gini

We are planning on moving (AGAIN) this time to Manhatten and an interesting question arises - based on nearby restaurants, grocers, specialty stores, where would you live in the city if price were no object and your decision was purely based on what there was to eat closeby?

I know that this is insanely late, but my roommates and I like to compose haikus regarding our terrible kitchen fiascos. Mine of course, involves the yam: Stupid yam. Oh damn! Why did you poop on my new aluminum pan? :dork:

During college I briefly dated a frat-boy-hockey-player-chemical-engineering-WASP who was so afraid of food it was scary. Everything about him was white. White skin, white food, white socks with his black shoes. What was I thinking, seriously? It couldn't have been over quick enough, but low and behold here's a brief description of our last date. I call to say I'd like to see a French movie in the sqaure and go out for some Indian. He says, "I don't read my movies and I don't eat anything the name of which I can't pronouce." Yeah, we didn't exactly make it to the movie. To this day my girlfriends refer to him as I-don't-read-my-movies-Jim. On the other hand, I am now blessed with the most adventurous, wonderful man who tries new recipes for me constantly, is always excited to go try something we've never eaten before, and is quite able and willing to read his movies.

My ideas are no where near as interesting or tasty as those mentioned above, but I do eat my packed lunch every day, so I thought I should chime in. I go grocery shopping at lunch every Monday and buy my next week's supply of lunch to leave in the fridge. Salad greens, cheeses, anchovies, olives, roasted red peppers, marinated mushrooms, grapeleaves....the whole lot goes into a bag in the work fridge so that I can construct my salads each day. I bring in homemade salad dressing and keep that in a bottle as well. This way I get my salad every day, I can choose different toppers with which to assemble, and it doesn't get soggy sitting in dressing for hours. My sweetie does the same thing with his turkey wrapups. It's made our lives much, much simpler. Do I ever get tired of eating salad for lunch? Sometimes, but then I go out once every great while for Korean or horrible americanized chinese buffet. Then I ultimately come back to the salad.

Fish stock mostly, but I don't see why you couldn't make some stock out of prawn shells. It's 1 litre of fish stock to 400 ml of coconut milk. The other components are as follows: 3 tbsp sunflower oil 1 medium onion, finely chopped 3 garlic cloves, finely chopped 450g risotto rice 5 fresh limes leaves, finely shredded 250g fresh cooked white crabmeat 15g fresh coriander; chopped freshly ground black pepper Method (besides your normal risotto prep): I would add the stock before you add the cocunut milk and not mix the two either... When the rice is almost done, stir through the lime leaves, crabmeat and coriander. Season well with plenty of black pepper. Olive oil and grapefruit juice? I'm intrigued, yet minorly disgusted !

I'm sad to say that this is my answer to most anything but - risotto! Sweet risotto with coconut milk, apricots, almonds, raisins etc. Savory risotto with coconut milk, crab, coriander and lime leaves. The typical proportions for me are substituting 1 can in place of 1 cup of stock (water for the sweet dishes). As for the quinoa - quinoa and mango salad with a curried yogurt dressing. This is one of Mr. gini's favorite dishes I make. How about some sort of sweet potato Vetha Kozhambu for the sambar powder? Of course, you'd have to make huge quantities to use up 5 packages. Can I have the olive oil? I'm running a little low. On a side note, I have a friend who recently moved and she brought her entire freezer with her in a cooler including 4 frozen quail that had been in there since the dark ages. If you don't want to move it though, or eat it all, donating is a great option.

I had a Hannukah dinner at my house last night with 3 friends. I actually don't really like lattkes, but they were requested so I made two types: potato and zucchini. The zucchini fritters had gruyere and cayane pepper in them, but the potato were "traditional." With them we had a potted whole chicken with onions and black peppercorns as well as some cranberry sauce. My friends loved sour cream on their lattkes, but weren't so enthused by the applesauce. Go figure. The chicken was great, and the company was better.

What a great article. Thank you for putting a smile on my face at the end of the day!!

