Good Western European, American Cooking

[Chris Amirault]

I'll bite. Why is that frustrating exactly? Food discussion around here is, wonderfully, not a zero-sum game. So why are you perturbed if members are excited to tweak temps and times for sous vide moose or adjust the texture of their cardoon and cocoa noodles off in a corner of eG Forums?

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I dunno, this is sort of feeding into my dissatisfaction with the dinner thread. It used to be just what folks are having for dinner. Now it seems to be a little..."show-offy" with an x-treme closeup picture for everyone's admiration.

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I'd respond to this with something devastating, except I can't get the klieg lights properly trained on my grilled cheese for tonight's photo shoot. Sorry.

[hjshorter]

I'd respond to this with something devastating, except I can't get the klieg lights properly trained on my grilled cheese for tonight's photo shoot. Sorry.

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I'd just come back at you with an amazingly attractive shot of the keilbasa and lentil soup we had tonight.

[Ling]

I see great Thai, Sous vide (yeah, yeah, yeah!), Mish mash (ah, I meant to say fusion), I've belholded far to many butts and No I'm not a cool kid from anywhere. I've nothing against any of this, but I'd like to see more good food that uses ingredients available easily to most of us. Food that uses imagination coupled with common sense to achieve results & does not try to be trendy or reach way too far to make an impression. No, I'm not a geat fan of foams & I've been to E' Bulli & won't go again.

For many people, the Thai food (and presumably, other ethnic foods) you see on EG is made with ingredients that are commonly available in the area they live in. This is an international food board--not everyone grew up eating roast chicken and mashed potatoes, or spaghetti bolognese.

I doubt any of the food we cooked during our blog was out of the norm, or "fringe" cuisine, except for the stuff we did during the Iron Chef competition, when originality was up for marks. Still, I'm sure you've seen far stranger things on the TV series than the stuff we came up with that night. Like Daniel pointed out, we did our grocery shopping at the local markets, and nothing we bought was outrageously expensive or extravagant, so I fail to see how we got singled out.

Edited September 5, 2006 by Ling (log)

[Pan]

[...]Naturally, cooking evolves; ingredients evolve and new things are invented. But Moore's law does not apply to the culinary world. Lentement as the French would say. Take it easy & don't try to out clever each other.[...]

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A lot of "fusion cuisine" sucks, but that's not a statement against the concept itself. It's instructive that couscous is the favorite "French dish" in France.

[Pontormo]

Regarding the subheading of this thread & Heather's first post:

Abra's preoccupied now with guests, but I remember she began a new alternative Dinner thread out of somewhat similar feelings, i.e. a belief that the Dinner Thread was a place for stunning revelation vs. simple daily reporting. The first responses she received were protests, saying that the dinner thread was for everything other than the disasters that the poster might prefer to document in the Anti-Dinner thread.

The more people who do not shy away from mentioning their grilled cheese sandwiches made with supermarket cheddar and Arnold Healthnut bread in the Dinner thread, the more variety there will be. I personally would like more of this since I have a personal interest in the real ways people eat. I'm just not sure eGullet members provide a sufficiently diverse range of dietary habits to represent a good sample group.

A lot of what goes on here is showing off, mostly good-natured. It's not exclusively a place for disseminating information or seeking and gaining advice. No forum is exempt. I find inspiration in many of the most ambitious postings of this nature; cf. my references to Ling & Henry's Chinese banquet which I culled only for two dishes, both extremely simple, if one requiring four hours of braising, virtually unwatched. Here one can show off to like-minded people what one would not to colleagues, relatives or even friends.

When The Dinner Thread reached page number 500, I actually spent time looking at the first pages and years. Two things strike me:

1) In the beginning, the novelty of eGullet fueled a lot of the simple, mundane reporting in very brief posts. I'd say it's a bit like the first years of the cellphone, except I overhear too many unexceptional conversations on the streets. How motivated is someone who's been around for some time to contribute the same kind of brief notice on a regular basis?

2) Food photography changes everything. It takes a while for photographs to become the rule rather than the exception that they are on the thread. Once photographs became virtually requisite, then for many posters, the quality of the image became important. Cf. Dessert thread, too. As the only regular contributor to the cooking threads who doesn't photograph her meals in the Italian forum, I know what it feels like to be the one sane person in the room who is nonetheless the odd ball. (I am more than tolerated there.) This is especially true when text is minimal in photocentric posts and images make it easy to say, "That looks wonderful!" and "What exactly did you do to make the cream do that?"

