Been married several months. Didn't you read the post?
Ha, this is exactly the sort of thing I like reading. (except for the excessively long descriptions)
Reminds me of this somehow.
I know what you hoped, young teo, I asked why you hoped it.
Funny, this is exactly the sort of thing I hate reading.
excessively long descriptions of food, that is.
But there are no excessively long descriptions of food to be had in the essay, not even for ready money!
5: I don't know how I managed to so drastically misread a two-word comment. Anyway, 1 was not actually sincere. I don't care how long they were married.
I really need to read that whole book. She's a gas.
In the interests of gender equality, I believe a link to W is for Wanton should be provided:
and the great difference between the way a man eats and has his lady love eat, when he plans to lead her to the nearest couch, and the way a woman will feed a man for the same end.A man is much more straightforward, usually. He believes with the unreasoning intuition of a cat or a wolf that he must be strong for the fray and that strength comes from meat: he orders rare steak, with plenty of potatoes alongside, and perhaps a pastry afterwards. He may have heard that oysters or a glass of port work aphrodisiacal wonders, more on himself than on the little woman, or, in an unusual attempt at subtlety augmented by something he vaguely remembers from an old movie, he may provide a glass or two of champagne. But in general, his gastronomical as well as alcoholic approach to the delights of love is an uncomplicated one which has almost nothing to do with the pleasurable preparation of his companion.
A woman contemplating seduction, on the other hand, is wanton.
[...]
In general, however, the great courtesans have paid less attention to the Freudian appearance of their kitchens' masterpieces, from what I can gather, than to the temperaments of the men they have willed to please. They have studied the appetites of their prey.
This is, in a way, a paraphrase of the old saying, "First catch your hare, then cook him": wolf or even goose can be substituted for the little wild rabbit. Once caught, a human male is studied by the huntress as deeply as if he were a diamond. She looks at his ear lobes and his finger-nails, before and after he has eaten of rare beef...and if the former are plump and ruddy and the latter rosy pink, she knows his glands to be both satisfied and active. She analyzes his motor reflexes after he has downed a fair portion of jugged venison...and if, instead of showing a pleasurable skittishness, he yawns and puffs and blinks, she nevermore serves that gamy dish. She notes coldly, calculatingly, his reactions to wine and ale and heavy spirits, as well as to fruits, eggs, cucumbers, and such...she learns his dietetic tolerance, in short, and his rare metabolism, and his tendencies toward gastric as well as emotional indigestion. [...]
Yes, thanks teraz! I knew there was another essay in there on the same theme, but it wasn't "R is for Romance" and I wasn't likely to type up another one anyway.
I was at the queasiest possible moment of pregnancy.
Women really get queasy around food when pregnant? I thought my wife just made that up to get me to stop eating my salami and fried onion sandwiches.
I believe I have already, somewhere in the archives, pronounced my love for her essays. But consider it pronounced again, towards this one in particular.
How instantly recognizable is the style of M.F.K. Fisher!
Beef! Die Weine and Das Wurst-Spiel fuer Maenner (Kinky, or is it just lonely and bored? Yup it's the latter.)
14: Yes. The smellier the food, the more likey it is to make pregnant women flee. I stopped drinking coffee during the first two months. COFFEE. This was how I figured out something was wrong with me.
So the not so Bachelor should have served somethng really bland accompanied by a Genevan white and followed by a nice after dinner blunt.
Oh wow this is lovely. So much so that I read the whole thing on my phone, a device that tends to prompt "tl;dr" responses at even the slightest hint of boredom. Must read more of her.
That's funny; I read this whole thing thinking, "This has to be M.F.K. Fisher, but she never had kids, so there's no way." Whoops.
||
AAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH (in re: football)
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That was one really strange 4th down call.
Oh I do love me some M.F.K. Fisher.
I often wonder if there's a word for the feeling of loving something but fretting that it's so damn typical of one's particular station in life to love that particular something that one is uneasy in loving that something, yet loves it, unironically, truly loves it, nonetheless?
Swip...puh...
I don't think there is, no.
What I'm trying to say is that if loving Sifu is SWPL, I don't want to be, um, uh, non-SWPL.
You don't want to be black?
Too bad, M/tch.
Too damn bad.
If he's got a problem with Mischlingstoltz maybe he's afraid he'll have to flip a coin whenever he's thinking of eating shellfish or pork.
Talking food, Bittman has a thing about how pancake mix is the symbol of the decline of cooking skills in America. He's wrong, it's mayo. Making pancakes from scratch is pretty routine, yet most people I've met seem to find the idea of routinely making mayo a stretch, and look at me a bit strangely when I say it's a breeze. It's two to three minutes by hand, less work than pancake batter.
How instantly recognizable is the style of M.F.K. Fisher!
So recognizable, she's still falling!
I remember making fun of 34 years ago. I believe this comment is about --.
I often wonder if there's a word for the feeling of loving something but fretting that it's so damn typical of one's particular station in life to love that particular something that one is uneasy in loving that something, yet loves it, unironically, truly loves it, nonetheless?
"Cultural cringe", perhaps.
BEEF has a recipe for frittata soup.
I gotta cry foul on that one, teraz. pancakes are way easier to make than (admittedly, not so all-fired hard to make) mayonnaise.
this is the sort of NPRish thing my sister likes and i can never get into: its too long and pseudoclever
Making mayo is easier than making pancakes from scratch, and uses ingredients you're more likely to have on hand. Also, the differential enjoyment between homemade and store-bought mayo is greater than that of pancakes.
Aw, pancakes and bachelor cooking reminds me of the single biggest fail of my single life. A girlfriend decided to set me up with a mutual guy friend, in part because he expressed interest, and in part because she was newly affianced and realized she'd never get to score with this guy and wanted me to describe it for her.
The whole event was a disaster from start to finish. He was painfully awkward; I was painfully awkward. Not much occurred other than a night of sleepless frustration and pawing. In the morning, he decides to make pancakes for breakfast.
They are terrible, leaden, miserable things. We are both disgusted. "This has never happened to me before," etc. I get a terrible giggle fit and cannot recover.
Later, friends told me he was mortified and was put off dating for a long time. I thought there was something sort of sweet in it, to have shared the most disastrous date possible. Every single detail had gone wrong. Those pancakes were atrocious. What could I do but laugh? We liked each other, and are friends again now, but laughing, at that particular moment, was apparently a pretty terrible thing to do.
34: As someone who just successfully made mayo for the first time recently, after a series of failures, I'll say mayo is harder than pancakes. (I'm not sure what I did right the last time, but I think it was that the eggs were room temperature and the bowl was warm. Recipes often say that all ingredients should be room temperature, and I usually ignore them -- it's unsettling finding one where that matters.)
43. Another thing is that if you're using a blender (not sure if you call them that), the default speed setting on most models made in the last 10 years is too fast to emulsify properly. Bitter experience.
Another data point: I find pancakes incredibly easy to make - what's to go wrong? You mix, you avoid lumps, mebbe chill it in the fridge a bit before use, easy.
I've had much more inconsistent results with mayo. Although I'm not really a huge mayo fan anyway, so would normally go with shop-bought.
43: If you'd stop going with store-bought eggs and get your own hens, then the eggs would come out just a bit above room temperature.
42: That's a great story, and great stories are a source of pleasure for far longer than fantastic sex or delicious pancakes.
Come to think, could some mayo makers give me oil advice? Extra virgin olive oil, which is what I'd normally use for something I was actually going to eat rather than fry stuff in, tastes too strong in mayo. Do you just use the same tasteless vegetable oil you'd use for frying, or is there something particular? The cookbook I have says 'salad oil', and I don't know what that corresponds to.
"Cultural cringe", perhaps.
Oh yes, that would be a very handy phrase to have on hand. Boy do I have a lot of things to culturally cringe over, but I still just adore them.
Yes, making sure that the eggs are room temperature is key, as is starting off with very small amounts of oil. But other than that there are no tricks. Also no need for food processors or blenders, if you factor in cleaning time you'd be better off using a fork. Add small amounts of oil and whisk them in until you get a mix with the consistency of mayo, then add oil to taste. Add a little bit of something acidic and a small amount of salt and you've got mayo - two to three minutes, that's it.
50: I'm guessing 'something acidic' means lemon juice or vinegar, but I'm with LB in wanting to know what type of oil to use.
I have never made pancakes or mayonnaise.
It is truly a miracle that I was ever able to part with my virginity.
Do you just use the same tasteless vegetable oil you'd use for frying, or is there something particular?
I know one recipe that I used suggested safflower oil, but I don't remember why other than it isn't very strongly flavored. I think neutral tasting is the important part.
LB, for most purposes you want to start off with either a neutral oil or some old faded olive oil (I keep some around just for this purpose). If you use good strong tasting olive oil right from the start, not only is it going to be too strong, there's a risk that you'll get a nasty bitter taste. So even if you want and olivey mayo, only add the strong stuff at the end. But do use at least a little bit of olive oil even if you have no old stuff and are mostly relying on a neutral one, it really brings out the flavour.
For neutral oil, I've sometimes used grapeseed oil, and sunflower oil, and used to also keep a bottle of very very mild olive oil around. Not specifically for mayo, though, just for dressings and marinades and things where I didn't want to use stronger oil.
42: I think you've told that story before. The part about a disastrous date set up by a mutual friend who wanted to sleep with the guy by proxy, at least; the pancakes are a new addition. Not that I mind, of course.
