mssurgeon81

Thank you huiray! I just moved to Indy and am still learning my way around...will be following with interest and hope to have some reports to contribute soon

I usually eat the skins of my roasted sweet potatoes (which is how i usually make my sweet potatoes)

Bumping for any north Florida lurkers.... So the Gainesville food situation is not as dire as I'd feared. Thee are plenty of good little independent restaurants which aren't doing anything earth-shattering, but are putting out good food. North Florida has an abundance of good fresh local food, and while there aren't a lot of avant garde preps I've been pleasantly surprised at the tasty meals The local chefs are producing, Embers, The Top, and Civilization are a few of the places I've had a good meal at lately. The Queens Arms pub in haile has also been a great find. Anyone else have some Gainesville favorites or hidden gems?

I just made a sensational caponata-style eggplant dish using eggplant that I sliced and grilled over low heat until it was smoky and soft. Then I chopped it roughly, along with a generous scoop of SobaAddict's slow roasted tomatoes, roasted garlic, capers, pine nuts, and lots of fresh basil. Served it over pasta with a crisp unoaked French Chardonnay....even my eggplant-hating guest loved it!

Any updates on the Gainesville food scene? I'm moving there in a year from Philadelphia, and I'm starting to panic at the amount of culture shock that would appear to be forthcoming...

I've got to stop reading the Drinks! thread right before bed when I have to work tomorrow....I'd already poured myself a Manhattan nightcap, was idly surfing Egullet, and thought to myself, "hmm...I have everything to make this drink...." It's delicious. Tart, with a nice complex floral background from the St Germain. I may have another....or try it with my Flor de Cana 12-year and blanco tequila. Damn you, Chris Amirault!

Thai Curried Butternut Squash Soup, from the November issue of Food and Wine. The only change I made was to roast the butternut squash (rather than boiling it as the recipe suggests.). Garnished with a dollop of greek yogurt. Served with an Americano Imperial (an Americano, with champagne instead of club soda) to balance the rich sweetness of the soup. This was rich, spicy, and REALLY REALLY good. I ate an embarrassing amount.

Haha Katie....it was an import from across the Pennsylvania-Delaware border! Definitely not a locally-available product....

I was home working tonight...and feeling sorry for myself...and then I saw this topic and realized that an old-fashioned was the perfect nightcap for my current mood. 2oz Rittenhouse 100 rye barspoon rich demerara simple (I was out of sugar cubes) Fee Brothers Whiskey Barrel Aged Bitters Orange twist This is such a deceptively simple but awesome drink... (and Katie, I'm totally coming by Oyster House for your version next week!)

Nice to see my Philly boys represented with Franklin Mortgage...

When I moved to an apartment that was bigger than a shoebox I hit up IKEA for some liquor storage. I found this glass-fronted cabinet that works perfectly. The two things I love about it are 1) the depth of the cabinet, which allows 4-5 bottles deep and 2) the adjustable shelves, which let me size it perfectly for my bottle of Luxardo. (Plus it was fairly cheap)

Totally craving those Dan Dan noodles, and seeing the pictures only made it worse!! I may have to stroll down to Front and Chestnut and get Han to whip me up some takeout...

I'm waiting for Jeff to post pics from dinner, since there is no way I will be able to remember all the dishes we ate (even Han was impressed by the amount of food we put away). I will say that pretty much every dish was a star - clean, brilliant flavors with blazing spices. I do remember the wontons in chili oil, the spicy green beans, the ma po tofu, and the noodles as being standouts, and I can't wait to go back and have them again! It was a thoroughly magical evening with amazing food and wonderful company. So nice to meet all the eGullet folks....and props to Jeff for drinking a shot of chili oil at the end of dinner! Can't wait for the pics....

Yeah, my mom cherishes this fantasy that I have an occasional glass of wine, never drink beer, and have never had anything stronger than an amaretto sour. I forego the gin martinis, rye manhattans, and tequilas when she's in town Can't wait for dinner tonight!

Thanks Katie! Sadly I'm all too familiar with the 12th and Chestnut store; when my mom came for a visit I think she was a little alarmed that our cashier knew my name! I'm going to see what I can find in the way of Gewurtz and Riesling, and if I can find a less-dry sparkling rose I think that will be yummy. I just finished rereading through the thread on the previous excursion to Han Dynasty (the suburb edition) and now I'm starving. Can't wait for Thursday!

