Stone

Babbo is for tourists.

"Bad things, man. Bad things."

Stone, In another recent thread, I mentioned that I hadn't gotten pissed off at many things I had read on eGullet and you said that i hadn't been reading your posts closely enough. This time you got me. Who is to say those people were from the Midwest? Who is to say that any of the so-called 'TOurists' everyone so easily identifies as being from the Midwest are indeed from the Midwest. I am from DC now, but lived in the aforementioned St. Louis for 22 years. I was raised properly as were most, but not all, of my friends and certainly know how to act in most social situations. I am sure this is the case in cities and towns all across the midwest (and West, Norteast, Southeast and proablably Europe, Asia and everywhere else. Some people have social grace and some don't. Aw, come on. I was just joking. All of my cousins in St. Louis dress and act very well. (Except my Aunt who still thinks that gold lame (sp?) track suits are appropriate to wear out of the house.) It's funny, New Yorkers take a lot of shit from everyone else in the country. We're rude, overbearing, obnoxious, frenetic, impolite, unfriendly, demanding, narcisistic, degenerate, criminal, pompous, egotistical, and basically destroying the moral fabric of society. But when we try to give it back a little,

Dress appropriately. are jeans OK? If they're clean; yes. (Thanks Calvin, for making jeans and a black t-shirt formal wear.)

Dress appropriately. (Although I'm sure you would anyway.) There's a big issue about declining/changing standards for dress, generally plummeting towards everything being casual. Some people, me included, like the thought that certain areas maintain a formal feel -- theater, opera, high-end restaurants. I remember going to see a Broadway matinee in the early 80's and everyone -- except the obvious tourists -- wore at least a sport coat. Now I go to the opera in SF and parents are in t-shirts and shorts and their kids are dressed like they're going to a rave. Many people think that's fine, or even a good thing. I disagree (and find it very disrespectful to the staff and players). I've never been to Babbo, but I assume Mario et al. spend a lot of money and energy creating a beautiful atmosphere. I'm sure diners would be disappointed if they showed up and saw plastic covered table clothes, table tents advertising Mario's new jalepeno poppers, and waiters wearing ten buttons pushing various tropical drinks. That's not what you're paying for. People should, in my opinion, dress and act accordingly. But yes, I know that poor dress is certainly not the exclusive provence of mid-western tourists. (I mean, there is Florida after all. ) But when I was last at Gary Danko, and the guy at the table next to me was wearing an open collar hawaiin shirt and sandles and his date had on a . . . I don't even know how to describe it (let's say that nothing involved in that dress was created naturally) and in their booming voices they ordered a Mai Tai and a Bombay 'Tini . . . . . I'm glad that my parents moved me out of St. Louis when I was 1.

When I'm trying to make thin slices from things like potatoes and tomatoes, I find that one problem I have is the blade descends down and out, away from the object, giving me only a half slice. This could be due to less than perfectly sharp knives. I compensate by thinking that I'm actually slicing inward to produce a thicker bottom -- and I end up with uniform slices. By the way, anyone remember in the movie The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover, there was one scene in the kitchen where next to the action some guys was slicing a cucumber? If the movie were put out today, I would assume it was digital technology because this guy's hand was cruising and seeminly perfect paper thin slices of cucumber were flying in the air.

Right you are, Kate - I think the fact that there's a debate about anything being covered in eGCI is more the rule than the exception. I think what Kate means is that she doesn't grip the blade between thumb and forefinger, opting instead to curl all four fingers around the handle. This grip is totally acceptable, and I'm sure many professionals use it. I find it easier to "fine-tune" control of the blade angle using the method I described. As with most techniques: if it's easier for you, if it works for you, then stick with it! My only suggestion would be to try everything at least once to ensure there's not something even easier and better for you out there. Exactly. If I can butt in here with my relatively unexpert two cents... I have experimented with both grips and find that I have much more conrol and a much better feel of what the knife is doing using the grip Marsha describes. This is, however, often at the expense of comfort. BTW, Chad touches on a way to modify the spine of your chef's knife to make it more comfortable in his upcoming lesson on knife sharpening and maintenance. I agree with Kinsey, et al., that it's more comfortable and there's better control when the finger rests against the blade. I notice that my friends who have taken "amateur" cooking classes were all taught never to do this, but to wrap all four fingers around the handle. I assume that lesson plan was written by the lawyers. (As all lesson plans involving sharp instruments should be!) And my thin bladed Chinese cleaver gives me a nasty blister on the outside of my index finger after about 5 minutes of chopping. It's prompted my near-universal shift to a chef's knife.

