stellabella

i use a half-gallon mason jar. i boiling water over four regular tea bags til half full. steep five minutes then fill jar the rest of the way with cold water. i don't sweeten my tea. i use red rose tea bags--i don't like lipton, find it tends to have a bitter aftertaste. i think it's perfectly fine to try other types of black teas, if you want a more exotic flavor. also key is to use filtered water. malawry's method for making "southern" sweet tea is pretty much exactly what i've heard from other southerners. i heard it first from deacon burton, the famous soul food cook in atlanta. it's really the best sweet tea method--the tea has an almost "caramel" flavor, since the sugar is boiled into the tea. great with barbecue and other "soul" foods. a treat for me, only--i try to avoid the sugar, and i actually prefer unsweet tea, as i really like the taste of iced tea.

huh. well, i am in the process of trying to decide which chicken salad sandwich is better: a] here at school i sometimes buy a lunchtime sandwich from the woman who runs the snack bar. i described it in my original post here. she serves it on thick cheap white "texas toast" bread; the salad is made from canned cooked chicken meat loaded with mayo and sweet pickle relish. b] at the lunch place where i sometimes work we sell homemade chicken salad: we poach fresh chicken breasts with celery, bay leaves and poultry seasoning, we chop the meat by hand, add mayo, chopped fresh celery and bell pepper, and sweet relish. we sevre it on fresh bread, soft or grilled with butter, and add lettuce, tomato, sprouts, and red onion. "unfortunately," i find myself continuously craving the first sandwich, which, by every reasonable definition of what makes food "superior," should be inferior to the second, better-quality, better-prepared sandwich. i pretty much always cook from scratch with the best ingredients i can lay my hands to. many of my friends are gustatory philistines, but i don't "lower" the quality of my cooking simply because they're too culinarily unsophisticated to really appreciate it. i'll wager that everyone appreciates my food, not because they think it's the best food they've ever tasted, but because i was kind enough to cook it for them. if i only associated with people who had as much appreciation for and knowledge of food as i do, i'd be single and i'd be lonely. i guess i started this thread more as a, "hey, get a load of this," than to encourage a debate. i think many people in this community really have lots of like-minded friends [EDIT: like-minded when it comes to FOOD]; i have very few, and that's why i like egullet so much. i won't judge ANYONE's character based on what he or she eats or how or where or with whom. i judge a person's character based on how he or she treats others. if there's a universally-agreed-upon criteria for making such a judgement, i believe this would come pretty close to being it.

The Supreme Court long ago recognized that all American citizens have a fundamental right to travel and move from state to state. thank you for making me i really needed to *clink*--that's the sound of my toast to yins

i enjoyed your post, mixmaster. i don't think you're a heathern for eating in front of the tv. i am married and childless, too--i really pressure my husband to eat with me--i think it's an important ritual--but we often eat together while watching a movie. i mean, we're married--we don't always feel like talking to each other . but i absolutely WILL not answer the phone during supper. watching tv or not, we're still having time together. sometimes we sit out on our screened deck and eat--this is our favorite place, even preferable to the tv, but the weather prevents my husband being outside in the summer. he can't stand the heat. it's just starting to get really nice outside again.

i try always to keep a cloth on the table, primarily for aesthetic reasons. when i have a dinner party, i often choose one of my favorite cloths and make sure i have enough matching or complimenting cloth [ONLY!] napkins for each diner. i choose dishes accordingly. i have five different sets [3 of which are incomplete] , as well as many odd pieces that i mix and match. for example i like to mix blue willow pieces with fiesta ware. i use silverplate, mostly odd pieces, or every day. i don't take care of it but it still looks better to me than my husband's pre-me stainless. although lately i have been noticing some stainless patterns that i really like--nonetheless i doubt i'll ever make the splurge. i am in the process of amassing silver. i don't use it very often simply because i don't have enough for more than 7. sometimes when i do a small dinner i get it out. and it isn't engraved yet, which bugs me. it's old maryland, and when i get the set completed i am taking it to my girlfriend to have engraved all at once. not that i'm obsessive-compulsive, or anything.

i loved the pickeld eggs at the wenlock. and as long as i can buy crisps, i'm fine. god, i love those mccoy's crisps. to me, THAT'S pub food.

obsessed? paranoid? HUNGRY! the only cheese i have is wrapped in plastic. i live in rural georgia. what are my options?

for example the other day i ate a sandwich made with thick white bread--what some folks call"Texas toast"--and good ol' white trash chicken salad: canned chikken, mayo and relish. people, that was one damn good sandwich. and yet i felt that eating it was below my dignity. i secretly confess to envy of those who allow themselves to enjoy real junk food. while being, at the same time, of course, a food snob.

