough when I get around to it. Sigh, but the cheese just will not be the same ! * * * I checked through Ada Boni and was surprised by her list for Quattro Stagione pizza. In Tuscany I am used to artichokes in one quarter, prosciutto cotto in another and then usually Margherita and olives for the other two. Is this a regional thing? She's got seafood which does make sense for Naples...

Tonight's dinner is being cooked at a leisurely pace, in part because just about every surface of my small kitchen is covered and the mess spills out to the dining room, and in part because I was so hungry and tempted by the fact that the first course was virtually all done, mellowing in jars in the refrigerator, so I couldn't resist. To begin: Tichi's Gazpacho Since the winter when rows of orange curtains wove through the snow in Central Park, New Yorkers, at least, have known that Christo is not a lone artist, but an enterprising pair of husband and wife who psyched out the Macho Individualism of the American art scene in the 1960's and 70's and decided they'd have more success if their projects were attributed to one man. In turn, we're more inclined nowadays to give spouses credit for their influence on their beloved partner's professional accomplishments. In that spirit, let's acknowledge the wife of Jose Andres, praised by the chef for the divine splendor of her Andalucian version of this cold soup. Given the explicit directions for the semi-deconstructed presentation of the dish, I have to assume there's some collaboration going on here. Earlier, Bilrus provided a photograph. I will not. I used the same type of huge white pasta bowl from Sur La Table (I am guessing), with slices of a long yellow plum tomato, some of its guts spilled out in "fillets" of tomato seeds. (I find only my plum tomatoes will stay together in a quivering jellyfish mass; larger tomatoes do not cooperate, but instead, appear ready to go into labor the way their water gushes out.) Scallion rings instead of chives. Purple slivers of shallot rather than petals of pearl onion. So-so cucumber since there were none at the market. What I loved, especially, was the pleasure of crunching into the croutons and all the separate flavors of the discrete strands and cubes on the plate. Because the bread is fried in one piece, then broken, textures range from perfectly soggy to crisp. I also liked the little dabs of unblended Sherry vinegar, olive oil (possibly from Tunisia) and salts. Because the bread was not blended with everything else, and there was no onion other than the pieces arranged decoratively on the plate, the flavor was sweet and mild, texture, smooth rather than pulpy. Distinct. I also thought the instructions to reblend the liquifidied vegetables once they were seasoned was smart. Magic the way the soup turned from a rosy, deep watermelon red to a bright orange during that second whirr. Less appreciated: Photograph on page 39. It's very pretty, but not the right texture. Come on, the stuff was strained! Salt could be taken down 1/4 notch and no way, no how is a slice of bread going to turn into a crouton over medium-high heat in olive oil in four minutes. Charcoal, maybe. Olive oil, 3/4 cup? Miserly and just starting to lose weight, I used half of that and could not imagine more. Well, it's now dark and I am hungry again. More later, but not nearly this much. Albondigas con maelocotones I highly recommend the meatballs with peaches, a dish that caught my eye because Ling and Henry Lo just held an Iron Chef competition during their first joint-food blog last week in which peaches were the featured ingredient. They are probably my favorite fruit and the season is almost over. The recipe is on page 246. Consult the photograph on page 247 and if you think the dish is pretty as is, you too should skip the parsley garnish, cut thinner slices of peaches and let them cook for more than twice the time indicated in the recipe. I was intrigued by the call for only 1/4 of a pound of ground beef, 1/2 oz. of bread and 1 T of beaten egg (! 2/3 of a scrambled egg for breakfast tomorrow) to feed four people. I'd say three if you're serving 5-8 tapas since three little meatballs and three slices of peach just aren't enough unless your guests are Chinese and consider four an unlucky number. Spare number of flavors, only parsley, garlic and salt in the meatballs, cinnamon, toasted pine nuts, Sherry vinegar and chicken stock in the sauce made from a butter and sugar syrup used to carmelize the peaches. Surprising choice of meat, but it works. Potential for variations are endless. I'm thinking ground lamb and plums. Pork and apples. Spinach a la Catalana This is probably my favorite tapa at Jaleo...or up there. After making it once, I am humbled by the skill it must take to get it just right when it comes to the table. I need more patience since I added perfect baby spinach leaves with too much water still clinging to them. They should really be bone dry. The apple should not be the lesser of the two wrinkly ones bought a couple of months ago and I am sure a nice, liquidy toasted pine nut EVOO puree the consistency of tahini-lemon sauce would prove superior to a hasty smash of nuts and oil with pestle then fork. No room for chocolate and olive oil on toast.

Has there been a cook-off for stuffed vegetables yet? There should be one if not. I made a modified version of this dish from the September issue of Gourmet: an egg baked in a small Purple Cherokee. What were they thinking? Don't discard the goop scooped out of the tomato; save it for gazpacho or some other use. I simply seasoned the tomato shell, added some crumbled bacon, watercress and grated Parmesan before the egg. Would be good with fresh roasted chile strips, too. On a bed of watercress sprinkled with the other crumbled strip of bacon and a squirt of lemon with a wedge of buttermillk cornbread baked with fresh corn and onions. * * * As for the tomato above, for the first time I noticed there were yellow and orange plum tomatoes in the farmers market this weekend. Does anyone make a distinction between genuine, revived varities of tomatoes and new hybrids?

