trillium

Thanks for the lowdown, SG. He's gone, but I'll pass it on tonight. I think Penang is a chain with different family members running them, right? There's one in Chicago. I thought it was good, he didn't (like I said...picky). They didn't put the REQUIRED cubes of pig fat/skin (don't remember the name) in the chaw kway teow and that got him all huffy. Cincaluk that is questionable? Was it foaming out of the bottle? Or a strange grey color instead of pink? We actually had a hard time moving our kitchen stuff from Chicago to Portland and it makes me laugh when I think about what we took and what we threw or gave away. The bottle of really good cincaluk (from S'pore) was included in what made the cut, vs things like the oregon white truffles in butter that didn't! thanks again, trillium

okay, let's do this one at a time. i'd probably call that south asian, not east asian. And you'd be absolutely correct. Meant south asian, typed east....oops There is a big south indian influence on cooking in S'pore. Keralan food is great. So is Andhran. So is food from Madras (dosai bigger then my head!). Sigh. Oh well. The buffet thing does not sound promising. At least this way I won't be jealous. The only cabbie place I know of is Chef Abu's, on 9th about 3 blocks north of Vine. Have you eaten there? What sort of food? So Chinatown has real shops, not just restaurants for tourists? The best places to buy stuff in SF where hardly ever in Chinatown ('cept for herbal stuff). Even in Chicago it was hard to find lap cheung that wasn't packaged in plastic. I'll pass on the recommendations and the contact info (can you PM me your actual email address?). Maybe you can demonstrate that secret handshake in person...heh heh thanks a bunch trillium

For pure Chinese (not Nonya) Yan Kit So's _Classic Chinese Cookbook_ because it has most of the classics from many regions and isn't too watered down (but her best are the HK/Cantonese recipes). regards, trillium

hi all, My partner is going to be in Philly for a conference starting on Wednesday. He has a laminated map of the city, frommer's guide and a bunch of posts I forwarded him from here. He's not afraid of taking public transportation or cabbing it. He's hoping for some advice on where to find some decent East Asian food (anything --Pakistan through Kerala). We got really spoiled in Chicago and miss "real" East Asian food here in Portland. If the place is open all night and feeds cab drivers, it's a plus. Same goes for Greek food. He's also wondering if it's worth eating any Chinese food while he's there (Chinatown is close to the conference center). He's ethnic Chinese from Singapore and he's picky (he doesn't think so, but he is). He was reading about Susanna Foo's place with great suspicion... Any hints on a Chinese grocery where he could find good lap cheung (the kind hung up with strings, not the stuff in plastic) and dried shrimp (the big sized bulk kind that isn't colored red/pink) or an Indian grocery with a good selection of snacks would be appreciated too. I think he's going to need to eat out with his boss a few nights, where he'll need to eat somewhere less adventurous then what he plans on doing on his own. He was eyeing places like the Striped Bass and the fusion latin place whose name I'm blanking on. These are still well thought of, yes? Is there a secret eGullet handshake I should teach him before he makes a reservation? thanks trillium

You can find corking equipment at your local homebrewing supply store. Most homebrew places also carry wine making supplies. regards, trillium

The farmer's market at Portland also has a couple of cheese booths from people here in Oregon making cheese. One guy makes more Italian style cheeses the other I never checked out because I didn't see enough soft washed rinds to fight my way through the crowds of tourists. I'm another PNW weather lover. Once in Chicago it got really misty and foggy and people freaked out and wouldn't drive (but they'll drive in a foot of snow). It made me homesick for days. I can't stand too much hot/humid weather and then if you survive you're force-marched through about 6 months of cold so bad it hurts to breathe. I'll take the rain. regards, trillium

Or the next time you're in Portland come and eat them at Ken's. His version has a dark caramel colored slightly crunchy crust and is flavored with orange zest and maybe rum? regards, trillium

I would argue that sake is neither. It's the process of a co-fermentation of mold (aspergillus oryzae Globosus) and yeast. Well, maybe not, since lambics are co-fermentations of bacteria and yeast. Anyway, I think it deserves its own catagory, due to the necessity of koji (rice innoculated with mold). regards, trillium

