nakji

Does she give a Chinese name for it? I found this translated reference to a pre-prepared Chinese stock powder on-line: So perhaps the powdered berry is used as a stock flavouring? There are lots of "health powders" available, but I've never heard of this one. If it's an ingredient for stock, and she's not calling for much of it, I'd leave it out.

This is, in fact, exactly the case. Which is why I buy my towels several packs a time at Ikea - to outnumber the gremlins.

A couple of my books are un-indexed yet - for example, Everyday Harumi, The Korean Table and Yan Kit-So's Classic Chinese Cooking. Because they're regional books, I guess it'll take a while before they get indexed. It seems like, however, according to their forums, that they will be opening up a service where members can start to index things themselves - including their own family recipe cards and magazine clippings. That's some big appeal, there - I look forward to that coming out. I spent yesterday going through the recipes in my favourite books and tagging them with "bookmarks". I geekily love this sort of thing - my tags, along with "Favourites" are "made", "made and liked", and "want to try". I was trying to come up with some more useful tags - I might start to tag regionally as well. I also starred and commented on as many recipes as I had something relevant to say on. The "friend" function has also gone on the current site, but will apparently come back. I hoping that when it does, there's some intelligence so that you can see how trusted commenters/raters are - right now the stars are aggregate, I think, but it would be nice to know that when "kittychef47" says "This dish is good" what kind of person is saying that. Sites like Hostelworld do this so that you can match your profile to other members and know whose comments you're most likely to trust. I did, in my travels, notice some errata - for example, the recipe for stir-fried pork and green peppers in Fuschia Dunlop's Revolutionary Cooking is indexed as having Cornish Game hens as an ingredient. On a suspicion, I thought perhaps it might have called for chicken stock, and the index was referring back to a recipe for that, but on reading the recipe, that was not the case. No Cornish Game hens, no chicken stock. Now, I've made the dish before, so I know there's no chicken in it, but if I had a couple of Cornish Game hens I was looking for something to do with, that search result would throw me for a loop. I noticed several other recipes in the same book doing the same thing. Actually, I spent the whole Saturday afternoon geeking out with the site- and I only have about 20 cookbooks. I can imagine if I had to add more than a hundred books how daunting the task would be. I did notice that the most commonly owned book on the site - is this correct? - is Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. I wonder how many people regularly cook from it?

Towels. Because I so rarely use my oven, they just more practical to have around the kitchen because I can use them for a variety of purposes. It helps that the oven is not big enough to burn my wrist on, though - I've done that several times working with full-sized ovens. I have a small pot holder that I brought with me from Canada, but I can never find the thing when I need it, despite having always left it on the same hook. Kitchen gremlins are obviously using it for their own purposes.

I've seen rare or high quality teas being offered for as much a pot in restaurants in China. Why not, if the quality is excellent, and it's what the patron wants to drink? My question is - aside from the table-side jazzy gimmickry of the Siphon/Chemex - what kind of coffee will they be using? And will they also have espresso-type or individual coffees for people looking for a cheaper cup?

I mean - specifically, with the World Gourmet Festival - you mention some of the events have changed. Is that mainly due to the age of the event, or is it in reaction to this year's political strife?

I'd be interested to hear if you think attendance has been affected due to events this year. My husband and I were booking our summer holiday in May when Bangkok was burning, so to speak, but found no reduction in bookings for the islands and other holiday places. We opted for Malaysia anyway, as it was a little quieter and cheaper, thanks to our Hangzhou Air Asia hub (W00t!W00t!) but I'm still thinking it's time to get back to Thailand.

I ordered this at lunch today - 地三鲜- Disanxian, as it turns out it's called. Upon further examination, I'd say the three vegetables were deep fried first, then tossed in a sauce featuring chili paste, sugar, garlic, and soy. I couldn't finish it, so it came home with me, where it turned out to be even better cold from the fridge.