I guess I'll take that as advice: don't make things complicated with cooking breakfast the morning after a date, especially not by getting creative or adventurous.
So, corn oil or 'vegetable' oil is fine as 'neutral' oil? Just the stuff you'd generally buy for frying?
I've used vegetable, grapeseed and canola successfully. Peanut and corn haven't worked out too well.
Wait, we're hating on pancake mixes? Bob's Red Mill and Krusteaz both make a buttermilk pancake mix that's pretty tasty. Although, fuck that "add water" noise. Milk, and an egg or two is the way to go.
56 That depends. To tie two AWB anecdotes together, I had a very nice result with buckwheat crepes with sauteed mushrooms doused with red wine, accompanied by plenty of same. Led to a lovely late morning and afternoon of stuffed boozy fun. Of course the day was pretty much killed otherwise, but oh well.
59: It's not so much that they necessarily make bad pancakes, but they're pointless -- they just don't save that much trouble. Once you've got a go-to recipe, pancakes are just a couple of ingredients to measure, and the whole process takes maybe thirty seconds or a minute more than mixing something wet with the mix. If you like the results, there's nothing wrong with it, but believing that the mix is doing much for you in terms of better results or saving trouble sounds like an indication that you're unfamiliar with cooking.
I haven't read Fisher before, but I'd like to. Any suggestions on a good book to start with?
The Gastronomical Me, maybe? It's a memoir, structured as a bunch of essays rather than one continuous narrative, so you get a picture of her life. All of her writing I'm familiar with is essays, though, which means it doesn't matter so much where you start -- they're all sort of scrappy bits. Maybe not How To Cook A Wolf, which is more practical WWII era tips on cooking economically -- it's still interesting, but in a different way.
they just don't save that much trouble
Sure, unless your kids proclaim that they like buttermilk pancakes best, and buttermilk is one of those ingredients that you never have laying around. I don't actually know if they can taste the difference in taste with buttermilk because I'm too lazy to test them.
Do you just use the same tasteless vegetable oil you'd use for frying, or is there something particular?
If you came from Minorca, where the stuff was invented, you'd use a very light olive oil, which would be one of your "neutral" oils anyway. Not having that around, equal quantities of vegetable oil/canola/whatever and salad grade olive oil seems to work for me. But not extra virgin (or use less than 50%).
Taste taste taste. Let's pretend that second sentence makes sense.
If you have unsweetened yogurt laying around, that substitutes pretty well for buttermilk -- they're both acidy dairy products. You could try that, or keep doing what you're doing, given that it works for you.
By pancakes, btw, I assumed you just meant the usual French style thin things? Flour, egg, water and milk, pinch of salt?
68 to who?
"French style thin things" as opposed to what?
"French style thin things" as opposed to what?
Well, one doesn't make pancakes in a cake pan, so.
68: Nah, Americans mean something leavened when they say pancakes -- they end up maybe 1/3 of an inch thick. The thin French things are crepes.
Also, the differential enjoyment between homemade and store-bought mayo is greater than that of pancakes.
Suggests to me that emdash has never had really good pancakes. The (buttermilk) pancake recipe I use is so good that I can rarely be roused to make anything else for Sunday breakfast. The Bisquick on which I was raised (forgive my mother, she knew not...) created crappy pancakes whose not-right flavor I can unfortunately still recall to this day.
I'm not saying that homemade mayo isn't much better than storebought*; I'm saying that pancake mix is a deeply inferior product, and that the easy alternative is vastly superior.
* Although I eat mayo in 4 contexts: mixed with chicken, tuna or egg on a sandwich; mixed with horseradish on a (roast beef or egg) sandwich; as a dip for crudites; or as sauce for fish. Homemade would be pointless for the former 2, and storebought would never be used for the latter 2. So I'm not really sure what the point of comparison is supposed to be. Hellman's and fresh mayonnaise are different, non-interchangeable things. It's like making your own ketchup for french fries: that might be a tasty, tomato-based dip, but it's not "ketchup," which is something made by Heinz and imitated by others.
70: I am assuming he means "French style thin things" as opposed to the sort of fluffy pancakes that all Americans mean when they say "pancakes". Which would make his advice less useful.
I tend to use a neutral oil (canola, or clear peanut), with a splash of EV olive oil at the end. But I also tend to drop in some dijon mustard and a bit of garlic, too, so the olive oil taste is complementing other strong tastes.
Re pancakes: I've found the easiest thing to do is have a spouse who likes buttermilk pancakes so much that she keeps buttermilk around the house as a staple, and makes pancakes 2-3 times a week. If I could just convince her that it's not too much trouble to cook a little bacon at the same time, I'd be completely set for life. (Not that I'm complaining--I'm a very lucky man as it is, I know.)
Actually, you know what's surprisingly easy to make: buttermilk biscuits (which may actually be better made with yogurt; I can't tell if the yogurt makes the difference or if other factors interfere). The hardest part is cutting the butter into small pieces (before putting them into the food processor). While they bake, clean up and, sometimes, make some sausage gravy. What an amazing breakfast to be able to make for yourself in half an hour.
Southern-style cornbread is even easier, but it's a bit less versatile (to me anyway).
Homemade would be pointless for the former 2
Say what? (He says after happily using a batch for a chicken salad: Things to do with leftover stock stuff)) Huge difference as a spread as well.
It's worth noting that buttermilk keeps pretty well - at least 3 weeks. Probably helps to get it in a plastic jug rather than cardboard carton (better seal, I fancy).
The trick, btw, to great buttermilk pancakes is letting the batter rest 10 minutes between mixing and frying. Lets the rising get underway, plus allows for a bit more hydrolization.
I've occasionally wondered whether sour milk would be good for pancakes. But you can't get it here, my mom likes making them for me back home, and my aunt won't let me into the kitchen in Poland.
The trick, btw, to great buttermilk any kind of pancakes is letting the batter rest 10 minutes between mixing and frying.
Fixed that for you. I generally rest pancake (crepe?) batter for an hour.
76: Eh. I've done it. The flavor was different, but I'm not sure along which axis it was supposed to be better. It certainly tasted less like chicken and more like homemade mayonnaise.
Since I want the horseradish spread to taste like horseradish*, homemade mayo is actively counter to my goal there.
* I'd note that traditional hot roast beef is served with horseradish cream sauce, so a creamy base with a very mild native flavor
61: Yes, the truly convenient option is the microwavable pancakes in the freezer section of your supermarket.
I have a feeling that the demographic for this product does not read Unfogged (I'm the unfortunate exception).
If you're actually making horseradish spread from scratch the homemade mayo would give it a fuller flavour, enhancing rather than hiding the horseradish. Though if you do, hats off, my eyes kill me if I try grating the stuff.
The buckwheat pancake/waffle mix at Trader Joe's is pretty tasty. But I bought it mostly because my cookbooks say you really, really ought to beat egg whites and fold them into your from-scratch batter, and I hate beating egg whites but feel crushing inferiority when I cheat and just dump in the lightly beaten egg. If laziness is going to prevail, why not just go all out?
I saw something online recently that advise one to make your own always-on-hand buttermilk ... pour the last of your purchased cultured buttermilk in a glass jar with some plain milk, leave it out overnight, then keep in the fridge. Intriguing, but past experiences with sourdough starter have made me leery.
Is there another UK term for leavened pancakes, or are they just not a common food item over there?
79: Right, I meant to mention that - AB makes Pfannekuchen (German crepes, a bit thicker), and lets them rest. In fact, we used to mix them up, then take Iris & the dog to the park, then come back and eat. That's too complex for us these days, but anyway.
Do NOT let buttermilk pancakes rest for an hour. They'll be thick as crepes and heavy a lead.
I have a feeling that the demographic for this product does not read Unfogged (I'm the unfortunate exception).
No kidding. Why do you and I even look at the food threads when they inevitably end up by feeling ashamed for probably not being able to recognize a "roux" when we see it?
82: Was really disappointed the only time I tried to grate my own horseradish - I hadn't realized that, straight out of the grater, it doesn't do much (I guess it needs to be in solution?).
I was thinking that fresh horseradish into homemade mayo the same way you do with garlic in aioli would probably be good, but, yeah, way too much effort. I'll just open my two jars....
re: 84
Scotch pancakes, or drop scones, maybe? Assuming we are thinking of the same thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pancake#United_Kingdom
The Bisquick on which I was raised (forgive my mother, she knew not...) created crappy pancakes whose not-right flavor I can unfortunately still recall to this day.
Sometimes I think that taste buds come in an IQ spectrum, and that the Mineshaft has Mensa-esque taste buds.
Like peep and Cryptic Ned, I've got remedial taste IQ.
83: Yeah, beaten whites is kind of the defining characteristic of waffles (or yeasted, which is even less likely to happen). I didn't realize that for a long time, and found waffles to be merely ok.
Actually, yeasted waffles are way easy -- you just have to think of it the night before. Mix the batter, let it sit overnight, mix the eggs in in the morning, and go. Faster in the morning, because most of the work is pre-done.
81, 86, 89: Oh, I talk big, but I don't mind Bisquik pancakes at all. Don't feel bad.
Beating egg whites seems to be a thing I'm remarkably inept at, though it does provide a nice workout.
86, 89: Can it be that I'm not all alone?
But I am without shame. I enjoy playing the bum that just happened to stumble into a fancy restaurant. I do hope I'm not ruining anybody's meal.
