tammylc
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Posts posted by tammylc
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I'm loving the reviews and the pictures - thanks everyone! I can't wait until I can make it to Alinea myself. I told my husband this weekend that it's what I want for my birthday, but October is a long way away!
One question - what's up with the Alinea website? I understand minimalism and all, but a little more content would be nice.
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Tammy,
I'm happy to crash on the living room floor. And don't worry about the munchkin running about in the early morn--I'm known as the unofficial babysitter of the Heartland.
Also, I have a hunch that my co-pilot Maggie might need accommodations as well. Maybe we can all pitch a tent and eat pastrami under the stars!
I'm sure we'll manage to figure something out - there's certainly plenty of room for tent pitching, and in July that could be quite nice. :-) My husband and I were just discussing some options for crash space. One of the nice things about living in cohousing and knowing our neighbors is being able to borrow spare rooms in other people's houses, so that's an option still to be explored.
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Are couch-crashing privileges available for migratory Heartlanders? I'm making the jaunt early Saturday morning (tentatively with Maggie the Cat as co-pilot), so I just need one night of sleepspace.
DISCLAIMER: You haven't lived until you've seen the Fress Man with early-morning bed-head.
Sadly, Alex has claimed the spare room, and I don't have a couch that's fit for sleeping (not to mention that it's in the living room and my little person gets up way too early).
There are three hotels very near by, at a variety of price points, including a Super 8 which should be super cheap. Or perhaps another local can offer crash space?
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Tammy,
Will this be a family friendly outting? Will Zingerman's allow small ones on the tour?
Thanks,
T.
How small are your small ones? The Bakehouse website says no children under 6 on the tour, and I expect the Creamery will be the same.
The common house has a big kids play room, and there's a playground just outside. And lots of friendly neighborhood kids to play with. My one year old will certainly be around for much of the day. It could be a long day for kids though - I expect we won't be eating dinner until 7-ish.
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Didn't think this merited starting it's own thread, so I'll revive this old one...
How long for dinner at Tru? I'll be making a quick visit to Chicago next week and I'm trying to figure out if I can fit in dinner and get to O'Hare in time for my 9:40 flight home. Website says they open at 5:30.
I'm sure I can manage the 3 course prix fixe, but if I'm going to Tru it would seem a shame to only do 3 courses.
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The date is definite. And as Ronnie noted, non-eGullet food lovers are definitely welcome.
Some other details:
Our tour of Zingerman's Bakehouse is scheduled for 10 am and will take about an hour, then we'll go next door to tour Zingerman's Creamery.
When we're done there we can head down to Kerrytown for lunch and supply shopping at the Farmer's Market, Sparrow Meats, Monahan's Fish (and Zingerman's Deli, of course). Then back to my place for the cooking extravaganza.
How's that sound to people?
Depending on how many people we have, I have this idea about organizing individuals or small groups to each take on the planning and preparation of a single course, and serve dinner a multiple course plated dinner instead of family style. Does that sound fun to anyone else, or am I being too ambitious?
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I just had Ronnie unpin this post, in case the lack of interest is because people just weren't seeing it up there at the top of the page.
We had a blast last time in Grand Rapids - let's do it again, shall we?
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Traveler's Club International Restaurant and Tuba Museum in Okemos is fun.
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C'mon - they're must be more Heartlanders who want to enjoy some Michigan hospitality!
Or is everyone like me and just forgets to check the pinned posts?
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July in Ann Arbor is a great time of the year – warm but not sweltering, U of M undergrads gone for the summer, yummy Michigan produce at the Farmers’ Market – which makes it a perfect setting for our next Heartland Gathering.
Our last gathering, not quite two years ago in Grand Rapids, was a blast. This year, I’ve reserved the common house at my cohousing community for all day Saturday, July 16. (There's plenty of space, but in the unlikely event of too many potential attendees, first posted = first served.)
Just as we did so successfully in Grand Rapids, some or all of us can pool our money (probably ~$15/pp), then hit the Farmers Market and other Kerrytown shops in the morning and decide as we go what to make that night. Other food contributions are enthusiastically welcomed, of course. Beverage contributions, alcoholic or otherwise, are up to each individual. Anyone who can't join us during the day but would like to attend the dinner can just chip in when you show up.