No, I have a Canadian Bank card and Canadian credit card linked to a Canadian bank account and have registered and verified both through Canadian Paypal. Also, my husband tried using his Paypal account, which he uses frequently for internet purchases, and we still kept getting the same error message. To be honest, I was beginning to think I was crazy - or missing some incredibly obvious point. After a series of increasingly pointed e-mails to Paypal customer service trying to locate the problem, I received this in reply: Bolding mine. For whatever reason, Paypal was not happy with this transaction. The only thing I can think is that their "internal security model" noticed I was doing the transaction from a non-Canadian ISP and that ticked a box somewhere. Although I use my credit card in random, bizarre places all the time, and keep my bank constantly updated on the places it might see charges from routinely, of course Paypal doesn't have access to this information. Whatever the case, after this last e-mail from Paypal, the payment was suddenly, mysteriously accepted, without any direct confirmation from Paypal that they were now going to allow this transaction to go through. So: long story short, I now appear to be registered. I started up my organic CSA again immediately after resolving this, with the hopes of using that in conjunction with EYB to make some tasty meals from my current cookbook collection. And I get to add more books (relatively) guilt-free now, since I know I can make better use of them. Since I took out a lifetime membership, I won't have to deal with Paypal again, but I hope (out of pure cranky spite) EatYourBooks adds a direct payment method.

Thanks. Also Muji. You know, the funny thing about my one is that I never seem to give it more than a rinse from the tap, yet coffee oils and grit never seem to accumulate on it. Another reason why I love it.

Another great place to go in Suzhou is also on Ping Jiang Lu is called Pinvon. They're in a historic house set on the side of a canal, and they specialize in dumplings. Picture menus again, so perhaps you'll forgive me for not remembering what any of these delicious things are called: Pork-filled baozi; sesame crusted and fried on one side in a cast iron pan. Standard jiaozi with a thick, chewy dumpling skin (on purpose). Much more substantial than a gyoza-style wrapper. Interior shot: Steamed rice dumpling with more pork inside - a house specialty, I think. I liked them; my friends preferred the wheat-wrapped dumplings. Soup. Bland, but a nice counter-point to the dumplings.

Here's a picture of mine - just a plastic one I got at Muji, and it takes the cone filters, too. I've never seen a metal/gold filter one.

I picked up a copy of Madhur Jaffrey's "From Curries to Kebabs: Exploring the Spice Trail of India" over the summer at the library, copied out some recipes, and now that the weather's gotten a little cooler, have started making some. My first attempt was her chickpea curry recipe, which I think will become a household standard for me. My second attempt was for a Kofta curry, which also came out exceptionally well. I mentioned over in the meatball topic that I wanted to freeze the koftas and freeze them for a few days before making the curry. The recipe calls for making the kofta mixture and then holding it for several hours before proceeding with the rest of the curry. Instead, I fried the koftas up on a Sunday, froze them, defrosted them Wednesday night in the fridge for a curry I made the Thursday evening. Came off without a hitch, and yielded a curry with exceptionally nice flavour, I thought. This was the first time I've made a curry using more broth than anything else - say tomatoes, coconut milk, or yogurt - as a base, and I thought it would be rather bland. It wasn't. In fact, it was one of the nicest curries I've had in a while. The sauce the meatballs cooked in was basically made up of several cups of beef broth, onions and aromatics, spices, and a bit of tomato. Very simple and easy to crack out on a week night - the only hard part was waiting the twenty minutes for the sauce to cook down a bit. My husband really enjoyed the koftas, and I'm interested to hear if there are other methods or sauces for making a kofta curry.

Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention that. I learnt to do that in Vietnam, where they always do that in the Vietnamese coffee makers. I wonder why it makes a difference - does it get the oils out better?

Sweet and savoury granolas - it's funny to think a restaurant as posh as EMP has a granola fixation! Makes it seem more approachable to me, somehow. The coffee service looks quite elegant. I've had siphon coffee in Shanghai - it makes an excellent cup. Much better than something that's been sitting on a Bunn burner for an hour, I'd have to think.

