blue_dolphin

Very interesting. Thanks for the link!

Thank you for sharing this. I look forward to hearing more. How long have you been growing grapes and making your own wines? Do you ever mix with purchased grapes or juice? Is this all done on your property? Do you own all this equipment or do you share with other growers? So many questions! Feel free to ignore if I'm being too nosey!

hummingbirdkiss, the green smoothie is a good choice to fuel your work day but I was sure you'd be having jook with an egg on it for breakfast! I know others have mentioned this but please do think about starting a thread to share your kitchen remodel. I've really enjoyed it when others have done the same. I had an early AM dentist appointment, followed by errands that included a stop at Trader Joe's where I picked up a box of frozen pumpkin waffles. I tarted one of them up à la rotuts for a late morning breakfast treat: Pumpkin waffle topped with goat cheese, fig butter (warmed and thinned with a few drops of rum) and walnuts. All from TJ's. Plus coffee and some grapes.

Old thread, I know but just yesterday, I followed a recommendation in it so I thought I'd follow up. In spite of the 90+ degree temps we've been having lately, my CSA box had items like collards, turnips and mizuna that I usually associate with cooler weather. Not in the mood for my usual hearty beans and greens dishes so I searched up this thread and in post # 3 above I found a recommendation for this collard green olive pesto. I only had about 1 lb of collards so I added the turnip greens, cooked separately. I included some extra olives, a handful of walnuts and, as I usually do with pesto, a squeeze of fresh lemon juice. I posted a picture of my pasta supper over on the dinner thread where I mentioned that I was concerned that a pesto made from cooked greens would turn into a dull green slime. That was not the case - the walnuts and olives gave it a good texture and the olive flavor comes through nicely. The recipe made quite a bit so I put half in the freezer. I'll certainly make this again when I'm deluged with greens!

Pasta with collard green olive pesto, shrimp, red bell pepper and feta: I was worried that making a pesto with cooked greens would result in green slime. It's smoother than my usual pesto but the olives and walnuts add enough texture to avoid any sense of slime. I'll make it again.

Pasta with asparagus, garlic, lemon and guanciale: Last week, my brother was in town and we stopped for lunch at a new-ish pizza place. I ordered the "carbonara" which arrived with about a quart of molten mascarpone/pecorino sauce, thick slices of guanciale that appeared never to have been exposed to any sort of heat, and a pretty much raw egg all atop a paper thin crust. I'm all for a very runny yolk but I'd prefer the white to be at least somewhat set. If they'd used about 1/10th the amount of cheesy sauce, I think the guanciale and egg might have cooked a bit. Since I didn't eat much, they automatically boxed it up for me. Like it was going to get better??? I removed all the guanciale, rinsed off the sauce, diced it and crisped it up for this pasta.

Ah, thanks for the derivation. I always thought it was like 'pipe dope' that would always be in a plumber's tool kit so you'd always want to keep 'toast dope' on hand in the kitchen!

OK. I have now increased my vocabulary and I am laughing at myself as well. Batticarne? What's this? Some sort of culinary battering ram? With all the talk of stew and champ, my mind was in the British Isles and I had visions of andiesenji whaling away at the meat with a big old shillelagh or fierce Scottish war club! No. Batticarne = meat pounder. Just as it says. If I'd only gone to the romance languages first .

Thanks, Smithy! I have a Valencia tree in my yard and I think they have great flavor. I haven't given it as much water as it would like and have only a few, very small green fruits so I'm appreciating the CSA box fruit we're getting. I'm hoping my tree will recover if we get some decent rain this winter. Saticoy melon, lime and blackberry: ~ 3.5 cups melon, 2 oz fresh lime juice, 2 oz homemade lime cordial, 2 oz homemade limecello plus fresh blackberries The Saticoy melon was very sweet so the lime cordial and limecello added enough sweetness. I think a regular cantaloupe would call for a bit of simple syrup. Edited: missing word

Sorta lunch, sorta brunch…. Asparagus and smoked salmon quiche: With a melon/tomato/feta/mint salad and toasted ciabatta: Garnished the salad with a few blackberries and added a glass of methode rotuts:

Thank you for bringing this up. It's on here today @ 3:30 PM (KLCS) and I'll be watching!

