Katie Meadow

Darienne, yes, I did make that up on the spot. I'm impressed with myself. My nephew just moved to a new apartment and has virtually nothing. I've been thinning out so I can give him some stuff as well as make some room on my shelves. I realized there are several cooking vessels that I use exactly once a year if then, and only for one specific dish. It's been interesting to question whether I really need those things, or if something else can fill in. Mostly the answer is no, nothing else will do. Aah, stuff.

With the exception of tomatoes, food preserved in jars tastes better to me than the same stuff in cans. Heartsurgeon, you might try Annalisa ceci in the jar. I find them tastier and less tinny than any canned chick peas. Same goes for tahini if you are making hummus. The tahini in jars like Sadaf or Middle East brands seem far superior than tahini in a can; the consistency is softer, it doesn't need to be mixed nearly as much as the canned stuff does. I've also found that buying tahini from a store that specializes in mid-east ingredients and has a higher turnover results in fresher tahini, as well as more options.

What exactly is a casserole pan? I take it most of us mean a pan that is a lot wider than it is deep. Over time I have acquired four pans that I think of like that, all of which are different but useful sizes. They have sides that vary from about 3 inches to 4 inches. Three are rectangular, one is oval. The oval one is the deepest, and it is pyrex. Traditionally I have used it for eggplant parm, but only because it's easier to snuggle round slices into a curved edge and because my eggplant parm tends to be a little deeper than my lasagne. The giant rectangular one is Creuset enamel cast iron. It weighs about a thousand pounds but it's a thing of beauty. I don't look forward to a time when I can't carry it fully loaded. The next one down is glazed porcelain, Emile Henry style but I don't think it's Emile Henry as I don't remember it being pricey. The smallest one is another Creuset, very old, with funny metal handles that I purchased used on eBay. It's adorable, too small for lasagne, but perfect for mac 'n' cheese for two or three with one serving of leftovers. When it comes to something like lasagne, I've never noticed that the enameled cast iron and the clay turn out markedly different ones. My lasagne comes out pretty much the same every time. (And that's a good thing.) In fact a great lasagne can be made in a funky old metal roasting pan in my experience. Casserole is just another word for forgiveness. The funky metal roasting pan is one of my oldest pans, and I'm very attached to it. It works surprisingly well for roasting vegetables in the oven. If I saw it at the Goodwill I would think, eww, but after 30 or 40 years, I see my pan as being well seasoned.

I've had the best luck with Italbrand DOP (what does that mean?) San Marzanos; there are only about three Italian brands that I see regularly on the shelves where we shop. One thing I've noticed about the Italian tomatoes is that they vary can to can, even within the same brand. I don't see that as a bad thing, necessarily. It makes more sense than tomatoes that taste exactly the same. Italbrand seems to be a bit more consistently good than some of the others. Cento doesn't have a presence around here, nor have I seen La Valle. Strianese, yes; they are sometimes very good, but sometimes anemic. I've tried the Muir Glen, but there is something about the taste that seems off to me. Maybe I just don't like the type of tomato they use? I like the Ortiz stuff too. The bonito is what I use now whenever I want canned tuna. I've convinced myself that since bonito is a smaller fish, there's less mercury. And it makes a pretty decent tuna salad. And Heidi, I haven't had a bad can of chipotles yet either, but I just assume that it's because it's so fiery that any subtleties escape me. When I get a hankering for Vietnamese iced coffee I like Longevity Brand Sweetened Condensed milk. Partly I just love the can.

I will eat foie gras, but only if someone else pays for it. I will not make my own and I will continue to feel very bad about how it is made. It's creepy. I will learn how to make biscuits. I will learn to make Alton Brown's graham crackers without relying on my husband to do it for me. I will continue to let him do everything else that involves flour. I will eat more fresh sardines, even though I have to go out of my way to buy them. I will not be intimidated by the Chinese fishmonger who tries to sell me dead crabs or crabs with missing claws. I will make enough marmalade this year so that I can give some away instead of treating every jar like precious jewels. I will continue to hate tripe. I will try more new recipes.

