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dividend

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  1. dividend

    Dinner! 2007

    I've never been brave enough to post my dinner until now. I've started trying to learn how to take better pictures, and futzing around some with Photoshop. Forgive retro plate. This was last night's dinner. A quarter of a roasted chicken, oven fries from the Cook's Illustrated method, and greens with tomatoes and asiago from Deborah Madison: That's not countertop under the plate, that's my roof! The lighting in my kitchen is abysmal, plus it was really nice out, so I sat outside to eat.
  2. dividend

    Lunch! (2003-2012)

    About two months ago, I bought a Mr. Bento lunch thermous. I love this thing! It's made packing my lunches for work a whole lot more fun. Here are some pictures of my Bento lunches. (Be gentle with me, this is my first attempt at posting pictures, and they're from my camera phone since I was at work!) Homemade tomato soup, salad with greens, almonds, craisins, goat cheese and walnuts, chicken sausage, homemade sourdough: Spaghetti with Marcella Hazens tomato sauce with butter, spinach salada with pine nuts and parmesan, tomato olive salad: Pasta with red sauce, vegetables marinated in Italian dressing, homemade cheddar garlic bread: Deconstructed salad Nicoise - tuna salad, green beans, tomatoes, olives, and potatoes in olive oil dressing, homemade cheese bread garlic toast:
  3. Well, the things the OP ordered are things that are easier to do poorly than to do correctly. Forgive me for stating the obvious here. I'd imagine it's easy to not change the frying oil a couple of times, and fried food that's been left to sit easier than frying to order. As for pizza, it's certainly easier to heat up prefab than it is to make from scratch, which would be impractical for a non pizza specific place. As for sushi, well, doing sushi well is hard. So I think it's pretty easy to see why that round of food would suck. Alot of American palates are conditioned around food that we as eGulleters thumb our noses at. It's not going to change. I know that the only thing I can do is choose to support the places I really beleive in when I do eat out. That's why I can name 30 restaurants in my area I would like to eat at before I get to a single chain restaurant (except Chipotle ). I'm constantly sharing these places with my freinds and family, fighting the good fight. So if where I choose to spend my dining dollars has any impact as a vote, I'm voting for the places that care, the places where the food doesn't suck.
  4. This bothers me too. I don't see how it isn't a contradiction on at least some level. The idea of organic is natural, sustainable. Nothing is less so than chemical additives and factories. On another message board I frequent, there are tons of discussions about way to save money in the grocery budget. I groan every time someone says - "we eat only organic, so everything is more expensive." Well NOT WHOLE FOOD! GAH! But that's almost off topic.
  5. I think you're preaching to the choir in this subforum. HFCS in BBQ sauce? That's some kind of crime, I think. Gates doesn't sell sauce in non-KC supermarkets? I didn't realize that. How dreadful for the rest of the country. You need me to mail you a case of it? Seriously though, I think if I moved away from Kansas City, I would probably just stop eating BBQ out, either making the sauce the way I think it's meant to be, or waiting until I can come back to visit. Same way I don't generally eat BBQ on vacation. A few months ago, I was sitting in an open air beachfront restaurant in Zihuatanejo, Mexico, with a group of people all from the Kansas City area, and mixed in among the authentic Mexican dishes and fresh seafood, was "barbecued" baby back ribs. Someone at my table actually ordered them. I don't get it. Why fly 600 miles south into another country, and then eat a poor imitation of something your hometown is famous for?
  6. I rented this over the weekend, and I agree, fun and cheesy. The chop-chop-chopping is fun in a four-year-old banging on pots and pans kind of way, which is awesome. Some of the mechanics are neat - I got a kick out of following the arrows to knead dough... but I draw the line at digitally peeling potatoes and carrots for fun! I also totally failed the recipe where you make pierogies. Definately worth a rental if you have a Wii, but I probably won't buy it.
