Barbara

Credible Tex-Mex to me is unavailable on the East Coast. I consider what I ate while growing up in El Paso (and we mostly ate Mexican food in Juarez) to be the real deal. Seriously people, folks would make tamales and sell them door-to-door for extra money at Christmas time. There are NO tamales worthy of the name around these parts; although, the ones sold at Whole Foods (!) on P Street come closer to anything else I've found. I've never understood tacos made with pre-formed shells. What is that crap?

Just noticed that in the tomato recipe Pat posted a few years ago, the same question mark inside a diamond appears where the measurements are supposed to be.

There are many, many "cat people" here--"dog people," too. We've all been there and had to do that. Much empathy for you and your loss, since we know exactly what you're going through..

Cashion's?

Believe it or not, I'm hoisting a drink to the DC Government. Dame Edna and I just got home from a community town hall to get info on the new Obamacare law. If all goes as planned--and they have some top-notch, dedicated people on it--this should be a model for the rest of the country.

Since I prefer the guac I make to anything I've had, at any price point , I won't need to try this place. Bad Mexican food is just not worth the calories or the $$$.

I assume we are all "wetting the head" of the would-be King of England. Or, possibly, wetting the head of our new relations, plants, pets, or anybody else who needs a special blessing. Personally, I am hoping that the beautiful Kate has a much more successful marriage, and life, than her late Mother-in-Law did.

While reading that in the chat, I just wondered why they didn't just walk next door (in any direction) and find a place to sit? Perry's has a Happy Hour, as does TAAN. Even the Astor probably wouldn't care if they just walked in and sat down for a few minutes. It's wasn't like they were in the middle of nowhere with no place to get out of the heat.

This is why I am loath to travel anywhere by air. I'm not alone in this; which is why members of my family chose to drive to Georgia for a funeral over a weekend to attend a funeral, rather than fly. Twelve hours in the car, both coming and going, beat the Hell out of dealing with the airlines. I'm old enough to remember when flying was a very comfortable, pleasant way to travel and something to look forward to, rather than a cause of anxiety. Not anymore.

That would have been a wake!

Ditto this. Whenever I buy a bunch of beets, I roast them all and just store the ones I don't use wrapped in the aluminum foil they were roasted in. I trim and peel them as I need them. For the ones already peeled and getting spots, I would just cut out the spots. They should be OK, otherwise.

When I worked at the DC Legal Aid Society (which was located at 11th & G Sts. NW), I was often sent on a run to Swings to buy coffee for the office. This was (and I'm guessing still is) a shoe-string operation. However, one perk was an insistence on decent coffee for the office coffee pot. Besides the nice walk, I loved the old building. Not sure I'm too happy with the "facade-ectomy" that was done on the block; but, then, I remember frequenting the Old Ebbitts Grill when it was also in one of the old townhouses. I'm glad Swings still exists, in whatever form, and has learned to adapt to the times. Beats the alternative.

My quibble with this is that, as we learned from Julia, all those recipes weren't tested before publication--something I learned on my own much earlier, having made a few things that simply didn't work. I agree that it is full of info. The problem is that I don't necessarily trust it. Still, a case could be made for her inclusion.

I took this to a party yesterday and just added the avocado and some tomatoes at the last minute: http://www.onceuponachef.com/2010/08/black-bean-salad-with-corn-red-peppers-avocado-lime-cilantro-vinaigrette.html and there's also this: http://www.cooking.com/recipes-and-more/recipes/tex-mex-summer-squash-casserole-recipe-9491.aspx#axzz2YBXjaxkI

I didn't have any issues with the flour burning or clumping when I added the oil. I don't have the exact instructions (and you know how fussy ATK is on that score), but I believe it involved taking the flour off the heat and letting it cool down a bit. I certainly didn't need to deal with burnt or clumped flour bits. The roux was just a 10-minute job, followed by about 45 minutes in the oven while I did other things. Worked perfectly. Ask Waitman--he had gumbo for dinner on Mardi Gras this year (not that he would publicly dis any food anybody else made for him ).

