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I stopped by Total Wine and stocked up for Réveillon season: They were out of the Clear Creek Pear Brandy I usually get but I have enough left that I can compare it with this German bottle. Tasting them neat, the Clear Creek tastes more of ripe pear and the German brandy has more of a green pear flavor. I suspect it will be fine in the cocktail though. I like the Réveillon with Carpano Antica, the Punt e Mes is more of a general restock.

Steven Colbert hosted José Andrés recently on The Late Show and their cooking segment featured a couple of dishes using Thanksgiving leftovers - a cranberry cocktail and turkey croquetas. Here's a link in case anyone wants to try them - have your liquid nitrogen handy! I usually find Colbert annoyingly silly in these segments but Andrés was in fine form and matched him at each step. It's pretty funny. Edited to add: Here's the first part of the interview where he talks a bit more about World Central Kitchen and Thanksgiving, too.

Leftover pasta with slivered sugar snap peas and pancetta from Six Seasons with a poached egg on top

I've made it before and I'll make it again. First, a new batch of the Cacio e Pepe butter p 34 to use in the Pasta alla Gricia with Slivered Sugar Snap Peas p 123. Love the way the peas and pasta have a similar shape but separate textures - tender-crisp peas with slightly chewy pasta and crisp little pancetta nuggets to add an extra contrast.

This post should get you there

Indeed! I signed up for Prime a few years back when my ~90 year old mom was getting frustrated with shopping. She was sharp as a tack and a safe driver but making her way across an icy parking lot only to find that the item she wanted was out of stock was very annoying. For me, a few thousand miles away, it was priceless to be able to order and tell her that item would be delivered in a couple of days. Sadly, I don't need that particular aspect of the service anymore but I've gotten rather accustomed to it for myself!

I understand. It wasn't awful or anything but together, they made it little too salty for me and kind of overwhelmed the pear.

Amazon does list all their deals in one place. And you can sort them by category. Unfortunately, there are tons of them to sift through. Some are good deals and others not so much. http://www.thewirecutter.com can be helpful to finding deals on items they've previously rated. My vintage 2011 iPad is getting clunky and I knew that was something I wanted to look for. One of their updates showed a decent early Black Friday price at Best Buy and tipped me off to an additional discount "member price"

Inspired by this post from a couple of weeks back I made a batch of roasted onions with balsamic vinegar and sage They became the bottom layer in this pizza al taglio with pears, bacon and blue cheese I should have used either the bacon or blue cheese. It didn't really need both. On the plate with a salad of arugula, persimmon, pomegranate and toasted almonds with a pomegranate vinaigrette

I had a tuna salad sandwich in a pita bread with bread and butter pickles on the side. No photo because I can't manage good photos of stuff inside pitas. Also, I was hungry. I've now moved on to dessert. Two corn sablés with my coffee. The front one is upside down because I was still hungry and picked it up for a quick bite.

And I've got that one in Modernist Cuisine at Home!

I ordered from RC Willey. It did include the mat. Included instructions were fairly minimal: a tri-fold red "quick start" card, a temperature card and a 12 page manual that's not particularly detailed. Do go through all the packing materials carefully as I know there was some part that I almost threw away because I thought it was part of the packaging.

I'm so conflicted about this. That price is still holding for now. I have it in my cart. I've coveted Modernist Cuisine since it came out and the price hasn't been this low since 2013 so it's a good buy. I use my cookbooks regularly but the "master tomes" with recipes for everything aren't what I currently gravitate to. I'm not a modernist cook and am more drawn to books that are framed in a personal point of view.. Would I really use these books? For $379, I could buy a lot of other books. What do to? What to do?

A couple of Trader Joe's potato pancakes, heated from frozen in the CSO and served with sour cream and David Lebovitz's cranberry chutney. Plus a glass of sparkling wine, (Trader Joe's Reserve Brut Rosé North Coast) not pictured. For me, the charm of potato pancakes is in the lacy edges which are understandably lacking here but they're not bad.

@Duvel, that spread looks amazing! I'd be most pleased with a birthday feast like that....if I can skip the crown featuring my advanced age! This morning, I followed @Anna N's lead and made the Fatoot Samneh that she posted about here the other day. It might not look like much but it's exceedingly delicious. I had some nice homemade, whole grain pita bread but I think any sort of pita would become crispy and delicious when fried in a generous amount of ghee. Definitely a more than the sum of its parts dish. I had my doubts about the suggested topping of honey but I added a drizzle of Mike's Hot Honey to a corner of my plate and called that bite my dessert. Not bad.

I bought mine at the same local mill where I get the coarser stuff I use for polenta. It is certainly finer than the polenta stuff, but still with a noticeable grit. I went ahead and sifted enough for another batch with a mesh strainer, giving the coarse bits an extra grind in my old whirly-blade coffee grinder until they were fine enough to pass through. Dorie recommended the Bob's Red Mill corn flour for these cookies but I don't want to buy more corn stuff. I'll save that expense and perhaps invest it in some cultured butter as Dorie says they use at Poilâne 🙃

A slice & bake version of Poilâne's Corn Sablés. The recipe appears in Apollonia Poilâne’s new book, “Poilâne, The Secrets of the World-Famous Bread Bakery.” I used the recipe that Dorie Greenspan wrote about in the NYT: A Cookie Inspired by American Cornbread, Perfected in a French Bakery. Instead of rolling the dough and using a 2" inch cutter, I shaped it into 2" diameter logs. Dorie describes the corn flour called for as, "a type of cornmeal so finely milled that you can barely feel the grain’s grit." I purchased corn flour but it must be a more coarsely ground product as my cookies have a slightly gritty texture. I don't mind it, but I might try sifting the corn flour next time to see if that makes a difference. On the other hand, she also says that sablé means sandy so maybe the texture is as it should be, though mine do look a bit more coarse than the article photo does. Either way, I like them - buttery, sandy and not too sweet.

@Anna N, that Fatoot Samneh sounds really good. Did you try the suggestion of putting honey on it? I was going to make it today but decided to stick with my original plan. I did take a pita out of the freezer so it will be ready for tomorrow. Or maybe lunch🙃 Today's breakfast was Instant Pot polenta, CSO steam-roasted asparagus and fried duck egg, each layer anointed with the Double Mushroom Butter from Six Seasons.

I know you are wanting to source the real deal but Karin on Brot & Bread opines that roggenmehl typ 997 is similar to the white rye flour that can be purchased from King Arthur. Might do in a pinch. She also says that the King Arthur medium rye is similar to roggenmehl typ 1370 and the two can be mixed together to approximate roggenmehl typ 1150. Too bad you missed your opportunity to have @Duvel hand a packet off on his recent EWR layover......edited to add: what could ever be suspicious about a kilo or two of white powder????

Growing up, we got Pop-Tarts maybe once a year or so. Maybe it was a sale or a coupon because we were each allowed to pick a flavor. And I always picked the Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon, too!

OK, I'll bite. What were your all measuring cups occupied with? And why was your scale unavailable?

I have to say that I also didn't think it a complete disaster at first glance. The cheese looked warm and melty, the eggs like they might have a goo-ey yolk and the bread or roll looked nicely toasted with holes that all suggested a crisp exterior and chewy crumb. But since @liamsaunt described it as "sad," I believed her and figured that her amazing photography skills might make most anything look marvelous!

Well, you're on vacation, so there's that 🙃!

I'd compare it to feta but a bit more dry and dense

My former boss advised following this maxim: "When traveling, eat early and eat often," when on business travel. @Duvel may be following the corollary that applies to drink ,