thistle

We had an early Valentine's Day dinner here, more crowded than I've ever seen it, almost (aside from a soccer fundraiser for Mt. Vernon). It was delicious! I had a cheese enchilada, chile relleno, taco, rice & beans & I totally cleaned my plate. Afterwards, we drove through the small shopping center off Cooper Rd. to see the collapsed roof over Taco Grande, CT Nails, & Thai Nakorn-the only one I mourn is Thai Nakorn, it was a nice, homey Thai place.

dewluca, great first post! revisiting this thread, I discovered the $50/wk blog-I read through it & picked up lots of great ideas-soup, use the breadmaker, make yogurt... I think we're still doing OK, about $150/week, not much eating out, 2 adults, 1 teen & 1 preteen (vegetarian)-we shop mostly at the army commissary, supplemented by trips to Trader Joes's, H-Mart-I still haven't visited Wegman's yet (I need to, right?} I'm looking forward to spring, when I can garden, & try to grow some salad stuff, at least...

I like so many things from TJ's, that I almost hate to post this-dug some stuff out of the pantry (during the great winter snowstorm pantry cleaning)-& had mixed reviews. I tried the TJ instant miso soup today & thought it was gross-have at least 2 other instant miso soups that are better. I also found some white chocolate chips & tried to make chocolate covered pretzels-my daughter will eat them, but my son says they smell like fish-they are a little funky, the nestle white chips are better, for me. Not that I would stop shopping at TJ's, I'll just pick other items....

yeah, we're all snowbound, & frustrated- (not that we don't love the board) ....

Adding my Honey Pig experience, lunch-MLK weekend, when everyone was at New Kam Fong-I went w/ a friend & kids (6 & 10 yr.old), arrived at 11:30, got ja mul rock , rice , asstd, panchan, steamed egg (for my newly veg daughter)-also also ordered the beef & octupus chul pan, & unfortunately, got abandoned-I tried to attract attention-I waved & pointed, by the time someone came to our aid, the seafood was pretty toasted, still pretty good, we all enjoyed the j-pop music....

Ghetto version of maple sugar candy-I cleaned out my pantry (nothing else to do) & found 3 (!@?) bottles of magic shell-told the kids to take it outside & write in the snow-no space in the pantry for that stuff...

You are so lucky! No plows here, just one guy at the end of the street w/ a snowblower (he helped us unearth the driveway Mon.) My son went out this afternoon & reshoveled the driveway-my DH has been out of town, he's flying into Richmond this evening & getting a rental to drive up here-yes, I told him he was crazy....

I'd like to try this, once we dig our way out of here. I frequently get grocery store sushi at the Ft. Belvoir commissary, & my kids like the plainest of plain sushi, cooked shrimp on sushi rice,but it's good for what it is (&very fresh, sometimes, we ask for something special & swing back, halfway through shopping, to get it)-I was behind the sushi guy in the express lane yesterday, he had 2 cases of avocados. My favorite is definitely unagi...

Me,too-no more comfort food, looking out at the tundra that is my yard, I'm thinking about a beachfront tiki bar, w/ frosty rum drinks- & no snow again, EVER....

Now that I've seen that FC schools are closed T & W, I'm almost ready to jump out in front of a snowplow (well, I would, if a snowplow came this way-I'm in the burbs, we have a single track road still). I'm amazed that I got the Sat-Sun-Mon papers today & an Amazon order placed before the snowstorm-cookbooks-Momofuku & the Steamy Kitchen, now I can think about stuff to cook, once I go to the store again....I'm out of limes (no guac), but have tons of milk, go figure....I also have several demolished trees-a magnolia (that pushed me to get this house) & a pine....

I think we ended up at around 24", no power loss (thank goodness, cause I was lazy & didn't lay in firewood this fall), & my wonderful neighbor came over w/ his snowblower & did our driveway. I baked some poundcakes this afternoon & took one down to them. Dinner tonight was an interesting mix of pork & sauerkraut, over buttered yellow potatoes & a big wok full of fried rice. My DH is out of town (he always misses big snowfalls, wherever we live) & my biggest concern is how soon the children will go back to school

Hey, I got cukes today-bet I was the only one. My favorite sandwich is a greek grilled cheese, pita w/ toasted provolone, yogurt & feta, pickled cukes (rice vinegar & salt), romaine, tomatoes, & sometimes olives. I have supplies layed in...

I've visited the commissary at Ft. Belvoir both yesterday & today, at 8:30 a.m.-slightly busy yesterday & definitely busy today. Also, they're in the process of remodelling, so quite a few things are closed off or in different places-meat, bread, ice cream. I was focused & used self checkout both times. Today, I had 2 older ladies, who had clearly never used self checkout before & both of whom had way more than 20 items in their carts in front of me, when they went together to one of 4 self-checkout stands, I zoomed around them & was out of there, before the beleaguered attendant could show them the process (I bet she had to scan every item for them)...

