maggiethecat

Double dipping is rude, but I think the switch hit double dip is legit. I find the dipping, double or otherwise, it situational. I have cute little cocktail plates I put out so guests can scoop dips onto a plate and ingest their own germs. But I think we should think about what's being dipped. A Crispy Thing should have some strength and structure, to support a full load of dip. Think Wavy Lays. Or the Dipped Thing should be small enough to be dipped once only -- no crudites longer than an inch or rounder than a cherry tomato. If you don't monitor your toddler's dipping habits, forget about monitoring your teenager's driving habits. Then there's the Holy Dip into the shared chalice at Communion. I'm a nonbeliever now, but I was a good Episcopalian girl once upon a time. The priest would use a linen cloth between sips -- nothing antibacterial, trust me --and I don't remember the parishioners of St. James, Trois-Rivieres, getting sicker than any other portion of the population. Maybe we should recite the Nicene Creed over the California Dip?

I don't own"Domestic Goddess," but my daughter loves it because "All the recipes work!" I'd go for "Feast." Eclectic, reliable, Nigella talks, and, yes, the pix are lovely.

I'm a good shopping citizen -- I use the tongs or the wax paper or the plastic bag. Then I forget about it. Otherwise, that way madness lies. (I knew a woman who would flush the toilet in public loos with her elbow, even though she scrubbed like a surgeon post pee.) What about the baker with a cold who coughs all over the rolls back in the bakery? What about the cooks in good restaurants, not buffets or food courts, who are encouraged to work sick short of typhus or a heart attack? How scrupulously did the receptionist scrub those apples in the pretty basket at the dentist office?

A dear friend of mine blindsided me last night, saying that whether I talked about Montreal, Quebec City, LA, NO, Ottawa or Sweet Home Chicago, I emitted snotty, elitist chauvinist prejudice about sourcing, cooking or dining out. Kinda weird, because the level of culinary skill in some of the towns eclipse the sweet sourcing opportunities in others, swamped as they are with Tim Horton's. My response was, to make it sound civil, prickly. As far as I knew, I had never done a head-to-head comparison with food in his city, which might be called an aspirational but still second-tier food burg. (Not that I've eaten there or anything! Sorry Babe.) But this spat got me furiously to think. What part of our civil culinary pride --or shame -- is a reflection of what we've read, how many Best Chefs of 2008, how many stars or organic greenmarkets? Local dishes? Sleb chefs? Dollar to bliss ratio? And how much is civic love and pride? The longest stretches in my life have been spent in two cities always spiking the culinary EKG -- Montreal and Chicago. Am I obnoxious to others because I take that kind of quality for granted? Am I just plain chauvinist because I love both these cities so much? I'm interested in how you might feel: is it a culinary duel between Fort Wayne and Indy? Pierre and Grand Falls? (Forks?)How much is somehow verifiable and how much is love? Montreal, mon amour. And my kind of town.

Well, my Lancashire grandmother has passed on to the great chippie in the sky, so you can't make her stand in the corner. Come to think of it, even if she was with us, all 5' nothing, 98 pounds of her, you'd quail and run to avoid her fury. She called them Dabs. They were slim potato wedges in a flour and water batter, deep -fried. In a long life of eating everything not clamped down, and mostly avoiding naughty erotic behavior when I want to swoon or howl in public places like restaurants, , Dabs made me act that way when I was a sheltered virginal 9. Nana, if you're reading this in your perfume and fur-strewn afterlife, be gentle. Dr. Teeth knows not what he says.

Ronnie, please add Lou and me for Saturday.

I'm with you on chili - and that means chopped beef, not ground, and wrangling dried chiles -- no chile powder, no tomatoes. (Where would cowboys get tomatoes?) Martinis must be made with gin, and enough vermouth to add a presence. Pasta Puttanesca shouldn't skew red, just a few chopped tomatoes. Hamburgers should be pressed from 70/30 ground chuck -- you should still be able to see the pattern of the grind -- and enhanced with no more than salt and pepper, and (thank you, Paul Newman for this tip) a drop of W sauce spread lovingly over one side with a fingertip. Waygu, foie -- pfui. No chicken in my Caesar -- yes to raw eggs and W sauce. Espresso black and dark: don't wiggle that bottle of sugary fruit, spice or extract anywhere near it. There's only one topping for pancakes, and that's maple syrup. I have spoken.

No one is more grateful to the electronic media than I, and I appreciate all the time-saving, tree-saving, cut-and-paste, sort and print options daily. But you know, I spend enough ass time in front of a screen. I don't want to squint at one to find the biscuit recipe from "Joy." Because I treat my cookbooks as kitchen tools, to be a dinged as my knives, not coddled like the Dead Sea Scrolls, I find the easily portable paper and board book simpler and more practical in the kitchen. As to kids toting books, pfui. It builds character. I did it in -20 weather, in a miniskirt in high heeled boots. If kids still tote books, it's probably the most exercise they get , except for those Manhattan sqaush lessons.

Janet, that's a beautiful thing! As you say, the best of both worlds. I want one, really bad. But I don't actually need one, sigh, because I have my 30 year old Mouli. A tamis casts a lovely pro glow over your home kitchen, and it works. But in the end, forcing the spuds through your sieve will produce perfect results with no expenditure. And then, there's the puree producer that dare not say it's name: a cheapo hand mixer. My mother in law's "whipped potatoes" were severely short of the butter of Joel's, and broke every tenet about how to smush spuds, but they were silken.

