Katie Meadow

When I moved to the west coast a million years ago I was shocked at the shape of the butter. The truth is, a standard east coast butter dish, of which there are millions and millions in this world, holds a stick of California shaped butter with no problem. Yes, the CA stick is short, but so is your life. Especially if you are eating a lot of butter!) I like using a simple covered butter dish, glass, so I can see how much butter is left with just a glance into the fridge. Covering butter seems to protect it from refrigerator odors. Cheap is good; butter dishes get handled several times a day, and they do get dropped once in a while, so I would not use anything valuable on a regular basis. My suggestion is to go on eBay and get a nice classic mid-century style for a few dollars. Or get whatever one looks like what you think a butter dish should look like.

No fanatic here, but I do rinse my dishes fairly well before they go in to the DW. It isn't because I don't think my new DW can't handle a bit of crud. It's because it takes 48 hours to get a full load at our house, and I find the dishes start to smell, especially ones with dairy products. Since I load as I go, I really don't like smelling something icky every time I open the door.

So much candy, so little time. And so many threads about it. But really, isn't most commercial candy pretty awful? I've always had a soft spot for chocolate Necco wafers (the other flavors not so much); I can think of a lot of candy worse than that. And jujubes have their place: my dentist uses them to sproing out temporary crowns. Really! I'm in the camp that says tic tacs are not candy. Candy should never claim to be anything but candy. Without thinking about it too much, Raisinets come to mind as a candy I wouldn't eat no matter how desperate. Horrid texture as well as incomprehensible flavors. I've never eaten a peep, but I am pretty sure they give Raisinets a run for the money.

I'm with Carlton. I pretty much have a loading plan, so I rinse and load as I go and typically don't have to do much rearranging at the end. We probably dirty relatively few dishes, since we no longer have a kid at home and tend to hand-wash large mixing bowls and pots, pans etc. If I don't wash my measuring cups (at least when creating a new load) I always need them again; never fails. Piling up dirty dishes in the sink would be gross, especially since we usually do one load every two days, or not even. We must not be very adventurous eaters, because we typically use about the same percentages of bowls, plates, flatware, etc every few days.

I've heard that milk makes eggs tender, and water makes them tough, so I add just a smidge of milk or cream. Anyone else ever hear this? Growing up my dad always added water at the beginning, and then cooked the eggs very fast in brown butter. Not bad, but not tender, either.

I'm guilty, I know, of making remarks about the high prices at some farmers' markets. I don't shop the Ferry Building in SF. I do sometimes shop the Berkeley Farmers' market and sometimes the Oakland/Chinatown farmers' market. The difference in prices between those two farmers' markets is staggering. Surely the prices reflect a lot of variables: size of the farm, methods of farming, organic or not, type of merchandise. Of course my bags of groceries will cost five times as much in Berkeley if I am buying charcuterie, grass fed whatever, organic avocadoes, organic baby collards, etc., while in Oakland I am buying gigantic bunches of Thai basil or other Asian greens. Last August I was buying peaches in Berkeley for $5-6 lb. At the Oakland market they were half that price. Sometimes the fruit was good, sometimes not nearly as good as from my favorite seller in Berkeley. I shop the Berkeley Farmers' market mainly May through October. I'm willing to pay premium prices for fabulous lettuces, corn, tomatoes, stone fruits, okra and fresh edamame. The baby collards are $2 for a small bunch. Certain supermarket items can never compare in quality to these things, even if that supermarket is Berkeley Bowl, where I can get a four times the weight in collards for the same price, but they are older and leathery. Meanwhile I do not in any way assume that any of the small organic farmers are taking much profit. Farming is a hard life, even if you are a wall-street drop out. I think a pretty long-term study is needed to really get an overview of pricing and value, and it probably varies widely across the country. Otherwise I agree we are comparing apples to oranges.

