annabelle

Oh, okay. That sounds more like tapioca than mochi. Vietnamese food always puzzles me. I love it, but I can't figure out what half of it is made of, how to pronounce it or how to cook any of it.

Interesting. So, do people keep cans and other foodstuffs in these shelters? Just water, flashlights, pillows and sleeping bags. I have to stress that in ten years here, we haven't had to hide out ever. We've prepared, but not had to go in.

There are tornado shelters in the bigger cities, Peter or you can have a hidey hole built in your yard or a safe room in the house. We hide under our house since it is about 4 feet off the ground and has concrete footings.

I treat my cutting board, a Boos block, with mineral oil as well. I buy it at the pharmacy.

That's what we do, too. It works great.

Agreed about the hard water issue. I live in a household of garbanzo haters, so I buy the canned beans and make small batches of hummus for myself. The Philistines here wouldn't eat a falafel if I paid them. I can't even get them to eat three bean salads in the heat of summer.

I lived near Little Saigon in San Diego for many years and I have to agree with ChrisTaylor: Those jellies are...meh. I never found one that I said, "I really need to stop off and get some more of those on the way home!" When you said it was "starchy", did you mean like mochi? The white layers look like rice flour paste.

I'm going to Sam's next week, (albeit in Joplin) so I'll check on what they have in industrial sized cans. I know they have all kinds of scary stuff like chocolate pudding in a giant can, so it's quite possible they would have great big cans of garbanzo beans since a lot of places buy for food service there. Jaymes, hummus always seems to be expensive, even at Sam's. I'm chalking it up to the tahini paste in it, which has been expensive everywhere I've lived. Since the OP has the more expensive portion of the hummus covered, I'm with you and would make a deal with the store manager to buy cases of garbanzo beans at a discount. I don't know if Madison has an Hispanic population, but Goya foods are often cheaper than some of the other brands available. I personally like their beans better. If your house buys a Sam's membership (you can get a student discount) it is possible to buy large bags of produce in season, like avocados, tangerines, grapes and the like.

That was the reason I urged you to go with the canned beans. Even if the bulk beans are "cheaper" they are not cheaper if they are labor-intensive and in the trash on top of that. 4 pounds of Asiago is a lot of Asiago. You could grate it up in the food processor: chop into smallish hunks, toss in workbowl and pulse until fine. It's technically not grated, but it's close enough. Make a big pot of spaghetti noodles, toss with olive oil and toasted bread crumbs, browned with garlic and pass the cheese on the side for you non-dairy eaters. Parmesan and Asiago are similar cheeses but react to heat differently, in my experience. Also, Asiago has a sharper taste that some dislike. Ask if you can taste it before you buy any. Good luck!

Nice, Chris! I love tamales, but I don't have the patience to make them. Ditto with chocolates, so I'll live vicariously through your blog.

Yay! My crocuses are up, too. But, I have the yellow ones. Looking forward to it, Chris!

Great. It wasn't bad enough when we had to suffer through the "gourmet" burger phase. Now they want to come for our Reubens?

jrshaul: Are you looking to feature fried rice as a main? Cooking large batches is going to cause you problems with consistancy since you really need to keep it moving while you are frying it. If it were me, I'd make fried rice for six or so and then make a second batch just so you aren't trying to manipulate a gigantic pan on a household sized stove. That way, you can use your wok without burning yourself or the food. I have found that overcooking, burning, and undercooking are the problems novice cooks face most often. Add trying to double and treble recipes and you're just asking for grief. Fried rice is traditionally served as a snack, but we serve it as a side dish in non-Asian households. If you take FauxPas' excellent suggestion to make a themed dinner night, most Asian feature at a minimum five dishes. Of course, you don't need to make that many and if your Chinese housemates complain, hand them an apron!

Well, Dave it sounds like you need to make your concerns known to Bravo. I think that Top Chef as a franchise is done in my house. I liked Top Chef Masters and I'll watch that if they bring it back and it doesn't get stupid right out of the gate. In the meantime, we're watching the Worst Cook in America on the Food Network on Sunday nights. It's hosted by Ann Burrell (ick) and Bobby Flay this year.

Iceberg is the Rodney Dangerfield of lettuces: It don't get no respect. Well, it does at my house. We love it on sandwiches and in salads, of course. It stores well and doesn't bruise, is available year round and is inexpensive. I'd rather have it than boutique lettuces, although I do grow leaf lettuces in my salad garden. Nothing else looks so elegent as a crisp wedge of iceberg with blue cheese dressing and bacon crumbles on it's own plate. And they are so easy to prepare and store. Rap them stem end down on the cutting board and the core pops right out. Wash, spin, use what you need and store the rest. I keep mine in an unsealed gallon plastic ziplock bag.

