Bustin a gut in New Orleans

You know the saddest sight in New Orleans? Anyone carrying a bag of McDonalds, that's what.

Here's a grab bag of some more food and drink experiences from Mardi Gras. We were pleased at how good everything was. We did not have a single bad meal while we were there, and prices at the nicest places we dined were a far better value than similar restaurants in Chicago.

We made two visits to the Acme Oyster House, which I'm happy to report was even better than I remembered it.



It's a nice surprise when a place specializing in fried seafood goes to the trouble of creating distinct types of breading for all their fried items. The fried oysters, catfish and crawfish tails were all noticeably different in texture. And just in case you think your hush puppies could use a little extra fat, they thoughtfully include a couple pats of butter:

Here's something that turns up on a lot of New Orleans menus, but that we hadn't tried before. Oysters Rockerfeller soup:



We are now ready to declare that the Carousel Bar at the Hotel Monteleone serves the best Sazerac we have tried:

Cafe DuMonde continues to be a perfect stop for a non-alcoholic pick-me-up. Don't get the large cafe au lait, because they serve that in styrofoam cups now and it takes away some of the perfection. Get a small cafe au lait and an order of beignets for less than $5.00:



Don't step on a pigeon while you're walking to your table.

Coop's Place has the best jambalaya of any restaurant in New Orleans. It has sausage and rabbit meat, and you can get the "supreme" version which includes a bunch of seafood. I got a small serving at lunch with some salad (they make their own Green Goddess dressing), and MizBubs got a smoked duck quesadilla:



We sat next to two cute French girls who were busy studying their guide book, and a mellow cat who kept watch in the front window:

Coop's has an ample supply of Abita Turbo Dog beer, which is an awesome value for $3.50 a bottle, and they also make a phenomenal Bloody Mary. MizBubs needed her vitamins so she didn't wait for me to take a picture of her cocktail:



The very best meal we had on this trip was at Luke. We had a late lunch there on Mardi Gras, and it was amazing. Wonderful service, delicious food, an open floor plan that was buzzing but not too noisy. It was the best combination of food, atmosphere and service we found on this trip, and I really can't say enough about the place.

We ended up having appetizers and dessert because by the time we finished the appetizers (and a few of their specialty house beers) we couldn't handle entrees. First there was Badischer Presskopf. I've never eaten head cheese before, and wanted to expand my horizons. This was one of the most delicious flavors I've ever had. It was served with a series of pickles on the side that served as a perfect counterpoint:

You can see the raw oysters there in the background. They were the best oysters we had on this trip. Luke has a good raw bar, and from where we sat we could see tray after tray of "Plateau de Fruits de Mer" going out to the tables--silver platters bearing mounds of ice laden with all manner of shellfish, crab legs and shrimp tails erupting from the tops.

The waiter recommended following cold appetizers up with something hot. He suggested something called Flammenkuche, which turned out to be an Alsatian pizza. It also turned out to be possibly the most perfect single combination of flavors and textures I had on this trip. We've been scouring the interwebs since we got home, trying to find a recipe that might approximate this.

Picture a small pizza, but with an insanely buttery, flaky crust more like a pate brisee than a typical pizza dough. Then there was a white sauce, then thinly sliced onion and Emmenthaler cheese and chunks of the best bacon I've ever eaten:

This did us in. The bacon was from a fellow named Alan Benton, and I can tell you he'll be getting some of our mail order business soon enough. I can taste it and feel the texture of the butter on my lips as I type this, it's that good.

We were stuffed, sure, but we still had dessert. I departed from my usual New Orleans ritual of trying every restaurant's bread pudding, and we had profiteroles with strawberry ice cream and creme anglaise.

We are happy to report that the Napoleon House is staying open later again--they had been closing at 5 or 6 since Katrina--and while Girod's still has not opened they have expanded their cafe menu.

There is one bartender there, I can't remember his name, who makes a fantastic Sazerac. He does this little flourish with the glass as he swirls the Herbsaint, and then flicks his wrist to toss away the excess when he finishes. He was not there on our most recent visit, and I think his absence might explain why the Napoleon House Sazerac has now fallen to second place. It's still a superior cocktail, though:



The meal we were most looking forward to on this vacation was at Cochon. The owner, Chef Donald Link, was named best chef in the south by the James Beard Foundation in 2007, and Cochon was nominated for best new restaurant. We first heard about this place after seeing Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations episode in New Orleans. The place gets rave reviews on Yelp and Trip Advisor. I mean, come on--the restaurant is dedicated to pork, and bears the French name for "pig". Surely we would love this place, no?

