fifi

Too much stuff in the fish tacos. I just use finely shredded cabbage, a chipotle mayonaise, and "pickled" onion. Pickled onion is just finely sliced red onion with fresh lime juice, s&p, let it sit a while. Sometimes I substitute pobalno crema or chipotle crema for the mayo. (Poblano crema: Roasted poblanos whizzed in the blender with crema. Same thing with chipotles and a little of the adobo that they come in.) The pickled onion adds the acid note.

No reply from USDA yet. (Not surprising.) I will see if I can get anything from the Aggies. (Texas A&M)

This is absolutely brilliant marketing. These guys are using something as simple as color to get a buzz going. I remember when they added blue. Everyone was talking about how that was just WRONG. But... Everybody was talking about it. And, I have to admit, I had not thought about M&Ms until then and I bought a few bags to put in the candy jar on my conference table. I will probably buy some of the black & whites, too. It is a good conversation ice breaker. BRILLIANT. Duh... We are talking about it here.

Fluorocarbons like Teflon heated well above 500F can give off smaller molecule hydrocarbons down to HF that is indeed harmful to birds. However, the concensus was that there are a lot of other fumes from cooking that are detrimental to birds and that they should never be kept in or near the kitchen or kitchen fumes. I think the human death thing from this is an urban myth unless there is some extreme circumstance. That one comes up every so often and is usually debunked. But, birds are very sensitive and should be kept from ALL cooking fumes. The compounds just from browning reactions aren't too nice either. There are a lot of reasons to keep a bird out of the kitchen. I would just do that and not give up my non-stick omelet pan.

I think I will go for Madhur Jaffrey. I have seen her many times on TV and she always makes some sense to me and is not at all intimidating. Thanks, guys.

I sent an e-mail to fsis.webmaster@usda.gov with the following text. This was the most likely address in that confusing web site. We will see what comes back.

What that means is that all vertbrates have a spinal cord surrounded by the vertebrae. How far the spinal cord goes down the tail is the question. The reason for the question is... should we treat oxtail with the same suspicion that we are neck bones for purposes of stock making or oxtail soup. I have done some googling but I don't know if that is helpful since my search capabilities are rather primitive. I haven't found anything on USDA sites. I may see if I can find a place to submit a question.

I did brussel sprouts like this for Christmas dinner. They were really large so I quartered them. I didn't realize that I was doing the same thing as this recipe at the time. Since they were pretty big chunks, I reduced the temperature to about 325 to let them cook through after the initial browning. They were incredible. I can't wait to try the cauliflower.

OMG... eGullet has a movie star. J Lo has nothing on you, lady. What lovely pictures.

I am way too many years away from comparative anatomy to answer this question about tails. And all of my anatomy books are packed away. I am not sure about cow tails. And I am not sure about our "tails" having had a very painful experience with mine related to shingles which follows nerves. Where are the vets here?

'nuf said. You be careful out there, girlfriend.

In my jelly making days I occasionally made a batch of "pancake syrup".

I was sure that the concern with elk was BSE, or its relative. This guy is some big whoop-de-doo in some big hunting organization (my, isn't THAT informative?) and I think he said that they changed the way they finally dress them out. Mabelline, I remember the brucellosis hoo-ha and this isn't that. OK... It is probably prudent to ditch the neck bones for stock. Now what do we use that is affordable? And... What about oxtail? Does the spinal cord extend into the tail?

I can identify with that. Likewise, I would not have thought this recipe remarkable but, given the reports from this esteemed group, I will now try it. New Year's day maybe.

Wasn't there a piece somewhere--New Yorker perhaps--which investigated and completely debunked the squirrel brain disease hysteria? Yeah, Pan. You are correct. It was New Guinea. I am having a bad geography day. I only remember hearing about the squirrel brains. I didn't follow up because I am very unlikely to eat squirrel brains. Given that the brain proteins are essentially the same in warm blooded animals, I can see that it would be possible for some mechanism to start folding the proteins funny in any animal. There was some concern about elk, according to a family acquaintance that hunts elk in Montana on a regular basis. What ever happened to that? And... I may have asked this on the other thread... What about using neck bones for stock? Do they remove the spinal cord?

