Schielke

I have not made it to very many Japanese places to eat stuff other than sushi related items. I used to go to a great little place in our University district that had really great beef and onion over rice, shu-mai, croquette, and curry over rice (Japanese style). I really need to try more Japanese food other than sushi. Ben

The pesto was not mine, but it was homeade. Nightscotsman joined me for some pizza last night and he brought it over. You might PM him for the recipe. It was tasty. Ben

I used the rest of my pizza dough to make a couple more pizzas. Pizza One- Marinara, basil, fresh mozz, parma ham, EVOO Pizza Two- Pesto, fresh mozz, toasted pinenuts, parma ham, EVOO

Tough call. While it is a sweet drink, it is still very refreshing and might be a nice appertif. I say that it should be taken as some sorbet courses are; as a refresher course in the middle of the meal. Ben

Thanks for the great info everybody! NSM, I might just take you up on that offer. I do know that the blue willow tea house here in Seattle sells the implements for making it, but I don't think they serve the tea. It would be worth checking out again. Nightscotsman, do you recall about how much the matcha is at Uwajimaya? Ben

So, how did everybody work around their pickiness? For myself, I just decided that I wanted to make sure that I did not like something on my list. I figured that since somebody likes them, there must be some kind of redeeming factor to these foods. Ben

Yeah, while I was not exposed to them as a child, I am sure I would not have eaten any offal or anything like snails or such. I did enjoy many spices and such though. I remember liking chinese food quite a bit if it had none of the items on my list. Ben

I have also heard that the powder is very perishable. Is this true?

I managed to get my hands on a FOG last night. Very nice! Great job Dale! It is a dangerous drink, strong in content but not on the pallate. And flaming the oranges was fun! Ben

Doesn't the phrase "meat smuggling" violate the user agreement in some way? Good luck with customs though! Ben

In a good way? Ben

I think that I would get in trouble with my woman trying to cook something that had fish head as a main ingredient. It does sound like fun though! Ben

I was a very picky eater as a child. From what I can remember, I would not eat: Beans Pickles Tomatoes zucchini mushrooms olives fruit salads Ham Cold noodles cold salads bell peppers eggplant anything slimy Some of this I believe stemmed from being forced to eat a "no thank you" helping of anything I did not want. Also, I believe I was given poor examples of some of the above items in the past. As I grew up, I started to like more and more. I have been systematically eliminating my dislikes and am at the current list. Pickles mushrooms (in process of liking them, it is a texture thing) Olives (I am yet to like them alone) Cold Salads (pasta salads and potato salads are still unappetizing to me) Green Bell Pepper (The smell and taste is just offensive to me) Goat Cheese (Some are ok, but some taste like I am licking a goat) I wonder if some of my extreme pickiness as a child opened me up to having really good experiences with food. For example, I knew I did not like olives but when I was presented with a lovely presentation involving top notch olives I tried it to make sure that I did not like it. I now appreciate the unique saltiness they bring to a dish. Were any of you very picky eaters as children? Or did you always enjoy eating everything presented to you? Ben

I have been interested in buying some Matcha (Green tea powder) to try out in tea and to use for making green tea ice cream. Does anybody have a good source for this stuff or any tips on using it? Have you tasted tea made with it? I believe there is a traditional whisk like implement used to make the tea; sort of like an old school shaving cream brush. Ben

Cool, thanks for the tips! I will let you know what I ended up doing with it. Ben

Sounds great, I will keep an eye out for it! Ben

Yeah, I was hoping the pizza would turn out good enough to make me cool. But a sweet flame paint job on my peel couldn't hurt either. Ben

A sack of 88 pork sure does sound good though...

Yeah, and making them would probably cost me somewhere around 3.00 a sandwich. I could get two sandwiches for that!!!!!

Ahh-ha! Damn...now I need two peels. I was toying with the novelty of getting one of those 5 foot peels for my regular oven. It would look pretty sweet when I got pizza out of the oven, but I think I can get by without looking cool. Ben

I didn't know that Kirkland was the equivelant of Yonkers! I must visit sometime.

I know, I got a great deal on a pair of shrinkwrapped Jeep Cherokees. It's funny to see the "Kirkland Signature" products all over the US, because Kirkland is nothing more or less than a Seattle suburb that happens to be Costco headquarters. It makes as much sense as "Yonkers Signature." What would be great is if Costco were a Portland company and the brand was "Beaverton Signature." Nobody's mentioned the free samples, have they? Has anyone had anything good recently? When I moved to Kirkland, I quickly rushed to Costco and bought everything Kirkland Signature. Ben

Sarah's Bahn Mi Looks like Sarah has read the bahn mi thread here in Pac NW. I wonder how this recipe would do? What we really need is to go down to Bahn Mi 88 and demand his bbq pork recipe. Ben Edit: I doubt it was inspired from our thread, but I can always hope.

Hey! That was Brunch! And yeah, I will. Ben

Last night was my first attempt at homeade pizza. It turned out great! I topped it with a light saucing of some jarred marinara, shredded motz, and some wonderful sopresetta from salumi. So good, I am going to do more pizza tonight. Ben