FoodMan

I would even go as far as suggesting that Hathor and Keving come up with a quarterly calendar of sorts. This way we have even more headway into researching the regions. For example: Q1: JAN - Piedmont FEB - Fruili MAR - Lombardy Q2: APR - Alto MAY - La Marche JUN - Liguria and so on... Just a thought. We are all enjoying this and I am pretty positive that no one will have major qualms with any of the suggestions. I sure don't. Am I applying too much of my day to day office job to this thing ?

Chufi, that seriously looks like a great risotto. I think it looks great as well. I will review the Roden cake and see what the difference is. BTW, I made some Zabaglione to go with the rest of the hazelnut cake and it worked out wonderfully (I took a pic and will post it later). Also the "dry" cake is excellent with espresso for breakfast . Fruili or Lombardia sound good to me too. Not terribly familiar with either, so more to learn.

The other "dry" Italian cakes I've made before, I think one was almond and the other Hazelnut, were both from Marcella Hazan's Essentials. In both cakes she uses whipped egg whites, Mario in this recipe does not. The Hazan cakes come out more airy and while not moist, less crumbly and have a better texture. So, I prefer her recipes. That is the only remedy I can think of. Pontormo- I did not buy the cardoons at WF, I buy them at a local grocery store called HEB. I never noticed them at WF. HEB also has an awsome gourmet store called "Central Market" (superior to WF IMO) and they carry it too. Wanna hear what the best part is about buying them at HEB? Well, This is the second time that they charge me for them as "celery" . So a large bunch of the stuff costs 1.30. Hold on now, it is not my fault. I pick up the cardoons, there is no price tag under them (by bunch or by lb). The bunch does have a UPC tag on it though, so I think they will just scan it. I get to the cashier and she tries to scan..."item not found". She askes "what is this?" I say "cardoon". She looks in her little booklet and does not find it, she calls the manager, the manager asks me "sir, what is this?" I say "Cardoons", he says "did they have a price tag?" me "No". The manager digs in his booklet and the checkout line is building behind me, so he goes "they look like big celery, charge him for celery, is that ok sir?". I say "I am sure it costs more than celery, so yes it's ok." This happened the first time I bought cardoons from them a few weeks ago, and I thought whatever glitch they have it would have been fixed by now. Wrong! Almost the exact script happened when I bough this bunch. When no one could find the mysterious thistle I told them "last time I paid for them as celery and I thougth you would've fixed the problem by now", the manager goes "celery it is".

These are very good looking Agnolotti. They were too bland? well that is what Parmesan cheese is for.

My Piemontese dinner ended up on Monday, Sunday was way too busy. I did do most of the prep work on Sunday though. - Risotto with mushrooms and parmesan. I used a good amount of dried porcini in the stock to give it a nice flavor. This could've been a meal in itself. - The wonderful cardoon sformati. these came out lovely topped with parmesan and fried bread crumbs. my wife finally admitted that she loved them. She had not eaten cardoons since the "incident". We served these as a side dish - The beef tongue with Salsa Rossa. i love beef tongue and this one with a tangy and herby sauce is excellent. I am looking forward to cold sandwiches tomorrow - Hazelnut cake with a dusting of cocao, from the Babbo cookbook. The flavor was excellent but I though the cake was a little on the dry side. I should've gone with my first instinct and made a zabaglione to accompany it. Oh well, there is always tomorrow. my wife's plate

yeah, blanching is not optional. neither is properly removing the outer "ribs". I learned the hard way the first time I made cardoons. I did not clean them enough or boil them long enough (it is really boiling till soft, not just blanching) and a lovely looking baked cardoon in balsiamella casserole went to the trash.

Nothing too fancy for my first contribution, dinner tonight was a Piedmontese "Zuppa di Ceci Tutti Santi" or Chickpea Soup for All Soul's Day. The recipe is from The Italian Country Table by Lynne Kasper. Very easy and satisfying on a cold friday night. I served it with extra olive oil, parmesan and homemade Italian Country bread. Tongue to follow....hopefully Sunday dinner.