Next time try Ton Kiang out on Geary. On a good day, they beat Yank Sing in the seafood dim sum dept, but Yank Sing gets points for consistency. regards, trillium

And you'd be close enough to state lines to cross 'em to buy your booze in California. I do love living in Portland, but even our most faithful booster will admit that as state-run booze stores go, ours sucks extra hard. I think pot is easier to buy here then a bottle of booze. regards, trillium

Does the batter cooked in Nordicware Bundt pans have the same dark, crisp exterior even without the butter/beeswax mixture? I'm very intrigued by this idea...I bought the a 10 c Bundt pan at Costco because it was cheaper then at a cookware store and it came with one of the 6 mini Bundts pan. I haven't figured out what to use the it for, but I love canneles. regards, trillium

Sometimes sales clerks will actually ask you how you are and mean it. They'll chat with the person in front of you while you stand there and try not to be huffy. Wait until you pass people on the sidewalk and they say "good morning" or "hello" or "thank you" from the back of the bus to the driver. Scared the hell out of me the first few times, but now I really like it. I'm not sure I'd call it boring, but just that people get their entertainment in different ways (lots of breweries, bike/hike/bird watch groups, underground restaurants) that aren't tied to the latest and greatest "hotspot". I don't know housing in Seattle anymore, but it depends on what you want here in Portland. A 1 bedroom can run from hmmm....400 - 800 depending on location. The 800 one would be pretty swank. I haven't been to the Union Square market, but from what I can tell, we get comparable or better quality and selections (I found Damson plums here, someone in NYC couldn't at the Union market). I don't think it's entirely fair to judge produce against another region because the very fact it's in another region means that things will shine there that wouldn't here and vice versa. For example, the berries and stone fruits are to die for here. The tomatoes and corn and chilies just don't see the blistering heat that makes them out of this world like they are in the midwest. For biking, I think Portland has the most bike lanes of any city. I think it got some award from a bike magazine or something, but I don't keep track. As for the bustle vs. ease, that's a really personal decision I think. Both have merits. Me personally, I'm enjoying the break from big city life and I nearly swoon every time a heron flies by my living room window. But I do miss 3 am runs to the Pakastani restaurant that stays open all night. regards, trillium

Just a few more thoughts to add to the pile... I never lived in Seattle, but a little town 45 minutes NE of it until I went to college. 5 years in SF, 8 in Chicago and 1 in Portland. Portland beats all others for public transportation hands down. It's not just the light rail, but all of the system. Clean, friendly drivers, on time for the most part and really affordable (bike racks on all the buses help too). FlexCar, a car sharing program that is just getting started in Seattle, is pretty well established in Portland and helps with car needs. The access to produce here is probably about equal with Seattle, but I think we get a better selection of high quality fruits. I'm not sure what nightscotsman means about the seafood being better in Seattle, whether this refers to restaurants or just availability. It might also just be a matter of taste. I rarely like a seafood restaurant more then what I can cook at home given the right ingredients, but where I've had the best seafood restaurant experience in the US is here in Portland. That being said, we don't eat out that much. The seafood you can buy here has been fantastic. I adore the fact that I can buy 3 doz oysters pulled from Yaquina bay that morning for $15 at the farmer's market. The crabs are the same here as in Seattle, this may be due to the fact that we always buy them live from Asian fishmongers. Portland needs a good fish store, but you can get almost anything you need if you're willing to talk to the fish buyers at New Seasons (the best grocery store ever). The food "scene" here is very friendly and creative, lots of people trying things out on their own. We even have some hipster SF refugees doing arty club/drink/food things. Housing is extremely affordable and can be very pleasant (wood floors, turn of the century buildings) or dreadful (carpeting from the 70's etc). The worst thing about living in Portland for us is the lack of diversity and the fact that the city pretty much shuts down at 10-12 pm. Or as the partner likes to say, Portland is very diverse, you'll find every kind of white guy you can imagine here. It's not really quite that bad, but it does affect the food. I think Seattle has more diversity going on. We got really spoiled by the South Asian (Pakistani down to Kerala) goods and restaurants in Chicago. Nothing like that here. Not very good southern/soul either. The southeast asian ingredients are a little harder to track down here in Portland then in Seattle. I think the SE asian restaurants are about the same in quality. Same for "Chinese" (pretty much dreadful all around unless you get desperate in our not very humble opinion). Seattle has the advantage of being close to Vancouver for good dim sum and HK style food. I think if you had to choose between them, you'd want to weigh availability of nature (desert, mountains, ocean etc) and ease of living (cheaper!) vs. a similiar but more urban setting where you loose some of the ease and gain some of the city bustle. regards, trillium

