General Mills Slinging Dope?

“Popular cereal is a drug, US food watchdog says”
At first, it sounded ridiculous – the Food and Drug Administration calling Cheerios a drug? That was the headline which caught my attention. I half expected to read about the millions of kids becoming addicted to the little round bits of processed “oats”  I should have known [...]

The Bean Pot

 

The Bean Pot
Originally uploaded by kilgorebrian13
A clay pot is essential to proper New England style baked beans.
My mother made “Boston baked beans” every Saturday night I lived at home. I tried to duplicate her recipe without success until I found this clay pot in an antique store in Lompoc, Ca. I don’t think it was [...]

Liquid Bread

My first experience with this Bavarian “liquid bread” was in 1973 and involved a late night trip to the Bahnhof with my buddy Reginald, six half-litre bottles of Salvator doppelbock, and a crippling hangover.
Bock is a strong lager which has its origins in the Hanseatic town of Einbeck, Germany. Bocks have a long history of being brewed and consumed by Roman Catholic monks in Germany. During [...]

The Roquefort Files

The Bush administration apparently doesn’t like the essential ingredient to one of my favorite salad dressings – Roquefort cheese. So, before turning off the lights and heading to Texas, George slapped a 300 percent duty on the real deal. This pretty much means we will either have to pay through the nose for the stinky [...]

Kaiserschmarrn

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Kaiserschmarrn (“Kaiser”, meaning “Emperor’s” and “Schmarrn” is “Mishmash” in Austrian German) is one of the best know Austrian desserts, popular in the former Austria–Hungary as well  as in Bavaria. In Hungary it is called “császármorzsa” or simply “smarni”. The translation of Kaiserschmarrn has generated some etymological debate. While “Kaiser” is literally translatable as Emperor, the same cannot be said for “Schmarrn”. “Schmarrn” [...]

The Ultimate Breakfast

We enjoy our own version of müsli just about every single morning and never seem to tire of it.  Most of the ingredients are available in a decent grocery store, but we have to drive to Johnson City where we shop at the Whole Foods Market .  Here’s how we make it.

1/2 cup mixed thick rolled (not instant!) oats (50%) barley flakes [...]

Sacher Torte

I am reading ”Mortals” by Norman Rush.  On the back cover are all the out-of-context quotes by various literary types.  Karen Heller writes for the Philadelphia Enquirer and says “Dazzling . . .  A thick, delicious Sache torte of a novel.”  It is a good book, but this Austrian delight has it’s own web site.

It’s Good!

I tried the Schlenkerla smoke beer last night.  We had it with Gerda’s homemade broccoli soup and laugenstangen with cheese.  It was a little milder than I expected but this could be the difference between the bottled and on-tap versions.  In any case it was excellent. The smoke flavor wasn’t at all overbearing, even at the [...]