Jambie's Profile
New 'Menu Items That Need to Be Retired", 2012 edition...
As much as it pains me, I have to say hummus as well. I love hummus and have had some that was outstandingly good. However, I know it is a bad sign when I see it as an appetizer on the menu squeezed between chicken wings and jalapeno poppers. I only have a couple of words for those restaurants: Please don't.
I don't want to share my dessert!
You are right Babette and I really wish I had done that. I let the situation get out of control and my dessert quickly became part of the public domain. Lesson learned.
I don't want to share my dessert!
I understand what this is like. I went to an out of town restaurant once with friends and had literally been thinking about the homemade ice cream for months. Once the server set the bowl down, I lost count of the number of spoons that dove in my bowl and I hardly had any left. It was a big disappoinment because I can't get more easily. In this same situation next time, I would make my intentions clear from the get go that I had no interest in sharing my dessert.
Popular flavors that you don't care for
Yeah, I know that I'm the odd one out but when somebody brings a cake to work with a cream cheese frosting, I'm totally safe from eating any! For my birthday recently, somebody actually made me a lemon cake with cream cheese frosting. It is the thought that counts so I ate a piece but it wasn't easy.
Popular flavors that you don't care for
Lemon in any kind of sweet dessert. The tart and sweet together set my teeth on edge. Ditto for cream cheese in frosting and fillings.
Things You Shouldn't Order at Just Any Restaurant
I learned that lesson last weekend. I ordered the waffle with fresh seasonal fruit (strawberries). I guess those strawberries might have been fresh and seasonal last year before they were frozen and drowned in fake strawberry gelantinous goo. Maybe the server was embarrassed because she didn't even charge me for the extra fruit (and even calling it fruit is being generous.)
Top Chef Just Desserts - the last 2 weeks (spoilers)
I don't understand why the Quick Fire winner often gets both money and immunity. Why not make the person choose? Maybe the top Quick Fire winner should get to choose money or immunity and the person in 2nd place would get the other. That would make the show marginally more interesting.
Trader Joe's Yea/Nay Thread - 3rd quarter 2011 [Old]
Big yea on the soft peanut brittle; two nay votes for the malted milk ball cookies and the chocolate croissants in the bakery aisle. I could taste no malt what-so-ever in the cookies and ended up pitching the container after eating only two of them. The chocolate croissants were dried out and stale. I would have returned both of these items except that we live two hours away and won't be back for probably a year.
Did our server do anything 'wrong'?
We were in a restaurant recently and my husband asked the server if he could sub something for the fries. She said it would be no problem and went through the available items but happened to forget to mention the extra $2.00 charge to sub a salad for fries. I guess you just have to learn to ask questions (a lesson we are still learning.)
When to complain in a restaurant
I'm usually pretty patient and rarely send anything back but I did order manicotti recently only to find that the tomato sauce on the outside was plenty hot but the cheese filling was still refrigerator cold. I brought it to the attention of my server and she was pretty skeptical telling me that it really shouldn't be cold. Well, it was. I will say that the manager came out to apologize and it was hot when it came back to the table!
Funniest Thing a Server Said to You
Went into a local family type restaurant one night and we both ordered sirloin steak . I heard this conversation in the back: "Customers want sirloin; what does it look like?" Answer: "Grab any steak from the cooler, they won't know the difference." Nice.
Have you ever OD'd on a food? And if you did, did you ever recover?
I was in Vienna a few years ago for three days and went on a pastry binge. I had little time and wanted to try them all. I was sick all the way home because I way over did it. It didn't make me stop eating sweet stuff but I will never again have a pastry lost weekend. I'm much more into moderation.
Taco Bell's "Pacific Shrimp Taco"
Haven't tried the shrimp taco but I did buy a bean burrito yesterday and was unpleasantly surprised to find shrinkage has set in at our local Taco Bell. I guess they've gone to a smaller tortilla and the cheese was barely there as well.
Joe's O's taste strange the last few boxes
I thought your comment about the chemical taste was interesting because I recently bought two boxes of Corn Chex and both boxes had a weird chemical taste to them. I was really surprised and disappointed because I've been eating them for years. I wonder if Trader Joe's cereals are manufactured at the same plant as Corn Chex?
well known brands that just arent as good as in the past
Campbells Bean with Bacon soup and Peppridge Farm cookies, especially the Milano cookies. I used to buy a bag occasionally as a treat and have made my last purchase. It is the cookie part that changed and I can only figure that they went to healthier oil which is fine because I don't need to be eating them in the first place.
Cheap and delicious [London]
I read a review in Saveur magazine of a pie and mash shop in London called M. Manze which sounded inexpensive and good. I meant to try it on my last trip over but didn't make it so I can't give an opinion on it but it sounded interesting though!
