Ok, folks - tonight I’m making pecan pie, gumbo, remoulade (red and white!) and shoo-fly pie. I’m covered on the how for everything but the shoo-fly. Any advice? Favorite recipes? (And is it shoo-fly, or shoe-fly? Hmmmm? And is it cake or pie?)
so i read an interesting article about how the italians put parmesean rinds in soup stock. apparently you can even freeze your rinds and put them in the minestrone later… have you done this? does it add to the flavor? i’ve never considered freezing a cheese rind!
At Tin-Pan last night the special appetizer was lumpia. I practically jumped out of my seat. Lumpia is a favorite food from my childhood. Unfortunately it was nothing like what I was expecting. Good, of course, but no clear noodles or ground carrot-like veggies. Any ideas on where to find a traditional recipe for lumpia? I’m not even certain what’s in the homestyle version. Thanks!
i have been thinking about the tools that are in my cluttered kitchen, and realizing i rarely use most of them, and there is a long list of things i would like to add to my kitchen. so with that in mind, what are the top 5 tools/appliances that you can’t live without?
By way of an introduction to my queries about people’s personal cooking repertoires, I’m going to include a few excerpts from chapter 22 of the book I reviewed earlier, Cooking for Mr. Latte:
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Fall is, hands-down, my favorite season. The crispy San Francisco air, the alternating mist and fog with clear cold sunny days, the fall apples and mushrooms hitting the markets, and the beginning of the glorious rain - there’s more than i can begin to describe. When the weather starts turning, i definitely shift modes, as well. I want to go out less - instead, i want to welcome my friends into my home. I want to cook for them, sit around candles with a glass of wine or an irish coffee and chat, late into the night. It’s a social season for me - but a quietly social season. What are some of the things you cook in fall? Your autumn rituals? I’ll share some of mine - and would love to hear yours…
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Ok, kids - this isn’t a Friday Five, but it is a Friday discussion!
I’m having a cocktail party, resplendant with champagne cocktails (and of course, a few other varieties and non-alcoholic yummies).
What are your favorite champagne cocktails? What kind of food would you serve alongside them? I’m looking for inspiration here, folks!
I’m trying to recreate my favourite buns from the recent trip to Sweden… They were a brioche-like pastry (a little denser) flavoured with cardamom and shaped into round buns. The buns were then filled with a thick egg custard cream.
I have a Swedish recipe book with instructions for making the rolls *without* egg cream, but I’m wondering how you make them with a filling. Can you cook egg custard cream at brioche-baking temperature without having it curdle or dry out? Would you have to pipe it into the buns while they were still warm?
Any thoughts?
Does anyone have a good recipe for iced tea or for lemonade? I tend to prefer both on the less-syrupy side, which means making my own, but I’ve not had much success.
When I tried this before, I used good quality tea, so I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong. Is it absolutely essential to cool the tea immediately? I almost never have enough ice on hand.
Thoughts? Suggestions? Tips?
Say, what are your favorite things to do with leftovers? I love repurposing leftovers into new dishes; it excercises frugality and creativity - and often, you can get a really quick dinner on the table after work.
The latest leftover creation i played around with involved salad & risotto cakes. We made dinner for Forrest (actually, the meal is mentioned in the not-quite-chopped-salad entry) I intentionally made extra risotto so we could me the cakes later, and we still had a bunch of cabbage and lettuce from the salad. Voila! Nice ‘n’ easy. (click on the avocado - you know you want to!)
What do you do with leftovers?
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