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Is jerzeytomato being passive aggressive here? I find this incredibly irritating - the kind of "rules only apply to the little people" attitude that does permeate New Jersey. How do I know? I live here. It's the same attitude that justifies people walking their dogs in public spaces and leaving their poop unscooped (or bagged or whatever!) which will eventually result in the space being closed.
"Oh, I pay my taxes and so I get to soil!" Never mind that other people get to step in your dog's poop. Never mind that other people actually scoop or bag! If you have difficulty counting just don't get in the express lanes.

At boarding school the housemistress would start meals with "For what we are about to receive, may the Lord make us thankful"..the matron added "truly" to the mix. After the meal it was "For what we have received may the Lord make us thankful". Once I snorted at that one as lunch had been really the nadir of cuisine consisting of "mince" which was abominable followed by a suet pudding known as Spotted Dog which was inedible but had to be swallowed. At least it was short. At college (also in England) the grace was even shorter, mumbled by the Mistress at High Table and consisting of two Latin words which I never quite caught.
Imagine my dismay when I came back to America and visited this wonderful woman who had taken care of me when I was a baby! She said grace for 10 minutes! There are a number of people who do this. And then there was my best friend's cousin who said grace over any thing including a cup of hot tea at his grandmother's - we went to Macau for a weekend and he said grace at every meal (all in restaurants), every snack, but, he was Catholic and grace was set rather than extempore so it was fairly short too.
I don't say grace at home, but I will if there are people present who want to say grace or to hear it said before a meal. And I cannot understand how someone could get offended by the very concept - methinks they do protest too much.

Saveur, a nice collection of recipes and articles which whet the appetite and set my curiosity going.

Many years ago a friend and I were reduced to hitchhiking to get around LA because his car broke down. It was in the heyday of Hippiedom, and I willl never forget one ride we hitched. The guy in the front, a passenger was eating a meal from a big bowl. It basically looked like rather dark sand with a sauce the color of Russian dressing only without any pickles and stuff, and I think there were some chopped raw vegetables included. Frankly, I never saw anything more unappetizing in my life. And he was eating it without any evidence of enjoyment. I have remained a meat eater although in moderate quantities.

Of course even one of those age-old vegetarian/vegan friendly cuisines had its own mock stuff, in China fake duck made of tofu and mushrooms comes to mind. I actually have tasted that and was not very impressed but I have never even attempted to taste the mock hot dogs offered in frozen form at the supermarket. My paternal grandmother had a strictly vegetarian diet and allowed me to taste a few of her dishes. Mind you she had supervised and cooked the meals for the family which usually served around 16 to 20 and were uniformly delicious. Her own meal on the other hand was not particularly tasty and included all sorts of ingredients with rather unpleasant textures, like the hair vegetables and certain forms of pressed tofu. I wondered if she was punishing herself!

Plain with salt and pepper and maybe a squirt of extra virgin olive oil. Or sliced with ripe tomatoes on rye bread, but only in the summer.

If you want a more nuanced law your course of action is through your legislator rather than the courts. A stoop that ends on a public street seems to me to fall into a slightly gray area of being quasi public in nature as opposed to a fence with maybe a hole in it which might make activities visible from the street. I would hope that any jurist would make that distinction too which would snuff out the threat to drinking at a barbeque in the backyard etc.
Frankly I cannot agree that drinking alcoholic beverages on a stoop adds anything to the public discourse. At best it is neutral. At worst it is annoying and possibly disruptive if the drinking degenerates.

The recipe I have is from Elizabeth David's "Italian Food" and does not call for cream but just milk. Not quite as rich but just as delicious.

Dinner tonight was scrambled eggs with scallions, home fries and brussel sprouts, of course the whole thing was lessened by sauteeing the potatoes and eggs in duck fat.

Alas in the barbeque wilderness which is northwestern New Jersey the best barbeque joint must be in someone's back yard - I have heard tell that one Eric does a mean barbeque, but as of right now it might just be me and I am not that good!

The same to you and may 2012 be an excellent year for food and for good writing. I am so grateful to you for keeping me sane and on an even keel as far as possible. Wish me luck as I roast my duck tomorrow. Jerome also extends his best wishes particularly to Hambone.

Wish I could tell you but there isn't one around here any more. They don't seem to last long in Warren County. All I know is that I had some ribs yesterday and some wings - the ribs were dry rubbed and while moist did not have much taste. Don't know where they came from.