maggiethecat

Dianabanana -- yeah, I know about aerosolized grease, only too well. I chose to live in denial. Dave, positions six through ten get pretty crowded. Baking bread is certainly a contender, along with standing rib, tarte tatin and thirty gloves of garlic sweating in olive oil. A worthy nominee is panetonne fresh from the toaster. (My mother once accused me of selfishness because I breakfasted on untoasted panetonne -- I wasn't playing well with others by depriving them of the warm sweet aroma.)

Thanks, Peter -- and everyone. Sometimes I feel like a passionate high school history teacher -- I want to tell the story, and make the kids laugh. I'm no expert on geography in the TO, but I seem to remember that Guthrie Ave. was referred to as "Up the Humber," if that makes sense to Torontonians. This tiny house fascinated us as kids because it had no washbasin in the bathroom, just a pretty shelf over the bathtub that held a ewer set.

Brand new Pets-in-the-Kitchen story. Last night, during our Sunday phone call, my daughter told me she wanted to make a pizza and asked me for my recipe. I obliged -- 30 years of Sunday night pizzas and the recipe is engraved on my brain. Knowing she owns the KA on HGS, I told her to throw the whole batter in the bowl, insert dough hook, crank. "No, Mom, tell me about hand kneading. We have no KA attachments." Seems she stored the paddle and dough hook in the bowl. One of her cats (I suspect Max) turnded the KA on while they were at work. She returned home late to the volume and passion of "The Anvil Chorus" and two mangled attachments.

150,755.

Don't sweat it. At various potlucks at work I've eaten 1) meatballs 2) chili 3) L'il Smokies in that grape jelly sauce 4)Italian Wedding Soup 5) Sloppy Joes 6)"BBQ Beef" 7) Chicago Italian beef -- and that's for starters. If I tried I could get to 20. They were all heated from a cold start in the crock pot for lunchtime delectation. Not only has no one died, no one has even suffered a tummy wobble.

Long, short, three-quarter -- whatever I'm wearing. Interesting. I've never given a thought to sleeve length. Sleeve width I think about. I set fire to a pricey silk blouse a few years ago because the corner of a floaty Stevie Nicks-style sleeve swung its stylish way into a gas flame. Now I make sure my sleeves are tight or cuffed.

Shortening for sure changes the texture in cookies. I learned the hard way not to sub butter for shortening in an Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe my mother made often when I was a kid. With butter, they weren't soft and chewy, they were brittle and crunchy. (Tasted fine, but it wasn't the same.) Butter makes for better taste and a melting, sometimes sandy texture. I use it in every cookie recipe except the one noted above. And I agree, oleo is probably short for oleomargarine, which is is a whole 'nother fat.

George Bernard Shaw was a teetotal vegetarian (so never going to make my heart or any other part of my anatomy throb) but this is a neat quip: "I flatly declare that a man fed on whiskey and dead bodies cannot do the best work of which he is capable." John Gays's my guy. His poem "To a Young Lady, with some Lampreys" extols, poetically and erotically, the delightful sin food can lure you into. Just a few lines: "Each day has its unguarded hour Always in danger of undoing, A prawn, a shrimp may prove our ruin! The shepherdess, who lives on sallad (sic) To cool her youth, controls her palate. Should Dian's maids turn liqu'rish livers And of huge lampreys rob the rivers Then all beside each glade and Visto You'd see Nymphs lying like Calisto."

Give me the Old Crank any time. They're efficient, easy on the arm and faster than strainers -- much faster.

Yes, meat in smallish chunks, potatoes, onions and, not carrot but diced rutabaga -- or swedes as they call them across the pond. When I leave them out, I miss their flavor. That's an "authentic" recipe. That said, a Cornish lady can improvise with what's at hand. I remember reading a Cornish saying that goes something like: Satan won't venture into Cornwall for fear of being baked into a Pasty."

This is a story about how a pet averted, if not a cooking disaster, a cooking mishap. My elegant little calico, Willow takes an interest in all my interests. When I'm weeding in the garden, she pounces on the Creeping Charlie as I wrestle it. Sewing is a special favorite -- all that pattern tissue to shred. Origami, crochet, the crossword puzzle: she's right next to me, observing. Every night, she jumps onto a table that butts against the counter and watches every slice, dice and stir. Observes the meez without vulgarly approaching it. One night I had rolls all risen and about to be popped into the oven. Willow abandoned her scholarly distant approach, walked onto the counter, and put her paw on the little dish of egg glaze I'd forgotten.

Congratulations Cecilia and Lisa. Seventh Daughter was one of only a dozen cookbooks cited in the New York Times Holiday Books section.