(For those who will be in Ann Arbor Friday night and/or Sunday morning, we can decide later what to do for food. We can go out or, if there aren’t too many folks, we can cook at my place. If enough people are staying over one or both nights, I can try to arrange for a discounted hotel rate.)
For the educational part of the Gathering, I’ve arranged for a Saturday tour of Zingerman's Bakehouse and Zingerman's Creamery. And, if anyone wants to shop at Zingerman's Deli (like anyone wouldn’t!), we’ll have our own “shopping assistant.”
Also, Ann Arbor is home to the Longone Center for American Culinary Research. They’re normally open only Monday – Friday until 4:45, but there may be some extended hours by Gathering time.
I'll post or PM more details (when/where to meet, directions, etc.) as the date approaches.
So, are you in? (And for what day?)
This event has been organized through the eG Forums by members but is not sponsored by the Society or its eG Forums. The event is open to all participating eGullet Society members, contributors and their guests. By participating in this event, you confirm your understanding and acceptance of the eGullet Events Policy, to which all eGullet Society members have already agreed.
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I'm starting a wine tasting club and looking for ideas. I thought I had a wine book in the basement with a good home tasting course, but I can't find it, so I'm trying to come up with a plan on my own. (I've looked at the EGCI course, but it doesn't quite meet my needs.)
A bunch of the people who are interested have little or no experience with wine, so I want to have a plan that will get everybody familiar with the basics before we just start tasting randomly. I figured I'd start with the most common varietals, whites in the first meeting, reds in the second. But where to go from there? Some of that will depend on what everybody wants to do, but what do you think would be most useful for a beginning wine drinker? We could focus on a characteristic, like oak, and compare oaked and unoaked chardonnay, etc. Go further in depth into a specific varietal and compare the effects of terroir by looking at the same varietal from different countries (Sancerre vs New Zealand SB). Go further in depth into a particular country or region (Bordeaux, Italy).
How does this sound? Any other ideas or suggestions? How many wines do you think is reasonable to taste during an hour long meeting?
I have a little more experience than most, but I'll be learning right along with the rest, so I'm not an expert instructor or anything.
Thanks!
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Tortilla Soup, Redux
I think I could make this meal every time I cook (twice a month) and still have people breaking down the door to get it. It's very popular.
Thursday nights we alternate hosting meals with our neighboring community, Sunward. So between our members and theirs, Thursday night dinners can be large. This week I had 23 meat eaters, 18 vegetarians, and 12 children of assorted ages, for a total of 53.
I decided to make 4 recipes each of the vegetarian and meat version of the soup (figuring meat eaters could have the vegetarian if they wanted extra, but not the other way around). I shopped at Meijer this time instead of going to Arbor Farms like I usually do, for a couple of different reasons. One, I didn't indicate that this would be a mostly organic meal, so I didn't feel compelled to buy as much organic as I usually would. Two, I needed ingredients that I couldn't get at Arbor Farms, but didn't have time to go to three stores (I also needed to go to the Mexican market).
Doing the shopping at Meijer reduced the cost of the meal quite a bit, as did a key discovery. Last time, I bought cartons of stock, but at $3 a carton it added quite a bit to the cost of the meal. But I didn't have the time or energy to do stock from scratch, which would have been cheaper. This time, I was looking through the latest Cook's Illlustrated and noticed that Better Than Boullion stock concentrate came out second in their chicken stock tasting. Looking on line, I noticed that it came out second in the vegetable stock tasting too! At $4/jar, this made for a huge cost savings to the meal, and no sacrifice in quality from the liquid stock I used before.
eGullet member CaliPoutine was visiting the area and offered to assistant cook. She was did a great job and was a fabulous help - thank Randi! She brought along 4 jars of home canned peaches to contribute to a peach berry crisp that she made for dessert, plus she smuggled in four avocados from Canada, where for some reason they are much cheaper than in the US. And good thing, since Meijer didn't have enough ripe avocados and we would have been seriously short without them.
