Mjx

This all looks fantastic, but the fried fish... would you mind sharing the recipe? I'm a bit of a fried fish junkie, to tell the truth.

Recently ordered a Rösle, and am impatiently waiting for the DHL truck to make it's way here from Germany. I made the decision based on recommendations here (thanks Kerry and Linda!), availability and reviews on German amazon, and the 10-year warranty. It's running €99, not counting shipping, and I'm really hoping the brand continues to live up to its existing reputation. Oddly, food mills appear to be both unavailable and unknown in Denmark.

I definitely would not take out my feelings about tipping on waiters (and not just because I've been there). If I dine out in the US, I tip, and it's 20% unless the server is actively rude (goes down to about 10%), or frighteningly and apparently irreparably incompetent (goes down to 15%, since I really don't want to encourage someone this bad to persist as a waiter). Anyone polite, making an effort, and more or less succeeding gets the 20%, even if they accidentally drop part of a course in my lap, or are apparently catatonic. But it does make me feel like I'm somehow supporting a miserable system. And it really has an impact on how often I dine out, because knowing that the person waiting on me is essentially relying on the kindness of strangers for the bulk of his or her income is an incomprehensibly Dickensian thing to be happening in the 21st century.

Damn. Well, if I can deal with it in NYC, I can deal with it elsewhere.

I cook rice both ways (and sometimes fry it first, sometimes not), depending on how it's going to be used. I can't think of any cogent argument favouring one method over the other; it's really down to personal preference.

I think a combination of greed, apathy, and guilt sustain the whole tipping system. It's reached the point that even thinking about eating out in the US makes me feel a little depressed. Even in places where there is no question of your being waited on, there's a bloody tip jar, with some irritating message stuck to it, such as 'Tipping is good karma', which doesn't make me feel like dutifully tipping, it makes me feel feel like doing rather violent things. Which I don't do. I don't tip, either, which I think is justifiable (unless sub-minimum wage is now the norm in coffee shops), despite the fact that this horrifies my sister.

Just really vaguely, what sort of cake did you have in mind (light? dense? have to be round?)? Or doesn't it matter, as long as it incorporates pumpkin? And, not to pull anyone's tail, but isn't venison (or any game, in fact) at least as traditional as domestic turkey? This is my impression based on various sources, notwithstanding the assertively vegetarian Thanksgivings I endured as a child.

What temperature does your oven reach when it's self-cleaning?

I've never used the self cleaning feature, because it scares the crap out of me, even in the nearly-new Gaggenau, which is presumably reliable enough to not burn our place to the ground when this feature is deployed. Oven cleaner? US oven cleaners may work better than the Danish ones, which do not even make a dent in the polymerized chicken fat that pretty much blankets the entire interior of our oven. I just flake off whatever burnt bits I see coming loose, but it's a losing battle. I'd love to hear that everyone else routinely uses the self-cleaner, and it works brilliantly, and nothing horrific happens.

Kerry, I think the cakewrecks site pretty makes a solid good argument for a 'No' (although I helped trick out enough of BioMed club cakes with various muscles – 'feline tibialis anterior insertion, anyone?' – to have qualify that with '...unless you're serving a bunch of people who are as eccentric as yourself').

Sounds another example an item that costs far more outside its home country, simply because those abroad may be unaware of its domestic price.

How about venison? I've done that a couple of times, and am thinking of doing it again this year (my boyfriend's father hunts), something with the back straps and tenderloins. I'm also thinking chestnuts (particularly dried ones that have been reconstituted and cooked in chicken broth until the broth is almost completely reduced and caramelized), and roasted mushrooms, as sides.

Hey, that's starting to make our being there more likely. What's the weather like in August, by the way?

Payard, no? I was crushed. Loved that place, even though they took my money and made me fat. They've reopened on Houston, but I haven't been there, yet. There was also Les Friandises, although that may have been in the upper 60s (and which I don't remember seeing when I was last wandering about in the area, in August).

