Katie Meadow

@Chimayo JoeI've not seen the Alexia Yukon Select Puffs but I'm going to look for them. I agree that the Alexia Crispy Seasoned have more flavor than is needed. I have no nostalgia about tater tots. I never tasted one until I was 73 years old! And it will have to be a cold day in hell for me to ever make them from scratch. Hot tots and a glass of rye makes an excellent snack for a chilly evening in front of the TV.. Not a ketchup person myself, but I could see a smoked paprika aioli for dipping. That's my condiment of choice with fries. But I'm happy without any dip.

I finally made the Cascadian Farms spud puppies for a late night snack. They are perhaps a bit smaller than the Alexia tots, and therefore have more crunchy exterior to the amount of soft potato. For some that might be a plus. When very hot they are okay, but when they cool down, which they do quickly, they don't have a lot of flavor. They are very plain, and not salty, which would be fine with me if they had a really nice potato flavor, but somehow I wasn't wowed. I think I prefer the Alexia, which are peppery. I've never seen a tater tot cart, but I would certainly have bought them on the street when navigating a New York winter.

I always have one ceramic knife on hand. They do get duller, if you are lucky, before the blade breaks. Although I don't see the usual reasons for not putting this knife in the dishwasher (the usual reason for me would be wooden handles) I just don't put any sharp knives in the dishwasher. I don't believe the dishwasher would be the culprit for you; daily use just dulls these ceramic tools. They are certainly not knives meant to last like good steel that can be sharpened. The one chore that I routinely use it for is mincing garlic because the blade is so thin.

On his first night in Nantucket Ishmael goes out for dinner. The server asks him "Clam or cod?" He's afraid he will end up with just one clam, so he orders the cod. He doesn't realize she's talking chowder.

My comal also lives on the stove, but it only takes up one burner and rarely needs to be moved. I don't roast my poblano or other green chiles on it either. For that I have always used the broiler, which is how we did it when living in NM, but my broiler is underperforming currently so I've been using the outdoor gas grill for blistering peppers which is even better. It is a mystery why I didn't think of that before.

My workhorse griddle is a basic cast iron comal. No ridges, just a large flat surface and it works well to distribute the heat on one burner. We use it for pancakes, tortillas and quick searing dried chiles. It's cheap and indestructible.

That's because they used it all up in the food; at least the salt, and just a pepper shaker would look stupid.

Yay to mattress ticking. Never looks anything but cool and you can take it to the grave.

Kitchen mishaps no apron would prevent: Now that Seville oranges are in season in my neck of the woods we made our first batch of 2022 marmalade. It is beyond me how I ended up with ribbons of it in my hair. Truly icky. Filled up the jars, and got in the shower in a hurry. If I have any clothing I wish to protect will wear my one apron, that I've had for as long as I can remember. It is heavy cotton mattress ticking railroad or whatever you might call it. Works fine, looks very jaunty. But more often I cook in old flannel shirts and don't bother with the apron. After a few minutes I inevitably have a dish towel slung over my shoulder. Sometimes two of them if I forgot I was already wearing the first one.

My guide for crab cakes is this: use almost nothing but crab. Bind with the least possible amount of stuff you can get away with, the plainer the better. Crab, a touch of mayo, scallions and minimal amount of bread crumbs. Not a fan of Old Bay. Also not that it matters, I grew up on Manhattan clam chowder. Recipes for chowder are heavily stacked in favor of New England style, but Jasper White has a great recipe for Manhattan.

If anything seemed off Kerry could palpate the liver to make sure it's okay to eat.

I'm confused. How do you know what to call vertical rotisserie unless you know its origin? If it is Greece I would call it a Gyro. I would have expected it to be lamb, but my daughter, who spent a year in Athens, said it was often beef. If I was in Turkey or the Arab world or Israel I would call it Shawarma. In that case I would expect it to NOT be pork. If I was in Mexico or Los Angeles I would not call it either, but I would ask what THEY called it. If it had a pineapple ring on top I would assume it was pork, most often destined for al pastor tacos. The onion picture makes me think it comes from somewhere that has onion dome architecture, so I might call it shawarma. From just looking at a picture it would hard to know what to call it unless you had some idea of the spices/flavorings involved. The truth is here in Northern CA I don't get a chance to look at stacked vertical rotating meat very often, so my knowledge is pretty theoretical.

If you trip and fall into the conversation pit you probably needed more dilution or more vermouth.

When I was young we went out to my mother's brother's house in NJ for once a year seder. My uncle prided himself on making a great martini, and everyone but the kids was sozzled by dinner time. But what would you expect from a man who called his wife "battle axe?" Us cousins had to make do with Manischewitz wine. That yearly celebration was the only time I heard my mother really belt out some tunes!