Here's an image from Imagestation: If you follow my instructions, it will work.

Before I had a dishwasher, I set mine in a pot of boiling water for a few minutes, then a slight sponging.

A few year's back I ate at The General's Daughter. I'm pretty sure it was in Sonoma. I don't remember much about the meal, except that it was very good.

Mine have taken longer. But my butt may be bigger than Mark's.

One should be able to right-click the image, choose "Properties" & get the URL. Just make sure you don't use a double jpg extension with Imagestation. (If you've double JPG extensions in the URL, just delete the last extension.) It's not that easy. You can't link to the viewing page. The explanation should be in here. But essentially, after you upload your picture to your storage bin in Imagestation, you must click on the image to view it in the viewer. Then, you must click on view/source to get a page of source code. In that code, you can find the url, and paste it into the eGullet image box. The correct url code starts with something like img=src www.imagestation . . . . . .jpg. It's not as difficult as it sounds. Don't worry about the butt getting too dark. The dark color is not "browning" like on the stove top. It's from the smoke -- and the butt should be close to black by the time it's down. Good old yummy nitrites.

Imagestation will work, but you have to find the image's url in the source code. It's not as hard as it sounds, and it's described in one of the image site tips. As for the butt -- I assume it's just a question of more time. Even a smaller 4 pound butt will probably take longer than 4 hours, and from what I know about you, I'm guessing your butt is closer to nine or ten. Did you take an internal temp?

I had the opposite experience at a place out here in SF. Foreign Cinema is not a "high end" restaurant, although it has a pretty good repuation for food. (Bad reputation for bridge & tunnel trendy crowd.) We were there Friday night with pretty good service, but the oysters were slow coming out and the waitress forgot to put in my entree order, so my meal didn't come out until the others were finished. We told them it was no problem at all as we weren't in a hurry and I was comfortable after having the oysters and an app. Not only did they give us comp dessert and dessert wine, I was presented with a $75 gift certificate, which I tried (mildly) to give back.

This is the first time? Obviously, you're not reading enough of my posts. Crinoidgirl, if that's the worst problem you two have, go out and buy yourself a couple cans of Cheese Whiz and a big jar of Helmans, and get down tonight.

If Quizno's didn't acquire a melted plastic flavor (I think from their "oil & vinegar"), it'd be high on the list. But I don't think any chain sandwich shop provides a decent sandwich. Cheap bastards.

One of my few utter and complete failures was an attempt to make tuna tartare. Don't what the hell I was thinking of. I threw tuna, some parsley, ginger and way too much garlic in a blender. Added some sesame oil. It tasted like fish-hummus. Looked worse.

I'm curious whether people in the U.S. and GB are referring to the same thing when they say Chicken Tikka Masala? I don't recall ever seeing "Butter Chicken" on a menu in the U.S.

Two folks I work with. That's about all I know.

Have you ever seen "The Sopranos"? (By the way, I Massachusetts used to have the same policy. Liquor licenses were like gold.)

There's a running thread on Chicken Tikka Masala here.

Fringale is good. I've never been to Delancey Street, but it's an interesting place. It's run by a "shelter" that offers jobs and training to ex-cons. The food is supposed to be great, and it's a great cause. They also run a moving business, which I've used. Great people. I'd skip Palomino-- nothing great for the price. A holdover from the Dot-Com bust. Bacar is a little stuffy, but supposed to be good.

fifi's method: What do you start with? Pork belly from a butcher's shop? How do you know when to pour it off? Don't you need it solid to cut into flour for dough? Would that be hydrogenated? Or do you refridgerate it first?

Slanted Door is fairly close.

It's the Napster logo, isn't it? As for pigs heads, there's a store in Manhattan that has a boneless pig head, dried and pressed flat, hanging in the window. In Chinatown, across the park (I think) from the Courthouse. Someone told me that these things were good luck.