Well...no. Not exactly. Maybe they were having an off night--we did visit on the day after Mardi Gras, after all, and maybe the staff wasn't quite feeling their best. Maybe our expectations were too high after reading all the accolades. Who knows...

The place smelled perfect as we walked in. The greeter was lovely, and we were seated right away, and we ordered drinks. Some time after getting my bourbon flight (a sampler of three different bourbons) things just kind of went slightly off the tracks.

We were seated next to two women who had kind of a snooty vibe. One seemed almost haughty, and her dining companion was deferential to her to the point of being obsequious. They were dressed well but not too expensively. There was no obvious bling, or high end purses or expensive shoes. It didn't seem as if they had a reason to feel any better than anyone else in the place. The two had a look that some women begin to carry in adolescence--that of someone who always seems like she smells something bad.

Within a couple minutes a server (not ours) delivered two appetizers to our table. We paused for a moment, uncomprehending, and then told the server it was not our order.

"That's ours" said bitchface next us, and with great clattering of dinnerware the server lifted the items from our table and deposited them in their rightful spot, awkwardly reaching over my bride to do so.

The bourbon flight was excellent. The three bourbons were Sam Houston, Buffalo Trace (now our house bourbon, having replaced Wild Turkey) and a new favorite, Jefferson's Reserve. Wow.

Our appetizer arrived, a slice of andouille sweet potato pie with apples and green slaw. Meh. We were surprised that it didn't make more of an impression on us. I'm sure that in texture and flavor they were going for subtle, but it passed subtle into bland. The slaw didn't even register in flavor or texture.

A few minutes into the meal I looked over at the women seated next to us. They were preparing to leave, having finished less than half of their two appetizers, and with wine still left in their glasses. Neither of them looked like the kind of social x-rays who don't eat full meals. It didn't seem like they'd argued, or been called away by an emergency. I got the impression they felt we had somehow soiled their food by having been uncouth enough to allow a server to set it on our table, however briefly. When they left I told MizBubs I kind of regretted not snatching a quick bite out of their appetizers as soon as the server set them down, or at least sneezing over the plates.

Dinner began to arrive, and a pattern emerged. We'd be left alone for a while, longer than we'd like, and when servers would appear they seemed almost clumsy. A number of times we'd hear a fairly abrupt "excuse me" and have to move out of the way of the servers. It was the first time I've ever experienced service that managed to be, simultaneously, both indifferent and obtrusive.

MizBubs had paneed pork cheeks with goat cheese arugula & beet rösti, and pork and black-eyed pea gumbo with greens. They were both good, but not impressively so. The gumbo was overwhelmed by black pepper to the exclusion of other flavors.



I did well. I had an amazingly perfect item--an oyster and bacon sandwich. The bacon was wonderful, the oysters delicate and flavorful. The slaw that accompanied it was just right, and the sauce on the sandwich...well, I wish I'd paid closer attention to the finer points of the sandwich, but I ate it too fast.



The best part of the meal was dessert. While the dinner items were all good, except for my sandwich nothing jumped out at you. The desserts, on the other hand, were delicious and inspired. We had a cornmeal pineapple upside-down cake with coconut lime sorbet and dulce de leche, and a flourless chocolate cake with cream cheese mousse and pears.

Sadly, the evening ended on another off note. Of the two toilets in the men's bathroom, one of them was badly stopped up, literally full to the rim, and on the verge of spilling over. By the look of it, it had been that way for a while and no one appeared to be doing anything about it. A raunchy toilet can be an entertaining part of the atmosphere in a dive bar, but it's not what you want to encounter in a nice restaurant.

We left Cochon and both felt out-of-sorts. It was not a bad meal by any means, but there was just something about the place that fell really short of expectations.

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In 2004, while training for a marathon and running every day (including a 10 mile run in 90 degree heat) I still managed to gain 8 pounds in 3 days. Not so, this time. I managed to avoid the weight gain I usually experience on trips to New Orleans. We walked, a lot, and drank a lot of water too.

