the food rant thread

[Kim]

It's like a CV, Barakta. If it's not on the first page, and preferably in the first couple of paragraphs, no one's going to read it.

The only way you can sum up the catering requirements for BiCon in a couple of paragraphs is:  "Don't do it.  Don't even think about it.  The only way to win is not to play."

[Cudzoziemiec]

I can't help hearing/reading 'BiCon' without adding a mental '-ur'. 

Ob food rant: Someone* left a large jar of Dolmio 'lasagne sauce' in the fridge and I have been tricked into eating some. It really is foul stuff.

*It was Mrs Cudzo. She claims to even like the stuff. It's the obstinate Polish streak breaking out.

[barakta]

It's like a CV, Barakta. If it's not on the first page, and preferably in the first couple of paragraphs, no one's going to read it.

We kept telling them we have loads of awkward diet people and were PROMISED it wouldn't be a problem. It wouldn't have been a problem IF the fucking caterer had read the full spec.  I really do want some kind of financial recompense FROM the caterer for that cos Friday was just fuckup central.

[contango]

After a long weekend in NYC, I'm disappointed to report that all my food was served on plates. Nothing came to me astride a piece of slate, a discarded licence plate, hub cap, or manhole cover.

I also disgusted my wife by eating pancakes with eggs, sausage, and Canadian 'bacon' in a sea of maple syrup and butter. I also ate fried chicken on a huge belgian waffle (with spicy aioli and maple syrup) while working my way through the bar's extensive list of craft beer. She believes the the combination of meat and sweet is fundamentally wrong and may result in the collapse of the universe. I say bring on the galactic crunch.

Your wife clearly knows nothing about food. That is all.

Actually that isn't all. She should be forced to eat sausage and bacon with stacked blueberry muffins drowned in a vat of maple syrup (the stuff that comes from maple trees, not the garbage that's little more than high fructose corn syrup, artificial sweeteners and artificial flavourings) until she disowns such a heretical stance.

I guess you managed to avoid foods with names that end in "on a stick". Gary Larson did a cartoon of early business failures, featuring "porcupine on a stick".

[contango]

Maple syrup would be my guess.

ETA: I'm not actually that keen on maple syrup.  Will I still be allowed into Canada if they find out?

I wouldn't try it. People have been shot for less, although that might have been in Alabama.

[contango]

Speaking of maple syrup I recently attended a farm festival where people were selling a range of craft foody type products. I'd gone to visit a friend who makes stupidly hot pepper sauces (which are hugely tasty, loaded with capsaicin, and prone to turn the teenagers trying to prove they are tough in front of their girlfriends into sobbing wrecks, which can be fun to watch)

We met a couple who make maple syrup the traditional way, and bought some maple syrup, maple spread and maple sugar. I shudder to think what it would do to my blood sugar level if I were to eat even half of that lot. I'm not diabetic but suspect I might appear to be after that lot.

[ian]

Oddly, one of the first things that happened to me when I arrived in Canada was a trip to a maple syrup farm, possibly to establish for the stupid and misplaced Englishman that it doesn't come out of sugary cows. After that we climbed Mount Canadian stereotype for a game of ice hockey. But yes, maple syrup should be squeezed out of maple trees by burly, plaid shirted Eh-Eh-Ehing Canadians. At a pinch I'll accept Vermonters who are effectively sneaking out of the US when no one is looking (if I remember, there's a on town on the border with a theatre where you can actually enter in the US and watch the show in Canada).

Faux maple syrup is a crime in any jurisdiction and one I will not abide. Fortunately I know my NYC diners and thus minimize the risk of 'Canadian-style maple flavored syrup'. The further south you sink, the riskier the proposition gets. In California, for some reason, I once ended up with agave syrup which wasn't as bad as it sounded. It could have been worse, it might have been avocado syrup.

I've experienced food on sticks. I don't think there's anything in the mid-west that they can't deliver deep-fried on a stick, and I won't say anything bad about the mighty corn dog. Someone once tried to serve me fried clams on a stick. I don't like shellfish at the best of times and they're one of the few things that even immersion in a deep vat of hot oil can't improve. I once attended an American football game that lasted what felt like eighteen long weeks and I only survived through eating eight corn dogs and stetson size helping of nachos. My great American novel will be based on this epic struggle for survival.

Reminds me, cafes in the UK that put random cheap brown sauce in the HP bottles because it must save like, oh, pence. Stop it.

Right, I'm off to Paris. There's bound to be a rant in that. I can feel those Parisian waiters bristling already. Poor schoolboy French locked and loaded. It's the only way to neutralize those surly waiters.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It's like a CV, Barakta. If it's not on the first page, and preferably in the first couple of paragraphs, no one's going to read it.

