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担担面 (dàn dàn miàn*) in Sichuan does not use peanut butter; it sometimes, but not always, uses sesame paste and is sometimes, but not always, garnished with raw peanuts. It is was originally a street food snack dish which with no standard recipe. All the recipes I've seen in English are very American-Chinese with ingredients from all over China that would be unlikely to be used by street vendors in Sichuan if even available. I’m reasonably certain peanut butter powder doesn’t exist in China; a search in Chinese on Chinese search engines reveals nothing. * The official Mandarin transliteration in China. Tan Tan is just an older, outdated transliteration never used in China and now mainly only used in America

Lotus root soup. Oil, garlic, pork ribs, sea salt, water, raw peanuts, dried Chinese jujubes ("hak jou" (black jujubes) variety), honey jujubes, sliced dried Solomon's Seal rhizomes, dried cuttlefish, sliced lotus roots, dried wolfberry fruits (goji berries).

Tomatoes with scrambled eggs (蕃茄炒蛋). White rice. Oil, scallions,eggs, Shaohsing wine, salt, white pepper, tomatoes, turbinado sugar, ketchup. Lotus root soup. Oil, garlic, pork riblets, salt, water, dried Chinese jujubes, dried Solomon's Seal rhizome slices, dried longan flesh, raw peanuts, dried honey jujube, lotus root slices, dried wolfberries.

It was gorgeous and inspiring as always this morning. Even as it opens at 8am the crowd makes it hard to get images. I got peanuts, Malabar spinach, parsley for the rabbit, incredible Honeysweet pluots, and tomatoes. I always have to tell myself "you can return on Tuesday - just a few days away...." Here are just a few shots: Half of the incredible greens array A stunning pepper selection More of the Asian veg vendor with very young ginger in foreground. The pale brown bin is raw peanuts with okra in front of it

I have some raw peanuts from the farmers market. I'm off to google sprouting instructions!

Use them as one would raw peanuts in various savory E/SE/S Asian recipes – I would imagine they would be a nice twist to them. (ps lateral thinking is a good thing)

Ah, OK. Then what about this? They should still be usable in the recipes with raw peanuts.

Hiyayakko. Cold soft tofu, grated daikon, katsuobushi, scallions; mixture of Takara hon-mirin, Higeta Honzen soy sauce, water, and hon-dashi granules zapped in the microwave then cooled before pouring around the tofu. Lotus root soup. Water, sliced fresh lotus root, black jujubes, honey jujubes, dried sliced Solomon's Seal rhizome, dried goji berries, dried longan flesh, raw peanuts, couple of dried cuttlefish, sea salt, oil.

I will take the challenge, I can cook tomorrow night (Sunday). Here is my list (I am a lacto-ovo vegetarian): broccoli onions (white & red and garlic, fresh chives) celery russet potatoes cheese: swiss, mozzarella, parmesean eggs limes raw peanuts (I make my own peanut butter as needed.) firm tofu NM green chiles, roasted I have a pretty extensive pastry-making pantry with several types of flour, syrups, butters, craisins, raisins, candied fruit, etc. I also have many pantry staples like dry beans, rices, cornmeal, semolina flour, noodles (asian and italian), and canned goods. Feel free to ask if I have a pantry item. I am willing to make bread.

Lotus root soup. Water, pork spare ribs, lotus root slices, Solomon's Seal rhizome slices, black jujubes, honey jujubes, goji berries, longan flesh, raw peanuts, sea salt. ETA: ...and a couple of small dried whole cuttlefish. (NB: dried cuttlefish has a very different taste profile from fresh cuttlefish, for those who are unfamiliar with it) A rice plate. Stir-fry w/ peanut oil, garlic, minced pork, fish sauce, pattypan squashes, hon-mirin, sea salt, green & yellow French filet beans, Chinese long beans, water, Thai basil. White rice.

I prefer a whole wheat pullman loaf for PB & J. I make my own peanut butter. I keep raw peanuts in the freezer and roast them until dark in a pan with a lid on the stovetop. I allow them to cool a bit then hit them with an immersion blender and a dash of salt. (I use a milkshake machine cup.) This only takes a few minutes, but makes really great tasting PB. I like many different jams and jellies, so, I change the type often. Sometimes, I will make ½ and ½ different flavors like apricot and cassis. I also enjoy PB & honey, with raw honey.

