sos foodies!

Jackson Doofster · Post by **Jackson Doofster** » Fri Aug 15, 2003 2:21 am

Well, we're off to Tuscany in the morning for a fortnight and so I guess it will have to be the best of Tuscan cuisine. I will not stereotype Italian food, by saying pasta, pizza and ice cream - I have never been to Tuscany and so i'll tell you what the food is all about when I return

Arrivaderci

verbal gymnastics · Post by **verbal gymnastics** » Fri Aug 15, 2003 3:15 am

Beans a la toast.

Instructions

1. grill some beans
2. heat up some bread to toast (do not overboil)
3. put 1 onto 2.

Et voila.

Or something like that.

There's plenty more where that came from!

sulkygirl · Post by **sulkygirl** » Fri Aug 15, 2003 3:35 am

***rubbing temples in a slow, circular motion, and focusing on the recently visible planet Mars...***

Do I see an "Elvis Costello Fans" cookbook in the making??

selfmademug · Post by **selfmademug** » Fri Aug 15, 2003 3:53 am

Bobster, you've got me hankering for a hot dog or 3 from GRAY'S PAPAYA on W. 72nd St in NYC.... quite remarkable since it's about 5 a.m. (though I've never been one to turn down any good food on the grounds that it's the wrong time of day.)

girl out of time · Post by **girl out of time** » Fri Aug 15, 2003 10:04 pm

ASADO! ......what else??!!!!!

ice nine · Post by **ice nine** » Fri Aug 15, 2003 10:13 pm

A good hot corned beef sandwich with mustard and a kosher pickle on the side is mighty tasty. A side of potato salad is nice to have. Finish this off with a nice piece of cheesecake (strawberries optional)

bobster · Post by **bobster** » Sat Aug 16, 2003 12:47 am

Icenine --

Don't get me started on the joys of Jewish deli cuisine....I'm a pastrami man, but corn beef runs a close second. And then there's lox (smoked salmon) on a bagel with cream cheese with a thick slice of tomato and onion on top, now that's fressing! For those of you who've never tried, think of it as Jewish sushi! (Just as good and 4x as fattening!)

SMM -- I've actually eaten at Gray's Papaya. The hotdogs were okay but, as I recall, they were remarkably low priced. It was probably 1988 or thereabouts and I think they were two for a buck.

I also was sort of surprised by the juxtaposition of the hot dogs with the papaya beverage (seemed like a bit of a papaya variation on an Orange Julius or an Orange Band). Someone told me that papayas are supposed to be good for digestion, so I guess having a papaya beverage with hot dogs is a little bit like consuming a poison and a poison antidote at exactly the same time.

BTW: the best pastrami I ever had was on that same trip to NYC -- the 2nd Avenue deli...yummm!

Otis --

"Brea" as in La Brea is the Spanish word for tar. One of L.A.' most famed tourist attractions (at least for folks with an interest in geology, prehistoric critters, etc.) is "The La Brea Tar Pits -- which, when you think about it, means they're really "The The Tar Tar Pits"

VG --

Okay, this is obviously one of those things that American vs. British things. I'm actually pretty anglophilic, but I just don't get it. I mean baked beans are okay, and toast is dandy, but -- for some reason -- the idea of putting them together sort of revolts me.

I have also never consumed Spam. (Though many Americans do -- particularly in Hawaii, believe it or not.)

Still, the U.S. has some pretty revolting dishes of our own. #1 for me is tuna casserole (aka "tuna hotdish" in the midwest, as per Garrison Keillor/Prairie Home Companion). Can't even stand to be in the room with that.

Still, I bet someone is going to rise to the defense of tuna cassarole/hotdish, and, naturally beans on toast, and possibly spam as well.

miss buenos aires · Post by **miss buenos aires** » Sat Aug 16, 2003 5:30 am

I must take a moment to praise the greatest condiment ever invented: mustard butter. You take a stick of butter, two or three minced cloves of garlic, and a tablespoon or two of mustard. Mush it all together. You can put it on bread, or use it to sautée things...but I'm telling you, three young women can polish off all the mustard butter in the house, especially if one of them is having man trouble. This'd be on bread, not straight.

Otis Westinghouse · Post by **Otis Westinghouse** » Sat Aug 16, 2003 10:28 am

Bobster: indeed! Nothing to do with sea mists (that was 'bruma'), tar or pitch. I remember learning this word from Spanish group El Ultimo de la Fila (who were not at all bad, by Spanish pop group standards). My favourite song of theirs, 'Ya no danzo al son de los Tambores' started:

Como barca en la mar
que encendida en brea
muge y zozobra

I learned a lot of new words from them! Can't say I've heard 'zozobrar' elsewhere.

SoLikeCandy · Post by **SoLikeCandy** » Sat Aug 16, 2003 1:18 pm

Spoonbread is what white folks call corn pone--it's very soft cornbread.

