Dianabanana

I have done exactly this. There is a coffee shop near my office where I like to spend time every morning, but they don't stock the kind of tea I like. I bought a box of it and asked the manager if he would just keep it on the back shelf and sell me a cup of tea made from it every day. He wanted me to tell the cashiers just to charge me $0.51 for the water and cup, but I just let them charge me the full price. It's only a few dollars extra over the course of many weeks.

Holy cow! Thanks guys! Okay, so I'm all over Picasa, and I checked out the light box and the Lowel ego. I think the Lowel ego looks like the simplest solution for me as it doesn't require a bunch of setup. I'm very excited now! Thank you so much.

Thanks everyone, keep it coming! My camera is just a Canon PowerShot A520. I have no idea whether it can take an exterior flash, although the manual must be around here somewhere. I imagine it's easy enough to tell by looking at the camera if you know what to look for, so I guess I'll just take it into a camera shop and ask. I do have a little mini tripod. Here are two pictures to show you what I'm dealing with. The first was taken in the summer by the window. I think it looks okay. (If you're interested, it's grilled salmon with aioli, herbed rice, sauteed spinach, marinated bocconcini, cerignola olives, mini chocolate orange brownie, and almonds and dates.) The second was taken in the winter on the kitchen counter. This actually was a very colorful and appealing bento in real life but needless to say it looks quite unappetizing in the photo. (It's rice with black sesame and ume plum, tamagoyaki, cucumber and smoked salmon rolls, "chicken" nugget, miso peppers, those lightly pickled mixed vegetables that I can never remember the name of, and a strawberry.) My kitchen is horrible for food photography--all the surfaces are mostly different shades of gold. Is there something in particular I can do to counteract all the yellowness?

Okay, so I've been making bentos for my husband and myself almost every day for about a year. I take a picture of them every morning before packing them up, and the quality of the photos varies drastically depending on the weather. I don't have really good natural light anywhere in my house, and although I can get pretty good pictures by the sliding glass door in the warmer months, it's incredibly gray and dark in the mornings from late fall through early spring. In fact I never noticed just how gray and dark it is until I started this project. I want to stop hoping for good weather and start taking things into my own hands. I am willing to spend some money and time on this, but whatever I do has to meet the following criteria: 1. It has to be compact; i.e., no big cardboard boxes or other space-hogging equipment. I have a super tiny house and just don't have the room. 2. It has to be quick to assemble and disassemble. I want to be able to set it up, take the picture, then put it away and still make it to work on time. 3. It has to be utterly independent of any source of natural light. I really know nothing about photography, so anything you can tell me, no matter how basic, is bound to be helpful. I've looked through all the eGullet photography threads and didn't find anything on this particular situation, but if I missed it, feel free to point it out. Thanks!

My Googling thus far has revealed only Kolbeh and Caspian Grill. Is that really it for Persian restaurants here? If so, which one (if either) would you recommend?

My husband bought me something similar to the Herb-Savor for Christmas. To tell you the truth I kind of inwardly rolled my eyes--I'm pretty anti-gadget in general--but I'm amazed at how well it works! My previous method was to store them in the produce bag they came in until they turned into black liquid. This is much better.

Pffff. I'm a lawyer and virtually all of my many female friends are lawyers. We're all in our 30s and 40s, and we all like to cook. The notion that "empowerment" is contingent on lacking the skill to provide for your own most basic need is patently absurd.

That may be true for burgers, but I can attest that this strategy does reliably yield a dangerously hot, bursting-with-scalding-oil Filet-O-Fish.

Right--porkpa beat me to it. You order the Filet-O-Fish sans cheese--that way they have to make it fresh. And who wants cheese on their fish anyway? Add me to the list of those who as a child exclusively ordered FOF. What a discriminating bunch we are!

Yes, I notice it every time I have raw tuna. There's no denying that I have a distressingly good sense of smell and taste. I wish it weren't quite so keen. I wonder if it is the blood that I'm tasting. Good one, Helen!

Does mercury have a taste? I ask because although I have always loved sushi since I was a teenager, I've never been too crazy about tuna due what I perceive as a "metallic" taste. This can't be psychosomatic because I've been saying it since about 1984, when I don't think this mercury issue was well known, or at least not to me.

