Fashionistas you have arrived 3-25-03 - 10-3-03

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally posted by bilmore
When wouldn't that be?

Let's see. Well, yesterday I was out right around the time you were posting on this board, so not then. Usually I watch during my daughter's nap on the weekends. But aren't you getting a little personal?

Originally posted by bilmore
And maybe a little anger management counseling . . .

Why would that be necessary? My anger does exactly what I want it to do.

TM

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by purse junkie


Entertaining was much simpler when everyone liked steak au poivre and scalloped potatoes or at least just shut up and ate it.

It remains that simple if you invite only your friends who like such stuff. The finicky eaters get invites only to the cookouts, where I can slap a chicken breats or tempeh puck on the grill for 'em.

What's the fun in cooking elaborately for people who don't really enjoy food because they're concerned as to whether it fits into their dietetic regimen?

So, no, Lance Armstrong won't be invited to dinner.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally posted by paigowprincess
But hell if I am gonna eat pork base when I havent touched pigs in upwards of twenty years.

paigow, circa 1983 (right before that last extra large pork burrito):



TM

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
This raises a pet peeve of mine and gives me an opportunity to take the League of Fabulous Gentlemen to task. I ALWAYS provide guests options when having them over, rather than assuming that one size fits all in food. A good dinner party should not involve force feeding your guests a limited range of food, and it is really not that difficult to provide a few options. ...
If you have more than two or four people over, assume some are vegatarians or keep Kosher and that some may have the most common allergies. ... And guests, you should never be shy about letting your hosts know of any special dietary needs or restrictions in advance -- any good host should want to serve something their guests will appreciate.

I must (i) laugh and (ii) object on a number of points.

(i) This is amusing because it is what often happens when people abandon traditional forms of social interaction as being "outdated" - they then try to invent things that are 3 times as much trouble to replace them. "Variety" in food served at traditional formal dinners is automatic. One of the great benefits is separate courses, ideally many of them.

(ii) The purpose of a dinner party is not to eat. The purpose of a dinner party is to have conversation and socialize with the other guests. No one is even supposed to notice the food. Including the host, who should never notice whether or not or what the guest eat. The idea that they are coming there to eat your food rather than enjoy your company is inherently insulting.

Anyone who knows me well enough to discuss their health with me in detail is surely welcome to include allergy information; or religious preferences or whatever super nifty wacko diet they are on now. I may try to take this into account in organizing future dinners and parties (or picking restaurants, more usually in this city); sometimes I can't, or don't feel I should subject the rest of my guests to the limitations of a few (or the limitations I myself suffer, for that matter). But if I offer my hospitality to someone, I am justifiably insulted if the hospitality I do (or can) offer is deemed to be inadequate and my guests feel they need to inform me what I must do to please them. To denigrate or abuse another's hospitality is close to a capital crime among manners violations.

[Not Bob]

Originally posted by bold_n_brazen
I was listening to CNN on my XM Radio this morning (Has there been a discussion of XM Radio here yet? If so, there must be. Like TiVo, it has changed my life.)

I was out of town for a deposition (again, not to be confused with a "deposition, nudge-nudge, wink-wink, say no more") recently, and the Mercury Grand Marquis that Hertz gave me had Sirrius satellite radio. After driving around in that fiiiiiiiiiiiiine American sedan listening to the commercial free crunchy granola lesbian folk station (when it got too twangy, I switched to the hipper than PLF pure jazz station) I am so going to look in to signing up for satellite radio. How much is it?

Originally posted by bold_n_brazen
and heard the children of the WTC victims reading the names of the victims ... I about had to pull over...my eyes filled with tears, I had a lump in my throat. Here I was thinking I was fine, and then BAM! It was raw again.

I am sorry for your loss.

[purse junkie]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
It remains that simple if you invite only your friends who like such stuff. The finicky eaters get invites only to the cookouts, where I can slap a chicken breats or tempeh puck on the grill for 'em.

What the hell is tempeh?

I've only recently got this "tofu" thing down, please don't confuse me with any new health food crap.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by purse junkie
What the hell is tempeh?

http://www.tempeh.info/

lord knows. All I know is that it's sufficiently non-toxic that I don't worry about cross-contamination when I put it on the grill with genuine, honest-to-God, amurican red meat.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by paigowprincess
Yes, the Jewish people do love their bacon, don't they?

Now here is a situation I was in during law school. Married couple friends, gourmet cooks, invited my bf and I over for a little dinner. they made some kind of cajun soup thing (gumbo?) that was pork based with hunks of pork in it. The guy who made it said to me "I know you are a vegetarian so I picked out the pork". This was really bad bc since it was a pig based food, it still was something I could not touch. He made it, and then he went to the effort to try and help me- not aware of his ignoreance to the vegetarian way o' life. I did not eat the soup but thanked him. While my bf didnt say anything, I think he thinks I should have eaten it. And our friendship was never quite the same.

But hell if I am gonna eat pork base when I havent touched pigs in upwards of twenty years.

Pork gumbo? Why go through the trouble of making gumbo if it isn't seafood? My momma makes the best seafood gumbo ever.