I third Dome de Marais. There's also Bofinger, which is quite famous, but too pricey for your ROI. Le Bistro de Bofinger (both on rue de la Bastille) is the less costly sister resto across the way. For Basque food there's always Au Bascou on rue Réaumur, which is also mentioned on this board. M. Talbot has actually suggested places closer to yuor hotel. Mine aren't quite as close. Anyway, happy stay in Paris!

Because I just can't help myself, I'm back for more lunch ideas. Finkelsztajn for all things cheesecake or Vatrouchka also on rue des Rosiers. I've never been able to decide if I love La Tartine on rue de Rivoli or not, but it is the oldest wine bar in Paris. It has a nice wine selection by the glass (but of course) including some beaujoulais and bordeaux not easily found by the glass stateside. Tomorrow I'll bring you seafood, regional and basque dinner choices.

My absolute favorite falafel joint is in the Marais: L'as du Falafel on rue des rosiers. It's run by a load of great israeli guys. Service is brisk, but competent. They do wonderful things with eggplant (even in a falafel). A long time ago we used to have to scream at them to bring us tap water, but it's gotten better recently. It's very near the Picasso museum too. Good for lunch. I promise I'll post you more places tomorrow. Mostly cause you're from Cambridge and I recently moved there (here?) .

I'm probably too late, but these are the bottles I used for my limoncello gifting this year: Specialty Bottles. I like the spring top corked options...but they're only around 250mL.

Sandy, thank you for starting this thread & everyone who responded. It's been a great read to start my morning. When I was at my mom's for Thanksgiving this year we saw that commercial and I shyly asked my mom, "Does anyone actually eat that stuff?" To which she replied, "Only white-bread people, sweetie." Anyway, definitely not white here, and have never been in a 25 foot radius of the thing. I have my suspicions, however, that some of my mother's new neighbors had it for Thanksgiving (recent transplant to Maine). Mr. gini, on the other hand, is the whitest shade of pale I have ever seen in my life. And when I asked him this question, he responded, "I love it." Must have something to do with his being from the upper valley in VT. His grandmother used to make it and I feel like he's putting fuzzy-memory-frames around his childhood with her. Au contraire, he assures me: "She made it cause it was cheap and she grew up during the depression. So she continued to eat that way. Another thing I learned to do was bake trout from the river in milk, and eat it with thousand island dressing. How horrible is that? But i am trying to remedy my WHITENESS NOW! With you!" Which makes me feel like a judgmental bastard. I have to go now.

The Quaker Oats cookie recipe is what my mom used to make me as a little kid! It's the reason why oatmeal raisin cookies are my favorite. I don't remember the brand now, but I use the cherry pie recipe off the side of a box of minute tapioca my family has had since the 40s. It's actually quite lovely.

It's really depended where we were living..... In NJ, yes, we went out consistenly, always to a place in Ridgewood, but I can't remember the name of it now. Then, we stood in line for what seemed like forever to see a movie. In Canada, no, we went to Spa Eastman, but really, I would go there anytime I could get away. In Paris and Geneve, no way, we were always took the opportunity to spend it with family nearby - in a non-religious way. Now, back in the states, we're going to a spa again (NH) for Christmas this year (yay! an extra day off from work, let's go to a spa! ), but I think in the future we'll probably hit Chinese. It really comes down to not wanting to cook because we're in the cooking-for-other-people business. So we need to go out, but what's open that's not a traditional Christmas Ham Dinner? (Or Turkey? I forget which one is traditional.) Ahha! Chinese! But as Jason notices, other choices have become more readily available. Anyway, Pam R, I wholeheartedly advocate making a spa trip a new Christmas-for- the-Jews tradition chez vous. It's probably about as far removed as we've been able to get from the whole hubub of the holiday, which is important to us.

Of all the posts submitted, this is the one that makes me the most curious, I must say! ← Cowtails are caramel sticks with a cream center. I had never had one before I came to the company I work for now, and I am sadly drawn to them. I think I'm going to go get one now .

