jackal10

Mash with equal quantity of butter. Spread on toast. Eat. Pizza toppings Pasta, or as part of alla Puttanesca Add to a meat dish. The anchovies melt into the sauce

Lea and Perrins Worcestshire Sauce

Fish skin, descaled, crisped in a hot pan. Sort of a fish version of scratchings or gribenes Pea-pod soup (puree, then sieve) Veg peelings and trimmings (not potatoes) for stock MRP (Mechanically recovered meat) (ugh!)

Four or five cups a day, half decaf? Thats not a lot. I guess I drink maybe 8-10 cups a day...full strength, and have done for many years. Press pot with semi-skimmed milk at home, and double expresso at the office. Surprisingly it doesn't seem to affect sleep patterns

For fish quenelle you should be able to use any uncooked white fish, or salmon or the like. Not oily fish. I use 2 of fish: 1 of heavy cream: 1 egg white. Keeping it all cold while mixing is the key. Ther is a reciep here, just leave out (clasically) the onion and the parsley: http://recipes.egullet.com/recipes/r836.html They need quite heavy seasoning. They ae tough to sieve, but it does add extra smoothness. I'd leave out that step initially until you have something you like. You will need to flip them manually, once they release and float. The boiling water should cover them initially. They don't take long to poach on the top.

Informal Guest Night in college In Hall Twice baked Goats Cheese Soufflé with roasted vine Tomatoes Braised Saddle of Hare with Herb Dumplings Pureed potatoes with home-cured Bacon Selection of vegetables (pureed parsnips, broccoli) Pear Tart Tatin with saffron Pastry and Armagnac Creme Caramel Petit Bourgeois sauvignon Blanc 2002 Cot Rotie Chapoutier 1997 In Parlor Coffee and petit four (miniature caramalised lemon tarts, white chocolate florentines, truffles) Cheese Fruit Ch d'Angludet 1993 Ch Coutet 1988 Grahams 1977 Presentation: (Hare: fanned slices of hare, quenelle of potato scattered with small cubes of the tea-smoked(?) bacon, jus) (Pud: circle of pear tatin; small creme caramel with curved triangular tuile half surrounding it like a flag, compote of dried fruits(?) in Armagnac) About 50 people. Seriously good and accomplished food.

Cavolo Nero is a plant; a variety of kale in the cabbage family. Fairly easy to grow, but yield is low (at least in my garden). Cook it like kale, or use it as a spinach like component to stuff into things. It was trendy a while ago. Personally I think it over-rated.

How long is a piece of string? It depends on the quality of ambience you want. Basic is about 10sq ft per cover for chair and table; Double that for circulation and loos etc; Double that to allow for kitchen and service space, and you are looking at about 50 sq ft per cover, since you can never fit them in ideally, not forgettting wheelchair access etc. That is really crowding them in, canteen style. For an upmarket space you could easily double or triple that again. Then there is the bar or lounge, parking, garbage, dry storage etc etc... Gross is the overall measurement, which the real-estate company sells you. Net is the actual usable space after partitions, corridors, fire exits etc. Maybe half gross, especially of its an awkward space.

No need to breadcumb...fry directly

I think I have cracked an acceptable low-carb fish cake. Recipe is http://recipes.egullet.com/recipes/r836.html Key is to invert the process for diet foods of replacing fat with starches...

Low carb fish cakes I have cracked a solution for a low-carb version of fish-cakes with an acceptable texture. Its the inverse to low-fat solutions that use starches instead of fat to give the maouth feel. 500 g White fish, or crab or shrimp meat (raw) 4 Egg whites 250 ml cream 2 Onions peeled and chopped parsley, chopped Soften the onions in a little butter or oil, and let cool. Whizz the fish and the egg in a food processor or blender until smooth and incorporated together. Keep cold. Add the cream and blend until incorporated. Season with quite a lot of white pepper and salt Add the parsley and the onion and blitz briefly to mix. Make into cakes (for example as large quenelles with two tablespoons), and put into a baking pan. Fill the baking pan carefully with boiling water, and put on a gentle heat to poach. The fishcakes will release from the bottom and float when cooked - turn them over to cook the upper side for a minute or two, then take out with a slotted spoon and drain. They will firm up as they cool. You can eat them as they are, or brown off in a frying pan. Keywords: Main Dish, Fish ( RG836 )

Low carb fish cakes I have cracked a solution for a low-carb version of fish-cakes with an acceptable texture. Its the inverse to low-fat solutions that use starches instead of fat to give the maouth feel. 500 g White fish, or crab or shrimp meat (raw) 4 Egg whites 250 ml cream 2 Onions peeled and chopped parsley, chopped Soften the onions in a little butter or oil, and let cool. Whizz the fish and the egg in a food processor or blender until smooth and incorporated together. Keep cold. Add the cream and blend until incorporated. Season with quite a lot of white pepper and salt Add the parsley and the onion and blitz briefly to mix. Make into cakes (for example as large quenelles with two tablespoons), and put into a baking pan. Fill the baking pan carefully with boiling water, and put on a gentle heat to poach. The fishcakes will release from the bottom and float when cooked - turn them over to cook the upper side for a minute or two, then take out with a slotted spoon and drain. They will firm up as they cool. You can eat them as they are, or brown off in a frying pan. Keywords: Main Dish, Fish ( RG836 )

Sourdough bread Marmite chunky peanut butter Homemade and home grown Grape Jelly Sandwich spread (or salad cream)

Serve it in smaller portions. Its an old catering trick make it hot, that way it goes further without too many complaints, and few come back for seconds... If you want serve it with a bland filler, like rice or baked potato on the side.

