
Pan
eGullet Society staff emeritus-
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Everything posted by Pan
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How are you thinking about combining rambutan with salted fish?
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I can confirm that.
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Is that ombak (heart of palm)?
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Of course. Anything that succeeds in the US is bound to take over the entire world.
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There used to be a Chirping Chicken between 105 and 106 Sts. on Broadway, I think. I seem to remember the people there were Tunisians. It was OK but not as good or as close to where I was living as El Malecon. But to be fair, that was a lot of years ago (probably over 10).
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That Chipotle/coconut milk fish chowder looks great! What are the greens toward the side of the little bowl?
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I can't make out too much of the jawi. I even tried copying it into Photoshop and am having trouble focusing it. The candy looks like it may be the same thing I remember, though I'd have to taste it to be sure.
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Funny that you mentioned that. I was thinking of Hungarian food when I read this: I wonder whether Hungarians do generally consider French cuisine the finest in Europe, or indeed, how much they think about the cuisine of that fairly faraway country as a model of or example of anything highly relevant to their cuisine. Like Ptipois and perhaps more than you, I consider well-executed Hungarian cuisine damn fine! If you held a gun to my head and made me decide, based on my experience so far of eating in Hungary and France, I'd vote for France, but arguably, the two cuisines are different enough to make comparisons somewhat problematic, and there are some terrific things about Hungarian cuisine that are different from terrific things about French cuisine. For example, in Michelin-starred gastronomic restaurants in France, I've had fantastic lobster salad with hazelnut oil, but the savory thing I liked best in Hungary was uborkasalata (cucumber salad), and nobody (at least to my knowledge) does it like they do. French pastries? Spectacular! But Hungary is, to say the least, no slouch in that department. I'll ante up a somloi galuska and raise you a gestenygolyu and a gundel palacsinta. Can you beat that? Probably, but I think a really fine meggyes retes is a standoff against a delicious tarte rhubarbe. And I'm not so sure Hungarians don't have the French beat or at least played to a draw in the soupy stew category. Sure, there's bouillabaisse, but soupy stews are a major category of hearty Hungarian food, what with porkolt and gulyasleves. I guess the upshot for me is that I see little real use in comparing Hungarian -- or, for that matter, Italian -- cuisine unfavorably to French cuisine. When any of those cuisines is really good, I'm not thinking about not eating the other one at that meal, and all of them stand on their own as worthy of appreciation, as indeed do various non-European cuisines including Chinese, Indian, and Thai. And of course, the elephant in the room when I mention national cuisines is Adam's question about regionality...
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Yeah, that picture of kacang tumbuk does look similar. I hope you find the thing I'm remembering. My parents and I sort of gorged ourselves on it, when we weren't disgusting our neighbors by eating rounds of manisan like they were maple candy.
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How many times have you been there, and in what ways do you consider the place overrated?
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Pan, Have you ever eaten shredded banana trunk before ?[...] ← I don't think so, only bananas and banana flowers (jantung pisang in Malay). In the bo nuong la lot (grilled beef wrapped in wild betel leaves), do you eat the betel leaves? Are they at all narcotic? And please tell us something about the provenance of the wild leaves you use. Do they actually gather them in some jungle or something, dry them, and fly them to the US?
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They make a mean salade, from what I hear. ← Yep, and great soupe de poisson.
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Shredded peanuts? What is that? Can you describe it in more detail? The shape, packaging, etc ..... ← I guess it was more nearly powdered peanuts. The shape was a rectangular tetrahedron (like a cube but rectangular). I suppose each "cookie" was something like 2 1/2 inches long and 1 inch high and 2 inches wide? There were several (don't remember the number) per package. And the company might have been Hong Chong Sdn. Bhd.... I don't remember the appearance of the packaging too much, but it was all paper, except that the outer box was probably thin cardboard with paper wrapping. All the pieces inside were wrapped in several layers of paper. Not much plastic in Malaysia in those days.
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Try it before you jump to conclusions. I tried Socca at the most famous Socca place in Vieux Nice and found it totally underwhelming. I also didn't think much of pissaladiere, and I otherwise thought Nicois cuisine was terrific!
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Just curious, Ned, have you tried any of the usual suspects for Japanese foodstuffs so far, like Sunrise Mart? I wouldn't know where to get it, but those are the kinds of places I'd think of first.
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Probably not, but if there seems to be a clear connection between which concert series advertise and which concert series are reviewed, that tends to indicate that there may be at least an appearance of advertisement-driven coverage in some sections of the newspaper. Like it or not, those kinds of perceptions are likely to affect some people's views of the rest of the newspaper, sort of that pen you accidentally leave in your pants pocket may leak into your other clothes in the washer. I know there are a lot of "if"s in that post, but I'm merely being somewhat careful with my phrasing. To Dan Macdonald: You can only do as well as you can with what you have. That's really the best anyone can do, and if you are doing the best you can, everyone should respect you. There surely is a need for restaurant coverage outside the biggest markets with the biggest budgets.