Chufi- Great looking dishes, those partridges look awsome! You beat me to the Cardoon sformato. I will be following the Batali recipe as well. The picture in the book shows a much smoother custard though. Did you coarsly shop the cardoons by hand?

This all looks so good folks! I should add some contributions in the next few days. Beef tongue in salsa rossa (from Roden's The Foods of Italy) will probably be the main course. Now what is stinco?

Wolfert is correct about Baqli, it is Purslane. Hindaba ,however to my knowledge, is not dandelion. I know two kinds of Hindaba, the "wild" one, looks like large dandelion leaves (as long as celery) with red "ribs" but is not nearly as bitter as dandelion, they could be members of the same family for all I know. I have never seen this type here. The other kind called "Hindaba" is chicory, or frisee.

Hathor- now u know we will need a breakdown of every region just like that. This thread has already been so educational and I am loving it! Sformati has been on my to do since I saw Mario's recipes. Since Cardoons are widely available here this time of year, I might do one Sformato with them or maybe Mario's onion one. Maybe an artichoke risotto as well and some sort of beef stew. For dessert, I am thinking hazelnut cake or hazelnut semifreddo. Nathan, that Valpellinentze looks terrific.

dinner last night was from CoSWF. I made the chicken with lemon garlic cream and the famous starw potato cake. Both were big successes, especially the potato cake which can make a wonderful first course on its own. The only different thing I did was use a couple of tablespoons of creme fraich in the leeks mainly because I always have a small jar of the homemade stuff. It added a lovely tangy note to the filling. Unlike Swiss, I do not have a plate big enough to accomodate the cake so I served it direclty from the pan. BTW, it really is simple to do if you follow the recipe exactly and use a nonstick heavy pan.

Yeah, maybe Jeffrey Steingarten's recipe (from his 1st book) for the egg pasta made with 20 egg yolks and tons of white truffle is very appropriate this month.

From the link above "Tapulone is a stew of donkey meat served around Novara"

Found this which is very helpful. The site also has the same summary for all other regions. So Bagna Cauda, bollito misto, fonduta, agnolotti and Vitello tonatto among many others. Any one up for Tapulone ?

Sounds great so far! If it is not too much to ask and since many of us might not be that familiar with Piedmont (or is it just me), can someone post a list of some recipe names and ingredients typical in Piedmont? I will be doing some research as well but a quick "reference" will be very much appreciated. For next month, I say we stay in the North for the winter. So any northern region is fine. Maybe for the summer we can gravitate towards the south.

The prok belly with basil and beans is on the menu, it is just not very well described. It is the first dish on maybe the third or fifth page. I found it by looking for it's Thai name (from the Walsh article) pad ga pow although I think it is spelled differently. The dish can be served with chicken, beef or "crispy pork". You want the "crispy pork" version . the word pork belly is nowhere on the menu.

Thanks for sharing the pics. I am looking forward to visiting LBM sometime soon. The Chronicle's article mentions the sorbet using liquid Nitrogen. Very similar to my wonderful dinner's final dessert at El Bulli this past May. That one was made with guanabana -soursop- cream and topped with coffee "caviar". I can still taste the amazing medley of flavors, textures and temperatures months later . I would love to try your version Randy! Also any news on the website? Will it be up soon? And please share more pics of the food if/when possible.

more coddled pork...or coddled potatoes or mushrooms or to saute veal or chicken in or to drizzle on toasted bread. Possibilities are endless .

The only possibility I can think of is that your dacquoise was underbaked. Did you bake long enough to get a little browning on the dacquoise? I seem to recall needing a bit more baking time than the book allotted. ← You defintily underbaked them. I made the dacquoise recipe from the book (see my cake on previous page) and it came out awsome, but when I took them out based on the time alotted by the recipe I could immediatly tell they needed more time, they were pale and soft. So I baked them till slightly browned and dry-ish.