Tuna dip with artichoke?
I want to make a tuna dip with creme fraiche so it will be served cold but then I also have a jar of Trader Joe's artichoke dip that I got for a gift. I can't decide if this tuna mixture would be well served by having some of the artichoke spread added to it or if I would be making a mistake. Does this sound like a strange combination?
Odd Cooking Shows
Does anybody remember the cooking show on PBS that featured a married couple with their two teenaged kids? I can't recall the name of the show but I always felt sorry for the kids because they looked like they wanted to be anywhere else.
What classical desserts would you like to see make a comeback on menus?
That is exactly the way we ate strawberry shortcake in my house growing up and I really miss those days. We do have a restaurant that has it on the menu but it comes with pound cake and ice cream which is disappointing to me. That is closer to an ice cream sundae, not shortcake.
Traveling through London in July....where should I avoid?
Avoid the chain "Garfunkels" at all cost. It wasn't my choice of a place to eat and I ended up spending 15 pounds for a late afternoon lunch that was absolutely dreadful. I ordered the chicken and mushroom pie which was advertised as having a light and flaky crust. Nothing could be further from the truth and the mashed potatoes were inedible. On the half good/half bad end, we went in Super Star Chinese in China town. On the bad side, service was horrible and we were overcharged. On the good side, the spring roll was really good as was the fried rice. The rest of our food was not so good so I'm sure there is much better Chinese food to be found in London. You didn't ask about good meals but we had two or three lunches in the cafes of the museums and those were outstanding.
Disappointing meal at `Tamarind, which Indian restaurant next. [London]
I had a really good meal recently at Moti Mahal in Covent Garden and the service was top notch as well. The Qabali Seviyan was outstanding.
Ice cream and raw milk and butter
I was at the Boroughs Market a couple of weeks ago and sampled some unpasteurized butter which was out of this world. I would have brought it back to the states if I could have. I want to say it might have been at the Real France booth but not 100% sure on that.
Food items you enjoy in only very limited quantities or amounts?
Fried eggplant. I get an overwhelming craving for it during the summer when the small eggplants look so beautiful at the farmers market. After a couple of pieces, my body is begging for mercy and I don't want another eggplant for months. I suspect if I employed better cooking techniques, that might not happen.
Kansas City Missouri, Costco
I wasn't even aware that Costco sold truffle butter. Do you have an approximate idea of what it usually costs? We don't live near enough a Costco for me to run in and check-thanks!
Searching for food boards or blogs in Columbia, Missouri
Thanks both of you-I'm looking forward to some good food reading.
Searching for food boards or blogs in Columbia, Missouri
I know about Co Mo Whine and Dine. Are there other boards or blogs about restaurants and food related topics around Columbia that I'm missing?
dining with plain eating friends- coping strategies? ;-)
Let me try and explain what I meant and I hope I don't dig myself in deeper. No, these are not mandatory lunches and we certainly don't eat together each day. We try to do it once-in-awhile as a fun event although it isn't sounding much fun. The words "sushi vs chain" were bad choices. This isn't like that because we are not talking about chain places really. It is more a matter of my being willing to try different types of restaurants but their range of acceptable restaurants is much more narrow. It isn't a matter of my food choices being good and theirs being bad. I would say their choices are just more limited. I have even gone so far as to print menus from other places and hand them out for review. I have gotten comments back such as "Gross, disgusting, what IS that?" and so on. But as I said before, I have no problem taking a book and visiting those places alone.
dining with plain eating friends- coping strategies? ;-)
I'm sorry if my response started the negativity-all I wanted to do was sympathize with you but I have also learned a lesson about choosing my words much more carefully. I don't always express myself in the right way and I'm sorry if it caused problems.
dining with plain eating friends- coping strategies? ;-)
I think you are exactly right because they are supposed to just be fun social events but I end up being the one sitting in my cubicle with my arms crossed just waiting for the verdict of where we are going because I'm the only adaptable one in the entire group. I like a wide variety of foods-food snob hardly describes me.
dining with plain eating friends- coping strategies? ;-)
I should have been more clear that I'm discussing work lunches during the week but what I was trying to say was that I can make all the suggestions that I want as far as those lunches go but they get a thumbs down and we end up at the same type of familiar places if you prefer that word instead of chains. I'm sorry if you think that makes me a snob but it is just the way our work lunches go. I could refuse to go with them but I think that makes me more of a snob than going ahead and joining them because I can find something to eat on just about any menu you set in front of me. I won't apologize for wanting to eat something a little different for lunch once-in-awhile and on those days, I go alone like I already said.