Thanks Andiesenji for your assist. The NYT op ed page this morning amplifies the answer--worth a look, I won't try to paraphrase. Here's my New Years Day menu for 8. The cow peas are not going to be the star, nor will the pork or greens, but they will all be represented in some fashion. Cocktails (something with rye, because I don't like bourbon.) Manhattans? In fact, there are no southerners among us. Cheese straws (Lewis and Peacock) Carmelized bacon (to satisfy the pork requirement and the tastes of two foodie 20-somethings) Pickled shrimp (New NYT cookbook) Roasted tomato soup (One of only two Cook's Illustrated recipes I ever make) Crab cakes (Gotta take advantage of this year's Dungeness haul; lotta work to cook the crabs and pick the meat, but I feel sad if I don't make crab cakes once a year.) Beans 'n' rice, a room-temp salad of some type (Good Mother Stallard is all I've got right now, but they will be an upright stand-in for black eyed peas.) Green salad (friend's contribution; I hate messing with raw salad ingredients.) Cornbread Lemon Buttermilk sorbet (my husband's secret recipe) Buckwheat butter cookies w/cocoa nibs (Alice Medrich)

What's supposed to bring good luck in the new year, the legumes or the pork, or both?

David, I made this as per your recipe, and it was delicious. We had it for dessert last night after our Coq au Vin, serving it as you did, with ice cream and caramel sauce. I used two granny smiths and two pink ladies. Both my husband and my picky Walla Walla daughter declared that it was even better this morning at room temp or slightly warmed. It is more custardy and eggy than I would have imagined, but that's why it was so good for breakfast.

What if the crab grabs onto your tonsils on it's way down? I've had my tonsils out, have you? What if it bites you while you wrastle it between your teeth? Frankly, this sounds like a very unappealing kind of street food. If it's snapping or wiggling, no thanks. I'm happy with just a hunk of baguette. At least a raw oyster doesn't try to crawl out of the shell. As for the tabasco bath, I am guessing it doesn't kill the oyster first, but perhaps it makes it wish you would put it out of its misery in a damn hurry.

David, thank you thank you! Four apples never scared me. Two quick questions: you really cut the apples so small and they hold some shape? The picture looks like they were cut bigger (just curious.) What kind of veg oil did you use? KM

David, that Apple Gateau looks fantastic. Can I get a recipe for that and the caramel sauce that goes with? I'm on an apple cake kick. Thanks.

Is it because someone really wants turkey or because someone doesn't want beef? I'm so over turkey for another 11 months, but other poultry is respectable, no? You could roast a different kind of bird. We do Coq au Vin for xmas dinner every year, and the rest of the menu is simple, because we have to transport a main dish for Xmas eve and don't get back til midnight. Our traditional dessert after Coq au Vin is a Tarte Tatin, but this year I'm thinking something easier, perhaps a creme citron (lemon wine mouse) with raspberries, served with some chocolate cookies I can make ahead. I was going to ask for a kitchen torch for a present, but then I forgot. Otherwise I might be making creme caramel.

Thanks to all for helpful replies. I looked up that cheese and learned that it is a salty aged sheep's milk cheese. One of the sites I found suggested it might not be that easy to come by, and that aged myzithra or some type of pecorino can be used as a substitute.

It's doubtful anything can beat a $2.99 price. I have a simple little TM8 timer made by CDN. CDN makes dozens of timers, and they are available on Amazon. It is small, and you do have to hold the buttons, but it has three buttons for time: hr, minute and second, so at least you never have to hold beyond 59 (and it is very fast.) It has a clock feature, a memory feature, counts up after the buzzer goes off, a magnet on the back, and uses standard batteries. Cost is around $12. It is not elegant, but for a little plastic object it tolerates abuse, like being dropped on a tile floor. I do see the value of multiple timing, but timers with that feature have always confused the hell out of me, plus they usually use weird batteries. In my experience anything made by Polder is more annoying than it's worth.

