SylviaLovegren

Yes, Cheese Dreams! The ones I grew up with were in Betty Crocker and were toasted bread of some sort, topped with a slice of tomato, bacon, and grated cheese mixed with Worcestershire and a few other sharp things, maybe some egg. Broiled. I usually skipped the taste sharpeners and stuck to nippy cheese. Cheese Dreams were supposed to have been very popular with college coeds in the 40s and 50s, hence irresistibly sophisticated to preteen me. Plus deliciousness ensued. I love your idea of crumpet as the bread base.

My mom always lined her drawers and cupboards and I carried on the tradition for years. Until one day, I was replacing the lining and realized there was no point to it. So I stopped.

One of my favorite mushroom recipes is from an old Cuisine magazine from the late 70s or early 80s. Basically wild mushroomms sauteed with bacon and a bit of onion, served over polenta seasoned with parmesan, all topped with gremolata. The bright gremolata really brings out the earthiness of the mushrooms.

My dad used to do cinnamon toast that way, too. Maybe it was a guy thing? Heavenly, indeed. Never tried it with cheese, but it's on the calendar now.

After reading this, I had to make toasted cheese for lunch. Yum. Thanks!

Gastronomica and AofE are quite different, although both are "serious" food publications. AofE is very focused on quality of food, on how and where to find good food and a great deal about the people producing that good thing. Nothing is tangential to that. Ed Behr said in the interview that his goal is to support good food and traditional producers and that is clear in the magazine. Gastonomica is much more diffuse, with a broader interest. All centering around food, of course, but not as focused. I do have to take issue with the brief discussion about American food in the interview, however. While I'd agree that there are many improvements in what's available at the supermarket and the cooking in restaurants, the quality of home cooking I'd say has gone down. Women used to cook a lot and as a consequence many of them were pretty good cooks. Try to imagine a Clementine Paddleford today going around the country collecting local recipes as she did in the 50s -- her collection, while not "sophisticated", has some good solid eating in it. I fear the modern Clem would find pretty poor pickings.

I had forgotten about splitting the hot dog to allow for more charring. Thanks. I like my hot dogs well charred, with cheap yellow mustard and cheap sweet relish on the cheapest squishiest heated hot dog bun possible. Do not give me a fancy bun! Oh, and regular kettle chips, please (which is not really in keeping with the main feature, is it?) Once a month for lunch, please. That is exactly right. If the bun is just right, it will stick to the roof of your mouth, too, which for some reason is part of the perfect hot dog experience.

I see this ALL the time. Their day starts with "My bus ride to get to school is 45 mins long and I wake up at 6am to get to school so I just eat some poptarts for breakfast" and then moves to a brown bag of chips, cold sandwhich and "fruit" juice. At one school I worked at there was a kid who came in with a huge lunch bag that had a soda, a couple different kind of cookies, some M&Ms, all rounded off with a variety of chip snacks. The mother saw me looking at this "food" one day and explained that the kid was a picky eater and that she had given up on fighting with him over food choices. It was absolutely appalling -- this family would have benefited from the policy. On the other hand, if the school had told ME I couldn't send a bag lunch with MY kid, I would have gone ballistic. How would the kid have benefitted? He wouldn't have eaten anything at school almost guaranteed. Maybe the kid would have discovered the joy of bread or potatoes, instead of having only packaged sugar or salt snacks. It's also possible that the kid might have tried something really exciting like jello or a piece of fruit. I didn't mention that the child was 5, so it's not as though the mom had spent much time trying.

I see this ALL the time. Their day starts with "My bus ride to get to school is 45 mins long and I wake up at 6am to get to school so I just eat some poptarts for breakfast" and then moves to a brown bag of chips, cold sandwhich and "fruit" juice. At one school I worked at there was a kid who came in with a huge lunch bag that had a soda, a couple different kind of cookies, some M&Ms, all rounded off with a variety of chip snacks. The mother saw me looking at this "food" one day and explained that the kid was a picky eater and that she had given up on fighting with him over food choices. It was absolutely appalling -- this family would have benefited from the policy. On the other hand, if the school had told ME I couldn't send a bag lunch with MY kid, I would have gone ballistic.

If you're still there, head just a bit east on Rt. 30 to Ronks to Diener's Restaurant. (It's next to the Dutch Village, which you do not want to go to for food.) It's a Mennonite buffet place, all you can eat dinner for $9.99 (or was it $8.99) -- but they close at 6P.M. on weekdays (farmers go to bed early). Home grown veggies and real country PA Dutch food, but not one of the tourist trap chains. Breakfast is all you can eat for $7.99 and stupendous -- great bacon and eggs, but also scrapple and creamed chipped beef. Old fashioned good stuff. It's a real favorite.

