KatieLoeb

But the real question is, are any of you bargain hunters going back to a place you tried on a promotional week/night at full freight?? In a perfect world, new customers would test drive a restaurant during a promotion to see if it's worth coming back at full price. I think the reason a lot of restaurants won't put forth their best efforts is because a lot of "frugal" (read: cheap) folks that won't darken their doorstep again until the next "Low-Cost-Prix-Fixe-Night" come out, don't order any beverages or anything that isn't included, and in many cases will tip poorly. The staff gets run ragged for nothing, the restaurant is overbooked because folks think they've rented the table for the night, to hell with whomever else has reservations later than they do, and everyone is miserable. It's like going out to brunch on Mother's Day. It's a lose-lose for everyone concerned. I personally think a lot of restaurants are afraid to stop participating in Book & the Cook or Restaurant Week or whatever, because they're afraid it might send a bad "message" if they aren't seen on the promotional postcard this time. But if they had their druthers, it might be quite different. Let me ask - to those of you that have had great $30 meals at La Famiglia or Bar Lyonnaise for Restaurant Week. Have you been back since??? I could be wrong, but I don't think I am.

Good lavender syrup really adds great color as well as flavor to a cocktail. The Lavender Sours I made with Ciroc vodka, lavender syrup, fresh lemon juice and half an egg white were a lovely pale purple and smelled so good. I didn't have an edible orchid around to garnish it, but it would've been stunning if I had. Your sorbet sounds fabulous!

This sounds interesting! rmockler - how much lavender syrup did you make at once?? It shouldn't ferment if kept refrigerated. I've kept various syrups for several weeks/months at a time and not had a problem if they were in the back (colder) part of the fridge. Also, what proportion of lavender did you use when making the syrup? I usually use about 1/3 cup lavender per cup of 1:1 syrup. I bruise the lavender with a rolling pin and stir it into boiling syrup and then take it immediately off the heat and allow it to cool completely before straining it. I doubt the proportions would be linear for more syrup at once, but I've never needed more than a cup at a time, so that works fine for me.

If you want to throw an Irish Whiskey into the mix, you could have Clontarf or Redbreast. The Redbreast is particularly tasty over ice or makes a fine Manhattan.

Wow Katie, you have created cocktails out of all sorts of things. But this one I just can't imagine. Would the lavender work here? You know that I think a little Luxardo maraschino always helps a drink. I am just as interested in the name you have given this one. What's that you say? This isn't the cocktail thread? Oh. Sorry, please disregard ← Any cocktail I would create at that phase of the lunar cycle would require prescription drugs, not OTC pain relief.

The passionfruit gelee I used is the Boiron Frozen Puree. I've used their mango and lychee flavors before also and it's a very good product. But they aren't inexpensive. Mercifully, I didn't have to buy this. We just took a passionfruit cocktail off the menu at work, so there was an extra frozen package laying around. Since the pastry chef didn't need it, I brought it home to experiment with. I just bought a bottle of Goslings to infuse some cherries into, so I might see if a dark rum/passionfruit cocktail of some sort would work.

Anne: Sending good vibes your way. Best of luck on all counts, and please keep us posted. Turbo, Blizzard and Dulcita are sending your cat telepathic directions home...

Where did you get cachaca? I'd *love* to be able to make a caipirinha! I've never seen in in the PA sate stores! ← Dorine: Pitu is a listed product and available at State stores. I'd only use that to soak off a tattoo though. There's another "listed" brand but the PLCB website seems to be down at the moment so I can't look it up for you. edited to add: The other listed brand is called PIRASSUNUNGA CACHACA 51. Never tried it so I don't know a thing about it, but it's the same price as the Pitu and you generally get what you pay for... Recently the Fazenda Mae de Ouro became available in PA as an SLO and is well worth seeking out. It tastes like a fine Cognac compared to the well brandy that the Pitu would be. It's incredibly smooth and flavorful. I had a couple of passionfruit caipirinhas last night that I made by adding a splash of passionfruit puree to the mix. Muy delicioso! Cacahca Dave is the importer and he posts here in the Fine Spirits and Cocktails thread pretty frequently. I'm sure you could e-mail him with questions, but there's a pretty good Q & A on the website as well as some great cocktail recipes.

Duh, of course -- I guess I just assumed fennel bulb since I had a fennel (bulb) based dish recently... In that case, I guess I don't know what the Jewish part of the dish is, then.[...] ← Possibly the absence of yogurt. ← And dried fruits, nuts and spices are common in some Sephardic cuisines, so that could be considered "common ground" perhaps.

I was thinking the exact same thing! Rodney - props to you for both unwavering persistence and unending patience. I am duly impressed. What might be good as a "gilding the lily" addition would be Wilbur Cinnamon Chips. I add these to muffins of all sorts and they're delicious.

Actually this thought occurred to me. TarteTatin - got any gorgeous head shots you could submit to test the theory?

