KatieLoeb

That's it Fresser! Now I know you're nuts!

Now I know I'm on eGullet! Only here would someone suggest an IV drip of duck fat.

I made Cranberry Mimosas last Thanksgiving. I boiled down some fresh cranberries, sugar and water and then whirled into a thin puree. I added a couple of healthy dashes of bitters. A dribble of puree in the bottom of the flute and top with sparkling wine of your choice. Needs a stir to incorporate and always has a sweet blob at the bottom of the glass, but they were well received and mighty tasty, if I do say so myself.

Cherry cider! That sounds like it has a lot of potential. I recently had for the very first time a starfruit, which, though it was underripe and kind of bland, seemed like it could be a pretty useful ingredient for cocktails--citrusy and a little bitter without being very sour. Probably a pain to get juice out of, though. ← I like starfruit as a drink garnish. A slice looks so pretty perched on the rim of a cocktail glass. I doubt one could juice them though.

Might the anesthetic spice be Szechuan Peppercorns? I seem to recall it having a mild numbing effect at Szechuan Tasty House.

I just got word that Steven will be in Philadelphia at Book & the Cook's Caffe Society in the KitchenAid Theater at DiBruno Brothers on September 23rd. Book & Cook has requested that I post the event to the PA calendar. I'm looking forward to seeing Steven again and will try and get a good turnout of PhilleGuleeteers to join me. Congrats Steven! I'll see you in a couple of weeks!

Thanks Curlz! When the Bobolink Potluck gets re-scheduled for the springtime, I'll make sure I bring some Limoncello for more Arnaldos. They're just as refreshing on a nice spring day as they are in the summertime.

Impressive consumption gang! We bow before you in deference to your superior eating prowess! That's a lot of hot 'n spicy dishes for only four people... I'm sorry I missed this, but looking forward to being there when the Hot Rabbits Ding is actually available. Gotta try the Hot Rabbits Ding, if for no other reason than it's my favorite bad Chinese menu translation ever.

Hodad: Capogiro is located at the corner of 13th and Sansom Streets, right across from El Vez. They're open reasonably late (until midnight Sun-Thurs, 1 AM on Fri & Sat) so it's a great stop for dessert after dinner or an event anywhere else in the city. You can see more info about them at their website, including some of the flavors they offer. But go back and re-read this thread from the beginning and I'm sure you'll get enough descriptions to entice you to make the short trip up from DE.

Who the heck doesn't air condition their restaurant in a Philadelphia summer??? How hard is it to purchase a couple of window units? I guess the million had already been spent elsewhere? I've eaten here twice and on both occasions had to literally get up and find my own glassware so I could enjoy a glass of wine that I had brought myself. The food is adequate, the service is atrocious. Attitude flows from the top down in any organization. My limited dealings with the Butcher's Cafe management have led me to believe they are insincere at best and complete a$$hats at worst. 'Nuff said.

Definitely don't miss Gecko's. My recent post details the wonderful meal I had there recently. Louisa's also comes highly recommended to me by my friends that live in CM. A Ca Mia for Italian, the Mad Batter for brunch and the Pier House at Beach Drive & Pittsburgh Ave. on the site of the former Water's Edge are all good bets as well.

Wow! Just made it home a short while ago. The drive wasn't really that bad, and the Philly crew made good time, but we stopped for a dinner bite in southern DE and then drove Mummer out to his house in the burbs. When we got to Herb's house in NJ, there was the world's cutest/smartest/sweetest stray dog sitting on his front steps as though he were waiting for us. Approximately 5 month old small-to-medium sized part Ridgeback/part lab(?) puppy. Soooooo sweet. All waggy tailed and kissy. He was far too well mannered, clean and relatively healthy looking to be a total stray, but Herb couldn't let him in his house, and my three kitties would never have allowed me to bring him home either. We both called every single person we knew to see if someone would take him. No luck. I wouldn't have slept tonight if we didn't do the right thing, and leaving him running around was far too dangerous. We fed him and gave him some water and played ball with him until a nice local police officer arrived from our call to 9-1-1. He hung out with us and the dog (by now nicknamed "Rolly" for semi-obvious reasons) and called for animal control. So we waited and waited and animal control finally arrived and took Rolly away. Herb will check on him in the coming days and make sure he gets adopted. The nice officer seemed interested so perhaps Rolly will end up with him! Herb took a picture of the dog so maybe he'll post it so you can all see the post-Pickin' unofficial mascot and location namesake. Wish I coulda kept him. He was an awesome pup! I can hardly begin to thank everyone for the wonderful time they contributed to. My memories will have to do, but seeing old friends and meeting new ones was truly a great experience. The McCords are the most hospitable hosts and I am much obliged for the warmth and kindness. It was so much fun! And lucky us - we did get some leftovers in addition to some wonderful purchases from the NC Farmer's Market we picked up to bring home as well. YUM!!! I'll be eating good Carolina food for the rest of the week. Brooks, bless you for being so sweet and thinking of us. Here's to hoping the next party is at your house. I wouldn't miss that for the world! I couldn't agree more! I tried to convince Jason to Photoshop in some toenail polish and bubbles in the bathtub. Now there's an eGullet Christmas card if ever there was one! The Limoncello Arnold Palmers have been dubbed the "Arnaldo". Very refreshing. The photos don't lie. The weather was picture perfect in every way. It was a spectacular weekend all around.