Shopping List, with notes for next time
Soup
1 jar Better than Bouillon Chicken
1 jar Better than Bouillon Vegetable
8 large white onions
3 heads garlic
16 tomatoes
1 bunch cilantro
1 pkg oregano
3 chipotles
Garnishes
2 pkgs (6 dozen) corn tortillas (needed more with this number of people, we ran out after the first pass)
2 pks Cotija cheese
1 3/4 lbs Montery Jack
3 limes
2 bunches of cilantro (I stole a little bit for the salad, and we ran out again)
16 avocados (That's what I wanted - we ended up with Randi's 4, and 9 from Meijer, one of which was bad. One can never have enough avocados in this crowd. 16 would have been better.)
3 jalepenos
Chipotle sauce (the rest of the can, pureed in the food processor)
2 1/2 cartons sour cream (there were some leftovers in the fridge, so I just bought one more 750 ml size from Meijer)
Salad
Instead of a green salad like last time, I decided to make a corn salad. I cooked the corn and then rinsed it in cold water to start chilling, chopped up all the other ingredients and mixed it all together with the dressing. I thought it turned out pretty well.
4 lbs frozen corn
3 jars roasted red peppers (Alessi brand - could have used more)
1 red onion, finely diced
1 bunch green onion, chopped
1 bunch cilantro, minced fine
6 limes, juiced
Olive oil (about 1 1/2 times the quantity of lime juice)
Salt
Black pepper
Cumin
A little fresh oregano from the garden
Peach Berry Crisp
These are ingredients in addition to the four mason jars of peaches Randi bought, and the whole wheat pastry flour, oats, cinnamon, etc that were already in the pantry.
1 lb butter
2 lbs frozen peaches
7 lbs frozen mixed berries (Meijer had a big bag of frozen berries on sale)
1 pkg slivered almonds
brown sugar (because the common house pantry was out)
Big tub of cheap (Dean's) vanilla ice cream
Best part has to be the price - $129.30! So it'll be about $3.50 per person. Compared to almost $6 last time! Part of that has to do with the ratio of meat eaters to vegetarians (I had to buy more chicken last time for fewer total people). I meant to buy tofu to have some protein for the veggies, but forgot. Oops. The stock made a big difference, plus there were some economies of scale - I still only needed one pkg of oregano and one bunch of cilantro for the soup. for example. This was just about the perfect number of people in terms of maximizing the value.
Just another comment about the soup itself. One of my neighbors was asking me what the broth was, because it's so flavorful. And it's a tricky recipe - the soup looks pretty much just like plain broth, but as one of my neighbors said, it has layers and layers of flavor - "Where," she asked "did that come from?" You start with stock, then enrich it with chicken and aromatics, then puree tomato and onions and garlic and chipotle, saute them, and then add them into the broth for something that's deep and delightful.
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Well, I was convinced about Emily's since a lot of people have mentioned it to me. The other plus was that they are nearby ( I'm in Canton.). Uunfortunately, they are not open on Sundays.
Where is Jeremy's? I've heard it mentioned a few times.
Sunday in Detroit is tricky. Tribute's closed too, so you don't even have the option of eating their twice.
But you're in luck, because Jeremy *is* open on Sunday! It's in Keego Harbor. A little bit of a drive from Canton, but probably not too bad.
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Hi,
I am in the Metro Detroit area and new to eGullet.
I'm having a friend over from San Diego and we have reservations at The Tribute. However, I have some other friends from Los Angeles a couple of days later who are really food and dining savvy. I do not want to eat at the same place a few days in a row. So, I am open to suggestions for restaurants.
Five Lakes Grill in Milford. Emily's in Plymouth.
Me, I'd go to Tribute twice.
I was *very* underwhelmed by Five Lake Grill. Emily's, on the other hand, was great - I was just there last week. I've written up reviews/reports of all three here, if you search back you'll find them.
Another place to consider would be Jeremy. Espeically if you're looking for the tasting menu experience like you'd get at Tribute, as I undrestand they've recently started offering a 6 course tasting menu there. But I haven't been there yet, so I don't have first hand experience to offer.
But I'd highly recommend Emily's. It was great, and cheaper than Tribute.