I am not a wing afficionado, but my son (who, as a teenager, has eaten more wings in his short life, than I have ever, in my considerably longer life) likes Wingstop-Rt. 1, Alexandria, south, near Ft. Belvoir. My daughter liked them, too, before she became a vegetarian...

Hey, that's Groundhog Day! We can legitimately celebrate...

I think you guys will have an awesome soupfest tomorrow. I'll be w/ you in spirit, but the social schedules of teen & preteen children are ruling my life right now-if I was there, I'd bring 'Drunken Shrimp Creole' from "The Surreal Gourmet Entertains"-I've made this a couple of times & it's got a sneaky heat that grows on you-if you have plenty of white rice, cornbread, & beer, it evens out....eat lots of soup & tell us how it goes!

This sounds great!-the only middle eastern restaurant I've been to, in this area, is Zikrayet (which I enjoyed) & takeout from Lebanese Taverna-I would love to visit another restaurant & Layalina , w/ a full complement of DR folks, would be fun-so can I assume that kids would be welcome (this food is definitely something my guys would go for, especially my recently converted vegetarian daughter)? Depending on scheduling, of course...

the shop lights have small chains attached to each end & I use small 's' hooks to hang them under the top wire shelf (which is level with the windows & doesn't need addtl. light.)-I plug all the shop fixtures into a floor power strip. My neighbors were quite interested in what I was growing, the sunroom is lit up like a spaceship in early spring....

You guys have inspired me, I've been meaning to try Honey Pig, so I'm going to meet a friend (+kids) there for lunch Monday-if there are any Rockwellians in the place, grab a table near us & say, "Hi" (&give me tips on tabletop grilling). Now, the only question is what to feed my daughter, who has decided to turn vegetarian at age 10, before we leave...so far, it hasn't been a problem, & she'll have fun talking w/ her friends, that she doesn't get to see as often as before (we've moved across town from each other). I'd join you guys at NKF, but I'm lazy, & don't like to travel too far. So, I plan to hit Honey Pig for the first time, I'm looking forward to it (I'm dying try the chul pan)...

I like Territorial- since for the last few years, I've worked at Holly, Woods, & Vines, I've gotten seeds there, as well as started plants. For an indoor grow station, I just have wire shelving from IKEA, w/ fluorescent shoplight fixtures attached, out in my sunroom. It's unheated. but I overwinter alot of plants there (orchids, mostly)-when I'm being a 'good' gardener, I run a humidifier, too. I've also overwintered palms in my garage, but this year, I've been incredibly lazy & left almost everything out-probably not the best winter to do this, but I hope I have some survivors. Last year, I experimented w/ using coco coir as a grow medium, but I wasn't overly thrilled w/ results (as compared to conventional potting mix). I have 6 earthboxes (love them!), as well as 2 5-tiered growpots. For online info, I like Dave's Garden & Gardenweb.

We eat at the Cooper Rd. location frequently (live right around the corner). I was anxiously awaiting the opening, because our previous favorite, El Puerto (on Rt. 1, near the Dennys) had closed. I think I was there the first day & was happy to see one of our favorite waitresses from El Puerto. She told us that the restaurants were not connected, but some of the cooks from El Puerto were in the kitchen. The food is inexpensive, filling, & delicious-a little salty, but I don't have a problem with that. I actually ended up taking a friend (who was visiting from AZ) there (It was after a busy day of sightseeing & we were exhausted, had 3 kids w/ us)-I hesitated, thinking she must be used to awesome Mexican food, but she loved it. She said it reminded her of our favorite Mexican place in NC, right down to the combos.

A couple of cookbooks I'm thinking of getting w/ Xmas cards/money are Momofuku & the Balthazar cookbook.- Can anyone who has either of these give me an opinion? I've also thought about Ad Hoc-I've checked out FL from the library & I have Bouchon (which I love, a little more basic), not convinced that the latest one is one I need. I probably got less kitchen stuff this year than ever before, but that's just because I have so much stuff-I need to use more of what I have & just cook a little more creatively, instead of just fixing what I know my family will eat...

I got a new 10K finishing stone from Dave at JKS & a Motorola Droid-it seems to do all kinds of things-now if I could just teach it to cook...& as a bonus, since I'm home sick (sent the family off for a week at Massanutten), I'm going to totally clean & organize my kitchen & pantry to start off fresh for the new year. I hope everyone had a peaceful holiday...Linda

Chili doesn't seem like a restaurant dish to me,it's something you make at home-meat, beans, onions & peppers, chile powder-a basic framework that you can expand almost infinitely, I like mine w/rice & cornbread. Several years ago, I had a neighbor who was a bowhunter, we got in a casual conversation about hunting, & I came home one night to find an entire deer leg in a styrofoam cooler on my front porch. Fortunately, the next day, our neighborhood was having a fall festival, w/ a chili cookoff, & I made a venison chili that was awesome. It was supposed to be a blind tasting, but I did label it as a venison chili, because some folks don't like game...I didn't win, but alot of people told me how much they liked it-& we didn't have to eat venison for a whole week....

That was a stellar picnic!-I think I'm still digesting...