Re the whole Heavy cream/Whipping cream discussion --- I'm always surprised here in Massachusetts because these are considered two different products. They're set next to each other on the dairy shelf, and I've looked at each container carefully and can't figure out what the difference is supposed to be.
Perhaps it's what skippy414 says, and it's 6 to 10% more butterfat --- but it sure doesn't say anything about it on the carton!

Company's coming Friday night and I'm trying Melissa Clark's Chicken Curry with Sweet Potatoes: http://www.nytimes.com/recipes/12151/...
She calls for bone-in chicken but the Hub much prefers boneless. How can I adapt the recipe using boneless chicken thighs instead?
Is time the only variant?
Any help would be much appreciated.

Steve's absolutely right --- set your parameters.
For example, if you live in the Pioneer Valley, the answer is --- NOWHERE.

I can weigh in on Ginger Garden.
Since they also offer Korean, Japanese, and Fusion-Asian as well as Chinese, they've got food to appeal to all kinds of demanding eaters.
The atmosphere is really pleasant, it's very attractive, and we've found the service attentive. And it's big ---
My one caveat: I like some things I've had there a lot, and found others meh. For instance, like so many things in the Valley, they tend toward New England bland. To get something tasty, you have to start out with at least one hot chile rating whether or not you think you like spicy. You'd really need to taste some of their offerings so you'd know what kinds of things would appeal.
That said, I've had terrific sushi and sashimi there, they have some unusual Chinese dishes I've never come across before, and their Twice-cooked Pork was just fine.

Ouch! I see that you really mean Mount Cabot Maple Syrup. That's harder to find. Atkins Farm in Amherst is now carrying it.
Here's Mount Cabot's website: http://mountcabotmaple.com/
The guy who owns it is very nice and obliging, and if you tell him where you are, he may be able to give you a lead.
It's a small producer, but worth tracking down. I couldn't believe it when I first tasted it (at Guido's in the Berkshires, although I don't think they're carrying it now), and everyone I've esteemed enough to share a taste of my precious supply can't believe how wonderful it is. A whole 'nother realm of maple syrup.

Whole Foods carries local syrup. So do many local supermarkets.
It's fun to go to an actual sugar shack for breakfast with pancakes etc and syrup, and maybe see them boiling sap. Here's a link for you: http://www.massmaple.org/
Western MA is chockablock full of places, so it depends on where in MA you are. You're still in time (until mid-April, depending on the weather) to see sugar shacks in action. As for a big breakfast and local syrup all year in beautiful country, a personal recommendation is Gould Farm on Route 2 kind of near Shelburne Falls. They have a website.
Enjoy!

On blueberries, then add sour cream. Simple but wonderful.
Thank James Beard, whose tip it is. I've been doing this for years.
Also great on oatmeal --- Bob's Red Mill Organic Steel Cut Oats are fantastic. Nothing better while winter still has us in its snowy, icy clutches.
Mount Cabot Maple Syrup (from New Hampshire, shame on me from MA) is so utterly unbelievable that you can put some in a shot glass, float heavy cream on top, and sip it. Cross my heart!

Thanks so much to everyone!
Found out that the return bus will actually be leaving from the MOMA area, so that shoots down uptown dinner ideas and leaves us probably with a quick meal at the Hotel Warwick or something like that before departing at 7.
BUT --- we'll be uptown at lunchtime, and it was great to be reminded of the Cafe Sabarsky, I love it and always forget about it, and we'd like to get to the Neue Galerie as well as the Met. If we're really ambitious Pascalou sounds just like our tasse de thé (you're right, CityKid!). And the Szechuans make me drool wistfully, if that's possible.
Best of all, if this works, the group runs bus trips in November as well, so we'd have a second shot. Again, thank you to all, I'm saving all these ideas. Chowhounds are a generous group!

Good questions.
We like almost all kinds of cuisines. Especially Asian, but really lots of ethnicities. Italian, Indian, French bistro, something off-beat? We live in a college area, which means restaurants offer lots of food for little money. NOT chowhound heaven!
Wednesday.
$50 - 80? Husband will have a glass of wine, I may or may not. On a bus trip down from the north, P/U will be at Museum (?I think) at 7 pm, so it's an early dinner. One important thing: a place to be from 5 - 7.
I guess it's a challenge. I'll look at your links, many thanks.