I'm more Yankee than Yankee -- I'm Canadian, and blessed with a father who supported "artisanal" cheese forty years ago. I remember driving up the Ottawa River to Mr. Gruff Cheesemaker's farm and watch Daddy haul a hundred pound wheel of cheddar into the trunk. Rat-trap cheese in my father's lingo meant the hard, dessicated, inedible, ungrateable edges of a wedge of cheddar. It was literally good for nothing but to bait a rat trap. Everything is local, especially language. What a beautiful thing.

I agree. Use the smallest disc size for the silkiest results. A food mill will probably set you back 30-40 bucks, but it's easier on the forearms than a tamis, and much more versatile.

Dear Poff: What awful dinner companions! I feel for you on that drive in the snowstorm. I'd feel even sorrier for you if I hadn't laughed so hard. The upside is that, as my great-aunt used to say, you'll be able to "dine out" on that story for years.

I don't think I've ever given a dinner party that included only the tried-and-true. As someone else said, that's part of the reason to give dinner parties -- to try something new that wouldn't scale correctly for a couple of people at home. You live and learn. Two dear friends have very conservative taste and I've given up doing anything too gastronomically challenging for them on the savory side. I always try a new dessert when they come over. Other friends eat every organ, every cuisine and I feel free to experiment with what a teenaged friend of my daughter's once called: "Your parents' weird food."

It works for me too. I have a container in the freezer to which I contribute the odd backs, wing tips, ribs, etc from chicken meals. (Also mushroom stems and parsley stems.) When whole chickens go on sale I toss a whole biddy in with the trimmings and pull it when it's gently poached and succulent. Strip off the breast and thigh meat for innumerable lovely preparations, and throw the rest back in the pot to add savor to the stock.

156.462. Thanks for counting, moreace01.

Maybe that's what I need! I just have to find some powdered milk... But I do love the Bouchon quiche. The crust sank to about half the pan, so I used all four eggs and only about 250ml-300ml of the milk and cream I had heated up. I used the rest of the milk and cream (there was 600mL total, so whatever was left) to make some very rich hot cocoa. It was divine! I haven't cut into my quiche, yet. I hope it doesn't taste too bad! ← I'm sure it will taste terriific -- it's hands down my favorite quiche recipe. Keller is right -- it needs to be a deep dish pie. I used a springform pan a little higher than the one he recommended, which took care of the pastry "slip back" problem.

I've read all of them but "Katish." This is just a terrific series. I highly recommend,"Cooking with de Pomiane." but each is an idiosyncratic gem.

Ding ding ding! PMS classic. Lazy, salty, crispy.

Chris (and Mr. Fab) are two lucky men. And in the freeze and drifts of January in the Midwest, the warmth and the food and the coziness and friendship just pop off the page. I love it that Chris's birthday was a kind of FeastEvent, spanning many days and meals. If I'd been there , you wouldn't have had a leftover lunchtime bowl of soup. Happy birthday, Chris.

Trust me, the picture is better than the real thing! While a friend and I were in London we decided to drop in on a wealthy English college friend. "Come for hamburgers! It's been ages since I had a hamburger." We sat horrified and astounded as Sara Jane took out the can opener and slid a few slimy grey disks into a saucepan along with their foul juice. And this girl had no excuse! She'd eaten North American hamburgers. I can honestly say that it was of the three worst meals of my life.

Love Midway! (Don't tell anyone else about Midway, Anna. I'm, er midway between airports but I try to fly from Midway anytime I can.) Yes, the SuperDawg! And the Greek place -- Pegasus? And there's an Italian joint that does paninis. And I can walk from the entrance to the gate in three inch heels.

Yes. Bagpipers are essential at any important gathering. Margaret McArthur Scots wae hae we Wallace bred Scots wham Bruce has always led Come into your gory bed Or to Mr. Beef.

I flew out to Denver from Rockford International (RFD) a couple of months ago, and it was the anti-OHare. Small, easy to navigate, free parking(!) and a hole- in -the-wall that was newstand, gift shop and restaurant. There was a guy working grill, and the menu choices went something like: Grilled cheese, hamburger, patty melt, tuna salad. There's no room to sit in the hole-in-the-wall, so we grabbed a table in the lobby. (We were the only occupants.) The food was hot, cheap, and tasted as if it had come off the grill in a greasy spoon. It was wonderful. (Re: RFD. After she'd run through the safety routine our flight attendant said: "OK. listen up! I have issues with this airport! Rockford is supposed to be the home of the sock monkey. Why aren't there any in the gift shop? I'm so bummed.")

All those hilarious mentions of risolles in "Captain's Paradise."

I'm a gourmande, I suppose, but self-identifying as one sounds pompous and makes the uninitiated goggle and ask "What's that?" I explain, and they say "Oh! you're a foodie." The English language is a liberal, open table kind of place. There are many, many more locutions I despise more than foodie: in fact, the first time I heard someone say prioritize the world wobbled. I give you incentivate, folks! The world at large understands foodie -- someone with a serious interest in food. Just as groupie could be more accurately defined as a girl who'll drop her drawers for the drummer, the word groupie implies that. Like Chris, I just tell people I'm interested in food, but if foodie is handy shorthand for them, eh ... it's not world peace.