Anyhow, I think we all probably have stories of meals we've had to suffer through that somehow contained our least favorite foods or foods that we couldn't eat for some reason (kosher, vegeterian, don't eat vegetibles). We politely pushed the food around, declined seconds, and drank a little more wine than the rest of the people at the dinner party. Sometimes there will be something that we can eat, but sometimes there won't be. The host/ess certainly has some duties to ensure that if a guest cannot eat something that there are alternatives, but sometimes alternatives simply aren't available for whatever reason. I remember a multi course meal that my mother served at an informal dinner party about a year ago. Every single thing that she served was on one of our friend's cannot/will not eat list. By the end of the night, we were all laughing about it, as yet another plate came out and there was another reason that he couldn't eat it. Eventually the cheese plate came out again so he could have at least something.

Especially with smaller parties, sometimes the meals prepared just don't work with all the guests, and sometimes it's impossible to know in advance what a guest can or can't eat.

[robustpuppy]

Originally posted by purse junkie
I've only recently got this "tofu" thing down, please don't confuse me with any new health food crap.

While we're on this subject, I think it's morally wrong to shape tofu into little balls that look exactly like fresh mozzarella, put them in a dish where fresh mozzarella would be a perfect ingredient, and then put that unlabeled dish in your overpriced buffet. Do you hear me, Sizzling Express?

The fact that I was eating the tofu while reading the posts with obstetric news you don't need to know made it that much worse.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
.... The idea that they are coming there to eat your food rather than enjoy your company is inherently insulting. ...


....But if I offer my hospitality to someone, I am justifiably insulted if the hospitality I do (or can) offer is deemed to be inadequate and my guests feel they need to inform me what I must do to please them. To denigrate or abuse another's hospitality is close to a capital crime among manners violations.

(i) I am under no illusions that my personality is better than my food. I play to my strengths; if they are there for the food, I can accept that.

(ii) Yes, it is inhospital to refuse any hospitality, so we resort to bitching and moaning on anonymous chat boards rather than suffering in silence. But oh for the days when a little cooking wasn't considered onerous and all the aspects of entertaining, including the food, was an art.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
http://www.tempeh.info/

lord knows. All I know is that it's sufficiently non-toxic that I don't worry about cross-contamination when I put it on the grill with genuine, honest-to-God, amurican red meat.

I love this line:

"But tempeh is now rapidly becoming more popular all over the world as people look for ways to increase their intake of soybeans."

(Thank god - I've been searching and searching for ways to increase my intake of soybeans! Now I can finally move on to my search for additional kelp byproducts!)

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by purse junkie
Entertaining was much simpler when everyone liked steak au poivre and scalloped potatoes or at least just shut up and ate it.

There were always vegetarians, and they never consented to eat the steak. They just shut up about it. Now, however, with the mistaken shift of focus to food (perhaps driven by everyone deciding adopting "gourmet" tastes and cooking pretensions), the vegetarians (etc.) feel untoward pressure to eat it, and therefore have retaliated by issuing menu demands to ensure they can. This is not an improved state of affairs.

Paigow, you behaved perfectly with the gumbo. You graciously thanked your host for his extra efforts to accomodate you, and you didn't eat something that you felt you shouldn't. Brava.

On a totally different note, I have rediscovered my cache of fountain pens. Yea fountain pens.

[ThrashersFan]

Originally posted by robustpuppy
While we're on this subject, I think it's morally wrong to shape tofu into little balls that look exactly like fresh mozzarella, put them in a dish where fresh mozzarella would be a perfect ingredient, and then put that unlabeled dish in your overpriced buffet. Do you hear me, Sizzling Express?

The fact that I was eating the tofu while reading the posts with obstetric news you don't need to know made it that much worse.

Oh ewwwww. This is why I smell/poke/cut open everything that I am unsure of. Kinda like seeing a nice pasta salad and saying "no meat in there, right?", getting a "no" response, putting it on your plate and taking a sniff only to discover crab or some other sea creature. WTF? That is meat, people. And no, I don't care if it is "imitation" crab because not only do I not eat meat but I don't crave or even like the taste of it so I don't want a substitute.

edited to say that I am a good guest and restaurant patron. I always find something to eat and I don't complain. I do get a bit annoyed when people try to be too "helpful" about my not eating meat -- I have been doing this for over two decades so I think I know how to manage. I also don't like being lied to about what is in food, especially when someone is trying to steer me from my wicked "no meat" ways by sneaking something in.

[evenodds]

I threw my last formal dinner five or six years ago when three minutes before I was to seat my 8 guests (after having cleared the menu with everyone in advance since I was cooking beef tenderloin), one of the girlfriends decided she no longer ate red meat and asked if I cook some chicken for her. Not when she arrived for cocktails, of course, but as I was about to seat everyone for dinner.

Of course, I accomodated her, but since then, I have people over for cocktails.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by purse junkie
What the hell is tempeh?

I've only recently got this "tofu" thing down, please don't confuse me with any new health food crap.

I reccomend skipping over Tempeh and going straight to Seiten, getting ahead of the curve.