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Pot Luck

by: JayinPortland

Mon Feb 08, 2010 at 19:00:00 PM PST


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JayinPortland :: Pot Luck
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Pot Luck | 37 comments
Long day... (4.00 / 3)
Too tired to eat, too tired to think.  Time to turn the brain off and babble and ramble.  And watch Seinfeld reruns.

I got nothing tonight.

What are youze all up to?

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

expecting more snow.. (4.00 / 3)
http://twitpic.com/11pied
that's my dog ..outside in my yard.

just got an email from my daughter the college activist. They came up with a great idea for Valentines Day.
http://www.studenthealthcareac...

[ Parent ]
Getting cold... (4.00 / 2)
...just thinking about snow.

Brrr.

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
I couldn't pass one either (4.00 / 3)
but I don't think dinosaurs walked around with people and I don't have a white hooded garment in my closet.And I'm old enough to remember being turned away from a hotel because we were Jews. That consciousness of being discriminated against has shaped me and my families perspective on all social issues. Including immigration.

I am coming to believe based on my own beliefs, therapy and new findings in neuro science, that conservative brains (like Tancredo)may be different than those of us here.Some of my thinking has been supported by reading a fascinating book by Jeremy Rifkin http://shrinkify.com/1pdi

He's guest blogger all month at Huffpo.

[ Parent ]
soapbox acting WEIRD (4.00 / 3)
my response was to Count and Jay about idiots like Tancredo
[ Parent ]
Great lunch at Marche Moderne today... (4.00 / 3)
Who knew one could find a lovely French Bistro in Orange County? I guess we're finally seeing progress "Behind The Orange Curtain". ;-)

Act on Principles and make equality happen.
Lunch at Ziba's Pitas today... (4.00 / 3)
One of my favorite food carts...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens
[ Parent ]
French (4.00 / 3)
I think there is only one restaurant that calls itself French remaining in Baltimore, after the demise of a couple of French restaurants in the last 12-18 months. The one left standing calls itself a bistro, but it doesn't seem particularly like a bistro to me, and I don't know why the proprietors present it as French, except (maybe) they serve sweetbreads. That, and of course the menu items are listed in French?

What makes a French restaurant a French restaurant?

[ Parent ]
A certain joie de vivre... (4.00 / 3)
A menu utilizing distinctively French ingredients. Techniques that were learned at Le Cordon Bleu. The flavors that can instantly take one to Paris or The Riviera or Brittany or Burgundy. Basically, the very special dedication to some very special food is what helps me determine if a place really is French.

And at Marche Moderne, I FINALLY found this here in OC! Now yes, a little California flair and some Modern American trends influence the menu. But still, they do not dilute the "Frenchness" of this place... Just complement it. ;-)

And actually, French and California cuisines actually mix quite well together. Both are super ingredient driven and focus largely on being in harmony with the farm and serving what's seasonal. IMHO what I really enjoy about both French Cuisine and California Cuisine is that they're both quite locavore friendly. :-)

Act on Principles and make equality happen.

[ Parent ]
More French (4.00 / 3)
One of the deceased venues met your criteria. I mourn its passing, but I understand it - the owner and chef (still alive) is beyond 80 y.o. I regret that someone didn't inherit the place and the tradition, though.

Another dead location was distinguished from other middling eclectic restaurants principally by the characteristic of garish adornment.

The remaining "bistro" offers good food, I don't fault it there, and the people are very nice. I don't see the Frenchness of it.

[ Parent ]
That's so sad. (4.00 / 2)
It's just so sad to see good bistros die like that. It's just unfair. So where can one find good French fare in Baltimore these days? Anywhere?

Act on Principles and make equality happen.
[ Parent ]
Jack's (4.00 / 2)
Far as I know, the best French cuisine near Baltimore is in San Francisco.
[ Parent ]
Don't get me started on SF... (4.00 / 2)
I'll wax poetically for DAYS on all the amazing food options available all over that place! And dammit, I can hardly wait until I've hoarded enough pennies to blow them all on this place! There's just no substitution.

