Alcuin

I put the eggs in a saucepan with lots of butter, turn the heat on low, put the pan on, whisk until combined, then whisk them as they slowly cook. Sometimes I take the pot off the heat if I think its getting too hot. Off heat, I whisk in some cream to slow down the cooking a bit (cold cream), season, then promptly plate (I like them runny). I always assumed people added milk or water at the beginning as a tenderizer for those who cook their eggs mostly through or for those who want to give themselves a larger margin for error so as not to overcook. Merely an assumption though.

I didn't know there were places with this policy in the US. Seems like a very reasonable policy to me. (As a European, I regard the age limit of 21 as completely insane. It needlessly criminalizes behavior that will happen anyway.) I agree. They tried to change the law in 2010, but that must have failed because it's still in effect. There is a woman who brings her kid sometimes to wine tastings (he's a teenager). She lets him taste a bit, and he helps her pick out wine. The kid's already got a good palate, and I bet a much healthier view of the uses and abuses of alcohol than many of his peers.

My local liquor store serves two roles: selling alcohol, and being a community gathering place. When somebody got voted judge (finally after a couple of elections), the first stop was the store (where a bottle of precious vintage champers was opened). People meet their friends at wine tastings there (which in full disclosure, I help run every Saturday), and stay to hang out, sometimes for hours. Some people just come and hang out in the store, sometimes even doing a little work. Children have birthdays there. Kids are brought there all the time. I even heard that one time, somebody needed a babysitter really quickly for their baby, so they thought to bring the baby there where a blanket and some toys were laid out in the store for the baby to play on and be watched by everyone (this was before my day, but I don't doubt for a second that it is true). The liquor store holds a block party to raise money for the community where no booze is offered gratis, you have to buy that, but they provide free food and a keg of Sprecher's root beer (the best, in my opinion), things like dance lessons and little art projects that the kids love, and music (the band is a local institution named after the liquor store!). In some ways, it's the agora of our little neighborhood. It's funny though, I never really thought of any of this until I started writing it here. Everybody just goes there, and it's not even something I considered out of the ordinary. But of course it is. Nevertheless, I think it shows that liquor stores don't have to be places that are stigmatized. Of course, here in Wisconsin, you can drink with your parents in a bar no matter how old you are (there must be a lower limit to this, agewise, but I don't know it). Personally, as a person who admittedly drinks much more than the average person (but doesn't get drunk a lot these days, getting older as I am), I think it's reasonable not to hide drinking from kids but to show them good examples of people doing it responsibly sometimes. That said, I don't think I'll be taking my kid to drink at the bar (that seems a bit weird to me personally).

I like a salad with vinaigrette with something like this, and a dry white wine with lots of acidity.

Sometimes it's possible to be empirical without rigorous, controlled testing. The Muir Glen tomatoes are a case in point. I was shocked when I first tasted them without the liner. Then again, you might say that I was engaged in a longitudinal test, having used the tomatoes for years before being hit with the unlined cans. I even bought a few more cans just to see if it was a fluke. It was not. I'm a bit worried about BPA, but I don't think I can can enough tomatoes to last me (I use a lot of tomatoes). And I'm not going to use those unlined canned tomatoes. So I guess I'm stuck chancing it for the time being with the lined cans. Then again, I drink a whole lot and sometimes smoke too, and I eat a decent amount of grilled food in the summer, so I'm hardly carcinogen free...

I buy Muir Glen plum tomatoes in the can. Recently, they switched the plum tomatoes to a can without a lining and the difference in taste is astounding. I can't stand them now and have switched back to their regular tomatoes that are still in the lined cans. I'm sure there's a health risk to this or something, but that unlined can ruined my sauces. I don't have that problem with the lined cans.

I pronounce it ab-sinth and I tend to Anglicize every foreign word I use in conversation. There is a long long tradition of doing this in English. On the other hand, I don't think its wrong to list both pronunciations. Linguistically, I prefer the descriptive over the prescriptive style. This isn't to say I'm not punctilious about my pronunciation of foreign words. I want to have the right Anglicized pronunciation. And it does sound a bit like an affectation to use foreign pronunciations to me, but that's mainly because it sticks out like a sore thumb to my ear. And if you do use the foreign punctuation, it's got to be good. But I'm not against it on principle. ETA: I should add that I've never actually heard anyone pronounce the word ab-santh. And if I did, I would want to hear an aspirated "t" there not a -th sound.

It's good with oil cured olives (or brine cured is fine too), parsley, shallots, and roasted red pepper with oil and vinegar. You can do this room temp or warm. If you have good salt packed anchovies (and like them), some filets are nice to add to the mix.

That is awesome. That's exactly what I use. It works well.

Does your stick blender come with its own cup to blend in? Mine does, and it makes a snug fit so I would probably use that if I wanted to puree herbs into a dressing. I make vinaigrette a lot, and for 2 people too, so I just put oil and vinegar into the oxo measuring cups that measure only up to 2 oz and emulsify with a milk frother. It works well for very small amounts (I'm doing a total of 40ml typically), but of course it only emulsifies.

