patrickamory

I'd also add Fucshia Dunlop - Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper

Amazing scotch eggs, rro and liuzhou. Love the scoring on your duck robirdstx. Kdra of chicken with pistachios, chickpea and lemon:

All the books by John Thorne. But if we're talking about all books about food that aren't primarily composed of recipes... that's a HUGE category. Were you looking for something more specific?

Yum! Any idea why it turned out juicier? Perhaps the chicken?

I use both candy thermometers and instant read thermometers for deep frying. Any cooking thermometer that can take the heat will work. Just be sure you have a steady hand.

I could have done without the gimmicky question format. But I liked that Wells didn't pull his punches. Fieri clearly deserved what he got - it's not just middle-American food, it's middle-American food done poorly, with bad service.

Onglet is hanger steak in the US. Flank is called flanchet in France, I believe; bavette is next to it on the beef diagrams, and Bourdain describes bavette d'aloyau as "the more tender little cousin of flank steak."

From RecipeGullet, actually, by helenjp:

Green bell peppers roasted & peeled, with salt, pepper and olive oil: Pasta with lemon and ricotta:

Vinegar chicken

Love Marie Sharp's! There's a hot and a mild version, based on carrots, both excellent. It's from Belize.

I like the Rancho Gordo recipe... and I use their Midnight Black beans to make it. What's great about it is the rich, smoky body lent by the roasted garlic and tomatoes. 6 unpeeled garlic cloves 2 tbs olive oil 4 whole fresh tomatoes with juice (they should be good ones) 1/2 pound dry black beans, cooked, with their cooking liquid 1/2 onion 1 jalapeno 1 carrot 1 1/2 tsp cumin seeds, roasted and ground 1 tsp dried Mexican oregano 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper 2 cups chicken broth or water freshly ground pepper garnishes: up to you, I used chopped fresh jalapenos, chopped white onion, sour cream, avocado, cilantro, and lime wedges Preheat oven to 400F. Place garlic cloves in aluminum foil, drizzle with olive oil, and wrap. Place the tomatoes in a baking pan, cut in half with the cut side facing down. Salt them and drizzle them with oil. Place both the foil-wrapped garlic and the tomato pan in the oven and roast until "soft, fragrant and brown" - 20 minutes or so. At the same time, place beans and their broth in a pot over low heat. Also, place 2 tbs olive oil in a heavy saute pan over medium-high heat. When warm, add onions, chiles, carrot and cook about 10 minutes or until aromatic. Then add the cooked onions chiles and carrots to the bean pot, along with the cumin, Mexican oregano, cayenne and chicken broth or water. The roasted vegetables should now be ready - remove them, peel the roasted garlic cloves, and roughly chop the garlic and the tomatoes. Add them to the beans, season to taste, bring to a boil and then simmer until it tastes right - about 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and let the soup cool, then blend half the soup in a blender, and add back in, adjusting seasoninings. Serve with garnishes.

Bruce - so did son #1 find it too peanut buttery? Looks amazing, I must say.

Back after a while, this was the last meal before the lights went out (literally by half an hour or so).

OMG mm that woodcock. Trussed with the beak!

Yes thanks for reviving Bruce. It reminded me to bookmark rro's post above with the amazing looking pork, along with yours with the Chiang Mai curry. It's interesting about your wife and peanut butter, the latter is one of the only two foods I will not eat, and in fact sometimes dishes incorporating peanuts evoke peanut butter too much for me to abide them. I think it has to do with how much the peanuts break down in the sauce (putting them in a paste would be absolutely out of the question for me) and of course how much peanut oil ends up being incorporated. Not a health thing, a taste thing, and not entirely rational - goes back to childhood. It's funny because obviously Southeast Asian food is one of my obsessions, so a certain amount of steering is necessary for me to deal with this phobia.

Hey Prawncrackers, sorry for delayed response on the massmun curries and peanuttiness, and that was not meant to be a loaded question! I like peanuts in their whole form, and sometimes crumbled. But anything that resembles peanut butter in even the slightest way is something I cannot abide, and sauces and curries incorporating peanuts sometimes get there. (Same goes for peanut oil in some applications, and even sesame pastes for some reason). Crumbled peanuts on top of a curry don't seem to evoke peanut butter usually. I've had bad experiences with penang and massamun curries in restaurants because of this association in my mind, and was wondering whether homecooked versions have to be like that, and what yours was like specifically. As you know I love Thai cooking and am pretty deep into it, but those are two dishes I haven't attempted for this reason.

Thanks pbear. I've been looking at the 8-quart Presto. I'm most often cooking for 2 people. There's no downside to using a pressure cooker this large for smaller amounts of food, is there? I want the flexibility to cook for larger parties (say, up to 6) as well.

Actually it turns out this is wrong! I lost power last night along with the rest of Manhattan below 39th St. on the East Side, and am happy to report that the gas still flowed from my burners this morning, thank God, and was lightable with a match. Even on the 11th floor. Would be curious to hear whether others in high-rises still had their gas even though the power was out. KennethT, I think you are in my neighborhood so a similar situation? Well, that would be the main reason, since many people who live in the city don't have an outside. I actually do have an outside, but I'm pretty sure the building would frown on me putting a generator out there.

Nice looking grouse Prawncrackers. re: the massamun curry. The sauce isn't too peanutty is it? Or is it?

Well, you can't use it on a balcony, terrace or roof. Or in a dwelling that houses more than 2 households. That would rule out 90% of the city. Nor can you transport it through the Holland or Lincoln Tunnels. Not easy to get. Nor can you have an open flame 10 ft from a flammable surface. Etc.

Dejah, that looks fantastic. Is the chicken deep-fried after the marination?

I do wish this was legal in a Manhattan hi-rise. But it isn't (and basically illegal in Manhattan, period).

Yep, I made it with chicken following the recipe from Cracking The Coconut. The Food Network has reposted it here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/seur-rong-hai-crying-tiger-recipe/index.html Note that it calls for Big Four paste, the recipe for that is here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/the-big-four-paste-glurh-ka-tiem-prikk-thai-rugg-pakk-chee-recipe/index.html

Don't know about freezing, but they certainly last in the fridge over a week - both times I've made them. The salt pork may act as a preservative. The beans get pretty mushy anyway. They preserve some texture, and caramelize, but I'm not sure that freezing would alter that significantly... unless it made them gritty or mealy.