What did you eat last night for dinner? - Page 735

Really?

I cut one up today.

As mentioned before there are cup sanitizers, but I often see that they're turned off and serve no purpose other than shelving. Keep in mind that at many places all the chopsticks and spoons are stored unwrapped in a container on the table, and the diners are touching them throughout the day. A lot of restaurants don't wash up w/ hot water, and it's rare for hot water to be in a public restroom. That being said, I eat at Korean places several times a week, and I haven't experienced much gastric distress over the years. I maintain that exposure to less-than-pristine conditions has its benefits. Korea toughened my gut up for several trips to India and Nepal; I've never been sick in either country. Want to see something horrific? Visit an open-air butcher in Kathmandu. Yet I still ate the water buffalo sizzle - just not medium rare. The hyper-hygienic Japanese have overdone it and in doing so have weakened their natural resistance. If there's a public health threat in Korea it's less so hygiene and more so doctors who wildly over prescribe anti-biotics.

All in all, your best bet for good, safe dining is a busy restaurant with clean water that serves the healthy locals.
Edited by curzon - 8/29/11 at 9:16pm

The last few pages are why Style Forum can be great.

I made shells of lightly folded semolina flour discs, with porc enrobe sans enrobe, kale and reggiano. A little over seasoned but still good.

First post in here... not quite up to the standards here, but I was happy with how this turned out. The crispy skin was awesome.

I would probably shorten the cooking time a little bit next time. I prefer my pork a little pink.

I know the green beans in the final shot should have had the ends trimmed. I didn't prep them.

Porchetta:

what'd you stuff it with? looks beautiful but the white balance looks a little off

I actually think that, for a rustic dish like that, the green beans should be no more trimmed than they are. It all looks very good.

+1
i think they look much better natural (heh-heh-heh).

It's a pork loin that was rubbed with a mixture of fennel seed, red pepper flakes, garlic, rosemary, sage and orange slices. Then that gets wrapped with skin on pork belly and tied.

The white balance may be a touch off. These were just quick shots on the kitchen counter when it came out of the oven. The under-counter lights are fluorescent and are a nightmare for coloring. I think that, in general, it is pretty close to how it appeared, with the exception of the final one that I warmed up a bit more.


Thanks. I agree that leaving the ends on is nice aesthetically. The only problem was that some of them were a little tough to eat.

That is a beautiful plate of food. Can post the recipe for the porchetta?

Sure:

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Porchetta-367138

Again, we probably have one of the real US experts on Porchetta here so listen to him, not me, but I believe that, like many regional dishes, there are guidelines and not really a recipe. I certainly have seen it done a lot of ways, some great, some less so. Check out a classic Italian book.

yup. almost every region of italy that eats pork (which is to say, all of them) has a version of porchetta. this one sounds very nice.

There was a great Saveur last year that dealt with Sicily, and the various ways classic dishes were prepared in each region. There was some brief mention of how horrified each region found another's preparations of the same dish.

the italians are SO provincial. And every one i've ever met has been an absolutely dictatorial expert on cooking. There is one right way to prepare a dish (the way his mom fixed it, regardless of the fact that his neighbor did it different). and that town 10 miles away? that's foreign food, what could they possibly know?
on the other hand, that is what has kept regional foodways alive in Italy when they are so threatened here.

I pray for the schmaltz and matzo ball revival.