Yeah, beaten whites is kind of the defining characteristic of waffles OBAMA'S AMERICA.
92: It's just slow. I did a quick batch of meringues this weekend because I had some whites left over from a yolks-only crepes recipe, and I do the 'count 200 strokes, shake my arm out, count 200 strokes, shake my arm out' routine. They turned out nice, though.
89: I liked them at the time. As time went on, I liked them and other pancakes less and less - I tasted enough other things that Bisquick and diner pancakes alike tasted unpleasant to me, even though I couldn't have pointed you to a better pancake. Betty Crocker's recipe was ok, the one I got from the It's a Wonderful Life Cookbook* was better, then came Cook's Illustrated. And actually, my current recipe is just from this past summer, and puts their old one to shame.
I honestly can't tell you how I became an Insufferable Food Snob**; all I can tell you is that it was some combination of cooking for myself often enough to teach my palate about better and worse outcomes and eating out enough to broaden my palate.
* Written by Zuzu!
** I'm actually not - I like Doritos and Mt. Dew and bar food.
Beating egg whites seems to be a thing I'm remarkably inept at, though it does provide a nice workout.
It's ok to use an electric mixer.
92: I've never successfully beaten an egg white by hand. I love my immersion blender because its single whisk does a beautiful job on small amounts of egg whites or cream. Come to think of it, maybe it would do a good job with mayo. Hmm.
91.1: It's a rare Saturday night when I'm sitting around, wishing I had something to do in the kitchen that wouldn't involve eating on Saturday night.
This is where my combination of extreme cleaning laziness and complete lack thereof for cooking come together into strange results.
Yeah, the immersion blender whisk is the only way I've ever successfully beaten egg whites (copper bowls? cream of tartar? whatever). Can't help but think that the fluffiness of egg whites would get dragged down by buckwheat, though.
100: Yeah, but it's literally three minutes before bed. Flour, milk, melted butter, yeast, stir, slap some saran wrap on the bowl and go to sleep. I have trouble thinking ahead to the next morning's breakfast, but if it crosses your mind, it's no trouble.
And what is your current recipe, jroth?
** I'm actually not - I like Doritos and Mt. Dew and bar food.
Doritos! These are bad breath chips right up there with the party mix things with the fake rye bread chips. I used to love them, but now I know better.
I bring flour, milk, melted butter and yeast to bed with me, in the hope that I might remember to stir and saran-wrap them in my sleep.
89
Like peep and Cryptic Ned, I've got remedial taste IQ.
Same here. Don't cook much and it's simple stuff when I do.
My parents complained about me being a finicky eater as a kid, although in hindsight I have no idea if I was really any worse than most. That changed while I was in France as an exchange student. My palette was broadened by that experience - but not particularly refined.
Here's the waffles I'm talking about, if anyone wants to try them. Very easy, and crazy light and fluffy.
Beating egg whites seems to be a thing I'm remarkably inept at, though it does provide a nice workout.
Copper bowl, large whisk. Takes maybe a minute. Man up, peopoe.
94: I have 8 bit tastebuds, and a preference for simplicity that on heebie's taste ->IQ mapping would put me slightly below fungus. Part of me would like to expand the dynamic range of my taste buds, but I'm put off by a lot of the class crap that goes along with being a foodie.
party mix things with the fake rye bread chips
Wait, what do you mean "fake"? Just because no Jews are involved in the baking of the tiny loaves from which the chips are sliced prior to their careful toasting? Or is there some other form of authenticity I'm missing? Because I love those things.
melted butter
My microwave is too powerful for butter (even on low settings) so I all-too-often end up with exploded butter coating the interior. I am thus leery of melted butter (when I can I throw it in the preheating oven, although this occasionally results in browned butter, not the worst of outcomes).
104: I'll bring it up from the kitchen after lunch. It's fairly standard in ingredients; I'm not sure exactly why it's so good, but it really, really is.
My microwave is too powerful for butter (even on low settings) so I all-too-often end up with exploded butter coating the interior.
Try that in bed!
I honestly can't tell you how I became an Insufferable Food Snob**
On that note, my brother likes to do a fancy waffle breakfast every couple of months. His recipe for waffles begins with grinding his own flour (corn, buckwheat, wheat berries, and I don't remember what else).
It doesn't add more than a couple minutes to preparation time (and scales up easily), and they're the best waffles I've ever had.
Of course that depends on having both a waffle iron and a flour mill on hand, and I have neither.
My microwave is too powerful for butter (even on low settings) so I all-too-often end up with exploded butter coating the interior.
Little pot, stovetop? (Actually, I have the same problem, and just do ten seconds in the mike, check, ten seconds, check, and take it out when there's just a little left unmelted. This sounds troublesome but isn't really.)
We have a tiny pot/measuring cup that works great for butter. I think it holds one cup.
The power setting on your microwave is important. Warm or thaw on low power. Aso, best explosions are from cream cheese.
Also also, microwaving peeps at low power is entertaining.
My high school girlfriend thought it was the grossest thing ever that my mom kept butter in the microwave. Mom didn't actually nuke it, mind, but it was like the little room-temperature butter-storage room.
I'm put off by a lot of the class crap that goes along with being a foodie.
I simultaneously get and don't get this. By any objective standard, I'm a foodie, but I don't like the term (first time I ever heard it was when the editor at my paper was offering the review gig to us, and I instinctively recoiled), and I always feel a bit queasy reading food writing, even though I am, myself, a food writer. The quoted passage put me off a bit, even.
But here I am, snobbing on about Bisquick and having very strong opinions about homemade mayonnaise. I guess my bottom line on food is that it's something I'm engaged with several times a day regardless, and I can't see why I would treat it carelessly (either in selection or preparation). But part of it is (more or less) inborn: I don't actually have an especially sophisticated palate (for the life of me I can't taste the difference between a battery chicken egg and a duck egg from a friend's back yard - true story), but I have an excellent taste memory. Even back in college, when cooking often meant a microwaved baked potato, I would be hit with a sudden food memory/craving for some dish or other. In fact, I still remember - still taste - these meatballs that a family friend made for us (in her fabulous penthouse apt. in Bette Davis' building on E. 51st St.) when I was no more than 6 years old. Tragically, when I asked her about them decades later, she had no recollection of them at all, so I'll never get to eat them again. But I'll always be able to taste them.
115, 116: I'm loath to dirty another pan. But I do kind of covet a nice little butter pan like that.
The crazy thing about my microwave is that it will explode butter that's only half-melted. I really don't understand the mechanism, because it's certainly not every time. If I had a "10 Second" button, I'd do that, but I have to press like 5 keys every time I make the thing go, so screw it.
I meant to say in 119 that the part about "class crap" that I don't get is that paying attention to the food you cook in your own kitchen doesn't have to be wrapped up in class. Or at least, no more so than your choice of underwear or toilet cleanser. The fetishization of ingredients is pretty class-bound, but really good cooking is not: a lot of foodies look down their noses at Cook's Illustrated for its rather old-fashioned, down-home tendencies, but roasting a chicken really well is its own reward, and it's hard to view as snobbish.
Actually, the reward of roasting a chicken really well is eating the chicken.
120: It means your microwave has a 'hot spot' that is getting way more radiation then the rest. Sometimes the hot spot is in the middle of the butter and then you get a big mess. Sometimes the hot spot isn't in the butter or is on the outside of the butter and nothing bad happens.
122: The real reward of roasting a chicken is eating potatoes that get all full of drippy goodness from being below the chicken.
Sometimes the hot spot is on the side of the butter. Sometimes the hot spot opposes the butter. Either way, it goes badly for the butter.
123 is very informative, but sadly unhelpful. At least now I'll be able to mutter, "Stupid hotspot" as I swab out the butter mess.
The real reward for roasting a chicken is the 4 meals you can squeeze out of it, making it quite cost-effective for your carnivorous needs. (To wit: roast chicken right out of the pan/pot, a stir fry, chicken salad, and then chicken noodle soup with the bones and any scrap chicken).
124: My first writing gig was doing recipes for the school paper at CMU. I got it because an editor lived down the hall from me in the dorm and smelled me roasting a chicken with lemon and butter and potatoes in the toaster oven in my dorm room. Great toaster oven. Great recipe (although I only use a fraction of the butter these days - you really don't need a whole stick for a 3.5 lb. bird).
Or you could have roast chicken right out of the oven, cold roast chicken the next day, and maybe some more cold roast chicken again.
but roasting a chicken really well is its own reward, and it's hard to view as snobbish.
Shouldn't be, but is. I mean, it depends on your background -- AWB comes from a family of working class Southern good cooks, so not associating an interest in food with snobbery. But in my family/inlaws/acquaintanceship, cooking at all, rather than warming packaged crap up, is correlated with class, and I'm not talking about high end ingredients or exciting recipes.
I'd like this association to go away, but it's there.
121: There's a divide between foodies who do it because they are attentive to the little pleasures of living life with an eye to making the routine elements pleasurable, and those who do it as part of performing swipple. If I had to come up with a criterion to separate them it'd be the relative emphasis on ingredients vs. equipment, but that's kind of crude. Perhaps a better criterion would be price sensitivity.
129: And then you gnaw on cold roast chicken bones, sucking out every last millicat of marrow.
130: Well, and some people think book-larnin' is correlated with class; we don't bother ourselves with what those people think, do we? At least when we're deciding whether to read People or Pale Fire?