Act on Principles and make equality happen.
[ Parent ]
"Freedom"... (4.00 / 2)
Actually, I thought all the French restaurants within 500 miles of DC re-branded themselves as "Freedom Restaurants" during the Dubya administration, no?  

The better so that their restaurants weren't "liberated", and their proprietors and staff shipped off to Guantanamo?

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
Tell me about it! I was in OC then... (4.00 / 2)
And of course during the start of the Iraq invasion, there was this "F*ck the cheese eating surrender monkeys and their fru-fru food! I want my RED-BLOODED ALL AMERICAN STEAK!!!!" attitude here. Thank gawd most folks are FINALLY over that stupid sh*t, even the people here who are coming around to appreciate some real joie de vivre. ;-)


Act on Principles and make equality happen.
[ Parent ]
"Libertad! Rebenga!" (4.00 / 2)
Why is it that I'm thinking of that riot scene from the beginning of Scarface, when I think back to that stupid period?

There were well over a dozen diners and delis and indie slider places in North Jersey (yet another Jersey food subculture) I used to regularly stop at for lunch, that changed their menu boards to "freedom fries" and "freedom rolls" and "freedom toast" back then.  

I liked the ones who did that, because it let me know where not to spend my money.  I found new lunch places.  Ignorant jingoism and faux (hey, a French word!) nationalist 'populism' are not traits I want to encourage and support with my money.  

When it comes to small indie businesses, I almost always ignore the owner's politics in favor of supporting local.   I used to regularly eat at quite a few places back in Jersey where the only thing the owner/s and I agreed upon is that it's good to vote.  But that imbecilic French-baiting crap was just way over the line, imo.

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
And it's even better to see progressive local businesses... (4.00 / 1)
To support, so that's what I did my best to do when I lived in OC. When the new "gay sports bar" opened in Huntington Beach, I was there. When the organic/farm-to-table/locavore/vegan-friendly cafes started popping up all over The Lab and The Camp in Costa Mesa, I was there. I guess it's nice to think that I was here when "The Great Culinary Enlightenment of Orange County" began. ;-)

And again, it's so different in Las Vegas. There, most of the good food is in the casinos. There are a few great indie joints (that I will be talking about more later in my diaries), but otherwise it's tough to do a non-chain restaurant out of a casino filled with a "captive audience".

And then with the casinos, I have to remember which ones are union, which ones are anti-union, which ones made HRC's nice list, which ones are anti-environment...

Sigh...

Act on Principles and make equality happen.

[ Parent ]
there's a really good one about 10 minutes from here (4.00 / 3)
the owner is really french
.
http://www.springmill.com/inde...

foods Fab

[ Parent ]
Lucky you! (4.00 / 2)
So what are your favorite items on the menu?  

Act on Principles and make equality happen.
[ Parent ]
from what I understand its popular (the rabbit) (4.00 / 3)
and local.

I don't eat here very often. Its expensive AND very romantic. When my husband was alive it was often the place we went for celebrations.I don't have a favorite and everything is good
although I can never bring myself to eat rabbit!

The owner is absolutely delightful. She opened the restaurant up for slow food day. And I got a chance to chat with her about what food was like for her growing up in a small village in France.  

[ Parent ]
Menu includes (4.00 / 2)
braised rabbit!
[ Parent ]
Poor bunnies... (4.00 / 2)
I guess we're at 'em again. ;-)

Act on Principles and make equality happen.
[ Parent ]
I'll admit (4.00 / 2)
All this rabbit talk makes me feel queesy since we've got two delightful house bunnies, Special Inspector Toggle and Gandalf, here at World Headquarters.
[ Parent ]
Pizza (4.00 / 3)
Baltimore franchises of national pizza delivery chains litter our neighborhoods with advertising flyers. Pizza Boli seems to "bless" me with one per week. I usually send them to the recycle bag immediately, but I read one today.

