Hassouni

Well, forget "smoking" per se, I'm just wondering how I'm going to make my repertoire of stir fries...

To answer: Ma'moul are Levantine cookies made from a typical cookie type dough (sort of on the cake-ier side), with a filling usually consisting of date or fig paste. Think Arabic Fig Newtons and that's not far off. The dough if I'm correct is pretty buttery, as that's part of the taste of the typical ma'moum - butter and dates, with most of the sweetness coming from the dates (or figs) The gizmo is a wooden mould and is what gives ma'moul its name, as in this context it means "moulded". The cookie is formed by hand into a ball, placed into the hollow of the mould, and then flattened down, almost like Chinese moon cakes. Each one, once finished, has a pretty consistent shape and pattern.

I remember the Hairy Bikers did an episode in Turkey where they assembled a whole döner spit (mostly using whole pieces of lamb) Here it is:

I had a Trinidad Sour for the first time ever last night, at the Passenger in DC. Funnily enough, I had to give them my iPhone with the recipe on it for them to make it! What an utterly fantastic drink.

I haven't "burnt" something per se, but in the family house I've seared a lot of steaks and done a lot of high intensity stir fries, I know all too well how smoke and cooking smells get EVERYWHERE - and that's in a kitchen with a big wide door to the deck and an overhead fan. As for the new place, it's an open plan living space, so living room/dining room/kitchen are all part of the same space. The living room has windows near the floor (all glass wall). I don't see what'll keep the smoke/smells from getting all over the living room...

Kitchen is nowhere near a window, I'm afraid...

O.K. ............... But-tum, uh... we're burning a fossil fuel here. By burning a fuel we are producing heat, light, and spent gasses. So what kind of gas does burning natural gas produce? Theoretically if it's complete combustion, natural gas burns very clean - it's when combustion is incomplete (for whatever reason) that carbon monoxide and other nasties are produced

Sorry, I should have said "gas stoves CAN emit CO (I've seen many many references to it), and if it's not vented, then that's not good"

I've just settled on and will soon be moving into a condo with a gas stove, with a microwave mounted recirculating fan above it. As I understand it, unvented gas stoves can emit CO into the air. Is there ANY recirculating system that can filter/trap CO? I'm not sure I'll be able to install a vented system....and apart from general usage CO emission, I'm also interested in stovetop wok smoking, as I don't think I'll be bringing my WSM. That must also produce CO, so does everybody who does the stovetop wok smoke have a vented hood or a kitchen with a window (mine is not by a window)?

A lot of the Chinese diaspora is Cantonese, so that may explain the prevalence of the wok hei concept abroad.

The electric coil stove at my parent's house gets hot enough to IGNITE the oil in my wok if I leave it too long without food in it. As long as I don't overcrowd it, it gets plenty damn hot. In our London flat, the gas stove is hotter than ANY cheap apartment gas stove I've used, and is equally sufficient. Cheap apartment gas stoves, however, SUUUUUCK. I have yet to see how the stove at my new condo fares, it's a GE profile gas one. One thing to keep in mind when cooking at such high temperatures is that your kitchen will get EXTREMELY smoky, which may be why some say that stir-frying "can't" be done at home. (also, the comment about Sichuanese cooking not really having a concept of wok hei seems right, I can't think of any Sichuanese dishes that employ it, or are even stir fried (chao) - Gong bao chicken would be a famous exception, but everything else seems braised, dry fried, simmered, etc.)

Racketeer variation, following suggestions on Kindred Cocktails 1 oz Rittenhouse 100 1 oz Fidencio Mezcal joven 1/2 oz Dolin Rouge (no Carpano at hand) <1/2 oz Bénédictine <1/4 oz Chartreuse verte (instead of jaune) 3 dashes Peychaud's Rinse of Laphroaig cask strength This is EXACTLY what I wanted - smoky, strong, with a warm herbal note. Wicked.