Thanks for all the suggestions! Going to hit up the PLCB tomorrow....

I would love some recommendations as to what kind of beverages to bring. I was thinking that some kind of sparkling wine or crisp lager might go well with Han's food but having never eaten at his restaurants I'm just guessing. Premixed cocktails (i.e., like a pomegranate margarita)? White wine? All I have in my wine cabinet right now are a bunch of red wines, so I probably need to go shopping

I'm in! On call Tuesday and Sunday night but otherwise free....

Jose Garces's cookbook (an autographed copy!) Latin Evolution and this from my cocktailian partner-in-crime

Ooh good question, Shamanjoe. I'm a single girl and I definitely started the slide toward too much takeout and ready-made food toward the end of last year. One of my resolutions for this year is to get back in the kitchen and cooking more than once a week! Specifically, my strategies are: 1. Cook more complicated dishes during the weekend that I can eat/modify during the week (i.e., short ribs, soups, lasagna, etc) 2. Actually cook the stuff I buy - I swear I have thrown away a hundred bucks worth of stuff over the past few months because while grilling a batch of chicken breasts on Sunday night sounds like a great idea, I often end up either too busy, too tired, distracted, etc and they sit in the fridge for two weeks. The same goes for the vegetables I have every intention of steaming and having on hand for salad. This year, I'm going to start cooking/prepping the food I bring home the same day I go shopping - and have realistic expectations about how much I'm actually going to cook 3. Start cooking outside my comfort zone. I have a good handle on the fundamentals of American and Italian cuisine, but this year I want to start learning the basics of Asian, Indian, and Latin cooking as well. I've already started collecting some basic recipes, and I'm writing one on my calendar to try each weekend. I'm really excited about this year - I finally have an apartment with a kitchen, and I think it's going to be a year when I can cook some memorable dishes and grow as a cook. And I definitely have eGullet (and all you wonderful eGulleteers) to thank for inspiring me!

Yay! Can't wait!

I'm heading home to Miami for Christmas but I am making a beeline for this place as soon as I get back next week. I've been drooling over the pics in the Han Dynasty thread for months! Any chance of an eGullet get-together at the new place in 2010?

Someone went to a steakhouse, ordered some non-steak dishes, and thought they were terrible. Big surprise. With so many innovative independent restaurants in Philly, I think there are a zillion better options for salads/seafood/non-steak cuisine (as people like Katie have pointed out). I wouldn't seek out that kind of cuisine at a chain steakhouse, and I certainly wouldn't expect it to compare in quality to that offered at so many other great restaurants in our town. Now, if this were to turn into a discussion on the STEAK at various steakhouses in our area, that would be awesome. I love steak. But otherwise I confess myself a bit confused as to the point of this discussion.

Count me in!! This Klatsch came along at a good time, since I've been eating out quite a bit lately and haven't been inclined to cook anything in my pantry. This despite the fact that I have all these big plans to cook, and so my pantry/freezer are full of stuff for all the cooking projects I haven't done! However, last weekend I braised a batch of short ribs and made/froze a few dozen meatballs, so I do have some starting points for meals this week. The past two nights I worked late, but resisted the urge to stop and pick up takeout on the way home. Instead I found some Trader Joe's black bean soup in the back of my cupboard, and stirred in some black beans, sauteed onions/garlic, and some chopped tomatoes to make a very respectable quick soup. With a squeeze of lime, a scoop of sour cream, and some cheddar cheese it was delicious! I think I'll do short ribs over brown rice tonight, and I definitely can do meatballs/marinara over pasta. The weekend is when I'll have to get creative. Short rib quesadillas maybe?

The new menu is awesome. I blush to admit I've been there three times in the past week, and every time I find a new drink to love. Sunday night it was the Kensington, which is a riff on a perfect manhattan with just a smidge of orange marmalade for sweetness. I don't usually like sweet drinks but in this one the orange flavor comes through bright, not cloying, and it's delicious. We're definitely going to swing by there as part of our Halloween bar crawl....