1. No potatoes.

2. No basil, which means no margherita.

3. A 12" one-topping is $11.24, delivered. The same pie is $6.99 picked up, a special on this flyer. That's Marketing!

4. A regular stromboli with ground beef is $10.99. The vegetarian stromboli is $12.99. WTF?

OY! (4.00 / 3)
Just got finished seeding in the greenhouse and picking up eggs. 38 eggs, Thank You Ladies!

Bloody cold and foggy outside. Nice and toasty in the greenhouse though! I hung 6 brooder lamps in there and put bulbs in 5 of them. It's 65 degrees on the surface of the plug trays, but 46 (feels colder though) outside.

Handy things them brooder lamps. Great hand warmers too.....

;-)

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

Sounds like fun... (4.00 / 2)
I sometimes wish I could do that whenever I needed eggs and veggies. And hey, I'd probably save loads of money over my usual Trader Joe's/Sunflower trips and visits to the guilty pleasure restaurants! :-p

Act on Principles and make equality happen.
[ Parent ]
I live for greenhouse work! (4.00 / 3)
One of my favorite things is to see all those little first leaves peaking up out of the plug mix. And then, a few weeks later, or less during the late spring/early summer when it's very warm in the greenhouse, all the young plants doing their best to outgrow their neighbors. And to think that this is all happened just because I put seed to soil and added a bit of water.

The miracle of life!

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

[ Parent ]
civics literacy tests (4.00 / 2)
My feelings about civic literacy tests are bifurcated. I don't think KKKers should be able to determine what questions are on the test, and that they should be able to determine that the test will be administered only to non-white, non-Protestant, non-heterosexual Americans, and I don't think former Representative Tammi Tancredo should be empowered to determine that a test should be administered only to people whose surnames suggest that an ancestor might have come to the U.S. from south of the Rio Grande. Heck, I'm glad all I need to do is show up on election day to cast my vote. I don't know if I could pass a civics literacy test.

The other argument is, our country is in dire shape because our elections are determined by many people who know nothing about American history or our Contitution, are functionally illiterate, and who in fact seem to inhabit an alternate universe which has nothing to do with our reality.

Can we implement some golden mean? I don't know how it might work. We are afflicted with people who have Ph.D.s and can't tell the difference between a pizza and a flying saucer, for example. Can we weed them out of the electoral process somehow? Shouldn't a potential voter from Michele Bachmann's congressional district at least be able to prove the ability to distinguish between an elephant and a pancake?

Tancredo... (4.00 / 2)
Ironic that someone like him should lead the persecution squads these days, when his very own grandparents from both sides, Italian immigrants, were almost certainly treated worse than sewer rats when they first got to the US themselves.

But I don't know.  Nothing you can really do about the other thing.  It's really sad, though.

America, 1933 - "There is nothing to fear but fear itself."

America, post 2001 - "The terris' are comin' (wetting pants), please strip search us in airports and investigate my neighbor!"

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
Mule article in The New Yorker... (4.00 / 1)
Sadly, I had to let my subscription to The New Yorker lapse last year.  I pick up an issue now and then when there's a really good one though, and the current issue sounds like one.  I do believe I'm gonna go have to pick it up.

The mule article (only the abstract is available online) sounds fascinating.

As does Malcolm Gladwell's 'Drinking Games'.  Gack, those are the only two articles not available for free online, I think.  It's like they tailored this issue around making me go out and buy it...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

Michelle speaks. (4.00 / 1)
M. Obama officially launched the "Let's Move" anti-obesity campaign today. Let's revisit some numbers.

First Lady Obama repeated the $10 billion for 10 years number for school nutrition programs, and she used the "31,000,000 students served" number that Ed Bruske has used. Let's say a school year has 180 days.

31,000,000 x 180 - 5.58 billion meals, at the rate of 1 meal per day. Close to the "5.4 billion lunches" number used by the NYT writer, so yes, 5.4 billion would be the number of lunches, not the total meal number.

I don't know how many students eat more than one school meal per day, so let's exercise our calculators.

If 25% of students eat two meals per day, let's say the total meal number becomes 5.4 billion x 1.25 = 6.75 billion. Then $1 billion per year / 6.75 billion = $0.148 additional per meal.