I'll call these Orange Negroni pops: I juiced 2 cups worth of fresh oranges from my CSA box and added 4 oz of that Negroni "marinade" that was leftover from the orange slices I tried above. I really like these. They taste like I'd hoped the orange slices would. With all the orange juice, they don't absolutely scream "Negroni!" but the flavor is there.

I love this question and Manhattans too. Many of the "highball" type cocktails I've had taste watered down so I'm curious what an ace bartender would serve based on your question. I am certainly not an ace nor a bartender but my first thoughts were along the lines of the previous recommendations. I first thought of a Dark & Stormy. Like the G&T, it's a simple, 2 ingredient drink where both the base spirit and mixer offer a lot of flavor and it's tasty over a range of concentrations, particularly with a zippy ginger beer. The dark rum has some of the warming characteristics of the rye in a Manhattan and like the drinks that Craig E and JAZ mentioned, the mixer contributes flavor and not just dilution. My second thought was something with Campari, like the Jasmine that cdh recommended because the flavor is strong enough to tolerate some dilution. I first thought of an Americano (equal parts Campari and sweet vermouth, topped with club soda) but on a hot day, I've also made a Negroni into a tall drink along those lines and enjoyed it quite a bit. Plain old Campari and orange juice (extended with club soda or not) would be another option. I'm curious to hear more ideas and what you think of them.

Looks great! And I enjoyed the sneak peek of your cookbook shelf, too!

Yes, a homemade or purchased (TJ's) cold-brewed coffee concentrate were options I considered and I think they'd be good. I was sort of using up leftovers with my brewed coffee and instant packets……as my grandmother used to say, "trying to make a dollar out of 98 cents." Edited to fix grammar

Those Vietnamese iced coffee pops are good and it would be easy to scale the recipe to make just a few. I wanted to make a swirl or layer that would be milkier, like it is in a glass of the real thing but I had to run out to meet a friend and ended up just pouring it all in the molds. I do have the rest of the can of condensed milk in the fridge so further experiments could happen. And I think the leftover Negroni "marinade" will find its way into a popsicle some day .

I think btbyrd captured the essence of the place and as Lisa pointed out, there's likely a lot of frozen, pre-cooked food. Sadly, I live in a land of chain restaurants and have a Lazy Dog outlet very close by. I have friends who like it because they can bring their dogs (patio only). I haven't eaten there. I assumed it's like the Applebees that I visited while traveling with family. My quesadilla was delivered without guacamole and the server told me that they could get me some but that it would take "a really long time to thaw out the paste." Yeah, I know that's what I get for going there but still, no thank you to "the paste!"

Hot here again. 103 deg F today so 2 more popsicle variations. First up are the Vietnamese Iced Coffee pops for Anna N. These are good and very easy. Just 2 ingredients: 2 cups (500 ml) extra strong coffee plus 2/3 cup (160 ml) sweetened condensed milk. I used leftover regular drip brewed coffee which was fairly strong but David said the coffee "should be chest hair-raisingly strong" so I supplemented with 2 packets of Starbucks instant Italian roast coffee - free samples that had been hanging around in my cupboard for some time (best by date = Aug 2010 ). I was lazy and just weighed 160 gm of the sweetened condensed milk into the coffee without bothering to look up the density (1.29 g/ml) and calculating that I should have weighed 206 gm so they are a bit less sweet (29% less) than they should have been. However, they taste fine and pack a serious caffeine hit. I'm feeling pretty hyper at the moment and will ration them to 1 per day. Next, I tried a recipe for Negroni Orange Popsicles from the LA Times. Basically, orange slices are soaked in a sweetened Negroni and then frozen on a stick. The picture online looked appealing but my result was less so. Here are the orange slices in their Negroni bath: Drained and sticks inserted, ready for the freezer: The 3 slices with the holes in the center are from a large navel orange. The other is from a smaller Valencia orange. And after freezing: These taste OK but I suspect a longer time or maybe a vacuum infusion would get more Negroni into the slices as the flavor was much stronger on the periphery of the slices compared with the centers. The frozen orange slices were hard (not surprising really ) and the navel oranges tended to break apart along the membranes. The frozen membranes were unpleasantly chewy, more pronounced in the navel oranges. I don't think I will bother to perfect these.

