I have a new entry on my list of ‘national foods which I have only had good examples of outside of the country of origin’. That list needs a snappier name.
Included on it, are: Read the rest of this entry ?
Posts Tagged ‘Chicken’
TND – Birthday Season 2012 (part 1)
September 21, 2012
I have to preface this post by saying that custard is very much my culinary bête noir – everyone’s got one (or more), and nobody should be discouraged from making this ice cream based on how much I’m about to whine.
Or, let me put it another way, there’s a catch phrase in our house that nothing is serious until James Earl Jones says, ‘mother-of-god’*. When I tasted the ice cream base on Saturday afternoon I paused, stared down at the pot in awe, and did my very best James Earl Jones impression (which since I’m a 5’ nothing WASP is distinctly underwhelming, but the sentiment was heartfelt). This is seriously good ice cream, y’all. The Effort here is entirely commensurate with the payoff, my issues with custard notwithstanding. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – Misanthropic in Massachusetts
September 10, 2012
It’s time for another set of food related pet peeves for no particular reason other than that I’ve spent quality time recently trying to work my way around the issues that they present (albeit none of them for this particular dinner).
1 – Restaurants that don’t have websites. Or, restaurants that only have place holder websites.
This is mostly because I like looking at menus, and even if the menu that you have up isn’t the menu that I’m going to be ordering from when I show up I like to have an idea of the prices and kinds of dishes that you serve. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – The Experimental Pickle Edition
July 5, 2012
I got to the farmer’s market last Thursday at the very end of the day which is always a mixed blessing. On the one hand you sometimes get fantastic deals because the farmers don’t want to have to repack and take home the bits and pieces they have left, so they’ll sell them to you for a fraction of what they were during the day. On the other hand, they’re frequently sold out of whatever it was you actually needed. This is how I ended up with 12 crazy early mostly unripe peaches and then had to figure out what I was going to do with them. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – Belated Posting
July 5, 2012
There’s a new ‘diet’ making the rounds that seems to primarily consist of fantasizing about food that you then don’t eat. Okay, so there’s a little more to it than that. The idea, as far as I can tell, is that if you think about whatever it is that you’re craving – a burger, an ice cream sundae, an enormous plate of macaroni and cheese – and you visualize yourself eating it, and imagine the tastes and smells in Technicolor detail you’ll then stop craving it. Imagining the experience is, apparently, enough to satisfy the craving. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – Embrace the Kitsch
May 31, 2012
There are certain things that I firmly believe you have to either have grown up with, or been introduced to at a tender and impressionable age to truly appreciate. Among these I include Ambrosia Salad, Marmite (or Vegemite) and the Eurovision Song Contest. I grew up with Ambrosia Salad at church picnics and was introduced to Eurovision in early middle school and love both unironically. Marmite/Vegemite I was also introduced to in early middle school, but think is one of the most revolting things you can do to an innocent piece of toast. So possibly you can grow to appreciate Eurovision, but Vegemite has to be introduced to you prenatally. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – Delayed Gratification
May 18, 2012
I am normally the queen of delayed gratification. I can have a birthday present arrive in the mail weeks before my actual birthday and feel no overwhelming impulse to tear into the wrapping early. I wasn’t a child who went around shaking presents under the Christmas tree (at least, I don’t think I was). For me anticipation is genuinely half the pleasure. I love making restaurant reservations in advance and then perusing the menu online (at length and frequently multiple times) to build a sense of expectation for the enjoyment to come. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – Hypocrisy Hits Home
May 16, 2012
All right y’all, I need to have a conversation (okay, monologue) about a distressing recent trend in food television. By which I mean I want to talk about the television which is more about gluttony and conspicuous over consumption than it is about food. There are lots of food shows I find boring (Sandwich King), or pointless (Chef vs. City), or repetitive (Diners, Drive-ins & Dives), but lately there have started to be shows that I find actively offensive. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – Shallow Within Reason
May 14, 2012
I have a confession. I need my cookbooks to have pictures. This makes me feel like a little kid, but when I’m faced with a cookbook that’s just text I get lost and overwhelmed. I need pretty pictures of the food to go with the recipes. Partially this is for the simple reason that I believe in white space on the page like some people believe in the power of a good martini at 5pm on a Friday*. Partially it is because, like many people, I eat with my eyes first and I need/like to be enticed by what something looks like as well as by the description of the ingredients. And partially, it’s because I’m shallow and I just like the glossy food porn quality of the current cookbook market. Read the rest of this entry ?
TND – On a Mission
April 4, 2012
Last week (about Dinner three weeks ago) I expounded on my difficulty in finding rabbit or wild boar to make any of the tasty recipes featured in Food & Wine’s March 2012 issue. This past weekend I ended up doing a little more rabbit hunting because I’d talked and thought about it so much that (a) I was really craving rabbit, and (b) it had become a quest. Read the rest of this entry ?
Monday Night Dinner 