  7. That thread is so silly. Just recently I had a meal at a local restaurant that, while not quite TFL, was probably in the same league. The food and wine and service was so good that I don't think getting slapped by the maitre'd on the way out would have provoked feelings as strong as the OP displayed TWO YEARS after a single, one sentence, slightly dismissive (not even outright rude) comment. I just can't fathom reacting that strongly, especially if I were in TFL post-meal afterglow. But I guess some people can find a negative to fixate on under ANY circumstances, huh? Wow.
  8. I think that a typical (non-foodie) American diet can really dull your palate. Salty, sweet, mild - that kind of a flavor profile is pretty mass-market freindly. So you eat a frozen dinner, or fast food, or you go to a chain restaurant (I know a lot of people who eat this way), and you inherently limit your exposure to more complex, challenging flavors. It's not irreversible. I started elimating processed food from my diet a few years ago. Now I find that alot of the foods I used to enjoy on a regular basis aren't as enjoyable if I'm not specifically craving junk. I grew up drinking soda, but now I don't really like it. I'm to the point where I actively dislike drinking something sweet with meals. I feel like in some ways, I've un-deadened my palate. Coffee is an interesting example. Growing up, I didn't like it black at all. Milk and sugar please! Now the only time I put something in it is on a lazy evening when I specifically feel like treating myself to a vanilla latte. I always just assumed I had grown up. I guess the biggest thing I've noticed is purposefully choosing to eat something salty or sweet, instead of taking them as the baseline.
  9. Title says it all. Basically, I have a gift card to a book store, and would I would like to take the opportunity to acquire a few good books that that will help me deal with the upcoming glut of CSA produce. I've checked out three Deborah Madison books from the library, and will most likely be purchasing one (or maybe two) of them: Greens, Local Flavors, and Vegetarian Cooking for everyone. I also checked out A Year in a Vegetarian Kitchen, but I didn't like it as much. I don't necassarily need vegetarian cookbooks, just books with good ideas on using seasonal produce.
  10. I'm not suprised that letting chocolate melt on your tongue is more arousing than kissing your SO, in a typical office setting, while researchers in lab coats with white clip boards look on. I wonder if the study would have obtained the same results if the participants were hooked with portable monitors, and then measurements were taken remotely, while they were kissing their SOs in their normal setting. The fact that I find fault with this study is in no way negated by the fact that sometimes I sit at my desk and quietly enjoy a peice of chocolate. There's no way that kissing someone could be so discreetly enjoyed.
  11. These sound good. (And they sound they'd be good mixed with vodka too!) Their website says that the only place in Kansas City to get them is The Better Cheddar. Which reminds me that I've been meaning to go there anyway, as the cheese selection in my fridge is getting dangerously low. My wallet hates you guys sometimes...
  12. We had a smoked peice of plum, and I think that tuile was made of parmesan. I think at some point I told my friend that I would sleep with our sommelier. Oh man, that scallop... <slips back into food coma> OK, I want to say the herb foam was lemongrass. Ours had sausage (linguica?) foam, and was explicitly described as a deconstructed paella. Most of my friends are not white-tablecloth (I love them dearly for it - most of the time.) Sam was on good behavior the majority of the night, but this dish caused him to declare "If heaven was deep-fried in awesome and smothered in a honey-lavender reduction, it would taste like this." His subsequent Myspace blog about our meal (written, I think, while still drunk that night), reads like some kind of vaguely Anothony Bourdain inspired food pornography, including my personal favorite comment, about this course, "If I never get to eat another bite of lamb, because PETA got all pissy and took it away from those of us who actually enjoy eating animals, I can be completely satisfied with the fact that my last bite of lamb came from this dish." Amen. He told us he has the best job in the world - he gets to spend other people's money for them (and better than they could do themselves, in this case).