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Tammy, thanks for sharing so much info on your cooking escapades. I'm going to be cooking for a large crowd this summer - possibly more than 200 people and am always looking for recipes that can be increased. You chickpea / carrot stew sounds intriguing as do some of your other ideas/recipes. Let me know you thoughts.
That stew is definitely one of my favorites. It's really easy to multiply for large groups, and it's really cheap. If you're not trying to cook organic, you can just buy chick peas in the giant #10 cans, or to be even cheaper you can use dried beans.
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Alright, now that I'm caught up I can move on to planning Thursday's meal. By popular demand, I'm going to make the tortilla soup again. eGullet's own CaliPoutine is joining me as guest assistant chef, and I believe she'll be making peach/raspberry crisp for dessert (with her own home canned peaches, no less!).
I'm a little bored of plain green salads for sides, so this time I thought I'd make something different and go for a roasted corn and red pepper salad, or something like that. I haven't looked up recipes or developed a plan yet, so your opinions are most welcome. I'm figuring to roast frozen corn and probably just use jarred red peppers, and mix it up with a lime cilantro vinaigrette. Maybe add some black beans? Finely chopped red onion? Tomato? Normally I'd do avocado, but I'll need a ton of them as garnish for the soup and they're expensive, so I don't want to buy them for the salad as well.
Please post any ideas or recipes!
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Still catching up...
Last Sunday I revisited one my earliest meals - Middle Eastern night. I was foodblogging last week, so I did write it up promptly and just need to crosspost it over here. I recalled the falafel being a lot of work last time, so I decided to skip them this time and make baba gannoush instead. This was a mistake - I should have done the falafel. We had hummus, tabouli, baba, yogurt and cucumber salad, lamb kabobs, pita bread and feta cheese.
First, my shopping list:
2 lbs dried bulgar wheat
4 tsp dried mint
4 bunches of parsley
2 bunches green onion
12 cucumbers
4 tomatoes
8 cans of chick peas (I could save a lot of money by using dried, but it's too late now)
4 c of tahini
8 lbs eggplant
3 lg containers yogurt
4 1/2 lbs lamb or beef for kabobs
1 pkg fresh oregano
4 heads of garlic
a bunch of olive oil
enough lemons to make 5 cups of lemon juice
some feta cheese (how much will depend on how my budgets coming together)
8 packages of pita bread
2 trays of baklava
I had 17 meat eaters, 10 vegetarians and 5 kids signed up for dinner in advance, and got another 7 adults and 2 kids through late sign up slots.
It was only okay. t wasn't bad, just not very exciting for the work required, and I think by the time dinner came around I just wasn't in the mood for the food.
I headed into the kitchen around 3 and put the bulgar on to cook, then pierced the skin of the eggplants and through them into the oven to roast. When the bulgar was soft I spread it out on a sheet pan and put it into the fridge to cool. Then I proceeded to hack up the lamb I'd found.
Ideally I'd have liked a nice simple boneless loin to work with, but I didn't have time to run all over town to get one. So I just grabbed a 5 1/2 lb leg piece from Kroger and cut the meat off the bone. Trimming it took quite a while, and I'm sure I didn't do the most professional job of it... I made a marinade of garlic, olive oil and oregano and set it aside to soak.
I set Keith, one my assistant cooks, to juicing up the 20 lemons I'd bought. They were nice juicy lemons, so we ended up with about 8 cups of juice - more than we needed, but it's nice to have extra. Meanwhile, I tasked Hope with cutting up all of the veggies for the tabouli - parsley, green onions, tomatoes, cucumber. Unfortunately, she cut the parsley a little to course for my preferences, but I didn't realize it until we were mixing it all together and it was too late. Here's the tabouli all plated up and heading out to the tables.
I worked on the hummus, giving frequent tastes to Keith and Hope until we got the right balance of flavors, then put it in the fridge and moved on to the next thing. We garnished it with a drizzle of olive oil and sprinkled it with a little paprika and parsley.
Hope scooped out the eggplants and mixed up the baba ganoush. I don't particularly like eggplant, so I wouldn't have been the right person to judge the correct balance of flavors. Speaking of that, we used the cookbook Moosewood Cooks for a Crowd as the starting point for the hummus, baba ganoush and tabouli, mostly to get a sense of proportions, but mostly did it all by taste.