Its a good price. Parker quotes 88 points, price band D (about $25). Buy some for now, and some to keep..

The secret is not to overcook. Fish needs to be no more than 45C/115F. Forget poaching. Easiest is to wrap it (gutted, washed but otherwise whole) in oiled aluminium foil, Add a splash of white wine, some herbs (parley, dill spring onion), salt and pepper. Seal the foil and put in a medium oven for half an hour or so. Of its very big curve it artistically so it fits in the pan and looks like its swimming. A digital themometer really helps here, and they are not expensive. Take out of the oven and cool to room temperature. It will be fairly fragile, so handle gently. Strip the skin, put on a big dish. Up to you whether to leave on the scales or not. Decorate with cucumber slices, and if you like piped mayo. You can use the decoration to hide the messy bits or where you broke it. You can add sea-like decorations to he rest of the dish. Serve with a good hollandaise or mayonnaise... If you plan to serve it warm or hot then salmon is pastry (with ginger and raisins) is a good version. Get the fishmonger to skin and fillet the salmon. Roll out two sheets of puff pastry bigger then the salmon. Good quality shop bouht pastry is OK, especially if you give it another couple of turns with real butter. Make up some green forcemeat (lots of soft herbs, chopped onions sweated in butter, bread crumbs, and for this ginger and raisins. On the sheet of pastry put a layer of the stuffing, one side of the salmon, another layer of stuffing, the other side of the salmon, another layer of stuffing. Eggwash all round. Put the second sheet of puff pastry on top, and seal round. CUt it out into a fish shape - tail at one end, head at the other. With aknife draw in the hea and eye, and make scales all along with a small round pastry cutter. Eggwash 45mins in a hot oven or until the pastry is brown.

Yes. The very same. http://www.tobaccoreviews.com/blend_detail...LPHA=T&TID=1259 Escudo is another good tobacco with a high perique content To be pedantic "A good cigar is a smoke" is from Rudyard Kipling's "The Betrothed" I wonder if Loufood would do a blog, or should we wait until she is settled in Spain? or Fat Guy...or Rachel...or one of the professional chefs..

What a fine meerschaum. I knew we had something else in common.. Unfortunately since a bout of alveolitis a while ago I can only smoke on high days and holidays, but what joy. Maybe we should have a seperate thread on tobaccos. I habitually smoke Three Nuns (none nicer), but its not the same since they make it only ready shredded, and not in the original navy cut with a dark perique centre....

Brilliant food...I wish I could plate like you do.. Smoking a pipe of tobacco is more satisfying...

At a local outdoor event there were hired portable loos. In the mens urinal trailer, just at eye height it read "For this relief we give much thanks to <name of hire company>" WHich I guess takes us onto graffiti. Written on the ceiling "You are now peeing on your shoes"

Its a standard sucker ratchet. The bet is that you will lose money and need to go back to them for more, which you will inevitably. That's OK. You gave away say 30% for the first round. Generously they will let you have the second round on the same terms, and they now own 60%, and they have control. Three rounds and its 90% and all your work is for nothing, just as it begins to turn the corner. A nastier variant in these times is the death spiral. Here the proposition is that the investors value is maintained even if the value of the asset declines. Thus you start with 30% for which you buy nice new shiny equipment. You need more (or want to cash out), or its review time. The equipment is worth less, having been used, or the economy and the restaurant trade has delcined, or you haven't made the projected numbers. The value of the business is say half what it was. The financiers therfore own 60%, even without putting in new money. Down rounds are really tough. Actually (at least here) it is really tough to find an investor who would put in the majority of the money without owning the majority of the stock, or without an asset backing or other guarantee. If the investor owns only 30% you will need personally put in the other 70%, which under the schemes above you lose rapidly. The sort of person that would put in money without stock or guarantees, you probably don't want as an investor, and may be even more expensive or difficult to service.

I believe the normal procedure in such places (not that I go to them) is to point to the pictures and grunt. The pictures are helpfully provided for the majority of their customer's normal forms of communication... OTOH what would a kosher restaurant be without the repartee... "I want chicken soup mit Knaidlach, and a kind word" "Here's the soup" "And the kind word?" "Don't eat the knaidlach!"

In the UK its usually with an "n" - sarnie. You might have a cucumber sarnie, or a an egg sarnie or tinned salmon sarnie. More refined than its op north version, a Butty (as in Chip Butty or Bacon Butty) - thick white bread, lots of butter and whatever filling..

Yumm! But we need recipes, ideally in the recipe section, especially for the delicious looking ice. Is it really that colour? How are you going to serve it? Tuile? Biscuits? Balsamic splash?

Its a rip-off, and demeaning The restaurant should pay their staff properly so that they should not need to beg for tips. I wonder what percentage the restaurant takes?