  13. I took my best friend Sam to Bluestem last for my birthday, and I've been wanting to rave about it, but my coworkers would just look at me like I was crazy, so I hope it's ok to rave here. (Please don't laugh at me!) Neither of had been before, so we decided to jump right in with both feet. We did the 12 course with wine pairings. I asked how the wine pairings worked, since I don't eat at this level very often, and was surprised that wine would be paired with all 12 courses. The sommelier made some really excellent selections. Here's what we ate, and forgive me because I wasn't taking notes, I may have gotten the order wrong. Amuse - carrot juice with cucumber foam. Oyster, smoked trout, salmon roe. We ate this as one bite and then just kind of looked at each other in silence. Very intense flavors, especially after the mild spring taste of the amuse. It took me a minute to decide that it was delicious. I guess that's what people mean when they describe a dish as challenging. Crab cake, with cucumber jello. The crab had Asian/sushi flavors, and the cucumber jello was brilliant. Sam said he doesn't like cucumbers, but the flavor here, in a friendlier texture was really nice. Escargot - oyster(?) mushrooms, pine nuts. Warm, clean pesto flavors. I've only ever had escargot that reminded me of a piece of rubber swimming in garlic butter, so eating it this way was nice. Foie gras tourchon. My first time eating foie. I now understand what all the fuss is about. Sam had eaten it before, but when I asked him what it tasted like, he said it doesn't take like anything else, it just tastes like foie gras. I hope I don't sound like a rube when I say this was the single best thing I've ever put in my mouth. The Canadian ice wine was a great pairing. Asparagus soup served over whipped ricotta, prosciutto, and olive oil. I wanted to lick the bowl. Seafood pasta in tomato sauce with fresh oregano. This was the only dish I didn't really like. It was served in a mini fishbowl, which I thought was a cool presentation, but it hindered actually eating it. The shrimp still had the tail on, and it was akward getting a knife and fork in to the bowl to eat it. I also think the shrimp was a little overcooked. It tasted good, so I think maybe it only suffered in comparison. This had probably the most interesting wine pairing - a very yeasty champagne that Sam said was like drinking bread. And the pairing was sort of like having a crusty bread to mop up the tomato sauce with. Scallop. I'm not sure I can recall what came with this, because the scallop was just perfect. Crisp seared crust, absolutely silky inside. I wanted to eat a dozen of them. Deconstructed paella - seared whitefish, sausage foam. This turned the savory way up. A nicely soft pinot here. Waygu fillet, whipped smoked potatoes, tomato jam, blue cheese crisp, grainy mustard sauce. This was about the time we just started sighing with pleasure. A big California cabernet-sauvignon for this and the next course. Lamb 2 ways, tiny spring vegetables, honey jasmine sauce. More sighs. That honey sauce was perfect. Cheese course - goat cheese, spiced nuts, almond bread. Earlier my friend had asked the sommelier what else would be good paired with the ice wine. So he brought that back here. It was fun to see the wine take a totally different character against the cheese versus the foie. Dessert - chocolate souffle cake, Kalua ice cream. Tawny port pairing. Smiles and sighs from both of us. Champagne float. This was the other near-miss. Taken as a single drink, this was a little too much at this point - too cold, too bubbly. Instead of this I would have loved a tiny espresso shot. Petit-fours - lavender chocolate truffle, caramel. This was good. The bitterness of the truffle actually provided that coffee note that I love with dessert. We stumbled out of the restaurant afterwards, both of us sort of breathless and flushed, probably from all the wine. OK, it was really from having eaten the best meal either of us had ever had. Go and do this if you haven't already! We're lucky to have a restaurant of this caliber in Kansas City. I can't wait to go for brunch.
  14. Oh man, the one in Kansas City closed years ago, and there was much sadness. My little brother called me a few weeks ago: Him: "Hey, you wanna go to St. Louis next weekend?" Me: "Sure, I'm always up for a roadtrip!" Him: "I just a want to go eat at White Castle." Me: "Hell yeah!" Of course, then we both came to our senses. Later that day I drove to my grandmother's house and raided her freezer for her stash of frozen sliders. In return she made me drink bourbon with her at four in the afternoon. I love my granny. My roommate eats at BK so much for lunch at work that he uses those loyalty punch cards, and like once a week his meal is free. That's some street cred right there.
