Kouign Aman

Good on you, eJulia. You are making a difference in the world, one starfish at a time. As much as the recipients of your efforts appreciated the food, I bet that even more, they appreciated being treated like people and your conversation with them. Its so easy to look away. I used to keep bags of food in my car to hand out to the "will work for food" folks at so many intersections (grocery bag, cans of veg, stew, etc, small backpack style can-opener). I must start doing this again. Thank you for the reminder. JPW beat me to it. Bulk baby wipes are relatively inexpensive. Several can be removed and folded neatly into small ziploc-type baggies. Even the cheapest baggie will suffice to keep them moist quite a while. Very labor-intensive tho.

Tomatoes still blooming their hearts out and still being mostly ignored by the bees. A couple small tomatoes have set. Sigh. I may move the plants over to my neighbor's yard, which is resonant with bees. Bought beefsteak termaters at Trader Joe's and gave them an extra couple hours of sun in the kitchen windows. They did very well in BLTs for dinner. They'll help tide me over. Basil tried to bolt this weekend! Lots of basil-flower buds drying now. Time to reseed cilantro altho the first round isnt yet big enough to harvest. The tricolor sage is very pretty. I sense brown-butter and sage pasta in my near future. Any idea why my narrow leaf sage died off after a happy 9 months in a pot? Does it need lots of water? (It seemed like a dry climate plant to me). Erik, thanks for the info on favas. Are they what the english call "broad beans"? If so, I shall stick some in dirt this fall. Toliver, how are your mom's tomatoes looking for 4th of July? I wish you the best of luck.

Oh my God! You have to purchase appliances for blogging?? I was just going to clean my kitchen up a bit and tidy the fridge! This runs into big bucks! ← Perhaps you can get a new toaster? $15 at Costco...

Extra peppers not only can be dried, they can be pickled, or used to make chili oil. Lots of fun stuff. Composting - in an apartment setting, stick to vegetable matter and well washed eggshells. Rotting meats/eggs/dairy stinketh.

How did it go?

hands down favorite: Mother's Angelfood Chocolate Chip (which I can now only find as part of a variety pack :mad:) The little hazelnut chocolate wafer cookies sold at Trader Joes - Cant buy em, cause I cant get the darn things all the way home. Used to love oreos but the filling changed and they are not as good any more. I wonder if that happened when the filling changed from being simply sugar and lard? It used to be so in-your-face instantly and purely sweet. Now its not. Mystic Mints were a college fav, but I dont crave them anymore. And when in England, my favorite biscuits are Jaffa cakes. Oh my. Now to find and try the Pim's pear version described above. (how does one spell "bickie" (diminuitive for biscuit)?)

creative use of rum extract? Sparkling water and .....pick your flavoring

Okay, not to put too fine a point on this, but poached eggs with baked beans on toast is a pretty good description of the meal I might prepare just immediately prior to commiting suicide. I despise baked beans, and particularly despise the idea of them with something else soft (like eggs, and toast after it's been around eggs and/or beans). So, no, not tonight. ← Cant have that; you have a blog to finish! So no beans on toast for you tonight, young lady! And there's no use begging.

Omelets? Poached eggs with baked beans, on toast? (ack! my roots are showing)

McD's fried pies- any flavor: Cherry, Apple, redbean (still available in China, never available here to the best of my knowledge) McD's fries from 3 decades ago. Jack-in-the-Box Mexican Chicken Salad - test marketed at one location near my home in San Diego. I used to drive there from work (past a dozen more convenient franchises) to get that salad. Jack-i-t-B's rice bowls- why didnt they just wrap them in a big tortilla so they could be eaten while driving?

Gran Marnier is a favorite not-so-secret ingredient to add to pancake syrup and hot chocolate. For backpacking: High-altitude pancakes are a treat. I make 'em as big as the pan, and the batter climbs the sides... big and puffy and crispy on the outside. Instant soup to sip while awaiting the rest of the meal. Dry salami is nice to have around too. If varmint activity is low risk (I'll take my chances with marmots, but I concede to bears), I like to take pre-cooked bacon for the first couple of days.

post war South?

he ate jerusalem artichokes.

rhubarb, sugar, gran marnier. Simmer 'til desired texture / thickness Store frozen. Sometimes I use a bit of vanilla to add a roundness to the flavor without really being detectably vanilla. Serve on blintzes, pancakes. Use as syrup in making rhubarb margaritas or daquiris (I prefer the rum flavor with this 'fruit') Yes, I know. Its a stem therefore not a fruit. And a tomato is not a vegetable. whaddevah.

