dividend

So that'll put you skirting the SE corner of Kansas City. My favorite (non-BBQ, Sandy nailed that one) recs for that area would be Spin for pizza, 40 Sardines for sit down finer cuisine. When you drive through Sedalia, MO on 50, there's a great little counter diner (I beleive it's located where 50 intersects 65) called the Wheel Inn. I make it point to stop there whenever I pass through. Also, you'll be in Missouri wine country. There's a restaurant nestled in a vinyard on a bluff in Rocheport that has pretty good food. It's a beautiful a-frame building overlooking the river valley. It's north of I-70 though, so it'd be about a 15 mile detour. But if that was at the end of a driving day, that area is full of cute little B&Bs. How have you not come back and eaten there yet? This needs to be rectified ASAP.

This made me laugh. I've been using the same couple of Nalgene bottles for years, and I'm pretty sure I bought them empty. In my area, there are a few places to buy purified water in large quantities, for something like 25 cents a gallon. Are those places commonplace? Seems like that and a Nalgene bottle or two would prevent having to buy actual "bottled" water, or to install an expensive filtration system. I fill a huge 4 gallon jug of the stuff sometimes when I go camping, and it tastes just fine. There's a middle ground between drinking and discarding 25 tiny bottles imported from Fiji each day, and drinking tap water even if it kills you.

← I'm not sure I'd throw the DVD at him. It retails for right around $30. And if he'd had the cast autograph it or something, it'd be worth even more. Tacky, sure, but I'm not sure he really stiffed the waitstaff. Although in the many tipping threads we've had around here I've never seen is recommended to leave an item valued at the amount you want to tip.

Is soup a terrible idea for a potluck? We're having one at my office on Thursday, and the e-mail that went out about it specifically stated that I had to be there, because the boss thinks I'm a good cook. That might be true (at least, compared to the frozen-dinner-for-lunch girls I work with), but now I feel pressure to do something awesome. My favorite big-batch thing that I normally make (to stock the freezer), is roasted red pepper and tomato soup. So I was thinking I'd make a double batch of that on Wednesday, and then crock pot it in the morning. But yesterday my roommate posited that soup is not an easy thing to eat, and thus might be inapropriate for a pot luck. What do you guys think?

I dislike the overpowering pungeny of rosemary. The only way I've ever found it palatable was in a pasta dish with tuna and onions. I think it's becuase it's almost impossible to get it to be a background flavor. Even the smallest hint in a soup makes the soup taste of nothing else. I also don't really like sage or too much thyme for similar reasons, but those aren't active aversions, and there are dishes with each one that I enjoy. And gin. It tastes like I'm trying to drink the Christmas tree. Blech. These all have a similar flavor profile, so I think that portion of my tastebuds must be hypersensitive.

That is just precious. What is with the glut of slightly angsty ("something is missing in my life and I must seek to fix it"), socially concious (ie must reveal a dark aspect of typical American characteristic or lifestyle), introspective, self serving books (and I guess now movies)? I just finished reading Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping, and this sounds like more of the same. How many more facets of our society are left to be challenged by self-important hipsters like this who want to make a buck off of doing without something? So much of the rules they've set seem awfully arbitrary, and in some cases absurd. Why 250 miles, and not 100 miles? Surely half a day's drive is better than a full day's drive. Why not grow their own food and barter for the rest of what they need? They're already composting. Why a mason jar for lunch, instead of a reusable container that makes sense, like a bento box? I understand that it was an assignment, designed for the end result to make us reflect on how trapped we all are by modern conveniences, but I suspect it's going to ring so hollow that profoundness will be lost. I also suspect that once the alloted time period is over, Ms. Conlin will be making a beeline to the nearest department store. I think I might be a little jaded. The dinner desribed at the beginning of the article sounds pretty good, although I prefer my frittata filling to be something other than a social message.

Congrats on your weight loss! I'm impressed, not only with the numbers, but with your whole healthy attitude towards eating. I'm also impressed by the sheer amount of vegetables you're managing to consume this week. Good show! I'm enjoying your blog tremendously.

I find them at Wild Oats in the fall. I don't know anything about them, other than that they're sublime.

I'm not sure if this should go here, or in the "Stupid kitchen mistakes" thread. It was 3AM and it definately was alcohol fueled. Roommate likes to cook bacon and eggs after a night of drinking. After a couple of small gas flame potholder fires, he's developed a phobia of my cast iron skillet. This weekend he decided to use a nonstick sauce pot with a plastic handle. The only setting he knows on the stove is HIGH. I'm out on the roof smoking a cigarette, and come back inside to an apartment that smells like someone re-enacted the Joan of Arc story with a barbie doll. The flames from the burner had come up around the edge of the pot, melting the paint on the sides and the plastic handle, and filling the apartment with horrid burnt plastic and paint fumes. We had to air the place out for a full day before it was inhabitable again. He'll never learn. A few weeks ago he was drunkenly cooking bacon BUCK NAKED. That is not something you want to do. So yeah, we cook alot of bacon when we're drunk.

