For millennials who have money to burn! Would be a lot of fun to be in that business. But out in the sticks where I live, I am scrounging deer meat from my farmer friends and living off of apples, onions, carrots, canned tomatoes, pasta, beans, home made breads and potatoes. I watch Clara Cannucciari's Depression era cooking videos for inspiration. I just dream of having a decent Chinese take-out place nearby! I have got to get to SF someday. It's like Oz to me!

lpinkmountain, if you're in the mood for some good food writing, try MFK Fisher's 'How to Cook a Wolf'. It's not really recipes for serving up a fricassee of canis lupus, but rather what she did during periods of low income when she had to scrounge--keeping the wolf from the door, so to speak.

She's a real delight to read. 'How to Cook a Wolf' is in paperback for around $13 from Amazon, but a better deal is the anthology 'The Art of Eating' for around $19 which includes How to Cook a Wolf and several other books as well. I lucked in to a copy at a used book store for $3.

Here is a link that might be useful: MFK Fisher books

I second MFK Fisher's book..... I've read it at least once a year since I've owned it. I loved Clara's Depression Era cooking video, too. The recipes go along with my WWI "Official Recipe Book" and WWII "Victory Cook Book". I did a lot of research on Depression Era and Rationing Recipes a couple years ago... Even as much as I cook from scratch, I wouldn't want to have to go back to those days! They would have to ration microwavable chicken nuggets and French fries for Millennials (LOL). Times have certainly changed....

I live in the middle of nowhere too, in a town it takes 12-minutes (13-minutes during "RUSH" hour) to get from one side to the other, and can't identify with any of this except pizza delivery.

-Grainlady

>>They would have to ration microwavable chicken nuggets and French fries for Millennials (LOL). >>

I hate to say this, but we have a lot of Millennial friends, and the only people we know who eat Chicken McNuggets are Boomers. Here in the SF Bay Area we take the whole "pink slime" thing seriously [smile].

lpinkmountain, hope you come visit the Bay Area someday! Although I have to tell you, Chinese food has been in a funk here for the last thirty years. My DH is from Hong Kong and there are only a couple of places we rank as 'acceptable' these days, mostly because we prefer Cantonese food, and the Big Thing here is Sichuan and Shandong cooking.

Better choices are SE Asian - excellent scattered outposts of Vietnamese (San Jose), Burmese (SF), Laotian (Oakland & San Pablo), Thai (everywhere, but especially SF). Indian is average, found in SF and San Jose (Silicon Valley has an enormous # of Indian-born engineers here on visas). There's a huge Afghani population in Fremont, between Oakland and San Jose. Also a cluster of Tibetan/Mongolian/Nepalese restaurants in the Berkeley/Albany area. Decent Korean in Oakland, which is also the home to most of the Ethiopian/Eritrean restaurants.

For a long time the Japanese restaurants here lagged well behind Los Angeles, where most JapAms live (LA also has the best Korean fusion). Now we finally have some better quality, sustainable seafood izakaya/sushi (grilled food/small plates; the Japanese equivalent of bar food) places opening up, with excellent omakase menus. Still very few offerings of true kaiseki, however; I only know of two and that's not many in an area where sushi is available by the pound at all salad bars!

Seafood, including shellfish, is available year-round because most of it comes from Alaska, Oregon & Washington. SF hasn't been a big fishing port in decades. We locals still pay attention to when Dungeness crab is actually in season but sometimes I think it's as much because we're expected to, not because most people care any longer.

What we do well In the SF Bay Area is locavore, fusion, Mediterranean/Californian. Mediterranean influences have expanded beyond Italy and Greece into Spain, Morocco, Turkey and Syria. Housemade charcuterie, part of the "nose to tail movement", is huge here, with restaurants setting space aside for multiple coolers for aging different cuts. We take top-quality produce for granted, since it's available year-round. Great wine, excellent coffee, fine bakeries, artisanal chocolates, and tasting menus are everywhere.

We have the very high-end available -- the only Californian Michelin two- and three-starred restaurants are in the SF Bay Area -- but there's also an amazing breadth of mid-tier restaurants. These would be destination restaurants in most cities, but here they rank as just average, because there's just so many of them crowding for attention. When I was growing up in Chicago, Kokkari (Greek) or Boulevard (CA) would have been 'a special night out' choice. But here they're afterthoughts...the "oh, if we can't get into Quince or Marlowe, we'll go to XXX instead because they'll have room."