The trip has left me even more obsessed with food than usual. I made a creme anglaise for the first time yesterday, and it came out well. Our search for the right Flammenkuche recipe continues. I found out that the Carousel Bar is the birthplace of two cocktails, neither of which I've ever tried, so that's on the horizon too.

For now, though, even with all this thought of food and excess, I'm living a pretty sober life. I weigh less than I did last year, the foot pain is gone, and I'm getting ready to run some half marathons this summer. Camping season is right around the corner, work is busy but not driving me crazy...it's all (keep your fingers crossed) good.

It looks like maybe Mardi Gras did the trick, and ended up clearing my body,mind and soul to face the challenges and joys ahead.

Here's to a new week. Hope your weekend was good, and that your coming week will be healthy, productive and fun.

See you later, alligators.

Leftovers

Let's talk for a moment about leftover stuffing, in particular. What do you do with it?

Cover it in foil and heat it in the oven, and it runs the risk of drying out. Adding broth to it before reheating might keep it moist, but it might make it too wet once it heats up. Heating it in the microwave might work in small amounts, but it also risks turning the stuffing gummy and rubbery. Don't want that.

May I make a suggestion?

Fry it.

The eldest was reheating some stuffing for breakfast, and commented on how it contained so many appropriate breakfast foods: sausage, cornbread, pecans, dried cherries and apples. Then she said that the stuffing, once it was in a bowl for reheating in the microwave, reminded her of the way crab cakes look before you shape them into patties for frying. Why not, she said, try and make little stuffing cakes and fry them? I leaped out of my chair and grabbed a skillet, eager for a new adventure in frying.

What we did was beat a couple of eggs and then mix them in with the stuffing in a mixing bowl. Then it was into a few tablespoons of oil in a skillet. They began to crumble, and I pressed them down with a spatula until they resembled fat potato pancakes. They fried up beautifully, crispy and brown. The sausage released its fat, spicy and savory, the pecans gave off a wonderful toasted flavor, the cherries added a sweet note, and the cornbread reminded you of cornmeal batter on fried catfish, or of hushpuppies.

But sweet Jeebus, were they rich. One was definitely enough.

We each had two.

Let's get on with the holiday, shall we?

I'm ready for the 4th to get here. You may have noticed the new Independence Day-themed banner at the top of the page. I got that courtesy of photoshop wizard Dr. Zaius, and I'd like to thank him publicly for helping make things a little more festive around here. He also provided this alternate version that I may use to mix things up a little:

Nice work, huh?

_____________________

Well, today marked this summer's first appearance of the deep fryer. We did fried dill pickles, and I was told by the girls that they were better than the ones from the Blue and White Restaurant in Tunica, Mississippi and from the Praline Connection! Woot! Even better than the pickles, though, was the catfish. I tried out an Emeril Lagasse recipe that involved slicing the filets into 1" strips. They cooked for about 3 minutes (after soaking in milk and creole mustard for an hour, and being dredged in flour, corn meal and Tony Chachere's seasoning) and it might have been the best fried catfish I've ever eaten. I was stunned. MizBubs found the slaw recipe she's going to use on the 5th, and it was delicious. It starts as a traditional cole slaw recipe, but has some fennel to perk it up. It was goooooood. On top of that, she made two loaves of fresh bread yesterday, and half a loaf got devoured with dinner. We ate everything before I had a chance to take pictures of it.

We are going to have some feedbag next weekend. After tonight, though, we realized that the fryer is too much work for a party--I don't want to be slaving away over a vat of hot grease when there's people to talk to and drink with.

_____________________

Our eldest totally got ripped off at the zombie pinup contest at Flashback Weekend in Rosemont. She didn't even place.

Now look at this and tell me she isn't one amazing zombie pinup:



That's from one of her friend's pages. I'll try and find one that's not so blurry. She did say she met a lot of nice people and might pick up some makeup work in the near future. I wish I'd been that cool at 19.

____________________

There was no Sunday afternoon cocktail today. We have to focus.

Now it's time to get back to work.

Time for a brutal self-assessment

100%ALCOHOLIC

That's just for starters.

Thank you, Bubbles and Kirby, for helping me see just how far I've fallen.

On the diet and weight front, I now tip the scales at 219 pounds, more than at this time last year. Last time I was in New Orleans on vacation with my family, in August 2004, I gained 7 pounds in 3 days, while training for a marathon.

