fifi

PamPam . . . You are so right. I got engaged to my ex (native New Orleanian) not long after Betsy (1965) and was able to see the rebuilding from that one up close and personal. His father was a big wig in the banking business and had a lot to do with the rebuild. Yes, it all came back. Yes, this one was bigger and a whole lot worse. But, the big heart is still there. I am much encouraged. Keep reminding me, but I am putting it on my calendar. I will see you on September 8, 2006 at 4 PM at the Napoleon House. Have my Pimm's Cup waiting!

I just ran into this one this evening. It is not a case of individual statement but one that I can't figure out. At my local Randall's they have a $1.99 per pound special on asparagus. Specials are usually featured in special bins and fridge cases in the entryway to the store. Here they have the asparagus all lined up artistically. Smack in front of the case there is a big display, making a "brick wall" sort of like shoring up the front of the case, of . . . Velveeta? Oh! And next to the Velveeta they have a similar display of the store brand "fake Velveeta." The mind boggles.

I am a little late to the party. Vancouver is one of my favorite cities in the world. I have been spending some time looking at the pictures. I really need to get my arms around Filipino cuisine. Many years ago, my dad was in the hospital for a bit. We had (and still have) a lot of nurses from the Philippines here in Houston. With a severe nurse shortage at the time in our huge medical center, there was a program to bring in the lovely ladies and train them. Many decided to stay. My dad had a deep love of the Philippines. He was on a supply ship during WWII and spent a lot of time there after the liberation. With all of his flirting with the nurses, he found out where to get ingredients and we went through a period of him trying to do some of the dishes. Actually, he did pretty well. Years later, when my daughter was about 2, we lived across the street from another young couple and she was from the Philippines. One night she fixed us a family meal. To this day, 33 years later, I still remember the distinctive flavor of little rounds of a well preserved sausage that she used in her version of a spring or egg roll. I haven't found it since. We have great kolaches here in Texas. Central Texas has some rather large pockets of Czech ancestry and the love of kolaches has spilled into Houston. We have lots of shops. The dough is typically fairly dense and quite yeasty. I love the savory varieties but they are not nearly as adventurous as what you have shown us. You won't regret raising Noah as you are. Mine are in their 30s now but from the time they were in their very early teens, they were (and still are) a delight to travel and dine with. Our routine with food is just about exactly what you describe. I don't recall either of them going through a picky phase. They might have had an aversion to something in particular from time to time but then, so do I. I am enjoying this immensely. Gotta get to Vancouver before long.

Let us not forget a good dousing of malt vinegar on crisply fried fish.

OH GREAT! Thank you, NewYorkTexan. May all of your steaks have gristle and your apples have worms. GROOOAAAAN! As she dials the number for The Slate Company.

I started this thread on Wagyu beef in Texas in general. There is a link to some information on Harrell there.

You guys are killing me. I am drawn to this thread like a moth to a flame. I really really can't make myself spend the money. But, good grief the stuff is gorgeous (to me) and I really like the fact that it comes to look "lived in." That goes with the rest of my "look" . . . think beach house or summer house. Everything is not perfect and shiny. And it is so practical. And I could have a big clean up sink fabricated for that corner. And . . . no, really, I can't . . . really. The problem is, this is the one natural or unnatural stone material that I like the look of. Because of my attachment to the lived in look, I have never liked the Corian, Silestone or the polished granite. I, too, have researched the sources. The Gulf Coast seems to be about as far away from the sources as you can get in the US. The uncertainty of getting a final product that will actually fit shipped in from far away is a valid worry to a builder. And, if you don't have qualified craftsman in the area that is another valid worry. It gets to be a chicken or the egg thing. It isn't used much around here so I don't have craftsmen. I don't have craftsmen because it isn't used much around here. So, how did we get over that hurdle and granite burst upon the scene? I would like to know how many acres of granite have been installed around here. And most of it comes from very far away. We do have pink granite in the state but I see very little of it used in kitchens. Well, perhaps that means that we did have craftsmen around. (It is lovely, for granite, BTW.) I would be curious to see the sales figures from the soapstone suppliers and what happened to them after Martha Stewart did that series of programs on her new studio kitchen a few years ago. It was that program that brought back fond memories of my lab days and planted the evil seed in my head.

Having lived off and on in New Orleans or in the area since the 60s, I can say that I have seen disasters come and go. No . . . maybe not as bad as this but pretty bad nonetheless. The great restauranteurs always find a way to come back. I am so grateful for that. A first meal at a favorite restaurant when the recovery is well underway is a way of reaffirming the great food culture and the resilience of the people. I will be getting on an airplane when it happens this time.

I have always wanted to put some chicken on the bottom rack of my WSM under some pork butts.

When my grandmother was raising ducks and geese, she had them processed by some lovely ladies at a Franciscan monastery in the area. The fat was kept in the freezer forever. Grandma used it in pie dough, cookies, sauted veggies, whatever. It is all good. I attribute that supply of good fat to her long life. (Off Topic note: She made me some lovely duck and goose down pillows.)

