SLB

@blue_dolphin, you must be so frustrated! I admire how none of it comes through in your posts about this experience; I'd be cursing a streak bluer than your hair!! Meanwhile, I bought a panettone for the first time to take to my brother's girlfriend, who was hosting Christmas this year. I got it from an Italian deli in NYC which, while not upscale, is reputed to carry really good panettone's (I heard this from, among others, a person from Italy who seemed startled at the offerings). The brand I got was called "Bonifante". At the last second I remembered that she does not eat chocolate, so I got the traditional. I carried it on the plane, trying to keep it from getting smashed. Guys. It was . . . not so good. In fairness, it was not the most expensive one, but it was fifty bucks! I really should've done some more research.

The hankies that I inherited were what my mother had inherited from her mother and aunt; they had been professionally laundered and ironed (?!), and tied into stacks with lavender ribbon. As I said, I use them. Several are in rotation for the above-referenced winter activities; I have one ribboned stack left intact. I got anxious once, and researched the New Hankies. They seem wonderful, are larger, and are priced for preciousness. I really do believe that this last stack of my grandma's is gonna get me through the duration.

@Maison Rustique, I'll take pix and DM you; most likely after Christmas, though. Meanwhile, here is my table with my new tablecloth on it. It's less formal in a manner that is certainly my style, however I expected the color to be browner/greener, and less . . . creamsicle. Its paleness makes the chairs seem much less neutral, and more like part of a whole pastel palette, which is kinda weird. I don't hate it, but I don't love it as much I expected to.

Girl. You want mine? <edit> I do realize that creating something out of other people's heirlooms is not the same. But, I'm just sayin' . . . . Re hankies, I kept a lot of those because I thought they were beautiful, and they have have turned out to be very useful during outdoor winter recreational stuff (like hiking, skiing, etc.), activities in which one's nose is ALWAYS running. They work so much better than kleenex that I'm genuinely confused about why we have wholesale stopped using them.

Me, I like. And these gems you've got don't seem like the more challenging Marimekko, you know? These seem like they will be downright subtle under a set table. And @Shelby, your Grammy's stuff is beautiful! I *love* the flower prints, and I confess that I would probably steal the plaid one if you ever let me in your house. Are they cotton or linen?? I've got a bunch of doily-thingies, and rectangular textiles in similar knit/crochet; I literally just put them in the donate pile because, while I wasn't prepared to discard them when my mom passed; I'm now prepared to own the fact that I can't even imagine putting out anything like that, anywhere.

And the Hendrix.

That soup looks marvelous! And I tend to think most bean-forward soups, where the beans are the main event, really do NOT look marvelous. And I'm glad to see the new posts, I was looking for you, Patti, and wondering if you were taking the rest of the holiday season away from the CFM work (which would be totally understandable). I saw a quote just now about the World Central Kitchen work and their commitment to providing food that local people would recognize, someone said "We're just trying to give people a bowl of home." Your CFM meals and all that Tony's came immediately to mind.

I would roll bigger. I like a small burrito -- particular for the use-case you referenced, eating-while-driving -- but I agree that a 6" tortilla is going to strain the project of a true wrap.

Those lefse looked thinner than the tortillas, at least the one draping off of the roller. Let's just say this: that collection of tortilla ingredients intends to produce 10 cut balls of dough that will get rolled out to a 6" diameter apiece. For about a decade, I had work that took me all over Vermont. Believe this: each and EVERY time I was in the SE portion of the state, I made a pilgrimage to the KAP campus. Once, the TSA agent at the Portland airport [this makes no sense, I don't know why I was flying back out of Portland, it's possible that I made a social stop with friends in Maine]. anyway, I was carrying on all of these . . . implements . . . which TSA flagged. I explained that I'd been to KAP. I got waived through.

Hi -- As I understand the note in text accompanying the recipe, this is enhance the gluten of the flour if you have not used a high-gluten flour. Teh point of getting the gluten high is to keep the flour sufficiently pliable when it's rolled out thinly (I didn't post the recipe, because rules, but this is a rolled tortilla and not a pressed one). So I interpreted the term to mean what I know from Rose Levy Berenbaum as "vital wheat gluten". Maybe just an added bit of bagel flour would work too; I don't know but I know someone around here definitely does know. [As an aside, if I recall correctly KAP used to call their highest gluten flour "Excalibur". I totally loved this.] Re the filling: I actually HATE burritos with a whole lot of filling. Tacos, too -- I want the tortilla to be a substantial part of the taste experience. [This might be connected, I don't like a lot of sauce on pasta either, nor a lot of dressing on salad]. I think Chipotle's are inedible, they are so full. You have to have a fork! Meanwhile. I now need a Sichuan chicken burrito, immediately.