There's a divide between foodies who do it because they are attentive to the little pleasures of living life with an eye to making the routine elements pleasurable, and those who do it as part of performing swipple.
This sentence is pretty hilarious,.
And then you gnaw on cold roast chicken bones, sucking out every last millicat of marrow.
No, then I grind their bones to make my bread.
nosflow: grammar troll, food ogre.
Perhaps a better criterion would be price sensitivity.
Price of what?
I'm not really sure if you can distinguish between "authentic" foodies and performing ones - or at least, not by overt markers. I mentioned ingredient fetishization up above - "Oh, I would never cook with anything but sea salt!" - but to LB's family/etc., distinguishing between the stuff in the green canister and fresh-grated Parmigiano-Regianno is fetishization.
I'm thinking that a good test might be how the person in question prepares herself an egg for a quick weekday breakfast - when no one's around, does she just scramble it up, or does she throw in a couple things lying around to make it better? There's nothing wrong with a plain egg, but a "true" foodie will probably take the extra minute or two to add shallots or half and half or cumin or whatever, while the performative foodie doesn't care enough about what she's eating if no one will know that she's done it.
But that might be complete bullshit.
There's a divide between foodies who do it because they are attentive to the little pleasures of living life with an eye to making the routine elements pleasurable, and those who do it as part of performing swipple. If I had to come up with a criterion to separate them it'd be the relative emphasis on ingredients vs. equipment, but that's kind of crude.
Which is which?
137: Yesterday I made a scrambled egg, and I took the extra minute or two to add leftover macaroni and cheese, some over-sautéed pasillas that I'd left out overnight, and a tablespoon of Cholula. It wasn't good.
There's nothing wrong with a plain egg, but a "true" foodie will probably take the extra minute or two to add shallots or half and half or cumin or whatever, while the performative foodie doesn't care enough about what she's eating if no one will know that she's done it.
On the other hand, perhaps the "true" foodie thinks there's nothing wrong with a plain egg.
137: Well, by that standard, I'm not a foodie. (By pretty much any standard, I'm not a foodie.) I bake because I like to, but I'm not an excitingly skillful cook, and that sort of absent-mindedly optimizing everything I cook for myself is alien to me.
What I think of as the line that is, but shouldn't be, a class marker isn't so much being a foodie, but being someone who thinks that an ordinary meal starts with raw ingredients rather than something bought pre-assembled.
Just today I took some eggs out of the fridge and took the extra time to stare at them for a little while before deciding I didn't want to dirty a pan cooking them and putting them away.
But that might be complete bullshit.
Maybe not "complete," but what you describe sounds like foodie-ism as defined by the Silver Palate Cookbook, which leans heavily on gussying up basic stuff by addition.
I poach my eggs, even when there's no one else around.
I imagine you could break out the origins and emphases of people's foodiness, but I don't think you gain a lot by doing so. You'll probably find someone who learned to cultivate saffron at her grandmother's knee and now bursts with genuine affection for her ingredients and her dinner guests, and one horrible snob who has no taste buds whatsoever but trembles at the thought that people might think she can't yample up a enclousted sea bass with the proper plichette du velamine and Alan wrench. In the middle will be a lot of people who have social reasons for making good food, and enjoy it.
Allen wrench, k-sky. If you really knew the pleasures of gourmandise, you'd have known that.
Yes. The only thing I'm unsure of is whether Alan wrench should be capitalized.
142: Rocky would have known what to do.
Spaghetti and eggs with cholula or pickapeppa rocks. But, to get there from mac+cheese: leave some mac free of cheese. This leftover macacorni, the next morning, sautee it first (olive oil or bacon drippings) until it's hot through. Now add your eggs, scramble. Plate and top with artistic drizzles of sauce. Worcestershire+tamarind is a good combination, hot sauce is OK too. Enjoy.
No more seducing oneself to Edward Woodward.
137, 144: Yes, there are lots of people that are into food but can't be bothered to cook something fancy for themselves. It's not because their love of food is all a performance, it is because their enjoyment of food is social.
Yes, there are lots of people that are into food but can't be bothered to cook something fancy for themselves.
Many of these people are chefs.
152: Few knew that Ed Wood extended his life by multiplying himself by a factor of ward.
But that might be complete bullshit.
But I really like plain eggs! With coarse salt and freshly ground pepper. I don't like milk in eggs much (I prefer mine drier, too moist icks me out), and I like just tasting egg so I usually skip other seasonings.
Then again, I don't really claim to be either kind of a foodie.
Perhaps my class discomfort with certain elements of foodieism is best expressed as a sense that for some the experience of making and consuming food is enhanced by the fact that it's done in a way that is unavailable to the plebs. Requiring expensive kitchen infrastructure, long prep times, and costly ingredients is part of it. Another part of it is looking down on people who don't prefer the fancy route. Snobbery, in other words.
157:
But here inventiveness, confined to a fairy-land reality, must be applied only to garnishings, for the genteel tendency of the magazine precludes it from touching on the real problems concerning food (the real problem is not to have the idea of sticking cherries into a partridge, it is to have the partridge, that is to say, to pay for it).
Barthes was ever good at that business.
158: Equipment -> readily displayed class status. Your stand mixer is a boot on the neck of the proletariat.
157: What I find annoying? socially dysfunctional? something like that? is the imputation of snobbery along the lines you describe for food that's really not much more troublesome and isn't more expensive at all -- where the difference is just skill (and not much skill, just the kind of skill you get from cooking raw food regularly) and attention.
160: My stand mixer has been in the box since we got married.
160: Although you can read it backwards: a competent, non-snobbism based cook is probably going to have a pretty good knife, a reasonable assortment of pots and pans (possibly not made out of anything exciting, but in useful sizes), a decent whisk, and that sort of thing, but might be buying grocery store meat and vegetables rather than anything fancy. While a possible type of snob who's not much of a cook would be someone who only buys produce massaged daily by biodynamic gardeners, but doesn't own a decent cutting board to chop it on.
Trying to have kids, or still in the honeymoon phase?
Sometimes a stand mixer is just a stand mixer.
But a good cigar is a smoke!
162 is true for me, too. My kitchen has neither the counter space nor the outlets for it.
I can't remember the last time I cooked an egg, or how. (Don't tell the Egg Council, they might still be out there watching us.)
161: But that kind of foodie-ism still takes time, which is an incredible luxury these days.
169: I think you sort of missed 161's point. It doesn't take time (or at least, not much more time). LB says you need skill and attention. I think it is more likely to be a matter of organizational ability (i.e you do have to buy more items at the store and, if you don't want it to take more time, you have to be able to set-out the steps in a logical way).
169, 170: And it does take some more time, particularly while you're getting experienced at it. Buck cooks most nights, despite the fact that when we got together I was probably starting from a higher baseline skill level, because he's worked at home and I commute -- if I cooked on weeknights we'd eat very late.
So it's a real problem for some people, but not, I think, for as many people as treat cooking as snobbishly impractical.
161: Right - that's what I mean by a divide: On the one hand you have people squeezing more pleasure out of the same investment of resources, which isn't snobby or class related at all, and on the other you have people who are getting more out of their meal precisely because it requires an investment of resources not available to the plebs. That's still too clean of a division, but hopefully it clarifies what I'm getting at.
163: While a possible type of snob who's not much of a cook would be someone who only buys produce massaged daily by biodynamic gardeners, but doesn't own a decent cutting board to chop it on.
163 seems to get it right, or get one type of food snobbery right. I wouldn't call that being a "foodie" though.
Time out to note that those without a decent cutting board but with, perhaps, superbly sharpened knives, are frustrating as hell. I visited a friend a couple of years ago who was situated in that way; also refused to have a microwave and had no medium-sized pots to speak of, and reheated soup in a skillet. Dude. What are you doing?
It was here that someone explained that food is the new sex, a source of anxiety and personal identity acting-out, which seems about right. That renders attempts to think clearly about anything pretty much impossible and hard to generalize without having biographies of your interlocutors handy, though the endless speculation is entertaining. How long before discussing food becomes as taboo as eating?
I will have leftover pizza for dinner tonight, shared with an eight-year-old. Unfortunately, I do not think that sex is the new food, since I have only poured coffee for the cutie who works on the floor above me.
170, 171: You can substitute skill, experience, attention and organizing ability for time, but only if you have these things.
For me, the time to cook will always be a luxury, because I have the organizational ability and attention span of a caffeinated 5 year old.
Of course there is aestheticism in my cooking. It is really freakishly selfish and weird to spend the time and energy I've spent making a soup for myself. I spent a lot less money making that soup than I would have spent getting even mediocre take-out, but that's exactly what's so infuriating about it. I'm not money-bourgeois; I'm time-and-energy-bourgeois. I spend my time and energy doing things for myself not because of my health or even to show off to other people; I do them merely to give myself pleasure. Spending all day making myself a perfect soup is pretty equivalent to taking an entire day to masturbate.
I used to only cook nice things when other people were involved. That can be nice (food as gift) or it can be obnoxious (food as showoff). But since then I've learned how to be totally 100% selfish about my cooking if I have the time and want to do something relaxing all day. That's worse than being swipple. It's practically satanic.
I'm time-and-energy-bourgeois. I spend my time and energy doing things for myself not because of my health or even to show off to other people; I do them merely to give myself pleasure.