I don't drink milk either and find evaporated milk a useful pantry staple to keep on hand. Many brands of evaporated milk in the US also contain a bit of carrageenan that adds useful thickening properties in a dish like this.

Oh yes, please do continue. I loved reading along last time. I really enjoy visiting markets and I sadly plan lovely meals I can't possibly cook in a hotel so it was a treat to read about your experiences in Venice that incorporate the meals you prepared with local produce and dining with a "local" perspective as well.

Oh dear, Condolences on your dearly departed Eva Zeisel plate. I love her work and the Harlequin pieces are lovely. Good luck in sleuthing down a replacement!

A recent NYT article might be relevant to this discussion: Restaurants Take the Din Out of Dining From the article, "...Some diners will always be drawn to places where the music seems to be coming from the main stage at Coachella and dialogue proceeds at the sore-throat volume one would expect on a battlefield…." "This seems to be a real trend with the restaurant people we’re talking to,” Ms. Meyer (co-owner of Meyer Sound, which develops systems to fine tune acoustic environments) said. “The idea is to make a really comfortable environment.” "...Bay Area restaurants have noticed that such a granular level of acoustic comfort entices diners to stay longer, drink more and spend extra money…" The article says acoustic treatments can, "cost anywhere from the high five figures to half a million dollars," but they also refer to more low tech solutions such as an observation that a particular knife had a tendency to fall off plates being cleared and generated significant clatter. Solution - train servers not to drop knives Really! In reference to Ken Friedman of the Spotted Pig, "Originally, he wanted to lure people through the front door with the promise of a high-volume happening; now he’s more concerned with making sure they come back, and acoustic restraint plays a part in that. Toning down the din, he has discovered, has its pleasures. “It just gets to the point where I’m sick of yelling,” he said."

This thread has been making me crazy trying to figure out what I did with this thing as I'd sort of like to give it another try. I recall (and Amazon confirms) that I bought the Fasta Pasta back in early 2009. At the time, my stove was very underpowered and it took forever to boil a pot of water so I thought this might be handy. My recollection is that it worked OK however my microwave was as underpowered as the stove and it took a lot longer than the time estimated. The bigger issue was that I found it much more cumbersome to open the microwave, get the thing out, fish out a piece of pasta to taste and repeat those steps until it's right than it is to do the same on the stovetop. I'm sure if I was willing to go through the learning curve (and record my data in an appropriate laboratory notebook ), I'd find times that would work for some common shapes and develop enough familiarity to get the time right without as much trial and error. However, I really enjoy trying different brands and shapes and found a lot of variability in cooking times so this seemed like too much of a nuisance. Also, when preparing a pasta dish, I often use the microwave to steam vegetables, defrost a cube of pesto or sun dried tomato paste, etc. so having it occupied by the pasta wasn't helpful. I'm now living in a different house, with a different microwave and would consider giving it another go…..if only I could find it . I suspect I utilized the handy rectangular shape and it's being used as a drawer organizer somewhere! Edited to add: My microwave was one of the above the stove units so the above pasta testing steps involved reaching up to remove and replace a steaming and boiling water-filled unit from almost above my head so that contributed to my opinion. That said, I can certainly understand it being worth the time investment to become comfortable with its use in better ergonomic situations like the one that Andie described.

Ditto the above! It's fun to see and I can only imagine how glorious all of this must smell!

Pumpkin walnut cookies are one of my favorites. And that Dorie Greenspan holiday bundt cake (includes an optional maple glaze) is nice, even if Labor Day isn't quite the holiday for it! I like pumpkin smoothies too but they're not baked ! Edited to fix typo