I want one! This will certainly make for a less stressful post-drinking video game than the Wii surgery game, Trauma Center, where every time you fail an operation, the patient dies and main character quits medicine!

I didn't grow up with an awareness of convenience foods, but looking back, they were definately there. Mom certainly used cookie/brownie mixes, frozen vegetables with cheese sauce (though most often without), Texas Toast, jarred pasta sauce, frozen meatballs. Dad used to make the best pizza every once in a while, and, while I was a little disappointed somehow when I learned that it was just a Chef Boyardee pizza kit with added sausage and canned mushrooms, I still angle for an invitation to dinner when he makes it. They never went full tilt into frozen dinners or hamburger helper though. The things they kept around that weren't raw ingredients were like jump-starts to a meal. Now that my brother and I are out of the house, they lean more heavily on convenience. Their freezer is full of breaded shrimp, pre blackened salmon, chicken fajita kits, commercial twice baked potatoes. They eat pretty well, and they're not eating out every day. So, for my parents, these kinds of foods are about saving time and energy, now to a greater degree than in my childhood. I loved convenience foods in my dorm in college - they were a great way to break the monotony of the dining hall, especially things that could be bought in bulk at Sam's club. Ramen noodles, Easy Mac, flats of soup, microwavable pasta bowls, frozen White Castle cheeseburgers, flats of chips. When I started cooking for myself and my 3 roommates, I first leaned on my mother's hybrid style of cooking. So I might serve spaghetti with frozen meatballs, jarred sauce, and frozen garlic bread. I think of that as a transition to real food. These days I make my own meatballs for the freezer, make my own spaghetti sauce, make my own bread for garlic bread. Essentially the same meal. No convenience foods in sight, but also less convenient. That's the trade-off right? Somewhere along the line, I started making an effort to avoid processed foods as much as possible. So most kinds of convenience foods are de facto off the table. But it's been an evolution. I haven't bought a frozen meal or a frozen pizza in over a year, but I am sorely tempted at times. When that happens, I find a reason to visit my parents and eat from their freezer. I think in my own mind I've rationalized that if it's not in MY freezer, it doesn't "count". This thread got me thinking. I'm not sure why my craving for White Castle frozen cheeseburgers is something I feel I have to rationalize. Or why a frozen meatball lovingly made by my own hand several months ago seems superior to a frozen meatball from the grocery store. For me, these kinds of foods have been about many things - breaking up the dorm monotony, transitioning to scratch cooking in a familiar way, and now, satsifying a specific craving or nostalgia.

That was the first thing I thought of when when I read the first post, that active culture pills / yogurt are great for travelling. Also, anecdotally, I started giving my roommate yogurt with fruit and ground flax for breakfast, simply because I could get it ready the night before, and it would be an easy source of calories for the morning. An added benefit was that he started coming home feeling healthier, with less of his regular digestion issues. I've also heard that Activia works a little too well in keeping the digestive system moving right along. Like, to the point of disrupting one's routine.

Ambrosia apples. They're in the supermarket in the fall. The first time I bit into one I had a taste epiphany - THIS is what apples are supposed to taste like. I had a similar moment with new potatoes that the vendor told me had been dug up just that morning. Quarted and lightly steamed, they needed no butter, just a whisper of salt and pepper. June strawberries at the farmer's market- the little ones that are so fragrant you can smell them from 40 feet away, and you're lucky to get them home without smashing them to mush. Oysters eat on the beach. In the half shell. No accompaniments necassary. In my mind it doesn't get much purer of taste than that. Foods that taste of themselves are fickle and fleeting, a seasonal fling rather than a long term relationship. You have to bide your time, eschewing imposters, until it's again time to taste them as they should be.

I didn't even have to think about it. I read the title and immediately thought: I'd be loaf of rustic, hand-formed sourdough. Full of delightful contrasts of crackle, crunch, crust, and crumb. Monetarily cheap, but a labor of love. Can be perfected either with high tech kitchen gadgetry and precise measurements, or simply with your hands and senses. Equally at home in a fancy french restaurant and your grandmother's kitchen. A personality that develops as you eat it, and then lingers with you for hours afterwards. (The "thirty minute finish" ) Like the perfect little black dress that goes with everything, yet can be the star of the evening given the right circumstance. OK, I admit I tend to wax a little poetic about sourdough, but I swear the first time I baked a loaf I fell under some sort of enchantment.

