KennethT

I agree. And if in such an emergency, a better ingredient, imo, than a GBP is a green goat horn chilli - only mildly spicy but a lot more fresh flavor and none of the unattractive GBP stuff...

What's in what looks like a toothpaste tube?

Just an update - I've been back a couple times now and they've been consistent. I went in tonight and the lady taking my order remembered me from the first time I was there back in May! They weren't busy so we wound up chatting - everyone working there is from Singapore - and when I mentioned how I'd be there next week, she slipped back into speaking Singlish with me which I enjoyed. I asked for extra chilli sauce and she gave me 6 containers for the 2 orders, which wound up being a decent amount. Also, they must not be that busy in the evenings as they have a new promotion - after 7PM week days and after 5 on weekends, it's buy 1 chicken rice, get one 50% off. Also, starting next week, they're also going to be featuring a chicken curry noodle dish which I'm curious to try. The lady I was chatting with said she tried it already and she really liked it.

This could be a cultural thing though. Like SE Asian meatballs that are 'bouncy'....

Wow, that's an amazing price for not actually being in SE Asia. Are they fresh, frozen or irradiated? Where do they come from? I'd ask if you could ship some down to me, but I'm going to be in Indonesia next week - hopefully I'll find them at the market and gorge myself on them.

I am so happy to hear that you're finally in a place that has a possibility of a proper diagnosis and treatment. Hopefully the stay will be short and the treatment will be long lasting so you can get back to your normal life soon!!!

I'm surprised you don't have a root cellar. They're really hand for storing, ahem, root vegetables for a long time... and apples. I made a (very small) root cellar out of a corner of our wine fridge - 55degF and slightly humid - onions, garlic, ginger and limes last a lot longer than anything else I've tried.

@BonVivantThanks for yet another amazing trip! So glad I could experience it through your lens.

Made a couple dinners this past week, we've been busy with work right before vacation. Grilled barramundi in the Lombok style - barramundi bakar taliwang. Grilled mahi mahi in the Manado style with a raw sambal called dabu dabu, which means chopped, made with mango. Mahi mahi bakar dabu-dabu (that's fun to say)

There's lots of greenhouse grown tomatoes available here - I don't know if they're necessarily the Mucci brand - it seems they have quite a few brands under their umbrella. Campari tomatoes are an example of greenhouse grown tomatoes (I don't know if they're Mucci or another company though)

The grower of these is Mucci farms - a large greenhouse grower in Canada. Over the last several years, there's been great strides in greenhouse cultivation - primarily due to the decreasing cost of LED lighting that is used as supplemental lighting in greenhouses. Now it can be summer all year long in the greenhouse with much less energy expense and lot less excess heat. There have also been a lot of advancements in breeding cultivars that grow really well in greenhouses that have more flavor, as well as being more resistant to greenhouse issues like mold and rot.

@blue_dolphin When I did them deep fried, I split the shells, removed the vein and then sliced from the back almost all the way to the other side but stopped before I got to the tail. That way, the meat is even thickness all over.

oh yes, we've been gorging ourselves on the Chinatown ones. My wife has been been going back there every other day. Last week at our preferred vendor (SE corner of Mulberry and Canal), the Thai mangoes were $1 each, and then a couple days ago, there wasn't much left and they were $0.50 each!!! Needless to say, we cleaned them out.

I am soooo jealous of those prices!!! Pompano for 3.88/#???!!!???? <<<feints>>>

I have no idea. I'm not a fan of social media either. The only people I'm 'friends' with on FB are people I know in real life - so like 12 of them! But I do belong to a few groups - one being this fruit group, the others are gardening/hydroponic groups which have been very helpful to me over the years.

I'm trying to look them up but I can only find an Instagram, etc. no website. Do you mind giving me an example of the prices of various dishes - or at least a range of prices?

It's variety dependent. The mangoes that I like have a very flat seed and it's consistent among every individual mango of that variety.

There's a Facebook group called Fruit 4 Sale. Started by some guy who loves to eat fruit. Now it's got a few thousand members - some of which are growers/sellers and others are people looking to buy. It's a great resource.

Since it's the season, I got a box of Nam Doc Mai Thai mangoes from a Vietnamese farmer in Florida. All tree ripened but shipped hard. In storage waiting.... On the counter. The on one the right has been a couple days, on the left from last night.

I cut them vertically. Most of the time I can get very close to the seed. On a green mango, once I've cut up the cheeks, I'll lay the seed with some flesh on it flat on the board and shave off whatever is left. If the mango is ripe, it is sometimes too soft for that, so instead I'll just stand over the sink and take off the remainder with my teeth (the sink is necessary if the mango is really juicy).

I've only had them the one time, so I'm no expert, but how the waitress taught us (actually showed us since she only spoke Basque) was that you pinch a small leathery part by the toenail and tear the leathery skin off then eat it like a popsicle. It was tender and briny, but really hard to describe because it was like nothing else I've ever had.

OK, where the hell was this??? How are prices? Oh what I would do for some percebes. Best percebes ever was at Etxebarri in Spain - grilled percebes over their custom charcoal was amazing.

I would kill for some live prawns... it's probably a common sight in your neck of the woods, but I have fond memories of a restaurant in Singapore that had maybe 30 different tanks of live seafood and the "fisherman" would go out with a net when an order came in - the prawns would literally jump out of the tank!

You're right - I love head on shrimp, but then again I love eating just the shrimp heads. If you're going to eat the whole head, the best thing to do, imo, is to deep fry them. If you deep fry the whole shrimp shell on, you can eat the shells also. Just make sure they're really dry or they tend to splatter a lot. First take a scissor and cut the shrimp head just after the eyes - you want to cut off the pointy thing on top that can be super sharp. If frying the whole thing, I tend to cut down the back and then slice about 3/4 of the way through the meat so it cooks evenly. When frying shrimp, I don't really measure the oil temp but it's probably around 375F or so - definitely not hotter than that. Also, if you fry the shrimp heads, I like to save the oil - it becomes orange and has a nice shrimpy flavor - it saves in the fridge for a long time as long as you strain it first and is a great thing to add to fried noodles - I learned that from a famous pad thai place in BKK that makes it with shrimp head oil. You can also cook the whole shrimp in a broth or sauce of some kind - the heads will flavor the sauce and then you can suck the heads like a crawfish. It's not as sweet as a crawfish head and it's really earthy/shrimpy - my wife isn't a huge fan but I like it.

Wanted something fun before my COVID booster.... sambal grouper with cucumber salad.