Endless Simmer - A Food Blog

 
Blame Oklahoma???

- DAD Gansie has the final word on  the Pringles Scandal: Chips Are good. I like the baked lays with ridges. Mom Gansie Likes herrs too.

- Totally random commenter wants to remind you that today is your last chance to enter the Pine Nut Contest:  this pine nut contest rules! i love pine nuts!

- The verdict is in on pre-packaged peanut butter slices, and simmer-ers are not happy.

Clayton: Please, for the love of all that is holy, tell me this is a joke.

Jon: This brings America one step closer to futuristic food pils. USA! USA! USA!

And you can trust JoeHoya will track evil down to its source:

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Forget Ice Cream! You guys were all over Maidelitala’s Tofutti Cutie plug:

Liza: “I was a lactard as a child, and I depended on Tofutti (yes tofutti “ice cream” did exist in the 80s) so I was delighted to see this childhood favorite back and in “cutie” form. (and because when I was little I thought Tofutti was a silly word and it made me laugh when I saw it again) I’m addicted!!!!”

JoeHoya offers up an alternative: “I still prefer Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches…only 10 more calories and 6 more grams of sugar, but 4 fewer grams of fat and more protein and fiber. Plus they come in mint and chocolate/peanut butter!”

And Sarabelle has another: “I have to say, my fave dairy free ice cream is SO purely decadent coconut milk dairy free ice cream. so yummy. They also have lowfat so delicious ice cream sandwiches, you have to try them. Thanks gansie for addressing the needs of the lactose challenged! Any idea why people grow into lactose intolerance?”

-Back in the world of real dairy, Liza also sides with gansie on toning down the fancy cheese scene:

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- Bobby has taken a commanding lead in the Spice Master Who Cooked It Better, but  it ain’t over ’til it’s over - you’ve still got a couple days left, so make sure to cast your vote. Don’t forget to catch the mudslinging.

JoeHoya: My opponent’s dish represents four more meals of the same Middle East strategy.

We hear some shady 527’s are planning last-minute anti-Rosemary push polls.

- Meanwhile, I still don’t know who to believe in the whole raw milk debate:

Jenny: the benefits of raw milk have been illustrated in several studies and the risk of pathogens is incredibly low in raw milk from clean dairies. Pasteurization is simply an excuse to produce dirty milk.

Nikki: So what does raw milk have that pasteurized milk doesn’t…that I NEED to have in order to lead a healthful, fulfilled life? And can I get these properties from another source? Does it have to be dirty milk? And yes, it is dirty. Raw=dirty.

Fearless Kitchen: I’m pretty opposed to government interference in matters of personal choice. If someone wants to drink raw milk I have no problem with their drinking raw milk, with the caveat that they need to know what they’re getting into. And I do like raw milk cheese, proximity to cow hiney notwithstanding. I wouldn’t eat it if my immune system were compromised or if I were expecting or something like that, but since none of these are the case… As for drinking, I’ll stick to beer. Solves the problem for me!

Finally, Rooms digs back to Sarah Palin’s recipes and brings us some much-need scientific knowledge:

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Is bacon the food world equivalent of the four-letter word? Read on for details…

- Have you taken the Omnivore Hundred yet? Among ES readers, Camille appears to be in the lead with an astonishing 88 percent.

- On the herbivore front, Alex is taken with gansie’s pine nut salad:  I am usually thrilled to find them lurking in my salad. This could have something to do with my not really liking salad and really liking nuts…I’m just bopping along, eating my salad like a good vegetarian, and then WHOA! THERE’S A PINE NUT! AWESOME! It’s like when you crush up a pill and put it in delicious juice for a kid to drink so they won’t know it’s there, except opposite. Maybe I should start crushing up my lettuce and hide it in my pine nuts instead of hiding my pine nuts under my lettuce.

- But Mean Today is unimpressed with Padma Lakshmi’s salad course:

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- 80p let it be known this week that he is not happy with your decision to induce a month of gansie whining by forcing her to cook chicken pot pie. But MonkeyBoy is already salivating:  If you recount make sure you get all 7 of my votes. I’m not letting you cheat me out some good potpie!

While Maidelitala has just one pearl of wisdom: Gansie dear, I beg of you, leave the fried eggs out of the pot pie recipe!

- It must be pick-on-gansie week or something, because Rusty reached back to g’s Roasted Poblano Johhny Cake recipe and let us know how to make it a little less cheat-y with homemade corn muffins.

- Following up on my Truck-Side Dining article, JoeHoya chimed in with some cool new mobile food options in D.C. Check out the full story over on Capital Spice.

- And 64 percent of you think Sarah Palin is most likely to consume moose burgers, but the would-be veep still won’t give us a recipe. Maybe she’ll have some free time now that she’s already done campaigning.