I like The Blue Agave in Yorba Linda (near the 57/91/55 Fwy intersection). Family, not divey, not scenic. Its in a stripmall. But, Im hoping for some other folks to pipe in and add to the list. I havent eaten Mex in OC in a while, except at TBA.

EGullet at Burning Man.... oh yeah, baybee! Dont gotta worry 'bout bears there... the homonym, perhaps. What wine best compliments alkali dust?

Wow. Howard Johnson and Joel Robuchon had/have the same vision... it seems that people are people at all income levels.

I really like to see seasonally appropriate veggies, and creative ways of cooking said veggies. In July, try sugarsnap peas (or in a budget place, frozen english peas) instead of cauliflower. Major brownie points. I love to see lettuce other than iceberg in the 'dinner salad' or its equivalent. I appreciate restaurants that have figured out the best place in their floorplan to put those of us/you who bring their kids to dinner, even to the local spaghetti joint. I'll forgive a lot (except outright rudeness and dirtiness) for good food. If the meal is good enough, I'll probably literally forget all those things that were annoying me before it arrived. When we take the munchkin out with us, we remember those folks and places that make even a tiny extra effort to accommodate a baby/toddler: an extra water 'glass' at the table, an extra set-up brought for her, offering to bring the child's order first/fast etc. Face it, the kid is the center of our universe - its easy to fool us into believing you think our kid is great - we're half fooled before we enter the establishment. And if you make us think you think our kid is great, why we'll be happy and we'll be back. (Natch, we are not talking formal dining restaurants in this paragraph - although should we ever find ourselves in that situation (yikes & ugh), go ahead - fake us out! The same theory applies.)

Prior to entry - the door handle should be clean and not sticky. I wont finish opening the door. On entry - welcoming, clean, well-maintained (not threadbare), and with an air of things being in control (calm, even in the face of great bustle). Things that bug me... pools of darkness from poor lighting. Not being able to get host's attention, obviously broken or worn out things, a feeling of panic in the air, bad smells. Things that appeal ... warm greeting and smile, communication, clean/tidy/neat/uncluttered, air of competence, flowers, well-groomed host and servers. In an inexpensive place, the candy dispenser should not be full of oxidized candy slowly falling to powder. On being seated - no stickiness, anywhere. Urgk. Clean silverware etc. ditto what Abra said about substitutions.

Thank you. Loved your blog, and love your brilliant and warmly-colored kitchen. I especially enjoy the weather previewing on your coffee counter. I hope you enjoy winding down from this amazing week.

Car-mel corn, but car-a-mels. And car-a-mel apples. Also from SoCal.

I've had a bag of those meatballs in the freezer for at least two months, so I pulled them out this past Sunday. I've spent hours making my own Swedish meatballs (Samuelsson's recipe) and while the frozen balls from Ikea aren't that good, they're good enough considering the labor that it takes to make homemade. I served them with a brown sauce with caramelized onions, mashed potatoes (instead of the traditional boiled), rutabagas (for She Who Must Be Obeyed; I can't abide "Swedes"); quick pickled Persian cucumbers; and lingonberry preserves. Perfect with some bag syrah. Hmmm? Jason, do you think an Ikea Meatball-Tater Tot casserole is worth pursuing? ← If it's for the sole purpose of pissing certain people off at the very thought of someone doing it, yes. It will probably taste good too. ← here's my entry. Lightly grease baking dish. Line with chopped onions. Add 2 layers of defrosted IKEA meatballs. Top with solid layer of slightly flattened tater tots. Bake til 'tots are crispy. Serve with gravy.

Oh. My. God. Book my flight immediately. Bacon and liverwurst sandwich. I like the bacon extra crispy for this one. white rice, eggs, bacon, small amount of soysauce. (McCall's "Fried Rice" - quadruple the bacon. It aint fried rice, but its a nice way to eat bacon) scrambled eggs with corn kernels, topped with bacon.

I recently read an article stating that vinegar effectively lowers the glycemic index of some carbs. The study administered it a few minutes before a meal (~ 2 T). I'm wondering if adding vinegar instead of ketchup to one's fish'n'chips makes them more diabetic-friendly.

The rich warm colors you chose for the kitchen walls are so appealing. And I really admire the little built-in wine rack. Good luck with the remodel finishing soon and well, and thanks for blogging.