Once when I was dating Girlie Girl, the long-fanged, three-headed Menstrual Monster reared her head. When I figured out what was happening (and that GG didn't MEAN to act homicidal ), we retreated to the grocery to purchase a chocolate bar, pretzels, Midol and Diet Coke to wash everything down. We then held an impromptu picnic outside the grocery, where GG wolfed down a fistful of pretzels, several chocolate squares and the Magic Midol pill. Definitely an interesting date, even if I did feel like an extra in a George Romero movie. ← You should write a screenplay based on that scene. It should probably include animation. From my end, I'm not often visited by cramps or cravings, but I sometimes feel like I eat like a pregnant woman....last night I ate an entire jar full of leftover homemade cranberry sauce. And two vanilla sandwich cookies. And a piece of bread with brie. And 7 carrots. And 13 whole cashews. But I told my baby I only ate the cranberry sauce. Cause I was insane. He then offered me some chocolate almond biscotti. I should have taken him up on his offer, but they'll have to wait till Friday.

In 2006, I will eat anything new and different including food of which I can't pronounce the name. I will make a real effort to stop eating cowtails at work. I will find new recipes to make and consume. I will learn how to make cheese cake that isn't ricotta based even though that's the only kind I like. I will teach my honey to be somewhat efficient in the kitchen. I will read a cookbook that I don't already know how to make the recipes in. This is the year I will try to actually bake something sweet, including carrot cake I will taste wine and understand its complexities before downing it. I will use an apron. I will give D less of a hard time in the kitchen and remember that I'm not a caterer anymore, I'm just a home cook. I will cook as much as possible and stop ordering takeout from the same places. We will run to offset all the food we will eat - perhaps even that marathon we've been training for forever. My kids consist of one 31 adult man who cannot cook. He will learn or die trying in the next year.

Mr. Maw, Thank you for your thoughtful reply to my question. I'm going to get back to those demanding widows now . -g.

I just had this issue last night! This is what I did: Make a white wine risotto as you would normally. Meanwhile, sautee 2 yams that have been thinly sliced into half moons in a whole bunch of sage, ginger and butter (15 minutes). Dice your chicken and add to the risotto as it is just about to be done. Add most of the yams to this mixture. Stir in some reggiano parmagiano or romano or.... Spoon into heated bowls and decorate with a few of the crispier yam slices and some fried sage leaves. ETC: "lamp" to yam.

Well, if you insist, as long as the children of the widows have been fed....a series of questions that have been bothering me lately.... As more and more "food blogs" hit the web, what is your take on how a foodblog affects both restaurant critics and wannabes? Are bloggers using their sites as resume builders, ego-boosts, self-indulgent rants, or purely for the love of food (or all of the above?)? After the success of Chocolate & Zucchini, are more and more foodbloggers hoping to use their blog as a means to start a career in food? Does the food blogging phenomenon somehow take away from what restaurant critics specialize in, or does it make those critics all the more valued?

That reminds me of college! One very, very late night a friend of mine started eating leftover mashed and gravy out of tupperware without a utensil. The gravy container was quite tricky.

oops, I almost forgot about a New England must - Seafood: B & G Oysters in the South End is a local favorite (owned by the uber-successful lady of No. 9 Park), but crowded - oh my! I was unimpressed by their ginormous lobster roll, but they are a lovely little spot to hit for oysters and champagne. Great Bay - a little pricey, but really lovely - located in Kenmore Square right near another one of my favorites - Petit Robert Bistro, a charming and affordable little French bistro. Neptune Oysters - in the North End - North End meets stylish Oyster bar. Always packed, but DELICIOUS. Last but not least is East Coast Grill in Inman Square (right near you in Kendall) that does really great seafood. They don't take reservations though, but their brunch and bloody mary do-it-yourself bar are killer on the weekend.

Pastrami on anything but rye. No lettuce, tomatoes, mayo, or fancy mustard allowed. Just some good old-fashioned deli mustard and a pickle on the side. ← That reminds me of a Milton Berle quotation: "Anytime a person goes into a delicatessen and orders a pastrami on white bread, somewhere a Jew dies."

I've heard good things about Helmand. Any recs for Korean food? ← I really like Hometown in Union Square (Somerville), but New Jang Su (Burlington) has great BBQ. You'd need a car to get to New Jang Su however as it is 20 minutes north of the city.