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Just a heads-up that a tried a new dish tonight that was incredible! Lamb w. Hot Sauce ($10.95) is actually a dish without sauce. It's dry fried along with sliced garlic, scallions, ginger, lots of hot peppers chopped into small pieces, and Sichuan pepper, and it's redolent of cumin (probably marinated). Really a knockout!
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My favorite store-bought candy in Malaysia used to be a shredded-peanuts-and-sugar candy made in a factory in Bahau, Negeri Sembilan. Somehow, I think I remember it was made by Chong Hong Sdn. Bhd. It was halal and the writing on each package was in Chinese characters, Rumi, and Jawi (and maybe Tamil). Do any of you know what I'm talking about? I didn't see it in stores the last time I was in Malaysia, but my parents and I liked it very much in the 70s, and I haven't found anything of that type that I've liked nearly as much since. The little shredded-peanut-and-sugar candies from Taiwan that are in big Chinese supermarkets in New York just don't compare to my memory of the other ones, which were bigger and wrapped in paper.
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I've had taro root many times but have never knowingly had taro stem. Can you describe the taste? And can it be eaten raw like celery, or does it have to be cooked?
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Here is where I have a problem. While the customer has the right to complain, how come the chef doesnt have the right to address the complaint in any manner..defensive or otherwise.[...] ← My own point of view is that anyone can do anything they like, within reason (we're not talking rape and murder here!), as long as they are willing to accept the consequences. And I'd follow that up by saying, But is it smart? [Edit: Looks like others said approximately the same thing first. I really have to read the entire thread before posting. ]
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After posting a favorable report on a certain restaurant, based on a first visit (unannounced, of course -- I'm no big deal!), I received an email from someone at that restaurant thanking me and encouraging me to let him know when I return so that some kind of special treatment can be given to me. I wrote a polite response that didn't mention the offer of special treatment. I continue to recommend that restaurant based on my experience and plan on returning someday, but without fanfare or expectations of special treatment. Should they recognize my name and do something for me, so be it, but I will not ask for or expect it. It's different if I have a preexisting acquaintance with the chef, etc., but since my profession has nothing to do with food, that's uncommon (I can think of only one instance, in fact, and it really is a special case, as he's someone many long-time members of the eGullet Society know). My refusal of special treatment based on knowing that I am an eGullet forum host is ethical and something I feel good about, whether or not it increases my credibility as an amateur food writer in these forums to remain Everyman at restaurants where I'm not a regular (and where I am a regular, I don't get comps, anyway, as my regular haunts are decidedly down-budget). I have to say that I think many of us are overlooking the possibility of subconscious effects from being comped meals. JJ, it sounds like, all things being equal, you find it more difficult to post a critical report on a place where you were comped than one where you weren't. Because you have integrity, you force yourself to be as accurate as possible, but it is harder, isn't it? Also, allow me some skepticism that the source of money for an investigation of whatever kind cannot by itself skew results. There was an article in, I believe (docsconz will probably help with this) the New England Journal of Medicine indicting medical research scientists for giving up their objectivity and becoming cheerleaders for flawed medications in exchange for funding from pharmaceutical corporations. But it wasn't that simple, because undoubtedly, the overwhelming majority of those scientists believed in the work they were doing. Statistics bore out the bias in the studies, however, indicating that the source of their funding was probably affecting them subconsciously. So while individuals often overcome many potential sources of conflicts of interest, their web of socioeconomic interactions does tend to promote certain tendencies. In terms of what Nancy has had to say about this issue, the most important thing to me is: "If an ad exec in this office complains to me about a review, that person is fired." Open and shut. Of course, there can be more subtle forms of suasion than open complaints, but based on what Nancy says, it would seem that they are not at play at her magazine.
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Suresh, there's no fermentation at all in the milk that's used for kulfi in India? I thought I detected just a hint of yogurty taste in it.
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Andrea, I stopped by Holy Land Market just to check out their stuff the other day. They've got a whole bunch of conserves that could be really interesting to experiment with, though because they're expensive ($6 a not very big jar), I didn't buy any that time. The one I'm most intrigued with looks to be sweet tomato conserves, but they have morello cherry, fig, date, apple/cinnamon, and some other stuff.
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Au Bon Pain? Yuck! Au mauvais pain! Pain au raisin with raisins with sulfur dioxide! Here in New York, we have Le Pain Quotidien. I doubt it compares favorably to the average boulangerie in Paris, but it's certainly a lot better than Au Bon Pain (of which we have a bunch in New York), and it does qualify to me as French (sort of) takeout food. Then again, this is New York, by far the most populous city in the US. When I was in Nice, I got all kinds of stuff to take out, but again, it was practically all at boulangeries and glaceries. Chaussons aux pommes, tartes aux poires, tortes aux blettes, tartes pommes et amandes, various kinds of ice cream (it was summertime!), occasionally a savory tarte (e.g., tomates et poivrons). I think my French fellow students usually got only ice cream to take away and otherwise ate things wherever they bought them. That said, some sandwicheries were mainly counters onto the street.