  15. Right now I'm sitting at my desk at work eating a #7 from Wendy's: breaded chicken sandwich with cheese, fries, and a diet coke. I was out late last night and didn't pack my lunch when I got home. This morning I was on my way out the door before I noticed the empty spot in the fridge where my lunch normally resides overnight. Our office cafeteria closes early on Fridays, which I never remember. So suddenly it's 3:00, I'm hungry, and I have no accessible food in the building - even my drawer stash of peanut butter and crackers is empty. Wendy's is the closest restaurant to our office, and I don't even have to get on the highway for it. So I went. Total time, desk --> car --> Wendy's --> car --> desk: 18 minutes because I park far away. I had my food from the drive thru in literally the time it took to drive through. Pulling away, I sampled a french fry. It was piping hot and salty. Back at my desk, the food is tasty, tasting mainly of salt and savory. The chicken and fries are hot, the lettuce and tomato cold and crisp, the bun soft and inoffensive. For the investment of a short drive and swipe of my AMEX (for cash back, of course!), I'm fed, instead of spending the afternoon in a state of hunger-induced crankiness. It occurs to me that my experience is exactly the purpose of a fast food restaurant. Would I be reflectively grateful for Wendy's filling this niche today if this was how I fed myself everyday? Of course not. But we all know many people who consider McDonald's, Burger King, and Taco Bell the three food groups, and when considered as the mainstay of someone's diet, fast food restaurants probably deserve much of the criticism they endure around here. In the context of an occasional repreive from cooking, or from packing a lunch, or even from having to sit down and interact with a waiter, sometimes you can't beat a brown bag passed through the window, a foil wrapped chicken sandwich eaten in front of a computer. I'm not a food purist by any stretch of the imagination, so I eat fast food probably once or twice a month. Sometimes because I forget my lunch, sometimes because a lazy weekend afternoon prompts a craving for a couple of effortless cheeseburgers (from McDonald's). Another time when fast food exactly serves it's purpose is late on a Saturday night. The bars have closed, we've piled too many people in the designated driver's car, and we're fiending for snacks. If we end up at my apartment, we scrounge the last bits of good stuff from my fridge (or my roommate attempts to cook bacon). But I'm the only one in my circle of freinds with consistently edible bits in the fridge at any time. So if we end up somewhere else, we always hit the Taco Bell drivethrough. (If I'm not too inebriated I will inevitably make a joke about "fourth meal.") It's fast, and it's tasty in that excessively salty way that tastes good when you're drunk, and there's no risk of burning down the apartment by leaving the stove on. Now I want you to tell me that I'm not alone in this. That sometimes, drunk or sober, you too find fast food wonderful.
  16. For serious? Why? How old? If this is really the answer I will FedEx you a batch of egg salad.
  17. Can someone please tell me how to produce perfectly peelable hardboiled eggs? I've tried and tried, every recommended technique you can imagine, boiling water, cold water, ice water, different times ranges, etc. etc. And it's always the same - the eggs won't peel cleanly, it escalates into a full scale me vs. eggs battle, and when the smoke clears, I'm left with yolks broken in half, peices of shell with white attached, and not a speck of it is usable. My mom has a hard boiled egg cooker that makes perfect eggs every time. Please, someone, give me the secret that will prevent me from breaking down and purchasing one in an attempt to salve my wounded kitchen pride.
  18. Try mixing halved cherry tomatoes and pitted chopped kalamata olives, in roughly a 3:1 ratio. Mix 'em up with your hands, sort of squishing it all together. Then toss with a little olive oil and vinegar (not balsamic, an herb kind works well). Let that marinate overnight, and when you pull it out of the fridge to take, add freshly ground black pepper and either basil or chives. This is one of my favorite lighter side dishes.
