Katie Meadow

Raspberry sauce is my favorite dress-up for lots of fruits and cakes and sorbets. No cooking, so easy and so just raspberry: 1 1/2 cup fresh raspberries, 1/4 cup sugar, (or to taste) ,1 T framboise. Dump into the processor and...process. Then use a coarse strainer to strain out the seeds. The original recipe came from a simple fruit dessert in which fresh pineapple rings were laid to rest in a puddle of sauce. I love it with lemon or buttermilk sorbet and plain or lemony cakes or drizzled over fresh peaches. I imagine it would be nice with cheesecake, too. Or with biscuits or on pancakes...

We're drinking Green Hornets! That's 2 parts rye, 1/2 part Fernet and 1/2 part Chartreuse. Our house rye is Bulleit, and the Fernet I like best is Jelinek, so that's what we used, along with green Chartreuse. Anything made with Fernet isn't timid, but that's okay by me. Best go-with so far: La Panzanella crackers with a modest smear of TJ's Hot & Sweet Chile Jam topped with a thin slice of young Manchego. Yummy.

Seeing as you are in NM the obvious suggestion is fish tacos! When I lived in NM (60's and early 70's) we never ate fish; it was rarely if ever fresh, if sold at all. Back then no one ever heard of Baja tacos, but I'm sure you have the rest of the fixins close at hand. Cod is just right for fish tacos, whether you bbq it or batter it first.

Seeing this thread I too was made seriously nostalgic about rice pudding, and I made the simplest version possible the other day using arborio rice, two percent milk, sugar and vanilla bean seeds. Very plain but very satisfying. I'm after a creamy textured rice pudding, but one that doesn't use gobs of butter or multiple egg yolks or heavy cream. I'm definitely a fan of using arborio rice. Then I came across a risotto rice pudding recipe, for which incremental amounts of milk are added during cooking until mostly absorbed, as for risotto. Does anyone here use this method?

Oh yeah, hot dogs in cassoulet. Doesn't everyone do that? Duck confit is so yesterday. Jaymes, I totally agree with everything you said. Life is short, indeed, and in the end a hot dog in Sunday gravy is something we can all live with.

Let's face it: Americans have some weird ideas about food. Personally the thought of dropping a hot dog into a glamorous and lovingly tended Sunday Gravy is sort of wicked, or at the very least passive aggressive, but stranger things have definitely been done. Especially to hot dogs. And especially for children with limited eating habits. The same people who would like that probably put ketchup on their hot dogs too.

You can easily put together a sauce using the following: oyster sauce, soy sauce, rice wine, a little broth or water, a little sesame oil if you think that flavor complements the dish or reminds you of the one you had. See how that goes and then start messing with the ingredients or the ratio of ingredients to make adjustments. That's just a very basic non-bean based sauce. If oyster sauce doesn't seem right, you might try hoisin sauce instead, but--just a guess here--it is more likely oyster sauce was used. For a basic beef stir-fry I would probably use oyster sauce for a bit of body. If the dish was simply called sizzling beef you might look up other sizzling recipes and get ideas for the technique as well.

I wait all year for rhubarb, which has a relatively short season in the stores here in the Bay Area. Not only does it not look that great, but it has become very pricey over the last few years. I'm so envious of you with your wild patches! Once in a while I see it at the Farmers' Market, but last spring I bought some and was disappointed, as it had little color and less flavor, despite being organic, semi-local and expensive. I guess it doesn't grow very well where winters are warm (and getting warmer.)

Ann, that looks like a very lovely fresh version of Caldo Tlapeno. Do you have a recipe? Thanks! (btw, I have long suspected Moe is an invention, but if not, no one else on earth gets so many amazing breakfasts. I would NEVER show my husband a breakfast post of yours.)

My solution is Nabisco Famous Chocolate Wafers. Taste very much like the Oreo cookie. And for me they are perfect, since I hate the filling. Until I discovered these cookies I used to scrape off the Oreo filling and throw it away. I justified the waste by feeling virtuous about my teeth.

Just want to report that I cooked my Marcella beans from RG and served them mashed, on toast. I cooked them pretty much the way I cook most beans, sautéing onions, carrot, celery (all finely chopped) followed by garlic. Beans go in, get tossed gently. Then liquid goes in (in this case I used a very diluted home made chicken broth). This gets boiled for about five minutes, then the flame is turned way down and aromatics (or what ever you call them) are added: bay leaf, fresh thyme, a little rosemary, a little cumin and just a shake of dry harissa. Cooked them close to 2 hours, salted, cooked another fifteen minutes. We mashed them coarsely, and spread them on toasted rustic bread rubbed first with raw garlic, then buttered. Very very good with a little extra sea salt sprinkled on. Tomorrow I'm planning to put the rest of the beans and their broth in a soup with farro and Tuscan kale. Cin cin, Marcella!