Okay, I've never made this but my SIL made something she called Spanakopita, and it inspired me to do better. She used frozen phyllo, and that was the best part of the dish. Her filling was missing the spinach, as far as I could tell, and the cheese tasted sweet. I believe I bit down on some nuts, too. So the filling was pretty awful (like out of some new age vegetarian health food book), but the dough was crispy and flaky right out of the oven, and not greasy. Not critical, but my first stumbling block upon googling recipes was spelling. Spanakopita wins, but spanikopita is popular. Is it phyllo or filo? The frozen package I have says filo. Here are some other questions: Butter or oil to brush the layers? How eggy should it be? Some recipes call for 3-4 eggs. As for cheese, some recipes use a combo of feta and ricotta or feta and myzithra, presumably to cut the saltiness a bit. Adding some ricotta would make a creamier filling, I presume. That sounds reasonable, but is it typical? When I make Greek salads I've taken to using French feta, because it seems less salty than some others. My preference would be heavy on the spinach and not too salty. As for spinach, I'm going to use frozen to start with, since I have some Cascadia organic spinach and I think it's pretty good. Once I get some technique down I'll branch out and try fresh spinach. I have no intention of making my own dough, not just yet that's for sure; I already have some frozen. But rolled or flat? Some recipes make folded triangles, some make a flat casserole. Flat sounds easier to start with. Some recipes suggest scoring the top filo layers before baking. How essential is that? Does anyone have a great traditional recipe? Or other hints? I'm already hip to the fact that you need to keep the filo/phyllo moist and work quickly, and I won't be surprised it there's a steep learning curve there.

Just let me know when dinner is and I will be sure to tell you what I "hate."

Chris, that sounds delicious and ambitious. Two questions: does the Salade Compagnard have a goodly amount of lettuce? If not, perhaps something green and vegetal could be added. Also, and maybe this is just me, I might not go with two onion dishes following eachother. Maybe instead of one of them you could sub a green soup like tangy sorrel? Or if you are stuck on onion soup (does sound very yummy), instead of the stuffed onions have something colorful and refreshing. Something with beets? Or a palate cleanser sorbet? Icy and tart, like maybe grapefruit tarragon? That's what popped into my mind when I read your menu. Once I made Elizabeth David's daube and served it as she suggested, with saffron flavored white rice. I used basmatti, and it was very good. She also says noodles are common, but she calls the noodles a Macaronade, which sounds very alluring and mysterious.

A good laugh can be had by reading Andrew Newman's Advertising column in today's NYT business section. The only encouraging news is that people actually do make their own Chex Party Mix at this time of year, rather than buying the pre-made product--at least if I understand the article right. Beer and Bacon Mancakes and other Dude Food is scary enough, but the last few paragraphs describing the Velveeta Brownies are mind boggling. Apparently adding a large amount of Velveeta to chocolate brownies makes them rich and creamy, and doesn't make them taste like cheese. I'm not surprised that they don't taste like cheese, since Velveeta doesn't actually contain cheese. So it's okay then.

I don't mind most prep work, but if I'm rushed or in a hurry it loses whatever meditative value it might have. I agree with one of the posters above: I find chopping parsley (or cilantro) very annoying. And I am pretty fast, although the only person I can compare myself with is my husband, who treats parsley and cilantro like an art project. In the time it takes me to chop two onions, a carrot and celery, he makes one perfect little mound of parsley. Not that I'm not grateful. Chris, we came up with two solutions to the container problem. One is the cheap solution, in which we purchase things from the same source that uses cup, pint and quart size plastic containers that have the same size lids. The lids get stored separately, and the containers get stacked. For bigger, more substantial containers we had to shell out a little money. But we still found ones that are stackable, and the tops are still stored separately, in a drawer. Saves a lot of space, and means that it doesn't really matter if the tops get washed at the same time, and I don't have to worry about matching odd tops to odd bottoms, etc. I got rid of the idiosyncratic containers and it saved much space and frustration.

