Stone

I think Mae Ploy makes a decent curry paste for Thai food. (I think Mae Ploy is the good brand.) It sure makes the cooking easy -- curry paste, meat and coconut milk. I tried making my own Thai curry pastes, but didn't think it was worth the effort. If you peek into many Thai restaurants, you'll find that they use pre-made curry paste also. I think Patak's curry pastes are also pretty good for what they are. I used to make big pots of curried veggies, based on minced onion and tomato and a few big tablespoons of Pataks. Usually made curried cauliflower, okra or potato. Back to curry paste and cumin -- I had always thought cumin was the dominant flavor in chili powder. I guess it's that versitile. And I'm confused about the question whether chicken tikka masala is a curry or not. Are we confusing the different uses of the word curry? (I.e, the yellowish powder; the Kari plant; and the term for a dish based on a mixture of spices/flavors?)

Oscar Madison called it "tomato wine." I love it. I love it on everything. I splosh it on my burgers. I plosh it on my vindaloo. I mosh it into my ice cream. I splorge it on my morning cereal. I squeeze it over corn, under towers of steak tartare, around store-bought pastry-puffs of mushroom and crab, and into doughnuts because what's jelly anyway but a misguided attempt at fruit-ketchup. I drench it on broccoli and quench my thirst with it. I've done away with Crest in favor of Heinzing my teeth every morning. 57 varieties for 30 teeth. I've filled my jacuzzi with a delightfully sweet tomotao froth. Some people think ketchup should be banned. That's crazy talk if you ask me. What say we petition the government to declare Ketchup the truly American food (hamburger and frankfurter sound too tuetonic for such an honor).

What's a loomi?

Pushing the "brew" button twice on the coffee maker at the office. Coffee on the floor of my own kitchen is bad enough. Coffee ruining the newspapers on the office kitchen counter . . . .

When I was waiting tables, someone ordered a Finlandia and Tonic. I told that I didn't think we had Finlandia. She said, get me either Finalandia or rail, and we'll see if I can taste the difference. She couldn't.

Ooh. I take it back. I absolutely love Singapore Mei Fun noodles. I think that's just mei fun noodles, with meat and some veggies, flavored with curry powder.

I always thought curry powder (meaning the yellowish power known to Americans) was mixed by the british. I didn't know that any dish ever called for anything like it. Other than adding some to scrambled eggs, I don't think I've ever used it. (I hate Chinese/Vietnamese restaurants' versions of "curried" this or that, which is usually little more than a plain stir-fry with curry powder dumped in.)

I drink Kettle One, but probably because it was the first "good" vodka that I tried. (Has anyone ever had Cossack, made in Somerville, MA.) I only drink it chilled with a twist, mostly because I don't like vermouth. I've had Starya Moskova (?) and it's excellent. I cringe when my friend orders a "dirty" Grey Goose martini. He's rich, but why ruin a good vodka with a splash of olive juice. When I have a Bloody, I don't much care what vodka they use. It's the hot sauce and horse radish that makes the drink. (Anyone ever dash a little A-1 in a Bloody? Pretty good.) However, I find rating vodka a little strange, considering that the ultimate goal for the spirit is that it have no taste.

Forget to put the cap on the blender tightly and lean on it with a towel when pureeing hot soup, or should I say, napalm.

Good point. If purchasing puff pastry is cheating, what about purchasing pasta?

My father refuses to eat sushi because he thinks it's morally wrong to eat uncooked fish (I think he's also still harboring some animosity from Pearl Harbor). I try to argue that he eats lox, and that too is uncooked. Then we get into the cooked/cured debate. I usually end it by pointing out that he eats and claims to enjoy Halvah (a marzipan like confection that's similar to compressed dust), and if the Jews traditionally ate sushi he would love it. To this he claims that the worst anti-semites are the Jewish ones and points out that if I'd only date Jewish women I'd be happily married by now. Oy.

Guilty of all of the above. I add butter and/or cream to risotto, soups, sauces, etc. Hey, I like the compliments, and I don't know a better way to cook. Perhaps someday I'll learn. Until then, I'll give my guests coronaries. And I think Shaw has a point about home chefs not using enough butter/oil etc. But most of my friends cook more for "health" than "flavor". They don't realize that the major sacrifice in taste is not much of a health benefit. The sesame sauce drizzle is worse -- more because too many people think that that flavor is somehow special. But again, I take compliments where I can get them. And I also keep a bag of frozen peas in the freezer and toss them in just about everything.

Butter and cream -- add one or the other to almost anything. Sesame oil -- drizzle it on almost any "Asian" cuisine and most people are impressed.