My grama used to make sweet spoonbread, and my dad would mash it up in a bowl half full of buttermilk and eat it with a spoon. Southern Mississippi cuisine. Yum.

Ox tails are YUMMY when simmered extra slowly with blackeyed peas. Also tasty are beef neckbones. Yep--neckbones. Similar rto ox tails, but they don't get as tender--still good with a plate of collard greens and some cornbread.

Me? I adore cooking a little bit of everything. My latest culinary triumph is chicken and sausage jamabalaya, but my old standby is turkey sage chowder--thick, creamy, spicy and just heavy enough for a chilly autumn day. For summer, nothing beats grilled lime butter salmon, with fresh guacamole made with Mexican limes.

Mme. BA--I simply MUST try this mustard butter thing. Never heard of it, but it sounds divine--perfect with lightly toasted French bread, lots of beer, and a side of "men suck".

Gotta go. I'm hungry now...

Otis Westinghouse · Post by **Otis Westinghouse** » Sat Aug 16, 2003 2:57 pm

So if you soak your pone in, say, rum, does that make it 'alcapone'?

Love the sound of this deep southern stuff. I want to drive around there for a month being invited in for home-cooking.

Mexican limes sound very exciting.

The side order less so.

Boy With A Problem · Post by **Boy With A Problem** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 3:32 pm

I was in Denver this week and I ate 4 things for the first time -

1. Rocky Mountain Oysters - aka bull testicles - fried. Not much taste and very chewy - would not eat again.

2. Rattlesanke - They put it in a dip and served with tortilla chips. The dip was too similar to an artichoke dip - and while it was good, I really couldn't discern any taste from the rattlesnake.

3. Quail - I guess this is fairly common, but I'd bever eaten it. It was nice, but they served it with some sort of sweet sauce that came off pretty close the jarred Ah-So sauce, that I don't use much anymore. It was crispy and had a flavor that seemed to me somewhere between chicken and turkey (not the duckish flavor I was expecting).

4. Yak - A medallion of yak. Beefish, without a lot of flavor - it was served with a sour cream / dill sauce, which really didn't add much.

All in all a food adventure that was more exciting in name than taste.

Goody2Shoes · Post by **Goody2Shoes** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 5:10 pm

Hey Boy With A Problem:

Did you happen to be dining at either the Buckhorn Exchange or The Fort?

Boy With A Problem · Post by **Boy With A Problem** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 7:42 pm

Goody -

A huge group of us went to Buckhorn - great atmosphere. I'm told it's the oldest restaraunt in Denver - Colorado Liquor License # 1. !!

It really was a fun time - and I even sat at the table nearest the Jerry Mathers celebrity photo. ( I have a "Leave It To Beaver fixation - we named our new cat, "Miss Landers").

Are you from Denver Goody? Colorado is a terrific place.

bobster · Post by **bobster** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 8:59 pm

See below (why does the delete button dissapear whenever I need it????)

bobster · Post by **bobster** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 9:04 pm

Yak?

Thought I'd heard of just about everything food wise. You gotta love it, if only because "yak" is one of the funniest words ever invented.

American's will remember that Johnny Carson, esp. as the Great Karnak, was quite fond of the word, as in "May a diseased yak leave a memento in your artichoke dip." (Actually, I made that one up, but I think it gets the, er, flavor....)

Have eaten most of the other dishes at one time or another -- with the exception of "Rocky Mountain Oysters." I'm not sure why I couldn't, but I think it's kind of the same reason I have a problem with the idea of eating brains. (A clue may line with the old Woody Allen line from "Sleeper" when he was threatened with some kind of brain surgery/washing operation: "My brain? But that's my second favorite organ!")

Boy With A Problem · Post by **Boy With A Problem** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 9:16 pm

The Yak was part of the "special". Anthony Bourdain in "Kithchen Confidential" advises against ordering anything that is offered in the "special". Specials are often comprised of meats and fishes that have been sitting around for a while and need to be disposed of quickly. I rolled the dice and the yak seemed fresh and was served on the rare side of medium rare. Of course there was much joking around the table, "I'm not ordering the yak, I get enough yak at home." At this particular restaraunt the walls are adorned with the heads of everything on the menu and the heads of several things not on the menu. Them yaks are big.

bobster -

If you want some really good chicken saag in the LA area, there is a hole in the wall place on Washington - sort of on the Marina Del Rey / Culver City line - right near the Holiday Inn Express. I've eaten there twice and the saag is as good as any I've had.

Goody2Shoes · Post by **Goody2Shoes** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 7:37 am

BWAP-

I lived in the Denver/Boulder area for a long time. It is, indeed, a terrific place, and we get homesick occasionally. I miss that beautiful sky (the non-polluted, non-winter sky, anyway) more than anything else.