Why not just contact them, and ask? You'll probably get a response (this is my experience, at least), and perhaps some advice, too. For whatever it's worth, I don't own MC, and probably won't for quite a while, but I enjoy reading about what people are doing with it (in the forums, here); the absence or presence of an actual/complete recipe doesn't have any real effect one way or another on my interest in what I read. ETA: Frankly, posting someone else's recipes on a blog seems like a bad idea, but if you contact the MC authors, they may have an entirely different take on this. Still, I definitely would not do this without the getting the go-ahead from them.

I remember hearing this used with regard to wine a good 15 years ago, when wine had no place in my life, so it's actually not a newborn, but a really irritating and boring teenager

Actually, DKK995/8 courses. For a meal of this calibre in Denmark, I agree the prices are quite good, although I don't think I'd use the term 'bargain' I'd love to try the current menu...

By some odd fluke, I'm sort of loaded up with palm sugar... isn't at least some of the Indian jaggery palm-sourced? Are ladoo fairly straightforward to make? Several of these dishes sound like they rely on being cooked over an open flame, any idea of how something like litti chokha would come out in a conventional oven? Is the millet ever ground up as flour? I'd be thrilled to hear that millet flour get a lot of use, because I don't handle wheat very well (although I love bread, so I sometimes just take a batch of NSAIDs, and deal with the consequences), so a new alternative is always interesting to work with. I know... that really made me wonder about the best title to give this! I'd love to hear more about the Fanesca, which sounds delicious. I'm also curious as to the the method used for roasting suckling pig (is the local method indigenous, or introduced?), although my odds of getting my hands on one are pretty slim. Yes!!! MJX, winter in Denmark sounds even more dreary than Seattle, and being farther North, I'm sure it is. We have a large Asian population here, and pho has become hugely popular. I'm looking forward to a lot of pho this winter. Laksa is heartier and richer with coconut milk, so good. I find myself craving Korean kimchi tofu soup lately as well - really almost anything spicy and savory. And don't forget udon & ramen soups and congee (rice porridge). Another good dish for winter (just because of it being citrus season) is Vietnamese pomelo salad with pieces of pomelo (you could use grapefruit if you cant find pomelo or ugli fruit), fresh mint, crispy shallots, and shrimp. Maybe a nice bright side to a steaming cauldron of noodle soup? http://www.vietworldkitchen.com/blog/2008/02/pomelo-salad-go.html At this moment, that pretty much all sounds good... I definitely need to make a trek out to the Asian foods shop that was really close to our old flat!

'M' is for 'musculus'. The fausse-araigné cut is probably not the soleus, though, since in mammals the soleus is a deep muscle of the posterior lower leg (back leg, in a cow).

Please tell me more! And yes, you got it, the winter dishes of tropical/subtropical regions are what I actually most want to hear about (I found out, by looking up 'monsoon season' after posting, that I messed up the usage ).

I'm in Denmark, where we don't get monsoons as such, but during winter it rains. And rains, and rains, and rains, even more than it does during the summer. It's also darkly overcast most of the time, so by November, even getting out of bed seems way too demanding, never mind using my imagination to think of something marginally interesting to cook (and I like rain). This year, I want to see if I can forestall the supposedly inevitable, fading-to-grey feeling, by starting to explore – now – what people in warm countries cook when rainy season comes around. I love the traditionally European things I tend to cook in winter, but just now, I think I'm in a bit of rut (even though I'm negotiating a challenging kitchen setup). What are traditional winter specialities in various tropical/subtropical regions, including those in Asia (I'm including India), Africa, the Middle-East, South America? I'm as interested in cold-and-rainy-season-specific ingredients as I am in recipes, so let me hear what you've got!

Definitely agree with this one. An app that incorporated something like onlineconversion.com, which bases its weight<>volume conversions on ingredient density, would be a great idea (accuracy of the ingredient density database would be crucial, of course).

