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Good God, does that look delicious! Right up my alley!

Judith, if it wouldn't be too off-topic or personal, why did you move to Wisconsin from Texas? I had to go out and play a recital today in weather not nearly as cold as that but still plenty cold for me. I was able to dress adequately for it and even walk crosstown (from 14th and 8th to 7th and just about 1st, if that means anything to you), but my apartment is chilly, I'm wearing a sweater as I type, and I couldn't imagine moving to a place that has winters with really long periods of extreme cold, except for a really good job. Stay warm, everyone, and be well!

You're welcome and thanks for the kind words. Yes, I have had a few events in my life. I notice from your profile that you flute and that you live in the East Village. Several of those events in my life occurred when I lived on East 10th Street, 4th floor walk-up, just across Avenue A, right up the street from the Peace Eye Bookstore. In that incarnation I worked answering letters for The American Bible Society. Once gave first aid to a guy who had been stabbed in Tompkins Square Park. ← This neighborhood has changed radically in the last 10+ years (and in some ways which many of us in the neighborhood are happy about) and is in the process of changing even more radically (mostly in ways which many of us, and especially the longtimers, are very disturbed about). My brother used to live here in the mid 80s, when the neighborhood was really grungy and downright dangerous, especially in Alphabet City. But you sure could get cheap, good pierogies at Leshko's Coffee Shop on 7th and A! When's the last time you were back in the neighborhood?

Klary, I do love liver, and your dish looks great! You are a very sweet wife.

That's been a lost cause almost since the word "go," because the entire categories of low-end and "Outer Borough" restaurants are grossly underrepresented here. And I happen to like Hearth very much, though I'm certainly open to considering restaurants at a similar price point that have similarly dependable food and service.

Thanks for the bonus excerpt, ChefCarey. I loved it! You've had an eventful life and have a wonderful gift for storytelling.

My mother used to make that. It's great! Gut Shabbos and Gut Yomtov!

Well, the East Village is practically the bellybutton of the Earth as far as delivery is concerned. In order to save money and get more exercise, I get takeout much more often than delivery, but I get good dinner delivered from Grand Sichuan St. Marks pretty often, sometimes from Congee Village (which is about 10 1/2 blocks away, so I tip the deliveryman well), sometimes from Teresa's. I have lots of other options if I want some other kind of food. The only time I totally struck out on delivery was when I was sick on Thanksgiving and tried to get lunch delivered. None of the places I called that were open were delivering, so I walked slowly to Cafe Mogador and got takeout.

There is loads of great stall food in Malaysia! The list of items you can get quickly on the street is practically endless. And there are loads of other places with equivalently extensive and delicious street foods. India and Thailand come to mind. You are researching a truly vast subject.

When I was in Hangzhou (quite a long time ago: 1987), I was traveling with three other people, one of whom was on a macrobiotic diet. We had Buddha's Delight two days in a row, and it was terrific! What you have to watch out for is that "vegetable" dishes can have pork in them. There was one time when the four of us had lunch in a cheap restaurant downtown and ordered two vegetable dishes, one of which seemed to be really vegetarian, and the other of which had pork or ham in it, in addition to the vegetables.

I don't get your point. They would be dealing with cane syrup, not with solid sugar, wouldn't they?

I may have occasion to visit this restaurant at some point. I haven't read the whole thread, but it looks like this is a much-beloved place among eGullet members. My friend has celiac disease. Would it be easy to get a rewarding gluten-free meal at this place?