Maybe a lot of local growers in the Bay Area have a glut this time of year? It's typical for the price of heirloom tomatoes to start dropping in September; certainly true of the east bay farmers' markets. This morning we bought lots of them, including some varieties that are new to me. It's espelette pepper season! Only one vendor I know of at the Berkeley market sells 'em, and this year they are fiery hot. There's only a couple of Asian vendors at the Saturday Berkeley market, but this is their best time of year. Fresh raw peanuts in the shell, fresh baby ginger with the stalks and leaves attached (truly amazing, and you can throw the leaves into a stir-fry!) Also they have good okra. What do I do with the peanuts? I boil them, like the good southern girl I am NOT. Professor Hobbit (that's how I think of you, Soba) I have a question for you, since you are clearly frequenting farmers' market every week end. Actually two questions. Did you see any English peas this year? They were noticeable absent over here in the east bay in the spring and early summer. Tons of edible pod sugar peas, but no English. Also are you seeing any eggplants? Seems to me in years past they would come in with peppers, but so far no.

IMO, the best peanut butter is the stuff you make yourself right before you need to use it. I take raw peanuts and roast them on the stovetop in a copper saucepan (if it's just a few, the copper cools quickly helping avoid burning) or the oven if it's a project using a lot of peanuts. I let them cool a little, put them in a steel milkshake cup, then hit them with my immersion blender. Just takes a few minutes, and tastes better than anything that's been sitting around. That said, I usually make almond butter cookies instead of peanut -using roasted almond butter, made as above, plus a drop of almond extract. If it's a super special occasion, I will half-dip them in dark chocolate.

Tuesday is vegetarian night! Here's my list, I do have a ton of condiments (including wasabi covered sesame seeds), as well as stock in my freezer, etc. In the fridge: 1 leek 1 cucumber ½ head cabbage 6 nectarines 4 white onions 6oz swiss cheese, sliced a parmesan rind the size of a finger 1lb sealed pack extra firm tofu carrots 6oz white mushrooms 42 eggs 8 pink grapefruit 8 limes 6lbs mozzarella 34lbs of assorted chocolate: baking bars, chips in 3 colors, callettes, etc. plus nibs 5lbs raw peanuts, 10lbs raw pecans, 1lb raw walnuts In the cupboard: dry beans: pinto, pink, red kidney, yellow split peas, brown lentils, red lentils lots of different dried pasta including Italian types plus: dry bean thread, ready-to-eat fat rice noodles, and dry Chinese egg noodles rice: 1lb brown jasmine, 1lb basmati, 3lbs Bomba, and 5lbs Calrose I do have semolina flour, cake flour, bread flour, whole wheat flour, and AP flour. corn meal and corn flour sweeteners: sugar, cane syrup, blackstrap molasses, powdered molasses, 4 kinds of honey, corn syrup, crystallized fructose, jaggery olives: black, green cocktail, and pitted kalamata canned: diced tomatoes, garbanzos, black beans, bamboo shoots, baby corn cobs, water chestnuts, chipotles in adobo, coconut milk 8 lbs of glaceed cherries 4 lbs chopped fruitcake mixed fruit many condiments, oils, butter, spices, black limes, misos, etc. cocktail stuff (no potatoes right now, they are hard to keep in the summer, go bad before I can eat them, the house is kinda warm) Bon Chance!

Several lunches from recent days. -------------------------- • Pan-fried King Oyster mushroom slices; w/ just salt & pepper. • Lotus root soup. With pork short-cut spare ribs, garlic, Chinese jujubes (lam jou variety), Honey jujubes, Goji berries (kei chee), raw peanuts, dried cuttlefish, sea salt. ------------------------- • Bak Kut Teh (Herbal Hoklo-Canto variety) w/ fried tofu puffs. • Gai Lan, stir-fried w/ garlic & a sauce mixture of aged Kimlan soy sauce, Morita ryori-shu, Kimlan luscious soy sauce, sesame oil [Dragonfly], oyster sauce [LKK], white pepper. • Yau Char Kwai (youtiao; Chinese crullers). • White rice (Basmati), cooked w/ fresh deep-fried shallots and shallot oil, garnished w/ fried shallots. -------------------------- • Fresh broad linguine [Nicole-Taylor’s]; tossed w/ a sauce of unsalted butter, chopped walnuts, gorgonzola dolci (melted in), heavy/whipping cream. Dressed w/ parsley florets. Had seconds and thirds; ate the whole pan of it, carb coma ensued. Zzzzz. -------------------------- • Leftover seared/roast picanha, sliced. • Boiled fresh fingerlings. • Leftover salad (Spinach, Napa cabbage, Shunkyo radish, oil & vinegar, salt, pepper) -------------------------- • Fresh pork sausage (schnecken; [Claus’]) pan-fried then sautéed with the remainder of the bamboo shoots mixture from dinner the previous day, plus a bit more Szechuan-type “nga choy” (suimiyacai). • Black rice noodles (黑米面/黑米麵) [Havista] [actual Chinese brand: 五穀豐牌]. • More “Choy Kon Tong”, cooked the previous day and left at RT (covered pot), now deeper in flavor.

