scottie

Updated to add: Michael Stipe! He's the one I was the most excited about. He requested no cilantro, though.

Fair enough. I still don't think it belongs on top of bruschetta, though.

The cold apps menu at the place where I'm going to get married offers something called "tomato confit bruschetta." This is just wrong in so many ways. First of all, how the hell can you confit something which has no fat of its own? Then, why would you have a French word, followed by an Italian word? The menu also offers cold-app stuff on "croutons," so why not put the French-named thing on another French-named thing? Or else call the "tomato confit" something Italian? Aarrgh!

Ha ha ha! That reminds me of our household's tradition of having either my sister or me name that year's steer (or heifer, as the case may be). I remember Billybubba and Buttercup as being especially tender...

My father, as a boy, was given a cute little duckling for Easter one year. After a month or so, the duck became too unwieldy to be a reasonable pet, so my grandfather took it out to the family farm, where it could have a nice duck life. Cut to Autumn. A delicious roast duck served up for Thanksgiving. My grandfather cannot resist telling my dad that this was his cute little pet Easter duck. My dad bursts into tears! But, the duck is so delicious, that he cannot stop eating it, tears rolling down his cheeks all the while... The trick is to make the rabbit that delicious, and your son's psychological scarring will be minimal, as well as providing a humorous family story for the future. I recommend wrapping it in bacon, then roasting. Mmm-mm, good! And not at all related to my old pet bunny Snow, the greatest rabbit in the world.

The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook. I like to jump around in it, reading a bit here on there while on the train. Always makes me smile. Also, the latest issues of Gourmet and Food & Wine.

Your description of the market sounds like the one (hopefully) ongoing in Uptown New Orleans, complete with card tables and similar produce. But no one would think of paying for loquats there! AKA "Japanese apricots," the trees grow on every block. I once made a delicious loquat sauce with fruit from our neighbor's tree, which conveniently overhung our garden wall. The sauce was a perfect accompaniment to a Chinese-spiced deep-fried duck. I got the recipe from Alice Waters' Fruit cookbook- I think there are other loquat recipes in there, as well. Seeding them was a pain in the rear. But the delicate sauce was worth it.

I see now you want to shape the pappadum before cooking it. Your method sounds like it could work with a reasonable amount of success. I think it's crucial to dry the thing out somewhat after you have moistened it, as you have done, so that it does not disintegrate. Repetition does, indeed, lead to proficiency where shaping pappadums is concerned. I could only do one at a time when I first started. Keep us posted! -scottie

I've done something kind of similar at the restaurant where I work: Pappadum Cups. We fill them with Indian-spiced guacamole, then top with a crab cake. The filling will make the cup soggy after a few minutes, so they must be served pretty soon after they are filled. The trick is to get them really, really hot, then mold them as fast as you can. Professional equipment also helps. What I did was first place a sheet pan, upside-down, under the salamander (broiler). Then, once the pan was hot enough, I would put a pappadum on top, under the fire. Then I would turn it around as it blistered, so it would do so evenly. Once fully blistered, I would pull it off, immediately placing it over a cylinder (in this case, a Baleine salt container) and tamping it down and all around the sides to get the cup effect. I could do up to three at a time on the sheet pan, staggering them so that they were ready in succession, not all at once. Did I mention I wore three pairs of latex gloves throughout this process? Yes, it was hot. So, how to do this at home. I would suggest turning your oven to maximum temp, with a cookie sheet in it as it heats up. Hopefully a cookie sheet you don't care about, because it might warp. Once hot enough, kneel on the floor with the oven door open and your pappadums and molding device within reach. If you have an upper element, that would be best; otherwise, just try and see how it goes. Put on gloves! Thin ones, so they don't interfere too much with your ability to feel. Roll your sleeves down. You will probably burn yourself, and this will be a hot process, but just think how professional you'll feel! Oh, and drink lots of water or Gatorade. Working quickly, place a pappadum on the cookie sheet, turning it until it is evenly blistered, then immediately remove it and press it around your molding device. I am envisioning the pappadum to behave sort of like a tuile in this scenario; you might press it around a rolling pin or thinner cylindrical thingie to achieve a cannoli-type effect. Once molded to the desired shape, remove it immediately and place it on a tray to cool. It will be fragile and delicate, and you will have broken pappadums. I calculated about a 20% breakage loss when I did this at work- about 1 in 5. Repeat as necessary. If you have a gas range, an alternative method would be to wave it over the flames, using tongs, until ready, but I think that method would not work as well. I hope this helps. I have no idea how to get it into more of a spring roll-like shape. Cannoli is the best I can come up with. I'm very curious how the restaurant you went to does this. Please let me know if you try this! Good luck, Emily (scottie)