And what did I fatten up on? Well...here's just a little something for you. Please forgive me if some of the photos are a little...blurred. In an effort to avoid looking like either a rube or a voyeuristic freak, many of my vacation snapshots were taken with a cell phone camera.

Chopped pork shoulder sandwich and barbecue spaghetti at Interstate B-B-Q in Memphis



Fried dill pickles at the Praline Connection on Frenchmen Street.

And of course, my beloved Sazerac. First with lunch at the Napoleon House

And then before dinner at Arnaud's



Did I mention beignets? Forget Krispy Kreme, Dunkin Donuts, Lard Lad and all the rest of them. This is the ticket: fried dough covered in a mound of powdered sugar. Beats the hell out of any elephant ear or funnel cake you've ever had at any county fair. Served up all day and all night at Cafe Du Monde on Jackson Square.

Let's just grab one more order to go



Wait, I almost forgot--there was also bacon involved in this trip. Oh yes.

At one point, my stomach full, enjoying an expansive feeling of well-being toward my fellow humanity, my senses and speech only slightly impaired by intoxication, I suggested to MizBubs that it was in fact entirely possible to design an entire cuisine around oysters, bacon and a deep fryer. Yes, there was a lot of bacon. The most glorious example was this gem, served as an appetizer at Elizabeth's on Gallier.

Behold, praline bacon:

That's all for now. I'm off to cook dinner, some clear broth and a few pieces of spinach, followed by a piece of fruit. For now the bacon will stay in the freezer, and no deep-fried food or delicious cream sauces will cross my lips.

See y'all later.

Whew...

See that?

That's a clean desk top, complete with a desk blotter that's already had the inked-up, coffee-stained March page torn off. April's page sits there, a tabula rasa, because I won't walk back through those doors until April 6.

Yep. That's my office, the way I left it at 7 pm last night

The last 6 weeks or so have wrecked me. I'm about 15 pounds overweight, the result of too many surveillances, too many schedule changes, too much fast food and too many jibaritos while driving around Chicago looking for the last few pieces of the puzzle that we need to solve our open murder. My skin looks pale and saggy and I'm just getting over a wicked cold. I've only run a couple of lethargic 2 or 3 milers in the last month. The shitty gray weather has suited my mood most of the time.

But things are looking up, now that I'm away from the desk you see pictured above and everything that goes along with it.

I leave for Dallas tonight, shoot a training video tomorrow and then come home Thursday. Hopefully I'll have time to visit the Book Depository and the grassy knoll along the way.

This time next week we'll be eating a big-ass southern breakfast at the Blue & White Restaurant in Tunica, Mississippi, on our way down to New Orleans. I might even have pie after breakfast. When we're back from spring break in New Orleans I head right into my favorite job-related event of the year, the ILEETA conference, where I will shift gears from gorging myself on rich food to gorging myself on law enforcement tactical swag.

Now it's time to get the youngest to school, get a haircut and pack my bags.

See you later, alligators.

All is quiet on New Years Day

What a day. I couldn't really tell you a single thing I did today, other than cook, but I mean that in a good way. The day just passed by in a pleasant, slow moving blur. Everyone relaxed, hanging around, talking. A perfect day for me to be the big shiftless hillbilly I am.

Today was a food day. I took a pound of sausage out of the freezer last night to thaw, and rinsed and put a pound of black eyed peas in a bowl to soak before we went out. The last couple of years I've gone running on New Years Day, but the snow and ice kept me from doing that this year. So I cooked, and I ate. I woke up before anyone else, drank some coffee and caught up on some reading. And then I started cooking. Breakfast was biscuits and sausage gravy--delicious and filling, and a nice lazy way to start the year.

Once we were sufficiently coffee'd up, and had some food in our bellies, the champagne came out. Today's drink was the Bellini; we cheated and used peach nectar instead of pureed peaches, and we used champagne instead of sparkling Italian wine.

Later in the afternoon it was time to start cooking again. Usually on New Years day I like to make hoppin' John. I was excited because this year I had a new recipe that promised to be more flavorful than the one I'd used in the past. Also on the menu were southern greens. I started the greens first.

Like all good southern vegetable dishes, you start with some bacon.

