pax

Yes Qulifier: If I cook it.

When we moved a year ago, I goodwilled dozens of cookbooks I had collected randomly when I was out on my own for the first time, then newly married and trying to figure out what the heck this cooking thing was all about. The authors that that made the cut and are getting used regularly right now: Marcella Hazan Diana Kennedy Rick Bayless Julie Sahni Madhur Jaffee James Beard Julia Child (especially the book co-authored with Jacques Pepin) Mollie Katzen (I used to use these a lot more but I couldn't part with them.) Jamie Oliver (although I will confess this as much because I want to support his politics as I like his recipes, also, he's cute ) The Gourmet Cookbook (the ugly yellow one, despite it's complete layout horribleness , everything I've cooked from it has been fantastic) and, whenever I am in a real jam for something infallible, The Joy of Cooking Baking: Nigella Lawson's Domestic Goddess Pierre Hermes Dorie Greenspan The positively ancient Rodale Press, "The Bread Book" which isn't really anything special but I love the book itself, the pictures, the way the recipes are written, the commentary, etc. Reference Magee Phillip Pauli's Classical Cooking the Modern Way-Methods and Techniques The New Catering Repetoire, Volumes I and II, Hugh Cracknell Between multiple books by the same authors and a few one-offs, there are about 40 on the shelves, 10 of which are used almost constantly, some which are reference only anyway, and some, like the baking books, are only there for special occasions. I really really want Peter Reinhardt's book next, since I use his pizza crust method constantly and would like to use others.

I used to really love buying cookbooks. Now, I don't buy them unless I've used more than a few of the author's recipes taken from the Net and really like them. Money, space, thinking green, etc. On the other hand, you know, if they are recipes I love and I've basically "stolen" them from the net, I feel I owe it to the author to buy the book. I've also found taking books I want out of the library for a trial run before buying them has helped me out on a few occasions.

Micro-tatos or whatever they call the potatoes individually wrapped in plastic so they can go right into the microwave. I mean, it's a POTATO. What the heck? And grocery stores around here sell "peeled onions"--all the loose brown paper skin removed, for fifty cents more per pound. Yanno, I just can't imagine how many onion paper I'd have to skin to get a pounds worth. Not to mention they are much more subject to getting icked.

Well, it's not The French Laundry, but Phoebe Damrosch wrote a great book called "Service Included" about working as a captain at Per Se. I highly recommend it. There is probably someone who could provide you an e-Gullet Society friendly Amazon link for it. I don't know how.

I know it's officially fall because I unconsciously collected all the ingredients necessary for a double batch of Marcella Hazan's Ragu Bolognese this afternoon. And her pork loin braised in milk. *drool*

I watch Top Chef bought from iTunes, and I make it a habit of not reading this thread until after iTunes is bothered enough to get around to putting the new episode up. I've been cursing out iTunes for weeks now. DON'T EVER BUY THE SEASON PASS. And random non Top Chef weeks make me cranky.

Er, I guess I meant...Florence is a city...not a region. You know what I mean?

There was a little out take of a couple of them discussing where "Florentine" might be. I was really boggled that chefs, at least, wouldn't know the names of basic Italian regions. Ok, so it's not Tuscany, but jeez louis!

Fish in the desert? Glad I'm not a judge. And I admit, I too found the lip rings distracting. I wish I didn't cause I like to think of myself as open minded and all that hearts and flowers stuff, but I could not hear a word she said my eyes were so stuck on her mouth.

Nothing like a good old fashioned pig roast. That's a lamb in the back. Dutch oven with beef stew.

You are a good person, chezcherie. I don't know if I can count the number of times I've made this for my kid's breakfast (with a seasonally appropriate cookie cutter, a maple leaf, pumpkin, etc.) since this thread has been posted. Now, her favourite bread is a rye-dark pumpernickle swirl that I try to get a yin-yang pattern in, and as you know, the yin yang pattern often has little circles within it, which I cut with a small bisquit cutter. So to your list, in the southern tier of NY, you can add, yin yang eggs.

It might be my simmer was just too slow. It might be that my gnocchi were too big. The recipe calls for mozz, ricotta, and parmesan, with binder, egg and flour. Having done it both ways after the simmer....broiled AND deep fried, I'd go with the deep fried next time. The interior was softer and the crust was thin and crispy, as opposed to the tough skin the broiler produced.

I love these updates. I never said anything before but I thought you'd like to know I appreciate them. In fact, with this post you've inspired me to start paying attention to my local wines. Here I am blathering on about eating local, and I'm drinking Australian shiraz, and German whites, and cooking with Italian reds. And I have a treasure trove of wines in my back garden. *forehead slap* Slainte!

