Text 5076, 135 rader
Skriven 2013-09-25 17:18:03 av Ruth Haffly (1:396/45.28)
   Kommentar till text 5042 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: noncreativity 218
=========================
Hi Michael,

 RH> With Steve being half Italian, I've got to keep oregano in the house.

 ML> Does that also mean you have to keep woodruff in the house ...

No, he was raised on the 3 I use. I use them because his mom did & she
gave me her recipies. Of course now I riff on them.

 RH> It's one of the 3 green herbs I use in a lot of Italian type cooking,
 RH> along with basil and parsley.

 ML> I've let thyme take over oregano's responsibility and also that
 ML> of basil, which is odd, as though I think of thyme and oregano
 ML> as both occupying the same niche, basil is a bit different -
 ML> my way is almost like having a centerfielder roped into playing
 ML> quarterback, but it works.

OTOH, I don't think of thyme as oriented toward Italian cooking. We use
it in various things but not easpecially Italian. OTOH, basil is pretty
much a "given" for Italian cooking around here.


 ML>   I'm also using a bit of mint from time
 RH> to time, thanks to Janis.

 ML> Very southern, I am told.

Yes, and Steve's mom's ancestry is from the Calabrian region, the "toe"
of the boot. Mom doesn't use mint tho.


 ML>  OTOH, I've had to buy oregano and basil when
 RH> I wanted to make spaghetti or other pasta for my folks, same with
 RH> garlic. Several years ago when we went up for their 60th anniversary
 RH> celebration, my dad and I each made a pot of meat sauce for the dozen
 RH> or so folks that were eating supper at the house one night. My sauce
 RH> basically disappeared, Dad's was taken by some folks who wanted to be
 RH> diplomatic and have a bit of each.

 ML> Do what I have done and sneak seasoning into the food. I was
 ML> once cooking with a former echo member and questioned that
 ML> person's lack of seasoning in a dish; when (s)he wasn't looking
 ML> I added about 4 or 5 times the amount of seasoning, and when
 ML> the food was served and everyone ate, the person said to me,

I was busy with other things at the time but will keep that in mind.
Whenever we've gone up to my folks over the last few years, we've prett
much kicked Mom and Dad out of the kitchen. Dad insisted on making a pot
of sauce "so there would be enough for everybody" but we had lots of
left overs (his), a little bit of mine.

 ML> what did I tell you. I never divulged this until now.

Secret's out! Now we'll all beware when we're cooking with you. (G)


 ML> I'm less confident now, though, because my peculiar health
 ML> condition makes me erratic in my use of and taste for salt.
 ML> Herbs and spices, pretty much the same.

I'm using a bit more salt than I used to, but still very little and a
lot of it being the KCl. I'm (still) using a lot of herbs & spices.


 ML> He's as much balloon as tire to me.
 RH> Sorta like the Pillsbury Doughboy of the tire world.

 ML> Uglier, at least in historical representations.

And he doesn't giggle when you poke his tummy.


 ML> Okay, I can see your point, but one can enjoy even such meals.
 ML> I admit that a familiar with the lily family helps a lot.
 RH> For sure! I usually go thru several pounds of onions a month, less of
 RH> garlic (because it's smaller--G--).

 ML> Here in my dotage I probably would do fine with food such
 ML> as your mother made, but that may be partially because
 ML> during my stay on the planet I have had a substantially
 ML> more adventurous time of it than most people.
 RH> And I'm trying to get away from the foods my mother made, or at least
 RH> the way she made them.

 ML> My mother was pretty much the perfect cook. Being the unloved
 ML> second twin and living with the servants gave her an advantage
 ML> in that sense.

Sometimes that's an advantage.

 ML>  We splurged Friday night on our anniversary and
 RH> went to a 4 star German/Polish place. The menu was very limited but
 RH> jaegerschnitzel with locally grown shitakes was one of the specials.
 RH> We both ordered that; it came with red cabbage (not as ubersweet as
 RH> found in a lot of German restaurants) and spaezle. That had been fried
 RH> a bit in butter after boiling so it wasn't a glu-ey mass.

 ML> I think I've mostly had them this way, with a few breadcrumbs
 ML> strewn over.

I've made them with Swiss cheese mixed in, also good. That's a varient
found in my Bavarian cook book, a gift for me from a German family in
Augsburg that Steve knew when he was TDY there in 1984. A number of my
favorite german recipes are from it.


 RH> peach streusel on yellow cake--on the dry side

 ML> Stroozle (the way I say it) gives the impression that things
 ML> are drier. Do other people pronounce it Germanically
 ML> (STRrhOY-zel)?

Most people strew crumbs over something, they don't (de)stroy it. Same
people pronounce spaetzle as spazle.


 RH> The menu was very limited but there was an extensive beer/wine listing
 RH> that we ignored.

 ML> I understand Buckler gives a reasonable facsimile of the taste
 ML> without the alcohol. Kaliber as well.

We just had water, which they kept refilling.

---
Catch you later,
Ruth
rchaffly{at}earthlink{dot}net  FIDO 1:396/45.28


... Proverbs 3:13 | Happy is the man that findeth wisdom,...

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