The paper bag technique makes me anxious and I have never had great success with it. I get the best results (and the fewest unpopped kernels) with stovetop popping and fresh high-quality corn. I have an old copper-bottom Revere ware pan that does a fine job. Some of the best popcorn I ever had came from the farmer's market, sold by a farm that grows delicious organic corn. And I have given up shaking, except that right after the corn goes in I give the pan a good roll to make sure all the kernels get coated. My theory is that if you don't shake, the popped kernels stay on top and the unpopped kernels remain on the bottom in contact with the heat until they pop. But I do have a question: what kind of oil are you all using? I used to always use corn oil, because it made sense, but then I tried peanut oil and it didn't make a discernible difference. Does anyone use olive oil?

For snacking I usually want a cracker-like object, savory or salty, often accompanied by tea, if the weather is cool. Right now I'm partial to something called Raincoast Crisps, available at Whole Foods and one other place I shop more routinely. There are a half dozen flavors, but the only one that appeals to me is the "original," which is seedy, nutty and simple. The others sound awful to me, frankly, so I've never tried them; they have various fruits and nuts in them and must be fairly sweet. Fussy. Another cracker I love is the Stonewall Kitchen Simply White. Also very plain. Their other varieties include Seasalt and Asiago. When I have no crackers or I am actually hungry, I pop corn and top it with gray salt and a little grated pecorino. That can easily replace a meal, especially in the evening when accompanied by something tall and alcoholic. Maui sweet onion potato chips, Cheetos and Trader Joe's Root Veg chips are weaknesses, and I just have to limit those purchases. I go through them so fast it's a total waste of money.

I spend an inordinate amount of time hanging out in the kitchen and often don't wear my watch while I am cooking or reading the paper or whatever, so having a big analog wall clock is essential; that would be a Nelson Ball Clock (not an original) which looks great in our sixties-ish kitchen, but is very impractical since it collects exactly what kind of dirt you would suspect in a kitchen and needs to be wiped periodically. My advice about kitchen clocks: get one that's easy to clean. Love that red and white clock.

Doesn't her accent and delivery remind you of a certain SNL character created by Gilda Radner?

Poorly designed websites abound, whether complex or simple, but the choice to use music always amazes me. Don't many of us surf while others are working near by? When the music comes on I exit really fast, way before I ever get to see the menu. Surely more customers are lost that way than not. At least give us a chance to reject the menu.

I didn't know there was a rule about fish and cheese, but I have to admit it isn't a mix that I usually find appealing. For instance I'm not wild about seafood risottos. Also I would never sprinkle parmesan or any hard cheese on a linguini dish with mussels or clams. I can think of two exceptions off the bat: one is a tuna melt, but I find a little cheese goes a long way there. The other is one of my weaknesses from a Mexican restaurant near where I shop, and that's what they call a crispy shrimp taco. Some kind of gooey white cheese is down at the bottom along with the shrimp and it really works. Still more unappealing to me is the combo of fish and mushrooms. That sets my teeth on edge.

Sriracha? Is your main very spicy and Asian style? A nice light Asian slaw with cabbage, julieneed daikon and/or green papaya (if you have access to it) cilantro, lime juice, etc. If your main isn't very spicy, then you could add some hot pepper flakes to the slaw to liven it up. Easy, clean, lots of texture.

Soba, beautiful as always. I suspect I would eat anything you make, happily. Define minestrone. Is it just vegetable soup in Italian? If I make a seasonal multi-vegetable soup with some beans, some pasta, some dark leafy greens like chard or black kale, and at least a little bit of fresh or canned tomato I might call it Minestrone. I typically use a chicken based stock. If instead of beans and/or pasta I add barley or rice or couscous I probably would not call it Minestrone. I make a chard and vegetable soup with noodles and use harissa for flavoring, and that sometimes has a little tomato if it's summer, but in the winter, not. So that can't be called Minestrone. But truthfully, I am clueless about what qualifies.