I just got bag of raw peanuts. They are already shelled. However, can I still make boiled peanuts? How long do I boil them for? All recipes I've used before for peanuts in the shell. Soup

Pork belly & lotus root soup. Lotus root segments, scrubbed; sliced pork belly; smashed garlic. Pork belly slices beimng sautéed w/ the garlic in peanut oil. Some other stuff that went into the developing soup. Starting from 11 o'clok and going clockwise: Large Chinese jujubes, honey jujubes (Chinese red jujubes preserved by drying and soaking in honey), dried (& lightly salted) cuttlefish (three of them), dried Goji berries, raw peanuts. Soup being cooked. Salting/seasoning adjusted. Bowl of the finished soup.

Couple of lunches. ----------------------------- • Sliced pork belly marinated w/ Shaohsing wine, black pepper, sesame oil, ryori-shu, mirin, oyster sauce; stir-fried w/ Western celery, scallions, baby leeks. • Lotus root soup. Made w/ chicken & beef pieces, smashed garlic, vegetable oil, raw peanuts, lam jou (a sort-of smoked large Chinese jujubes), kei chee (Goji berries), yook chook (dried rhizome of Polygonatum odoratum), dried salted oysters (of a variety called 沙井蠔豉) (from the Pearl River delta), water, salt. • White rice (Basmati). ----------------------------- • Smashed garlic (lots) sautéed w/ bamboo shoots, chopped baechu kimchi, sliced scallions & coriander leaves. Eaten w/ skinny wonton noodles. • More of the lotus root soup from the previous lunch.

Lunch from a few days ago. • Pork belly & lotus root soup. Smashed garlic, corn oil, sliced pork belly, sea salt, water, simmer, "black" jujubes, honey jujubes, raw peanuts, dried Solomon's Seal rhizome slices ("yook chook"), dried small squid (rather than dried cuttlefish), simmer, sliced de-skinned lotus root, simmer, dried goji berries, simmer, seasoning adjusted. • Deep-fried firm tofu slices. Eaten w/ grated daikon, scallion "flowers", and Lingham's Thai Hot Sauce. • Soba, dressed w/ chopped green parts of scallions, katsuobushi, Izu oroshi-wasabi, hon-tsuyu.

Early dinner. • Lotus root soup. Short-cut pork spare ribs sautéed with garlic, salt, water, "Yook Chook" (玉竹; Yale: yuk6 juk1; Polygonatum odoratum (Mill.) Druce), "Chan Pei" (陳皮; Yale: chan4 pei4; dried tangerine peel), dried longan flesh, dried Chinese jujubes (two varieties - lam jou plus ones from Shandong), dried cuttlefish (two small + one medium sized ones), sliced lotus root, raw peanuts. • Garlicky chicken. Chicken leg quarters, cut up; sautéed w/ two-heads'-worth of garlic cloves (lightly crushed) and halved shallots; w/ corn oil. Water added plus splashes of rice vinegar, hon-mirin + jozo mirin; seasoning adjusted, simmered down. Eaten w/ Fuzhou-type fine wheat noodles (min6 sin3, a.k.a. mee sua; I used this one (Taiwanese brand)). • Stir-fried large mustard green ("kai choy"; 芥菜).

Deep-fried pressed tofu. With scallions & grated Korean radish. Lingham's Hot Sauce + fresh ripe calamansi lime juice. Lotus root soup. Pork spare ribs, garlic, oil (sauté), water, dried cuttlefish, sliced dried Solomon's Seal rhizome, raw peanuts, large sort-of smoked Chinese jujubes, honey jujubes, dried tangerine peel, sliced lotus root, sea salt, dried goji berries towards the end.

