ScoopKW

I have a recommendation for a rustic place in the middle of a regional park: Bar Trattoria Parco Burcina Cascina Valfenera Superiore Parco della Burcina 13814 Pollone Tel. 328.9552619 Closed Tuesdays A friend took us there -- great food, and inexpensive (for Italian restaurants, at least).

That pretty-much sums up a lot of former addicts.

No. I'd mortgage the house and bet it all on that one.

My university did not force me to take part in their meal program. It would surprise me if more than 30% had a mandatory meal program -- too many students live off-campus.

I only seem to get manufacturer's coupons for Hot Pockets and other processed crap that I would never buy. Nothing healthy ever seems to merit a coupon, so I don't bother. If there were coupons for vegetables, raw meat and fish or even grain, I'd use them more often. The one exception is my local "Smith's" store, which does in-store coupons for flour, butter and orange juice. I use those whenever I can. The best is when they send me coupons for "$5 off your $20 grocery bill." That's ideal -- no muss, no fuss. That being said, I much prefer shopping at the Asian and Mexican markets -- 10 pounds of potatoes for $1, 4 pounds of onions for $1, etc. With prices like that, who needs coupons? And don't even get me started about people who pronounce it "Q-pon."

I bought mine at a thrift shop for $1. It works fine. As long as the element will get red hot, you're good to go.

My wife is a teacher. We have purchased at least a metric ton of "Malt-O-Meal" cereal, because if she didn't give many of her kids a breakfast, they wouldn't eat anything until dinner. (Yet mommy has a new nail-job every week and daddy has so many gold chains, he looks like "Mr. T.") Neglect is pervasive and a lot more wide-spread than people seem to think. Incidentally, she said, "Oh HELL no," when she read the original post. Our district feeds kids a diet of chicken fingers. The veg and the fruit get tossed, uneaten. (We never have to buy apples or oranges -- she brings home a dozen a day. 10 times as much is simply thrown out by kids who only eat fried, salty, sugary fat-laden crap.) I think Jamie Oliver is preaching to an empty room.

My wife and I call McDonald's "Scottish Food." (Vague "Time Machine" reference.) On a road trip, the conversation is usually: "What do you want to eat?" "Anything but Scottish food." I won't eat McDonald's. My wife used to love McNuggets. Then she saw a video on how the things are made. (Extruded is a better term.) I'll have an In'N'Out, or a Fatburger. But never Mickey-D's. And their fries? NASTY. The TRUE reference fry is any proper pomme frite served in a paper cone on the streets of Belgium. Anyone who doesn't admit THAT needs to get out more.

For those eGulleteers who do not live in N. America, there is NO reason to shell out $700 to see if real southern BBQ is "right for you." Get an unglazed terracotta flower pot, big as possible, a portable electric cooker, a disposable pie pan, wood chips, some bricks, a wire rack that will fit in the terracotta pot and water. 0) Do this somewhere safe -- driveway/patio/etc. 1) build a brick "fort" around the cooker -- so that you can rest the wire rack at least six inches above the electric element. 1) Place pie pan on cooker. 2) Loosely fill pan with damp hardwood chips/sawdust/etc. I like fruit woods like cherry and apple. But oak or maple is fine. Never use soft or resinous woods. 3) Set cooker to "medium" 4) Set wire rack on bricks 5) Set marinated, dry-rubbed brisket/pork butt/chicken/etc. on wire rack 6) Cover with inverted terracotta pot. 7) Place probe thermometer in the hole in the center of the pot. Adjust the cooker until the temperature inside your "BBQ on the Cheap" is around 110C. That probably sounds awfully low if you're not familiar with BBQ. But seriously, 110 or so. Just above the boiling-point of water. Many BBQ people I know cook even lower. 8) Replace your wood chips occasionally, when the smoke dies down. (But don't oversmoke, or your meat will taste like a burnt Michelin tire. You'll get the hang of how much is good and how much is too much) There's a "Good Eats" episode that uses something like this. I've been cold-smoking salmon with a long rectangular terracotta planter for a very long time. I'm very happy with the results. The above rig is quite good for smoking, and can be assembled for less than $50. It's something to get you started at least.

Just to repeat, once you have the cornelius keg, the CO2 bottle, and the hose and fittings, sparkling water is essentially free. In general, I dislike proprietary systems. Checked the sodastream site. Enough CO2 for 130 liters is $50 for a full bottle or $30 for an exchange. That's $0.40 per liter. I can buy a 20-pound tank, full, for about $80. That will do about 500 gallons. That's close to 1900 liters, at a cost of $0.04 per liter. I dispense into a stainless bottle, and it keeps it's fizz quite nicely. Of course, my system isn't as pretty, and takes up more space in the 'fridge. But I can go to any Airgas or hydroponics store in North America and swap my tank for about $20.