Fried rice is a great suggestion and a fantastic way to use up odds and ends that are cluttering up the fridge. I would also caution you to stay away from wok cooking for now and stick to things like casseroles and one-pot meals like chili, stew, soups and the like. You can tart these meals up by making biscuits or cornbread to serve along side. Hot breads always seem like a treat and are very easy to make from scratch.

As expensive as sweet potatoes are, I can't believe you have a bunch of them lying around. Lucky you! I also like to bake them like potatoes, djyee, but I scrub them, poke them to release the steam and wrap them in aluminum foil since they make a hella mess if they drip in the oven. Canned pumpkin, as cautioned above, is not the same as fresh pumpkin and won't behave the same way. What is this fascination that college kids have with not eating meat? One of my sons is a senior at University and he knows a few girls who are occasional vegetarians, but no one who is hardcore about it. Is it fashion? I used to think it was for economy, but it's more expensive and more time-consuming than eating a meat based diet.

You don't have to, but they can get between your teeth and can be bitter. You should be able to find industrial sized cans, they used to be #15 (I think) but I'm not sure. You should also look at dented can sales and end stock at places that carry that sort of thing.

Trust me: Buy canned chickpeas, rinse them well and go from there. They are so inexpensive it's not worth the trouble to pick through the bulk peas to get out the stones, then boil them for an hour and a half, then rub the skins off.

It worked really well, better than a magnetic board where you were either in or out since people would forget to move the magnets. Signing in everyday worked great and also made everyone responsible for whether or not they got fed. It wasn't hard to remember, really, since it was right by the door to the street that everyone used.

Jrshaul, is the number 26 a constant in your diners or does it contract or inflate depending on the cook? I found when I was cooking for the house, I often had more diners than I had planned for, which was around 14 who lived in the house, including myself. What I did was post the menu on a chalkboard and had the diners sign in until there was no more room at the inn, so to speak. One or two stragglers can usually be wedged in, but more than that, well they were welcome to the peanutbutter and jelly. If it was a special occasion, then all I asked for was a week's heads up to allow for extras. Fortunately, I did not have to also do the shopping, but gave a list to one of the other girls who had more time and followed the list well. Good luck and keep us informed!

I like the sound of your recipe, FauxPas. To the OP, at one time about 25 years ago I had to cook for a houseful of girls on a larger budget than what you are being allowed. It was still difficult to come up with interesting meals, and I was an experienced cook. I think your co-op folks are being rather unrealistic in their demands about what you are going to be able to achieve on such little money and with so many limitations. No gluten? Seriously? Is this person a celiac or the latest bandwagoneer? No offense meant, but if it were me, I'd just buy a meal ticket for the caf and wish them all well.

That was a hilarious bit of editing in the Biathlon sequence. Before the commercial break they showed Bev with the rifle, we hear a shot crack and see Sarah fall over backward. Plus, Miss Crackshot Sarah was sighting her rifle with the wrong eye and bitching that Bev got more rounds than her? Whiny much? I'm thinking she was that girl in grade school who ratted on her classmates for minor infractions. Other than that? Sheesh. Chewy rabbit is better than slightly (Tom said slightly twice) over-cooked char? I think not, but I think the fix was in. Do we want Bev to "step outside her comfort zone?" or do we want her to cook the "amazing" Asian flavors we've become used to, Tom? Jaymes, I totally agree about the disrespect in the car. It would have been interesting to hear about LCK and, yes, Sarah: there are loads of trees in Canada. Thank you for pointing that out. I think I'm done with Top Chef after this season.

I loved Nathalie's shows, even if they were repetative. She's a messy cook and so am I. Doing a television show is a lot harder than it looks.

I usually do the hardening off, as well. We have a greenhouse that is attached to our garage, so the plants go in there at night. I'm a little concerned about my elderly cat (who is living in there now that she is addled with old age at 20 years)trying to eat the tomato seedlings. I think I'll just grow a box of wheatgrass for her as a decoy. We have a great many plastic jugs that originally held hard pretzels, the big ones from Sam's Club, that we sawed the bottoms off of and use those to make a shelter for the plants if it gets unexpectedly cold after they are in the ground. We take the lids off and the jugs act like mini greenhouses and also protect the young plants from our relentless winds and freakish hail storms. I've lived here for ten years and the weather is still a puzzler to me.