I have another question: what kind of anchovies? regular jarred oil packed ones? Or the nice fat salt-packed anchovies? I used the recipe from Alford's and Duguid's baking book (using a yeatsed dough) and regular oil-packed anchovies. The only problem I had with the recipe is WAY TOO MUCH anchovies. I could not taste anything else. I will be making it again with less fish. So, I have those nice big salt-packed ones, should I use those? As for yeast, I only use the "instant" yeast (aka Breadmachine yeast) from Fleishmann's. Non of that foaming in water crap, just add to the dry ingredients, and you use less than half the amount of active dry AND the jar sells for the same price as active dry yeast.

I made a batch of confit about a week ago as well. They are currently maturing under their cooking fat. Today or tomorrow I will be packaging them and wrapping them tightly with some of the fat and freezing. I thought about leaving them in sterilized jars, but unfortunatly I have no fridge space and I am NOT leaving them at room temp in Houston . I used the traditional method and a crock pot. I will never make confit in any other vessel. The slow cooker maintained a perfect 206F all the way through. It is big enough to handle up to 10 pekin legs. Also it is a Godsend if, like me, you have a spouse who is ultra-sensitive to the smell of duck fat (she does not mind eating the finished dish though). I placed the crock pot in the garage and plugged it in. This means that the garage was filled with the wonderful garlicky-ducky aroma instead of the kitchen. I am hoping to use some of the confit for a Garbure soon. Richard- Sorry about the CM Muscovy duck legs! Here is a tip, buy the duck legs from your local Hong Kong Market. That's where I get mine. They sell excellent frozen pekin legs and for a lot cheaper than CM does. Only buy your fat at CM.

I have been meaning to go to Vieng Thai ever since I read the Walsh review. Since it is really out of my way I finally managed to head there with a friend for lunch today. I am so glad I did! This has to be the best recommendation Walsh (and Jason) ever gave out. We had the Pappaya salad, E-sarn sausage, Mussaman Curry and the stir fried pork belly with basil and beans. When the food came out we were under the impression that some of it will be leftovers for tonight's dinner. Instead everything was promptly devoured. The pork belly was amazing and as "lean" as pork belly gets with a wonderful crispy/chewy texture and a very exotic flavor. The Mussaman was not your typical goopy thick cloggy curry that tastes like peanut butter. It was more saucy with a good peanut flavor along with all the herbs and spices that go into a mussaman. I saved a portion of the salad till the end becuase it was so tart and refreshing. I am no thai food expert, but Vieng Thai IMO has the best in town. The menu at vieng is quiet lengthy compared with your typicall Thai joint with the four or five familiar dishes. Next time I really want to try the Coconut chicken soup and the larb.

I tried the classic hot chocolate and the caramelized cinnamon hot chocolate. Both were great, though I used a bit more sugar than the recipe called for. ← And I thought the "classic hot chocolate" was good! I made it everytime I wanted a cup of hot chocolate. However, after reading Patrick's recommnedation for the caramalized cinnamon one I gave it a try and it is out of this world. I had it 3 or 4 times over Xmas weekend. It is my current all time favorite.

What do you mean? ← I'm not sure. I was hoping someone would share my feeling and explain it better. It was just that storing the IB, along with all its attachments, taking it out, using it, washing it, and putting it away again seemed like a lot of bother to perform tasks I used to do otherwise with less fuss, even if not as quickly or completely. And although I'm not small by any means, (5'11' 175 lbs), it seemed large and awkward to use. I had the same problem with my electric knife, which I really only used to cut fresh bread. My new one was only slightly bigger than the one I replaced, but I didn't like the feel of it, so I put the motor and handle part away and just use the blades alone like a regular bread knife. SB (Maybe being left-handed has something to do with it?) ← I am pretty sure I will not be using the crappy attachments that came with mine, so these will be put away. The IB itself is as easy to store as a bottle of olive oil. A big advantage to it is not having to pour hot soup from the pot to the blender in batches. Just puree in the pot. Cleanup is a big plus over a blender or a food processor as well, just immerse the dirty end in soapy water and “blend”. It comes out squeaky clean. Store it back next to the bottle of olive oil . The Braun is no more than 12 -16 inches long, is that how big your IB is? Maybe you got one of those restaurant issue ones. I don’t mean to sound like an infomercial, but I really cannot understand the problem you are having with it.