Just for the hell of it, I'm gonna cook all of it, Wade. No lie.



plus 10 to you

It's not me, it's my darling wife. I am a shellfish guy. Hell, I'm one of the few folk around that can put together a blue-crab feast and pick the fuckers LIVE for you to get more "Old Bay" on your backfins. (That's right, I shell 'em LIVE! 99/100ths you've never seen THAT - (including those of us in the Chesapeake Bay watershed) - we are talking pre-steamed here, aka dead crab WALKIN' lol)

YES, I get "bit", alot, but I've usually been drinkin', so that mitigates the pain, alot, plus it grosses out the girls, which just brings out my natural teenage-like immature redneck tendencies. [aiee]


Thank you very much, Wade. Keep 'em comin'! if you got 'em, keep 'em comin'- like I said, ( at least within my time constraints) I'm going to absolutely respect your posting it by cooking it.

Foster,
The thing missing from the list is a good vegetable dish.

Does your wife/you like the taste of thyme? If so, one easy one is to cut up a mix of vegs: sliced carrots, celery, green and/or bermuda onions, red potatoes, summer squash, thin slices of corn on the cob,etc. Then marinate them an hour or so in olive oil, balsamic vinegar, some oregano and garlic, and a crapload of thyme. Then put it all on the grill. It's okay if the carrots end up a bit undercooked/overhard.

If you don't like thyme, though, it'll suck. 🙂

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I came back to this thread to make sure Wade posted something. So now that he has (and boy, did he post a lot), I got no work to do. =d>

Foster - I don't do recipes. That sounds like a cop out but it's true. I don't. I wing things, and my cooking is still pretty good. Anyone here is invited if they're nearby SF any time and I'll show you what I mean. No recipe, just good food.

However, I have used recipes in the past. I own 2 Giada books. Her marinara is top notch and it's vegan friendly. If I posted it, it would be a copyright infringement so I'd advise when you have time, pick up a Giada book. Besides, she's sexy as hell and there's always a nice cleavage shot or two in every one of her books. She's got cute boobs and the publishers know it (and exploit it).

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Just realized, Foster, that that sauce recipe will not likely be enough for 15 people. I'd probably start by doubling the stock and bourbon (definitely look for lo-sodium, though, since reduced stock can get salty quick. (Purists would say make your own stock, but that's way too much work for me.) If you can find "For the gourmet"-brand stocks, those are outstanding, but I don't know if you can get them other than by mail order; I'd probably just go for whichever one in your store that has the least salt.

You probably should be warned: I'm like zombieslayer, I rarely do recipes. So insofar as any of the above resemble recipes, the ingredients should be considered approximations. Fudge and "that looks like about a cup" hopefully will get a good result for you. And it is impossible to get too much cheese in mac-n-cheese in my opinion.*

(*Way back when I first found a recipe for fettucine alfredo, it called for 1/2-3/4 cup of parmesan/romano cheese. When I make it now, I use a minimum of 1 1/4 cups.)

Last warning: if you find the lamb, use a hot grill and don't overcook it. Better to have it rare in middle and char on outside, IMO, than risk medium well or worse. Those little things cook damn quick, and if you take them off rare, they'll be close to medium by the time they've made it to people's plates.

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At least we know who the cook will be when we have our RL PH meeting.

Agreed with the lamb.

ZS's rule of thumb. It's better to err on undercooking lamb, beef, and salmon. It's better to err on overcooking pork and chicken. The latter two can give you diseases or worse, worms. Thus is why I make sure they're fully cooked.

Overcooking lamb, beef, or salmon though = ruining them.

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Undercooked salmon though, while it may not make you sick, it doesn't taste very good and the texture is horrible. Out of your listed 5, salmon is by far the most difficult to make properly. At least in my opinion.

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I bet you over cook Sushi too.

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Where are you getting your salmon from? Come out to SF and I'll undercook some salmon and you'll love it.

Of course the most important thing of all, beyond the chef's abilities, is to secure good ingredients. If you start off with crappy products, no matter how talented you are, you're not going to have good food.

Btw, this isn't even sushi grade salmon. It's just real good Pacific salmon.

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