Why is that infuriating?
that food is the new sex
If it is, then bacon is for furries whatever other fetishes leave you clothed.
178 is missing a conjunction. I'm very sorry ashamed.
It's a different kind of privilege. If I bragged about going to some wildly expensive restaurant every night on Facebook, people would rightly (I think) be pissed at me for flinging my wealth in their faces. Instead, I'm bragging about taking the time to make myself food. Given how many friends I have who seriously do not have the time or energy, usually due to enkidulation, it's something I've become more sensitive to. OTOH, they're the ones who get adorable died corn cernle resapies.
That's worse than being swipple. It's practically satanic.
Good grief, AWB. It is not.
time, which is an incredible luxury these days.
I'm just going to go ahead and play the "food stamps" card here, and note that, actually, income is an incredible luxury these days. For instance, in August I had plenty of time - we spent 3 days at Lake Erie - but what I lacked was, you know, money (my credit card limits, let me show you them). In fact, I had time, when we returned, to carefully concoct meals for 3 nights out of leftovers and pantry staples because our account wouldn't be refilled until the 7th and we didn't have the money to buy a head of lettuce.
As I think I've noted here before, $500/month covers ~95% of our monthly groceries, and we do, in fact, eat like "foodies" on that budget. Before we went on the dole, I always found the insinuation that eating well was snobbish to be annoying, but now that I'm living the dream, I find it makes me angry. No one has to make eating well* a priority, but it's a choice, one that's available to all but the most poverty-stricken. I would never judge a poor mother for failing to make it a priority, but I'm extremely annoyed at the upper middle class types who treat it as nothing more but another status marker.
* defined as you wish
180: "enkidulation" -- did you just make that up, AWB? I like it!
182: Exactly. I'm not sure what sorts of unspeakable joys you becoupled cohabitators revel in that can possibly match the luxury of doing whatever I want all the time.
Spending all day making myself a perfect soup is pretty equivalent to taking an entire day to masturbate.
Or, you know, watching TV. Most single people spend comparable amounts of time amusing themselves -- you just do it in the kitchen rather than on the couch.
friends I have who seriously do not have the time or energy, usually due to enkidulation
I think it goes without saying what my reaction to this is.
181: Along with food, AWB's other great pleasure is exaggerating her sinfulness.
185: I'm not seeing how this is a bad thing. And what LB says in 186: how is cooking for yourself a greater sign of privilege than, say, watching a football game?
186: Wasn't this Clay Shirky's point, linked here the other day? People are all, "oh, there's no time for anything these days - people who have time to do things they want to do must be insufferab- ooh, "House" is on!"
This isn't actually "I don't even have a TV" - the point applies to other diversions as well - but people seem to think that cooking in particular must be carved out of, I dunno, working or child-rearing, because all of the other stupid bullshit we waste time on (hi, Mineshaft) must remain inviolate.
I certainly don't think it's a bad thing. If I want to do things with other people, I leave my apartment.
I think people are protesting too much. Of course the kind of interest in food on display here is a class marker. Not necessarily class in terms of income, but a clear socio-cultural signifier nonetheless. And? We are who we are. Is occasionally choosing to see a museum exhibit rather than watch a game or blow twenty bucks on a bottle of wine rather than on beers at a bar such a horrible thing? Sacrificing decent furniture and nice appliances in favour of good ingredients might seem a strange choice to some, and is an indicator of class, but it's not necessarily snobbery. It only becomes so if it is seen as a sign of superiority. And I guess that's it, since home cooking is something people take pride in. Its a skill honed by countless hours of work and which provides wonderful tangible results, and the line between pride at that and social snobbery can once in a while seem a bit blurry.
I think it goes without saying what my reaction to this is.
You call up your buddy Gilgamesh and go hunting?
That said, I share your attitude to a certain extent. I've just started a diabetes education program, and the nurse who did my intake told me I'd be the model student, since I've managed to lose a ton of weight and go off (with my doctor's blessing) my medication. I'm a little skeptical; what am I going to say to the other students, "Spend 2 hours in the gym 5 times a week and you too can control your blood sugar!"? I'm well aware that having the time to do that is a luxury that not many people have.
185: Uh, so AWB* is feeling guilty/shameful for remaining single. I hear you, for what it's worth.
* Sorry to speak of you in the third person.
Speaking of TV and exercise (not that anybody has put them together in this thread yet), has anybody played the sword-fighty thing in the new Wii sports package? I'm very curious. I was going to take a fencing class, but this would involve fewer trips to repurposed warehouses.
193: You're right -- I guess it just bothers me because it seems like an economical and healthy source of pleasure that people are culturally shut out of because they think of it as class-inappropriate.
"an entire day masturbating"
Among us males that's known as an age signifier.
Come on, people. 194 was clever. Make with the approbation.
I've never even been on probation.
On melting butter: Metal measuring cups make fine vessels for melting small amounts of butter on the stovetop, as I reminded myself when I made pancakes (of course!) this weekend and needed all of one tablespoon of melted butter. The 1/4c one was about right.
198: People lifestyle-police themselves far too much.
(/obviousman)
I used to only cook nice things when other people were involved. That can be nice (food as gift) or it can be obnoxious (food as showoff).
Isn't it always a bit of both? Again, committed cooks always take pride in their successful creations.
200: Now that I go back and stare at it with my head tilted to one side for thirty seconds, it was clever. Whizzed right by me on a first reading, though.
Speaking of class markers, one of the things I don't think I'll ever come to terms with in the US is the degree to which an interest in skiing is seen as such. The maddening thing is that it makes sense: skiing here is genuinely a very expensive hobby. But coming from a background where it was easily accessible to all but the seriously poor, and where it was pretty much universal (literally mandatory in fact for public school students), plus one of my favorite things in life, it just bugs me.
206: Oh I know -- when I first left the upper midwest and realized that curling and eating bratwurst were stigmatized as snobbish and elite activities everywhere else I was truly taken aback. I was so distraught that I had to call my analyst that very minute.
207: Or when I left the middle midwest and realized that none of the people I was meeting owned hundreds of acres.
curling and eating bratwurst
You know, I think you should eat your bratwurst straight, the way it comes from the store, rather than fancying it up first. That's why people think you're a snob.
The worst part was learning that everybody was too poor to have a favorite Big 12 football team.
207 Or when you left the middle Midwest and moved to the big city and realized that a love of open spaces was seen as a sign of wealth.
207: Jesus, Natilo. Curling? I suppose the select few go for it.
But, um, you know that teraz grew up in Poland, right? At least I think so.
211: I still get a constrained feeling from being surrounded on all sides, be it structures, people, or trees around me. I loath being surrounded by cars, but I don't think that is unique enough to reflect any specific upbringing.
211: In the big city, a love of open spaces is seen as provincial.
to taking an entire day to masturbate.
Suddenly sounds appealing. "Dear everyone else: I have moved the computer next to the tub, and will not be talking with any of you for 24 hrs."
I'd like to register a third plane for measuring foodieism--technique. Equipment infrastructure is great and all (I have the knives, the Le Creuset and All Clad, Stand Mixer et alia). But I made a phenomenal pork stew at a cabin with little more equipment than a cast iron dutch oven, a shitty knife, and a crockpot. Because I knew the relevant techniques for optimizing the ingredients on hand (pork shoulder, some bacon, whole black peppercorns and salt, assorted root veggies, and some beer), it really was fantastic (I'm not just patting myself on the back here--a buddy described it to others as "literally the best stew I've ever had). (Of course, the investment in time I've put into learning how to cook probably rivals at least a bachelor's degree of effort over the years).
In the capital, wanting to live in the provinces is seen as provincial.
214: I will never be able to live in a hilly area, much less mountains, and Manhattan makes me claustrophobic. Land should be flat, and everything should be laid out in grids. Damnit.
220: The lack of a grid fucks with my head. Once I leave my usual haunts, I get lost so easily. No matter how many times it gets me lost, I cannot stop my brain from assuming that all streets form a grid.
Huh, maybe that's one of the reasons behind my love of NYC. If you can't be surrounded by big jagged mountains at least you can have buildings.
That's what the pigeons are doing here.
The thing about spending a couple of hours making soup for one person is that you then have soup available for the next week. Right now I am alternating meals between a giant pot of split-pea soup (with the remains of that giant pork half-shoulder I roasted a week ago), a giant vat of pumpkin soup, and a giant pot of rice pudding. The freezer helps, of course.
I'm born and raised in Manhattan, but I find open spaces attractive and pleasant. My only issue is that I need a decent sized body of water somewhere close enough that I can orient myself by it. Coasts, fine. Cities on a big river, fine. Great Lakes, fine. The middle of a big piece of land? Disturbingly claustrophobic and weird.
What bugs me about the quoted passage, though clever, is its unending condescension, especially about minor details. Everything means something, including the exact temperature of every dish, and no matter how good everything else is, it's the one wrong detail that is fixated on. In fact, it's not even good enough that the meal was great, but that it was the wrong meal for the weather.
It is this form of fetishization - the finding of meaning and worth in the most minute details - that is the most obnoxious to me, far more than those of time and money that were discussed earlier.
226: That's only true for a couple of major US cities though. Almost everything is by a big lake, major river or ocean.