You chop a half pound of bacon, and fry it in a big pot until it starts to get crispy. Then you add a couple cups of sliced onions, and fry them with the bacon till they turn golden. Then throw in a tablespoon of minced garlic, fry it a little more, then pour in a bottle of beer, a quarter cup of vinegar and a couple tablespoons of molasses. Mix it all up, and then start adding your greens.

Lately we've been using the greens from Glory Foods, a mix of mustard, collard and turnip greens that come pre-washed and chopped. It saves a lot of trouble, I'll tell you, especially in January when the garden is snowed under and there's no farmers market. You add 3 pounds of greens to the bacon/onion/liquid mix described above and then you cook the whole thing on a low heat for about an hour and a half.

While the greens are cooking you can start on your hoppin' John. The first thing you got to do is rinse and soak your black eyed peas overnight

The recipe calls for a ham hock, but I cheated and used a big hunk of smoked ham, cut into chunks. You start by searing some ham in a big pot; after a few minutes you add a half cup of chopped celery, a half cup of chopped red pepper, a tablespoon or two of garlic, and a cup of chopped onion. Boy, does it smell good.

After a while you add a bay leaf, a teaspoon of thyme, salt, pepper, cayenne and a quart of stock. You bring it to a boil, and then reduce the heat and let it simmer for a little over an hour. I had to add about another cup of stock during the cooking. When it's all done you serve it over some steamed white rice:

We were going to make cornbread, but after a few Bellinis we just didn't have the energy. Which is kind of a shame, because MizBubs makes some damned fine cornbread.

_____________________

So the day went by in a pleasant haze of eating, lounging and drinking. Our youngest left for a sleepover, our eldest's boyfriend came by and had dinner with us, then they went out for ice cream with some friends. We popped in Kairo, the original Japanese version of Pulse. It was a cool movie, moody and dark, but I started to fall asleep and got up to go to bed. And then the phone rang.

It was an old friend of mine, technically an ex-girlfriend although I don't really think of her that way since I only dated her for a few months in my junior year in high school. She's one of a small number of people I've managed to stay in touch with since high school. From her I found out that one of my best friends in high school, someone I'd lost track of about 20 years ago, had died of brain cancer.

I cracked open a bottle of Knob Creek that my partner gave me as a Christmas present, poured a quadruple, and spent the next half hour on the phone catching up. I found out another girl I knew--my ex-girlfriend's best friend--also had cancer and was quite sick. We spent some time talking about our kids, talking about loss, about reaching middle age, and about the tendency of some folks in our age bracket to spend more time looking back than looking forward.

My friend Warren Stewart was one of the coolest people I ever met. He was one of those kids in high school who just had style and tastes that were developed far beyond that of any of his peers. He was wicked smart, and funny, and he loved good food and paid attention to good cooking years before I ever did. He was the first of my friends who knew how to mix a cocktail.

The last time I saw him was in 1984, when he visited me and MizBubs in Chicago, and I have vague memories of him and MizBubs dragging me home from a punk rock bar in the classic drunken sailor/crucifixion manner. I can't even remember how I lost track of him, and I feel kind of shitty about that.

It turns out Warren was living in Brooklyn when he died, and was loved, and will be missed by many many people. There's a memorial blog set up for him, and I spent some time reading the various entries. I didn't recognize the names of any of the posters; the lack of names from our high school years made the passage of time seem somehow more intense. I don't know why, but the idea that I had at one time been so close to Warren, and knew nothing of how he'd spent the past 20 + years, was at once disorienting and sad.

After a while I got off the phone with my friend, and went upstairs to tuck in MizBubs. She was curled up in bed reading, and asked how my call went. She had only met Warren twice, but they got along famously. I like to think he'd be pleased to see how we turned out. At one point I said that we've now officially hit middle age--we're at the point when we're starting to hear about friends getting sick and dying, and there's sure to be more of it coming in the next 10 or 20 years. Somehow, though, that thought's not depressing to me. It's just kind of curious, just part of the journey. Time marches on, and we all go on doing whatever it is that we do, and so does everyone else.

Tired and weary, or not, we must go alone. Hopefully we'll all find peace in the new year.