Not a fantastic special occasion dinner, not a diner either.
Just a nice interesting place leisurely enough to spend some time in.
Will be visiting for a Cinderella day from a town where restaurants are, shall we say, sparse on the ground. Has to be an early dinner as we leave at 7 to turn back into pumpkins again.

This reminds me of a cut of beef in a sandwich I used to get years and years ago --- a "fingerling steak" sandwich. The description was similar, a long thinnish strip of meat, looking like a fish filet. Very tender, served as a sandwich at a roadside place, the only place I ever saw it.
This was on the road from Long Island up to Wellesley, MA, before the interstates (gives you an idea how long ago, in the 1950's).
The place called itself, Fingerling Steak, or something like that. I've always wanted to find it again, but haven't ever succeeded in finding out anything more. Just off chance, people here good at researching obscure cuts of meat --- maybe someone knows??????

Have discovered that whole allspice are subtly different (and to my taste better) than cloves for chicken soup.

Oh, dear. Not what I was hoping for. (We loved that shrimp too, but without shell. Sissies.)
Banh Mi Saigon is one of our favorite new places, and everything we've had so far has been delicious. Only thing is it's pretty chilly and the decor is strictly takeout. We usually eat there anyway. Do you have some favorites to recommend? We're looking to try new stuff.

So, strictly off the menu? Worth thinking about.
How was dinner? We used to love Butterfly and go regularly and then something happened, it fell off a cookery cliff (!) or something. Is it back to its old good self?

I see Butterfly in Hadley has a new sign out front advertising Dim Sum on Saturdays and Sundays. Has anyone tried it?

So sorry I forgot since last visit to add another comment. Went there a couple of weeks ago. They've expanded their menu and include some more noodle and rice dishes besides the pho. We tried an assortment (nobly omitting the banh mi we love so much in favor of trying new stuff) and everything was great. Yes, it's bare bones, but the owners are very warm, and the food is SOOOOOOOO good, and it's reasonable as food goes in the Valley. So it should be more crowded than it is. Selfish wish! I want them to stay around a long long time. (We were sorely disappointed in Mi Tierra last time we were there, so I'm especially happy about the Vietnamese.)

By me it doesn't have to be pure, or traditional, or anything but delicious.
And I find it delicious!
(Or I wouldn't be making it.)

Not to risk lynching or anything --- but I shortcut the white sauce part by using Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup (straight, not diluted). Green pepper and/or red pepper, onion, garlic, andouille sausage if possible, spicy Italian if not. All sauteed in butter, concentrated soup added, then shrimps "poached" in the sauce.
For the grits, White Lily made the very best but the company's abandoned all of us. So I use Bob's Red Mill, but I think most any real (not instant) grits would do. One cup of grits to one stick of butter, 3 cups of water, then 1 1/2 cups of half and half or cream. (Hey, go for the cream, you only live once, it says here.) No cheese. The grits are real good and creamy this way. But I prefer to pour them into a baking dish and then let it set, then fry diamond shapes of the set grits till they're beautiful and brown, and decorate the shrimp in sauce with them. Just made it the other night, and could eat it again tomorrow!
Incidentally, this is an adaptation of what I consider the BEST shrimp and grits, and they're not from Charlestown, they're from Savannah, Georgia, served at the Soho South Café (at least several years ago they were).

Both of these products are available from the King Arthur catalog and at Whole Foods. I love scones, served with strawberry jam and ---- which one of these?
Are they the same, in which case why do they make both? Or is one more traditional? Thicker? Yummier? If you know, please advise!

In the event we went with a New Zealand Pinot Noir, Crossings, and it did go very well with the squash. Not to mention the chicken. Thanks.

We had a superb Riesling to go with Melissa Clark's recipe in the NY Times the other night; but fussy guests are coming this weekend, one of whom doesn't care for white wines. Especially not Rieslings.
So what red to serve? A Pinot Noir? If so, whose? (Our wine budget doesn't run above $20.00 and preferably under.) Any other suggestions?
(The dish has LOTS of flavor and a touch of sweetness becuz a reduced maple syrup is part of it.)