There are lots of reasons to make your own and lots of reasons not to. If I can't buy something that meets my taste, I try to make it myself. If it is something I enjoy making, I keep on doing it, perfecting it, etc. For me it is a combination of desire and talent and sometimes price. My husband and I make our own marmalade. I know exactly what I like in a marmalade, and commercial products don't cut it. We've been improving ours for several years, and now there is only one artisan in the area who makes a marmalade as good or better. By good or better, I simply mean the way I like it. We buy seville oranges in quantity during January and February, and make enough for the year. And it costs far less than buying good quality marmalade. I make my own ketchup. It was an accident. I made a ketchup to use to frost a meatloaf and it was so good I decided using Heinz was pointless. Home made ketchup is not cheaper than Heinz, I don't think, but a whole nuther universe. Then there's soup stock. I'm pretty sure it costs more to make my own chicken, ham or beef stock, but it makes me happy and tastes so much better than anything I can buy. And soup is major for me. I make those things because I love eating them and care about them. I don't make my own croissants or my own dijon mustard. Tartine Bakery in SF makes a croissant that's so good it's criminal. And then, croissants are not a staple for me. I'm very happy with Edmond Fallot mustard, and don't have the slightest desire to make an approximation. If I enjoyed making pastry or mustard perhaps it would be a different story, but there's only so much time. I'd rather make soups. As for bread, I simply got lucky. I have a husband who likes to bake bread, and he's pretty good, although his repertoire is limited. There are so many good bakeries around here, so we supplement and get variety that way. We eat a LOT of bread. Given that a good loaf of bread is pretty pricey nowadays, I think we break even there.

Don't know about you, but is anyone else here finding that FC has been lacking something for the past year? Maybe a coincidence, but the recipes seem to have gone a bit dull just about when they glammed up their design, which was a turn for the worse for me; busy photographic backgrounds, an increase in reverse-out white type on dark backgrounds making recipes hard to read, pictures often bigger than necessary wasting space that could be put to better use. There also seems to be an increased dichotomy between simple quick meal cooking and over-the-top fussy. Not a lot in between. Okay, enough whining. I did actually make something quite yummy from #104. Determined to use up leftover turkey gravy and some yukon golds, I bought a celery root and made the garlic-infused mashed potatoes and celery root. This would be an excellent sub for the regular mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving. The recipe calls for whole milk and very little butter, plus a half cup of creme fraiche. I didn't have nearly that much creme fraiche, so instead I whisked in soft chevre. The result was light and fluffy, and uses a very clever technique for keeping the dish hot while the milk and and the rest is being added. I tossed in some snipped chives at the end, since the FC calls for no garnish. Really satisfying.

That's an interesting variation on what I had the other night: I brought coppa and home-made mostarda di cremona to a friend's for an app, and he contributed a soft spreadable goat cheese and his version of toast points, which were squares of rustic white bread grilled on the barbie. The mostarda was made with dried figs, cherries and apricots and fresh pears. Goat cheese, cured pork and tangy fruit makes a super combo.

Crouton, your original post was yesterday morning. While the merits of turning the poor bird into soup vs turning it into compost have been debated, I hope it isn't still in the oven awaiting its fate. Personally I would have just thrown it in a pot if it was only out at room temp for six hours. But that is based on no scientific consideration whatsoever, just a deep desire for turkey soup. Sixty years of living a not very antiseptic life is my basis for optimism. What did you end up doing?

Cheap oxtails? Not around here. But as for something Asian, I find oxtails make a terrific Pho or a simpler version of same. Brown the oxtails in a heavy soup pot and remove. You could use other additional beef and beefbones for richer flavor. Brown onions, a little carrot, a couple of chopped stalks of lemongrass, some fresh ginger, garlic, a couple of star anise. Add water for broth and a splash of fish sauce. After two or three hours at a simmer I strain the broth, and pick off the oxtail meat for the soup. Defat the broth however you prefer. I pour the heated broth over cooked rice noodles or wheat noodles and garnish with a squeeze of lime, green onions, some thin slices of serrano chile, shredded cilantro and thai basil.

I would be very sad to have a martini with no garnish whatsover. I think the oil keeps flavoring the drink long after the twist is dropped in, and I like that lemony taste at the finish. Also it's so pretty, a zesty curlicue floating gently on the sea floor.