huiray

The OP talks about casseroles but also includes one-dish-meals in the subject matter. So, with me, regarding "one-dish (or one-pot) meals": • Rice congee with whatever I add in that day, cooked in the same pot. I've posted about them here. • Any number of "Instant Noodle" or "Ramen" packs gussied up with whatever I feel like in the same pot. Ditto. • Any number of soups (hearty or otherwise) I cook in the same pot and eat as-is; and there are lots of them which I have posted about here. • "Irish Stew". • Although it does involve another pot or bowl, any number of braises (meat + veg) I do; eaten w/ or w/o something like rice noodles( mei fun) softened in the same bowl (w/ hot water) that the braised stuff is ladled into, etc etc. I've posted many of them here too. Etc. I do almost all of my cooking on the stove top. Using the oven is very, very rare for me. Home cooking with an oven is almost mandatory with Western/European cooking but this is not so in very large swaths of the world elsewhere. None of them are specific "favorites". I just do whatever I feel like that day.

Leftover Hainanese Chicken Rice & sauces; with Pull Mustard (雪裡紅) in the poaching broth, plus bean sprouts sautéed/"stir-fried" w/ sliced ginger & scallions.

Hmm, I have the impression that they would start LCK up after 4-5 chefs have been eliminated? Maybe, maybe not this year...let's see. Yes, I like this season so far too. I like the "instant feedback" from the judges also. Not too sure about the sudden-death Quickfires, however, although the cook-off is an acceptable wiggle-out-of-it maneuver. Hugh Acheson's bog is as acerbic and droll as ever. But I think he doth protest too much about Aaron. He's piling on him excessively. BTW Richard Blais' blog on episode 3 on the Bravo TC website is nice too. Lots of recaps of TC out there - some are quite amusing to read. (Just do a Google search for them) I don't have the vigorous reaction most people have to Aaron. I have a little sympathy for him, even though he could do with more finesse and better manners as I have already mentioned earlier. I was fine with his making it through both the QF and the EC. Too bad, Ron, but perhaps this kind of reality TV cooking game competition is simply not the kind of thing for you to show what you can do, as you yourself sort-of said. Not your kind of food. I was a little sad that Keriann didn't get the chop. Katsuji does need to shut up too.

Hainanese Chicken Rice. • Yellow-skin chicken, stuffed w/ trimmed scallions; poached w/ the "shut off heat & steep" method and w/ lots of ginger pieces (smashed w/ a Chinese cleaver), sea salt & additional chicken fat, chopped up. Brought it back to a simmer this time because the thick part of the thigh temp wasn't at 160ºF yet. • Rice cooked w/ the poaching broth (with most of the fat scooped up and into the rice pot), ginger pieces, garlic, fresh pandan leaves. All these were removed after the rice was done. • Some of the poaching broth w/ chopped scallions & coriander leaves. • Sauce1: finely chopped scallion – grated ginger (with all juices) – salt – hot oil. • Sauce2: Lingham's Hot Sauce + Kokita Sambal Bangkok + juice of two ripe fresh calamansi limes + a bit of rice vinegar as well.

In SE Asia "jambu" refers to a fleshy fruit. (N.b. the birds in that photo set are Jambu Fruit Doves)

Fresh fettucine is often (usually) made with eggs (see here as one example). Many fresh pastas use eggs as the liquid component instead of water. (Wiki article) For myself, some of the best "store-bought" dried Italian-style pastas (and yes, containing egg) are the ones put out by Cipriani. My favorite one is the tagliarelle. I consider these a treat, not eaten on a "daily basis".

• A sort-of kon lo mein. Hot oil, chopped smashed garlic, sliced ginger, thinly sliced pork belly (skin on), short-cut pork spare ribs; "aged soy sauce" [Kimlan], "Superior dark soy sauce" [YHY], fish sauce [Red Boat]; water, simmer then cook down; jozo mirin, chopped scallions, sliced standard mushrooms, cook a bit more. Eaten w/ skinny wonton noodles plus more chopped scallions. • Green beans, "French cut", simply stir-fried w/ garlic & salt. Sauce + wonton noodles in picture was before tossing/mixing up; a little more sauce was also added from the pan then.

