fifi

Quit dithering about the old wood. Keep it. Don't sell it. And yes... Your kids may want some of it some day. Several years ago a similar thing was lost in a barn fire on my parents country place. I still mourn the loss of those stupid boards.

I have grown herbs for years and, for some stupid reason, had never heard of Stevia. So, I googled it. http://www.stevia.net/ This is either a paranoid rant or another example of your federal government at work.

I confess to a dark and secret longing for McD's sausage and biscuit. There... I feel a lot better.

I'm not sure which is better, the Char Griller or the New Braunfels. They look to be about the same to me. My only disappointment with my New Braunfels is that it does not have a drain in the smoking chamber to let out any accumulated grease or rain water that gets in during a typical Texas thunderstorm. But I intend to fix that. Get nephew down with a metal hole saw. When I am using my New Braunfels, I do put big foil pans of water on the lower rack of the smoking chamber to help with temperature control and added moisture. Works quite well. As to Klose. I went over there a couple of weeks ago. If you want to drool over smokers, that is the place to go. Those things are incredible. They seem to use 1/4" steel for most of their stuff. This is SERIOUS equipment. They make anything you want... custom. http://www.bbqpits.com/ edited to add: This place is just a few blocks from my high school. Is that karma or what?

Fried shrimp, catfish, other fish, crawfish tails... all of those are favorites here in Houston and New Orleans.

Nope, it was Brown. And they were going to sell it in bottles, not bulk. I even remember seeing in the Chronicle that they had a label design with a graphic of the skyline. The whole thing was insane.

Wait a minute... I am remembering that there has been taste testings of water from various cities. I think it was a few years ago because we got a big laugh out of the fact that Houston rated pretty high. Our nutcase mayor even had a scheme to bottle and sell Houston water to help out his lame budget. The sad thing is, he was serious! There is some group out there that judges tap water. Maybe someone with better google skills than mine can turn it up. I haven't been successful.

Interesting question. I just realized that I do have a pattern. I am at a time in my life that I can pretty much buy whatever I want but I don't do that. That wouldn't be much fun or much of a treat. I am not a big spender, don't play golf, not into clothes or shoes, but... I LOVE TOYS! My pattern is to wait until after Christmas, review my mental list and go buy something outrageous. That is how I got the $200 rice cooker. (It does have a retractable cord so that is something redeeming.) When I started cooking again a few years ago I was following the same pattern. That is how I got my knives, good pots, etc. Now that the basics have been taken care of, I tend toward the outrageous. A mandoline will probably bubble up to the top of the list after Christmas this year. I do indulge in smaller treats along the way. Microplanes fall into that category. If I ever run into the perfect cherry pitter, it is mine! Most of my toys are food related. But I did blow my tax refund on a really nifty remote solar powered weather station that I will install in the new house. Books are different. They are a necessity of life like food and do NOT count. But my stingy side does wish that Amazon didn't have that "people who bought this book also bought...".

Yep... What melkor said. The Weber Smokey Mountain is what I am getting. I just couldn't remember the name.

I have a New Braunfels with the offset firebox that I have had for about 6 years. I paid about $180 for it and it is still good. Not pretty, but still good. It is in storage now so I am aquiring a Weber water smoker that will fit on my apartment balconey for the duration until I get my house built. That is also less than $200.

Ooooo KAPDADDY... You are talkin' my language. Welcome to eGullet.

I have had an Oreck for years. Still works great. For some reason my daughter didn't want to deal with bags so I got her the Hoover. I don't get that. I would jump at a Meile for $400 C. How do they do that? My new house will have NO wall to wall carpet so I would really like to have a canister. I still think I may get one of those macho shop vacs for party clean-up. What a hoot to just go suck up everything!

Wasabi peas.

"Today's celebrities wear sizes 0 or 2, as compared to a normal size 12 a few generations ago." I beg to differ with the "few generations" statement. I was born in 1946. As I was coming up, my older sister (7 years older) competed in beauty contests. She was the "perfect size 10". That was the ideal in the fifties. Scary article.

The "Fresh Herbs" thread is suffering from an abundance of lemon balm (or is it lemon verbena?). I wonder how that would work out if used like the previously mentioned basil, etc.?

My all time favorite is the Mufaletta (sp? one f or two?) from Central Grocery in New Orleans, at least the ones they made 35 years ago. It was a perfect balance of meat, cheese, olive salad and the wonderful bread. It was all about the bread. The meat and cheese was in condiment proportions to the bread with a generous serving of olive salad for kick. I haven't been back there in many years. I only hope they haven't succumbed to the trend to pile on lots of meat and cheese. That is like our American tendency to over-sauce pasta. It misses the whole point. Ripe avocado, lentil sprouts, maybe some real bacon crumbles, good mayo, Jane's Crazy Salt, on slices of good wheat berry bread. Very thinly sliced sweet onion, lots of Hellman's mayo, s&p, a spritz of lime juice, on a good soft white bread. (I will bake homemade bread for this.) Drink a beer or two and you are in nap time. Somebody told me that there is something in onions that combined with beer is a sedative.

Houston/League City/Clear Lake aren't too bad. Except that every now and then in the summer they whack it with the chlorine and you have to "let it breathe". It is certainly good enough that I don't buy bottled water. And I drink a LOT of water... It is a promise I made my kidney stones. The worst in the world has to be West Texas. Thankfully, I only had to visit. Then there is New Orleans... You get whatever gets dumped in the river. It was nasty for days after a creosote spill. It tasted like someone had dumped lysol in it. Then, if they test the fire hydrants in your neighborhood, you get mud for a few days from the bumps to the system. The best of where I have lived has to be Hammond, Louisiana. It is artesian from several hundred feet down, very soft, and delicious. The well I had on my property there (not that deep nor artesian) was from a white sand strata and was so good, family and friends from New Orleans always came with dozens of gallon jugs to fill.

One word... Quack!

I seem to have a fixation on finding uses for the animal kingdom lately. Must be deep seated frustration at not being able to garden this year combined with a temporary absence of basset hounds.

My grandmother used to keep ducks and turn them into the garden. They gobbled up slugs, bugs and caterpillars and didn't seem to damage the garden much. They sure had good eggs. I would think a pet duck in a garden would be a hoot.

I would. Post please. And... Oh Yeah... and in eG recipes, please.

Lemon balm makes a wonderful tea. It is also great with fish and chicken. One time my sister had a bunch growing and her son had caught a big red snapper. She stuffed the inside of the snapper with bunches of it and baked it. WONDERFUL!

Here's an idea... Buy a lamb and feed it up. Bet that little sucker would taste good.

I think bee balm is diffrent, Monarda didyma. Mexican oregano is Lipia graveolens according to one site that I googled and seemed to be somewhat authorotative. Some of the other sites that came up used different names so I am somewhat dubious. This one seems right... http://www.davidscooking.com/ingredients/m...mexoregano.html

To make things more confusing, oregano-wise, there is also a Mexican oregano that is very important in Mexican cooking. It is TOTALLY different and you really can't substitute.