C. sapidus

I drove “down the road” to Maxim’s for supplies and stopped by Pho 75. I had number 6 on the menu (beef and beef tendon) with non-iced Vietnamese coffee (café su da). Yes, I know it was 90 degrees. It has been way too long since I have enjoyed good pho. Highly recommended.

Jason, that’s way healthier than our breakfast: Mexican scrambled eggs with chorizo, sautéed mushrooms, fresh basil, oregano, feta, and home-made salsa on flour tortillas warmed over an open flame. Despite looking somewhat regrettable, it was very tasty. Next week I’m back at work, so no more fun at breakfast.

I have read through this thread, and decided that my “magic mouthfuls” were flavorings rather than specific dishes. Our food growing up was lovingly prepared and healthy, but tended to be somewhat under-spiced (in the sense that the Marianas Trench is somewhat underwater). As a teen, I had a series of taste revelations. I can’t remember the sequence, so I’ll declare a three-way tie for first place. Garlic: Mom disliked the smell of raw garlic, so she never cooked with it. For some reason, one day I sautéed garlic in butter. Oh, my. To this day I consider garlic one of the basic food groups. Mom quickly warmed up to the aroma of cooking garlic. Black pepper: I used to liberally coat nearly all foods with stale, pre-ground black pepper. I also dumped the stuff into soups until they were gritty. A frequently-heard comment during school lunch was “You gonna have some meat loaf with that pepper?” Discovering freshly-ground black pepper was a true paradigm shift, equivalent to the world changing from black and white to glorious Technicolor in the Wizard of Oz (apologies if this analogy has been used before). Chilies: A can of green chilies once found its way into Mom’s kitchen cabinets (probably by mistake). It sat there for years. One day, I was making a frozen pizza and decided to add the chilies. Cue the violins and hallelujah chorus. Chilies provided the taste sensation that I had been seeking (but never finding) through black pepper. This gave me an appreciation for how cooks in India, Thailand, China, etc. must have reacted when chilies first arrived from the Americas.

To answer this question properly, we must explore the flash point and flammable range (often called explosive range) for ethyl alcohol (ethanol). Here is the basic safety information for ethyl alcohol (link to NIOSH): Ethyl alcohol's flash point is 55 degrees Fahrenheit (13 degrees Celsius). If the temperature is lower than the flash point, the ethanol will not catch on fire. Unless you have a very cold kitchen, the temperature exceeds ethanol’s flash point even before you fire up the range. Ethyl alcohol's flammable range in air is 3.3% to 19%. A flammable liquid will only burn when its concentration in the air is within the flammable range. If the concentration of ethanol in the air is less than 3.3% or more than 19%, it cannot catch fire. Safety geek note: ethanol concentrations higher than 0.3% (ten times lower than the flammable range) are immediately dangerous to life and health. In other words, you would keel over pretty quickly if the air throughout the kitchen was within ethanol's flammable range. Fortunately, only the air immediately above the hot pan has a sufficiently high concentration of ethanol vapor to exceed the lower end of the flammable range. So what happens when you flambe? When you pour a liquid containing alcohol into a hot pan, the heat causes the ethanol to evaporate rapidly. If enough ethanol evaporates, its concentration in the air above the pan will exceed 3.3% and you will be within ethanol’s flammable range. An ignition source (stove burner, match, spark, etc.) can then ignite the ethanol vapors. Voila, flambé. Or, if you are deglazing the pan near a flame, unexpected fireball. Move the pan away from any flames before deglazing with liquids containing alcohol, and don't return the pan to the burner until the ethyl alcohol vapors have had a chance to disperse. OK, people flambé regularly. Why don’t we hear of exploding liquor bottles? Why doesn't your lighter explode? Remember that ethyl alcohol's flammable range is 3% to 19%. Ethanol vapors inside the liquor bottle probably exceed 19%, so they cannot burn. The same principle applies to your lighter (although the flammable range will be different for different chemicals). Does this mean that a bottle of liquor is completely safe around fire? Absolutely not! What would happen if a cook was startled by the huge eruption of flame from a hot pan and knocked over the liquor bottle near the burners? Bad stuff. This is why tino27’s advice to pre-measure the liquor is spot on. Suggestion for eGullet: add a science geek icon (smiley wearing safety glasses) as a warning to the science-averse Edit: spelling

Daniel: thanks, that means a lot. I hope your birthday dinner was delightful. Diane Kennedy’s Art of Mexican Cooking gives a good description of bricklayer’s eggs (huevos al albanil). Yet another Thai-style omelet, filled with shallots, garlic, and home-made red curry paste (sautéed in butter), Thai basil, and Portabella jack cheese, and garnished with more Thai basil. Garlicky, shalloty, buttery, gooey, spicy goodness. Sorry about the blur.

Susan: pork-poblano sausages sound indescribably delicious. I believe that all such sausages require a Maryland inspection stamp, though. It's a pretty complicated process, but if you send me a batch and I'll, uh, take care of it for you. May all your summers be lazy and well-documented.

Bricklayer’s eggs: not terribly photogenic, but one of my absolute favorite things in the world. Toasted pasilla and guajillo chilies, soaked and blended into a sauce with garlic and onions, then reduced to their rich, warming essence. Scramble eggs in the sauce, top with feta cheese, and serve in flame-warmed tortillas. I forgot to add Mexican oregano, which puts it over the top. Susan and Percy: the more people making Thai omelets, the tastier the world becomes.

Lori: Is that lovely hammock in the shade surrounded by fragrant roses? If so, you need to take some time there to recover from your day (which will indeed be funny next week, or maybe the week after). Did you get a chance to enjoy your asparagus this year? How many plants do you have? I’m also envious of your tomatoes. We planted ours late this year (again).