I recently waited almost 2 hours for a mediocre Vegas buffet. When we arrived, the line was moving fairly well. We made it 80% of the way to the front in about 30 minutes. (The things I'll do for decent free champagne.) Then, it just stopped. The hostesses disappeared for what I'm guessing was a union-mandated "smoke a carton" break. Seriously, nobody was seated for 30 minutes. We saw a couple dozen diners LEAVE the establishment. But nothing doing. When a hostess finally grabbed a deuce from the line, there was spontaneous applause. Then it was another TWENTY minutes before we saw her again. And then the line moved normally again. In retrospect, I wish we had called it a morning halfway through the first stoppage. By the time of the second stoppage we were already in, "By God we've waited this long, we're getting our free champagne" mode. Oh well...

I buy great quantities of spice and regional foodstuffs when I travel -- I usually leave all my clothes in the hotel room so I have more space. I have purchased saffron by the kilo, tubes of Thomy mustard by the case (then I found a store that stocked it locally), peppercorns, allspice berries, fleur de sel, capers, decent anchovies, balsamic. You name it, I've probably brought it home by the suitcase-full. I just wish I could bring home the stuff I REALLY want -- Spanish jamon, cheese, raw milk, etc. If I were rich enough to jet around by private plane, I'd always have the dairy and cold cuts that I crave.

Too bad there isn't a poll associated with this topic. I'll bet there are more "let's try some schinken and kase for breakfast today" people than "eggs and bacon this morning and every morning for me" people. Breakfast for me is the BEST time to be adventurous. Much of a culture's best stuff is morningtime -- frittata, English breakfast (with stout, if you please), the cold-cut heaven that is German breakfast, a big bowl of pho. One of my favorite breakfasts comes from Marrakesh street vendors -- a French/Berber mash up of baguette, omelette and cumin-drenched roast lamb. Best. Breakfast. Sandwich. Ever.

Side question: What's so special about Mexican Coke? (Besides, I thought the Bolivian stuff was considered the best by the spoon-and-razor set? ba-dum-DUM.) Seriously though, why Coca-Cola from Mexico? Real sugar? Better extracts?

When we travel, more often than not we bring back breakfast traditions from a country more than anything else. I think we've probably had more traditional "English" breakfasts in the last decade than traditional "American" ones. And I would have traditional German breakfast every day if I had access to a good delikatessen. Lately I've had a hankerin' for the Taiwan big breakfast of dumplings, passion fruit, bratwurst (go figure) and tea (and coffee).

I can't help you with congeners. But I can tell you that a hangover is a mix of dehydration, toxins (those congeners) and a lack of vitamin B-12. Alcohol strips B-12 out of the body. Replace the water and pop one or two Brewer's Yeast tablets. Best thing you can do is alternate each drink with a pint of water. You won't get as intoxicated and you won't be as dehydrated, but expect many trips to the bathroom over the course of the evening. Then take some brewer's yeast and another glass of water before retiring.

My biggest mark-up standard item is easily salt. Uguni salt isn't all that bad in Japan, and French sea salt is very reasonable in France. Here, I pay upwards of $15/pound -- easily five times the local going rate. Dairy products are number 2 -- sometimes I just gotta have me some clotted cream or Delitia butter. Next up, spices. But spice mark-up has historically been the cause of the creation and loss of vast fortunes. Still, people who care about the provenance of their saffron or peppercorns are going to pay more than people who are OK with supermarket spices.

If it's still cold/cool where you are, simple roast goose with root vegetables and some Yorkshire pudding is a wonderful thing. And let me add myself to the list of people saying "save the fat!" The only thing better than duck fat is goose fat. EDIT -- At $1.99 a pound, I'd buy ALL of them just for the fat and the organ meat. The rest would be roasted, made into rillets, mixed with ground pork and made into pate, cooked into savory pies (and puff pastries). You name it. EDIT AGAIN -- Remove the meat from the bones after roasting, and make goose stock. And skim off the fat from your stock and add that to your reserve of goose fat. Even 20 geese won't take up much space once the bones are gone. Yum... five geese worth of rillets, two loaves of pate de campagne, goose liver pate in a terrine, a dozen goose pot pies, three roast geese. A sleeve of garlic poached in goose fat. Five whole gallons of light and brown stock. (Can you tell I really love goose?)

The "manliest" restaurant I have been to is Carnivore in Nairobi. It's basically a Brazilian steakhouse that carves up water buffalo, crocodile and zebra. (And more ordinary meats as well.) (I didn't eat there -- One, I don't really want to try zebra. Two, it's quite pricey for the backpacking crowd.) So, I would say that the manliest restaurant in America is some variation of the above -- an all-you-can-eat steakhouse. Preferably pouring craft beer and small batch whiskeys. My criteria: 1) It must be out in the sticks somewhere. Manly restaurants are not located in Beverly Hills, Greenwich Village or Boca Raton. Prime spots can be gleaned from the backs of pick-up trucks: Durango, Laramie, Yukon, etc. 2) It must serve meat and alcohol and not much else. (Some starch is fine. But the emphasis must be on protein. 3) Restaurant MUST MUST MUST offer a "you kill it and dress it, we'll cook it" option. Grizzly Adams should be able to walk in with a deer slung over his shoulder and plop it down on a long wooden table and say, "Grill it." 4) Men of all walks of life should feel comfortable there. At the best manly restaurants, vacationing tax lawyers are talking hunting and fishing tips with grizzled guides. I have been to more seafood restaurants that fill the "manly" bill than steakhouses. I fully expect to be able to walk into any of my favorite places in the Florida Keys with a 60-pound bull dolphin (aka mahi mahi) and expect to have dolphin steaks with some sort of side and pitchers of beer, and eat and drink with fishing captains while smoking cigars.