Neener, neener, neener.....erm...sorry. Seriously, I'm fairly certain you could get one at an Asian grocery store that sells pig. Many do the butchering themselves and get the hogs whole. It just depends on how confident you feel going in and doing a lot of gesturing to explain what you want. Do you have pork vendors at any of your farmer's markets? Bet they'd sell you a jowl or two. regards, trillium

There's also a recipe for curing pancetta in the Chez Panisse Cafe cookbook. Armandino of Salumi fame (and St. Mario's papa) says he doesn't understand why every restaurant doesn't make their own pancetta, it's that easy. There is also a great description of how guanciale gets made in "Cooking the Roman Way", I think you could make it after reading that too. If you can not get a hold of a cheek, belly might be a lot easier (asian grocery store), and totally worth curing at home. Salumi 309 3rd Ave S Seattle, WA 98104-2620 Phone: (206) 621-8772 Can I gloat? I have a piggie cheek rubbed with its curing salts and spices sitting on a rack in the fridge right now, slowly transforming into guanciale. Other lucky folks have pieces of pig belly sitting in their fridge, on the way to becoming pancetta. How did we get so lucky? We all took a salumi class from Morgan, a chef at Ripe, here in Portland. We started with a side of pig and ended up with 40 sopresatta and finocchiona salumi, the afore mentioned pancetta, and hot coppa. He also taught us how to butcher the leg to make prosciutto, but we didn't use the leg for that because our pig was too small. Those of us who opted for the class with salumi get to go pick up ours when it's done aging. The partner, who is very fond of our porcine friends, asked if he could call every day to check up on his salumi and Morgan told him he could actually come by to inspect it. This was the most fun we've had in a while. regards, trillium

Nearly every cook has a different recipe for the peanut stuff, but what I can tell you from the se Asian cook in our house is that you don't start with peanut butter, you start with Spanish peanuts (the red skinned kind) and it's not unusual for the sauce to separate. regards, trillium

sorry, what is pandan? I answered this same question in a PM but here it is for any other interested readers. it's an herb/plant leaf used a lot in south east asian (malay, thai, vietnamese, singaporean for sure, not sure about laos, cambodia etc) cooking. it gets used for savory (hainanese chicken rice in s'pore for example) and a lot in sweet (all the nonya/straits chinese sweets, ice kecang, and my favorite, chendol). It gives off bright green liquid and smells a little like vanilla and a little like good jasmine rice steaming. It looks like giant blades of grass. It gets sold seasonally in the fresh veg part of a se asian grocery and is stocked in the freezer year round. Here's a pic regards, trillium

If you say so. I personally don't see the difference since they both have obviously fake flavor, vodka and sugar in common, but to each their own (just don't make me drink either). regards, trillium

Don't be mad, it's just a pet peeve of mine. I think the key word is flavor. It takes a really, really good flavor chemist to get close to what mother nature does. There are usually hundreds to thousands of compounds in what we think of as a single "flavor". Jolly Rancher flavors are bland and boring to me. It seems like a waste of booze even if it is only vodka! regards, trillium

Success defined as how? Turning a perfectly decent bottle of booze (ok, maybe not perfectly, it is vodka after all) into something that tastes like the very bottom of the barrel of what the IFF turns out? Blech. I'm of the opinion that sweetened candy flavored spirits are in the same catagory as jello shots. Alcohol for people that don't want to taste alcohol and still have the flavor palate of a nine year old. If you want to have something red and sticky sweet and redolent of fake watermelon flavor, why not just eat the Jolly Rancher? Or drink some kool-aid? And it's not infusing, it's dissolving sugar, flavor and color into a bottle. I suppose someone is going to suggest laffy taffy next, for it's improved mouth feel. Ok, rant over...mutter...mutter...mutter. regards, trillium

how about pandan? it might make a nice infused vodka and look cool to boot. regards, trillium