Abra: Please report back regardless of the results. I'm certain they'll both be delicious, but at worst, you might save one of the rest of us from the tragic experiment.

Yes - thank you Jason. This has been a most amusing diversion. I'm working on a couple more. Sarabeth: I didn't save it, because I don't actually have a Flickr account, but I might go back and recreate it just to save it so I can order a copy and hang it in my kitchen.

Thanks Bob! Curiosity got the better of me and I stopped at RTM this afternoon and picked up the quenepas. Here's what they look like: I've tried a couple and they're kind of interesting. Similar to a lychee (which makes sense because they're a similar plant species, apparently) with a peachy colored flesh that is a bit slimy, fibrous and tart and tangy. There's not a whole lot of flesh - the seed takes up practically all of the space beneath the thin green rind which is quite similar to the skin of an avocado. But they're fairly easy to peel and quite tasty. They seem like an awful lot of work for very little payoff. Kind of like getting the really small steamed Maryland crabs. I have both some rum and some cachaca in the house so I might give that recipe a whirl in a small batch just to see how it turns out. But honestly, I don't have the patience tonight to experiment and will likely make myself some other form of immediate gratification cocktail instead. I also bought some nice looking dark cherries so I just have to go fetch a bottle of Gosling's tomorrow and the Cherry Dark and Stormys will be ready in a couple of weeks. Iovines also had some nice strawberries and blueberries for $1 a box today. The strawberries are the sweetest I've had this summer. Delicious! There's a pressure cooker filled with ratatouille on my stove right now that was the prize for finding several great $1 grab bags of eggplants, tomatoes, and peppers on the rack today. I picked up a big sweet onion and couple of zucchini and I was good to go. I'll be enjoying that shortly on some tri-colored couscous I found at the Spice Terminal. Should be delicious. The whole house smells like it!

Damn Erik! That sounds absolutely luscious! I just bought some quenepas or mamoncillos at the market today and am trying to figure out what to do with them. I might try the standard Puerto Rican preparation of soaking them in rum and sugar for a little while and see where that gets me. I also have some cachaca in the house and wonder if that might not be more interesting. edited to add: Erik, you're a genius!! You reminded me that I had a one kilo tub of passionfruit gelee defrosting in my crisper drawer. I divided it up into two containers and refroze one of them. The other was used to make a passionfruit caipirinha that I am enjoying as I type this. I'll use up the rest that's defrosted over the next couple of days in this manner. Delicious!!!

Cooked with a pinch of salt in milk. Then butter, cinnamon and brown sugar or honey. If I'm feeling really ambitious and have it around the house, some chopped dates and dried apricots. But I confess I'm usually lame enough to buy the little pre-flavored packets because they're easy to grab and take to work with me. I'd rather sleep the extra 15 minutes.

Fair enough regarding the speculation. Rich, if you can reveal your source it would be a fair statement and not merely a rumor. I don't think this qualifies as an egregious offense like outing a CIA agent or anything. But I still think it would be fun to sit across the street and try and distract the Pretty People from their appointed duties. Can we keep them from looking pretty and making everyone else want to be like them?

Like many of you, Matt first came to my attention through his incredibly thoughtful and intelligent posts. I thought to myself, “What a great new member. This dude really knows what he’s talking about!” Matt was gracious enough to send me a PM early last October, telling me how much he liked my drink creations and how much he appreciated me “helping to make eGullet all it could be.” Needless to say, I was unbelievably flattered. I wrote back and thanked him, and our friendship was born. We exchanged e-mails, drink recipes, and talked about restaurants, food and cuisine at great length. I was finally to be in New York a few weeks later and Matt and I exchanged phone numbers. We met at Pegu Club, had some drinks and some laughs and solidified what was already a mutual admiration society. Like many of you, I was shocked and amazed when I asked Matt his age. He carried himself with such self-assurance and was so incredibly passionate and knowledgeable it was hard to believe he had so much experience and such refined taste at such a young age. I managed to meet up with Matt (always) for drinks and (sometimes) a bite to eat on every subsequent trip I made to New York. I had a wonderfully memorable meal with him feasting on oysters, caviar, bone marrow, foie gras and pigeon and washing it all back with Champagne at 2:30AM at Blue Ribbon one night. It was outrageously decadent, and an experience I’ll never forget. Matt made it down to Philadelphia a few times too. He made it to a couple of dinners at Studio Kitchen, which I know made him very happy. He always came to visit me at Amada for lunch, and would try out some of the cocktails and often gave me suggestions that improved them. He’d work quietly on his laptop at the end of the bar while I was busy making drinks or serving other customers, and would patiently wait for me to finish work so we could go have a drink elsewhere, or go shopping for various gourmet food products or accessories. I took him to Reading Terminal and he had a field day at the spice shop and cookware store. I turned him on to House of Tea, my favorite tea shop, and he bought quite a selection of different teas, many of which were meant to be gifted to various friends of his at home. He was incredibly generous like that, and always went out of his way to bring someone something he thought would be interesting to them or would make them smile. I introduced Matt to many of my friends and co-workers in Philly, and he left a positive impression on every last one of them. He was just like that. Matt and I often discussed his future plans, and his desire to go to culinary school and someday open his own restaurant. He picked my brain relentlessly about restaurant operations and how to run a successful beverage program. His thirst for knowledge about spirits led him to begin his studies recently at Beverage Alcohol Resource, a certification program for bartenders taught by the most recognizable experts in the industry. It’s an intensive program and I know Matt was excelling in his studies. I hadn’t heard from him in several weeks and I assumed it was merely because he was studying so hard and working at improving his bartending skills. I wish I’d been more persistent about calling him sooner, because I now know I’ll not hear his sonorous voice or infectious laugh again. And that makes me incredibly sad. In looking back on my friendship with Matt so I could write this tribute to him, I now realize that Matt was what I think of as an “old soul”. He’d clearly been born too late. As Melissa mentioned, he was a very snappy dresser. He had impeccable taste in clothing as well as fine food and drink. His shoes were always polished, his shirt always pressed, his suit jacket well tailored and fitted. He was a real gentleman in his demeanor as well. His gracious manners were a pleasant surprise from a young man of his generation. He unfailingly would hold the door, give up his seat or light a lady’s cigarette for her. I have no doubt that if spats were still fashionable, Matt would have had several snazzy pair. He should have been around during the Jazz Era or been a Rat Packer. It would have suited his sensibilities perfectly. Luckily for all of us that had the pleasure of knowing him, either in person or virtually, he was here now. Young Matthew (a nickname I often called him, much to his chagrin), I toast you. I’ll look for you tending the bar behind the Pearly Gates when I get there. You were and will always be my dear sweet friend, and I will miss you very much.