Did anyone see the Iron Chef battle between Flay and Morimoto. I was a bit embarrassed by the American audience's cat-calls. And I loved how Morimoto criticized Flay for standing on his cutting board at the end of the show. By the way, referring back to one of the original posts, what does Emeril do wrong? I'm generally annoyed by his sillyness, (and I wish he would stop saying "d'gressssss"), but can you let us amatuers know what he's not doing correctly?

Someone recently put up a Billboard advertising Clamato in San Francisco, and the picture on the board looks like it's a Ceasar. I'd heard of the stuff for years, but never thought about trying it.

anyone ever eat raw bacon? Someone told that because it's been cured, it's safe. But I can't imagine it.

One of my "don't cook anything that takes longer than the pasta meals". While the water was heating, I chopped some onion, garlic, and parsley. When the pasta went in, I heated EVOO, sweated the onion and garlic, turned down the heat, added some fresh chopped clams, a dash white wine, some broth and a teaspoon of capers. Let it simmer as I poured out the pasta, threw in the parsley and I was eating while my friends were still waiting for their Chinese food to be delivered. Of course, I still have a pile of dishes in the sink.

Suvir, Hopefully this will make some sense. I'm interested in your comment that Jaffrey, Sahni, etc. are cooks not chefs. I'm also curious what you would suggest as good examples of Indian cooking, by which I mean the difference between something made by a cook and by a chef. For example, my understanding of Indian food consists of dishes like Vindaloo, Do Piaza, Rogan Josh, Chicken Tikka Masala, Saag Paneer, Malai Kofta, etc. These are found in almost every Indian restaurant I've been to in America, and most restaurants I went to in Northern India and Nepal. In America there's a huge difference between what most people eat at home and in the average restaurant and what they get in the high-end places often discussed in this forum. And I've often heard the saying that, for example, few Chinese people in China eat anything similar to what we eat in Chinese restaurants. So on one hand, I read JW's post as saying that an understanding of Indian cooking comes from growing up with it in the home. On the other hand, it seems like you suggested that an Indian chef makes food differently than an Indian cook, who learned by copying Mom and Grandmother. Are you saying that Chefs make the food better, or is there a whole other arena of Indian cooking that I'm missing? I recall going to some higher end restaurants in Delhi (at least I thought they were higher end, but I was only 17 and 22 at the times), and the dishes were pretty much the same, although the meats were better quality, the garnishes were fancier and the flavors better adjusted. When I've been to fancier Indian restaurants in America, I felt that where the offerings differed from the dishes with which I was familiar, they were doing fusion. On the other hand, in America I find that the higher end restaurants are doing more than cooking the same dishes better, they are cooking different, more complex dishes. Is there a whole level of Indian food that I have not experienced? Can you describe the types of dishes that you would expect an Indian "chef" to make?

I remember a show from the early 90s called "Cooking with Korma." Korma was a Western Hari Krishna and he cooked vegetarian Indian food. He had one show on "chonks." From what I recall, he put dry spices and ghee in a metal ladel and heated it directly over a fire until the ghee flamed. Then he added this to daals or other curries. I've never seen it before or since. However, I often notice a subtle flavor in some daals, usually chaana daal or yellow lentil, that tastes almost smokey. I wonder if that's where it comes from?

There's something about a good naan that I can't describe. It's soft and moist and steaming hot. Almost like sex. Most rotis I've had, however, were on trains in India and they were, well, not like sex. Mostly greasy and smelly. What's the difference between roti and chapati? I love aloo paratha, but the places out here are so bad that my friends make fun of me when I order it. (Of course, last time I went to Indian food with my friends we had 5 people and three orders of chicken tikka masala. I had to beg for some saag paneer.)