Food and drink

The other day a social worker asked me what I did for stress relief, and running was the first thing off my lips. Then I had to pause, and I came up with time with my family, and spending time outdoors, and then...cooking. I felt like crap the other day and called in sick, then ended up sleeping most of the morning and afternoon. I felt better when I got up, and without even really thinking about it started baking cookies, chocolate chip oatmeal cookies, and MizBubs ended up making a delicious pork stew and Irish brown bread. The house smelled great.

While drinking should not be tops on anyone's list of stress relief strategies, I have no doubt that the quiet, slow enjoyment of a tasty cocktail, glass of wine, fine whiskey or cold beer contributes greatly to a sense of well-being.

Sitting down and eating a dozen donuts or a pound of bacon at once might provide some satisfaction in the short run, it's probably not a good idea to lean on food as stress relief. That being said, the enjoyment of the right food at the right time goes a long way to restoring your spirit.

Take, for example, this lovely box:

See, at one time this box was full of 5.5 pounds of delicious handmade pastries. But, by the time I could find my camera, this was all that was left. Me and MizBubs came home at the end of a shitty day last week and found this box on our front stoop. Seems that the lovely Jin, of Uniquely Yours Pastry Shoppe, sensed my distress at the loss of my friend and did what she does best--she baked. Here's what we got:

• Lemon slices
• Cappuccino brownies
• Molasses cookies
• Apple crumble squares (these were like the top of my mom's apple crumb pie)
• Apricot scones
• Fruit muffins

Jin thoughtfully included storage instructions for items that had to be kept longer than 2 days. Trust me, we didn't need them. I can say I've never in my life ever had a better selection of baked goods.

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Sunday afternoon I marinated some chicken breasts in garlic, rosemary and olive oil. We ended up harvesting about 2 pounds of red chard from our garden, and we sauteed the chard in olive oil and garlic. When it was done we tossed the chard/oil/garlic mixture with roasted pecans, chopped crispy bacon and feta cheese, and mixed it all with some pasta. Then we cut the grilled chicken into strips and served it with the pasta. YOW. Good stuff.

So, what drink went with this Sunday feast? We returned to an old favorite, the Sazerac. While the best Sazerac around, in my opinion, is served up at the Napoleon House in New Orleans, the recipe we use is from the Gumbo Shop cook book. Bourbon (or rye whiskey), sugar syrup, Peychaud's Bitters, and absinthe with a twist of lemon peel.

_____________________

On Wednesday we continued with the New Orleans-themed drinks. MizBubs reached into her seemingly endless bag o' tricks and dug out a drink called a Brandy Crusta:

• 2 shots of cognac
• 1/2 shot of triple sec or Cointreau
• 1/2 shot of maraschino liqueur
  
• 1/2 shot of fresh-squeezed lemon juice
• 3/4 shot of cold water
• 4 dashes of Angostura bitters

Shake all ingredients with ice and strain into a chilled glass rimmed with sugar, with a lemon peel twist. When you're done it looks like this:

We followed up the cocktails by picking some Thai basil from our garden, and then tossing it with some ground beef from the freezer, along with garlic, chili paste, sugar and fish sauce. We served the whole affair over basmati rice.


And this carries us into the end of the work week.

Eat, drink and be merry.

Tasty vices

On today's date in 1987, Ben & Jerry's created my favorite ice cream, Cherry Garcia. It is now their most popular flavor.



Oh, one more thing... I think this breaks up the lull between Father's Day and our upcoming wedding anniversary very nicely, thank you.

According to Tom Fitzmorris of the New Orleans Menu Daily, today is National Dry Martini Day.

Bottoms up!

I'm hungry

Now this is tasty.

I got tagged by Johnny Yen, so now you can add me to this latest interwebs rage. I'll let this copy/pasted text explain how it works:

1. Add a direct link to your post below the name of the person who tagged you.
Include the city/state and country you’re in.

