KennethT

When I make them at home, I soak in room temp water until pliable, then drain. About 10-20 minutes. They're now ready to use in a stir fry or soup. If I'm adding a lot to soup, I'll rehydrate further by pouring boiling water over them for 30 seconds or so, then drain and add soup. Otherwise the soup becomes paste.

I guess rare is a state of location. It's certainly not rare in Indonesia. But in the NY area it's non-existent. Until now!

That's dried which is a completely different animal, errr, rhizome. Usually the dried stuff is used in TCM - the flavor changes too much to be of any use in the kitchen.

Scoot Manado- Singapore, Black pepper beef which was weirdly too tender. Served with vanilla and blueberry cookies made with freeze dried blueberries.

Scoot Singapore to Manado, Indonesia. Scoot is Singapore Airlines lower cost regional airline. Meals/snacks are for purchase but since our tickets were booked straight through from NYC (sort of), they included a meal/drink. Indonesian style chicken curry with potatoes (in the curry) and rice. Also a cup of chocolate ice cream that was really good. A good dark chocolate.

Singapore Airlines NYC - SIN direct Stir fried pork with black bean sauce. Braised chicken with vegetables and mung bean starch noodles. This was a good choice of noodles as they are almost impossible to overcook. "margherita" pizza. Any relation to real pizza of any kind is more by association than anything else. But tasty. A little too sweet but not bad. It's a shame they didn't have the ikan sambal bun like the last trip, but hopefully they'll have it on tonight's flight home.

I saw that movie! Not when it came out but it popped up on my HBOMax feed. I forgot they used that term also, but now that you mention it, I thought they ripped it off Avatar at the time because I didn't realize when it was released. Now James Cameron's use of it is even worse!

Ha! I give Avatar first credit. Although I will say I was a bit pissed when Cameron named it so. He also could have name it "Wow-this-stuff-is-expensive" or some other ridiculously obvious name.

The only hi-temp cheese I can think of is halloumi. I don't know about Austin, but here in NYC it's available in a standard grocery store with a decent cheese department or a Middle Eastern store.

Months ago, while planning the trip I'm currently on, I had asked one of the hotels I had been corresponding with if they use kencur, aka sand ginger, in the cooking of that specific region and if she thought I'd be able to find it in a local market while there. This stuff, fresh, looks mostly like ginger and tastes kind of like galangal but is definitely not galangal, if that makes sense. In the US, it also might as well be called unobtanium as I have asked EVERY Indonesian grocery in NYC and all I received were longing looks as if the shopkeepers dreamed of being able to have it since being in their homeland. Internet searches didn't prove much better. So you could have knocked me over with a feather when we checked into our room (for only 1 night) and there on the bed was over a pound of it, just waiting for me! What kind of service is this?!? Amazing! Freshly washed in my hotel room sink (it was already clean but I wanted to make sure there wasn't a speck of dirt or a single bug that could cause the USDA to reject it at the airport) and drying on a bath towel.

Does your canteen deliver to NY?

Wow, I am really jealous that you can get that via delivery. You find a lot of things in NY but good quality chuan'r that isn't abhorrently expensive is not one of them.

It's the only reason to eat the quenelle! I think La Cote Basque did them in a nantua sauce. They were fantastic back in the day.

Looks great! But, um.... paprika?

ugghhh... that sucks. sorry to hear it. But, you're certainly not the only one - I think we've all done something similar at some point or another!

I'm a huge proponent of fabric pots. I've been using them for years now (indoors, hydroponically in coco coir) and have never looked back for any of my long term plants. Laurel's heirloom tomato plants are great. I did buy an amazing Goose Creek tomato start from her many years ago and it was incredible, even when grown indoors in my apartment under lights.

Most NYers I know avoid San Gennaro like the plague....

At 55F, onions/garlic have no detectable aroma that I can tell. Plus, they're on a different shelf so proximity, dispersement etc

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.