zoramargolis

tacos al carbon made with marinated skirt steak

frijoles negros de olla (made in the pressure cooker)

guacamole and chips

pico de gallo

roasted green chile salsa

DB Vienna lager

last of the pecan pie

last night:

(canned) tuna and white bean salad with butter lettuce and spinach, celery, roasted red peppers, tomatoes, olives, avocado, scallions, garlic, capers, lemon, olive oil

pecan pie, made with a butter/vodka crust. the filling was a riff on John Thorne's recipe from _Outlaw Cook_: his biggest innovation is using Lyle's Golden Syrup instead of Karo; second is sucanat raw sugar instead of brown sugar. I didn't have sucanat, but I did have piloncillo, which I believe is the very same thing--unrefined, evaporated sugar cane juice. in any case, the pie turned out delicious, with crispy crust and pecans, and tender custard with great depth of flavor. We had it with whipped cream--tried the "bartender's method" of shaking cream in a cocktail shaker with the spring from a cocktail strainer. Well, it worked, but not as easily as in the video that went viral online, and it was kind of a mess getting the cream out of the spiral wire of the spring. Not sure I'll do that again.

masa corn cakes from the freezer

fried eggs

warm salsa verde

Peet's cappuccini

last night:

rice noodles in a miso-shrimp-dashi broth with napa cabbage, baby bok choy, wild-caught shrimp, scallions, cilantro and go-ju-jang

satsuma mandarins

Moctec in Landover, MD. You have to call and order it "para tamales" a couple of days in advance and then go pick it up. It's the real deal.

I haven't made any masa in a long time. I don't have access to the right kind of corn.

posole verde

tortillas

Calvin Trillin has likened "shrimp scampi" to "beef pork". That would, of course, be beef pork served with au jus sauce.

You must mean "au jus gravy." And don't forget macaroni and cheese au gratin. Although the high falutin' has gone to "mac and cheese" pretty much everywhere these days.

Thanks, Zora.  This is a good starting point for me, but I am going to have to try to figure out quantities on all this.  I consider myself a good cook, but it's hard to figure out how many tomatillos, poblanos, and how much pork.  On the other ingredients I can figure it out.

Would you think:

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

1/2 lb tomatillos

4 lb bone-out shoulder

3 poblanos?

For 4 pounds of bone-out pork shoulder, I would double the amount of everything else. That's a lot of meat.

Does anyone have a good recipe for the green pork chile you find in Colorado? Not looking for the sauce, but the thicker stuff your eat from a bowl. Thanks!

Saute onion, garlic, tomatillo, with ground cumin, ground coriander seed and Mexican oregano to bloom the spices. add pork shoulder, roasted peeled poblano chiles, broth or water, salt, pepper and aromatic herb bundle: celery leaf, parsley, thyme, bay leaf. Cook slowly on stovetop or slow oven until meat is tender. Serve with chopped cilantro and chopped onion.

I love broccoli stalks. But they absolutely need to be peeled. The peel strips off fairly easily with a knife. The inside of the stalk is crisp and juicy, and can be eaten raw, steamed or sauteed with the florets, grilled roasted or pureed.

Terrific short documentary videos with food as focus. I'm just posting just the first episode in each of these locales, Oaxaca and Tehran, there are others.

http://munchies.vice.com/videos/munchies-guide-to-oaxaca-part-one

http://munchies.vice.com/videos/the-munchies-guide-to-tehran-part-1

Here's the home page of the Munchies site:

http://munchies.vice.com/show/the-munchies-guide-to

You can grind meat in a food processor. cut into chunks and put in the freezer for about 15 minutes, then pulse. I do it all the time. But you can do a quick stew in bbq sauce. Brown chunks of round quickly, and cook in the sauce--thinned with some water so it won't stick and burn--just until tender. Some sauteed onion and garlic, and aromatic herbs can only make it tastier.

I have two 1.5 lb. pieces of beef labeled "beef round london broil." they are about 1" thick. Can i slow cook this cut in liquid (like a brisket) or to make pulled beef? Or must it be quickly cooked at a high temp? The label on the package says "for grilling," but with our cold temps here I'd like a slow cook inside. Is this cut too lean for that?