212: Actually, I'm only partly a midwest partisan, Parsimon. I like Mpls., of course, and Chicago's okay, and Madison is pretty nice, but most of the other cities are kinda lousy, and you only get really pretty countryside about 35% of the time. I'd move to Maine in a second if there was any work out there. And I wouldn't rule out moving to a big coastal city at some point, even though I have neither plans nor the wherewithal to do so now.
227: I can get being annoyed by that -- Fisher is very much a 'total attention to minute details' kind of person, and if you're not, you're going to think she's a manaical fussbudget -- but how is that condescension?
In fact, it's not even good enough that the meal was great, but that it was the wrong meal for the weather.
Heavy, hot, rich food in hot, stultifying weather is not a great meal.
Almost everything is by a big lake, major river or ocean.
True. I identified this as a problem when driving from Nashville to Fort Knox, and remembered it as the same feeling I'd once had driving to Iowa City. But most of the interesting places in the world are close enough to the water that I'm fine.
& if you're trying to seduce a married woman, for god's sake, do it right! It doesn't matter if she's married to you.
I've always found even non-hilly coastlines a bit eerie, not necessarily in a bad way but a little wrong. Talking claustrophobia, those days when the mist comes in low in NYC, there's a damp chill in the air, the buildings are all cut off and you feel like you're in a dark blurry tunnel, make me feel nice and happy. It's like the big city just turned into an Alpine valley.
231: Iowa City to Omaha is one of the most mind-numbing stretches of road ever.
Trader Joe's Buttermilk pancake mix is good stuff.
234: It's got nothing on I-80 the width of Nevada.
trees around me
I was in my 30s before I realized that I'd lived in a forest pretty much my entire life and felt weirdly exposed and vulnerable in big open spaces like the Southwest.
Re: MFK Fisher. There's a collection of a bunch of her works called The Art of Eating. The very beginning about the history of cuisine kind of sucks.
parsimon, what do you mean by a decent cutting board? Do I need to be anxious abou tmy plastic ones that I can put in the dishwasher?
Jesus, how do you poach your eggs? Do you have a special poacher? I once saw some sort of microwave contraption. We tried to do them, but it was a lot of work, and the results weren't great.
You can substitute skill, experience, attention and organizing ability for time, but only if you have these things.
This is really awesome, rob. I would love some more organizing ability. Maybe I could put it on my Christmas list.
Iowa City to Omaha is one of the most mind-numbing stretches of road ever.
Improbably enough, I did this (in reverse) on a one-day drive from Denver to Chicago. Actually, I think I got BOGF to take the wheel for the first 1-2 hours, but then she started to fade, and I had to rely on every trick in the book to keep awake until 2 am or whenever. But anyway, my mind was numb before I got there, and it was pretty much dark, so I can't say much. Although I vote for more or less any road in Kansas as being epically stultifying.
Do I need to be anxious abou tmy plastic ones that I can put in the dishwasher?
Not if you mean those sort of soft ones (not flexible, but they seem to be the same sort of plastic as milk jugs). "Bad" cutting boards are glass or Corian or similar materials that are unforgiving to knife edges. People think they look nice, but they're hell on knives.
Speaking of class markers, one of the things I don't think I'll ever come to terms with in the US is the degree to which an interest in skiing is seen as such.
You could move to Salt Lake. Still pretty accessible here.
You know, to do 35 minutes of cardio with 5 minutes of cool-down takes me about 2 hours with stretching and the bus trip.
Doing weights takes longer, and I have to be careful of the bus schedule. I am trying to be more consistent about exercise and to go maybe 4 times per week--6 days/week would be awesome, not because I want to be super-intense, but because the routine would be good. But the problem is that I feel great for a bit, but then I get really tired. If I exercise too often or in the morning, I'll probably want to take a 2 hour nap in the afternoon, and 4 hours is a lot of time.
242: They're not glass, and they have a bit of give. One's white and the other's teal.
You know, to do 35 minutes of cardio with 5 minutes of cool-down takes me about 2 hours with stretching and the bus trip.
Technically, you can exercise in a room.
I would love some more organizing ability. Maybe I could put it on my Christmas list.
You should come with us to see the Wizard!
But I won't exercise at home. I want to get stronger, and we have no space for free weights.
I hate that it is pitch black right now. I think that the change of seasons is giving me headaches.
246: You don't have to "worry" about those, but they tend not to last very long. They get pretty deeply knife-gouged in a couple of years, and then they risk harboring food/bacteria. I also find them less pleasant to slice on than a decent wood or bamboo cutting board, but that's a matter of preference.
adding a tbs or two of lemon juice to your milk gives a pretty similar taste to buttermilk. i think pretty much any pancake is a bit better with a somewhat low pH.
i usually mix up pancake mix, but thats because i grind up some oat flour and its a bit easier to add the dry stuff all at once.
One's white and the other's teal.
Oh, no, sorry. Teal's no good. White is fine.
adding a tbs or two of lemon juice to your milk gives a pretty similar taste to buttermilk.
Our blueberry pancake recipe uses this trick, and I always think, "Wait, do I have any lemons?" before realizing that I don't need lemons, because I have buttermilk on hand.
"When Life hands you lemons, make your milk into buttermilk."
239, 242: Do I need to be anxious abou tmy plastic ones that I can put in the dishwasher?
Not if you mean those sort of soft ones (not flexible, but they seem to be the same sort of plastic as milk jugs).
I'm not a fan of the (usually milky white) plastic ones; they always seem to be full of cut-marks which sometimes are browning, and the edges of the cut-marks have become rough, so you feel you have to scrub the thing fully rather than just wiping it down. Of course, I'm sure my wood cutting board is full of small cut-marks too, but I can't see them, and it still seems pretty smooth.
227: But you have to admit that this is a great line:
I almost always found that since my host knew I was aware of the situation, he was more relaxed and philosophical about its very improbable outcome and could listen to the phonograph records and savor his cautiously concocted Martini with more inner calm.
And I believe I have made this mistake before, having been unable to repress my natural curiosity:
Tact and honest common sense forbid any woman's penetrating with mistaken kindliness into the kitchen: motherliness is unthinkable in such a situation, and romance would wither on the culinary threshold and be buried forever beneath its confusion of used pots and spoons.
In general, the voice adopted in the OP's quoted passage strikes me more as deeply fond, somewhat teasing. I could easily see it getting out of control, though.
& if you're trying to seduce a married woman, for god's sake, do it right! It doesn't matter if she's married to you.
Of course. I would just rather seduce married women who aren't likely to discount the whole affair because I served them salad on a rainy day, and really, doesn't everyone know that salad on a rainy day is just evocative of far too much green?
Which answers LB's question. It's not the attention to details, it's the tone that says "anyone who doesn't attend to these details, or worse, doesn't understand them, is a total idiot/uncouth person."
Then again, you can't have snark without mocking someone, and it least she's mocking people who have brought it on themselves.
Thanks, LB and BG. I just got Gastronomical Me, one of the books that makes up The Art of Eating.
Further to 256:
Moreover! I recall few to no seduction meals that followed the pattern of the quoted passages. Hrm. There were times a man made a meal, yes, but he either welcomed my participation in the kitchen [which is best for play and interplay], or he was just making us some food which had no pretense to being fancy.
There was the one the guy made after picking me up at the airport, which proposed to be raw tofu tossed with spaghetti sauce and spaghetti. I nixed that in advance. Was I wrong to do that?
There was, I admit, the amazing vegan thanksgiving meal prepared and served to me by a guy at his place. Man. That was fantastic. Stewed apples and raisins for dessert; we went for a walk afterwards. I was told later by friends that that was supposed to be a date, and I was astounded. No it wasn't! Yes. It was.
It's not the attention to details, it's the tone that says "anyone who doesn't attend to these details, or worse, doesn't understand them, is a total idiot/uncouth person."
I don't get that impression at all—the whole thing comes off much too light-hearted for any of that—and anyway it is true that should one wish to seduce MFK Fisher, one might want to pay attention to one's cooking, and I think that's entirely reasonable. Nor do I think she what she said about the sweet-liqueur would-be seducer was out of order: he evidently hadn't bothered to attempt to discern her tastes.
It occurs to me that a flaw in this discussion is a failure to distinguish between inherently elitist class markers (fast cars, large houses) and functionally elitist class markers (lit-a-chur, scratch cooking). I'm certainly not the first to note that "makes her own biscuits" has not, traditionally, been viewed as synonymous with "member of socio-economic elite." There are variety of reasons that it has come to do so (some relating to ancient anti-cosmopolitan strains), but it's silly to act as if scratch cooking is inherently an activity available only to a privileged elite. The introduction of expensive equipment and name-brand (yet non-corporate!) ingredients are related to a social process, but should not be mistaken for the thing itself, which is a pretty traditional and accessible activity.
I certainly always cooked as part of seduction - when I wanted to invite a girl who was just more than an acquaintance to my junior prom, I sent my parents out of the house and made shrimp curry (per my father's crummy '70s-vintage recipe). I can tell you exactly what I made the first time I cooked for AB (impromptu, incidentally) and the first time she stayed over (rather more intentional).
But I also cooked for friends - in college I invited a bunch of people over to my dorm's basement (where the kitchen was) for a potluck Easter dinner, with me providing roast chicken (one year) and ham (the next).
Okay, so I re-read it and you have a point. It's light and complimentary and fond in most parts.
I will still stand by the condescending thing, though, because all of the compliments and fondnesses all have the undercurrent of "I know what you're trying to do, and it's really cute that you're trying so hard." It's a cynical appreciation, but I suppose it's no less an appreciation than one that is less well-informed.