Photos: Funny the World, ES, Capital Spice, AP

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- Our college eating suggestions brought out a great idea from Yvo:  Easy Mac also came out way, way after I was in college. I can’t say from experience, but, ahem, I hear you can make it without a microwave by, um, running the hot water in the sink as hot as it’ll go for a few minutes, then using that. I would not advise trying this.

I would DEFINITELY advise someone trying this, just so we can know if it works.

- Meanwhile, JakeSG’s tico report got everyone hungry

Pinch o Minch: That all looks amazing. I’d be a tad skeptical of dessert that looks like soap, though.

Britannia disagreed: The jello looks like a piece of bacon, even more appetizing!

- But it was 80’s latest artsy photo that laid down the challenge…

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- Gansie’s upcoming televised debut is causing quit the stir, with passions flaming between the pro- and anti- pot chicken pie people:

Mike Donlon: I am going to vote regular and often (it is allowed). CHICKEN POT PIE

Not Cooking: Pot Pie is a baked-good and a poor measure of COOKING ability. Booo.

With 71 votes in, lasagna has just inched ahead of chicken pot pie, and mac ‘n’ cheese is making a strong move as well. There are 3 days left to vote, so head over to Capital Cooking Show and weigh in.

- In other voting news, it’s a dead heat between the Greek Gazpacho and the Avocado-Sesame Gazpacho in our weekly Who Cooked it Better? Meanwhile, JoeHoya points out some further craziness:

Best gazpacho of all? Poste’s version with heirloom tomatoes from their courtyard garden, a sprinkling of black salt and a dollop of dijon ice cream in the bowl - hands down.

- But the singular Comment of the Week Award has to go to ES contributor/poet laureate Maidelitala for her flowery description of gansie’s latest runny egg yolk photography:

the glistening deep-vermilion of the tomato/

the coy curl of the shaved scallions/

the erotic gooeyness of a scarcely running yoke.

That’s some haiku shit right there! Way to raise the commenting bar, Maidelitala. And while we’re at it, a very happy birthday to our favorite veggie lactard from the entire ES community.

Photo: Roland

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- Everyone’s loving britannia’s Spanish teenager phase, although IOI points out that “the experts ask for a Katxi of Kalimotxo, and don’t expect a fancy glass.”

- Who Cooked It Better is shaping up to be a shocker this week, with both pork-y entries falling behind foodie nyc’s glorious goat cheese and fennel dish. Brit just doesn’t understand: “Bacon. Pine nuts. Cheese. FRIED! Why hasn’t this won already?!?!”

- And in case Michael Phelps is still hungry, our readers offer their own take on the very best in Olympic carb-loading foods.

belmontnedina: “What about the Stuffed Pizza Skins from Uno? Only in America would you take a deep dish pizza crust and stuff it with mashed potatoes.”

Liza: “Apparently there is now something called a P-Zone from PIzza Hut that is some combination of pizza and a calzone… like maybe one is on top of the other, I’m not really sure… but seems appropriate for this!”

Tom Aarons: Gold should have gone to the cinnabon! Can one challenge medal results?

Yvo: “My friends and I were trying to come up with a way to deep fry coffee- into donut like things. Every cop’s wet dream, right?” Uh, yes. Someone please invent this and get back to us ASAP.

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- Everyone is coming to Liza’s rescue in her doctoral dilemma. Gotta love the advice from EvoDiva: For my comprehensive oral exam (to become a PhD candidate) I went with the “impress-them-with-your-cleverness-then- put-them-in-a-sugar-coma-so-they-stop- asking-questions” route. Since I use fish to study evolution, I brought in Swedish fish (yep, the red candies!) and sugar cookies in the shapes of different fishes (fish cookie cutters from ebay!). I don’t know if my committee members were thrilled with the snacks, but I passed my exam!

and RubyGirl got creative: Trail Mix individually wrapped in re-cycled computer paper….tied with raffia or some sort of string material. The wrapping paper could have math formulas/or something that has to do with your thesis printed on it ??…..I may be from an older generation but “real men don’t each quiche” always comes to mind when I think of this dish….more of a ladies luncheon item in my mind.

What do the rest of you think of quiche? Are men ready for it yet, or still no? Can’t wait to see what you make, Liza!

- Olive juice is the new everything. My confession got you guys spurting the ideas:

Liz: I use pickle and/or olive juice as a base to marinate flank or skirt steak. I usually throw some other spices in (different every time) and it is great! Make the meat really tender.

gansie: i bet that would be good in hummus

Beth: It’s also good to put in a marinade for chicken. A little fresh lemon juice, parsley, garlic. Grill and top w/the olives and feta very tasty.

- I’m still blown away by how many of you are commenting on our Top Ten American Foods post. While some of you are just a teensy bit angrier than I expected (Joe: Fuck you writer, you anti-America piece of shit.) !!! The rest of you are still offering up more ideas for the best Ameri-foods:

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