Text 23789, 157 rader
Skriven 2015-02-07 15:29:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
     Kommentar till en text av NANCY BACKUS
Ärende: coverups 184
====================
 NB> I'm with you on that...  True, spice MIGHT be used to cover up
 NB> shortcomings but it's also quite nice to enhance the taste of foods,
 NB> as well... ;)  Perhaps that's a piece of my preferring Asian (of just
 NB> about any sort) over American cuisine...  ;)

Though there's no beating a big old steak on occasion.

 NB> Are there any other particularly American foods that are spicy...?

Can't think of any. Of course, even though hot peppers are
supposed to have originated (as with just about everything else,
it seems) in northern south America, their use never migrated
far north. Roughly, the (artificial) demarcations seem to be the
Panama Canal, the Rio Grande, and the Mason-Dixon, for hot,
semi-hot, and sissy hot respectively, the 20th-century hot for
hot's sake being an anomaly. I refer you to early editions of
Joy of Cooking, which referred to the placentas of ordinary bell
peppers as carrying excruciating heat: I don't have direct
evidence earlier than the 1950s, but I can attest to the Scoville
value at that time to be about 10 or 50, no more, even in the
hottest commercial specimens. I did have a sport once a few
decades ago that actually had some heat, but I suspect that was
the result of a horticultural mixup.

I wonder if there might be a market for a hot bell pepper
these days.

 NB> I hear you on the breakfast, I tend
 NB> to try to find something decent on those buffets just because it's
 NB> there and "free"... even though I'm not much of a breakfast person
 NB> normally either... ;)

It messes up the rest of the day. Lilli tends to threaten
to hold her breath and turn blue if I don't have breakfast
with her, though, so I generally do; this means that the
noontime brisket or fried chicken or rattlesnake stew
doesn't have the satisfying quality it otherwise might.

 ML> I had to take three Lasixes today after having spaghetti
 ML> and chili (made with that ancient roast beef that I banged
 ML> into the freezer a month ago) at 3 am this morning. Big
 ML> mistake, but I was hungry.
 NB> Was that particularly salty...?  Can't blame you though... hunger
 NB> makes for some odd/interesting choices...  ;)

As the beef was ancient and mistreated, I salted it a bit
extra. Also, for some reason, the cumin hadn't been put back
in the fridge (by whom?) so had all the earthiness intact
but not so much of the cumininess, so the result was hardly
worth eating except that I'm saving up for my next extravaganza,
whenever that might be.

By the way, Jonathan cleaned up the kitchen almost (almost) to
the point where I might be comfortable cooking in it; this is
good. He also wandered in while I was eyeballing the situation
and started talking with morbid excitement about a train crash
that had killed half a dozen people, something I was in no mood
to discuss and told him so. I did compliment him on the state
of the kitchen, though.

 ML> Relatively few of my friends these days have adventurous
 ML> palates - either that or they have used them up and have
 ML> become timid in their old age. It would be nice to take a
 ML> field trip with someone whose tastes were as wide-ranging
 ML> as mine.
 NB> I hear you.  :)  If anything, I think my palate is becoming more
 NB> adventurous in my old age...  ;)  Some things are ok once, and that
 NB> satisfies the urge to try, but other things become new favorites... :)
 NB> If I had the funds, I'd volunteer... 

Sigh. I need someone with no kids and no mortgage or who has
outgrown same (Lilli). Otherwise, you'd do fine.

 ML> from Joseph Roques, New Treatise on Everyday Plants,
 ML> Especially with Regard to Medicine (1838) - "Spinach,
 ML> broom of the stomach, a banal saying that has been
 ML> the cause of more than one indigestion ... ." 
 NB> Stole that tag from someone... probably UDD...  ;)  I happen to like
 NB> spinach well enough... doesn't seem to work as a broom, though, nor
 NB> give me indigestion... :)

If you ate enough for it to work, it might!

 ML> Mutual isolation can be a good thing. Back in the once upon
 ML> a times, they used to put the immunocompromised into "life
 ML> islands" - roomettes with air filtered in and out and with
 ML> airlocks for transferring stuff -; later, such were used in
 ML> cases of suspected contagiousness, notably, AIDS before the
 ML> method of transmission was figured out.
 NB> They still have some of those in the EDs around here.

Funny, earlier today I was singing to myself the song in which
King Gama introduces himself in Princess Ida, imagining it as
sung by Jeffrey Wayne Davies, who will always be inextricably
associated in my mind with that role. Jeff was one of the first
AIDS patients, and they built one of those things specially for
him at Sloan-Kettering when they had no idea what the stuff was.
I remember having been forbidden from visiting him during his last
illness, something that I sort of regret over thirty years later.

Now I guess they're using them for stuff like ebola.

MMMMM----- Recipe via Meal-Master (tm) v8.05

      Title: Spanakopita Peloponnisos
 Categories: Greek, Appetizer, Main dish, Vegetarian
      Yield: 8 servings

      1 kg Spinach
      1 md Onion; chopped
      1    Leek; chopped
      1 c  Chopped spring onions
    1/3 c  Olive oil
    1/2 c  Chopped parsley
      3 ts Ground nutmeg
           Salt
           Freshly ground black pepper
      8    Fillo pastry sheets
           Olive oil or butter

  Serves 6-10 Oven temperature: 180 C (350 F) Cooking time: 50 min

  Wash spinach well and cut off any coarse stems.  Chop coarsely and
  put into a large pan. Cover and place over heat for 7-8 min
  shaking pan now and then or turning spinach with a fork.  Heat just
  long enough to wilt spinach so that juices can run out freely.  Drain
  well in a colander, pressing occasionally with a spoon.

  Gently fry the onion in olive oil for 10 min, add chopped leek and
  spring onions and fry gently for further 5 min until transparent.

  Place well-drained spinach in a mixing bowl and add oil and onion
  mixture, herbs and nutmeg.  Blend thoroughly, adding salt and pepper
  to taste.

  Place a sheet of fillo pastry on work surface and brush lightly with
  olive oil.  Top with 3 more sheets of pastry, brushing each with oil.
  Brush top layer lightly with oil and place half the spinach mixture
  along the length of the pastry towards one edge and leaving 4 cm
  (1-1/2-inches) clear on one side.  Fold bottom edge of pastry over
  filling, roll once, fold in sides then roll up.  Place a hand at each
  end of roll and push it in gently like a concertina.  Repeat with
  remaining pastry and filling.

  Place rolls in an oiled baking dish leaving space between rolls.
  Brush tops lightly with oil and bake in a moderate oven for 30
  min until golden.  Serve hot cut in portions.

  From: "The Complete Middle East Cookbook" by Tess Mallos.
  ISBN: 1 86302 069 1
  From: Mike Dunsmore

MMMMM

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