Consider pickled jalapenos instead of salsa. I know it's not the same, and definitely no sub for tomatoes; but it can add enough taste to suffice as a work around. And FYI, in Diana Kennedy, The Art of Mexican Cooking, there is a recipe for the very best flour tortilla I've ever tasted, "Tortillas de Harina Integral." It's at p. 386. The list of ingredients is as follows: rounded 1/2t fine ground salt 1/2C warm water 5oz AP or bread flour 3oz whole-wheat flour 1 heaped tsp gluten flour (optional) 2oz shortening. I grew up in flour tortilla country, and I don't care for them generally although I appreciate their utility. This one, however, was so good none of them ever made it into the freezer. That said -- I only ever used leaf lard instead of vegetable shortening, and the whole wheat flour that I use makes the best tasting everything, it's from a small mill called "Kenyons" [which I can't really recommend for mail order anymore due to gobsmacking dysfunction in that part of the business] But that flour does taste dramatically better than anything else I've used on the whole-wheat front, so that might have something to do with it.

Shelby, you have outdone yourself. Also? I now want gizzards, So.Very.Badly. [Aside -- over a decade ago, I was dating a man who lived far away, in a relationship that involved a lot of travel. He liked livers and gizzards, and I was collecting them over months, chicken by chicken, cleaned and frozen in milk. At about the time I had a reasonable volume, he dumped me.] But where was I? Um. You know how Ronnie gets to have a Friend in teh blind? I think you need a Friend in the kitchen. My guess is, there may be a lot of e-Gullet friend/applicants for the position, but I definitely think it should be me. As I said several hunts ago, I am willing to mop, and I would pour the wine. More important, as Designated Friend, I would have your coffee ready this morning. It would be Irish-style! So then you could go right back to bed.

I would've guess that PCing after frying would lead to the breading sliding off! It's startling that it doesn't. [FWIW -- I've never used and IP, I use an old timey pressure cooker, I know they must be different because the bean cooking times are so very different]

SQUEE!! It's showtime!

I love the look of wood, too. What I don't love is the look of aged, crazed, discolored "book-matched veneer", which is what I'm working with. Trust me, I'd replace this table with a lovely long rectangle of wood if it made any money sense at all. [Also -- thanks to whomever -- my guess is Smithy -- got these posts seated in the appropriate forum. I searched and searched, I can't believe I somehow missed "The Topic" ?! Anyway, now it's straight]

My guess is machine-made; the pattern of the holes is so consistent and orderly. There's no label; how would I be able to tell??

This is not a great photo -- it's a gray day, and just plain dark: I don't know how old the tablecloth is, but I am very confident in my presumption that she did not have a tablecloth until well after WWII, when enough of her 20 children had done well enough for themselves to move her into the kind of house that had an indoor bathroom. I don't even know if it's particularly special; it just was the "fancy" tablecloth in my mother's home. In my child's eye and memory, it is very *pretty*. My adult self prefers block printing, geometrics, etc. Other kinds of visual stimulation.

Also, in my obsession I learned a new term: "Tablescape".

I hunted up this thread because my current obsession is tablecloths. I love textiles, and textile-art, and the whole thing where utility combines with pretty. I've tossed most of my mother's old tablecloths, which were all 1970s polyester. But I have one lace wonder that was my paternal grandmother's, a woman born not long after the end of US slavery. Actually, it's not lace, more like a weave or loose crotchet or something. I have no memory of it having stains during my mother's custody, but when I pulled it out yesterday, it featured several large yellowed areas. Now I want some new ones. Or at least one new one.

I enjoyed it too, although I wanted to hear more from McFadden. Dave can be a bit of a steamroller.

Me too, I'm definitely interested. And, I'm wishing you a nourishing holiday.

Patti-baby. This food you're throwing down on these neighbors in need? It's *sending* them down memory lane, in the very best way. I keep thinking, what must a person feel when they reach into a community fridge and get a meal like one of these??? I said it before, I like everything about this. It's invigorating and humbling and all the things for the season of thanks.

FWIW, I didn't read the detour to food-safety customs as hateration, I saw it as more of a reflex from the professionals who've had the rules branded onto them. Meanwhile, I've been meaning to say, I see all that shiny magnalite in effect! And I see it with my head hanging low in shame, as my own custody of my mother's magnalite has been so derelict that I can't even remember it being shiny, although it sure was shiny when my mother passed it to me back in 1996. It had been my Louisiana grandmothers before (not Lafayette, way over in Terrebone parish). C'est dommage. I'm looking forward to seeing the sammiches.

My first thought was, supply-chain issues.

As always, you and these photos are making the book basically irresistible. In the meantime, if I heard Dave Arnold correctly, McFadden is the guest on next week's episode of the "Cooking Issues" podcast.