Richard Kilgore

Seriously though, we do have a number of bread and pastry traditions...Czech and German, as well as Mexican.

Okay, Fifi. How about if we invent something and call it a biscuit?

Thanks for posting about your tour of Sandy Oaks Olive Orchard, Timo. Great photos, too. I would very much like to see more of this type thing here in the Texas Forum.

Linda -- I have not smoked large quantities of chicken in a while, but I do recall that loading up or crowding the smoker can take substantially longer than 3 hours to cook. I think I remember an occassion when I had mine overloaded and it took well over four hours. The advantage is you are saving some time by not taking the lid off and having to reheat the unit (if you have a remote meat thermometer). Perhaps you can find a 55 gal barrel and create one of the Monsters in the link. Hah! Your idea of doing the breasts and thighs/legs separately makes sense. If you combine them, there will not be a problem with the breasts drying out (due to the water pan), but you may save some time by doing them apart. What plans do you have for the smoked chicken stock?

Thanks. Here's a link: War Eagle Mill

If you do a day in Dallas, you could do the three clustered museums: Dallas Museum of Art, Crow Asian Art Collection, and the Nasher Sculpture Center, with lunch at the cafe at the Nasher, which is an outpost of the Mansion at Turtle Creek. Then zip up to the Meadows Museum at SMU (largest collection of Spansh art outside of Spain) and have a number of options for dinner if you are in Dallas Saturday evening. Or you could finish seeing what you want to see Saturday morning in Ft. Worth, then do a few of the Dallas museums and have dinner in Dallas. Or do the Dallas Symphony (an architecturally and acoustically wonderful hall), which is in the arts district with the museums, followed by a late dinner. You will have trouble seeing much of anything on Sunday before you go to the airport, since most of the museums do not open until at least 11:00 a.m. on Sunday if I remember correctly. You just will not be able to see all the major museums in the DFW area in two days, so will have to decide what you want to see the most.

I'll agree with most of the above, with emphasis on fresh green beans and other produce used. You also may be using too much oil, but I may not be picturing your procedure correctly. About 1T of oil in a very hot wok should be fine to start. One approach is to then add a clove of garlic and stir it, spreading the oil up the side of the work, remove clove and then proceed. Also you might try using peanut oil, which will add a little flavor since it is not as neutral as canola.

Welcome bperlow. Glad to see you made it onto the site. Benito's is near the Ft.Worth museum district and is Mex-Tex, easily under $20 for lunch. I can recommend the huge tamales and the carne guisada. I'll dig up an address and directions if you are interested in it. The steak house in the historic hotel at the Ft.Worth stockyards also will give you a serious Texas experience, and I'll get details on that if you are interested, too. It's not that far from the museums, either. I have not eaten at the restaurant in the Modern, but in line with what NewYorkTexan said above, it has gotten very positive reviews.

Absolutely! Catering definitely requires a couch. Great idea for expanding our talents and experiences. Even four-poster-bed cassoulet, perhaps.

Armchair terrine-maker, that's me. Armchair charcuterie. Yes, I like that.

What I want to know is where did you find a 16th century chicken?

Glad you had a good time here. But if anyone told you Joe T.'s was "Mexican" rather than Tex-Mex, they were leading you astray. Benitos near the Ft. Worth museums is more Mexican plus Tex-Mex. And you did eat at the historic, original Sonny Bryan's if it was a weather worn shack near Love Field.

Use it in gratins as bread crumbs or a chunk soaked, squeezed then either combined with the other ingredients or packed on top. Let crusts dry a bit and add to soups.

Looks great, trillium. I have not yet done a terrine, but it's on my list for this year. Does anyone know of a source for a clay terrine? Most that I have seen are either LC or white porcelain such as Pulliviet. Perhaps EH makes one.

Here find a wonderful NY Times piece on Glenn Roberts, the man who is restoring heirloom grits, thought lost to modern agriculture. Charley Trotter and Thomas Keller use these Anson Mills grits.

Upthread someone, Jaymes I think, said that flour tortillas were a recent thing here in Texas. But I believe I recall Tex-Mex restaurants in Austin in the 60s bringing both corn and flour to the table, your choice. Anyone else remember that?

Thanks, EMSG. Good to know. And the food channel on the Super Benriner is 3 3/4", so I may be remembering those slices accurately.

That's fine, EMSG. I would be glad to hear about how hard cheese does on your Benriner. (The Cuispro is simply a sophisticated box grater and the widest grate is 5/16", the microplane in the link is a "wide shaver" for making curls of chocolate or cheese.)

I'll say it again -- In my minor point above, I was talking about slicing cheese in wide 3" slabs from large chunks, not grating it. (Most of my intended uses are what you would expect.) I do have a microplane and a Cuispro for grating. Perhaps talking about slicing cheese is so unexpected in the context of a Benriner that it doesn't register. At any rate, I appreciate everyone's efforts to help here. Okay, so unless someone says differently, I am going to assume you absolutely can not slice hard cheese effectively with a Benriner. The restaurant I mentioned above must have been using something sturdier.

BettyK -- I guess I am a fog of ambiguous obsfucation today. I was not referring to julienning cheese, but rather making WIDE, long slices of cheese...perhaps three inches wide. This was a minor use that I had in mind, but I had a plate of such at a tapas place last year and the presentation appealed to me.

Noticed All-Clad has an 8 qt programmable, oval shape, SS, about $99. Also -- you can get the Rival "Smart" programmable function for any crockpot for $10. Plug it into an outlet and plug your crockpot into it. Anyone tried either of these yet?

The leftover roasted cauliflower/red onion/garlic went well with a French omlet.

Which one is which, and which is "not the nice one" and why? Whew!

Bux, I probably was not clear. I use a microplane for grating Parmesan also. I was referring to making wide, long slices of hard cheese, and 1/8" may be as thick as I was imagining anyway. And I am interested in using it to julienne vegetables for salads and many other things. A neighborhood Thai place, for example, sometimes juliennes their vegetables and sometimes chops them, I guess depending on who is in the kitchen or what mood they're in (?), and the julienne is the more attractive presentation by far.

The NYTimes article said the Jumbo Benriner is 5 1/2 wide and slices (only - no julienne blades) up to 1/3 thick. Same price as the Super. Which might suit your purposes, except for your "too wide" and slips complaints. Anyone use the Jumbo? Looks good for hard cheeses, which is one of the reasons I was looking at these things in the first place.