And who's to begrudge members who have developed incredible skills in photography, largely due to practice and advice gained through their contributions here?

That said, I tend not to pipe up on the Dinner thread except to praise other people's photographed meals. Upon occasion, I will make a plug for the Italian threads, pay homage to someone who influenced my cooking, or endorse something new I've just tried. That is why I wrote something last night and will not say anything about whatever I heat up or make once I log out.

[Pontormo]

Postscript just in case I was not abundantly clear in the wordy post above: I really enjoy the Dinner Thread. See my first post in this one: it's a place of great support as some of the most regular posters continually exclaim. Showing off isn't simply showing off, it IS also sharing and not meant to make anyone feel intimidated.

Second, I am drawn to the pictures first, no doubt. Visual immediacy matters and someone with the skills of a Patrick S. (Dessert thread), Ann T, Ling, Daniel, Shaya, etc., etc. deserves recognition for what s/he can do with a camera--or bag of flour, rib, peach or phrase.

Edited September 6, 2006 by Pontormo (log)

[docsconz]

The great thing about eGullet is that there is plenty of room for all sorts of culinary interests, whether they be ultra-traditional for the tradition of your choice, cutting edge creative or a combination of the two. If one is interested in a topic- participate. if not, don't. I look at food from the point of view of a person who loves the Slow Food Movement and hypermodern cuisine and don't see them as mutually exclusive. Where would any cuisine be today were it not for the culinary fusions that came out of the 16th century?

[Daniel]

And who's to begrudge members who have developed incredible skills in photography, largely due to practice and advice gained through their contributions here?

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I think its rather clear..

I've belholded far to many butts and No I'm not a cool kid from anywhere.

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I dunno, this is sort of feeding into my dissatisfaction with the dinner thread.  It used to be just what folks are having for dinner.  Now it seems to be a little..."show-offy" with an x-treme closeup picture for everyone's admiration. 

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Edited September 6, 2006 by Daniel (log)

[Dave Hatfield]

Ah! We seem to have really put the cat amongst the pidgeons now. Keep it up.

There's too much to answer individually, but I will make a few points:

- I love smoked foods & have eaten them all over the world. Texas is one of the 36+ countries I've eaten in. (Joke, Texans, Joke. Don't shoot me.)

- Many of you seem to have the impression that I only like 'simple' Western European food. Not true. I like all of the cusines I've ever tried (to varying degrees admittedly) so long as they were true to their traditions and ingredients.

- I certainly agree that what was once "exotic" can now be local. Evolution is the path forward. And, of course, it depends upon where you live. We who live in the country have to make do with a narrower range of ingredients than the city dwellers.

- Most of the time I like to read about the experiments. Its when they get out of hand & tip into oneupmanship & pretention that I start getting grouchy.

- I hope all of you realise that I've been exaggerating to provoke. Sorry if my sometimes warped sense of humor is not always obvious.

Meanwhile, lets hear more!

[hjshorter]

Daniel, did you miss the little winky thing in my post indicating that perhaps I might not be totally serious?

Dave, I think I understand what you're getting at, but most American cities are much less homogenous these days. Within a few miles of my house are Indian, Latino, Thai, and Ethiopian markets. And what was formerly exotic in the grocery is now commonplace. A little experimentation is to be expected. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

[Shalmanese]

The reason you see more "fringe" stuff than traditional stuff is that the fringe is just inherently bigger. Theres really only so much you can say about roast chicken or mashed potatos and the existing threads are a great resource. Most people are perfectly content reading and don't have all that much new to contribute. On the other hand, fusion stuff, alginates and the like are a huge field and a lot more of what people do is noteworthy or interesting. So even though we might cook 100 roast chickens for every tilapa noodle, we're going to be talking more about the right ratios of transglutaminate.

Same thing in the Dinner thread. I know I don't bother to photograph or document a lot of my day to day mundane dishes. It's only when I do something relatively interesting or tasty that I'm going to be sharing it. So the dinner thread naturally skews towards the "fringe". It's a perfectly natural trend.

And if you think we don't document our failures, you obviously haven't checked out the Dinner II thread.

[bergerka]

am I sick? I think a confit de canard curry sounds kind of delicious.

K

[Dave Hatfield]

heres really only so much you can say about roast chicken or mashed potatos and the existing threads are a great resource.

I don't bother to photograph or document a lot of my day to day mundane dishes.

