zoramargolis

Julia I know what you mean!!! For someone that really looks forward to going out and enjoying a good meal, I almost dread it anymore. I pick at the service, I pick at the food, The decor etc..

Occupational hazard. After you've worked in film, it's almost impossible to go to a movie and just get lost in the story. You're watching, thinking "Two shot. Over the shoulder. Why the close-up on her there? The camera is moving too much."

What about progressing from bubbly white to dry rose´--say, something from the Loire Valley or Provence --with the pasta AND the fish?

1) Chopped fresh cilantro is a must-have table condiment IMO, when serving Mexican food. I always add cilantro to tacos, burritos, huevos rancheros, tostadas, etc.

2) Fresh chutney, with cilantro alone or cilantro and mint--grind in blender with onion, lime juice, spicy green chile, salt and a little bit of yogurt.

3) Asian-style cucumber salad: thinly sliced cucumbers, rice vinegar, soy, red chile flakes or chopped jalapenõ or serrano, and lots of cilantro.

4) Vietnamese-style salads with greens, cucumber, tomato and steak, shrimp or whatever protein you prefer, and cilantro. Make an oil/ rice vinegar-based dressing with a bit of fish sauce, sugar, soy sauce, lime juice to dress it with.

5) Green enchilada sauce: cook onion, garlic, tomatillos and green chile in chicken stock until the veg are soft. Puree in blender with fresh cilantro. Return to saucepan and simmer for another 10-15 minutes.

Which brings me to a vexing question: where, if at all, is the nearest decent Fiorentina to be had? (somehow I suspect the answer will be Maremma in NYC, or somewhere in Toscana) It haunts me...ever since I first read Raichlen's lengthy discourse in the Barbecue[sic] Bible.

bistecca alla Fiorentina (2Kg!), Osteria dell'Acquacheta, Montepulciano

According to Bill Buford in _Heat_, real grass-fed, free range Chianina cattle are almost non-existent in Tuscany. The famous Tuscan butcher he apprenticed with, Dario Cecchini, sourced his bistecca Fiorentina from Spain.

Note: stinky cheese + refrigerator = stinky refrigerator

Put an open box of Arm and Hammer Baking Soda in your refrigerator. It absorbs/eliminates the odors.

I just bought some Proscitto San Danielle. I'm fairly certain that the young man who was slicing it for me snitched at least two slices of it while he was slicing it. I'm kind of grossed out, mainly because he sort of tried to slyly do it and only really succeeded in looking like he might be spitting into his hand from my angle. My husband thinks I'm being picky. I didn't report it to anyone at the store because I didn't want to embarass the kid but I certainly won't order sliced deli meat from him again.

Where was this?

What is the person who complained about Ray's The Classics today smoking? He/She could choose to dine elsewhere in Silver Spring if uninformed service and bland, non-meat dishes were the goal of their meal.

If I went to a primarily vegetarian restaurant, I wouldn't complain about limited meat options....Putting up with people like this (who then feel free to bash others hiding in the anonymity of the internet) are just another example of why restauranteurs/servers/bartenders/etc deserve heaps of praise.

I had a vegetarian friend, not into food and who didn't know how to cook. She would say: "I'll eat what everyone else is eating. Just leave out the meat for me." Grrr.

Egg white omelet.

Coconut macaroons

Almond tuiles (adds two whole eggs to four egg whites)

Dacquoise (meringue cake with mousse filling)

Cook in microwave and feed to family cats and dogs.

I'm with you on this, giant shrimp! The fact that the price that scans is the one that I "should be paying" doesn't make a difference to me--it's not the price that I looked at and assessed when I decided whether I would purchase the item. It's not the price at which they advertised the item.

I was in the P Street store this morning, and it seemed as if most of the produce items I looked at and considered buying had no price marked on or above the shelf. In one case, I asked a stock clerk in the produce section what the price of an item was, and it took her more than five minutes to go find the price and get back to me with the information. After that, it was "fuggedaboudit"...

Charcoal-roasted eggplant gazpacho

2005 Quinta da Alorna Rose (Portugal)

Oricchiete pasta with fresh tomatoes, capers, roasted garlic, basil and reggiano

NV Dover Canyon Renegade Red (Paso Robles)

Peach cobbler with creme chantilly

the todd kliman chog today makes me want to run to the station and grab a train to montreal. do they still go that far?

http://www.washingtonian.com/chats/dining.html

anyway, au pied de cochon has been at the top of my must list since seeing it on anthony bourdain's quebec show. who can resist a duck in the can?