Mountain oysters used to be, and likely still are, one of those 'dare' foods that drunken frat boys ate in mass quantities. At the University in Boulder, there used to be a festival called 'Alferd Packer Days', honoring Colorado's only convicted cannibal, that featured eating contests of the gross variety: mountain oysters, raw and cooked, for example, and other things in that vein.

I've had mountain oysters, and the thing that I didn't like about them wasn't the chewy quality, which they definitely had, but the unpleasantly grainy texture. I've also had rattlesnake a couple of times, and I think that the best I can say about that is that it's only as good as the sauce that covers it.

The Buckhorn is a hoot, if a bit touristy. It's the only place I've ever eaten alligator. All those animal heads freaked me out a little bit, too.

There is (or used to be) a place in Morrison, outside of Denver, called The Fort, that had a similar kind of menu, exotic game and such, but fewer heads on the wall, if I remember correctly. It's a stones throw from Red Rocks Amphitheatre.

mood swung · Post by **mood swung** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 7:51 am

my husband loves to try 'dare' foods, and yes he was a frat boy. when we were first married he actually expected me to cook these type of things. one day he brought home a rattlesnake. I wouldn't touch it, so he cooked it on the hibachi. I still remember how it looked like a big S cooking there. ick. tasted like chicken.

then there was the owl that was in the freezer for 7 years.....

Otis Westinghouse · Post by **Otis Westinghouse** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 5:34 pm

Did you ever defrost it? I wonder what owl tastes like. especially after being frozen for 7 years. The Spaniards are very into eating most parts of animals, and wandering around the meat section of a market often feels like the remains from the slaughterhouse floor have been hung up to sell, actually that's pretty well what happens. Huge sheets of tripe, bulls' balls too, brains, sheeps' intyestines (which they knot around two diagonal sticks), pigs ears, pigs heads even (for the cheek meat).

Goody2Shoes · Post by **Goody2Shoes** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 6:49 pm

Braised pork cheeks. Mmmmm, yummy.

I, too, was wondering how that owl worked out for you, mood swung. Did he shoot it himself?

bobster · Post by **bobster** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 1:01 am

BWAP --

Chicken Saag? That's Indian currry, right? (There are some pretty decent Indian places on Venice Blvd, just North of Washington, but don't know any on Washington). I usually get the vindaloo or the Tandori, but I'm open minded.

Where is it? What's the name? Any clues at all? Washington Blvd is a HUGE street -- made more so by the fact that it actually splits off into two streets (one is called Washington Place) at a certain place in the Culver City/Palms/Venice/Marina Del Rey area (all my old stomping grounds -- and the current stomping grounds of several friends of who love Indian food and are all anxiously awaiting your response).

And re: "dare" foods, a joke.

A man is visiting Spain, eating at a restaurant frequented by bull fight afficionados. While eating his dinner, he looks over at another table and sees an enormous plate of meat being served with great fanfare to another customer.

"What's that?" he asks his waiter.

"Oh, sir. That is a very special dish. After a bull fight, the vanquished animal's testicles are served as part of a special dish of our chef's own creation. It is wonderfully delicious and a great honor to eat."

The next day, the man returns to the restaurant and orders that very dish. When the plate comes, he is dissapointed to see a rather small set of "oysters."

"Why are these so much smaller than the ones I saw yesterday?" he asks his waiter."

"Sir, the bull, he does not always lose."

Boy With A Problem · Post by **Boy With A Problem** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 6:34 am

Bobster -

The place is called A Taste Of India (not a very original name) - and I had to look in the yellow pages for the address - it's actually in Venice (but right near the Holiday Inn Express, which is in Marina Del Rey) at 2805 Abbot Kinney Blvd - which is right off Washington. This is more take-out (or take-away) than dine-in, but the Saag is really nice - a spinach/curry deal, and many Indian restaraunts don't offer the saag for some reason.

I like staying in that area when I'm in LA because I can keep my freeway travel to a minimum - especially to and from the hotel to the airport.

mood swung · Post by **mood swung** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 7:42 am

he didn't actually kill the owl--it was found dead and already frozen in a chimney (or chimbley, depending on where you're from). it's illegal to stuff them--by a taxidermist, that is. so the plan was to mummify it by keeping it frozen for years. didn't work. got tossed when we moved. it was really cute--a little screech owl.
my local walmart sells pigs feet and ears over in the fresh meat section, but I've never seen anyone buying them. also beef/calf livers, hunks of white stuff that look like liposuction leftovers, and this seafood mix that looks like bait to me--tentacles, mystery hunks, octopi arms. I would really like to know who the first person was to look at a possum and think 'with a little gravy...'

PlaythingOrPet · Post by **PlaythingOrPet** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 8:31 am

My uncle is going to Paris next week and has threatened to try horse.

Elvis Costello Fan Forum

sos foodies!

asado

well, I did marry him after all....

he's a nut, but he's my nut.