Maybe they don't want any smartass chickens. ← OK . . . There is my GulleyLaugh for the day. Now that I think of it, I don't remember about my chicken. But I don't think it had the "Pope's Nose." (I love that term. I learned it from my in-laws in New Orleans.) What I want to know is . . . If they cut them off, what do they do with them?

I wouldn't count Deanie's out quite yet. It has been destroyed before. Does anyone know when it first opened? Deanie's is where my kids always head when they are visiting and need a spicy crawfish fix. That is where my daughter became the family champion crawfish tail pincher. She can actually peel crawfish fast enough to get something to eat. We think she sweet-talked one of the waiters into a coaching session. We have an interest in keeping up with what they are going to do.

I dined at Topo a few weeks ago while in Chicago visiting my son. We finally planned ahead enough to get that reservation. I have to admit that I was really anxious about the meal not living up to my expectations. We actually talked about that before being seated. There were three of us, myself, my son and a friend. I should not have worried. I don't remember everything we had but I can say that we were not dissappointed with the food or service. I second the praises for the soups. I tasted the friend's gaspacho. I don't like gaspacho. It was fabulous. The mole sauce on my pork was complex and sublime. My only worry was that someone would recognize my name on the credit card as being one of those folks at eGullet that gave Bayless such a hard time. We have eaten at Frontera a few times. Absolutely excellent and a different experience altogether.

Well, I guess it just amounts to your priorities. The concrete certainly has a certain "look" that is attractive. If you are willing to put up with its (considerable) deficiencies it may be the right thing for you. I remember when it first became popular that its first claim to fame was the low cost. That turned out not to be entirely true by the time you did what was needed to make it work in a busy kitchen, you could have done something else. I do have to make a confession here. As enamoured as I am by the soapstone, I may have to go back to the Formica® type laminate. I have had it in most of the kitchens of my life and have never had a problem with it. After forty years I still don't put hot pots on counter tops. I still use cutting boards. I can't say that I have ever had a problem with laminate and that is what my nostalgic attraction of the soapstone is fighting.

Having been labeled an "expert" in some fields professionally, I collected a few favorites: To paraphrase P. J. O'Rourke . . . "I don't know. I am not an expert therefore, I have a poor grasp of things I know nothing about." "Hi! I am from Head Office and I am here to help you." And my personal favorite when perplexed colleagues are looking longingly for an answer to their problem . . . "How the hell should I know?" But when it comes to food, I guess there are so many categories of expert it is hard to say in short concise terms. Some of us science geeks can get into the details of what is going on in the pot. But we may be nothing as compared to that talented chef or cook that can make magic without having a scientific clue. Then there is the person that can make magic in the garden or the farm. To me, an expert is someone that knows a lot more about a subject than I do and knows enough more about it to recognize the fact and try to disseminate that information.

Now that Spam has come up I had to jump in. I had forgotten about the baked Spam with brown sugar and cloves. I also used to slice Spam really thin and fry it crispy like bacon. Ummm . . . Must. Buy. Spam. What they do with Spam in Hawaii is just amazing. Back in the days of off-campus housing with a bunch of Catholic girls, Kraft Mac and Cheese, mushroom soup and tuna made the EVERY Friday night casserole. I thought I would never want to see that stuff again in my life. Now, 40 years later, I am developing a craving. Nostalgia will trigger anything. Mother, grandma and great aunt were great cooks so I didn't get into slummin' it until I was on my own at school and dad was a real stickler on my budget.

It is hard to say. The one place I worked where I lived with the benchtops for 5 years, those things had been there since 1935 so I wasn't around for when they were first installed and "finished." One year, we ran out of budget money (federal govt.) and had nothing to do and were really bored. We decided to "clean up" so we stripped everything off the benchtops, cleaned and oiled the benchtops. Heh . . . What a mess. Those things had been around long enough, and possibly oiled multiple times over the years, so that they absorbed very little of the new oil. We had quite a time cleaning that up. And that was in the micrbiology section where they are wiped down several times a day with grain alcohol. I have heard different regimes recommended but it makes sense that you oil them on some frequency when new but pretty soon you really don't have to do that anymore. On the reason why soapstone feels "warmer" than granite . . . How something "feels" to human skin when the mass temperature is the same is a function of thermal conductivity. For instance, at 150 degrees F, you can probably pick up and hold a chunk of wood fairly easily. You can't do that with a piece of aluminum.

I don't have any real data to justify the popularity of concrete. I can only tell you what my architect friend said when I asked her . . . "What were you thinking?" (We are friends.) Her answer was that she isn't a materials scientist and didn't know what she was getting into and "got caught up in the look." I agree on the softer look of the soapstone. As much as granite has to recommend it, I just don't like how it looks and feels. You get a lot of resistance to soapstone from the design shops here, too. The whining about durability and stain resistance is just flat not true. I went back and figured out that the counters (benchtops in lab speak) and sinks in that older lab I worked in were actually installed in about 1935 so that is more like what . . . 75 years? (They are still there.) Of course, there may be different grades of soapstone so that you need to buy from a reputable supplier. I think some of the objection to the soapstone is that they aren't a direct supplier for it. You could leave it unoiled but I would think that it would get pretty grungy looking in that every little oily drop would show. I would oil it. One of the suppliers I looked into had some that was not as dark as some others I have seen.