I like emptying out the dishwasher and seeing clean stacks of plates, cabinets of clean glassware, etc. Things I don't like doing: Cleaning radishes, rinsing and drying lettuce, de-veining shrimp and prepping fresh artichokes. That last one takes lots of time and you have to be vigilant not to get poked and stuck in a variety of ways. Plus all the lemon squeezing that needs to be done by hand to keep the cut pieces from getting brown, to say nothing of having to fish the quarters out of ice water. Thing is, they are so good sauteed up crispy.

Once my dentist described to me the amount of restoration needed in the mouth of one fifteen year old Jolly Rancher addict I never touched another one. Just saying! On topic: I agree that Cheetos dust is irresistible, and I will always love it, all the more so since I don't allow myself to have it very often. However, I don't feel the same about packaged mac & cheese products; they all seem repulsive to me. Is the sweet onion flavor in Maui chips artificial? I also like that. Anyone tasted their kid's anti-biotic liquid Augmentin? That's the pinnacle of artificial banana flavor, if you go for that sort of thing. And don't worry, your kid doesn't need the full dose, so feel free. I don't even like real bananas.

I can't imagine lugging my containers to the store, given they are mostly all glass. But I do re-use the basic plastic vegetable and bulk food bags, at least the ones that aren't messed up. When the farmers' market abandoned all plastic bags that became a necessity, and now I find that recycling them for bulk dry goods works as well. As soon as I come home I transfer the contents into their appropriate jars and again, save whatever bags remain tolerably clean. I do take my bottle when I go for olive oil; they know how much weight to subtract for a standard size wine bottle. If they don't, they will weight the bottle before I fill it. I use a tight fitting cork, and then when I get home I switch it out to a bottle pour spout. We re-use double paper shopping bags until they disintegrate, and we have a variety of canvas bags as well. I try hard to keep a few empty bags in the car at all times for unexpected excursions, but I'm not always successful. I have a hard time knowing exactly what I'll do when no plastic bags exist, if that happens, but so it goes.

I just tried the above Martinez variation with my recently acquired bottle of Bonal Gentiane-Quina and it's very good. I used a 2:1 ratio and a lemon twist and it does not taste sweet. Sounds nice. What kind of bitters did you use? Last night I tried a 1:1 rye and bonal with orange bitters over ice. Since it was a very warm evening it was pretty refreshing. I'd like to try 2:1 gin/bonal next. Don't have any maraschino...what should I add? I did try one drink using the Fee bros rhubarb bitters, since that really tastes more cherry, but it was not nearly as good as using orange bitters. I'm coming to the conclusion that the rhubarb bitters was a minor waste of money. It's about the same price as my favorite chocolate bar... Gotta say, love this Bonal Gentiane-Quina.

I have little experience buying in bulk at Whole Foods, but if the product is good that might mitigate some of the negatives (namely price) discussed on a recent thread. We routinely shop Berkeley Bowl, and some of the bulk items are great, but others are not. The cornmeal from Bob's made noticeably better cornbread than the bulk stuff at the Bowl. Bob's buckwheat, semolina and graham flours seem better than bulk flours. King Arthur Flour is always better than bulk AP flour or WW. The dark red kidney beans from Purcell Mountain Farms are far and away better than any bulk ones I have tried. I've never had any bulk basmatti rice I like as much as the packaged Lundberg. No bulk organic or otherwise roasted peanuts seem as good as the blistered ones from Trader Joe's. Steel-cut bulk oats are not as good as Pinhead in the can, but they are a lot cheaper, so during an oatmeal phase I do buy them in bulk. I guess I care less about my oatmeal than I do about rice. On the other hand, the bulk dried fruit from the Bowl is quite good, and so is the bulk organic popcorn as well as various flakes and cereals. And my upscale market where I shop for some specialty items has a very good deal on bulk olive oil, so I'm now using that exclusively. Generally I would say that buying in bulk really depends on the source and freshness of the product, and that quality (or freshness) is not necessarily related only to turnover. Berkeley Bowl has incredibly high turnover, but some of the bulk foods just don't measure up.