Yes I've heard that old saw about dairy calming the heat, but who wants to drink a glass of milk after eating delicious spicy Chinese food?

@Kim Shook, your toast and cereal breakfast is what my husband eats every day: several pieces of toast, then a large bowl of boxed cereal + added home made granola + banana slices and berries. The only time he doesn't eat cereal is when he makes pancakes. We are not typically variety eaters at breakfast, although now he is baking biscuits once a week. Otherwise, Have Bread Will Toast.

@glennThese are my favorite current splurges: one is a smoked soy sauce, the other is black garlic. Both are Japanese, both intense; and definitely specialty artisanal items. I order from Amazon because I can't always find these locally. My one local source for the black garlic shoyu disappeared, but with Amazon Prime it is the same price anyway. I also use Kikkoman to thin sauces out. There are lots of products out there I want to try. I also keep a dark Chinese soy sauce on hand; I am cooking Chinese food with all of them. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01G7MOHJO/ref=ox_sc_saved_image_8?smid=A3VDBPE82S43CG&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08HN2YPV4/ref=ox_sc_saved_image_4?smid=A3EG2S0U6KWUM9&psc=1

I believe you have Amazon in Columbia. Have you checked the soy sauce options there? I order several very good soy sauces on line, things that I can't find even here on Bay Area shelves.

I'm with you, @Margaret Pilgrim. A dollar a glass is about right. I do have a few flea market glasses left from my college years, but most of the time I swear by my Ikea Svalka wine glasses. No need to wonder whether they are for red or white wines, because they are designed to be as average as possible. One glass for everything! For $5.99 a sixpack there's no angst involved. And, surprisingly, they don't break easily. Pre- Ikea I used Duralex French juice glasses for wine. Affected, but effective. If I need a weird thrill I use the gold-rimmed crystal glasses that I inherited from my MIL. When I hold them I feel like I'm on the Titanic. They are a lovely, restrained design and very elegant, but of course can't go in the dishwasher and therefore are a double threat: if your tipsy guests don't knock them over you can count on the back-up disaster when hand washing at midnight. So every once in a while when I think about it I just look at them and admire them and wonder whether if my nephew or my daughter will want anything to do with them. Currently they are both in the Tommy Tippy stage of "glassware" for their babies.

That quote you pulled out of the review? Wow, Pete Wells is tripping over his own "effete." But the fish n chips sounds really yummy.

I'm eagerly awaiting your review. I have a pack of the same in the freezer. Spud Puppies. What a dopey name. Spud Puppies are hot dogs wrapped in potato pancakes.

Oh, you must have seen the revised play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead Drunk."

How old are those instructions that tell you to open a bottle of vermouth near the martini, then put it away? Also the idea of "rinsing" the glass with vermouth is comical. H ow would you even do that? Would you pour the excess back into the bottle? It seems to me you would have to love your gin a lot to drink it straight. I am sure I've tasted only a teensy percentage of available gins but I know I don't like Tanqueray in anything. I prefer Bombay regular to Sapphire. I love a Hendricks martini with adequate vermouth--in other words I like to know the vermouth counts for something. A twist of lemon is nice (that's how my parents drank martinis), or two olives in the glass to be eaten as a reward at the end. Just as I like a half sweet ice tea when in the south, I like a half dirty martini. One martini is all it takes--I'm a cheap date. As the years go by I notice some of my friends are drinking more, but I'm drinking less. A side of warm salty peanuts or cheese straws is all I need to go with. The best martini is the one my husband makes. The truth is I think martinis are the most delicious of all cocktails, but I can no longer handle the amount of alcohol in most of them. So so nice on a warm summer night. Most of the time we hear people talk about how they wish they drank less. I wish I could drink more!

Totally. It wasn't too hard to find good chile rellenos in mom and pop places in New Mexico, but here in northern CA not so much. Love them when they are good. So simple.

What I buy regularly at TJ's: Chocolate / hazelnut biscotti Empire kosher chicken (They used have Empire kosher organic chicken, which was great but no longer) unsweetened cherry juice Valrhona dark chocolate bar 71% (at $2.99 it is a steal) Tj"s maple syrup House-made flour tortillas Dark chocolate almonds w/ sea salt & turbinado sugar (not regularly since I eat too many of them) Bulleit Rye (good with dark chocolate almonds late at night!) Husband is opportunistic buyer of beer and Barbara's oat squares (oaty and aromatic when first opened, but in a few days they go south toward sawdust) Seasonal: butter toffee pretzels (love/hate relationship, thank god they are not available year round) What I would kill for them to bring back: Pane Guttiau Italian flatbread and chocolate coated sunflower seeds. Not eaten together, by the way.