Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

I used to eat one of these every sunday morning at 10:00!!
Now i'm cutting down. One every 1/2 year to 2 years.

(BACON BOY APPROVED)

I keep kosher-ish, so I would never actually go out and buy lard/bacon to make these. but if I go to a restaurant and have beans I just close my eyes and pretend that the lard doesn't exist... if you can't see it, it doesn't count, right?

So if the Banana is from God, does that mean that the Durian is from the devil?

For the record, Oreo Cakesters are delicious, whoopie pie phoney or not. Tried them last night and ate both in the pack.

My mom has always been petite (about 110 pounds on a 5 foot frame) but she never seems to diet or go hungry, which I didn't understand because our family eats rather fat-laden ethnic food, and my father, while a healthy weight, has always had a belly. I never noticed my mom's unique eating habits until I myself became conscious of eating healthy, in my later teens. I suddenly noticed her eating habits and I can't say I was surprised anymore about her healthy build. My mom always ate at regular mealtimes, never ate between meals, consumed her food very slowly and deliberately, flavored her food strongly, never skimped on fat and grease, ate smaller or fewer portions than the rest of us, and always had a small, rich dessert before bed.

I will never be a slow eater, and I skip way too many meals to adhere to regular mealtimes, but I've learned a couple useful things from watching her (she always encouraged us to eat frequently and didn't teach us her eating style, so I learned most of it from watching). I've learned from her not to eat between meals, so I get good and hungry before mealtimes. I then try to make large, full-fat, complex meals that satisfy me at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.The rule of thumb I learned from her was, If you're hungry between meals, you didn't eat enough to satisfy yourself at mealtimes, so don't skimp during meals because it'll backfire.

I don't think her advice fits everyone, though. It is truly suited to a particularly Asian style of cooking and eating: long, multi-course family meals with several helpings of rice to fill you up and a variety of heavily flavored, non-low-fat toppings, sauces, curries, and stews to satisfy all your taste buds, heavy on vegetables with meat or seafood served once a week.

My kids used to laugh about my mother in law's fretting that she wouldn't have enough food on the table, and then pushing more on everyone because there were left-overs. It's definitely a cultural thing. Hopefully the 'clean plate club' will be disbanding at some point in the near future. As one of my friends is fond of saying, if you want a little behind, you have to leave a little behind. And while I'm dishing out platitudes, I'll just add the one I found in a fortune cookie. "Life is a journey, not a destination." It's like that with managing food intake. You can't expect the issues to go away just because you meet a weight goal. It's something you're going to live with forever. And Ed, it seems as though you've made a breakthrough. Congrats!

Everybody loves Alton Brown! He just seems to be the type of guy that we would all want to have a beer with!

In fact, over at 43People (http://spriestley.43people.com/) I have listed Alton as one of only 5 people I would really like to meet - Alton, if your're reading - the list isnt in order of importance otherwise you'd be at the top!

I edit the FoodBlog Chowbelly (http://chowbelly.wordpress.com) and would LOVE to do an email interview with Alton sometime!!

You should try to explain to a Nebraskan what a whoopie pie is!! And they call themselves Germans............lol

I thought Zoi should have packed her knives and left. The texture of the corndogs may not have survived the holding and transport process, but other than the sogginess it was never said by the judges that they didn't have overall good flavor. Not so, it seems, for the pasta salad. Whether she wanted to do it or not, pasta salad is pretty simple AND is also a classic dish that normally can hold and be transported for picnics, block parties, etc. How do you screw that up? In my mind, a chef that failed to anticipate the challenges of adapting a dish he knows well to how it would hold up making it hours in advance is not nearly as bad as a chef who can't make something as simple as a pasta salad taste decent.

In comparison with last week, isn't that what Valerie went home for? Stephanie dressed her salad too far in advance and it got soggy (poor planning), but Valerie's dish simply didn't taste good, so she got the boot. The judging is often inconsistent in this regard; I think poor taste should always be the deciding factor over poor planning, poor texture, poor presentation, etc. If a chef can't taste how bad his/her own dish is when it's made, why would we ever want to eat their food?

Mmmm... gotta love a good whoopie pie. I haven't had one since leaving my home territory of Lancaster, PA and moving to MD after college. Although since I went to college in MD I did make whoopie pies as a "cultural snack" for my anthropology class. When I mentioned to my friends that my boyfriend and I were going to make whoopie pies that evening they thought I was talking about something else :). Now I'm going to need to take a day trip up to Central Market (which is filled with a lot of other wonderful food, by the way) and get a whoopie pie - or maybe see if I can find my mom's recipe.

I happened to catch "I can make you thin" on TLC the other night. I've followed this guy's advice to eat at the table-no TV, reading, or internet. After each bite, PUT THE KNIFE & FORK DOWN!" and chew each mouthful at least 20x. No alcohol with the meal. Eat what you want & like until full & don't save the leftovers. The pants I couldn't zip up on Monday sild on like a dream yesterday! (2 days!)I am never hungry, but realize now that my eating habits were the worst. At home, meals were just an aside to crosswords, the news, TV and surfing the net. Now I really apreciate what I eat and can leave something on my plate. I think there are more points to his program, but he said this method is enough for some. Lucky me!

@Dave try concentrating on mingling with friends at parties and always have a glass of mineral water in your hand, this way if you want to pick at the food you have to conciously put down the glass. ;)

I had an even week, too. I don't know if anyone else out there has this problem, but I eat when food is in front of me, so parties and buffets kill me every time, as do places with huge portions. I avoid buffets now, but I need/want to go to parties. Any thoughts?