Is it old-fashioned, or just realistic? That's actually an important question. Budding cooks now see "18 minutes at 455 F" but don't always understand the reality (i.e., limitations) behind these precise-looking numbers. (I've seen ovens vary widely in actual temperature and cooking behaviour, and they routinely cycle up and down by 50 degrees F or more anyway, when opened and closed, when thermostat cycles, etc. Thermostats normally are what control engineers call bang-bang or on-off servomechanisms: they regulate temperature by turning a power source on and off -- not adjusting it finely -- and relying on thermal mass to slow the resulting termperature changes.) Experienced cooks therefore learn the oven and go by results. Some wise cookbooks bring out this point . The original Gourmet Cookbook -- itself a bit of literature, a point eclipsed by the recent edition -- was explicit. Preamble chapter explained what "cook until done" means, and why overprecise formulae mislead. It also sorted oven temps into about as many ranges as can be realistically distinguished -- moderately hot, hot, etc. -- and gave a table of corresponding degree ranges. ← So I delved more thoroughly into Mrs. Dull's Southern Cooking. My edition was printed in 1968; however, the introduction mentions that the book was "born in 1928," despite the 1941 copyright. Mrs. Dull herself was born "shortly before the close of the War between the States," so one can imagine that she had a great deal of experience with many different types of ovens, as well as the innovations regarding oven technology that spanned, say, 1885 to the mid-20th century (she died in 1964, at the age of 100). In that context, it is both old-fashioned and realistic to refer to oven temperature by "hot" or "quick," "moderate" and "slow." However, I did discover a previously overlooked bit in Chapter 1 that gives the temperature ranges which correspond to the specifications from "very slow" to "very hot." I don't know whether this is an original or later inclusion. It sure would have helped me as a teenager, when I attempted several of the recipes in this book without understanding proper oven temperature. I was curious about your mention of this issue in the Gourmet Cookbook, so looked it up in my 1976 edition of Gourmet's Basic French Cookbook, the only Gourmet book I own, which does indeed specify corresponding temperature to "hot," "medium," etc. The recipes which utilize the oven all specify "hot," "medium," etc., first, then give the temperature or temperature range in parenthesis. This does seem wise. It also appears to be a vestige leftover from a time (or place) when ovens did not have temperature dials on them. Very few of Mrs. Dull's recipes give specific temperatures; some just say "bake until brown," with no specification whatsoever. Her recipes do tend to assume a certain level of knowledge or experience on the part of the reader. BTW, the same chapter gives instruction on the care of the icebox, with "modern" iceboxes needing to be "iced" only twice a week. Although Mrs. Dull was an urbane woman herself, living in Atlanta, surely she was aware of the varying age and style of equipment available to women across the South of that era. She does not, however, give instruction for cooking in a hearth. For that, you have to go to Foxfire.

I should think that any of "the masses" who happened to watch this episode and also happen to live in the very populous state of Florida all had a serious WTF?! reaction to the stone crab thing. And that's not even counting the millions of Americans who vacation in Florida and eat the hell out of some stone crab claws every ($30/ lb.) chance they get. PLUS the folks who live on the Eastern seaboard and eat blue crabs all the time. That's a significant enough portion of the TV-viewing public to make RR's and FTV's mistake a particularly egregious one. For crying out loud. That is really pathetic, and I do think it's valid to criticize Food Network for being so freaking negligent.