I wanted to spread the love for a gadget I have in my kitchen. When I moved to Japan, I couldn't afford a full-on drip coffee maker - nor, quite frankly, would there have been room on my kitchen counter for one. So I picked up a plastic cone filter holder - the kind with a platform at the bottom and the handle on the side, so it can fit comfortably over a cup or a pot. I just fit a paper filter in it, add coffee, and pour hot water over until I get the desired quantity of coffee. Yeah, the hot water has to come from somewhere - but a kettle is more versatile than a dedicated coffee maker, so I opted to buy one of those first.Anyway, the thing has worked so great, I never bothered to replace it in Japan, or even in China, where I have a lot more room and money. The advantages - I can walk away without worrying if I've left a machine on. And it makes a varying quantity of coffee - just a cup, or a pot for 6 equally well. In Asia, it's hard to find an economical coffee maker that makes more than two cups of drip coffee at a time. It cleans up with a rinse, and takes up virtually no room. I'm going to bring one into my office next week, I think; and it would be handy to throw in the car if you're on a long car trip or at the camp and don't like french press/instant coffee. The disadvantages - If you're making a big pot, you've got to keep coming back to the thing to pour more water over it and give it a stir. Not so bad in the kitchen in the morning, but a pain in the office or some place where you'd want to set it and forget it. It's no replacement for a full-on dedicated coffee-maker in a place that requires a large amount of coffee without babysitting. Also, because there's no burner, the coffee is hot at the beginning, but doesn't stay that way without a thermal pot being employed. And you need some other equipment to generate hot water. In Asia, there's always a machine for hot water for tea floating around, but that's not the case everywhere.

I am still, still trying to wade through the PayPal registration procedure to I can sign up for this site. I'm getting so hacked off at Paypal, my rage is beginning to bleed over to EYB. I have linked my bank account (took 3 days). I have linked my credit card (took another three days). Now Paypal is saying I have to transfer money from my bank account on to my Paypal balance (takes another 6 days - and I'm not confident that I'll be able to pay even once I've done that) as the only way to pay for the membership fee. Is this what everyone else has done? No word on why I can't use my credit card for the transaction, just a red balloon popping up every time saying I have to add funds to my balance. Which -it won't let me do via my credit card. Has everyone gone through this, and I am just stupid to think you should just be able to pay for something in one click online? Because it seems like everyone else has signed up so easily.

Oh, was it a savoury granola? It sounds really interesting. Was it made with oats...?

Thanks for the detailed report. Wait - the Times made an error so they had to add a course?

There's an article in the Dining section of the Times this week about how Eleven Madison Park is transitioning from an a la carte menu to a tasting menu restaurant with fewer seats. Not happy to rest on their laurels, I guess. Has anyone gone since the new menu was launched? Anyone planning to go? I have to do all my fine-dining living vicariously.

No tea drunk today, but it was club sign-up day at school, and this year the students are running a "Gong-fu Tea Society". I signed up and look forward to getting some new teas in my cup soon.

I will say that the quality of potatoes I can purchase at the market is usually quite poor. They've obviously been stored incorrectly, because more often than not they're green. I'm happy if I can find them covered with dirt, as this protects them somewhat - although it does make a mess in the kitchen sink when I'm preparing them. They're available throughout the seasons, and at pretty much any street market I've been through, which suggests to me that people are buying them and using them regularly. When my weekly vegetable box arrives, however, I usually only get one potato, which I assume means they're expecting me to use it as a part of a larger dish. I supplement as needed with more from the market, and the market stall lady gets a kick out of me buying 5 or 6 at a time. I think baijiu is made from rice or sorghum, isn't it? French fries I would believe though.

This sounds gorgeous, and not unlike the Japanese dish, nikkujyaga. Do you think she fried it a bit, then simmered it down with the sauce added after getting a sear on things? Was there a sauce binding the beef and potatoes together, or were they dry?

Yang Yang is easy to find - they've got a big English sign up touting their inclusion in the Lonely Planet Guide. The small closet of a restaurant next door is an imitator - if you go, you'll want the big, bustling, multi-storey one.

I do, and when it's done, I toss it with olive oil, lemon zest, and a few drops of balsamic vinegar. Salt and pepper, too.