I understand that there is a great tendency for members to praise the clubs that they belong to, so it would figure that most every post in this thread would pooh-pooh the idea that eGullet could be in any kind of trouble. This post is different. There is of course some great content here. From my standpoint, I would particularly cite the threads on the cooking forums with great photography (notably the Dinner, Breakfast, Dessert, and Confection threads), the foodblogs, and the various "cooking at home" threads (on Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese, Korean food, etc.) and other such topical threads about cooking, with photos. Most of those threads are very active, and they are a joy to read. On the other hand, while I don't know what the traffic is on some of the regional forums I don't frequent, I sense that there has been a significant falloff on the New York forum. At the same time, as has been noted in this thread, Chowhound has improved in several important ways. Their user interface (which could still use more work and I suspect will continue to be tweaked) is very serviceable now. And in their latest upgrade, the capability of linking photos directly into posts, one of eGullet's longtime advantages, was added. If you add the fact that the daily coverage of restaurants on Chowhound, and especially those in the "Outer Boroughs," dwarfs that on the New York forum here by a very, very wide margin and note that there is a "The Best" forum for New York on Chowhound while the "THE BEST" index in the New York forum, which not everyone knows about, is not being updated here, you can see how eGullet has largely lost out and is increasingly in danger of losing out even further to Chowhound, at least but I would say not exclusively in the New York area. I would contend (and have tried to contend on Chowhound) that information is better organized here, but when you look at the sheer amount of content that's posted to Chowhound every day and the fact that they have a corporation that seems to be happy to pour money into the site, I'm afraid that the handwriting is on the wall. I hope I'm wrong, because I still like this site and wish for its success in fulfilling its mission statement. As a closing remark, I will note that the last two upgrades on Chowhound were accompanied by a high volume of ridiculously vituperative complaints by members who preferred the old, practically unusable user interface, yet the moderators did not delete such remarks. So while I note the remarks of oakapple and others and have had my own experiences with being annoyed at having posts removed on Chowhound.com (such as the suggestions for merging numerous threads about the same restaurant), I have to say that the mods there seem to have a high level of tolerance for personal criticism.

Is that the restaurant's original dish? The only similar dish that I can think of is kamo nanban, which is a bowl of hot noodles (udon or soba) topped with negi (Japanese scallion) and thinly sliced duck (not ground). ← I have no idea whether it's their original dish or not. It was my first time at Soba Koh.

I happen to love a well-made moussaka, though. Perfect comfort food, and there's a lot to be said for that! I think that the perfectly made squid and octopus that you can get in good Greek restaurants is just wonderful. It seems like Italians and Greeks have a much higher percentage of squid-and-octopus experts than various other nationalities. The result is smoky, tender, delicious, and not rubbery or overly chewy.

How does Eater know what Bruni will review in advance of the review?

Looks tasty. What's fake about it?

I'm really enjoying this soupy blog, and in keeping with the spirit (and because of the cold weather), I had some delicious soba soup that included fried eggplant and ground duck (can't remember the name of the soup) at Soba Koh a couple of blocks from me. Judith, feel better!

Fat Guy, the descriptions of those dishes really appeal to me. But I was surprised to see you call the restaurant "mid-priced." I have previously had the impression that Gramercy Tavern was expensive. $76 for two courses for dinner [warning: PDF] (that is, not including dessert), for example, exceeds my definition of mid-priced (which would top out around $130 including tax and tip for two people). But then I looked at the tavern menu [warning: PDF]. If that menu is good for dinner as well as lunch, it's less expensive. Here's the restaurant's website for everyone's reference. I love the looks of the dishes that are being shown on the site! I may consider this place for a special occasion, though I was burned in my last trip to 11 Madison Park, which has gotten so much love.

Have you tried any of the salami? I've never tried Katz's salami. You're lucky you didn't get ticketed, but I'm glad you had a chance to try that pastrami!

Empire chickens are our soup chickens. They make a good roast chicken but I always found them to be unpleasantly hairy. ← Hairy chicken? Is that like feathery beef?

I hate the taste of straight corn syrup, so if my local diner substituted cane syrup as their standby, that would be great. And if Steve hadn't made the point that corn syrup is cheap only because of subsidies, I would have made it. (That IS true, isn't it?)

you might not, but many other people do. and they're not all innocent dupes of evil corporate mind-engineering. ← Let me make my point more clearly, then: I don't think that people usually have the same motivation for getting a whopper that they have for getting prime beef and micro greens, nor do I think those three products are marketed to the same demographic or on the same basis, for the most part.

In a thread discussing Michael Pollan's article about food vs. "nutritionism," Fat Guy made the following point that I believe deserves separate discussion: If he hadn't made that point, I would have. What is the convincing evidence that corn syrup, rather than sugar per se, will "kill you," as people are arguing?

For the record, I think that "tasting menus should be abolished" is a silly position.