It depends upon the sealer and how it is applied. The real disasters are the sealers, of whatever polymer, that forms a film. Without getting too technical, concrete has terrific strength in compression, almost none in tension. Whatever polymer film will set up stresses as it cures. This may occur over a surprising length of time, months maybe. Bottom line, the stresses will eventually pull apart the cement part of the concrete at the interface. The interface may be a few thousandths of an inch down in the surface if the sealer had good penetrating power. Now you have peeling and a real mess. There has been some work with some of the new polysiloxanes and there may be some help there. I think some folks are mucking around with additives such as acrylates in the concrete to help with sealer bonding and to reduce the reactiveness of the concrete. I am not all that up to date. I lost interest in it because I fail to see the reason to work all that hard to make concrete work as a counter material. When you get through messing with it, you could have spent that money on something more suitable to the purpose. I think it is one of those things that seemed like a good idea at the time to some architects that didn't have a good understanding of material properties and it got really popular 'cause it sounded cool. Heh . . . I have one architect friend that puts disclaimers in her contracts if she is working with a client and their kitchen designer. She got really sick of being called in again and again to "fix it." She makes it very clear that if the client insists on it they are on their own. If Daddy-A or some other designer checks in maybe they can update us. kiliki . . . I love the way soapstone gets that "lived in" look as well as my nostalgic attachment to it. Since the new kitchen will have acres of counter, I have balked at spending that kind of money for any kind of stone for the counters. But, I have to admit that my resolve is weakening.

A couple of years ago, Martha Stewart spent some shows showing off the new kitchen studio. There were acres of soapstone, counters and sinks. That was when I remembered it fondly from my long ago years as a lab rat. For many years soapstone was the material of choice for lab sinks, counters and such. The stuff is just about indestructible. In one chemistry lab I worked in it had been in place for well over 40 years. If you like the rustic look of soapstone, I can't think of a better material. Concrete will fizz under lemon juice and is dependent upon sealers. At one point, I was a materials technologist. We had a saying . . . "Man who paint concrete really stupid." From a materials' technology standpoint, I can't imagine a worse choice for kitchen counters. Over the years, I would get "government job" questions from architect friends asking what to do with a problem concrete counter. My answer usually came in the form of "Get a jackhammer."

I just roasted my first whole Smart Chicken. (I have used the parts before.) About ten days ago, I did an ordinary grocery store chicken. Just out of curiosity, I decided trying to kosher the thing following the instructions on the Morton box. I did a fairly usual seasoning thing with lemon, olive oil and a mix of herbs. I decided that koshering didn't do a lot for me and that I will go back to brining. For purposes of comparison, I decided to do today's Smart Chicken bare bones, no brining or koshering. I did use the same seasoning. Well folks . . . Smart Chicken wins. By a mile. The flavor, texture and the juiciness quotient are right up there with downright excellent. The only thing I would do is go back to brining, for the flavor, not texture and juiciness. I do like the slight saltiness throughout the meat. If you don't care about that, forget it and just plop that brainy clucker in the pan.

I, too, am an afficiando of the onion confit based soup. It is easy and I am lazy so we are already in a win-win situation. I usually have the stock in the freezer and a jar of onion confit skulking around so it is a no brainer. That being said, the "family favorite" is right out of Emeril's cookbook Louisiana Real and Rustic. We are lucky enough that it is posted here: Creole Onion Soup No, it is not traditional. But it is so delicious that I have to make a batch whenever the kids visit. A bowl of this and a salad and you have dinner. Next, I plan to try Tony's version. The mushroom soup is so phenomenal that I can't wait to try this one. (Thanks, Tony.)

The whole subject of Wagyu beef deserves more discussion here . . . Wagyu Beef in Texas Back to burgers.

Heh heh . . . The longer the check out line and the larger the audience, the more perverse I get. I can usually count on a blank stare from the checker for at least one produce item. I can usually guess which one(s). So, while waiting in line I will let my imagination loose and think up an answer: Today's fun was a two-fer. Big jicama root: What is it? "Oh, my dear, that is a rare root that is imported from Uruguay." What do you do with it? "You peel it, shave it into thin slices and dry it. Then you roll it and smoke it for enhancement of sex." Fresh horseradish root: What is it? "This is a really pungent root that was originally discovered in the tundra of Siberia but is grown here now." What do you do with it? No reply, just eyebrows heading for the hairline. You get the idea. Since I am a short, dumpy middle aged lady I try to incorporate sex, drugs and rock and roll in there somewhere for the effect.

Making a decision like this is easy . . . 1) Do I want it? yes 2) Can I afford it? yes 3) Do I need it? not applicable, see #1 Decision . . . GO! After all, I don't play golf.