Had it with the Food Channel...

[Daisy and Delilah]

I would have puked over the oyster stuffing too.

Interesting story about the sea bean. That is the only sea bean I've ever heard of in my life. I've seen those on the beaches here. It's been a long long time but I do remember those.

On "Chopped" last night, they must have had the plant that they come from. Very interesting.....
What they had looked like long, skinny, asparagus. I think I'll research further. Thanks for the link.

[RICHARD]

Thanks for the link.

No prob, we all learn here!

--------------

Have you seen the commercial with the Top chef host, Padma in it?

http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/marc...rss_topstories

I found it to be a turn off.

While the thought of a nice looking gal eat a hamburger on your front porch is kinda appealing, I don't want her to smell like "secret sauce" or red onion, or wiping her greasy fingers all over my pillows, later on.....

And if she's eating a burger with a bun littered with those little balck poopy seeds, I don't want her to stand up and spill them all over MY FLOOR.

Food is sexy, Spending a few hours with a SO in the kitchen is way better than a sloppy hamburger on some gum encrusted sidewalk.

An old college t-shirt, sweats cut into shorts and a pair of flip flops is my kind of dressing up for dinner.

Seriously, I have seen the commercial about 4 times and I still don't know what kind of hamburger it is.

The only thing I think about is the greasy clump of ketchup soaked meat, dropping off the burger and having to hear the moans and groans all night long...

"OHHH, this is my good dress!", "That will never come out!", Quick get some club soda!" "See what you made me do?"


If you can't pull the spoon out of the pot and hold it for your SO to taste?


It ain't sexy.


--------------------


I have to toss this in.

If I see food on TV, I'll stop there and see "what's cooking" (pun intended)

Today I stopped at the QVC channel when I saw something being cooked.

They were selling tilapia filets-each 3.25 ounces- 14 for $44.95.

I checked the price per pound and it came out to 15 bucks a pound.

I bought a bag of four, gutted tilapia, individually wrapped- I have to check the price per pound and the weight of the packaging- I wrapped them in foil, tossed them on the outer edge of the grill. After they cooked I put them in a plastic bag for later in the week. I steamed veggies and tossed the fish on top for the last 5-7 minutes to heat.

Even thoough it's a spiny fish, it is one of the best eating fish you can have.
It's white, tasty meat that only needs salt and pepper as seasoning.

I know that boning fish for filets is an art, but I just can't see paying 15 dollars a pound for less than three lbs of fish! Half the fun is puling apart a fish with a fork and a piece of toast.

[Daisy and Delilah]

I can't get the commercial to load but I'll keep trying. It sounds pretty gross. Not sure if I want to see it.

I don't know why but I never get to see Top Chef much. I watched it a few nights ago and I enjoyed it. I've noticed that these chefs on tv are on all the shows. Some of them at least. I saw a blond lady on Top Chef that was also on Chopped last season.

I have a picture of CA, in my own mind, of all residents out on their patios, grilling around the clock. There is just not that much grilling going on in Florida, as far as I can tell. Not in my neighborhood anyway. Usually, if they're grilling, it smells like the cheapest meat you can buy. I think it's too hot to go out and cook. It's just unbearable. People are stuck inside the house or shopping in the cold AC.

Richard, for years, all the restaurants here have served tilapia. It's real common here. I love it. I buy it all the time and cook it too. It's really delicious. Grouper was a big staple here but it got so expensive, many restaurants went to other fish like tilapia.

I also love mahi mahi but I haven't had any lately. I agree--$15 a pound for fish is ridiculous.

Tomorrow nights NFNS looks like alot of the contestants are in tears. I think someone is in tears every week so far. I would love to see Jamika win. I think she's delightful. I read somewhere that Debbie is probably going to get it. Let's face it, Giada likes her so she must have something going for her. I think she might be the first person Giada has ever liked.

What does everyone else think?

[RICHARD]

I have a picture of CA, in my own mind, of all residents out on their patios, grilling around the clock. There is just not that much grilling going on in Florida, as far as I can tell. Not in my neighborhood anyway. Usually, if they're grilling, it smells like the cheapest meat you can buy. I think it's too hot to go out and cook. It's just unbearable. People are stuck inside the house or shopping in the cold AC.

LOL,
You have to live in a Mexican neighborhood. Out here people find any reason to fire up the grill. The worst possible thing to happen is you walk outside your house in the middle of the week and you smell someone cooking! You can smell the citrus, onion and chile in the air, after I identify what the neighbors are cookling, I head indoors and open up a can of soup:rolleyes.:

Out here, the main meat is marinated skirt steak, it's cheap, not too thick and you can feed an army with a few bucks. You can buy pre marinated meat, a few dozen corn tortillas, Someone will make the salsa, A pot of beans, someone makes rice.