Get a copy of Lolis Elie's "Smokestack Lightning" to get a real flavor of what American BBQ is all about. Fantastic book. Real BBQ involves slow cooking meat over wood -- what kind of meat, what kind of wood, how much smoke, what kind of sauce, all vary tremendously depending on location and culture. You can make an argument for all different styles of Southern BBQ, but for my money, there is no better BBQ in the world than Lexington #1 restaurant in Lexington, North Carolina. Pork shoulder slow cooked over wood, not a lot of smoke but the taste of the wood just gets up in the meat. Absolutely haunting. God, my mouth is watering just thinking about it.

I haven't had those things in 50 years, but a bag jumped into my cart the other day ... it was very hard to share them. A secret passion. Also, the cheap drugstore brand of chocolate covered cherries -- the expensive kind just won't do. But of course you have to sit down on the couch, have a good cry over a sappy old movie and eat the entire box of chocolates in one go, otherwise, what's the point?

DH set himself on fire this morning. Was wearing a fleece and turned his back on the gas burner, the bottom of the fleece kind of flared out when he turned and whoosh! Up in flames. Fortunately he was right next to the sink and sprayed the fire out immediately. Neither of us will wear one of those near an open flame again.

Recently ran across Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer by Novella Carpenter, her story about running a small farm (complete with geese, turkeys and pigs) on an abandoned lot in one of the scarier parts of Oakland, CA. A bit harrowing and I don't think I'm young enough, brave enough or crazy enough to do what she did, but it was inspiring. Her relationship with the animals she raised for food was really interesting -- it surprised me that she had a harder time dispatching the turkey (she was very fond of that turkey) than she did her first pig. Edited to add: @ andiesenji "Oh, yes – quite alot of things [are beastly]. Birth is beastly – and death – and digestion, if it comes to that. Sometimes when I think of what's happening inside me to a beautiful suprème de sole, with the caviare in boats, and the croûtons and the jolly little twists of potato and all the gadgets – I could cry. But there it is, don't you know? (p. 239, New English Library paperbacks, 1968)" i just loved this.

That bread! It looks like the bread that used to come with the Mongolian BBQ at a restaurant in Hollywood a hundred years ago. I want!

The mention of American cheese reminded me of the boxes and boxes of Velveeta we ate as kids. "Cheese" comes in boxes? We "rediscovered" Velveeta a few months ago. It makes a wonderful cheese sauce for mac'n'cheese. But it's best sliced thin in a sandwich with soft whole wheat bread, mayo, and sweet pickles... (My husband will not eat this.)

Claudia Roden is wonderful, but these pictures have me drooling all over my keyboard. And I haven't had coffee yet this morning!

I keep hearing about the lack of time, but seriously, I can put together a good dozen cheap, from-scratch meals in a half hour or less each, from prep. start to serving. I'm not talking about the more elaborate things I make when I have the time, but the stuff I put together when I've been working all day, have no desire to do another thing, and my boyfriend comes in the door, beams, and says 'So, what's for dinner?' Really? Something that's actually cooked. Like what, for example? I mean, I can do something like spaghetti cacio e pepe in around 30 minutes, but that's hardly something I should be eating 4 nights a week. We do a lot of quick cooking and my husband's on a low-carb (argh) diet, but a typical meal would be: Broccoli rabe sauteed in olive oil with garlic and red peppers; salad of tomato, cukes, onion and Greek olives with some feta crumbled on top; and some thin pork cutlets sauteed in olive oil served with pan juices deglazed with lemon juice. If I get the water boiling for the rabe quickly enough, this meal doesn't take more than 1/2 hour and involves very little "skill" -- except for the knowledge of doing it at all and working out what should be cooked first. Of course, it also takes shopping for things that work together and can be cooked quickly. Experience helps.

You were there? This happened to me a few years ago when we had some friends over for the first time. I made a tried-and-true chicken casserole but apparently the oven was cooler than usual. Very embarrassing. Our friends were gracious while they waited while I nuked their partially gnawed chicken thighs. I've since taken to using instant read thermometers more regularly.

Oh God, yes. Had it in a small not-too-clean restaurant out the boonies in France once with the proprietess watching us like a hawk because she was sure we wouldn't like it. Tasted like badly cleaned chitlins. Gah. She was right. Also bitter melon, karella. Took a bite, spit it out, rinsed my mouth out. Never again. And anything gelatinous in a Korean restaurant.