'Liquidise'?! You've got to be kidding me... Sorry, my first reaction on reading the recipe just wasn't culinary. My original reaction, and the reason I took a look at the pumpkin soup recipe, is that sesame oil and balsamic vinegar strike me as a slightly odd combination. I've never tried it, it could be great, but I do have doubts. Is your sesame oil toasted? If it is, that may be the problem. I've noticed that even a couple of drops of toasted sesame oil have a really strong presence in something as mildly-flavoured as a winter squash. The amount of oil seems a bit much, too: 40g is nearly 50ml, or over three US tablespoons, which seems like rather a lot for an 'or to taste' quantity. In combination with an entire block of butter, I can understand your wife's reaction (I'm by no means anti-fat, but it's just not so pleasant to drink). I've also heard that kabochas need to mature after harvesting, so that some of the starch breaks down to sugar; perhaps it just hadn't been held long enough?

Thanks, that's sweet of you! We're on the other side of Storebælt I'm sheepishly admitting having given up on the brick idea. The chicken was hot after 2 minutes, so I didn't press on for a second round, even though that was the original plan. I should have just been more assertive (i.e. not a gutless worm), snagged a burner one way or another, and heated slowly on the stove. Not that the microwave isn't good for anything. My boyfriend's parents don't even realize that there's a problem, because A) I'm trying very, very hard to not be intrusive, and B) they tend to do kitchen-dominating bulk cooking (they keep a filled, full-sized, separate freezer; our freezer is a micro-morgue for half a dozen things we can't figure out what to do with, and a couple of paint rollers), and the idea of another completely diffrent approach is only an abstraction. But they don't love cooking, which may be the thin end of the wedge... If we went in for daily take away, our bank account would break long before anyone's spirit did Actually, I don't think it would prove spirit breaking at all, they'd just vaguely wonder, 'Why all the take away?' I can't really eat bread That is, I can, but it makes me incredibly congested, and my joints swell (I'm sure you wanted to know that, especially if you're eating). I have to admit that, after a day of eating nearly nothing (I'm a more or less 'dinner only' person), I'm usually in the mood for something more complex. But I'm starting to form a plan: My boyfriend's mother would prefer to spend her time doing something other than cooking (gardening, knitting, getting root canal), and I like to cook, so now, all I need to do is figure out how to very tactfully deploy this knowledge (Bright pink steak tartare? Haven't seen that, but have seen some remarkably vividly coloured sausages.)

I really don't get the impression that a dislike of seafood and fish is more characteristic of the US population than many others. You mention travelling a lot, and now I'm curious as to which countries you visited extensively (perhaps their culinary traditions are intrinsically more seafood-based?). I've also travelled a good deal since I was a child, and although I've encountered a number of Americans who at least claimed to dislike seafood/fish, in terms of percent of the general population, it doesn't seem as though it is any different from any other culture whose culinary traditions are not based on seafood or fish. Someone's dislike of fish seems to be equally worthy of note in the US, Italy, a Middle Eastern country in which I lived (unidentified because they're apparently all controversial at this time, and I've no desire to inadvertently sidetrack the discussion into a political arena), and Denmark (i.e. the only countries in which I've spent enough time to have more than a visitor's perception of this). The fact that vetoing fish on one's plate is considered worth mentioning suggests that it does not represent majority taste (if it did, no one would mention it, since it would be the norm). As I mentioned, I've travelled a lot, if not particularly broadly (mostly the US and EU), but I can't say I've encountered any anti-US feeling first hand, although I've heard a good deal about it (yes, I'm American, as well as another nationality, third generation born in NYC, in fact). I'm not denying that it exists, but am starting to suspect that anti-fish feeling is far more common Getting back to fish, you mentioned previously that Dover Sole improves with some days holding: Does it get fishier, or does it change in some other way? Is it held in the refrigerator?