I always think of that salad as a child of the seventies. Very common at potlucks! It's just an Asian style slaw, with the addition of slivered almonds and broken up chunks of packaged ramen noodles. The dressing varied in those days, as you might imagine, with additions of commercial sweetened peanut butter (really awful.) I made it recently with just a simple dressing of rice wine vinegar, peanut or veg oil, a squirt of sesame oil. I don't remember ever having it will apple, but nothing anyone did in the seventies is surprising. I am of the school that prefers to add the noodles at the very last moment, since they are all about the crunch for me.

Thanks, I checked my recipe and it also says 1 T baking powder, so clearly my brain isn't working very well. I believe what I did was use 2 tsps of baking powder instead of 1 T. I suspect that if I actually put in 2 T of baking powder I would have tasted it!

Today our main meal was the pancakes, with a side of leftover red beans and rice. The pancakes are great. I made two changes. One was to use regular KA All purpose flour, since I didn't have any self-rising flour. I'm not sure why the recipe calls for self rising flour AND a substantial 3 T of baking powder. I cut back and used only 2 T of baking powder without the self-rising flour. Is the recipe in the book like that? I got mine on line, so it is possible it was tweaked by someone. They were certainly puffy enough. My recipe calls for 4 T of melted butter. That seemed like a lot to me, since I don't generally cook with butter. I subbed out 1 T butter and cut back to 2 T safflower oil, so really I used 3 T fat/oil. I did make the compound butter and it was sinfully good. The pancakes were tender and rich. I have a rotation of three or four other vegetable pancakes I make and this one will join them. Thanks Chris, I'm not sure I would have made these if you hadn't raved about them.

Today I made RG's Domingo Rojo beans for the first time. As suggested on the site I made red beans and rice, the same recipe as I always make when I use the organic Dark Red Kidneys from Purcell Mountain Farms. The Rojo's were truly delicious and resulted in a very rich flavorful bean broth. They are a beautiful color, and after about a five hour soak turned the water a lovely scarlet. Surprisingly, given how small they are, they took a bit longer to cook and needed a more liquid than most of the other varieties I buy from either source (never tried the Ayocote beans, though!) I gave them about an extra 20 minutes and they could have gone a bit more, but my husband and I were really starving. They hold their shape amazingly well, and I think they would make a very good salad bean, not that I ever do that.

For many years I made sure I was never without a tube of Le Cabanon harissa paste. It's French, with a very distinctive logo and package design, and for many years was ubiquitous and the only tube style harissa available. I was addicted. I read that the great photographer Cartier-Bresson used to carry that very same tube around with him wherever he went. It's gone the way of the dodo and that breaks my heart. Now you can easily get a tube of harissa called DEA, which is not the same. It has no distinct flavor and is hotter than hell. I threw it out. And I have thrown out several other cans or jars either upon opening or after they languished in the fridge for a couple of years without being used. I haven't found one that has comparable flavor to Le Cabanon. It was something special; hot, but not so hot that it obscured its own flavor. Someone gave me some harissa powder but I haven't figured out what to do with it. Do I make a paste? The paste is so versatile; you can use it to further spice up a soup to taste, bowl by bowl. Perhaps this thread will nudge me to try making my own. I still have an original box because it is so lovely and simple. And because, of course, it's all that's left.

Just want to say thanks for this topic. It's nice to know there are some people taking the time to make Ottolenghi's recipes. The ones from Plenty seem like the most complex, so my admiration to you all; last year I took it out of the library and got exhausted by it. And that was just reading it. The Green Pancake recipe is all over the internet, and it looks delicious, so I'm going to try that soon. A favorite of mine from Jerusalem is his swiss chard fritters. But then I'm on a vegetable pancake and fritter kick these days.

Just a very quick google search reveals that there isn't a lot of mystery or confusion about what is a currant, dried or otherwise. The dried currants we typically see in this country are known as zante currants. They are in fact grapes, very small grapes, aka champagne grapes (not to be confused with the grapes used to make sparkling wine in the Champagne region of France.) They were originally known as Corinth grapes, as noted above, but no one seems to call them that any more. In season we get fresh champagne grapes which are adorable and very sweet. When you buy dried currants to put in scones or granola they are really just tiny raisins make from these grapes. Years ago when I was in New Mexico I lived in a house that had real currant bushes, both red and black. Both were delicious, but they are definitely a berry and grow on a bush rather than a vine. I can't remember the last time I saw them sold fresh or dried around here Perhaps the plant is more common in the UK, but they do grow here and they didn't seem to need any special attention. They were so so good. It could be they thrive with a lot of water. My bushes were right near an irrigation ditch which was regularly flooded during the growing season.