Yikes!! Remind to make sure I move fast enough or nail myself down. Y'all are scary!. Edited to add: We need to turn that photo of the pig's foot in the bathtub into the official eGullet letterhead, or sell postcards with that image on it or something. That's a very bizarre yet oddly appropriate image for the Society. I just love it.

Several years ago I worked for a caterer here in Philly that got the job of catering the wedding of one of the Kennedy sons to the local heiress to an automotive fortune. There were around 350 guests and the wedding took place at a local mansion on the banks of the Delaware River. There was much talk about the costs that day, between the food, the tens of thousands of dollars worth of flowers, the very expensive famous orchestra that provided the music, the real silverware and the Waterford crystal adorning the tables, and especially the brides gown, which apparently cost around $15,000 at that time. And it was really ugly too. Plain and boring and not terribly decorated in any way, and worse, not terribly flattering on the bride. If you spend that much money on a dress I think an entire convent of sequestered nuns needs to have gone blind hand sewing the beads and sequins on at least. But I digress.... I was so flabberghasted at the egregious level of conspicuous consumption that I wanted to vomit. This girl was a debutante from a prominent family. I'd think any designer would have donated a dress to her just to get the picture in Town & Country magazine. The couple could certainly have made a donation to a local charity in a generous amount on the occasion of starting their new lives together, instead of spending this ridiculous sum on an ugly dress she was only going to wear ONCE!!! How silly. Those of us that work in the food industry see enormous amounts of waste. I'm a huge supporter of organizations like Share Our Strength or locally here in Philly, a group called Philabundance, that takes all those leftovers from caterers and restaurants and food vendors and channels it to shelters and soup kitchens where it can do the most good. I'd rather save it from going into the trash in the first place than think about some poor homeless person digging it out of the trash to eat it. :shudder: My long and convoluted story ends with a plea that you suggest to the bride and groom that no gesture could be a better start to their marriage than to donate their leftovers to a good cause. What better way to begin their new life together than with an act of charity toward those less fortunate than they?

Good one Chris! Are there other interesting juices in the same line at Trader Joe's? I'd be curious to play around with some of them myself. At the recent NJ Tomato Festival, the Casettas, Mr. & Mrsbigjas and myself all tasted some very delicious NJ Blueberry wine. We were thinking it might make for a very tasty dessert mixed 1:1 with sparkling wine and with a vanilla gelato float on it!

Thanks for the good wishes!! We'll be thinking of the rest of you PhilleGuleteers that couldn't join us and we'll represent the best we can. Charlie is bringing his portable keyboard and I think I have some large dark sunglasses somewhere and an empty coffee can. We could always set up at a rest stop and have Charlie do his very best Ray Charles impersonation while Herb and I sing backup and pretend to be the Raylettes if we run out of money to gas up.

You can't move the pig out of the bathtub until the Philly crew gets in tomorrow early evening. I want to see the transfer from bathtub to cooker again and I have Mummer, one of the original " Piggy Pallbearers" with me. I'm certain he'll be crushed if he can't help this time. Herbacidal ought to be able to lend a strong hand too. I'll be mixing cocktails...

A man after my own heart. Your dedication is making me swoon.

There's a big 'ol jug of limoncello down in my kitchen that's cooling and waiting to get tweaked to taste tomorrow before I divide it up into plastic travel bottles. This was a short term batch as I've been busy and couldn't start this as soon as I would have liked. It'll still be good, but perhaps not up to my usual exacting standards. My hands are going to smell like lemon for days...

On second thought to my previous comments, I'll bet Disney has truly iron clad contracts with an iron clad date for guest counts and they probably don't give any slack either, even though they could conceivably use the food for another event!

If you charge them for it then it certainly is theirs. You will have to pack up as much of it as is possible and give it to them to cart away. And if you do cut them a break, what's to say that they won't expect similar treatment next time? I think you just have to put your foot down and say I'm running a business that has a thin profit margin. This is why we confirm guest counts in advance as stated in the contract. Sorry for the inconvenience but this is much too short notice for me to do anything different. I can't think of any caterer in the world that would do it any differently except maybe the Catering Department at Disney World that has dozens of events going on any given weekend and could possibly re-use the food elsewhere.

Hopefully when the roads are clearer and the water has receded they'll use their position and influence to organize and help feed the masses like many NYC chefs did after 9/11. They are the perfect people to do exactly that. When things aren't as chaotic as they are now and they're NOT helping, then I'll feel a little more comfortable judging their actions. YMMV.

And what should they do exactly?? Start a riot by offering what amounts to too little food to the gangs of heavily armed looters and thousands of desparate refugees? What they have isn't enough to go around. The police have no supermarket or running water either and at least they're working to keep the peace and rescue people. Perhaps if there were water to be had they wouldn't be drinking wine. I dunno. Seems like making lemonade to me. :shrug:

The numbers were confirmed at 200. Their mistake not yours. Cheerfully pack up the leftovers for them or offer to deliver them to your local foodbank on behalf of the happy couple. Why on earth should you absorb the cost of their error?? What if there's a last minute Act of God hurricane or storm that closes the airport and only 125 people show up? Should you only charge them for guests that actually show up?? This is why it's catering and not a la carte. And this is precisely why you confirmed their guest count and had them sign a contract, n'est ce pas?

So who's gouging whom? We'll be topping off the tank in lower VA on the way down for sure.