I do the same thing! It's like the Internet in that reading one entry leads to another, and another, etc. Madhur Jaffrey's World of the East Vegetarian Cooking Fergus Henderson's The Whole Beast- could read this one forever Anything by James Beard. I especially love some of the entries in Hors-D'Oeuvre and Canapes- "This is a real man's snack, definitely not for a female audience"! (p.22) Currently enjoying the heck out of Alice B. Toklas- I had no idea how much this book would make me smile. And for the Southerners (and wannabes) out there: Bill Neal's Southern Cooking. Full of fascinating information and history from a great chef who died too young. His influence lives on at Crook's Corner in Chapel Hill, N.C., where Bill Smith is the current chef. Southern Cooking by Mrs. S.R. Dull. Old enough to specify only "fast", "moderate" or "slow" oven rather than actual temperatures. Also includes the historically traditional chapter on invalid foods. And the best of all: The Foxfire Book of Appalachian Cookery. Who knew that mud turtle eggs make the best cakes? Well, the people of the Georgia mountains, that's who.

not sure whether to mourn or rejoice. The guy had a good idea that was very successful. Good for him, bad for people who actually care about the quality of their food.

I keep my saffron in the freezer; I think it will retain its flavor longer that way. My favorite way to use it is in a baked rice pilaf recipe in Madhur Jaffrey's World of the East Vegetarian Cooking. You bloom the saffron in a bit of milk (or other liquid- coconut milk works great) first- that way, the color and flavor go further in the finished dish. Then, you can add the saffron milk to any liquid used in soup, stew, rice, etc. for the beautiful color and somewhat weird flavor. Now, what am I doing with 12 cans of green beans and two cans of treacle?! Waiting for a neighborhood canned-food drive, I guess...

What's that Iberian ham that's only just this past year been allowed into the country? Expensive but delicious. Oh yeah, Serrano Iberico, I think. Chocolate was reserved for use as food only by the king in pre-Columbian Mexico, so Mexican-style hot chocolate with chilies and cornmeal (the way Montezuma drank it) could be good. I'm sure there's tons of stuff like that, for example, swan. It would be really cool (or perhaps really cruel) if you could get ortolans. Then there's that shark's fin soup that Amazon.com has been pressured into pulling from their website. Can you get the salak fruit in Canada? I know it's one of the things you're not supposed to bring into the country. Your dinner sounds like fun.

Oh wow, there was a movie where Mom was serving leftovers at every meal, but never cooked anything. Right on the tip of my tongue. Going to drive me crazy all day - thanks scottie ← is it creepy Parents where the little boy wonder where all the meat leftovers are coming from and when he asks his dad he says they come from leftovers to be? ← Yes! Parents. Randy Quaid's creepiest role ever. Sorry I took so long to respond, work, you know...

I know it's not even 10 am yet, but I just saw this on NY1 and I can't believe this is all eGullet has to say about it so far. I mean, aren't we glad that someone has finally, publicly called Bruni on his many and oft-repeated mistakes as a reviewer? Or, coming from Chodorow, does it just sound like sour grapes? I, too, would like to know whether past ads of this nature have ever mattered.

Yes, indeed. Which still leaves: "Leftovers....of leftovers!"

Days of Wine and Roses (Figure someone whose eGullet name is Alex would get this one, eh?) ← Of course. (I figured the chocolate counted as food.)

I always put my hair up and tuck it under my hat at work. But what's the deal with sous chefs? For some reason, they don't have to wear hats. I don't understand why being a sous chef makes your hair either cleaner or less likely to fall into a plate of food.

My sister wroked for years as a server at a "Southern" restaurant in NYC, where they feature "Coco-Cola Cake" on the menu. She discovered that the Coc-Cola Cake is comprised only of Duncan Hines chocolate cake mix, with no Coca-Cola in it whatsoever. People eat it up, and ask for more!

Speaking of Jack Lemmon, how about: Brandy Alexanders

Here's an additional (and very large) clue: in another scene, there's mixed fruit, cheese, fish, corn, peas, and carrots — we assume that each is in some sort of liquid form. ← Apollo 13? Here's some more: "It was...the salmon mousse!" "Leftovers... of leftovers!"

I was super excited to find a copy of Edible Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Kitchen in Williamsburg. And I was thrilled to see your BOH photos, harlanturk! Having become familiar with your work through eGullet, it was cool to see it in the magazine. I think the Edible Communities mags are a good and much-needed force for change in the way our society views its food resources.

The only texture that's ever bothered me was sea cucumber. It's like crunchy mucus. But I love cartilage, skin, fat, mushy stuff, etc. My father absolutely loathes winter squash, or Indian squash, as he calls it. He says it's the texture. He will reluctantly eat summer squash. But he'll eat the hell out of some grits and okra. who knows.