Scratch-cooking of even quite elaborate foods was the norm in my house growing up, and I'd imagine that's typical for almost everyone older than a certain age [and I'm a child of the 70s, so hardly ancient]. Our house was emphatically not an elitist one.
I can tell you exactly what I made the first time I cooked for AB (impromptu, incidentally) and the first time she stayed over (rather more intentional).
What did you put in the curry?
The tell is talking about it. Cook with great ingredients and equipment all you want. Tell anyone, especially with adjectives: you're a foodie.
Watch and read about baseball all you want. Tell anyone, especially with adjectives: you're George Will.
Not that there's anything wrong with it.
As promised to Neb:
2 C. flour
2 T sugar
1/2 t salt
1 t baking pdr
1/2 t baking soda (key for browning as well as rise)
2 C buttermilk
1/4 C sour cream (secret ingredient!)
2 eggs
3 T melted butter (unsalted; if not, use just 1/4 t of salt)
whisk dry ingredients, wet ingredients separately. gently stir wet into dry. Let sit 10 minutes. Lightly oiled pan, medium heat, cook. Delicious.
3 T melted butter (unsalted; if not, use just 1/4 t of salt)
Now I want to smack everybody who has given me a recipe calling for both unsalted butter and salt and not included the trade-off.
May the gods smile on all your endeavors, JRoth.
266: The meal de grace, if you will, was sauteed bay scallops, but it didn't work out at all - they were "wet" scallops, meaning treated with a chemical, and they exuded liquid faster than I could cook it off, so they didn't cook right. I was, of course, frustrated, yet somehow it didn't matter. Must be a lesson in there, but I can't figure out what....
[Right now, I can hear Iris sounding out a word in bed - can't quite tell what, nor why. No wait, it's 'starve.' That's weird - we fed her just the other night.]
I roasted the fuck out of a chicken tonight. Holy crap. I roasted that fucker up right.
Woo!
278: What, like, stood there hurling insults at an actual chicken? That's odd behavior, Sifu. Chickens don't understand English.
275: I should be clear that that's an estimate; off the top of my head I don't recall the exact ratio. But better a little much salt than too scant, I think (not like you can - or would anyway - add it at the table).
This was almost certainly a Portuguese-understanding chicken.
234: It's got nothing on I-80 the width of Nevada.
It's got nothing on Amtrak across the width of Nevada. Usually a lot of that is done in the night when people are asleep, but when I went through the first time we were three hours late because there was ice on the tracks west of Salt Lake and they held us at the station while crews went out to remove it manually.
I didn't have a watch, so when I woke up around sunrise I had no idea which part of Nevada we were in, or how late we were, until we finally reached Elko, where we had been scheduled to stop at around 4 in the morning.
I know I could just look this up, but how did Luso- become a prefix signifying Portuguese?
VdV -> VsV in that region, and they were known as great players of games.
Or maybe it has to do with Lusitania.
You make the call!
I don't recall having mentioned the HMS Lusitania.
If anyone's still interested, if anyone ever was, in access to dissertations, this doesn't sound like much improvement, but this is probably a good sign.
There was a discussion somewhere in the archives not all that long ago, relatively speaking, about open access to academic stuff. I suppose I could have used those >| symbols.
Jesus, how do you poach your eggs?
O hai, I missed this earlier because I had to, among other things, roast a chicken. Anyway, it's basically just cracking an egg into hot water. The fine print: the water should be just barely simmering (bring it to a boil, then reduce the heat just to the point of stillness). Salt and vinegar (wild guess, a teaspoon of each in a quart or two of water*) will help coagulate the outer bit of the white quickly, so the egg stays together, and keep it floating, so it doesn't sit on the bottom and stick to the pan (this allows me to poach in about an inch and a half of water). Use fresh eggs, and carefullycarefully crack them into the water. That's really all there is to it; people like to be fussy about poaching for some reason, but it's about as basic a technique as there is.
*You can also poach in stock, wine, milk or other liquids, in which case you'd want to adjust the salt and vinegar.
226: The middle of a big piece of land? Disturbingly claustrophobic and weird.
I like oceans and water in general, but I am the reverse. Not being a boat person I feel like a coast limits my avenues of movement/escape. In particular I have had more occasion to be out on Long Island* than I ever would have imagined and I always feel vaguely trapped out there (one of the last times we were there, I insisted on taking the Greenport - New London ferry--I think just to prove to myself it was a viable option).
*And actually one time we happened to be way out on the end for the Pleiades (early August) and somewhat to LB's point the skies were very good for the meteorites. Much darker than the amount of development on the land had led me to expect, but of course I was not taking into account the vast tracts of surrounding lightless "wilderness".
Oh yeah—somewhere between 3 and 4 minutes ought to be enough cooking time. You can check for desired doneness by poking the side of the yolk; I've learned to err on the underdone side. These, for example, were overdone, because I was fussing with the stupid camera.
I like 194. And "enkidulation", in the first place.
new eggs are really important for poachcing: the older they get, the looser the albumin is, and more tentacle-monstery the result is. i think tall pans are best, you get a longer trip to the bottom and more chance to coagulate
you want about 1/2 tbs vinegar and 1 tbs of salt per quart if you want to do the floating trick
I've found microwaves and a glass work reasonably well.
291 I just found the sequence amusing.
I have no desire to read this whole thread, although there seems to be some interesting stuff interspersed with the inevitable arguments over the swippleness of cooking or whatever, but I second 295.
On the "most stultifying drive" subject, I vote for El Paso to San Antonio. There's some nice scenery, but that is a looooong six hundred miles.
Traveling for 24 hours on a bus in Chile is probably my worst road trip, both for the time and the fact that the Atacama is motherfucking dry. Lovely once you get to San Pedro, though.
What about great drives? Driving through West Virginia is anything but boring, scenery-wise.
Chaco to Albuquerque got to be a bit dull for me after a few dozen times, but aside from that it's a great drive with some spectacular scenery. Actually, most of the best scenery's on 550, so Albuquerque to Farmington or Durango is really nice too.
Also Blanding to Kanab, but I feel like the awesomeness of the scenery in southern Utah is something of a cliche at this point. Definitely worth driving if you haven't, though.
The train through West Virginia, both routes I've taken, has been very interesting. Although the lower river route has the drawback of lots of train routes along narrowish waterways - you can never see past the valley/canyon walls.
On driving: I-5 out of the LA basin and through the Central Valley can get pretty dull especially around Sacramento but north of Redding until partway through Oregon it's quite beautiful. Then it's still nice, but not quite as beautiful until about southern Washington.
In the west I'd say that spectacular drives are more the rule than the exception, in general.
From a non driver's POV, the Californian coast just south of SF was surprisingly stunning. The ride up the Maine coast is also very nice. Bus trips - any long one is going to suck. My worst was from Warsaw to Geneva through Lyon with border delays and no functioning toilet in a packed bus. Miserable, thank god for the rise of discount airlines in Europe.
I took the bus from Warsaw to Vilnius in 2001. I enjoyed it, but probably more for the novelty than anything else. My favorite part was when the bus driver pulled into oncoming traffic to try to pass someone while going through a village, then swerved back into the right lane, and then onto the shoulder, then got ticketed, then got back into the bus, looked at the ticket, shrugged, and drove off. We arrived an hour ahead of schedule.
299: Yes, not much along that road, but I find that kind of stretch far more palatable than say, St. Louis to Columbus, Ohio.
300.2: Yes, hard to go wrong in the west. Beartooth Pass (NE entrance to Yellowstone), posted here before, Taos - Chama NM. and Owens Valley to Death Valley across the Panamints are a few of my favorites. For Highway 1, I'll go with Bodega Bay to north of Fort Bragg. In Washington, Highway 2/Stevens Pass and 20 -- the North Cascades Hwy. They're all freaking nice. Sulk. Pout.
Back East, a recent drive that I knew would be nice, but greatly exceeded expectations was from Duluth up to the Canadian border along Lake Superior. ( A couple of scenes from along the way.)
I find that kind of stretch far more palatable than say, St. Louis to Columbus, Ohio.
The difference, though, is that on stretches like that there'll be a town every few miles where you can stop for a snack or something. West Texas, not so much.
307.3: Beautiful. I've wanted to go up there since I was a kid...some day! (Maybe when I get that job in North Dakota.)
The area around Four Corners is nice. Example.
309: Yeah, and a number of nice waterfalls right along the road.
310: Yes, but really part of the whole southern Utah is awesome. My favorite town there is Bluff, further downstream on the San Juan, with great drives in all directions.
I've actually never been to Bluff (that I know of). I've heard a lot of good things about it, though.
314: Who ever told you that may have been, well, you know.
OT: You know what's super-cute? Everyone in the department I teach gave a little talk to advertise their classes next semester to students, and when I got up, there were four or five audible w00ts. It was adorable. The department does not have a TT job for me, but no matter; I am loved.
315: Yes, well, maybe you should take it up with JP. Shifty fellow, that one.
316: That's adorable.
302: How do you get from Blanding to Kanab? Down into Arizona?
I love the drive from Kanab to I-70, up Highway 89. And I love the routes through the Fishlake National Forest and the Dixie National Forest.
How do you get from Blanding to Kanab? Down into Arizona?
That's one way, but the way I was thinking of was going north through Capitol Reef.