Maybe we should. I'm guilty too, but there are many many ways, tricks & nuances to roasting a chichen. I bet most of us have our tricks or quirks to doing the mundane dishes. Besides my mundane may well be your revelation.

am I sick? I think a confit de canard curry sounds kind of delicious

Try it & let us know. If, however, it turns out to be delicious I insist that it be known as Dave Hatfield's curried duck

[Dave Hatfield]

Have a look at this for an example of what can be done with simple local ingredients.

[cdh]

Dave, you're not making much sense in this thread. Particularly that last pointer to your example of "simple" "local" food that you approve of.

1. Since when was lobster local to the mountains?

2. Since when was puree-ing it and shaping it into quenelles considered a simple preparation?

3. Since when was making a "cappuccino" out of mushrooms a simple preparation, and are you sure that all those many and varied mushrooms you ate are actually local to the mountains you were in?

4. Your pork was cooked sous vide, a method of which you claim to disapprove as not sufficiently simple for your preferences.

Now that I've pointed out what seem like glaring inconsistencies to me, I'd like to step back a bit and try to comprehend where you're coming from...

You're pining away for The Good Old Days When Things Were Simpler And The Kids Didn't Annoy Me With Their Crazy Notions... I wonder if those Good Old Days really existed anywhere ever.

So, Dave, rather than complain about what Those Crazy Kids provide for your eGullet reading pleasure, write up a specification for what you would like to see, then start the threads you'd like to see it in. Griping about what's here is pointless if you'd like to remain an eG reader... folks whose ideas you don't like are not going to shut up and go away because you wish they would. If you want to direct the discussion in a path more of your choosing, take the reins and DO IT. The cheese thread is a great example of that. Make more. And don't complain if people don't flock right to them...

Edited September 15, 2006 by cdh (log)

[ludja]

Frankly, I haven't understood the point of this thread either... Please *do* consider contributing to existing topics that tickle your fancy or else start some new cooking topics along those lines as cdh suggests. I look forward to it. Also, I think you'll find the variety of people's interests on eGullet is quite diverse!

[Dave Hatfield]

Ok, my absolutely last post on this thread since it seems to be getting a bit heavy which was not my intent. I really wanted to get some counter reaction to some of the 'fringe' posts that seem to dominate quite a few threads.

I used some very deliberate exaggeration to make some points & provoke a reaction. Seems that that type of argument is neither understood nor appreciated. So be it.

1. Since when was lobster local to the mountains?

Jarancon is about 40 miles from the Atlantic ocean. I'd call that fairly local.

Since when was puree-ing it and shaping it into quenelles considered a simple preparation?

You miss the point. Brandade is a method of preparing salt cod that is very widely used in French peasant cooking. Doing it with lobster meat is where the originality comes in. Putting the result into a qunelle shape is merely the window dressing.

Since when was making a "cappuccino" out of mushrooms a simple preparation, and are you sure that all those many and varied mushrooms you ate are actually local to the mountains you were in?

What's in a name? Whipping up mushrooms into a light mousse & calling it a 'cappuccino' is not exactly rocket science. Again, the originality is in thinking it up & exectuting it.

Yes, I'm very sure the mushrooms were local. By the way Jurancon is not in the mountains; its just at the edge of the foothills of the Pyrenees.

Your pork was cooked sous vide, a method of which you claim to disapprove as not sufficiently simple for your preferences.

Agreed. I am not a fan of sous vide ( or vide tete when I'm being nasty.) WHEN IT IS CARRIED TO EXTREEMS!! In this case I'm not even sure that it was cooked that way, but think it is likely that it was.

So much for the meal. My point was & is that you don't have to resort to exotic ingredients combined into strange combinations to produce cutting edge cusine. AND that the best cooking consists of imaginative uses of readily available ingredients prepared well. When I (& other serious cooks of my acquantence) go to a restaurant such as Chez Ruffet we go home with ideas that we can try in our own kitchens. We'll probably never achieve the level of these world class restaurants, but we can at least try.

Whereas, and this prompted my rant, I think I see too much attention paid to the, as someone else called it "the fringe" and not enought to good solid, imaginative food that we can cook and that we can all get ideas from. Enough!

Finally, if you were to take a look at all of my posts and the new topics I have raised you might find that they are overwhelmingly positive and seek to move the discussion(s) along in ways that benifits the forums as a whole.

That's it. End of thread as far as I'm concerned.