Postscript just in case I was not abundantly clear in the wordy post above: I really enjoy the Dinner Thread. See my first post in this one: it's a place of great support as some of the most regular posters continually exclaim. Showing off isn't simply showing off, it IS also sharing and not meant to make anyone feel intimidated. Second, I am drawn to the pictures first, no doubt. Visual immediacy matters and someone with the skills of a Patrick S. (Dessert thread), Ann T, Ling, Daniel, Shaya, etc., etc. deserves recognition for what s/he can do with a camera--or bag of flour, rib, peach or phrase.

Regarding the subheading of this thread & Heather's first post: Abra's preoccupied now with guests, but I remember she began a new alternative Dinner thread out of somewhat similar feelings, i.e. a belief that the Dinner Thread was a place for stunning revelation vs. simple daily reporting. The first responses she received were protests, saying that the dinner thread was for everything other than the disasters that the poster might prefer to document in the Anti-Dinner thread. The more people who do not shy away from mentioning their grilled cheese sandwiches made with supermarket cheddar and Arnold Healthnut bread in the Dinner thread, the more variety there will be. I personally would like more of this since I have a personal interest in the real ways people eat. I'm just not sure eGullet members provide a sufficiently diverse range of dietary habits to represent a good sample group. A lot of what goes on here is showing off, mostly good-natured. It's not exclusively a place for disseminating information or seeking and gaining advice. No forum is exempt. I find inspiration in many of the most ambitious postings of this nature; cf. my references to Ling & Henry's Chinese banquet which I culled only for two dishes, both extremely simple, if one requiring four hours of braising, virtually unwatched. Here one can show off to like-minded people what one would not to colleagues, relatives or even friends. When The Dinner Thread reached page number 500, I actually spent time looking at the first pages and years. Two things strike me: 1) In the beginning, the novelty of eGullet fueled a lot of the simple, mundane reporting in very brief posts. I'd say it's a bit like the first years of the cellphone, except I overhear too many unexceptional conversations on the streets. How motivated is someone who's been around for some time to contribute the same kind of brief notice on a regular basis? 2) Food photography changes everything. It takes a while for photographs to become the rule rather than the exception that they are on the thread. Once photographs became virtually requisite, then for many posters, the quality of the image became important. Cf. Dessert thread, too. As the only regular contributor to the cooking threads who doesn't photograph her meals in the Italian forum, I know what it feels like to be the one sane person in the room who is nonetheless the odd ball. (I am more than tolerated there.) This is especially true when text is minimal in photocentric posts and images make it easy to say, "That looks wonderful!" and "What exactly did you do to make the cream do that?" And who's to begrudge members who have developed incredible skills in photography, largely due to practice and advice gained through their contributions here? That said, I tend not to pipe up on the Dinner thread except to praise other people's photographed meals. Upon occasion, I will make a plug for the Italian threads, pay homage to someone who influenced my cooking, or endorse something new I've just tried. That is why I wrote something last night and will not say anything about whatever I heat up or make once I log out.

Yeah, I went back and noticed this was indeed your main point. Then, my main point would be that culinary history, like just about any rich history I can think of, is not insular. I'm not just paying homage to the glories of the Silk Route, though certainly you can go back further in time. Imagine France without sugar, Vienna without coffee...hell, Italy without France, France without Italy and Italy without the tomato. Would the streets of New York smell so sweet were its kitchens not sites of one fusion on top of another?

Dave, it's a shame that it is too late to send you to the first exhibition of Impressionist paintings, the Armory Show or the premier performance of Stravinsky's Rites of Spring! Just kidding, honest. Almost everything else I'd be tempted to say was said by others responding to your cranky reactionism and what used to be called Western bias until we of dangling earrings and Birkenstocks started to question how you can fit N. America & W. Europe under the rubric "Western" while excluding parts south of Texas. I suspect that the shadow cast by El Bulli and others who experiment with new technologies is rather slight here at eGullet. Bacon seems to be the site's pet food, with Sriracha a distant second. At the Dinner Thread, especially, you'll see all kinds of simple, complex, unadorned, elaborate, traditional and avant-garde meals received with the kind of graciousness that Miss Manners would applaud. Since you write with passion as well as self-depricating humor, perhaps you should start a new cooking thread in the French regional forum where expatriates play a considerable role. If I'm not mistaken, that area of the board is dominated by the usual inquiries and reports of visitors and diners. Just because French culture continues to dominate our notions of Cuisine doesn't mean that makers of simple crepes and charcuterie should turn exclusively to this particular forum if they wish to talk about their dinners and picnics. When you're got one host's monthly report of marketplaces and another's considerable culinary skills, it makes sense to integrate the two interests.