We kept telling them we have loads of awkward diet people and were PROMISED it wouldn't be a problem. It wouldn't have been a problem IF the fucking caterer had read the full spec.  I really do want some kind of financial recompense FROM the caterer for that cos Friday was just fuckup central.

I wonder if they read it all? Clearly, they shouldn't have said they'd do it if they hadn't checked the whole thing. I'm only thinking from their point of view why they didn't read it and how next year's caterers could be encouraged to do so.

[Gareth Rees]

To this day, I demand someone takes the skin off, I've never understood that. Are you supposed it eat it?

Yes, if it's properly cooked. There's a delicious layer of fat just under the skin, and this becomes crispy if fried, and takes on the flavour of whatever delicious things the fish was cooked in. Fry the fish with finely chopped hazelnuts and crushed garlic, or steam it with ginger and spring onion, or coat it with tamarind and chillies and deep-fry it, and the skin is the best bit.

If the skin is limp, tastes of nothing, or still has lots of scales, then don't eat it. But I wouldn't go back to a restaurant that served fish like this: they clearly don't know what they are doing.

[Tigerrr]

Proper maple syrup is quite alcoholic too.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Proper maple syrup is quite alcoholic too.

um - no it isn't.

I've helped make it. Get the buckets of sap from the trees. Pour into large shallow tray and heat for hours, to reduce the sap to syrup.

Trust me, no alcohol in it.

[rafletcher]

I've experienced food on sticks. I don't think there's anything in the mid-west that they can't deliver deep-fried on a stick, and I won't say anything bad about the mighty corn dog.

There was an article on the BBC website about food on a stick a couple of day ago..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33943760

Deep fried butter on a stick anyone   

[campagman]

I bought some raw milk today from the local farmers market. With all the hoo-hay lately about dairy farmers not making a living and the general public seeming sympathetic, I thought why don't people just go along to there local dairy farm and ask to buy raw milk. Cut out the middle man. It doesn't last so long but it does freeze.

[Gareth Rees]

Why don't people just go along to their local dairy farm and ask to buy raw milk?

Tuberculosis.

[contango]

Oddly, one of the first things that happened to me when I arrived in Canada was a trip to a maple syrup farm, possibly to establish for the stupid and misplaced Englishman that it doesn't come out of sugary cows. After that we climbed Mount Canadian stereotype for a game of ice hockey. But yes, maple syrup should be squeezed out of maple trees by burly, plaid shirted Eh-Eh-Ehing Canadians. At a pinch I'll accept Vermonters who are effectively sneaking out of the US when no one is looking (if I remember, there's a on town on the border with a theatre where you can actually enter in the US and watch the show in Canada).

That could be fun for the immigration folks. I wonder why there isn't a corresponding theatre on the south border, where you can enter in Mexico and watch the show in Texas....

Faux maple syrup is a crime in any jurisdiction and one I will not abide. Fortunately I know my NYC diners and thus minimize the risk of 'Canadian-style maple flavored syrup'. The further south you sink, the riskier the proposition gets. In California, for some reason, I once ended up with agave syrup which wasn't as bad as it sounded.

I was alerted to the way not all "maple syrup" has been anywhere near a maple tree when I stopped overnight with some friends just outside of Philadelphia a few years ago. In the morning they served an enormous plateful of waffles and pancakes and other American breakfasty stuff, which they smothered with syrup from a bottle. It was only after I had poured it over my own pancakes that I realised the word "flavored" was tucked between "maple" and "syrup" in a nice small font. Sure enough, the ingredients read something like "corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, aspartame, saccharine, acesulfame, artificial flavorings". So nothing that came out of a tree there.

It could have been worse, it might have been avocado syrup.

Never mind avocado, it could have been advocaat

Reminds me, cafes in the UK that put random cheap brown sauce in the HP bottles because it must save like, oh, pence. Stop it.

It's amazing what places will do to save a trivial sum of money when the end result is that you feel like they've cheaped out on you. When I think how cheap potatoes are it's amazing how many times you get a tiny portion of chips. The times I've had my meal come out and could barely lift the plate because of the weight of the chips, my first thought was what a good size portion they served. The extra couple of potatoes must have cost at least 20p, which doesn't seem like so much if I've paid 15 quid for a meal. Giving me six chips stacked with three on top of three might look poncey but gives me the impression you're just ripping me off and expecting me to admire the process.

Right, I'm off to Paris. There's bound to be a rant in that. I can feel those Parisian waiters bristling already. Poor schoolboy French locked and loaded. It's the only way to neutralize those surly waiters.

That could be fun. The last time I was in Paris I tried to use my pidgeon French and ended up ordering a steak tartare. That was an interesting experience, although once the waiter had stopped laughing he was willing to take it away and cook it. It came back rather like a spicy hamburger. For a while I almost thought I was back in Americaland, except that it wasn't smothered in banana peppers and the curious not-cheese-cheese-product.

