Food Follies

Recent experiences have led us to concoct this equation: the quality of a food experience is inversely proportional to the amount of media hype (even local) that it gets. First case is a local bakery, which shall remain nameless – we finally stopped in there and bought a loaf of their sliced white bread. I’ve heard nothing but good things about this place, mostly in the paper, but the bread itself was almost completely tasteless, and rather substanceless. Didn’t even make good toast when buttered and jammed.

Second case is all the television, radio, etc. ads for California Cheese. All of the cheese we’ve gotten that’s been stamped with the ‘real California cheese’ has been pretty basic. Not bad, but nothing amazing. My feelings on this might be skewed, of course, coming from Upstate New York, where the cheese section in Wegman’s supermarkets is simply amazing – LOL – without advertising. That, and the fact that they always show cows enjoying sunny skies with lush green fields – in many parts of CA the lush green only happens a few months out of the year or with intensive artificial watering everyday, that’s why the phrase, ‘the golden, rolling hills of California’ exists – dead hay/grass for most of the year.

Anyway, I’m taking the time now to notice things that I DON’T see a lot of hype about, and I’ll say that California wines, for example, seem to sell themselves pretty easily just by word of mouth – now THAT’S saying something. 😉

Looks like they’re having a lot of fun with the newish Google Blog, including a post from a Google Cook, Charlie Ayers, with a recipe for Buttermilk Fried Chicken which Elvis apparently loved. As I was glancing through the ingredients list, I noticed that it calls for ‘organic, free-range chickens’ – Go Google!

This reminds of the time I had the opportunity to have lunch with a group of friends at Microsoft Headquarters in Redmond, WA. I wish I could remember exactly what I had, but it’s been a number of years now. Mostly I remember that it was really good, that they had an excellent array (programming pun – heh) of dishes, and it was not typical cafeteria fare at all. Now, if I could just get myself invited to lunch at Google, all will be right with the world. *grin*

I haven’t yet decided if I’m a fan of the Supermarket Self-Checkout or not. I agree with the article in the sense that if you only have a few items, it’s much faster. (The faster you can get that pint of Ben & Jerry’s out of the store, the better!)

When I have more items, however, I have to admit that sometimes the thought of running all of them across the scanner, waiting for verification, and bagging them is just too much work, especially after a long day. On those occasions, I’d rather lean on my cart behind the person in front of me, and amuse myself with tabloid headlines while I wait/rest, and then let someone ELSE do all the work.

Speaking of tabloids… I wonder what kind of impact the self-checkout is having on impulse purchases. For instance, in the one local store that has self-checkouts, there are no impulse items nearby at all – I suppose that’s because there are no clerks around? Hmm.

I’ve been slaving over a first post for a few days,
when I realized what I was lacking was a bit of
introduction.

I began cooking when I was twelve years old. I can remember my Mom
calling from work and asking me to put some chicken in the oven (she
had already prepared it) after school one day. It was the first time
I had ever used the oven, and I was scared to death that I would
burn down the house.

When the chicken came out golden and crispy later, I was hooked. The
next thing I remember learning was scrambled eggs. I learned very
quickly that one of the secrets to great scrambled eggs was to keep
them moving in the pan so that they didn’t just sit in the pan and
cook flat. After that, I quickly became the week day cook at home,
and continued cooking regularly when I moved out on my own.

I started cooking professionally about six years ago. The transition
from “cook at home” to “professional cook” is not an easy one.
Suddenly, you have to plan out a lot of food on a very strict time
table. It’s like planning out a major party on a daily basis.

Many of the techniques I had learned at home were still applicable
though, and I learned even more from a great lady named Georgette
who trained me in those first chaotic weeks. Most of these
techniques are so simple, they usually go unmentioned (like never
flip a burger more than once) yet I know many people who cook
regularly and have never learned them. I’m going to share as many of
these as I can, as we go along here, so those of you who are
experienced cooks/chefs may have to bear with me at times.

I’ll also be sharing my more original recipes, but only after I feel
that they’ve been perfected enough in writing to reproduce them
accurately.

Oddly enough, although we have a large number of little black and white food-type icons like the microwave to the left, none of them are BUGS for some reason… Cicadas Take Menus By Storm – “‘Not much of a taste,’ she admits. ‘A bit like overcooked beans, but very crunchy.'”