Wilfrid

By George, he gets it! I am trying to parse, not spices, but Steve's position. He can't literally mean that there isn't a real and indefinitely sustainable cuisine trend which involves dominant spicing. Tens of millions of people eat that way and are likely to continue doing so. Just in the United States, there must be hundreds of thousands of restaurants which make that proffer (I'm counting Mexican in there). What Steve might mean (like the Mughal Emperors might have lacked chickens) is that dominant spicing is unlikely to become a trend in the cuisine served at the comparatively small number of restaurants one might regard as at the cutting edge of (predominantly French) haute cuisine. Well, yes, it would be weird to think otherwise. I don't suppose they're going to get into chargrilling entrees either. It totally wouldn't work for that style of cooking. Which proves...? (I know, it proves that haute cuisine is better :yawn:.)

Nor the English. And sorry I missed that excellent pun.

That may indeed be Grimes's confusion, but I am still having trouble believing it was deep fried. Maybe they had a regular smoked haddock dish on the menu, but he assumed it went into the deep fryer. Edit: Have someone pull your tongue out of your mouth. Edit edit: Looked at the article again. He doesn't actually state that the smoked cod is deep fried; there's a sliughtly ambiguous juxtaposition with his description of the fryers.

Smoked cod in kedgeree? Smoked haddock I grew up with, of course, but I just don't remember seeing smoked cod at all. Thank you for saving me a visit to Salt and Battery. I have been peering through the window recently.

Adam, I can confirm I am not your grandmother. Putting "foreign" in quote marks was just a short-hand way of emphasizing I meant foreign to the cuisine, as in external to the cuisine. I didn't mean "foreign" as in "ethnic". But the short-hand was wasted because here I am explaining it all...

Stone has a point. Use of spices, for example, at Blue Hill, Union Pacific and Cafe Boulud.

Where? Actually, the spice tasting menu sounds like a brilliant idea. If someone did it, I think people would be interested. Edit: Too many articles, definite and indefinite.

There are spices which are traditionally used in European cooking - members of the pepper and capsicum families for example, he said vaguely? - which is fine. I have yet to really enjoy the intrusion of "foreign" spices.

Interesting byway. The so-called "Banglatown" in Singapore is missed by most tourists, but it's one of the most fascinating urban areas I have ever explored.

I don't think you do find them in NY, unless they're hiding out in Flatbush or somewhere. I think it would be hard - perhaps impossible - for someone to develop a basis for judging Indian food by eating it in New York. I won't generalize to other American cities, because I have some vague awareness of the limits of my knowledge.

Can garlic or anchovies bring out, emphasize or enhance an ingredients flavor? I think so. I don't contend that they're spices. I am thinking about the spice question and can't make up my mind. Personally, I would prefer spices to keep their big fat noses out of traditional European cooking, but I relish them in the appropriate context.

No, it's about what is better, French food or not. Like all the other threads.

An expert PMed me to predict there'd be some more arguing on this thread before it was done. I'd be interested to know how "conventionally Indian" people think Diwan is. It was hard to tell from reading about it here.

There was a discussion of Manducatis on CH recently, and the consensus seemed to be that you had to push the right buttons with the staff to get good food. I am thinking of combining Roberto's with a tour around the Arthur Avenue area - something for the warmer weather.

I don't know why Grimes is reviewing this kind of restaurant, but that's another subject. Might I just observe that "smoked cod" is not a recognizable dish to this Britisher. Deep fried smoked cod? Weird. Has anyone been to Salt and Battery?

If I put Park Side on the list, I should realistically knock out one of the other Queen's restaurants. I doubt if I am going to eat five meals in Queen's this year, and probably not four. Ones I've now done are in bold, and I am already well behind the clock. Pizza DiFara;Patsy's. Heroes Corona Heights Pork Store; Leo's Latticini; Dafonte's. Restaurants Manhattan:Arqua;Centolire;Da Andrea;East Post;I Trulli; Il Giglio (or Il Mulino - same owners);Lavagna;Le Madri;Petrosino. Brooklyn: Al Di La; Areo; Bamonte's;Da Tommaso;Queen. The Bronx: Roberto's. Queens:Don Peppe;Lenore's;Manducatis;Park Side; Piccola Venezia.

You did take them out of the shells first?

Steven: I hear you. But at the same time, we don't want to frighten neophytes away by making it sound like they need to sit an exam, right? Incidentally, I have eaten at Tabla, and would sign up to the description of the food as nice pieces of protein, with some almost afterthought spicing. I have found that to be done well on occasions, and poorly on others (for example, a succession of dishes dominated by cumin). Diwan's on my list.

That's a big jump from my comments. I have never eaten at the Bread Bar in Tabla or at Diwan. I have no idea which is better. I was just talking about what might be involved in coming to understand Indian food.

I am willing to listen to Fat Bloke's argument, but I'm not sure I buy it. I started eating Indian food when I was about eight or nine years old. I wasn't introduced to it by an expert, and certainly nobody taught me what the spices taste like, one by one. I've eaten it all my life, I can cook a few Indian dishes competently. While I could probably identify the main spices in an indian dish by tasting it, to this day I couldn't tell you which have been toasted, how they were incorporated in the dish, or all the other technical stuff Fat Bloke refers to. Can I distinguish between good, middling and poor Indian cuisine. Absolutely; easily and reliably. Perhaps it's more to do with experience than with precise technical knowledge.

Is it a mammal?

You just made me hungry.

Absorbing. I recall a delicious skate preparation with a red pepper sauce which Gras offered at the strangely deserted Peacock Alley. I do hate those big plates with the little indents in the middle - Le Bernardin and March are among the NYC restaurants which are fond of them. If they're going to serve a tiny bowl of something for $24, it insults the diner's intelligence to pretend it's a big dish. All the portions there look pretty small, but I guess there were a lot of courses. Good to know Gras has found a suitable showcase for his work.

Best I ever ate were bought in Singapore airport. Someone bought me a dozen to take on the plane. A dozen .

I find I can open a bottle with just about anything. Of course, fierce determination comes into the equation.