I love grits. If they're poorly prepared, they can be too runny or too bland, but if they're well-prepared, love'em. I'm in NYC, but grew up mostly in Va. My parents aren't southerners, so I didn't have a lot of grits as a kid.
Reheating individual portions of leftovers, cooking the occasional frozen meal, and popping microwave popcorn
Porridge oats w/a little peanut butter mixed in, fruit, and a small cup of coffee
Gas. The biggest advantage is how quickly the oven heats up. The disadvantage is the layout of the burners. One burner is so huge I have to have it on low to keep from scorching whatever I'm cooking, but the others are so tiny it takes 20 minutes to boil water.
Scrambled. I like the yoke, not really the white (especially the hard-boiled, jiggly version), so I prefer when the two are mixed. Poached works too, but I'm not a fan of sunnyside up.
I get a low fat pie from my food delivery service that has tomato sauce, artichokes, olives, red peppers, mushrooms, and a little goat cheese. Great combo.
Fudgy. Absolutely on the nuts and anything else (peanut butter, chocolate/other chips, etc.) you want to throw in.
If anything I've always been underweight. I'm selective what I eat and don't waste stomach space on stuff like packaged foods, so it's not hard to keep the weight off.
Cakes and pastries in Vienna--they came in endless varieties of deliciousness.
Personally, I'm almost 15lbs overweight at 145. The last 5 came on when I started dating chef BF. But damn, I am so freakin' happy. Totally worth it.
AARP bumper sticker:
Food has replaced sex in my life.
Now, I can't even get into my own pants.
Not in my case, I love to cook more than I love to eat... I'm more like a picky 5 year old when it comes to eating.
Carolina de Witte - chefs can taste if they want to, of course. Some do, some don't. Some do sometimes but not always.
I was never taught to taste during service before sending it out to a customer but rather to be sure that I knew ahead of time by smell and look and by focus on the initial prep and even ordering/checking in of goods that when in the process of putting out anywhere from four orders to 250 orders that they would be good and correct in taste just from the building "from the ground up" so to speak.
As executive chef I worked on instilling this same way of doing things in the chefs and cooks that worked for me. It requires a lot of standardization of recipe and focus on initial ingredients, along with an intensive structure that involves detailed production schedules and a well-trained team who are willing to work together. It's not just about the food itself, its about the people who are putting it together.
This takes away from "creativity" allowed in a free-form way, yes. But the guests get consistency.
It's a beautiful thing when a kitchen of ten can trust each other to come in and together put out a range of meals where some of the plates might be finely detailed "fine dining" and the other plates are fine banquet service for 50 hitting at the exact same time.
Granted, part of this is intuition. But most of it is training, teamwork, knowledge and consistently-implemented procedures that run from step A to step Z.
But to each their own, and to taste on an ongoing basis is one way of doing it, for sure.
But what I said is true and workable also. :)
@annien - well put. I only consider myself sort of a foodie and only for the past year and a half or so. The eating habits that keep me at the lower end of my weight range over the past five years? Cooking and eating more fresh/whole foods, paying attention to what I eat at every meal (for both the sake of making sure it's healthy *and* the sake of making sure it's delicious), and going out of my way to enjoy what I eat as much as possible. I do tend to eat a lot, I think, but I've learned to cook healthy things in a delicious way, so my little transition to being a foodie hasn't resulted in turning into a fattie.
@BangieB - you're right, there is no moral triumph to being thin. However, with the obesity problem being what it is, I think we all owe it to ourselves to try to be healthier (which usually results in being thinner, though being thin doesn't automatically mean being healthy).
foodvox said: "No, chefs don't have to taste all the time if they are chefs for they know what they are doing and don't have to double-check." This isn't true. I've been a chef for many years, but I was taught to ALWAYS taste before sending it to a customer. There are many variables in cooking. If you aren't a good 'taster', you can not be a chef. The difference between ordinary, bad and sublime can be just a touch too little or too much salt, nevermind such ingredients as acids, etc. That being said, a 'taste' doesn't mean an entire mouthful of food, it is just enough to judge...a few drops could be sufficient.
I am not overweight, as I usually skip the 'house meals', and I go to the gym several nights a week. I eat the majority of my meals at home with my family, and we love fresh fruits and vegetables, organic and local if possible. I love preparing meals for my family even more than I do for patrons at work. Moderation is always key. I do splurge, but not everyday.
From my perspective, there is absolutely no moral triumph for being thin. You want to be thin, be thin. But when people pat themselves on the back for what they perceive to be better eating habits than someone else... I just find that, in and of itself, self aggrandizement of the grossest variety.
There's a difference between a foodie and a glutton. People comment to my DH all the time that he ought to weigh 400 pounds because of the way I cook. But if you're eating good food every day, I think you're less apt to eat like a starving dog, because you know there will be good food tomorrow, too. Someone else who dines with us might get a little carried away, because they're just eating this one meal with us.
And I also think that part of being a foodie who cooks is that I look into more than just the flavors. I look at things like nutrition.
And good food isn't necessarily fattening food. A perfectly cooked vegetable can be a delight. A fresh raw tomato is wonderful.
I despise the type pf thinklng which tells people that they look fat simply because they enjoy their food. This is a screw-up of the Puritan ethic, which told us that, if you enjoyed something, it would hurt you.
Today's foodies stand against that. We want to know more about every aspect of our food, not so we can shove rich things down our throats constantly, but so we can have a great salad or cookie or pasta dish or veggie casserole or hot dog or grilled cheese or or or...and makes sure it gives us strength and health as well as the calories.
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