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Dinner Tonight: Refried Beans Your Way
I can certainly imagine how the Austinites looked at you after that question! LOL!! Being from TX and having lived in Austin for a decade, I know how it is. Certainly, Tex-Mex would include the pork fat or lard. I don't think there is much in Mexican cooking that doesn't have pork added to it. Well, maybe that's an exaggeration... I only know about Tex-Mex. I love it and deeply miss it here in VA. At least now I can try this new way of trying to cook the refired beans. Thank you, I can never get them to come out right. Someone told me that I was probably getting"old beans" because no matter how long they cooked they were always crunchy. Tex-Mex is one of the foods that I prefer to eat out because usually the restaurant knows better than I do how to do it. Others include anything deep fried and ethnic foods in general. I only know how to appreciate these culinary wonders.
Nutraloaf: An Unappetizing Form of Punishment
I suppose they could go to the old (ancient) fare of hard tack. But I guess that those could be used as weapons as well if thrown. My daughter worked in the regional jail for a time as a commisary distributer. Not every inmate got stuff. They only got stuff if they had $$ in an account they set up. No money, no stuff. We're talking semi-luxury items (for a jail, like books, candy, etc. ). And it was also one of the privileges that could be taken away as punishment. toward the end of her employment there she was 6 months pregnant and there were some inmates who threatened her and her baby! Jail is not a vacation.
Top Chef: Block Rockin' Eats
"I was particularly bothered by the heavy handed product placement. The chefs were grabbing for bottles of Hidden Valley Ranch and KC Masterpiece while the camera lingered on the labels. It seems there's some gratuitous shilling in every single frame of the show. They don't expect us to think that these chefs are cooking with these (gross) "ingredients," do they?"
Actually, this is probably one of the few (up to now) episodes wherein the chefs HAD to use commercial grocery store processed foods. The products were probably donated to the neighborhood just for this show. I don't know this for sure...but since I've watched every year of this series - this is the first time so many processed foods were the food they had to use. No jicama "tacos" to be had here.
The quick fire annoyed me because everyone who used the traditional taco formula was considered as having not understood "upscale". The person who won - probably won - not because it was a "taco" (because it wasn't- closer to an enchilada, at least in form), but because it was probably known beforehand that one of the dishes (i.e., the winner) was to have the "honor" of becoming a menu item at the judge's restaurant - at least until it showed whether or not it would be monetarily valuable. (I'm wondering how it will be billed on the menu - any credits to Top Chef? I wouldn't be surprised. Because it would certainly be more curious for the Top Chef fans who would then order it.)
As for Andrew - at least there were fireworks there. But I don't think that was a smart move unless he actually has the talent and opportunity ( unlike Zoi, who didn't want to do the pasta salad but did anyway and probably should have refused to serve it when it turned out so badly - really a novice mistake) to have the ability to actually be good enough to warrant such a statement.
I know there is a lot edited out of the show to make it fit in the allotted time frame, but I would like to see exactly what they say to each chef a couple of times. The judges have said -in the past - that they go around and around for a long time about their ultimate decisions. That isn't shown to the viewers. I know that when chefs have refused to serve a dish because it wasn't good enough for that chef - the chef was not encouraged at all for doing what he/she felt was right - but this is a food show where every chef is supposed to have an entry. Even so, I've heard the judges say in the past that if the dish wasn't good - don't serve it. Catch-22.
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OK, I'm going to ask a stupid question - where did bananas originate? I've always thought it was in South America and close by islands. If it were in deed a "new world" fruit - then they probably weren't affected by human "intervention" that much until after 1492. I suppose that natives could have crossed the Pacific and then gone back with some. Just wondering! ;D