We went there in June. The person at the next table ordered the duck-in-a-can--I watched the process of opening the can, plopping it out on the plate. Very amusing, but did not look all that appetizing, frankly. After all that, it was pale-looking, stewed fowl. I enjoyed my buckwheat blini, foie gras, bacon, cheese curds and maple syrup. Todd didn't partake of the seafood options at APduC, which are as amazing as the foie gras, meat and duck. An amazing place. We had a great time in Montreal, and my daughter is thinking about McGill. We also have family there. More visits in the future!

THIS is surely "delicate dining"

Dos is fressen, nit essen.

Health food my ass!

I thought it smelled like Negroamaro...

Zora, what do you use for the "drip/steam" tray?

I use disposable aluminum baking pans--either one "brownie pan" or two loaf pans. Most supermarkets sell them.

New at the Dupont Market yesterday:

Chef Ris Lacoste, formerly of 1789, was weighing peaches and making change behind the counter at Toigo yesterday. Brief chat--she is doing some private chef-ing and enjoying life.

Also, a brief flurry of excitement at Eco-Friendly as Tom, the Dupont security guy, and Bruce, who works the booth for Bev Eggleston, wrestled with a homeless guy who'd reached through the fence behind the booth and grabbed some cash. Tom and Bruce struggled to get the guy handcuffed to the fence, while Stacy, who also works for Bev, called the cops. My friend Marty L., who teaches law at Georgetown (constitutional, not criminal) was also watching this drama unfold. He wondered if it was legal for them to handcuff the guy. I said even if it wasn't, the homeless guy would tell his friends what had happened to him and it might serve as a disincentive to others trying to steal from the vendors at the market. Marty agreed that it was a disincentive--he now had absolutely no desire to steal money from Eco-Friendly foods.

And cook it low and slow for a long time to develop some wonderful corn flavor. IIRC, Bill Buford talks a bit about this in Heat.

Oh, yeah! Low flame on a heat diffuser for about an hour. When I made it yesterday, I added some leftover fresh creamed corn I had, which added an additional depth of flavor/sweetness, along with some Reggiano and butter at the end.

I smoke my Thanksgiving turkey every year. I wish I had a real smoker, but I have to improvise with my Weber kettle. A 14 pound turkey is about the biggest I can do. I use a 24 hour herb brine in advance (in an ice chest, since there's no room in my fridge). I always rinse, dry and oil the turkey before putting it in the smoker. I put it in unstuffed, though a loose aggregation of onions and herbs probably wouldn't affect the heat/smoke penetration to the interior too much. I make a circle of charcoal around the perimeter of the fire grate, put a drip/steam tray filled with white wine, onion celery, carrot and herbs in the center, drizzle wet wood chips on the coals and set the turkey above the drip tray, breast side up. I seal the seam between the lid and the base with foil for the initial smoke period and leave the top vent open partway.

After about 45 minutes, I remove the foil, add some more charcoal, and assess the color of the bird. If it doesn't seem smoky-looking enough, I might add some more wet smoke chips, but I usually don't because I like lightly smoked meat so the turkey flavor is still there. Basting is a waste of effort, because the skin gets kind of crusty, and the liquid just runs off it. The liquid in the tray is what keeps the meat moist anyway, so I'll add a little bit of hot water to the tray, if it has boiled down too far. I don't turn the bird.

Once the bird is done, I strain what is left in the drip tray and add it to the gravy. Never had any complaints, and often have heard: "This is the best turkey I've ever eaten."

I use Goya brand coarse-ground yellow cornmeal. I usually find bags of it in the ethnic food aisle at Shopper's Food Warehouse. Cheap and good.

no haricots verts so far this summer at the dupont market. according to one farm, one planting was wiped out by deer in the dead of a single night, and a hot, dry summer is in the process of finishing off another.

Actually, Eli (Spring something Farm from W.VA) had haricots verts earlier in the summer and were charging $4 a half-pound. I was chatting with an acquaintance while she bagged some, who said "It's worth it to me." I went for the fatter "more beans for the buck" ones at New Morning that day.