Shish Taouk (or Tawouq in good Arabic orthography) comes from Turkish "Tavuk şiş", chicken skewer. Think Persian joojeh kabob. It is exactly what it sounds like, chicken pieces skewered and grilled. I don't know why in Montreal chicken shawarma is called taouq, but that's just a regional anomaly. Everywhere else a chicken shawarma is a "chicken shawarma"

Alpenz stuff is my dead giveaway, as is having Luxardo and Chartreuse verte. There are plenty of others, too, but these make a good start

Shawarma is beyond a doubt from çevirme, Nicolai, just as (q)awarma is from Turkish kavurma. Also, Döner in Turkey is quite often constructed from whole pieces of meat vs ground meat. Döner started in Turkey not as the vertical stack that it is now, but as the much older (19th century if not earlier) cağ kebabı, which is never made with ground meat (see below). Personally, I prefer awarma....even over a Barbar shawarma (their strong point is lahme b'ajin and mashawi) PeppersGalore, if you really want to take shawarma into the hard-balling league, grill it horizontally over charcoal, like what Turks call cağ kebabı. There are a handful of places in the Levant too that do this. Here's what it looks like:

Just two rums? I am not sure how anyone could live like this... Rums are by far the most represented category in my home bar, but as I remember you are not exactly a tiki fan, so maybe that explains your drastic decision! My rum collection surged past 20 well before I started making tiki drinks, Princesse. It's just such a diverse category.

Oh man, eliminating Barbancourt? That's a keeper for me! (But then at least 10 rums count as my keepers...)

The Entertainer crackers are back!!! Now under the name "Some Enchanted Cracker" with the subtitle, "the perfect cracker for entertaining" or something like that. These were the best crackers EVER, and they're back after a year or so's absence!

56g of fat! Wow. What's the grass-fed weigh in at?

This may be considered blasphemy, but I thought the jungle bird was utterly vile. The blackstrap and Campari run roughshod over everything else in the drink, and don't play nicely with each other, either.

My local WF (there are a few, but the one I go to most) has quite a big bulk section, actually, nearly any kind of bean or nut I want. I may be ignorant of other options, but in DC there really isn't much competition to WF and TJs (which I go to a lot). Safeway is shit, Giant is not much better, and Harris Teeter, while better, is more expensive. Not only isn't there much serious competition, I don't think there ever was, either, if one wanted top quality stuff. Of course, on the weekends, I haul out 20 minutes to Super H Mart - the happiest place on earth!

Isn't De Cecco made in bronze dies? I don't eat much pasta but I remember the raw product having a rougher feel (in a good way) than most other brands

Japanese, Chinese (usually Sichuanese or Sichuanese-inspired), are my go to cuisines for daily cooking, often a stir fry, quick stew (jjigae or nabe), soup, or whatever else, with rice. When I have more time then it's Middle Eastern or Indian (as the stews and curries take much longer than the East Asian stuff). Occasionally I'll do Thai or Mexican (though since I'll be moving into my own place soon, the Thai will probably increase - current dining companions can't handle my level of heat). wanting to make Iraqi food and learning how to make a killer curry were what got me into cooking seriously, and I went through a period (mostly in college) where I made either Indian food or Thai food nearly every night. Indian because it was cheap and delicious (I kept it mostly vegetarian, and would knead chapati dough while I watched TV), Thai because it was relatively cheap to make and very intense in flavor (that's when I built up my herculean chile tolerance). Any time I'm on a reduced budget (say, while living in Dubai as an unpaid intern!) vegetarian Indian covers about 75% of my cooking

Chaokoh is definitely the most consistently rich and coconutty of the canned brands. Pretty commonly available too. Frozen coconut milk is even tastier, but I don't often use it.

Yes, it'll work - keep in mind a lot of frying in coconut-producing countries is done in coconut oil. That said, it's not the same flavor as straight-up coconut milk, but it's pretty similar. If you have difficulty in finding cans of coconut milk that have a good layer of coconut cream on top, it's a good strategy. Chaokoh typically has at least half the can as very thick coconut cream, FWIW. By the way, there's no need to keep it in the fridge, it's pretty stable. PS: Coconut oil is crucial, however, for Keralan cooking, which is quite delicious