Panaderia Canadiense

That tradition in our house comes from Oma Salome, who was a Polish gypsy and who refused to have any other bread in her house. Hence her stuffing was always made with pumpernickel or some similar black rye type bread (she made her own on a cooked cornmeal base with black chocolate and aniseseed in the flavouring along with blackstrap mollasses; I have both her bread recipe and her stuffing one.) I'll PM you with the bread recipe; it's a bit of extra work but oh so very worth it. It makes for a heavier stuffing, but it's absolutely terriffic, and I'm inclined to agree with Oma. No other bread should be used in stuffing. Come to think of it, camote isn't all that traditional either, it's just that I can't find the flourescent-orange sweet potatoes down here. I'm beginning to think, though, that the purple ones are better. They're certainly sweeter. And yes, pineapples come in white flesh. They're rarely exported because they're so very tasty that the crop is largely eaten domestically. White pineapples are a hint sweeter than golds, with a better balance between the sugars and the acids. The white variety is called Abacaxi, and it's closer to wild pineapple (which I've also eaten - nothing compares to it.)

We did a roasted drunken chicken with all of the traditional trimmings - pumpernickel mushroom stuffing, mashed potatoes, camote (purple sweet potato), asparagus, green salad, gravy made with the bird drippings. No time for pies (oven time is at a premium on feast days in my house) but we had fresh white pineapple with ice cream, which more than made up for it.

At the Sher Punjab in Quito (incidentally, the best Indian restaurant in the country), they sous-vide the lamb first; I imagine that it would traditionally be boiled, however.

Not particularly, but it does form a significant part of Ecuadorian coastal cuisine - many of the best Esmeraldan dishes include it as a flavour (I'm thinking Encocado as the big one - that's peanut-coconut curry, traditionally cooked in the coconut, with shrimp or other seafood chunks. And now I'm drooling.) My guess is that it's because curry is big in the areas of Africa where most Esmeraldans originated, and it came with them. (For the curious, the demographics of the province of Esmeraldas are largely based on colonies of escaped British and Spanish plantation slaves.)

Sure, those are Zapallos. The all-orange types can be a little meh, but if you salt the soup well they'll actually taste just fine. Next time you get them though, cook them by steaming - you gain a really neat nutty flavour that way.

My take on an Ecuadorian coastal fave - this is the beef version of Seco de Chivo, Esmeraldas style. (I can't find good kid goat up here in the sierra to save my life, and lamb is more work than I was willing to devote to dinner last night.) It's a mild sour yogurt curry, and I had it over mixed quinua, cracked barley, and gold rice.

I'll put in a vote for Israeli-made Naots with custom-made orthotic inserts. Visit your podiatrist for the insoles, tell him exactly what's going on, and then find a nice pair of shoes for them to go in. I love Naot simply because they're killer comfy even after 10 hours on your feet.

I'd say it is, because I can buy Japanese-made nori here in Ecuador....

Naaah, that much fruit passes right over the "healthy" line and straight into "decadent" territory. For me, at least.

Japan - 日本の or 日本 China - 中国の Korea - 韓 Edit - whoops, misread the question. Edited to fix.

For me, it was a 12 fruit salad with vanilla yogurt, and a half a bread baby (more on those later).

Kim - red bananas have a full, almost vanilla custard flavour with hints of chocolate and tropical fruits along with a smooth, not so cloying banana flavour. The texture is also a great deal smoother than "grocery store" bananas. The flesh iteslf isn't red, btw, but the skins are - the flesh is a sort of pale pinkish colour. I don't have photos at the moment (Rosados don't last long around my house, for obvious reasons), but when I do I'll post some.

Down here, it's stewed mashed ripe plantain, quinua gruel, and whatever the parents are eating for veggies and fruit, mashed or pureed.

The only thing I'd add to your list is a good bottle of Cachaça. If you enjoy drinks that aren't too sweet and that allow their base spirits to shine, and you haven't had a Caipirinha (2 oz of spirit, over two limes sliced and muddled with a teensy dash of panela or raw sugar), you're missing out.

I use recycled grey plastic tubs (available widely down here for takeout), and write with sharpie on the lids regarding contents and date. For meats, these go into freezer baggies and are unlabeled because I have no difficulty telling the difference between chicken breast, say, and a chunk of fish. I rarely freeze bread unless it's already gone terribly stale and I'm saving it for stuffing. And of course the pureed veggies, applesauce, and shredded zucchini are in pre-measured amounts in freezer baggies with clear labels - applesauce and squash puree look a lot alike after they've frozen...

It is indeed a bright yellow lemon-verbena influenced soda type beverage. Dark rum improves it to no end.

Is it possible to visit your local forge or ironmonger and ask them to cast you one of appropriate dimensions? That's how my Persian friends down here got theirs.

OK, my other guess would be RWood, if Kim can't eat that much burrito....

It's not me, folks. I'm thinking Kim Shook as well - the cake photo wouldn't necessarily be in her own kitchen, especially given that she seems to take cake everywhere she goes....

Depending on the stress level at the bakery, between 10 and 30 oz of nice, black, aged domestic rum a week. This is mostly consumed as grog, rum slings, and Inka Libres (think Cuba Libre substituting Inka Kola for the Coke). Around Christmas, this increases dramatically because of the parties.

I'd classify it as "frozen" actually, and then use it as if it were fresh. It's not dehydrated, so it's not going to suck the moisture out of whatever you're using it for. Hmmm..... I'll have to try this, actually - I eat a lot of mandarines, and their zest is particularly yummy in things....

Kim, I'd be really tempted to try that cake with boiling milk in place of the water - I find that it adds just that little hit of moisture without unduly affecting the crumb. Also, have you tried it with fresh orange zest in place of dried? That's another source of moisture; I've found that dry zest/peel can really suck the moist out of most baked things.

I figured that you might like an update on this: the frozen bags of zucchini weep more than a bit when thawed - so I've taken to draining off about half of the liquid before I use them. However, on the upside, the result is actually better in the death-by-chocolate cake with frozen zucch than it is with fresh.

Or, if you're even a little bit handy, you could try buying the burr-grinder mechanism and making your own base box for it. Lee Valley has an excellent cast-iron burr grinder mechanism for a ridiculously low price ($20).

Yogurt goes with almost everything. Except Foie Gras.