kayb

Love my Instant Pot. Love my CSO. Love my Anova. (All purchased, btw, thanks to all you enablers on eGullet!) Would be real hard to pick one. I guess it'd be the CSO, which I use marginally more.

In a word: No.

First time I've cooked in a week (it's been THAT kind of week!) and it was a 30-minute dinner, but it was what I wanted and it hit the spot. Brats poached in beer, homemade sauerkraut, home fries. Topped off with the last of the homemade chocolate cherry ice cream. That with an early night should provide a wonderful night's sleep.

Amazon Warehouse Deals finally came through for me. After watching it on and off for a year or more, it finally coughed up a Masterbilt portable electric smoker for something under half price; I snagged it. It arrives Tuesday. I am about to settle down with a glass of wine and Ruhlman and Polcyn's Charcuterie. I have a couple of nice salmon filets in the freezer; that may be my first effort, and pork belly is not far behind.

God help us all. That's about the nastiest thing I've seen today.

No photos because it was not worth the waste of even a megabyte of space. I now remember why, and how much, I loathe Olive Garden. One of these days I'm going to recruit an Italian restaurant to this town, because there is not one fit for human consumption.

Well, you're in the right place. Welcome!

I'm not @Anna N, but here's the recipe for the best savory cheesecake I ever ate in my life. Damn thing is sinful.

Arsaga at the Market in downtown Fayetteville gets rave reviews. I haven't been. If you want a good, old fashioned burger (or a fine prime rib sandwich), Fred's Hickory Inn in Bentonville is still there. As is the Suzie Q in downtown Rogers. Tusk and Trotter in downtown B'ville supposed to be very good; haven't been there, either.

How ARE things in Kissimmee, has anyone heard? Have friends down there I haven't heard from since they said they were staying...

I would have spoken harshly to one of my reporters had they handed in such to me.

Welcome! Jump right in!

A package of cheese and crackers filched from the kitchen at a client's office. Didn't take time for lunch. That'll cost 'em.

I like good writing; some humor, some snark, something that'll make me smile. I used to LOVE "Thursday Night Smackdown," which, alas, is no more. Ditto "Dark Side of the Fridge."

I had plans (and thawed brats, "Southern Whiskey" flavor from the new smoked meats store down the road) for brats, new sauerkraut, and home fries tonight. I was at a client's office all day, and an unexpected errand that kept me out until well after 6 kicked those plans in the head. So far, I have had a baked sweet potato (new crop, from the farmers' market) with a copious quantity of butter, and I think I'm still hungry, so I'll probably grab some cheese and crackers and call it done. Tomorrow it is supposed to pour all day, there's nothing for which I have to leave my home/office, and I'm here by myself (the kid is in Alaska chasing moose and bears and such), so I'll do the brats and kraut and potatoes then. Meanwhile, another glass of wine...

It can't. That seems quite obvious to me.

It's been so long I don't remember where I got this macaroon recipe, but I began making them after my daughter, now 30, was diagnosed with celiac disease at age 21. It's her favorite cookie, and I make a batch to take to her every time I go. 1 12-oz bag flaked coconut 1/2 cup sugar 2 eggs 1/4 cup almond meal 1 tsp almond flavoring This makes a very crumbly mixture, but it can be scooped up and molded into a ball. Then you can flatten it slightly on the cookie sheet, like I do, or I suppose you could shape it into little "mountains." I have no idea how closely this tracks with traditional macaroons, but I DO know they're a great little cookie. And a boon to those who are gluten-free!

I don't know that I will. Something off-putting about it.

@rarerollingobject...I repeat, I REALLY want to work in your office. My office treat today (on site at a client's) was packaged cheese and crackers.

@Okanagancook Fascinating. Thanks for that. I had assumed it was what I grew up knowing as "Hog jowl," and always had cured, only later learning it was really guanciale. It was a treat in place of bacon when I was growing up. I can only assume the cheek muscle was either cut along with the jowl (seems like a remember a "streak of lean" along one side), or it got ground up in sausage. The head always got rendered for "head cheese," aka scrapple or souse meat, which is one reason I won't touch the stuff (the watching it being made).

Likewise in Arkansas, Tennessee and much of the rest of the South. I'm fortunate to live 30 miles from the Missouri line, so I can make a border run on a Sunday, holiday or election day, should I find myself out of something critical.

Well, it's been two great Road Food meals in a week. Went to Wilson, Arkansas last night to hear Jason D. Williams, a protege and alleged out-of-wedlock child of Jerry Lee Lewis, and certainly his spiritual heir at the piano -- whew, what a show! Wilson is a fascinating town, built in the Arkansas Delta by plantation owner Robert E. Lee Wilson in the early 1900s for his bride, to mimic an English village. Lovely Tudor-style architecture surrounding three sides of a green. It had fallen, like many towns in the South, on somewhat hard times in the early years of this century, until it was purchased, along with the multi-thousand-acre cotton plantation that surrounds it, by an entrepreneur with a yen to create, or recreate, something special. He has founded the Delta School, a private school that, by all accounts, is providing a superb education to local kids and kids from a ways off. Part of their studies include working in the Wilson Gardens, which grow organic produce that's sold at the Wilson Grange, a farm market that also hosts cooking classes and concerts. There's some new retail, a new museum focusing on the local pre-Columbian culture, and a great deal of new, upscale housing is going up, as Wilson becomes the new "cool place" to live and visit. They do big name concerts (at least medium name, like Jason D) at least once a month, outdoor festivals every couple of months, and are just generally doing all sorts of neat stuff. More here. The Wilson Cafe had anchored one corner of the square for decades. Some few years ago, when my kids were in school, it was a seafood and steak place on Thursday-Saturday nights, a popular place that included a buffet with all-you-can-eat crab legs and boiled shrimp, which made it a favorite of mine. It closed a few years ago, but the resurgent Wilson leadership has brought it back, with a focus on farm-to-table produce grown across the highway, local beef, chicken and pork, and bringing in a well regarded chef from Memphis to run the place. Its prices are reasonable -- steaks are in the 30-ish range, and come with a potato side and a salad. The menu ranges from there down to burgers and sandwiches. We went over for dinner before the concert. All I photographed were the deviled eggs. Bacon and cheddar deviled eggs, in point of fact. So simple. So good. My companion had fried shrimp, pronounced them good, although she didn't care for the slaw, which was quite spicy. I went with Arctic char, in some sort of vaguely sweet reduction glaze, over -- are you ready for this -- bacon barbecue mac and cheese. Sweet Baby Jesus. What a study in glorious excess. I wanted to take a vat of that stuff home. I bet there were 500 calories in every bite. Rich, buttery, cheesy, smoky, salty, a whiff of a sweet tang from barbecue sauce...have mercy! All that saved me was it was so rich I just had to stop. Fish was good. I ignored the sauteed kale side. Oddity of the evening, and I've noticed this eating there before -- no bread served with the meal. I didn't miss it. As I said, show was a killer. If you ever get a chance to see Jason D. Williams, and you're any sort of a Jerry Lee Lewis fan, don't miss him.

Milk bread, from the Food 52 website, credited to a restaurant in NC, and referenced by someone on here recently. Too dark, a failing of bread in my CSO and of the baker for not remembering to shield it halfway through with some foil. The one in the rear was pulled after about half the bake time and frozen, to be finished later when I want fresh bread. I've had reasonably good luck with that method. Good bread, plenty sturdy for sandwiches, but the texture is a little odd. Chewy/spongy, kinda.

Lord, honey, they're Baptist down there.

$1.99 US Prime price. Just looked and bought it. Thanks. Here.