I think I remember some folks getting it a few years ago and it was traced to eating squirrel brains. Tennessee? Kentucky? Interesting report, Nick. For all we know, this bugger has been around a long time at a low level and only showed up when people ate enough brains to crank up the exposure level. Sort of like the prevalence of kuru in... uh... Borneo?

Friends of mine and I have done fresh ham several times using a Chinese friend's recipe. It is really more of a braise than a roast but it sounds like it would be delicious with the sour orange garlic treatment. (I have got to try that. I have used a similar mix on pork butt using the Goya brand sour orange.) We don't use the whole ham but the shank portion and leave the skin on. The skin is not scored and the ham is tied with butcher's twine to keep the skin in place. You put it in a big covered pot (we use a big Le Creuset) and add the braising liquid. Cover and cook at 275 for about 6 hours. When you serve it it is more like pulled pork than pork roast. You peel back the skin and the fat under there is this wonderful, almost liquid treat. The lucky ones get some scoops of fat served with the meat. If I am going for more of a "pork roast" I would do it like wesza said.

Pork rinds are the food of the gods. Definitely not disgusting. Is this craving incredibly strange? BTW... If I haven't said so before, welcome to eGullet. Actually, even if I have said it before.

Katherine beat me to it on the Kamodo. But I want purple tiles. I am not a knife freak but those damascus blades are just to die for. I usually buy myself something outrageous after the holidays and I am really leaning there. I have heard about those on the knife threads here and seen some of the pictures. What I haven't seen are the blades with custom patterns in the steel. I want one that says "Hail to the queen!"

I just got a visual of Varmint walking into a knife shop, his pockets bulging with carrots, saying "Eh... What's up, Doc?"

I'm not sure I understand your disagreement. Feeding cows to cows is really stupid. And, I would have thought so if I knew what was going on before we even knew about BSE. BSE is only one potential problem with this. With most species (there are exceptions) cannibalism is not the norm. Certainly among herbivores. Hmmm... there is probably a good reason for this. Mother Nature is pretty good at weeding out stupid practices. We should probably pay attention. I was just looking at the issue from the standpoint of statistical risk versus our reaction to and perception of that risk. The enjoyment of raw milk cheese versus the low risk seems acceptable to me, and to a lot of other folks. If I had a compromised immune system or pregnant, I would probably give it a pass. Compare that to hysteria about one cow and people giving up steak seems unreasonable. Luckily, that doesn't seem to be happening, regardless of the news channels continually running the video of that one unfortumate cow. (A UK cow from way back, BTW.)

This may be the book you mean: http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/tg/detail...9304660-4487267 Hmm... I am not sure that is the one. The one I am talking about was aimed more at the "general reading audience", whatever that is. Whatever. Less technical.

So fire codes allow that thing in anybody's home? I want one too. Scroll down on the website: "Important: This product is designed and approved for commercial foodservice use only. It is not safe for use in the home." Just go buy a turkey frying outfit. Just don't use it "in the home".

I just read up-thread and found this. I would have probably NOT restrained my self from tapping her on the shoulder and saying. "Excuse me, madam. I do not love babies and I detest their caterwauling. Please remove the offender as soon as possible." I have already done the baby thing. I am too old to love babies that much anymore.

Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus. It is a bacteria that is immune to most, if not all, of the US's last-ditch-effort antibiotics. Not good stuff at all. I think I just read that it cannot be killed by heat either. Just a little more clarification... the toxin that causes food poisoning (extreme nausea and vomiting) is produced when food that is contaminated is allowed to "grow out" and produce the toxin. That toxin is not affected by cooking temperatures. If you kill the buggers before the food is allowed to sit you won't get any toxin production. R Washburn is correct. Staph is pretty sensitive to heat and relatively easy to kill. Staph is a normal skin resident but not all strains are equal in the production of the toxin. The infection is a different thing where the aggressive anti-biotic resistant staph enters the body, usually by mechanical means. One result is the "flesh eating" bacteria that gets into the news. Now, where was I? I had steak in Calgary, twice, the same week that the news broke in Canada. I will continue to have steak, and brisket. I am wondering about those neck bones for stock, though. Anyone know if USDA has addressed that?