Round will get very dry if you braise it for too long--not enough fat and connective tissue. You can use it for stroganoff or paprikash (quick-cooking stews) or the other possibility is to grind it, with some added fat if desired and use it as "ground round" in chili, meatloaf, meatballs.

Will you brine or salt it yourself, before cooking? If so, get an unbrined bird. If you'd rather not brine or salt it yourself, buy a pre-brined bird. Brining/salting makes a huge difference in flavor and helps keep the white meat moist.

Having purchased a couple of different inexpensive burr grinders that were flimsy and loud, and kicked the bucket after fairly short-term service, I invested in a Rancilio Rocky. It purrs instead of sounding like silverware in the garbage disposal. And it has withstood daily use without a hiccup for about eight years. click

 cushaw pie

I've never heard of this. Could you please elaborate?

last night:

per J's request for a light supper of "Chinese chicken salad": stovetop grilled marinated chicken tenders sliced atop a big bowl of shredded iceberg, celery, cukes, scallions, orange segments, jalapeí±o slices, cilantro, ginger-sesame vinaigrette. and since it needed to be old school to satisfy, J had crispy chow mein noodles with his.

an Ottolenghi meatless monday

eggplant cheesecake, based on a recipe from his new book _Plenty More_ with the addition of roasted red pepper, caramelized onion, parmesan cheese, and fresh parsley. delicious.

oven roasted broccolini

ottolenghi's (apple) cake with maple frosting, recipe found on food52.com--I substituted quince for the apple, and added cardamom to the batter. Instead of muscovado (dark brown) sugar in the maple cream cheese frosting, I used coconut palm sugar. fabulous.

2011 Ancely minervois

meat loaf with spicy ketchup

twice cooked new potatoes: steamed and then cut in half and fried in duck fat

haricots verts with garlic and lemon

vanilla ice cream with elderberry coulis

2006 Glorioso rioja

This sounds good, I made a avocado/ cocoa pudding that was delicious, here's a frosting-http://paleospirit.com/2013/avocado-chocolate-frosting-paleo-and-vegan/

You might have to omit the chocolate chips, doubt they would be dairy free.

Here's a link to my recipe for avocado chocolate mousse on Food52. If you use a little bit less coconut milk, it will be a quite stiff ganache and would work fine as a cake frosting. If you are using bittersweet chocolate (ie. 65% or more), there won't be any milk in it. The only drawback is that the chocolate might be a bit intense for kids. If you can cut it with marshmallow fluff, it'd probably be more child-friendly.

linguini with slow cooked bolognese (hot Italian sausage made by me with eco-friendly ground pork, onion-leek-garlic-fennel-carrot-celery base, pureed fresh tomatoes, other tomato products to beef it up, roasted wild maitake 'shrooms, porcini powder, wine, aromatic herbs)

lettuce and cucumber salad with lime vinaigrette

Bonaparte baguette garlic toast

comice pear

2011 Cantina Zacagnini montepulciano

click

Which was from Alice in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll (the Mock Turtle sang it).

Thanks.

Soup of the evening. Beautiful, beautiful soooooup*

duck stock, fresh cranberry beans, eco-friendly bacon lardons, onion, leek, garlic, celery, carrots, butternut squash, fennel, barley, corn puree, fennel seed, aromatic herbs

Bonaparte baguette & Kerrygold butter

comice pear

2013 Comolaluna palomino

*from _With Bold Knife and Fork_ by MFK Fisher

If any DR members are reading this who could do an Indian Food 101, or even a region, that would be amazing.  It is a cuisine that continues to perplex me a bit, that I am really interested in learning more.  This has been a great thread.  

Along with his expertise in Thai and Lao cuisine, Fishinnards is very knowledgeable about and adept at Sri Lankan and various types of Indian food.  If you ask him nicely and organize a time/place for such a lesson, and have participants kick in to pay for the groceries, I have a hunch he will be glad to teach such a class.