Because I have three parrots, I have to be extra-special careful with Teflon. Heat the stuff too high, and it will kill birds quick-fast-in-a-hurry. Teflon, avocados and neglect are the three most likely causes of companion parrot deaths.

Yeast -- my stock in trade. "Wild yeast" is often the best stuff in the world -- if you happen to live in Belgium, Bavaria, Marin County, or other areas where the local yeasts do great things -- think Lambic beer, Trappist ale and such. I remember reading about a couple foreign investors who bought a small brewery in Belgium. The first thing they did was clean all the cobwebs, dust and grime in the brewery. Without the wild yeast, the brewery failed. Moral, if your local yeast does good things, great! If not, go with a commercial variety and keep it healthy. Yeast needs the proper temperature and just enough sugar and nutrients. Packets of servomyces yeast nutrient will go a LONG way in this regard. Doesn't take much. I use mere grams per 600 gallon batches of beer. In general, wild yeasts are happier at higher temperatures. You can inhibit their growth by keeping your starter at lower temperatures. Lager beers are the result of colder fermentation. Both yeasts are usually present, but ale yeasts ferment hotter and lagers ferment colder. Bakers should hit up their local brewpub/microbrewery. Most brewers are HAPPY to pour a pint or two off the bottom of their fermenters. Doesn't cost us a thing, and generates goodwill.

Bah, too late to edit. Work interfered (making a LOT of stout this week). So, let's say you have a gin that you know to be 40% alcohol. 40% of 0.789 (pure ethanol) is 0.316. And 60% of 1.000 (distilled water) is 0.600. So, a hydrometer reading of the gin would read 0.916 -- if it only had ethanol and distilled water. Anything above 0.916 is residual solids in the liquor -- most likely sugar, but not necessarily. For instance, with absinthe there is plenty of sugar, but also herb and spice extracts. That increases the specific gravity, but it isn't ALL sugar. Having an accurate hydrometer that is scaled to the specific gravities that interest you is key. Knowing the temperature with certainty is also very important. There are conversion scales. But it is easier to use a 68f hydrometer at 68f. In my beer-making world, I use a hydrometer that reads from 0.990 to 1.120. I'm buying another that reads from 0.990 to 1.080 -- because that's the ballfield I normally play in. I also use a refractometer and a CO2 meter regularly. My next purchase will be a dissolved O2 meter -- but those are very expensive. If I was a distiller, I'd use a hydrometer that went from 0.780 to 1.010 -- that's a good range for alcohols. For home bar use, I'd go with an a hydrometer scaled for distilled spirits and another "beer and wine" hydrometer for concocting. Refractometers are great for making syrups. But a hydrometer will do the same job and costs less. (But a refractometer won't break into 1,000 pieces if you drop it six inches.) Your call. Either way, you can get the job done right for about sixty bucks. Let me know if you need more info, I can talk about specific gravity all day long.... EDIT -- A fun thing to do with a refractometer is to measure the Plato of various sodas, grenadine syrup, tonic water, margarita mix and such.

Ahh, my line of work. A refractometer measures dissolved sugar in solution. Although there are formulas for correcting for the presence of alcohol, it's best to just say that refractometers only work with sugar dissolved in water. This is measured in Brix/Plato -- both are a measure of dissolved solids. Brix is technically dissolved sucrose and Plato is any dissolved solids. In reality, they're interchangable. (Note, Plato is "PLAH-Tow" not "PLAY-Tow".) A hydrometer measures the specific gravity of a solution (typically at 4 degrees Celsius. Distilled water has a SG of 1.00. Pure ethanol has a SG of 0.789. If you know the amount of alcohol and the specific gravity, you can work out how much residual solids (usually sugar) is left in the liquor.

Abroad, I prefer the communal table. We can learn a lot about the area we're visiting, and get to know some locals. At home, not so much. Conversation tends to stick to television programs, medical procedures, gas prices and other things that hold no interest for us. I think most of the rest of the world has us beat in the art of conversation.

Chris, I gotta disagree. In general, a West-coast burger beats an East-coast burger hands down. Sure, you have Five Guys, and any number of mom-and-pop roadside stands that do a good job. But on the West coast, In-N-Out is the fallback position when a Tommy's isn't close at hand. And there are just as many roadside stands as the East coast. And because they have to compete with In-N-Out, Fatburger and Tommy's, they really "bring it." Same thing can be said for East-coast pizza. In general, a better pie is going to be had nearer to the Atlantic. Sure, there is some truly excellent pizza on the West coast. (Particularly around Portland.) But in general, the pizza is better on the East coast because the competition is more fierce. (Don't even get me going about fried chicken. I have YET to find a decent chicken shack here on the left coast. I'll put my local Florida gas station chicken against anything the West has to offer.)