Wow, the Baggins family really gets around! Where's Mr. B these days?

No, you're not imagining it--it's that nasty food service plastic wrap that contaminates everything it touches. I can't tell you how many hunks of parmigiano reggiano I've had that were ruined by having been wrapped in that stuff. I always unwrap the cheese and put it in a Ziploc bag as soon as I get home. I definitely taste it in sandwiches that have been wrapped in that plastic, too. I don't ordinarily encounter baked goods wrapped in plastic, but I would imagine that buttery pastries would be particularly susceptible, since fats notoriously absorb odors.

Okay I'm about to make some khichdee, which is basically a porridge of moong dal and rice. Can I do this in the rice cooker on the congee setting? Will the moong dal clog it up and make a horrific mess? I rather suspect the answer is yes but am tempted to try it anyway.

Last week I made the chocolate/vanilla swirl poundcake, which was exactly what I expected (in a good way) and the Chocolate Chunkers. For anyone who hasn't made the chunkers yet, there's a serious salt component to them a la Korova cookies. I used kosher salt, but next time (if I can afford a next time--that's a lot of expensive chocolate!) I'll try fleur de sel.

I don't know if I'd ever actually had creamed spinach before, or just read about it, but I made it for the first time the other night and it was fantastic. What a wonderful comfort food.

I vote for "food geek." It conveys the level of obsessive interest but without the elitism, and doesn't make any boastful claims about ability in the kitchen. Besides, it's the only one I can imagine actually using to describe myself to a new acquaintance.

Heck, never mind the tea, I want to bring my own boiling water. I have never once in my life--never ONCE!--had a decent cup of black tea made with actual boiling water in a restaurant in this country. Never! I can reconcile myself to the Tazo black tea or whatever is on offer, but when I'm presented with a tea bag and a freezing cold porcelain cup and a little metal pitcher of piss-warm water, well, I just want to cry. ETA: Okay, I exaggerated. There actually are a lot of restaurants serving decent tea in plunger pots and those heavy Japanese iron pots (I forget what they're called). But what I want is just a regular cup of black tea, made with fresh boiling water, like I make in my own kitchen.

Yes, it goes bad, and pretty quickly, too. Best advice is to keep it in the refrigerator. It's "safe" to eat inasmuch as it won't give you food poisoning, but when fats go rancid they undergo changes that are not healthful. If I were you, I'd toss it. Why waste an opportunity to eat something good by eating something bad?

Cold poached salmon. I love the way it makes your teeth stick together when you chew. In fact, that particular sensation must be one of my favorite things in the whole world.

As soon as I saw this thread topic I thought of this recipe, but ludja beat me to it! It's very good.

I do most of my shopping at the co-op, which is right across the street from our office. My reward is always a Poco Dolce chocolate in burnt caramel with sea salt. They keep them on the counter at the cash register--resistance is futile. I must be crazy to publicly admit this, but when I'm at the regular grocery, my reward is a copy of US Weekly. Believe me, I know.

I know what Mr. Dianabanana's getting in his lunch next Halloween.

Regarding staleness, my husband has part of a bar of dark chocolate every morning with his breakfast, and the unused portion of the bar gets stored in a ziploc baggie. Woe betide the person who fails to zip the loc on his baggie!

YES YES YES!!! I love this dish and if you combine it with kim chee (loaded with Vit C) or a side dish of seaweed ...you have sweet synergy going on ...you can ask here at the Korean restaurants for them to use extra clams I have done that I love this thread I was just told about my blood count last week and still I am in shock ....am trying hard to do a mix of foods with the supplements ...and diet off the recent fat gain at the same time so thank you for starting this! ← This sounds good! Can anyone direct me to a recipe? Hummingbirdkiss, I didn't realize you had the iron deficiency right now--I thought you meant in the past. Well at least we have each other for company! I knew I was anemic for a long time before the test and had been eating a lot of spinach, clams, oysters, etc. I don't normally eat beef but I was also eating a lot of pho. My doctor said I should continue to take iron supplements until I hit menopause (i.e., stop menstruating), so I guess I will also be trying to eat a high-iron diet for the next 10-15 years.