If 50% of students eat two meals per day, the total meal number becomes 5.4 billion x 1.5 = 8.1 billion. Then $1 billion per year / 8.1 billion = $0.123 additional per meal.

If 75% of students eat two meals per day, let's say the total meal number becomes 5.4 billion x 1.75 = 9.45 billion. Then $1 billion per year / 9.45 billion = $0.106 additional per meal.

If 100% of that money goes to school nutrition, and none to WIC, the additional benefit might be between 10 pennies and 15 pennies per meal. Is that right?

assuming (4.00 / 1)
the number of meals served does not change, but Ms. Obama anticipates that millions more children will enroll, so I guess schools actually may have less money per meal.
[ Parent ]
Labeling... (4.00 / 1)
The American Beverage Association has committed to putting clear, front-of-pack calorie labels on cans, bottles and vending machines within two years.

This reminds me of what Magnifico posted here the other day, about FDA (potentially, I assume - who knows what industry will eventually do to that proposal?) cracking down on serving size shenanigans.  

I'm pretty sure FDA won't do anything about that within two years.  So under the current system, how much good will it really do to see big and clear labels on the front of soda bottles, if they still contain misleading information based upon one 20-ounce bottle of soda being considered '2.5 servings'?  Big labels saying 180 calories!, when there's really 450?  How many are kids supposed to eat in a day, anyways?  Pretty sure it's less than the 2,000 number for adults.  

The bottles should say "Don't drink this shit if you're under 18."  Now that would be a clear label.

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
Hmmm... (4.00 / 1)
Professional athletes will join the chorus of voices urging kids to put away the video games and recreate.

Let's make sure to use a different word in the ads, though...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
Numbers... (4.00 / 1)
Here's a good USA Today article.  This is tucked at the bottom -

$25 million for schools to renovate their kitchens to replace deep fryers with equipment needed to store more produce and serve more nutritious food.

I'm hoping USA Today left out a zero or three somewhere in there?  I don't know.  Again, not to be a pessimist or anything, but 25?  That's it?  What does that do, renovate maybe a few hundred school kitchens?  Great for the kids in the schools who do get it... but how many schools are there in the US, again?  We can't buy a few less bombs this year and put the savings toward rebuilding real school kitchens?

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
Numbers (4.00 / 1)
Ed Bruske, in his first essay about H. D. Cooke Elementary school, said the school's renovation was a "multi-million" dollar project, but of course that renovation was more extensive than anything that will be addressed in this program.

How much does one walk-in cooler cost? I can easily imagine that an average cost for a minimal renovation might be $100,000, or 250 schools. For more schools, smaller renovations. Might be able to get some useful mileage from this by concentrating the renovation on centalized facilities, from which meals will be distributed to schools, but you're right, this doesn't sound very helpful.

[ Parent ]
Portland Public Schools... (4.00 / 1)
Okay, so Portland is the 29th most populous city in the US.  Portland Public Schools has 'about' 100 schools.  It should also be noted that Portland Public Schools only serves the inner areas of our city, and there are actually five other school districts which operate schools within Portland city limits.  And that's not even counting private schools.

So, just guesstimating here, but it sounds like there's probably over 175 schools just in the City of Portland alone.

I can easily imagine that an average cost for a minimal renovation might be $100,000, or 250 schools.

Yeah, a long way to go, eh?

Good point about centralized facilities.  How many districts use them?  I wouldn't even begin to know where to search for numbers on that.  

"Home rule" would of course be an issue of concern there, and one I'm quite familiar with from back in New Jersey.  There are over 500 school districts in New Jersey (here's an incomplete list).  Many of them have well under 500 students.  But mergers are regularly voted down and opposed vehemently, because god forbid a child from a $380,000 subdivision should have to go to school with a child from the neighboring $350,000 subdivision.  And they wonder why their property taxes are sky-high...

Okay, veering a bit off point there.  But still, heh...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

[ Parent ]
Pot Luck | 37 comments
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