  19. Yup, I know that feeling, even in my undersized apartment over-the-fridge freezer. The other day I was trying to find space to freeze some lasagna, and I found a neatly labled, foodsavered bag of strawberries from last June. It was a happy freezecovery of sorts.
  20. That is a seriously sexy fridge. I want to come home to that after a hard day at the grocery store. Ahem. Back to reality. And in said reality, a totally separate fridge and freezer is the best idea I've seen in a long time. It shouldn't seem that out there, considering alot of new kitchens split up the stove and the ovens.
  21. What would some of you suggest the OP should have done? Go anyway and subject the other diners to a cranky toddler? There's a thread right under this one about children in restaurants and how they affect other diners' experiences. Would it honestly be better to go to a dinner reservation no matter what the extenuating circumstances are? And I'm not seeing how requiring a CC deposit solves anything. I'm pretty leary of giving out my CC information unless I'm actually using it to pay for something, and I know many people who don't even have one. I'm always tempted to just make a number up in cases like this, and I imagine those people making 3 different reservations at the same time would do that. Being asked for it feels vaguely disrespectful to me, and it sets an underlying tone of mistrust. Am I the only one who thinks it's beyond tacky to complain specifically about the "monetary hit" the restaurant will take? That says to me that the restaurant sees me as simply a big wallet attatched to a stomach, and much of the polish and finesse is stripped away. Like the reverse of a fine dining esablishment presenting the lady of a couple a menu with no prices. It cheapens the experience.
  22. I just made the empanadas described in the original post for a loosely "Mexican" themed potluk at work. Wow! They're delicious. I made mine very small, using a 3" glass to cut the circles because, well, that's all I had. I ended up with about 72 mini empanadas, and came home from work with none. I'll definately make these again. At that size though, the full amount of dough only used half the filling, so I'll keep that in mind. Thankfully, none of my Lean Cuisine eating freinds at work asked for the recipe - that quantity of lard may have caused them to faint! Edited to add: I served them with Salsa Mexicana from the eGCI Salsa course, and Jayme's shortcut cooked red salsa, for a thoroughly eGullet themed offering. My coworkers think I'm a great cook - little to they know I'm just plugged into a great community.
  23. CLICK for an Emeril recipe for spinah artichoke dip that is out of this world. I make this every year for my parents' Christmas Eve buffet.
  24. I used to go to Applebees every once in a while because I'd get a craving for their Veggie Patch Pizza. It's a big tortilla covered in spinach, mushrooms, artichokes, tomatoes, and gooey cheesy goodness, and it was one of the few chain restaurant meals I could eat without feeling absurdly stuffed (probably because it's on the appetizer menu). I got tired of spending $10 a pop to satisfy my craving, and, with some help from Google, took a stab at making one myself for dinner the other night. Applebees apparantly uses their spinach artichoke dip as a sauce, so my bastardized version inlcluded a cheesy bechamel sauce spiked with granulated garlic and cheese, fresh spinach, canned chopped artichokes, thinly sliced mushrooms sauteed in garlic butter, chopped tomatoes, and Italian seasoning. The verdict? Just as good if not better than the real thing, and I could make about 10 for $10. Now I have no good reason to ever go back to Applebees. I'm sure lots of you have done this at some point. Tell me about restaurant dishes that you liked enough to try to recreate at home.
  25. I'm going to out myself as a nerd and say that alot of the time, I actually do measure a serving size. It started out as a way to quantify exactly how much I was eating, and now it's kind of second nature. So I'll cook 2 oz of pasta, or eat 1 oz of chips or trail mix. It's part of my philosophy that I'm not going to deprive myself of things that I like to eat that are bad from me even though I generally try to eat less processed foods. I actually buy a pint of really rich ice cream to keep in the freezer, and serve it with a little cookie scoop. I just can't allow myself to eat right from the bag, or the carton, or I'll eat the whole thing mindlessly, and then feel crappy afterwards.
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