My immediate family doesn't have a history of overcooked food, but I can think of one item my grandmother overcooked that I loved. She'd overboil her rice -- until the grain started to split -- drain it well, add a stick of butter and salt and pepper. Nana's English Buttered Rice. I guess we could call that Traditional. Buttered rice isn't around much anymore, overcooked or otherwise. That's too bad.

150,520. And Christmas is coming!

Here's a Daily Gullet piece about Tourtiere I wrote last year. You can be very sure I'll make it this year. I've, literally, eaten it every Christmas Eve since I could gum food. What's your meat mixture?

Noted. On my TJ shopping list. They sound beyond.

I think I might have mentioned this somewhere here ages ago. In his 20s my father was hospitalized with life threatening pneumonia, as bad as respiratory gets. The good Sisters at the Hopital St.-Joseph is Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, put him on "diete genereuse," rare filet mignon and a glass of burgundy for breakfast, lunch and dinner. If your Love can be persuaded, she might heal faster. (A couple of years ago in "The Lancet" or "Jama" this approach got some cred.)

Pre-puberty, not sure exactly when. My mother was smart enough (and busy enough) to delegate. For example, on our 12th birthdays we got an detailed lesson on how to iron a dress shirt, whether daughter or son. We were masters of our own pressing from that day on. One Sunday dinner she said: "Muffie, this is how to make gravy " She poured all but a few tablespoons of fat from the roast, showed me how to eyeball an equal amount of flour, and how to stir up the lovely brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Add liquid, stir. When she gave me the bechamel lesson a few years later, it all made perfect sense.

Dairy doesn't bother me, so: I'd like Welsh Rarebit on toast, with a cold beer. If I were really wiped out, my boyfriend could feed me.

Oh, yeah Baby! They are outrageous. I bought my first box last week for Thanksgiving houseguests, and it was an ugly struggle for the last piece. (I won.)

First mistake: Your father and sisters show up from Canada the night before Thanksgiving for the first time since your mother died. She loved the American Thanksgiving trip. Big emotional load. So after dinner, braciolles, fried polenta, blueberry crisp, you split a bottle of cognac with Daddy and chat about Mummy and the decimation of the Grande Armee de la Republique on the retreat from Moscow. (Daddy's an historian.) Pass out at three, wake up at 11:30. make the stuffing, pumpkin pie, cranberry orange relish on autopilot because I've done it so many times before. Raging thirst. Get the bird in the oven. Peel potatoes, mash 'em . Whip cream with the teaspoon of cognac left from last night's bottle. Shower, makeup, change into 70's YSL tuxedo suit I inherited from Mummy. Trader Joe's nibbles. A martini set me up. And dinner was wonderful if less imaginative than other years .The turkey was slightly overcooked, but that's what gravy's for. Daddy and I did the dishes forever. And we were all thankful.

I love all those pamphlets from Hersheys or Land o' Lakes or Carnation that pop up this time of year in the grocery aisles. Fudge, triple chocolate mint cookies -- they've entered my holiday oeuvre. And then there's the LCBO (Liquor Control Board of Ontario) glossy mags that appear once a quarter. Sure, they're shilling for the booze companies, but the recipes and photography are first rate -- better than many food mags.

I'm grooving on this debate -- it's what I live for. But I deplore the questioning of the motives of my reviewers. Because the publisher not only agreed to but wanted reviews, I chose five people I knew I could trust to read close, write well and keep a deadline. They worked hard, wrote well, met deadline. It's inappropriate to question their motives -- there are going to be legitimate differences of opinion about this -- or any -- book. Please confine future comments to the substantive issues surrounding the book. Personal attacks, innuendo or suchlike will be dealt with according to the member agreement. These are smart, good folks, doing what I asked them to do. Exploring this format exposed them -- and me -- to a whole lotta grief. In my position here, controversy and crap stick to me like sugar syrup. It's part of the job. But as editor, I cherish my writers, I know them, and I admire them for sticking their necks out. Thank you Chris, Ronnie Rachel and Dave. Next up, Steven Shaw.

Un veritable bouquet garni of reviews are to come.

How many recipes do I use? Billions and billions ... Why? Because it's fun. I'm a secure enough cook that I can look at the ingredients in my fridge and think: "OK: Pork, fennel, apples, a can of beer" and make dinner. "Damn, where are those five new potatoes?" That's my standard MO, baking always excepted. I read many cookbooks, and read them carefully. When an interesting recipe gives me a slow, seductive wink from the page -- a better idea, an interesting method, a new way to squander half a pound of butter -- I'm a thrilled as a schoolgirl with her first tube of Tangee. I follow the recipe closely. If it were something I know I could improve on I wouldn't be using it in the first place. Was it Brillat-Savarin who said that the discovery of a new dish is like the discovery of a new star? I feel that way about a new recipe. I seek them out and I use them. It's how I grow as a cook.