But that is comparing apples to oranges. I suppose I should have placed double quotes around that phrase in question. Even in Indiana there are Chinese restaurants that get pretty loud on the weekends when Chinese families pour in. I've been in any number of Chinese restaurants in Chicago and (since we're talking about it) NYC with deafening noise levels. But Hakkasan positions itself as high end sophisticated Chinese fine dining geared somewhat towards Western sensibilities and Michelin inspectors. The appropriate comparison would be another high-end fine dining restaurant of that sort. Maybe even something like Tin Lung Heen or Lung King Heen in Hong Kong, perhaps. (There are no other high-end Chinese restaurants with the sort of decor or aspirations in NYC, I think, that Hakkasan professes)

http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/834646 http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/731338 For myself, noisy restaurants - especially where the clientele is of a certain "beautiful people" type are places not for food but for being seen. Young people also seem to equate quiet places with fuddy-duddy-ness --- well, dear people, that's fine, just stay out of such quiet places then and you can diss them to your heart's content - but I will not care one whit about your misplaced ramblings. As for the other considerations - such as moving clientele along, as referred to above and in those links I gave - that is something that one can choose to acquiesce in or not. In this context I would note that Hakkasan in NYC has been reported often as having a deafening modernist-type sound track quite unlike what one might think of as a serene Chinese atmosphere - and the "beautiful people" appear to like it.

I vote for the fuller description (50 g egg, 20 g yolk, 30 g white) - that gives the reader a visual image of the components. As for "...but you can readily substitute canola" I assume you are aware of the REVULSION that many folks have (including folks on eG) for canola oil, yes? (I am not one of them). :-)

Thanks! Yes, true, this qualifies as an "empty out the fridge dish" and I have done variations upon that now and then too. :-) In this specific case it was a bit of that and a bit of "planned dish", however. I did have broccoli rabe I needed to use up...I had guanciale, which I was intending for some spaghetti carbonara...but also had the sliced Jamón Serrano sitting in the meats drawer. So - I decided it would be broccoli rabe and the Jamón Serrano and pasta...although with broccoli rabe and pasta I often use something like capicola; but pasta + broccoli rabe + a dried ham or salumi-type sausage --> broccoli rabe + artichokes + sun-dried tomatoes as a favored combination for me. Nope, no sun-dried tomatoes in my larder - I fished out a can of San Marino tomatoes instead...but nope, I thought I had the artichokes but did not after all. I suppose my mind was now fixating on my favored "trinity" so the can of S.M. tomatoes went back into the pantry, I put my pants on and picked up my car keys...and as they say the rest is history. ETA: As for the thin spaghetti + fedelini mix, well I didn't have quite enough thin spaghetti left in the opened box in the cupboard - so I used some fedelini (opened box) as well, which is not too dissimilar in sizing to the thin spaghetti. I just staggered the additions of each to the boiling salted water accordingly. :-)

Yes, I like that too. The Heritage series I mentioned upthread does that by removing such things as substitutions, commentary on the cooking times, other stuff etc into footnotes *removed* from the recipe proper, with the footnotes labeled clearly with a little header such as "Tip(s)" or "Variation(s)" . There is also no missing the footnotes, as each recipe (and footnotes) occupy the entire page or two (if needed) - so if there is a fair bit of "white space" because of the simplicity of the recipe proper, for example, it is simply left that way. If one had a book where the recipes ran on consecutively from page to page one following the other without page breaks then having footnotes could get a little confusing/distracting then. (I also dislike this "running style". Please don't do this.)

EV olive oil, chopped smashed garlic, chopped thinly-sliced Jamón Serrano, hot red chile flakes, chopped sun-dried tomatoes (jarred), with some of the oil; sliced standard mushrooms, roughly-chopped broccoli rabe, dried thyme; halved artichoke hearts (canned); al dente thin spaghetti & fedelini, tossed & mixed in the pan w/ reserved pasta water.

Brunch + Lunch (later). • Xiaolongbao [Wei Chuan]. • Kai-lan. • Soup.

Count me as another one who doesn't particularly care for risotto, especially ones that are praised as "al dente". I understand the concept of "al dente" rice in risotto with the "toothsome centers" of the rice grains, but that is only at the theoretical level. To me, personally, in practice, "al dente" rice skates too closely for my liking to what is called "sang kwat" (in Cantonese) ("raw bone/center") for rice, which is where the rice grains have a hard/semi-hard center, and is a despised characteristic for cooked rice in Chinese cuisines in a general sense at least for some people (I'm sure some folks like it). Yes, I'm aware this is comparing Italian to Chinese-type cuisines but I grew up with rice that was "properly cooked" without a "sang kwat" center. Note that I don't like mushy rice and much prefer basmati rice, for example, over Japanese types or types that tends to be sticky (including Thai jasmine)** - but the point is that there is no "resisting center" for any of the rice grains. ** except when it is supposed to be sticky - like lor mai kai and such things. ETA: There is also a difference between "al dente" pasta (semolina-types, in particular) and Chinese/Chinese-type noodles which are "springy". The textures are different. It is sometimes said that "Asians" (you mean E/SE Asians) like "soft" noodles/pasta &etc - but this glosses over the differences between the grains used for making the pasta/noodles and the concept of "song hou" = springiness/bounciness which is not the same as "al dente".