Isn't it always thus?

I don't disagree with you on this. However, they do come up with fool-proof recipes and I will never go back to making a roux the old way. The method his team developed for making one in an oven is just genius. I also appreciate the way they test tools and appliances. It's on those bases that I make my nomination--FWIW. BTW: I agree with you about Marcella Hazan. (One Christmas, Dame Edna received two copies of Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking--one from me and one from his Mom.)

Don't' know what they've reported about Farmers' Market eggs, which are the only ones I use, but you should be aware that the whites of pasteurized eggs won't whip (in case you were thinking of separating the yolks to use for mayo and saving the whites for something else).

If we are talking about people who teach/taught how to cook at home (which is solely what Child did), then you almost have to include Chris Kimball--his Test Kitchen has come up with some really useful techniques, even if a lot of the food is under-seasoned for my taste; although I'm always getting ideas from Pepin's "Fast Food My Way" shows, particularly when don't have an actual recipe to hand.

Ditto. Just found out it will be in new development at 7th & S Sts., NW (near the Shaw-Howard U Metro). Was only able to get to College Park to try it once--and, it turned out they are closed on Mondays. Am so looking forward to trying the new place!

To Texas State Senator Wendy Davis, who showed us what a filibuster should look like.

On that note, Dame Edna gave me a copy of Lindy Boggs' autobiography. I had to put it down after only a few pages when she wrote about the servants her family had-- "They were just like family!" Um, no, they weren't. The woman who worked for Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings in Florida put that idea to rest when she spoke publicly about working for her a few years ago. They didn't sit down at the table with you for dinner, you didn't make sure they had a decent place to live, and if you paid any medical bills for any of them, it was a rarity. The Help was a real fairy tale, but not because the details lacked veracity.

It's gonna take a while for my eyes to recover from that!

It turns out that this recipe was originally from Prego in LA. The real beauty of this recipe, apart from the sheer taste of the stuff, is that the most labor-intensive parts of it can be made in advance. In fact, where it says to take the whole thing out of the pot and cool it for 15 minutes before the final step? Who's doing the timing? I'm talking about preparing something quite wonderful for your loved ones in a non-professional kitchen. And, you absolutely have to use live lobster for this. It is essential to the broth you then use to prepare the risotto. I even remember my SIL coming up behind me, just when I was dropping that sucker into a pot of water, and squeezing my shoulder and "eeking" in my ear simultaneously. I must say, however, that Martha Stewart suggested throwing a shot of vodka into the water first because, "If YOU were being boiled alive, wouldn't you like a drink first?" Can't argue with that. ETA: I just saw your posting of Roberto's recipe. The one I've been looking for has a much more complex broth and doesn't contain any tomatoes or basil. And, no, I'm not going to argue which is better. Let's just say I was prepared to go to great lengths to find this particular recipe and was saved from a day at the Library of Congress by Squidsdc and her hubby. Not to mention the efforts of the other folks on this site.

I don't have the technical know-how to post what they sent; but, I'll bet Squids and Mr. S do--and I know she will see this by tomorrow. They are busy this evening taking his Mom for a birthday dinner (she was kind enough to call me from the car--he was driving--to tell me to check my email). If that isn't possible, I will type up the ingredients and instructions for all of you kind enough to care about this and everybody else, as well--though it might take some time. The real key here is the broth: there are specific instructions to boil a live lobster in a specific amount of water with other additives, none of which I could remember. That seems to make all the difference. BTW: with only that lonely lobster, I made the mistake of adding some snow crab legs I was able to find in El Paso because the recipe is for 4 people and I had 9 to feed. Don't do that. I can taste frozen crab or lobster from 100 yards. The dish wasn't ruined, but it sure wasn't as sublime as it was meant to be.