A friend got miffed at her dad recently when he openly disparaged, with overt condescension, all "people who have commercial salad dressings in their refrigerators." I often notice what someone is eating and think, "My god, that's repulsive." But I don't make negative assumptions about his or her character based solely on the food he or she is eating. On the other hand, I believe I am guilty of food snobbery, because I have strong reactions of revulsion to certain types of food and food-related products, many of which are consumed by people I dearly love: --I am appalled by low-fat desserts, Snackwell's cookies, etc. I am appalled by Cooking Light magazine. --commercial brands of bagels--you know, the ones that sit on the grocery shelf with an expiration date --fat-free half and half --fat-free salad dressings, especially the ones that are by their very definition, fat-full, like bleu cheese I clearly have a probelm with fake fat. I am guilty. Mea culpa, mea culpa. PS I am partial to Newman's Own and Annie's Goddess dressings, myself.

My number one pet peeve--when I serve dinner to guests and some piggy person sits down and digs in before everyone is seated. This behavior brings out the misanthrope in me like no other.

this is exactly what i was told--the pasteurization process reduces the effects of chilling and warming the guys at the package store said that many beers, coors for example, are delivered in refrigerated trucks and then put into warm storerooms or right onto the shelf at the market.--so it is in the distribution cycle, according to these guys. maybe they're trying to pass the buck? well, mickey and dstone, i guess i'll never really know. but thanks anyway.

we'll have to see if our plans intersect. if so, i'd love to meet. my husband and i are visiting friends who will undoubtedly have many plans. i'll post ya.

i have not yet had the pleasure of drinking the best beer in the world, though have tried many contenders. what could be better than a fresh pint of harvey's sussex? a fresh pint of thwaite's mild? Big Man, are you joking about the Bud? Just tell me before I start spanking YOU.

settle this for me, fellers. i buy my husband cases of yuengling when i visit family up north. he used to insist that i never buy cold beer--chilling it and then bringing it back to room temp cause it to "skunk." about a year ago i was told on chowhound that my husband is wrong about the skunking process. one said that the vast majority of beers are chilled and rechilled a number of times before they are purchased, and that pasteurization prevents the skunking. jhlurie's link suggests that pasteurization DOESN'T protect beers from the effects of light heat. so, is chilling a beer and then letting it warm up and then chilling it again harmful, too? i thought i'd won that one.

invited over to the neighbors' last minute last night--three couples dined al fresco, with a view of live oaks, cows and a lurid purple sunset: grilled rack of lamb, marinated all day in rosemary olive oil, served with homemade rosemary and lemon jelly, along with skewered grilled rosemary squash & zuchini. braised asparagus served cold with olive oil & mustard dressing, topped with chopped hard-cooked egg, roasted red pepper strips and capers. from my neighbor's son's bakery, jalapeno rolls, challah and sesame bread. even though i didn't cook this meal, i felt it must be memorialized. it was so unexpected and so FINE.

i am going to houston, too--it sounds like i will be there at about the same time, visiting friends for the weekend. in previous trips we have eaten at Otto's and Luling City. i liked both, and tried not to be put off by the Otto's "George Bush Likes to Eat here" hype. it was still pretty tasty. eating Q in houston i have earned to appreciate "bark" and red-hot sausages.

yum, jaymes--sounds good. the earlier tip about warming tortillas in a steamer is also very right on.

reading tony's dream descriptions i'm kinda wondering if maybe he actually had malaria. when my husband was taking meflaquine a few years ago he had psychedelic waking dreams which he found rather enjoyable and reminiscent of his hippie youth. the bit about avoiding the prophylaxis and simply taking the treatment if malarial symptoms start doesn't seem like totally bad advice. malaria has killed half the people who have ever lived. if you travel in malarial areas frequently, and if you spend long periods of time in them, you're very likely to get malaria anyway eventually [my husband did]. but as tony stresses, and this is the point i am making--it's a serious illness, it sucks really bad, it can recur, it can cause liver damage, retinal detachment, etc.--so do whatever you feel comfortable doing to prevent it. i NEVER use DEET, but i keep myself covered. mosquito netting--duh. during the last trip a local shaman showed us a plant pod that we could rub on our skin to repel bugs--it really worked. so maybe asking locals about prevention is a good idea, too.

while in london in july, i was invited over to my chum's flat for mint juleps, in honor of me, the southern belle. R. and i decided it should be a joint project. i had to produce mint syrup--he produced bourbon. i found some fairly fresh mint at the safeway, cleaned it and tossed the bunch, stems and all, into a syrup made from 2c.s sugar and 2c.s water brought to the boil for 5 minutes. allowed the fresh mint to steep in the syrup over night. this was actually the only thing i cooked in my london kitchen all summer the mint juleps were kinda nice, even moreso for being so anachronistic [really, R. and i shoulda been sitting on my porch down her in GA, waving at the neighbors as we ruthlessly tore them apart beneath our breath]. what i really regert is that we wer not able to drink them from "mint julep" cups. R. downloaded a photo from a website--funny straight-sided silver-plated tumblers, probably engraved with Daddy's initials. i really must have some, or I can never drink a mint julep again. toby, my sister was at home one year at thanksgiving looking through my dad's likka cabinet for some bourbon. my dad told her he only had maker's mark. she said, OK, well, I'm just gonna have a bourbon and Coke.... ...famous last words!