Go back to the pub and ask them where they got it or at least find out about the history of it? It could also be a re-purposed pan, an old piece of cookware that fit the bill for baking pies with instead. Like this new piece, maybe, which I am guessing could be used for pies and is about the same size as the pan you picture? (The one in your pic also does not look round but slightly oval instead.)

Dinner in two parts. Mushroom soup. Fresh maitake, fresh white beech, canned straw mushrooms; in a chicken-poaching "stock"/liquid, with chopped up chicken fat added in; plus chopped scallions & a bit of parsley. The "stock" was from poaching a couple of chicken thighs w/ salt & sliced ginger. Laksa lemak, with poached chicken (thigh, chopped up), de-shelled de-veined shrimp, mung bean sprouts, laksa leaves (a.k.a. rau răm; a.k.a. Persicaria odorata) added in. Dang, I forgot the tau pok (fried tofu puffs). The laksa "base" was a pack of "Singapore Laksa La Mian" [Prima Taste], shown below. This is pretty good stuff. A bowl of "bare bones" laksa, made with just the package contents, without any add-ins, which I had for lunch a previous day:

• Fedelini w/ tomato sauce. The sauce: EV olive oil, finely chopped shallots, minced smashed garlic, finely chopped outer leaves of a fennel bulb, salt, chopped de-skinned ripe tomatoes, some bay leaves, rind from a chunk of Parmigiano Reggiano, simmer; aged rice vinegar [Kong Yen], a couple nuggets of gula melaka, rest of the fennel bulb, chopped; plus chopped fennel fronds; simmer. • Maitake mushrooms sautéed w/ ginger, EV olive oil & chopped parsley.

• Duck fat, chopped garlic, duck livers, broccoli rabe, fish sauce [Red Boat]. • White rice. • Kkakdugi [commercial].

• Fresh green beans stir-fried/sautéed with duck livers & smashed garlic and corn oil. Very hot oil. ;-) • Remainder of the short rib, daikon, winter bamboo shoots, shiro miso. garlic etc braise from dinner two days back. • White rice (Tilda basmati). Parmigiano Reggiano for munchies afterwards.

Heh. I think I'd do the second option, regardless of whether or not it is dry or sauced.

Naftal, I picked this up (together with another goi3 wun2) from a curio shop in Kuala Lumpur more than 2 decades ago and brought it back to the States with me. The red mark is a variant of the mark of T'ung Chih (1862-1873; late Ch'ing Dynasty) in seal form. In script it would be 大清同治年製. I have never had it formally verified but I am inclined to believe that the piece is also probably of the period - but I don't know for sure. The cup lid carries the first part of a poem from the T'ang Dynasty era which may or may not be by the poet Du Mu; the bowl carries the second part: 清明時節雨紛紛，路上行人欲斷魂。 借問酒家何處有？牧童遙指杏花村。 Here is a Google translation and commentary (from a poetry-appreciation website) of the poem. Some others here, here, and here. The scenes painted on the lid and bowl are evocative of the poem's context.

Well, if as you say you have eaten in good Chinese restaurants and don't care for the stir-fry dishes it may be that this type of food is just not your cup of tea. That's OK, no one has to like everything.

IF I wanted to get a whole, free-range, etc etc turkey for Thanksgiving (which I DON'T) I might get it from this local vendor in my area, whose prices are half that of yours. I am wondering if this butcher you refer to drives around in a Rolls-Royce with gold fittings or flies to-and-fro on his own Lear Jet.

Anna N, "Sichuan dry-fried green beans" does not NEED the Sichuanese preserved vegetables as specified by that Englishwoman to be thought of as "Sichuan dry-fried green beans". Ditto many, many Sichuanese dishes do not need to be approved by that Englishwoman to be considered Sichuanese dishes. Just saying.