Wow - are they this desperate at Estia already?? Yikes! I guess they were wrong about Philadelphians wanting to buy fish for $30/lb. I'm stunned. As for eating outside there, it really is a fairly unattractive block. And let's not forget that the beautiful people want to be seen. That's why they'll wait an hour for that table at Rouge. When there's little walk by traffic unless it's the staff of the Academy of Music, I doubt anyone is going to change their route to go see the "pretty people" on the 1400 block of Locust Street. I mean really. Why not just put up a giant window display in front of the restaurant and we can all go gawk at them as if it were an aquarium or a zoo exhibit? Now that Smoked Joint is closed across the street we really can set up those beach chairs and a few coolers and make a whole evening of pointing and laughing. Vadouvan's got it right. And if they're clutching at straws this hard, I say it doesn't bode well for them. Perhaps lowering their prices and having better service would do better toward their eventual goal of increasing revenue.

There's a small gelateria here in Philadelphia that makes a Strawberry-Limoncello flavored sorbetto they call Francacella. Sounds delicious to me since Strawberry Lemonade is one of my favorite summer beverages. Strawberry-Lemon is a great flavor combo, as is Raspberry-Lemon and Blueberry-Lemon. I've been making a yummy cocktail with the new Stolichnaya Blueberry vodka. Here's the recipe: 2 oz. Stoli Blueberry 1 oz. Limoncello a splash of fresh lemon juice Fill with Sprite or 7-Up. You can also turn it a pale sky blue with about 2 drops of Blue Curacao and not change the flavor. Don't have a good name for it yet. It tastes like a lemon-blueberry muffin!

Hmmmm.... There's some good infusing fruits you've mentioned. I think I want to make some dark cherry rum and then try make a Cherry Dark n' Stormy. I want to try do something with those quenepas. Hey Bob - do you think they'd make an interesting infused vodka?? Is there enough flesh on them that if I cut them in half and threw them in a big jar with some vodka they'd create some flavor in a couple of weeks?

I hit Happy Hour at Davio's with a friend for their $5 cosmos and some really great passed hors d'oeuvres. They had pizza, cheesesteak spring rolls with spicy ketchup, lamb chops, potato chips with smoked salmon, mushrooms with tuna tartare, and some sort of crabmeat thingie that were all really good. And they were passing the good eats frequently. MarketStEl made it just in time to catch the tail end of Happy Hour. Definitely a Best of Philly Happy Hour!

Ned: There's been a lot of ink about the Geno's controversy. I'm firmly in the same camp as Philadining. I'll happily put my money in someone else's register. Their steaks were never that good anyway. And their attitude stinks. Even a humble cheesesteak stand qualifies as being part of the hospitality industry, and they obviously just don't get it. I hope they implode under the ponderous weight of their own stupidity and bigotry. Next time you come to Philly, you let us know. We'll show you where and what the locals eat. You'll definitely enjoy it better.

I gotta see the karaoke! That just sounds like fun! I can just watch, right? 'Cuz me singing ain't too pretty. I can carry a tune that has handles, but I was always more of an instrumentalist than a vocalist. And Korean BBQ sounds great. Last time I had it I went to Porky & Porkies and that was quite a awhile ago. I need to go with folks that can really show me the ropes...