mrbigjas

hey i remembered that! i just wasn't making the logical connection. very interesting, thanks. when my all-clad frypans die (which, well, it's been over 10 years and they are none the worse for wear as far as i can tell, so it probably won't be that soon), i'm totally replacing them with cheap french steel pans. i wish i'd known about them when i was younger; i could have saved myself and the family who bought me these pans plenty of money.

tamari soy has very little if any wheat in it--if the kid has a gluten allergy, that would probably be the source of the prohibition on regular soy sauce, which has a good amount of wheat in it along with the soy. i have a friend with similar food allergies who basically eats nothing but steak and pancakes and french fries and noodles with ketchup. his allium allergies are especially severe--one time he had a steak at a bar near our house, and apparently onions had been cooked on the same grill; he spent the next half-hour in the bathroom trying to breathe. (we didn't know it was that bad until he came out and told us what had gone on) there are several web forums/newsgroups for the no-allium folks--since onions are in almost everything, it's an difficult one to deal with.

Has anyone used the frozen chestnuts sometimes available at TJ's? ← no, but on a whim i picked up a package of the vacuum packed chestnuts they're selling there now, and i've been debating what to do with them. this is a good idea...

right now at the state stores they have big piles of various cheap spanish reds. i've had four or five different bottles and there was only one i didn't find totally pleasant and drinkable, especially for the $8-10 price tags. they also have cases of cuvee de pena at the 12th & chestnut, which is $8.49 and pretty tasty. it was better when it was $5.99, but what can you do. edited to add: oh also, what i've had a couple bottles of that i've enjoyed is this jean-luc colombo jawn from coteaux d'aix en provence called moulin de la dame cotes bleue. it's $7.99 i think, and mighty tasty for that price--medium bodied but with sort of a black cherry/violet/pencil lead-y thing going on. i know capaneus will bust my balls for promoting a colombo selection, but you know, i'll suck it up, because i like this one.

brasato as in this brasato di maiale recipe from mario, or brasato as in this braised mountain goat recipe from about.com? brasato seems to be such a generic term for braised somethingorother, what's to hate?

my invitation?

report: this recipe is damn good. the short ribs do not need to braise for the three hours that paula recommends in the book--two will do it easily. sometimes when i make short ribs i am at a loss as to why this is the cheap cut of beef and a steak is the expensive one. flavor galore. edited to add: the one thing i don't know about these dishes, and maybe it's because i didn't read the intro closely enough in wolfert's book, is what do you serve with them? a big hearty braised fatty beef dish seems to call for a salad of some sort. and a starch. when we were growing up we always had buttered egg noodles with short ribs, but that didn't seem right. so i steamed some potatoes in big chunks, and then browned them in a little butter/duck fat, and tossed them with some roquefort. not much, just enough for a little flavor. and some roasted brussels sprouts, which i sprinkled with verjus and olive oil. aw yeah. but anyway, any other thoughts on accompaniments?

if you were, we'd have to have a serious talk about a friends and family discount for all yer old buddies here on eg. we have needs you know. don't forget the sourdough specials -- the best pretzels on the market. everything else is too dry, or not salty enough, or too full of weird fake butter flavor... the only thing that comes close is them big ol' sourdough jawns that snyder's makes.

i have a general question about cookware: why isn't french steel more popular as fry pan material? they're cheap, they take some taking care of but less than cast iron, and they work really well. i have a couple small ones, and you know, they put a better sear on more quickly than cast iron. and they blow away stainless in that category as well. i don't know why. in fact, i'm kind of interested in the physics behind searing/browning ability in general. why does cast iron work better than stainless? why is enamel worse than either?

that's the standard rye around my house. i don't like the beam as much, or the old overholt, which are the only two affordable ryes easily available in pennsylvania. so i pick up a wild turkey whenever i'm in jersey. (i supplement with bulleit bourbon, which according to their site is made with a higher percentage of rye than most bourbon--probably why i like it so much; it's not as sweet as bourbon usually is)

here's another thread i started a little over a year ago, when i first started cooking farro.

dagordon, your implied fears in the first or second post in this thread were well founded--it did indeed get lost in the shuffle, and for some reason i still haven't been there. i think i'll remedy that this weekend. thanks for the reminder.

i like this idea! i have to point out, though, that there's kind of a price differential between a $1.25 bag of good's and a $27/lb roquefort papillon... but you know, i think we can work something out.

i just noticed one of these for the first time at salumeria last week at the terminal, but didn't get it. i'd love to know what you think. yeah that's a nice one.

stopped in giwa again on saturday for a bowl of soon doo boo tofu. it's not jong ka jib, as we were discussing in the other thread, but it does the trick on a saturday afternoon. they've introduced a buy-10-get-one-free card there, which is nice.

i'm psyched--i don't get it together to participate in cook-offs very often, but this time i have nearly 3 pounds of short ribs marinating in a bottle and a half of wine, preparing for the short ribs with cepes and prunes recipe from the southwest france book. of course the ribs weren't cut small enough (3 pieces, just under 3 pounds), but i think it'll work just fine. will report back on tuesday.

with the boy in the picture, i haven't had a chance to plan my cooking as extensively as i have in the past and my evenings are busier, so my participation has dwindled as well. but that doesn't mean i'm not enjoying what all y'all are doing. i feel like i'm holding my own as far as continuing to make good dinners and not relying on eating frozen tamales from trader joe's every night, but the kind of evening where i can get home from work at 5:30, make polenta, chill it, and then dawdle around putting together a polenta terrine type of thing and eat it at 9 are temporarily over. however, last month the one specifically tuscan dish i made was a total revelation and a joy, so i certainly plan on getting back to cooking this month. now this month will be perfect, if you guys can just point me to a definitive recipe for ragu....

what did you get?

well it does say 'in philly.' i think that el sombrero has been mentioned in the chester county restaurants thread, but i'm not sure.

as a side note, we discovered last week that they don't serve the frijoles a la charra on sundays. we asked why and were told that on sundays they have the lamb with soup, and they only cook up one kind of soup a day. most days it's frijoles; sundays it's barbacoa. (i didn't ask if he meant goat, since most of the mexican places around serve up goat on sundays)

i just had it. a spoonful of gerber organic baby rice cereal mixed with similac. i can't believe this kid likes this crap. i assume it's not the rice cereal, but the formula that has this weird chemically taste that is really repulsive to me. wish we had more breastmilk to mix it with instead...

ok then that's ANOTHER place i have to get to soon. anyone know a good babysitter?

so what's the deal? is he going to focus more on ansill? is he going to take pif (as a concept, i mean) somewhere else, or is he just going to bail overall?

you know what utz makes in a blue bag that rocks? 'carolina bbq' flavor. one of my favorite flavored chips. i love utz. they're my favorite (non lard) chips.

Save your trip to wawa, as that is nothing but Herrs territory, you ain't gonna find an Utz at all... ← really? i had no idea. it all blends together when your brain is addled by pork-fried potatoes. ok then, hie thee to a 7-11 or any gas station with a minimart and pick up a grandma utz's. or score a bag of herr's old fashioned at wawa. also lard cooked, also not the best. or you know where you can get the red-bag good's? at reading terminal. the folks at hatfield farms and glick's salads sell good's re-bagged into baggies for like a dollar.