BCarroll05

Results from March Madness, Round 1 (in which 3 American expats in Holland subject all the Belgian beers they can get their hands on to a systematic, rigorous blind taste-testing) Abbey-style Triples, Set 1: (in order from best to worst) Corsendonk Agnus This tasted typically "triple" - the faintest bit of sweet. It didn't have any of the off-characteristics of the next two, which were a close 2nd and 3rd but still very different from one another. Witkap-Pater Tripel The hoppiest of the four. Triple meets pale ale. C and P tasted pot. Hmmm... Leffe Tripel This most ubiquitous of the Belgian triples turned out surprisingly good. Triple meets Belgian wheat beer. Not too strong of a flavor. Refreshing. Val Dieu Triple Of the four today, this is the only beer actually abbey-brewed (and the only non-Trappist abbey-brewed beer in Belgium). The others may have some financial arrangement with an abbey (like Corsendonk) or just have an abbey-sounding name (like Witkap). Despite the authenticity of this beer, it came in a distant fourth. Tasted like socks. Dinner: Grilled Shad with Bearnaise Sauce (from Davidson's North Atlantic Seafood)

My fiancee and I just moved to Leiden and are very excited about cooking through your post. Could you recommend some good regional Dutch cookbooks? I know they will be in Dutch, but we are learning! Thanks -Brendan

I'm working on improving the Beauce Wikitravel page and would like to include some good restaurants, restaurants that are good in their own right, and restaurants likely to feature specialties of the province or even specialties local to Beauce. I've spent some time in Beauce, seen many sites and driven many backroads, but it was during my student days and so I generally fed myself on bread and cretons, eating only one restaurant in Saint-Georges that now I have forgotten. So please, give me a few good recommendations, a little blurb about the restaurant, what to expect, and I'll put it on the Wikitravel site. Thanks!! -Brendan

Any tips on restaurants open for dinner on Thankgiving in Chicago, in Lincoln Park or Old Town? -Brendan

I'd like to make a few German and Austrian pastries but am having trouble getting my hands on authentic quark. From what I understand, it's similar to farmer's cheese. Is it indistinguishable? I have also seen some recipes for quark online. If I went this route, would the homemade quark be significantly closer to quark than farmer's cheese? -Brendan

I come back to this cookbook again and again, trying to relive my summer of '05 hitchhiking around Hungary and tasting lots and lots of delicious pastries. Have made: Hungarian Walnut Roulades - wonderful Apricot Coffee Cake - so so Apple Strudel - with fresh picked apples, this was great Hazelnut Roulades with Mocha Cream - excellent, despite making it during a thunderstorm with the power going out midway through preparing Berry Meringue Slices Diostorte (Walnut Torte with Walnut-Custard Buttercream) Chocolate banana slices Farmer's Cheesecake (Topfentorte) Gerbeaud Slices (Gerbeaud Szelet) - by far my favorite and as good as I remembered Hungarian Chocolate Mousse Squares (Rigo Jancsi) Chocolate-Orange Cake Chocolate Cherry Roulade (Schokolade Kirschenroulade) -Brendan

Can anyone recommend a good authoritative cookbook on Tuscan food? I'm looking for something along the lines of Coleman Andrew's "Catalan Food" or Paula Wolfert's "Cooking of Southwest France" - full of authentic dishes and loads of detail on culinary history, ingredient guide, etc. Thanks! -Brendan