Some thoughts: 1) To answer the question many are asking, I believe this is Beeton: Beeton(God bless Google.) 2) I've now gone back to read the original post a number of times, and, well, I just can't seem to do it. (God damn t.v. and its destructive force on my attention span.) I don't know what, if any, point it is trying to make. I don't understand why it generated such anger at first. Although I find the thoughts it generated quite interesting. (But I find it hard to believe that any Texan would believe that anyone from Czechoslovakia belongs in Texas. Just kidding.) All that follows is probably way off the mark, but since I have to kill another 20 minutes before I can go home . . . . 3) Why would anyone think the subtleties of Indian cooking are inherently more difficult to master than the subtleties of French cooking, Italian, or Chinese. Does this mean that Americans, who have no real history, can't cook any cuisine because they can't truly understand the culture from which it came? If Indian cooking is so difficult for a non-Indian to master, is it because of some inherent "cultural" aspect to the food, or the simple fact that it uses more spices, in more combinations, which are not familiar to Westerners? In my layman's understanding, French cuisine is technically more difficult than Italian, but have no doubt that the differences can be taught to those that want to learn. I think that we in the West tend to assume that all things Eastern come imbued with some "spiritual" energy that can't be replicated by those with white skin. I think we like to think that way because then we become "spiritual" simply by eating tofu, purchasing a yoga mat, or burning incense. I asked my yoga teacher (yes, Shaw, I do yoga, and no, it's not pretty) why he calls out the poses in Sanskrit names that no one in the class understands and few can remember. Perhaps the same reason that my father cringes at the thought of Saturday morning temple service in English, not Hebrew. Would JW have had an easier time setting the sound for a philharmonic? a rock band? a klezmer band? To a person sitting in X seat of Y row, should the sound be set one way for Indian classical music and another for jazz and another for opera? Or do we want to set the speakers to the the cleanest, fullest sound regardless of what is playing? 4) How should I properly answer people who tell me that "I just don't understand jazz." What's to understand? Do you like it? If not, o.k. I don't like Ornette Coleman's freestyle jazz. I could say that I don't understand it. But that's not right. I don't understand why people listen to it. I don't like hip-hop and "scratch" music. I understand it. I just think it sucks. 5) Have I been trying to emulate Chinese cooking for years? No. I'm trying to cook it. And I can't seem to make it taste the way a restaurant does. I rarely use peanut oil. I never take the time to boil water so's I can blanche my one serving of veggies before I stir-fry. But does that mean that I have to travel to China and meditate for months before I can make a decent Hunan Chicken? (I wish it were that easy.) I don't need to know what was going on in Vienna to play Mozart. But I do need to practice a lot more. On the other hand, I believe that Mozart, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and Horowitz had a gift (genetic, but still a gift); whereas I think that Iron Chef Japanese is a just a damn good cook. Some of my friends say they can't cook. I point out that they haven't tried. Or if they do, they don't pay attention. 6) What's the difference between trying to adapt one cuisine to another and trying to adjust the two together? What does that mean? As my philosophy professor might comment, "dog spelled backwards is god." When I cut back on the chili's or fish sauce to adopt Thai recipes for Western palates, am I engaging in cultural imperialism? Or am I adjusting? I live in a town (San Fran) and and state (CA) where "fusion" invades just about evey restaurant. (Yes, I've been to an "authentic" Italian restaurant which served seared Ahi tuna and mango chutney.) Is there anything morally wrong with that? Is Tabla adapting or adjusting? 7) Is there something wrong with a chef taking a dish from another culture and selling it in America (or wherever) for whatever price she can get? Was my beef wellington "wrong" because I really thought it was invented by Napoleon's chef? Was my ceasar salad "improper" because I thought it was loved by Julius? Am incapable of making a decent Rogan Josh because I don't understand how the Moghuls conquered Northern India? I'm a decent non-trained cook, but I didn't learn anything from my parents. My friends tell me that my thai food is as good as they get in a restaurant. I think they're nuts. I've peered over the wall at lots of restaurant kitchens. I don't see much going on there but the rapid spooning and squirting of stuff into a wok. I can't imagine that I loved the chicken with broccoli from Charlie Mom because the "chef" could trace his lineage back to [fill in some ancient Chinese chef here.] 8) Iron Chef Italian makes some good looking food, for non-Italian. 9) "So how, finally, can we properly understand a foreign cuisine?" Eat it. 10) Really, if anyone could send me a recipe for Hunan Chicken, just like they make it at China Pavillion in Ardsley, I'd be greatful. 11) I apologize for all of the above.

I went to Don Giovanni last Spring and really enjoyed it. It seemed more casual than other places I'd been to in Napa, more of a "local" crowd. I can't remember exactly what we ate, but I know everyone was pleasantly suprised. Funny story -- I was ordering drinks for my group and asked for GlenFarclas, neat. The bartender said it was "--- years old". I wasn't paying attention, so I just nodded. The fill came, and the 40 year old scotch cost $26. I told the bar-keep that the last time I paid $26 for a single drink, it came with a lap dance.

I knew a real estate broker in the Boston area who said that houses are very difficult to rent if the prior renters cooked a lot of Indian food. He claimed that the oils from the food actually permeated the walls of the kitchen and surrounding rooms.

I use Crisco in a recipe my Grandmother handed down for a dessert pastry that my family calls kichels, although they're much closer to a soft, chewy, rugelach. The dough is a mix of mashed potato and flour, with a frightening amount of Crisco cut into it. Of course, we get the butter flavor by dipping the little fellows in melted butter and then a sugar/cinnamon mixture. mmmmmm, butter.

When I was poor, I used to eat pasta with a little butter, mustard and bread crumbs. I don't know what I was thinking of, except $.50 a serving.