No, this sounds kind of like chopped liver on speed!!!!! The other was more conventional sauteed livers, just really really good of its kind.
But this one's interesting. I've never encountered a recipe quite like this, Jannie!

Part of the problem --- who knows?
Craig Claiborne had many friends, including many who were really good cooks. Maybe could be called amateur chefs, but they weren't professionals. (It wasn't the day of the corporate professional chef yet.)
So John Shinn was a buddy who made this delicious chicken liver dish, and Claiborne featured it one day in the food section of the Times, as he did many friends. They didn't write cookbooks, they didn't own restaurants, they just loved food, and loved to cook it. And that's all I know!

Thanks to all for enthusiasm and recipe ideas. I kind of conflated things, and used my memory as well, and it was ---- okay. Could be lots of reasons for this.
1. livers were not up to my standard for quality, even though I soaked them in milk for 20 mins (another suggestion found in the recipe hunt).
2. The actual recipe included something I left out, or left out something I put in. Maybe the bacon, somehow it didn't taste like the right addition.
3. And most likely --- memory plays tricks and tastes change. So even if I had the original John Shinn standing at my shoulder --- it might have been a little disappointing.
I still love chopped liver, which I can make in my sleep with NO recipe. So I guess I'd better be grateful for that!
And again, thanks so much, chowhounds. It's always a pleasure to know a bunch of people are out there ready to give counsel and encouragement!

This was a delicious recipe for sauteed chicken livers and bacon that appeared decades ago in the New York Times (not the cookbook, the newspaper). It also contained either sherry or another fortified wine, and possibly mushrooms.
My husband's favorite --- dropped it for years because of diet ideas --- but now want very much to make it again. Does anyone remember it? Maybe even have the actual recipe stashed away somewhere?
I'm going to try and approximate it tonight, but last time I tried it wasn't as good as the original. So if someone can come up with it sooner (best) or later (okay) I'd be very grateful!

I blow hot and cold on this. Too many jars of jams and jellies "jam" up my small refrigerator. Seems to me friends in Europe don't keep these things in the fridge at all. Some say Refrigerate after Opening, others don't.
What do you do???????
(Same goes for soy sauce, ketchup, Sriracha, etc.)

Just returned from Banh Mi Saigon on Route 9 in Hadley with a feast for 2 for lunch!
The banh mi themselves (we especially like BBQ pork) just get better and better. If you like the jalapenos, tell them you want it spicy. Also got summer rolls --- really big, fat, fresh --- 2 for $4.50. We were stuffed (that was just sharing one sandwich!) so we put aside the new item, Bun, to have as salad for dinner. New to us, vermicelli rice noodles, carrots, cucumber, lettuce and a topping of beef, pork or chicken --- we opted for the vegetarian with tofu --- and a little egg roll to top it all off.
They of course have pho, but we haven't got around to trying that yet.
Now my "mission" in reporting this: inexpensive AND delicious ethnic food of any kind is rare enough in the Pioneer Valley. If we're lucky enough to have it right now, then we need an outreach to make sure it stays here. They have more customers now than when we first started going, but they still need a larger and more stable customer base. Everyone I know who's tried it, likes it A LOT. You can see the good comments here on Chowhound. But they need to have more people hear about it. They're out in nowhere, in a way, just in a strip mall on Route 9. Places in Amherst and Northampton get foot traffic, but they don't.
So if you know anyone jonesing for Asian food, especially Vietnamese, encourage them to seek it out. Disclosure: the SO and I selfishly want to make sure it stays around for a long time! That's what's called enlightened self-interest ---

I'm pretty sure that 555 is on opentable. Try Five Fifty-Five.
(I prefer soft shell lobster, lots less work!)

You fell in love with Old Chatham Sheepherding (as did we); Kelly and Price fell in love with each other.
Exit Old Chatham from the world, enter Primo! She has a place in Tucson now also, but we didn't go when we were there, looked like strong Southwest menu which I wouldn't pay up for (like it, but only at a price).
Still hoping to encounter you some day!

Just returned to Western MA from a trip to Maine.
*sigh*