I would SO buy that. That would also solve the problem of buying un-scannable items like, um, fresh produce, or anything from the bulk bins. The software could also create an automatic pricebook, making it effortless to track the price cycles of items you buy often, and integrate with a palm pilot meal planning /grocery list program. As if I'm not ALREADY the geekiest person in the grocery store. Of course, that takes the fun out of my do-yourself Access database pet project.

I sometimes buy canned black beans for making spicy black bean soup. I really like the taste of an organic brand (I think it's Eden Organic?). The beans have a savory, almost meaty flavor. Today I looked at the ingredients, and kombu is listed. This is a kind dried seaweed, correct? I would assume from the flavor profile that it's got a natural form of MSG in it. Does anyone have any experience using kombu in their dried bean cookery? If I could replicate that flavor, it would be substantially cheaper than buying these canned beans. Also, what's a rough conversion for dried to canned beans? What volume of dried beans will yeild the same as a 15 oz can?

I found the perfect spot in Kansas City for the local Ladies Who Lunch. It's located on the top floor of a mansion built in 1885 that's now an antique store. I took my mom there for lunch this week. This place was full of nothing but elegantly dressed women, eating ceasar salads with chicken and shrimp, saving room for classic desserts. (Mom and I broke the mold somewhat by ordering substantial main courses plus appetizers, as we are less concerned with appearances.) It was the kind of dining experience that was appropriately punctuated with overly theatrical superlatives like "That was to DIE for" as we descended the stairs. Fabulous, to say the least.

I'm not sure how well either of these places lend themselves to a quick taste, but Winstead's and Oklahoma Joe's would be at the top of my list. I personally think Oklahoma Joe's has the best fries in the known universe. If you're going to Arthur Bryant's, go to the original one at 18th and Brooklyn. The other location(s?) are sorely lacking in many respects, especially in ambiance.

Thanks again for putting this together. It was a great way to try a variety of different kinds of dishes, and it's fun getting to sit down at a table with people who genuinely love food (a sentiment sadly lacking in most of my freinds these days). I thought it was interesting the way the staff seemed so suprised that we enjoyed some of these dishes - I agree that nothing they served was really that "out there," and it was delicious across the board. Especially that dessert - so comforting yet luxurious at the same time. A++, would eat again.

What recipes do you guys have for ketchup, the Joy of Cooking recipe that's supposed to be the standard? I'm planting a bunch of tomato plants this year, so I might be up for a run at ketchup.

Mayo. I don't use enough to justify even a small batch. I'd rather buy Hellman's that can sit in the fridge until I use it all. Tortillas. Not worth the fuss. I just keep some corn tortillas from the Mexican grocery in the freezer to use as needed.

But if you have a bread machine, fresh bread is really really easy, even if you bake it in the oven. I made a freeform cheddar loaf yesterday with a total of 5 minutes of active involvment. I've not purchased a cheese bread I like better, and it's definately cheaper.

I love my pressure cooker! I grew up with my mom and my grandmother using their's, so I always found it strange that so many people are afraid of them. I got one for Christmas a couple of years ago, and I'm happy as a clam. The one that I have is a new Presto, but it's the old fashioned rocking top design. Some things I use it for are: - Plain boneless skinless chicken breasts. I think this is a comfort food thing. They're perfect after 9 minutes, either to eat plain, or to use in salads. - Rice. You'll have to fiddle to get the ratio/timing right, but it's so quick and easy. - Round steak, potatoes, and baby carrots. Just chuck it all in and cook it until the meat is done. The carrots and potatoes are wonderfully soft and mushy. - Beans from dried, particularly chickpeas. Lentils cook to quickly to bother pressure cooking, but all the others cook up quickly. - Fresh green beans. Cook in a splash of broth with some sauteed onion and bacon. A book I really like is Pressure Cooker Gourmet. Nice take on some classic recipes, good basic timing information. My old roommate says that the recipe for peanut butter cheesecake in a mini springform pan is to die for. I haven't tried it yet though.

The idea of this made my day. I'm still at work at 5pm on a Friday, and I was grumpy about it, but this makes everything better somehow. Actually, seeing as how I have a PI tattoo, this whole thread is like a party.

I got a recipe from a Joyce Goldstein cookbook for salmon that I like very much. You basically poach the salmon in a dry white wine, then reduce the wine with cream and fresh tarragon into a syrupy sauce, to which you add sauteed mushroom slices. It works well for the frozen peices of salmon I get from Costco.