makes me think about road trips to central PA in the summer, stopping at one amish farm stand after another..... whoopie pies.....

so many different sets of advice--who's right? those of us who have traveled beyond the mucky-muck have had pretty disparate experiences, and the botton line is that, at least half the time, you can never REALLY know what got you. when i travel in a developing country i pack a round of cipro and a round of flagyl, pepto-bismol and antacid tablets, advil, anti-bacterial wipes, anti-itch cream and essential oils of peppermint and lavender. i put peppermint oil in a glass of water for upset stomach--save the drugs for anything more serious which fortunately is rare. in ecuador a couple years ago an otavalan woman offered the members of our group hot oregano tea--half the kids had upset stomachs--we all drank the tea and it eased the upset better than any prescription med. so another tactic is to ask the locals what they do for an upset stomach. etc. my husband found out in may that his fever and chill spells, which had been growing more frequent and intense over the previous 14 months, were brought on by an onslought of active malarial parasites. we always take antimalarials when we go into the amazon--i always take doxycycline--bourdain is right--there is virutally no foolproof prophylactic against all strains of malaria--BUT doxycycline does reduce the risk for contracting more serious [lethal] strains. larium and mefloquine can cause hallucinations and psychosis, so anyone with a history of depression should steer clear. but in my opinion, it's foolish not to take doxycycline, even if only to REDUCE the risk. that said, you can get over malaria, but you can never donate blood again

jaymes and i discussed in another thread on the mexico board recipes for chilaquiles, which call for corn tortillas, but you might try an interesting flour tortilla variation. if you like hot, combine roasted peppers with fresh chopped peppers, in addition to your other ingredients. roasting mellows and sweetens the peppers, brings out the flavor--sometimes it's easy to forget that hot peppers lend flavor, not just heat. you can also roast garlic for the same effect. i agree with everyone, the simplest ingredients work well here--whatever is on hand. great when you're in a hurry. i'm having corn tortillas tonight, myself.

I have A Cook's Tour of Mexico and have used it a couple times--mostly I like reading about the markets. Unfortunately, Toby, you're gonna have to get up out of that armchair and go down to Mexico someday, to taste how sweet the mango is. I'm sure you hear "Well, I can't really describe it...." all the time, but....'tis true. I'm a Pisces and therefore need to keep moving. Nothing can stop the flow.

I had dinner at The Highland Tap the other night, in Va-Highlands. Hadn't eaten there in years. Used to go after I got off work when I was a waitron unit, drank their fabulous martinis, at the time considered the best in town. My three companions had steaks, my husband's the gorgonzola crusted filet--it was a buttery piece of meat. I had salmon with pecan crust--it was a huge filet--I never even touched the asparagus and mash that came with it. We all had salads, the spinach with warm bacon dressing being the best, and for starters escargot and mussels. I had a sidecar before dinner. It was a really, really good meal--not because it was the best meal I've ever had but because it was simply good, a good steak, not too fussy, good drinks, everything good, including the service. It's sorta dark and dungeony-like, but in a way the atmosphere makes the experience. It has a very old world feel.

adapted from Carol Fields Focaccia Cornmeal Focaccia with Figs dough: 8 ozs dried figs 1 1/2 c water, room temp 2 1/2 t. active dry yeast 2 T olive oil 1/2 c plus 2 t cornmeal 3 c all-purpose flour 1 1/2 t sea salt topping: 2 T olive oil 1 T turbinado sugar soak the figs in water for 30 mins. drain, reserve water, chop. warm reserved water to 105-115F and whisk in yeast. stir in olive oil. add cornmeal and flour and salt and begin kneading when it starts to come together and isn't too sticky. [if you make bread you know that sometimes you need more or less flour than a recipe calls for]. knead 8-10 minutes or til it reaches earlobe texture. place dough in oiled bowl and let rise til doubled. punch down and knead in figs and flatten to fit your baking stone. this gets tricky for me--you might want to let it rise a second time on your peel generously dusted with cornmeal so that you can slide it right onto the stone. heat stone in 400F oven--after second rise slide dough onto stone, drizzle with OO and sugar, and bake for 20-25 minutes. I MADE THE FOLLOWING CHANGES: i used fresh figs--kneading them into the dough was tricky but WORTH IT. then, about half-way through baking, i removed the stone and drizzled olive oil and honey and sea salt over the bread, and dotted with crumbled chevre. it was very good. this bread is best out of the oven--not nearly as good the next day. what would you serve this with?