We are once again in Atlanta, where I am having to adjust to a lack of certain staples, my daughter's strangely equipped kitchen, and her husband's many categories of "Mmm, no I don't think so." They are both on a high-protein diet (she's nursing twins, he's just wired that way) and are picky about certain preparations of ingredients; she seems to have accommodated to most of his quirks. One thing we can all agree on is hot spice. He's game for rice and beans, Sichuan takeout, BBQ. Luckily he will eat fish and shrimp. And almost any kind of chicken. Her cookbook collection is meager, but it fortunately includes the Lucky Peach 101 book. Last night we made the Lemongrass Chicken from the book and it was a hit. The night before we made the lamb burgers and they liked that as well. One of the few things I will be relieved about when I get home, aside from not being in an airport or on a plane, is less meat. Vegetable sides are a challenge; they hate cauliflower and okra and he doesn't like salads with any vinegar or mayo. Finding good cheeses, good bread, good ice cream and good stone fruit also seems to be hurdle of olympian proportions. The plums and peaches are dreadful and the lemons don't have much taste. Lemongrass is abundant and so is good beer. And for those of you like me, who have developed a bizarre love of boiled peanuts, the DeKalb Market is up to its neck in the best fresh raw peanuts I've ever tasted, big, meaty and not a bad one in a batch. So we did that and my husband and I ate most all of them, even though we thought the protein content would be a draw. Not so. We are drinking lots of Highland Gaelic Ale, a brown ale made in Asheville. Today we are making a big batch of marinara sauce they can freeze and we can have for dinner with spaghetti and Italian sausages. We make it at home all the time, but prefer it half the time with cauliflower instead of pork.

Just ate some of the best corn ever (and I really mean that!) from the Temescal farmers' market in Oakland. Bicolor, small perfect kernels, incredibly sweet. Also got, and I think this is a first for me, peacotums. What, you ask? A cross of peach, apricot and plum. Very good. Also some very fresh raw peanuts in the shell, which I plan to boil and serve as an app when my brother in law comes for dinner tomorrow night, along with cute little carrots and purple radishes from the market. Dinner tomorrow will also be mostly from the market haul: we are making two pizzas, one with radicchio and tomato, the other with that same corn and baby zuke ribbons. Peacotums for dessert? I am very attached to some of the vendors at the saturday Berkeley farmers market, but the Temescal market has generally better prices. The corn at the Berkeley market was selling last week for a dollar an ear! It was good, but the Temescal corn was even better and selling for 50 cents an ear.

So, it's 12:14am and I just finished my shopping list for tomorrow. It includes all of my make ahead stuff for our Christmas Eve party, Christmas morning breakfast and all the sweets and food gifts. It doesn't include the hams (already bought). There is also a "week before" list and a "last minute" list. I don't expect anyone to actually READ it, but I thought it might be fun to see it and compare with other folks' preparations. Keep in mind that Mr. Kim won't be home until about 6pm and I need to try to get this all done before I need to be home to put my mom to bed. Worst comes to worst, I can come home, put her to bed and go back out to Walmart. Not my favorite store, but it's the only one open 24 hours. PRODUCE 8 lb. russets or Yukon Gold 4 lemons 1 large or two small onions DELI ham FRUIT 4 (10 oz.) can crushed pineapple MEAT Bacon 2 lb. B’fast sausage FROZEN Frozen OJ Waffles GENERAL GROCERY 3/4 c. peanut powder - plain, no added salt or sugar sm cider vinegar Mustard BAKING light brown sugar 10 lb. sugar 5 lb. bread flour 2 - 7 oz. marshmallow crème 2 Lg. can evap milk 2 cup dark corn syrup Better Crocker GF yellow cake mix active dry yeast 1 cup slivered almonds DAIRY 1/2 gallon milk 2 doz. Eggs 4 (8 oz.) pkg. cream cheese, cubed 4 (8oz.) cup sour cream 4 (12 oz.) package refrigerated buttermilk biscuits (10 count) 1 c. heavy cream 3 oz. Gruyère cheese, grated (about 1 C.) Sugar Cookie Dough 4 RX fenof/jenta ASIAN MARKET 6 c. raw peanuts CUPERTINO’S Bagels TRADER JOE’S 3 milk chocolate WMART Depends Green paint tape Marshmallows 11x17pan WORLD MARKET Xmas crackers Cookies $10 ECW gift $ TREE 4 – 13x9 11x17

I caved to the raw peanuts in the bulk area of the Korean market. Small, skin on. I roast them but circumstances impede that for a few weeks They are currently in tupperware type container in a cool dark place. Freeze?