Dinner with friends and my neighbors, who provided a small package of venison marked "tough" by the person who had butchered and wrapped the meat. So, despite the weather, I did an oven braise with reduced red wine marinade, homemade mushroom stock, aromatic veg and herbs. Since there were seven carnivores and one vegetarian eating, I served:

First: La Quercia prosciutto and Sharlyn melon

2005 Pazo Senõrans Albarinõ

Main: Oven braised venison, charcoal-grilled ribeyes and portobello mushrooms, polenta with fresh corn, green beans

2003 Sebastiani Alexander Valley Cabernet

Cheese: Le P'tit Basque; Le Pie d'lAngloys boursault; Bayley Hazen blue

2003 Torbreck Woodcutter's Shiraz

Dessert: Blackberry-peach pie (made by the neighbors); pound cake (Balducci's) with black cherry-Italian plum compote and creme chantilly.

A sack full of boiled chicken heads and an entire bottle of Patron Anejo. A guilty pleasure of mine.

For the former--Do chickens have cheeks? If not, that's mighty slim pickin's

And the latter--I hope that's a very occasional pleasure, because Patron Anejo's mighty expensive, not to mention the cost of a liver transplant...

While I love traditional pesto (just basil), I have a fondness for introducing arugula into the mix, and have made an all-arugula pesto. It's bitter at first, but after a few bites, it's addictive. Kind of like taking that first sip of Resina.

I wouldn't even try to get away with arugula pesto--my husband will not allow a single leaf of arugula to pass across his palate. However, I lightly steam some fresh spinach and squeeze out all of the water and add it to basil, garlic, pine nuts, olive oil and cheese. It keeps the pesto from turning brown. It really works and I hear no complaints from the spinach-haters at my house!

21) Actually, the TJ's chocolate (milk and dark) are both great for baking--and I do like eating them, too!

22) The pecan granola

23) Choice of breads with no preservatives (hot dog and hamburger rolls, too)

24) Tomato and Corn Relish

25) Kalamata Olive Oil--huge bottle! used to be $5.99 but I think on last purchase it was up to $7.99 (still a steal, and quite flavorful)

26) Vermont Butter and Cheese Co. Creme Fraiche cheaper than anywhere else.

27) TJ's Unsweetened soy milk

28) Bottled green tea with bergamot for guzzling over ice

29) Poland Springs sparkling water CTAE (cheaper than anywhere else)

30) King Arthur Flour and Florida Crystals sugar CTAE

31) Pitted Kalamata olives, cornichons and capers CTAE

32) Italian gnocchi for quick vegetarian entree

33) Valhrona chocolate bars CTAE

34) Packaged smoked salmon CTAE

35) Vinta crackers CTAE

36) TJ's brand cream cheese and tortilla chips--better & cheaper than most others

37) Various fresh produce items: crimini mushrooms, avocados, cherry tomatoes, fresh basil (off-season) CTAE

38) Toasted pine nuts, almonds, peanuts, cashews, dried apricots, sour cherries, raisins fresher, better and CTAE

39) Vitamins and supplements CTAE

The real question is: were you so crazed by the Rockville Pike store's parking lot that you didn't see any of these things? Yikes, before TJ's opened in this area, I used to take an empty suitcase with me when I went to California, just to bring back stuff from TJ's.

The French Laundry Cookbook has a section on creating powders from various vegetables and fruits. It involves drying pulps and purees in the microwave and then grinding them into powders.

That doesn't sound like what you are looking for, though. What you described sounds like the Ferran Adria-El Bulli-inspired food wizardry that Jose Andres is doing at Minibar and Wiley Dufresne at WD 50 in NYC. I'm not sure that any of these wizards have committed their magic to print, yet. They seem to learn in each others' kitchens and then go off and do it in their own.

Fresh black truffle risotto-- it was unanimous around the dinner table--the best risotto we'd ever eaten (sorry Joe H.). I used a variation of the French Laundry Cookbook recipe--with riso baldo instead of carnaroli. I made mushroom stock yesterday, with shiitake, oyster and crimini stems, dried shiitake, King Oyster and porcini mushrooms, aromatic veg including fennel tops, white wine, fresh thyme, parsley and bay leaf (the FL Cookbook calls for stock made from button mushrooms only). Instead of whipped cream called for in the FLC, I used some creme fraiche, and of course black truffle instead of white. But it was magnificent. Ooh-mommy!

Charcoal grilled ribeye

Charcoal grilled portobello for veggi-teen

Tomato salad with EVO, balsamico and basil

1995 Ch. Merville Saint-Estephe (a gift from a friend with a wine cellar)

Vanilla ice cream with warm lavender-vanilla-El Rey chocolate ganache

Life can be good...