I recently was served a Martinez consisting of Old Tom gin, Bonal-Gentiane, maraschino and bitters. I don't know what the proportions were, but I am guessing it might have been 1:1. It was on the sweet side, and listed on the menu as an Aperitif. It was very nice, and the herbal flavor of the bonal was distinct. I might be inclined to try 2:1 gin to bonal, since I'm not generally inclined toward really sweet drinks. Any suggestions for using my new bottle of Bonal-Gentiane? I plan to try subbing it for the sweet vermouth in a rye Manhattan. We don't exactly have a well-stocked bar; there's gin, 2 kinds of rye, cointreau, orange and angostura bitters (and rhubarb bitters, which tastes more like cherry to me) and a few other things.

If you put matzoh in a frittata you'd have a Brei Pie. If you added browned onions and leftover nova, then you might have....a Loxattata?

We almost never eat in the car, except maybe some candy or small snacky things. Like Maggie, for long trips we travel with a big ice chest and pack lots of sandwiches, cheese, fruit, utensils, etc., and typically just water to drink. Admittedly we don't usually take road trips during cold and rainy seasons (well, on the west coast there is actually a dry season), but we always look for a picnic table and a bathroom, which usually means a rest stop on an interstate or some type of small-town park that's easy to get to from the road. Every so often there's a surprisingly nice spot. I need the break, and I enjoy my food a lot more when I'm not moving.

Yes, I'm guilty of referring to it as Whole Paycheck, although the truth is I almost never shop there except when visiting my mom in NY, since it is the closest large store to her apt. We're in car country here I'm afraid, and the extra 10 minutes it takes to drive to Berkeley Bowl is worth it, considering it is our main weekly shopping trip. It's easy to make assumptions about value based on too small a sample of products. I'm guessing that any large market that counts on relatively upscale clientele and in addition devotes so much square footage to prepared dishes is going to come at a price. In addition, I'm not the primary shopper in the house, my husband is. He never goes to WF and he thinks everything is cheap compared to the Berkeley farmers' market. It would be interesting to note some actual comparison prices. My sense has always been that produce especially is priced high at WF. I had some very minor shopping errands to run this morning, including one that necessitated a trip to WF. Before going to WF however, I needed a few things at my closest carniceria. Poblanos--smelling spicy and looking fresh--at the Mexican grocery cost .85 per lb. I also paid 1.99 for a half gallon of Berkeley Farms milk there, which is good quality milk but not organic. At WF the poblanos were 2.99 lb, smelled like nothing and were not as fresh. How much does a half gallon of milk cost at WF? I forgot to check. The next time my husband treks to Berkeley Bowl I'm going have him price some specific items.

Okay then, what about down and dirty Atlanta? Holes in the wall, cheap hot spots, legendary funky places, carts, wagons, farmers' markets, etc? My daughter will be going to grad school at Emory starting in August. Considering how little grant money seems to be available at grad schools these days, Michelin stars are not going to be an option--not that they are now anyway. After five years of visiting her in Walla Walla, this will really be a culture shock, since I don't believe I have ever been in any state that could be considered southeastern, at least within memory.

I like to use a full tablecloth to protect my table when having a dinner party. I find I worry less. I don't use expensive linen and I don't use white; something with a busyish pattern hides most minor mishaps that don't wash out. A couple of hems in a cotton tablecloth is about all the sewing I'm up to, anyway. Much cheaper than buying a ready-made one. For special occasions I like to use a centerpiece, but fun ones that kids can enjoy are the best. I have a large low glass bowl, and I would give my daughter the job of decorator. She would put colored glass stones in the bottom, fill with water, plastic fish, floating glass donuts to hold flowers and floating candles--whatever was available. In the low light of a dinner party it always looks better than you imagine. Duck candles always seem to be a hit as they melt in bizarre ways.