We chopped up a whole mess of cucumbers and mixed them with full fat yogurt, salt, cumin, garlic and a bit of lemon juice. This is one of my favorite Middle Eastern side dishes.
Keith finished skewering the lamb and went off to set the dining room tables while Hope was finishing the baba ganoush. I waited to cook the skewers until just about 15 minutes before service, so they'd still be hot. They'd have been quite nice on the grill, but firing one up would have been too much work, and they turned out great with just a couple of minutes per side under a hot broiler. There was only one skewer per meat eater (I was approaching the meat as a condiment, not as the center of the meal), so rather than putting a few on each table, I piled them all up on one plate and left them on the counter for the meat eaters to collect. I've done similar things with a special vegetarian item, when it doesn't make sense to spread it out. But I wish I'd made more - they were my favorite part of the meal - juicy, tender, nicely medium rare. Mmmm. I'd do these again, with some different side dishes, but go to a butcher who could cut them up for me.
We put out some halved pita bread and bowls of crumbled feta cheese, and we were done. It was never frenzied, but we did have to work steadily to get everything done on time. The nice thing about this meal is that because so much of it was served cold or at room temperature, there was no rush to get everything out to the tables at the last minute.
Dessert was store bought baklava, and it was nummy.
(The original foodblog post has pictures.)
I spent $117 at Arbor Farms, which included $24 for a 3 L container of EVOO that will be charged to pantry costs rather than my meal. Then another $34 or so at Kroger (I've managed to lose the receipt - doh!). My assistant cook spent $24 on two pans of baklava and four packages of pita bread. Total: $151.
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Okay - way behind again. I never did get around to writing up my jambalya redux, and it's too late now - I don't remember anything. Plus I managed to lose my receipts.
My Thai meal turned out pretty well. The salad (which was the reason I decided to make the meal in the first place) was just great, fabulous, words can't say. I also found a great quick and easy peanut sauce recipe online that I used to top fried tofu for the vegetarians. And I made a vegetarian curry with rice for everybody. This didn't turn out so well - I misjudged the timing and my veggies got mushy. And of course, because I was trying to accomodate the vegetarians, I couldn't use fish sauce in the curry, and Thai food just doesn't taste the same without fish sauce. If I do something like this again I'll probably make separate curries for the meat eaters and veggies.
The shopping list:
For the salad:
4 lbs steak (I think I ended up with flank steak, can't remember exactly)
3 cucumbers
4 tomatoes
2 red onions
1 bunch green onion
cilantro
4 romaine hearts
For the curry:
2 heads cauliflower
2 lbs green beans
4 green peppers
2 cans bamboo shoots
2 bags frozen peas
5 cans coconut milk
1 can green curry paste
basil
Assorted flavorings:
serrano chiles
garlic
red curry paste (for the peanut sauce)
palm sugar
lots of limes for juice
fish sauce
2 cans coconut milk
fresh ground peanut butter
Lots of rice
I can't remember how many people I had for this meal - I'll have to check that and come back and edit thee poste so these numbers will be useful for the future. We ended up having to borrow a can of coconut milk for the curry because we didn't have quite enough, and I should also have bought another can of curry paste - the curry didn't really have the right balance of flavors.
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I have a friend who did this to put a stock of meals away prior to her baby being born - really good idea, I thought.
Personally, I think the whole concept is brilliant. Every time I hear about it I think I need to check out franchising opportunities. I'm about due for a career change.
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Well, I went looking for the perfect parting image, but I don't have a good shot that exemplifies both Liam and Great Oak. So you get two. The picture of Liam is an oldie but a goodie, taken way back in November, just after Thanksgiving, one of the first times he actually let us get the food into his mouth. Although, as you can see, not very much of it.
The second is from a month earlier, and I love it because it shows just how much fun living in community can be. I think you'll be able to guess what special event we were celebrating that night!
Thanks everyone! It's been a great week!
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Awesome blog Tammy! Been following along silently here. My kids are much older so I didn't have much to add ... but it sure brought back memories!
Watch out for the post-blog-blues!