On the bottle I have now the name Lion & Globe is in tiny print running vertically. Look for the cartoon lion, then check the label.

Lion and Globe is also my preferred peanut oil for stir fry. It has a very pure peanut taste, so I don't consider it a neutral oil either. Given that I use my wok at least twice a week, buying a large bottle in Chinatown is the most efficient way to go. I do use Rice Bran oil, but mostly for certain Asian style salad dressings and slaws.

I love my Nutri Ninja Pro. It works far better for most drinks than my blender, which is a modest priced NOT high powered blender. It is smaller and so much easier to clean. And it effectively deals with ice. My standard blender gets dragged out very rarely these days, mostly for soups. Sometimes I wish I had a high power blender, but that's mostly if I ever watch Rick Bayless cooking on TV. I use the Ninja enough to justify its place on the counter. When I bought it I considered the Magic Bullet, but research seemed to favor the Ninja when I checked them both out.

Making your own ingredients, whether for alcoholic drinks or any foods or sauces, really depends upon the availability of time, dissatisfaction with or difficulty of obtaining commercial products, price differential, and fun. Two of the "from scratch" cocktail ingredients I find pleasurable to make and worth the time are flavored simple syrups and homemade shrubs. You can't beat shrubs you make from high quality fresh fruit when available. Both have uses in non-alcoholic drinks as well. Lavender simple syrup is a great addition to fresh lemonade and for baking. I've used flavored simple syrups and shrubs as additions to home-made applesauce and rhubarb. As for infusing tobacco, peyote or lamb chops in alcohol, I can't think of a more unappealing way to poison yourself. I know people do make bacon infused drinks, but you can also use smoky tea and it's far easier to make a cuppa than smoke a pig. If I went to the effort of making my own bacon (not gonna, but admire others who do) dropping it in a glass of vodka would be at the bottom of a long list of fun ways to eat consume it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_breakfast_cereals This is a pretty comprehensive list of cereals. The article notes which cereals changed names but don't note the date of that change, which is too bad. For instance Corn Pops are listed as 1951 and it is noted they were originally called Sugar Pops. They don't say when the name was changed. I must have eaten a lot of Sugar Pops and Rice Krispies. My parents ate a lot of toasted English muffins and never made a hot breakfast except on weekends. One of the most interesting aspects of cereal consumption was that the boxes provided reading material and business opportunities, so reading and math skills became an integral part of breakfast. Sending box-tops in for a toy became a way of negotiating and parents were not any part of it. Wasn't that the first time you ever put a stamp on an envelope and wrote an address on it without being prompted or cajoled? My husband goes a step further. He claims he learned his first lesson in cheating: that if you sent the box-bottom in for another toy it always worked. Too bad my brain has deteriorated. I remember the cereals I ate, but not the ones my daughter, 28, had when she was little. I do know that whatever she was eating my husband was eating as well. He remembers mini-wheats (sometimes frosted) and cheerios (regular) as part of their regular breakfast in the 90's. If my husband (the shopper) brought home Shredded Wheat or Chex I would eat that once in a while, but I was already married to toast. I think it's funny how much nostalgia there is over cold cereal for boomers and gen x-ers. My only real nostalgic moment over cereal now comes if I open a fresh box of cheerios. That heady smell doesn't last long; by evening the thrill is gone. But I haven't done that for years.

About roasting poblanos: I spent my twenties living in New Mexico, and the plastic bag method was pretty common. But recently I've discovered that you don't need so much moisture to easily peel a chile. Now I just put the roasted blistered chiles on a cookie sheet and cover loosely with a damp towel. Within ten minutes they are a snap to peel and the final product has far more structure since there is far less "sweating" involved. And structure is the goal here, hence the wisdom of picking out chiles that are not twisted. My preferred method of roasting is the broiler, so I can do a large number at a time. I've never tried using my comal, but I should see what that's like. I do agree that the faster the roast the better, since overcooking the chiles makes them limp and harder to work with.

Liuzhou, I realized I didn't know where you are, so I looked it up. Pictures of Guangxi province look amazing, but given the sub-tropical climate it isn't surprising lamb is uncommon. I love that combo of lamb and cumin, but I assume that's part of a northwestern Chinese cuisine. Seems you are eating a lot of donkey these days! I had no idea.