Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

Well done. What a wonderful list. I wish more people would actually take the time to at least try and take the time to teach young people some skills and manners their parents SHOULD have taught them. Far too many kids today have NO clue as to what manners are and how to use them or even some common sense. After running a retail store for years that specialized in some certain children's toys, I've seen it all. Toddlers that hit their grandparents, kids as old as 10 or 12 have TANTRUMS. I lost count of the number of children that had NO clue what please and thank you were. I don't know what parents are doing in the 21st century but it certainly isn't parenting. If this list helps just one person, it was worth doing.

I needed to think about this for several days and think about all the things I use. I've finally come to the conclusion that the one main thing that I would be devastated to give up in my kitchen would be my Kitchen Aid Mixer. Life is 10 times better since I have that. I use it for all sorts of things and since I do more baking than I do cooking, needless to say I use it quite a bit. I can't imagine how much work it was for my ancestors to do all that beating and mixing not only with a little hand mixer like my mother, but by hand like my great-grandmothers. Baby, we HAVE come a long way!

BROCCOLI!!! That's what I'm tired of seeing EVERYWHERE I go. No matter what restaurant it is, what catered function it is, any place there is hot food being served, someone is going to stick broccoli on that plate. Now I used to like broccoli. But ever since the day that President Bush Senior said he didn't like broccoli, the entire country conspired to try and teach him a lesson. Everyone revolted and started serving broccoli ALL the time. Before that day you rarely saw broccoli served as a vegetable, it was always peas and carrots or green beans or worse of all, zucchini and squash. Don't get me wrong, I like all of these vegetables, but everyone over cooks them in restaurants. But here in 2010, everyone has forgotten why they even have broccoli all the time, they just still put it down as the vegetable to serve with a meal. I used to enjoy broccoli, especially with a cheese sauce. But now the health food nuts have ruined that too. Heaven forbid someone would be allowed to put cheese on a vegetable. Almost all of my older relatives lived to be well into their 80s and some into their 90s. And you know what, not one ever dieted a day in their lives. They ate, drank and did everything in moderation. They lived on well-balanced, well-rounded meals, worked hard and didn't sit around on their duffs. The only ones that died younger were the ones that smoked, so what's that tell you. And most of them lived almost all their lives on food they raised and grew on their own farms. They never heard of anything called organic farming. So restaurants, I'm sure I'm not the only person (who after the 60th time they've been served broccoli since that infamous comments by 41) who has become SICK TO DEATH of broccoli. Please move on to another vegetable. And don't make it edamame. All of a sudden that's suppose to be the new "it" vegetable. What cracks me up most are the things that people now make "high class" or gourmet foods. Back when I was a kid in the 60s and my mom was growing up on the farm before that, small little potatoes about the size of golf balls would never, EVER have been eaten by people. Farmers actually called them pig potatoes because they literally fed them to the pigs, they were NOT considered good enough to feed to humans. In fact, if you had served those "pig potatoes" to company, they would have been insulted. We ate them because we didn't have pigs or cows to serve them to, and when people ate them they tried to give them a prettier name and said they were called "jacket potatoes." Now, those same things that were only good enough for the pigs have been turned into gourmet food by the high society. It's hysterical. Many foods that for years were considered "poor people" food and people with money wouldn't be caught dead eating are now the latest gourmet items on the grocer's shelves. So folks, don't be so gullible in the grocery store by these gourmet items. The same thing with "organic". I'll tell you about organic food. About 20 years ago a well-known scientist tried to warn the American public about the dangers of organic farming and no one would listen. Now everytime we have an e-coli outbreak in organic food several people have to die, and people STILL don't listen. This is what goes wrong in organic farming. The only fertilizer used by organic farmers is manure. Now that's fine, as LONG as organic farmers are patient. But they're not. In order for manure to be properly broken down to where organisms like e-coli and other bacteria are gone it takes well over a year for that manure needs to decompose. Most farmers don't wait that long, they use the manure far too soon and those organisms which we don't want in our food our deposited right in the soil to grow INSIDE our food. See unlike pesticides and other things which are dusted or sprayed on the OUTSIDE. This means these things can be washed off your food making it safe to eat. HOWEVER, when manure is used too soon by farmers the e-coli and other problems grow right inside the vegetables, making it impossible to be removed by washing. Also, the latest trend is this new liquid manure. WHEW! Trust me, it is the stinkiest stuff to ever hit farm country. Worse than any pig farm I've ever been around. You see, I come from farm country and farm stock. I understand this liquid manure which all the farmers are using also does not allow things do break down and decompose enough.

I think tacky hardly begin to describe what this charge to the guest could be called. It sounds like someone is trying to make a buck on this affair. I honestly believe the "guest of honor" should be told. I know if someone were giving a party for me and a friend or associate did this, I'd be so embarassed I wouldn't know what to do. Then I'd get mad! I think this person would want to know. What's going to happen is that people eventually are going to hold resentment against the person the party was held for, they're not going to to believe they didn't know about it. I wonder if the honoree finds out about this just how STUPID the hosts are going to feel? I really hope someone tells them off about this, I also hope they have VERY few people show up. Of course they'll wonder why, they appear to be a very dense type.

Wow, was this overdue. Not only for the Food Network, but this is how I feel about ALL the television programming in today's world, especially TV Land. There is also another channel that has lost their way. They started out as a channel running the great old shows that are classics, now they too have all this reality tv. What's wrong with these programmers today, there should be more than reality tv available considering all the money most of us pay for our service. I'm glad someone finally spoke up about this. Now I'm waiting for someone to speak up about all the stations flashing all their advertising on the screen while a show is on. I don't know how many times I've missed something or didn't see something important because they were advertising some show coming up or the channel information. I don't know about the rest of you but I find that practice EXTEMELY irritating. I hope this letter will set an example for all of us to exprese our concerns about the paths many of the stations on today's television is taking. Programming is becoming worse all the time and the only way it's going to change is if we all speak our minds.

I'm going to show my age here and say I graduated from college pre-microwave oven days. Now what I mean about that is that a microwave was still a very high price item, your poor college kid never even thought of owning such a thing. What saved me was the toaster oven. Now just about everyone needs a toaster, and why not get one that can do some other things as well. However, unlike your average college kid, once I got into apartments instead of dorm rooms the first things I got were a hand held mixer (great for basic baking), a blender (must have for parties as well as cooking, can take place of food processor at times) and an electric skillet. I had started cooking at the age of 14 and I was the college friend everyone came to for a home-cooked meal. I hit yard sales and stocked my first apartment kitchen. Believe it or not, I still own some of those first things from almost 30 years ago. Now also, if the poor man doesn't own them, get him a measuring cup (liquid and solid) and some measuring spoons. It's shocking the number of people in this country who don't own those basic items. This is what has happened to our country WITH the invention of the microwave and also with the loss of home-cooking and the family meal time. It's really a shame.