A.
Thanks, Daddy-A, and everyone else, for your kind words. It's been fun to write - I'm glad you've all enjoyed it.
And while I'll miss you all, of course, I don't expect to suffer much in the way of post-blog-blues. Finishing my foodblog will just give me the time to get back to writing in my LiveJournal, which I've been sorely neglecting this week. You're all welcome to visit me over there!
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The soup looks good, but it does seem strange not to have anything else.
How much did this meal cost you?
I won't know until I get my bill at the end of the month. But I'd guess less than $3 per adult.
My personal cheapest meal was an all vegetarian (and almost entirely organic) Morrocon meal that cost $1.78 per person. Now when I do that meal I add a chicken dish, so the price is more.
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Tammy,
Thank you so much for taking the time to blog. I really wasn't sure what the heck to expect from what was mentioned as being a baby-oriented blog and it has been fascinating.
Yeah, that was sort of a red herring.
Glad you enjoyed it!With regards to Liam, I found your community-living lifestyle an absolute original in my experience.
It's so cool that can you can send an e-mail to your neighbors looking for stock and other ingredients. Do you folks use this communication method for other things? Such as Birthday parties, etc? Perhaps you have covered this in an earlier post but I just gotta ask what made/encouraged you to decide to live in an extraordinarily close/small community?
Were you involved in the community before you had Liam? Maybe these questions aren't related to food...but I think they are by the very nature of how you live. The community meals are, I think, a foreign reality in most folks lives.
Thanks, again.
We use the email for a lot of things - announcements of meetings, distributing minutes of said meetings, organizing activities, and yes, invitations to birthday parties, etc. I didn't mention this earlier, but for my excursion on Saturday I needed to borrow a car (I was leaving my car with Eric since it has the only car seat, but I can't drive his car because it's a stick) and I was able to get one just by sending on email to the list!
We got involved in Great Oak when it was still in the planning stages, long before Liam was a twinkle in his father's eye. Eric was familiar with the concept of cohousing and a friend told us that a group was forming here. We attended an information meeting and pretty much immediately jumped on board. It took a couple of years until we were actually built and able to move in.
We both just really liked the idea of living in a community where we'd know our neighbors, and where we could be less wasteful by sharing things in common (we own one riding mower for the whole community, instead of a bunch of individual mowers, etc). I'm an extrovert, so I was really excited about the idea of having the opportunity to be easily social. But we also liked the fact that we'd have our own house, with all the amenities, and new construction to boot. And we knew we were planning to start a family and really thought it would be a great place to do that.
I don't know that I'd necessarily describe us as close knit. For example, I wouldn't call most of the people in Great Oak my friends, although I do have some friends here. They're just my neighbors, but with a definition to the word that's mostly been lost in this day and age.
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$4.73 per adult and $2.37 per child
wow, not only does the food look great, but it's a steal too!
it looks like you served it buffet style, do you ever have problems with people eating more than "their share"?
Last night's meal was served family style except for the kabobs. No one's yet attempted a plated dinner, although I have a friend that wants to help me cook one. Family style tends to be the best way to control portion size, since people can see how much food there is for a table of 6 or 8 or however many people, and adjust accordingly. When we do buffet style meals, the cooks will usually make a little sign telling people what the portion size is. I did this with the kabobs last night, since there was only enough to have one per meat eater.
also, I feel kind of stupid asking this, but since I don't have kids … how do you decide how much food to feed Liam? obviously he eats less than an adult, being so much smaller. Is he pretty good at deciding what he needs, and you just let him figure out how much he wants, or do you consciously calculate portion sizes?Not a stupid question at all. I ask myself that all the time. We've had days where it seemed like he'd keep eating all day if we'd keep spooning it in or putting it in front of him. Eventually we get tired of it, or need to move onto the next activity, and we call it a day. Babies don't have all the bad habits around food that we have - they haven't really learned to overeat yet, and will mostly just stop eating when they're not hungry anymore. Liam's pretty clear about when he's done.
Farmer's Markets - Heartland venues
in The Heartland: Cooking & Baking
Posted
The Farmer's Market in Ann Arbor is already open, every Wednesday and Saturday.