I love these updates. I never said anything before but I thought you'd like to know I appreciate them. In fact, with this post you've inspired me to start paying attention to my local wines. Here I am blathering on about eating local, and I'm drinking Australian shiraz, and German whites, and cooking with Italian reds. And I have a treasure trove of wines in my back garden. Slainte!

How did I miss this? Oh my stars, I am SO doing this. Fried cheese in any form is always a good thing.

Cheesy quesadillas are one of the few things I let my 7 yo do alone in the kitchen. Put tortilla on plate, grate cheese of choice, nuke for 20 seconds, fold. When I make them as a meal, I heat the other ingredients separately and add them after the cheese is melted, unless I'm also putting on beans, in which case I do those under the cheese. Slathering on homemade refried beans underneath the cheese works well for a protein, then cheese, then melt, then the other stuff. I tend not to do it in a pan or oven because I always get dried out edges on my tortillas when I do. I really like making tortillas with my kid but they aren't always as nice and flat and pretty and well rounded as they should be for even cooking.

I'm sorry, you are of course correct. The exact instructions say bring the water to a boil, then lower to a simmer. It took about 6 and a half minutes for them to come to the top at the simmer, at which point I put half of them into a warm, brushed with olive oil cast iron pan, rolled them around to coat, and put them under the broiler. The other half I threw in the deep fryer. The overwhelming majority preferred the fried gnocchi to the broiled ones. You get a quick crisp crust in just seconds on them in the deep fryer and the insides stay meltingly soft. The ones under the broiler were tougher to cut through (actually had to use a knife) and seemed to have become doughier. More like a steamed dumpling. I'll fry them next time. A minute at 350 was perfect. I served them with some really fantastic tomatoes marinated in olive oil and a delicious balsamic, fresh basil and a little salt, over homemade green pepper pasta. It was totally delicious. I need a wheelbarrow to carry my belly around in front of me. Even my picky 7 yo ate until she oinked. : )

The recipe calls for the chilled balls of raw ricotta, egg, flour, mozzarella and pepper to be floured and then boiled, and then broiled in butter. Is there any reason I can't just deep fry these, or even brown them in hot cast iron skillet? To what temp do you think I need to get these dairy products/eggs? I'm thinking it might not be so tender but who doesn't enjoy a nice crunchy ball of gooey cheese? What kind of differences do you think I'd see?

Brownies. Really dark, moist, chewy, dense brownies, no nuts.

All these suggestions, and the smell of autumn and my apples on the air, are making me so hungry I am drooling. You guys are amazing. I'm printing this whole thread out. HowEVEH....for a single guy with his first 3.5 lbs pork loin, I'd strongly suggest Marcella Hazan's Braising in Milk. It it is sublime. And it lends itself well to a week's worth of turning left over pork loin into all kinds of leftovers with no weird spice carry over. Although, that said, I do usually add whole cloves of garlic and roughly ground black pepper. But what can you do to it later...Mexican, Asian, Italian...that wouldn't involve those basics anyway? Don't follow her directions. Bung the thing in a slow cooker on low and check the thermometer. When the brown milk fond=the correct internal temp, you're golden. What I mean to say is, you may need to add more milk as you go along to make sure it doesn't dry out, what you want is for the milk to basically caramelize. Now I just made myself drool again.

I shop the Farmer's Market but I tend to do it in Dewitt Park during the week rather than brave the tourists on the weekends. Some people are growers, some people are eaters. I'm an eater. I can't grow stuff. I am the Black Thumb of Death. I have to spend my grocery dollars somewhere, so I don't really care if the prices are lower or not at the farmer's market, I do care to support local, and usually ecologically sounder practices. Although the Farmer's Market is a good place to take visitors when they're here. I recently ran across a booth at the normal Farmer's Market for a farm that grows "veganically". No animal products used to grow the stuff. I found the veggies kind of weak but the garlic knocked my socks off. I am, however, irked by GreenStar. The prices are ridiculously high in there. I'm better off with a normal food co-op with no storefront.

I roll out between two pieces of material, too, but I use parchment paper on a cold marble board. Also, I use minced frozen butter. I think there's room for all kinds of pastry, oil and butter and lard, and all of the variations. The trick is just to match the right filling to the right crust. No?

Boo Boo Kitty is an ice pack shaped like a cat face for putting on bumps or bruises. My kid is like Wiley Coyote's Tasmanian Devil...a whirl wind without much discretion.

I've let my kid (age 7) watch this with me because it's so much more respectful and I love the idea she sees people doing their own thing for charities. She's always making things for kids projects at our UU society and she's always wondered if what she was doing was the right thing. I love that these people are sharing their charities and putting the word out. I like both. They serve different niches. The one thing I really don't like is the voyeuristic peeking through the windows shots on TC last year. Show the banter or bitter, but don't go peeping through peoples' windows. It made me feel icky last year, the Bearded Colorado Guy with the NYC Girl. It really turned me off and if it starts going that way again, I'll bail.