[contango]

Why don't people just go along to their local dairy farm and ask to buy raw milk?

Tuberculosis.

As long as you enunciate clearly you should be fine.

If you ask "can I have a pint of milk please" that should be understood. If you mumble and they think you said "can I have some tuberculosis please" you could have problems.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Giving me six chips stacked with three on top of three might look poncey but gives me the impression you're just ripping me off and expecting me to admire the process.

You mean there are times when food might look poncey without giving you the impression you're being ripped off?

[mrcharly-YHT]

Why don't people just go along to their local dairy farm and ask to buy raw milk?

Tuberculosis.

Actually, the main reason is that few farmers are allowed to sell it. 'Green top' milk was not pasteurized and farmers had to be subject to rigorous testing regimes in order to be licensed to sell it. Dunno anywhere here that offers it.
When I lived in Holmfirth we had a milkperson who delivered direct from the farm. Really fresh greentop, fantastic stuff.

[rafletcher]

And the testing of which you speak would include for Tuberculosis. It's (Tubercular meningitis, most likely from drinking unpasteurised milk) what killed my sister in the late 1940's.

https://www.food.gov.uk/business-industry/farmingfood/dairy-guidance/rawmilkcream

[Gareth Rees]

I'll fill in the steps in the argument, just in case:

• Why don't people just go along to their local dairy farm and ask to buy raw milk? — Because only a few dairies (just 200 in the UK, out of roughly 10,000) are licensed to sell raw milk, so most people don't have a local dairy that does so. The nearest one to me is Longwood Organic Farm in Tuddenham, about 36 km away, which is a long way to cycle for a pint of milk.
• Why are there so few licensed dairies? — Because the inspection procedures are onerous and the benefits to the farm are low (they are only allowed to sell direct to the consumer, not through wholesalers or retailers).
• Why is the inspection procedure so onerous, and why the restrictions on sale? — Because of the risk of transmission of various infections, including tuberculosis.

[menthel]

Greggs not knowing how to make a proper London Cheesecake. Wank off you silly baking bastards- we need frangipane!

[contango]

Giving me six chips stacked with three on top of three might look poncey but gives me the impression you're just ripping me off and expecting me to admire the process.

You mean there are times when food might look poncey without giving you the impression you're being ripped off?

In some settings I can see that looking poncey and being expensive might not necessarily mean being ripped off. Although in fairness chips are unlikely to feature on such a menu.

[contango]

Why don't people just go along to their local dairy farm and ask to buy raw milk?

Tuberculosis.

Actually, the main reason is that few farmers are allowed to sell it. 'Green top' milk was not pasteurized and farmers had to be subject to rigorous testing regimes in order to be licensed to sell it. Dunno anywhere here that offers it.
When I lived in Holmfirth we had a milkperson who delivered direct from the farm. Really fresh greentop, fantastic stuff.

I remember as a teenager (with zits full of the stuff used to make advocaat) we used to get raw milk from our milkman. It came in a carton much like any other milk, except the carton said "raw unpasteurised milk" rather than "pasteurised milk".

From what I recall it tasted much the same as regular milk.

[hellymedic]

Much of the Kosher milk of my childhood was green top unpasteurised; fine if fresh and not very different from silver top unhomogenised pasteurised but  if stale and sour.

[ian]

To this day, I demand someone takes the skin off, I've never understood that. Are you supposed it eat it?

Yes, if it's properly cooked. There's a delicious layer of fat just under the skin, and this becomes crispy if fried, and takes on the flavour of whatever delicious things the fish was cooked in. Fry the fish with finely chopped hazelnuts and crushed garlic, or steam it with ginger and spring onion, or coat it with tamarind and chillies and deep-fry it, and the skin is the best bit.

If the skin is limp, tastes of nothing, or still has lots of scales, then don't eat it. But I wouldn't go back to a restaurant that served fish like this: they clearly don't know what they are doing.

I'm writing off fish in general, it's pretty much reached its culinary epitome when breaded and divided into neat fingers. I can manage battered fish, though it tends to be a bit of a faff and I reach my grease quota about halfway through the average battered haddock and my insides start to feel like an oil-slicked seagull looks. There is no actual limit to the amount of tuna or salmon from a tin I can eat though. Me and the cats could empty the oceans if they could squeeze out enough cans of the stuff. Fresh tuna makes me angry because chefs always insist on leaving it raw in the middle. My thoughts on sushi and sashimi ought to be well-known by now.

Fresh fish, mostly always overrated. You must try the seabass someone will demand. It's tastes like the colour white might taste. Now maybe you can concoct some kind of sauce, but if so, tip it over something useful that doesn't cost £5 a mouthful.