Nicole (Sydney, Australia)
velverse (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia)
LB (San Giovanni in Marignano, Italy)
Selba (Jakarta, Indonesia)
Olivia (London, England)
ML (Utah, USA)
Lotus (Toronto, Canada)
tanabata (Saitama, Japan)
Andi (Dallas [ish], Texas, United States)
Lulu (Chicago, Illinois, United States)
Chris (Boyne City, Michigan, United States)
AB (Cave Creek, Arizona, United States)
Johnny Yen (Chicago, Illinois, USA)
Bubs (Mt Prospect, Illinois, USA)

2. List out your top 5 favorite places to eat at your location.

3. Tag 5 other people (preferably from other countries/states) and let them know they’ve been tagged.

________________________________

I was telling Johnny that I wish I'd been tagged like this about 20 years ago, because I would have had a lot more interesting places to list. Ask me about my favorite places to eat in New Orleans, or Las Vegas or San Antonio or the Florida Keys, and I could give you a few good answers; it's just that now we don't go out to eat all that much. We love food, but we get more pleasure out of cooking with our family than we do from dining out. I do have a few places I can mention. Here goes...if you ever find yourself in the dining Sahara that is the northwest suburbs, you should be able to strap on a good feedbag at these spots:

1) Sushi Ai
This is an unexpected treat on Euclid Avenue in Palatine. The place is tucked, unassumingly, into a strip mall, next to a Dominicks. The owners were involved with Starfish in Chicago, though, and once you walk inside the vibe is urban--warm wood, cool design and techno music. The food is outstanding and cheaper than you'd pay at the same place in a hipster neighborhood in Chicago. The staff is really nice.

2) Wholly Frijoles
Now this is a place I'm reluctant to even mention. The food is spectacular, it's in a tiny space, they don't take reservations and it's nearly always packed. It's on Touhy Avenue in Lincolnwood. Outside of Rosario's in San Antonio this is the best Mexican food I've ever had. They guy who owns it used to be a chef at the Pump Room. This time of year you can see people sitting outside in white plastic lawn chairs waiting to get in. It's BYOB, so if you grab a six pack you can have a beer or two while you wait and then drink the rest with dinner.

3) Gail's Carriage Inn
My favorite breakfast place. We found it when we first moved out here, and it's a sentimental choice; still, the food is great. They recently moved to an address on Elmhurst Road in Des Plaines (a casualty of Mount Prospect's "downtown" redevelopment) but I'm happy to report the food is at least as good as before, maybe better. Try a "spuds" omelette totally encased in hash browns.

4) Alt Thai
Another unexpected gem. This is in Arlington Heights in one of those suburban commercial developments that's meant to look like (and usually fails to look like) a city environment. You'll smell this place from a half block away as you walk up--competing aromas of charcoal, cilantro, Thai curries and hints of fish sauce and coffee. It's a cool space inside, and it's surprisingly inexpensive.

5) La Tasca
I remember eating at some tapas restaurants in Chicago in the early 90's, and I loved the idea of it. All those little dishes, shared with your companions, washed down with a lot of tasty Spanish red wine. I didn't even know La Tasca was there until some friends invited us, and now La Tasca is one of our favorite places to relax and eat just the right amount of garlicky, olive-oil laden treats. They've got a great, reasonably-priced wine selection too.

Hmmm...I want to hear about some food I can't walk to, so I tag Jin, my sister-in-law Kate, Splotchy, Mob and Barbara.

Why do they all use Spry?

HERE'S WHY THEY ALL USE SPRY!


"It's marvelous. It creams so easily."


"Foods fried in Spry are as digestible as if baked or boiled."


"Spry is so white. I just know it's purer."



Valued readers like Dino, aka Katy, want to know about miracle product Spry Pure Vegetable Shortening. So, putting aside the fact that I get oddly and inappropriately excited when talking about fat and deep frying, here it is, in all its white whipped oleaginous glory.

Back at Thanksgiving we visited a few antique shops in Marion, Iowa, and I picked up a few old cookbooks. Not regular cookbooks, the little pamphlets put together by food companies, books like Medley of Meat Recipes from the American Meat Institute. Lucky me--I buy a few old pamphlets, and then, a few weeks later, I get some neat presents from my mother-in-law: some modern home magazines from the 50's and 60's, and a guide to building the "modern vacation home" from Popular Science. Anyway, one of the pamphlets I got was from Spry. Imagine a 48 page cookbook in which every single recipe calls for vegetable shortening. I love it.

Spry was a vegetable shortening (like Crisco) made by Lever Brothers. They had a spokeswoman known as Aunt Jenny, who hawked the product from the 1930's through the 1950's. You can see for yourself why Spry is the superior shortening here and here.

There are plenty of good recipes in here, but my real find was the newspaper clipping hidden inside. Click here for this delicious recipe for pineapple and carrot salad, circa 1940.


F*ck you Rachel Ray.