Fishlake National Forest
Sounds like they had some trouble figuring out just what natural features to promote there.
Also in southern Utah: Dixie National Forest.
Yes, I was concentrating on bits of southwest Utah that I like. If you ask me to name my favorite drives, I'll be here all night, listing off every favorite highway and county road.
Huh, I totally missed that you'd mentioned Dixie in 318. WTF is up with me in this thread?
322: Brought to you by the National Park Service's Office of Dicking with People's Expectations (NPS-ODPE). If you have more time in Utah, please see the Lake Michigan National Desert.
I hope there's a Desert Alkali Flat Wild and Scenic River out there somewhere.
312: How far away from that sign is the colorful part?
325: Mobihikku up late! Apparently the St. George area is know as Utah's Dixie (rather than New Dixie so as to not upset the denizens of Old Dixie).
I spent most of my visit to Utah exploring the Okeechobee Glacier Dunes.
See, it's southern Utah. Also they grow cotton there.
How far away from that sign is the colorful part?
Thirty miles or so, I'd guess. They have signs exactly like that at every entry point to the state. It's more appropriate at some than at others.
Do old times there tend to be forgotten?
332: Pretty much, yeah. St. George looks and feels like a miniature Phoenix.
33: Worst franchise-move non-name change ever. LA Lakers a close 2nd but no one even notices anymore. Arizona Cardinals are a bit off as well.
Oops, forgot a digit, guess which one and win a prize.
All those grizzlies in Memphis, however, make that name appropriate.
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Holy crap, does my head hurt, and I can't sleep. Wisdom tooth out is not making it better. And why the fuck did I go to work today?
|>
"Arizona Cardinals" is annoying because it's the only NFL city where they could actually have changed the name to a locally distinctive relative of the cardinal.
Now how the hell did you know that, Ned?
337: Forgot that one. At least it's not the Memphis Canucks. There's probably some other howlers out there.
340: Next thing you know he'll be spouting osso buco recipes.
340: What kind of person doesn't know that? I swear, it's hard to understand a world where birdwatching is considered an elitist activity.
Does anyone have recommendations for sharpening binoculars?
You have to season them in neat's-foot oil for at least two weeks before using them. I recommend burying them in your compost heap, unless you're lucky enough to live in a place with an artisanal binocular compost coöp.
344: Turn the little focus thingy.
My mom's been getting into birdwatching lately. I find it... odd. My approach to ornithology has always been oriented toward learning exactly enough about birds to avoid them as much as possible.
artisanal binocular compost coöp
I think you mean "coop." The role of the chickens is key.
345: Aged neat's-foot oil. I keep some around just for that purpose.
Taking up birdwatching at an advanced age is tough; becoming familiar with each bird's jizz is kind of an intuitive thing.
Overall worst team names ever are found in the Arena Football. They saw how well buttmunch names worked for the MLS and took it one step farther: One division consists of the Rush, the Crush, the Rampage and the Brigade. (Of course no on cares.)
I like the European soccer club names, like Nintendo or Carlsberg, or--wait, those aren't team names on the jerseys?
The Fly Emirates are my favorite. So imaginative.
'arizona cardinals' just reminds me of those subdivisions like 'elm brook' that connect the soulless place to whatever it replaced
There was the Tennessee Oilers for two seasons before they changed to the Titans.
Are primaeval gods a natural resource in TN?
Spend a weekend on Beale Street, yoyo.
There was the Tennessee Oilers for two seasons before they changed to the Titans.
Like the Houston Oilers?
When I was in grad school, our IM soccer team was called The Eulers, because we're funny like that. For my current IM team, I explained the joke to the undergrads. Later, when we got the schedule, I found out that our team name is The Oilers. So the joke was sort of lost on them.
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No more masturbating to Marissa MasseyKen Ober (OK, that should be easier).
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The Houston Oilers moved to Tennessee and were the Tennessee Oilers for two seasons.
Yeah. The weirder one though, is that the Baltimore Ravens used to be the Cleveland Browns, but weren't allowed to take the name with them to Baltimore when they moved in '96. Then the NFL gave Cleveland an expansion team called the Browns.
I prefer that model, really.
So the joke was sort of lost on them.
I don't know how you get out of bed on teaching days, heebs.
I prefer that model, really.
Me too. Wouldn't it make more sense for the current St. Louis team to be the Cardinals, for LA to have the Rams in cold storage, and for Arizona's team to be [insert offensive-to-teo Southwest joke here]?
I prefer that model, really.
I agree, but remain glad that the absurdist "Utah Jazz" exists.
Arizona's team should be the Rattlesnakes, and they could sell branded noisemakers at the stadium. I still have to pause and think before I place the Colts in Indianapolis.
Arizona's team to be [insert offensive-to-teo Southwest joke here]?
The Arizona Fry Breads?
The Arizona Lush Grass Yards?
The Arizona Don't-Call-Me-Anisazi's?
The Arizona Scary Birds?
No, the New York Highlanders (or whatever it is they call themselves nowadays) should have remained Orioles. Who can dislike an oriole?
The Snorioles slept through the game.
The Implorioles kept stopping and questioning all the plays.
The Borioles question Heebie's joke-repetitiveness.
While the Morioles asked her to keep at it.
I think there might be a Quarriole!
The Glorioles are one H from BJs.
If Fairbanks had a team, they could be the AuroraBoreoles.
366: Arizona's team should be the Rattlesnakes
Or maybe something more specific like the Diamondbacks.
I'm feeling good about the Arkham Ichorioles this season.
Everything is A-OK, here on the Hunky-Dorioles.
379: Oh, right [slap forehead]. They became a team well after I quit paying attention to baseball.
Would we ever hear condemnations of Sororiole Imperialism? We would not.
The Glorioles are one H from BJs.
But not the Whorioles.
The Arizona Chuckwallas would be genuinely awesome.
What are the Worioles good for? Absolutely nothing.
Japan's jumping on the whole name-teams-for-native-species bandwagon with the Tranzorioles.
You know what's long and repetitive? The Folklorioles.
390: yeah, you'll find that in all oriole histories.
I try to keep it out of my repetoiriole.
Hey Tweety, any idea on who you're going to vote for in the Senate primary?
The Christian Diorioles have the best uniforms.
For boring drives, the interstate across Nd and Eastern Montana, especially in winter or early spring is about the worst I've experienced.
The North Shore drive is pretty great. When I was a kid, we did a partial circumnavigation of the Great Lakes, and putting aside the sullen brat attitude I had on long car trips when I was a kid, the scenery was phenomenal.
396.2: Yeah we got ina lot of good northern Great Lake-y stuff on this last trip. The UP of Michigan was quite nice ... unfortunately its congressman is a big jerk (Stupak).
393: I'm in Boston, and I'm planning to vote for Capuano.
JRoth, Not sure what you mean. Sifu lives in MA, he knows a bit about our politics, and there's a Democratic primary on December 8th to fill the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy's seat.
I am torn between Capuano and Coakley, and I don't like either much.
399: What don't you like about them?
I don't know why anyone thinks I would be offended by jokes about Arizona. In any case, I think it would really make the most sense for Arizona to not have a football team.
JRoth, Not sure what you mean.
He's teasing you for interrupting the string of rhyming jokes with a serious comment.
I don't actively dislike them. I'd much rather have someone with more brain power like Barney Frank.
Capuano's claim to fame is that he managed to bring a lot of pork back to the district. He doesn't talk at all about what was good about particular types of investments, and I haven't seen much info about policy or legislation that he's helped to craft. He also says that he's interested in the Senate, because you have a lot more leverage there and can use the filibuster to block stuff. While true andperhaps necessary under the current system, it's not a good element of the Senaate.
Coakley goes after things with a prosecutorial mindset, and she talks a lot about prosecutors serving victims, but personally I feel very strongly that crimes are against the state--and that that's who prosecutors should be serving. Prosecutors don't really think this way, and they make me uncomfortable.
Of course, nobody could be as good as Kennedy was, but I wanted somebody who had the potential to grow into that, and I just don't have the sense that Capuano is that smart. Nor do I have any evidence that he's super good at forging political alliances.
Further on Coakley, I don't know what her review of non-profit hospital compensation accomplished, nor her record of antitrust enforcement. I mean Blue Cross did a deal with partners not to cut reimbursements, and partners is way too powerful. Her points about deceptive marketing are good, but I don't know much about what she advocates other than platitudes.
[late to the party]
Actually, I heard that Baltimore's team had been bought by a group of Mexican business moguls. Yep, true story. They're changing the team name to the Baltimore Órales.
[/late to the party]
When I was in grad school, our IM soccer team was called The Eulers
I remember my HS trig teacher having a list of similar puns on the wall, but googling I only find a JSTOR reference. If anyone can post the list I'd be amused (the google link contains the only specific entry that I remembered other than the "Houston Eulers".
401: But I wanted jokes making fun of the entire Southwest, not just Arizona.
Perhaps the Arizona Broad-brimmed Dorks? The helmet would just have a thin line around the equator.
407.1: What's the Southwest famous for? Hard-shell tacos and child abuse, and they only invented the hard-shell tacos to get to the kids.
But I wanted jokes making fun of the entire Southwest, not just Arizona.
Why, though? Can't we all join together in hating on Arizona?
Pedro the Lion has a song called "Arizona" about Arizona cheating on New Mexico with California. It's kind of confusing.
WOO, I'M INCORPORIOLE!