I'm not sure we were really part of the food cognoscenti, but my mom was a pro cook so that might have had something to do with those expectations. Then again, if one of my friends invited me over for barbecue chicken, I would have expected chicken prepared in a variety of possible ways (usually baked and not at all necessarily grilled) and covered with bottled bbq sauce. So the adjective barbecue there definitely refers to the bottled sauce. Its amazing, the variety there is of regional or maybe even micro-regional meanings of the word barbecue.

There seems to be some confusion about the noun barbecue here. When I say I'm going to a barbecue, I'm not necessarily expecting to eat barbecue. A barbecue is a gathering centering around food cooked with live fire. Barbecue is smoked food cooked low and slow. Grilled food is cooked fast. Of course, that's just my opinion and people can call whatever they want barbecue. But if somebody invites you to eat some barbecue, and they say that in those terms, aren't you expecting ribs or brisket or pulled pork? If you showed up and your hosts were just grilling some hotdogs and burgers, wouldn't you surprised? I would, and I'm not from the south (from the Philadelphia suburbs and live in the midwest). Then again, those are just my expectations.

I bought my cast iron skillet unfinished six years ago. In a few years, I didn't worry about damaging its patina. And now, there is no sponge that could even put a chink in its armor. Short of rigorous work with a steel scouring pad or maybe coarse sandpaper, that patina isn't going anywhere. That said, I treat my cast iron wok's patina a bit more gingerly. Then again, its only about a year old.

I've noticed that many people who primarily like big fruit bombs tend not to think of wine as something that goes hand in hand with food. I started moonlighting doing wine tastings a couple of years ago, so I've had the opportunity to have a lot of wine on my hands. Once I started drinking wine almost every day and pretty much always with food, I started drinking Old World wines with the acidity or tannins to complement what I was eating. Before that, I didn't drink very much Old World wine, but now I don't drink very much New World at all. Even when I think of a big fat steak, I want something with some tannins to cut the richness and refresh my palate. Though of course it has to have some power to it to match the steak, so I like Nebbiolo for instance (from Langhe usually, but if I'm lucky enough to have Barolo there's nothing I want more). So do you drink your wines with food more, or just drink them over conversation or listening to music (typically a cocktail fits the bill there for me)? And how does that effect how you relate to Old versus New world wines?

Chitarra, or guitar as my Aunt Anna would say. Fork, maybe. And if we spoke Latin there would be some more, like refrigerator, or scissors.

There was a time not too long ago I could get KA at a local store for $3 per 5 lbs. Then it shot up to $5 and I went to Gold Medal AP. Pretty happy with the results, and I just can't ever see paying $1 per lb. May as well buy bread at that point.

I'll put in another vote for the Klean Kanteen. They're quality, and I've never had any problems with leaking or a metallic taste. I don't buy water, just use filtered from home. Or in some of the libraries and school buildings I frequent, they have these neat filter systems designed to fill your water bottle. You put the bottle under and the filtered water flows-the wave of the future.

They do. It's called microoxygenation. The problem is, you can only go so far with that before you get oxidation. The effects are not easy to control with microoxygenation. And normal decanting can do the job of oxygenating the wine anyway; hyperdecanting just does it faster.

I've done this with three wines, a young Cahors, a very wellmade Spanish Garnacha, and a Cab Franc from the Loire. Each time, I saved a glass to compare with the hyperdecanted bottle. In my highly unscientific tests, the differences were pretty amazing each time. It was like a clinic in the benefits of decanting. This really does work.

I've done some looking around and it was from Tyranena brewing company, called Benji's Smoked Imperial Porter. Unfortunately it seems it was a special edition they're not making right now. It looks like Stone puts out a similar beer though, so you might want to look for that.

Speaking of bbq and smoked beer, I had a smoked imperial porter with chipotle at the Great Taste of the Midwest last summer in the real ale tent that was really good. Can't quite remember the name of the brewer (I don't think I ever knew, it was toward the end of the day so my wits weren't completely about me). I still have the program, so I'll try to look it up. Something like that would make a neat pairing with bbq I think.

That looks good. I also have a bottle that a friend gave me. Funny how so many bottles of Galliano are given away... But I don't have any rhubarb bitters and have never tasted any. I'm thinking of subbing Bittercube's Cherry Bark bitters. Do you think that would work?

I like it in a sour with grapefruit bitters. It really does stretch the limits of what gin is, but I'd still call it gin. It's extremely powerful as you say, so it doesn't work like you'd expect in a martini. I know people who enjoy it in a martini (2:1), but that's because they like the gin. I pretty much only use it in sours these days, and when I drink it I'm not expecting a traditional profile.

Cornish hens are just very young and so small chickens. I think the best way to treat them is like personal chickens.

Did you let it dry out long enough after brining? I like to let it air dry for several hours (overnight even) before roasting. Otherwise, the moisture will inhibit browning.