Here is the latest iteration of Mamster's Thai omelet. Disclaimer: the recipe author bears no responsibility for my modifications, and I don't inflict this kind of cooking on others I sautéed red curry paste, mushrooms, garlic, jalapenos, and slivered finger-hot peppers in butter, then folded the sauté into the omelet with some feta cheese. I used lots of lime juice and a very hot pan, so the egg turns into fluffy curds rather than coagulating like a true omelet. Definitely not French or Thai, but it hits my (probably odd) taste buds just right.

Deleted because Brooks types faster.

Brooks: unlike your position on cake vs. pie, you are on the money when it comes to fondant. Of course, no one ever puts fondant on pie, only cake. Score another point for pie. Oops, sorry, that's another thread. On topic: I have seen amazing-looking fondant creations, and I have a great deal of respect for the artistry involved. I also understand that visual stimuli can enhance the enjoyment of food. Ultimately, though, I favor taste over presentation. When presentation detracts from taste, it crosses the line.

Your honor: I’m enjoying your food blog very much. Thanks for sharing a slice of your life. It looks like you have a wonderful run of counter space in your kitchen. For the extra buns, my vote is for bread pudding. So, who is the champion pit-spitter? Your daughter looked like she had the best follow-through. Have any of the cherry seeds germinated? We are near-neighbors of yours, about 40 miles away on the other side of the Mason-Dixon Line. We go to Gettysburg pretty regularly, but haven’t explored north yet. Do you have any recommendations for casual places to eat? Also, are you the same person that I used to see posting on the Rose forums?

Our longest meal was during a work-related trip to Las Vegas. A friend had helped design the then newly-opened Bellagio, so we met her there at the buffet. Various other friends and relatives drifted in and out over the course of several hours. It was more a social occasion than a meal, albeit an all-you-can-eat social occasion.

Not-yet-rolled flour tortilla, toasted over an open flame, then filled with eggs, chorizo (sauteed with jalapenos and shallots), feta cheese, and sriracha. Yup, two of those ought to hold me until dinner.

If I only had one salad to eat, I’d opt to spend a lot of time deciding which Thai salad is best: som tam, larb gai, grilled beef with mint and basil . . .

I made Marlene’s braised short ribs with port, wine, and honey. The ingredients include a whole head of garlic, cut in half and added to the braising liquid. After the braising was finished, I tried the garlic and it was wonderful. We are saving it for this weekend, when we can slather tender, port-and-wine-flavored garlicky goodness all over crackers without worrying about social niceties.

DeBaggio Herbs in Chantilly carries a few varieties of Thai basil.

A colleague with a Ph.D. in microbiology is convinced that his bout with traveler's diarrhea was caused by not closing his mouth tightly enough when showering. This was in St. Petersburg, Russia, which has notoriously dodgy drinking water. We took reasonable precautions on our two trips to Russia, ate wonderful food from a wide variety of sources, and had no problems.

Marlene: Your recipe for short ribs was absolutely delicious! I made the ribs and sauce over the weekend and refrigerated them separately. Since we have a visiting dog, I came home for lunch, combined the ribs and sauce, and popped the lot into a slow oven. Arriving home from work, we were greeted by delicious smells and fully-cooked dinner. The boys couldn’t wait to tear into the ribs, so no pictures. The weather is now more suited to grilling than braising, so thanks for helping to end the braising season on a high note.

I can field this one for Marcia. The USDA hardiness zones (clickety) refer to average annual minimum temperatures. In Zone 5, the average annual minimum temperature is -10 to -20 degrees F (-23.4 to -28.8 degrees C).

If I understand your question, yes you can get a cast iron smoker box and place it on the flash bars. We have a smoker box, but usually use foil packets because they are eaiser to replace (to prolong the smoke) when cooking ribs.

A local Chinese restaurant offers “Ma La” dishes – pork, shrimp, chicken, and beef. I asked the server if they use Sichuan peppercorns. She smiled and said “No”. I ordered the shrimp anyway. It was pretty tasty, but neither “ma” nor “la”. Bummer. I have a bag of numbing, mouth-watering Sichuan peppercorns at home, awaiting the conclusion of my current Thai food obsession. I also have my eye on Fuchsia Dunlop’s book (and of course the recipes and tutorials here).

I agree that palm sugar has a wonderful flavor, milder than brown sugar. Palm sugar lends a much richer flavor to a curry compared with white sugar. Caveat: if the dish isn't very sweet, it probably doesn't make much difference which sugar you use. I once made a big batch of green curry paste, and seasoned one batch of the curry with white sugar and one with palm sugar. The palm sugar version was definitely better. Caramelizing probably reduces the difference in taste between the two sugars. I used palm sugar to make a caramel and coconut sauce for grilled fruits, and it mostly tasted like caramel.

Red curry with chicken from Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet. Ingredients (ignore the tomatoes and ginger): Frying the curry paste and chicken in coconut cream. Ready to eat with jasmine rice. This is a delicately seasoned red curry. I liked it, but prefer red curries with a more concentrated flavor. I made extra curry paste, so I will probably play with a few variations. Edited to add: More fish sauce and a touch of palm sugar improved the leftovers. Apparently, home-made curry paste is less salty than store-bought. I should have remembered that chile pastes (Thai and Mexican) need enough salt to bring out their full flavor.

I will not vouch for its veracity, but I have heard an explanation for this advice. Allegedly, setting a hot pot on an onion-and-vegetable-saturated cutting board will impart a sour, cooked-vegetable smell to the board. The injunction is thus based upon esthetics rather than food safety. I have never attempted to test this explanation. If Sam has been putting hot pots on wood cutting boards for years without noticing an offending odor, one would have to question the theory's validity. Has anyone sniffed their cutting boards lately?