One guy grills the meat and heats tortillas, the meat is tossed onto a butcher block where someone takes a cleaver to it! It gets dumped into a bowl and everyone goes buffet!

Maybe you don't want people partying in your hood.

Sometimes we get parties that go until 2-3 in the A.M.


BTW?

Yeah, it does get way too hot to cook outdoors in the summer.

[Daisy and Delilah]

Sounds like my kind of party. People in Florida aren't nearly as clever. The smell of citrus, chiles, and onion in the air would drive me crazy. I would have to follow my nose to the nearest fiesta.

Skirt steak. Is that the same as flank steak? FN is always featuring something like that. I almost bought some last week but I decided against it. I'll get some when I go shopping.

I was watching a show last night about grilling. They were grilling like maniacs.

The Weber Grill Restaurant is really unique. I didn't catch the location. The kitchen is all Weber charcoal grills. All their food is grilled. I couldn't believe the fire coming up out of those grills. They grill all the desserts too--grilled pineapple and bananas. Those chefs must be burning up through their whole shift. When they go home, they're reeking of smoke. Very interesting. The chef said he tried grilling watermelon but he wouldn't recommend it.
Wasn't there a lady just grilling watermelon on BF's show and loving it?

It was a good show. I think FN was honoring grilling yesterday. Maybe the whole weekend.

And, yes, there was some Romaine lettuce on the grill.

[RICHARD]

Skirt steak. Is that the same as flank steak?

The Weber Grill Restaurant is really unique. I didn't catch the location. The kitchen is all Weber charcoal grills. All their food is grilled. I couldn't believe the fire coming up out of those grills. They grill all the desserts too--grilled pineapple and bananas.

And, yes, there was some Romaine lettuce on the grill.

http://www.ochef.com/66.htm

The Flank versus the Skirt!

------------------

I saw the Weber program...being a typical male I was in awe of the grills. That is something I'd like to have, just to wow the neighbors.


Citrus Marinade?

This in not an exact science-lol, my recipe!
Go slow and add or subtract as you go along and TASTE, TASTE, TASTE!


Orange juice, Lime or lemon juice, About .5 cups of each.

You can use OJ and the lemon, lime or all three. You do get a different flavor
according to what you use and how sweet/sour the citrus is!

1/4 cup vinegar.
1 tablespoon of chili powder
1 tablespoon of garlic powder
1 tablespoon of meat tenderizer, like Sazon.
salt to taste.

Slice a small yellow onion or take about 4-5 whole green onions and a pinch of fresh cilantro. You can also toss in a few orange slices to the mix.

Toss it all in a bowl, toss in the meat, onion and cilantro. Let is sit for a few hours, over night is better? I plastic bag is fine, so is a covered dish.

Get a good fire going and toss it on the grill!

Don't leave the onion in huge chunks, do a julienne cut on it-most of it will fall thru the grill, but it already has flavored the meat, Green onions? Grill them away from the hottest part of the grill. You can eat them whole or chop them up to add to your meat.

The meat cooks up pretty quickly so have all your stuff ready to go.
The basic fixings are chopped onion, fresh cilantro, chopped tomato, lime or lemon slices to squeeze on it - or you can toss together a fast salsa with all the above and a jalapeno. Again, this isn't an exact recipe, so go 'thirds' of the veggies, add some lime juice and a jalapeno-to taste!

If you heat your tortillas on a grill be careful about turning them-and don't heat up too many at a time, either kind get hard if you do not eat them quickly. YOu can take a hand towel, folded in half, and put them there as you go along.

[Daisy and Delilah]

Great information, Richard. You Californians are grilling geniuses.

Do you use the citrus marinade for fish at all? Minus the meat tenderizer?

I never realized how many uses there are for cilantro. Eating it alone is difficult for me. Mixing it with other things, it really tastes great. Especially in salsa and guacamole.

Has anybody seen the new shows. "Best Thing I Ever Ate"? I can't stop wondering how all those chefs have been so many places and just happened to take a camera crew with them to get film for the show. I'm being a little sarcastic, of course. So far, I think I've seen three of them. One was for fried food, BBQ, and food in general.

Did they really go to these places and discover these items themselves or did someone else go and discover the item and FN assigned that particular chef to the bit? Where do I come up with these questions?

Michael Symon's definition of two kinds of people::eople that admit to loving fried food and those that love it but act like they don't.....there is something to that. I know people that tell you that don't eat fried food but it's usually the first thing they pick on a menu. Do they not know that certain foods are actually fried?

I almost lost in when Duff Goldman ordered and ate shrimp heads. Has anyone else heard of this at all? Is it popular in the big seafood areas of the country? It was disgusting!!

Giada eating those donuts, holy cow!! I hope she had a cigarette afterward.