Pix Patisserie is pretty hot stuff in the dessert department. I'm also a big fan of Paul Lemieux, the pastry chef at Lucere. I usually just order his stuff in the bar during their generous happy hours (while the partner pigs out on the pommes frit and other fried savories). I've had some cosmic ice creams at Higgins but I hear the pastry chef has moved to Park Kitchen, which I have not been to. During the fall I had a pumpkin ice cream of hers that really was the platonic ideal...it tasted the way a pumpkin smells when you cut it open. The other place that I had a really great dessert was Pambiche. Their guava cheesecake was the best cheesecake I've ever eaten. I'm actually trying to figure out how to recreate it at home. My mum loved her rum banana cake. Another time I had a taste of their version of a german chocolate and thought it wasn't that great but I think it's just a matter of personal taste. Two other places to keep in mind (can you tell I have a sweet tooth?) are Staccato Gelato and neo gelato (which I'm not sure is open yet). I have not been to either but have high hopes. regards, trillium

Hang on a minute. I never, ever said you should have rejected Ms. Planck's article. That's leaping to a conclusion I never reached. I think it was in need some serious editing from someone with a basic understanding of biology. I think if you publish an article that is giving people nutritional advice it's only ethical to make sure that it's clear it is an opinion. I think it makes for better reading if those opinions are also given in a clearer context. Reading referenced work can make for boring reading, but surely there is a middle ground. I never felt it reflected the viewpoint of anyone but the author, I do think that the article as published diminishes credibility on the author's part for sure, and more along the same lines will certainly diminish the credibility of this site. I'll admit a certain sensitivity to what I see as irresponsible reporting of "scientific fact". As a basic science researcher, I hate to see something reported as established gospel truth when it's just a single finding in a long line of studies, and then when later studies come out refuting it, the lay person feels betrayed and makes an assumption that all scientists are lying bastards. Science thrives on argument, it's what improves our understanding. An article doesn't exist in a vacuum. There are of course, the egotistical glory seekers who believe they should have the final say, but for the most part, we're actually a pretty careful bunch when it comes to claiming something is "true". I'm talking about people doing research in an academic setting. I have no experience with research in an industrial setting. The HarperCollins thing just made me really wonder, but then diet psuedoscience books get published all the time and by authors with impressive initials after they're names. It may surprise some people to realize that just because someone has a degree doesn't mean they know how to do properly controlled research, but it's the truth. As for the MSG site you listed, I'm fairly certain you could go to PubMed and pull up just as many, if not more, citations that list an opposing view. It goes back to what I said about context and an awareness of the body of literature that surrounds a given finding. Calling glutamate a known neurotoxin is a little like saying that water kills you, except that Joe Blow tends to know a lot more about dehydration and drowning then they do about neuroscience. regards, trillium

Exactly. I think it's also important to note that you need to take a given study in its context. There is usually a whole body of literature that surrounds it. Science thrives on discourse and argument, but that means there will be more than one published opinion at any given time; the hopeful end result is some sort of consensus, of course. I'm not even talking about all those bullshit weird diet books out there full of pseudoscience that people believe just because someone has a couple of initials behind their name. They give those out to nearly anyone, and I should know. Of course that's a great argument, but it's not the one that was used. I think it really destroys the credibility of the author, the editor and the site that publishes an article to base an argument on things stated as fact that are subjective opinions at best and downright bullshit at worst. I also think it's a total cop-out to claim that it's ok because the end point is right and it makes vegans look silly (honestly, do they need much help in that department?). As for soya milk tasting like shit, I happen to love a fresh bowl of soya milk with yew char kway. Or doufu fa steamed in a big bamboo bucket, but I don't pretend that it tastes like cow milk or custard made from cow milk. Soft tofu steamed with fresh shrimp paste on top? A thing of beauty. But now we're in the realm on subjective opinion... regards, trillium

Ok, no curdling...hmmm...maybe my half and half is the culprit. What bourbon did you use? I thought the amount of symple syrup was too much and made the drink too sweet, but I was starting with Maker's Mark. Did you shake it first and then pour it over ice like you're supposed to? I guess this means I actually have to buy whole milk and a fresh carton of half and half and drink both and compare them? regards, trillium