Dr. Teeth

Pasta aglio e olio and a basque cheesecake

I’ve been trying to figure out Chinese cooking with mixed success for over two decades. After about 15 years using Shaoxing wine from the grocery store for 15 years, I stumbled on a bunch of bottles at the state liquor, bought one and the quality of my food jumped considerably. So I bought a couple more. Jump forward. State liquor store put all the Shaoxing on the discontinuation shelf and I bought them out. About to run out. 1/4 bottle left in my last one. Looking at the Asian grocery stores, there are a number of bottles, but frankly for the most part the labels look the same and I’m not sure what I’m looking at. They are frankly very inexpensive, which is not reassuring. Anybody have a reliable online source for high quality Shaoxing?

Thank you for sharing. I’m leaning towards the casserole.

Beautiful old buck. Love the pseudo palmation on the left antler. Sure he was less than a joy on the plate, but holy cow. Thanks as always for letting folks follow along without having to wait in a cold stand.

Sorry to be a pest. You have mentioned a large collection of Indian cookbooks. If you were willing to share maybe your 3-5 favorites along with a general level of familiarity with Indian cooking needed, I would be in your debt.

Mapo Tofu. Had wanted to make for awhile. Tasted good, boys really liked it. Not photogenic, moved it around a bit too much after I added the tofu and it broke up more than I wanted.

Went into the district yesterday with the family and ate at Duke’s Grocery. Proper Burger there is on the list of best burgers in DC every year. Honestly had been talking about having one for years. Ehhh, it was ok. Cook was superb, medium rare as requested. All their food ate sort of sweet, which to my palate made it seem under salted. Fries were dipped. As I have said before, those who make, serve or even enjoy dipped fries should be caught and punished

I have intense guilt at keeping this secret to myself, which has led me to this confession. A fair amount of smoked paprika mixed into the mayo is black magic where tomato sandwiches are concerned.

Serendipity. Oh wait, I misunderstood the subject. I thought it was restaurants I’d be happy to see closed. Was Papaya King for me. I know, but it’s part of my childhood experience of New York. Thrilled that they reopened. Could say the same about Sammy’s Roumanian but the new place isn’t the same.

Thanks for the heads up. Just scored one

I tried a brandade about 5 years back and it fell flat with the family. May be time to try again. Salt cod has a big appeal to me. May try the stuffed peppers as well at some point. Thanks for the ideas

That would be fantastic. Seafood casserole appeals to me as being flexible being served in a small dish as a hot app or a larger one, looking to the future if the boys don’t come home for Xmas, as a main.

Yeah, there are some seafood choices that are more traditional depending on who you talk to: must have eel, or squid, or salt cod. I don’t really have a reliable source for eel, so I don’t worry about it

Annual price drop on 4qt Staub Dutch oven on Amazon. $129 bucks

The guests in question are Maryland natives and so mostly eat blue crab. Or similar. I’m originally from Boston, so I think crab is what people eat when there’s no more lobster