Also, due to the higher cost of labor, tipping is on its way out at the upper and mid-range restaurants. It's not universal yet, but probably will be in the majority of restaurants within 5 yrs. Some places institute a standard service charge; others just raise menu prices. This is because some cities have a higher minimum wage than the state sets, so the legalese differs, requiring employers to take into consideration the tax effects for employees.

What don't we do well in Northern CA?
- Steak: I'm fond of saying I can count on the fingers of one hand the times I've had a great piece of beef in CA, over the last 40 yrs. Really, it's sad.
- BBQ: "abysmal" and "pathetic" are two good adjectives.
- Classic updated French: it exists, but only in a few scattered outposts.
- Cal-Mex is always good eating; but high-end, authentic regional Mexican has struggled for years.
- There's a little too much emphasis on overly-sweet, overly salty cooking to accompany too many elaborate hard liquor cocktails.
- And although we have some phenomenal pastry chefs, there's a high number of restaurants who only offer variants of ice cream sundaes for dessert, something that irritates us no end. We don't pay $100+/pp to eat a bowl of ice cream for dessert!

jkom51, I was told that we will never see excellent Chinese food again here in the USA.

Many great chefs have left and returned to China for better pay and working conditions, and many have gone to Vancouver where many wealthy Chinese live there.

We do have top notch Japanese restaurants here, including Masa, $500 per person, tips, tax, drinks not included. Two months wait for reservation.

dcarch

Well, SoCal has the things on your list of missing up there, so maybe you just need to be expansive minded and take a road trip. :)

Agreed on the chicken nuggets thing. The Millennials I know are all into their smokers and making cheese or eating raw and foraging. What I haven't figured out is what they're eating for breakfast--maybe it's Starbucks. :)

I'm glad we don't have fine dining delivery around here (that is, it can be arranged, but last I looked it wasn't app-tastic). When I don't feel like cooking and review the options (including going out, involving dressing, etc.), I just go make something. :) OTOH, back when I was working 11 hr. days, if I could have had decent food delivered to the job I would have been in heaven!

"How to Eat a Wolf" is on my bookshelf, lol! I'm in the midst of packing up my whole life and putting it into storage, so not sure when I will get around to reading that. I love high end Chinese, but I would settle for just passable takeout. We have a couple of favorite places in the neighborhood where I was living, but the new towns where I'll be moving don't. No Thai at all in Michigan where I'm living, although I'm sure some of the bigger cities have it. Thai is ubiquitous here in the Lehigh Valley. On the flip side, you can get excellent Middle Eastern takeout in Michigan, unlike PA. And the Mexican is better I think . . . Italian . . . not so much. Not sure where the takeout business is booming outside of SF, but as Grainlady points out, it is definitely for the realm of places where commuting is the norm. I ate out a gazillion times more when I was commuting. Driving an hour or more home each night zaps your cooking energy.

This post was edited by lpinkmountain on Thu, Jan 8, 15 at 9:27

Food delivery service in the Far East, India, Hong kong, ---- has been around way before internet. A very interesting life style.

You subscript to the service, and hot food will be delivered to you in your office or home.

You will not know what they will cook for you the next day. No Choices, you just eat what they deliver to you.

Interesting that no one seem to have any food allergies, diet restrictions, etc. in that part of the world.

dcarch

Here is a link that might be useful: India food system

When my wife was in grad school, the wife of one of the other grad students did something similar to what dcarch describes. Each week on Wednesday you'd say yes or no, and on Thursday a box of containers of various curried whatevers would be delivered to the grad office. Each week was different, but as dcarch describes the only choice was whether to order or not. We ordered about 40 times during the time it was available, and only once was there something that I didn't really care for.

The best part was that it was $10 and you got enough food for two people to have dinner, with usually enough left for lunch the next day.

My Chinese/Japanese half-brother lives in the LA area. They have a lot of great food, but Cantonese isn't one of them, alas.

I remember commenting to my DH before we were married that his mom wasn't a very creative cook the way my family is. There were a few dishes she cooked well, but her entire repertoire consisted of maybe six very simple dishes, max.

He just shrugged and said, "That's because she never had to cook until we came to the US. We had servants to do that stuff for us!"

One of my "Duh" moments, LOL.....

plllog said: The Millennials I know are all into their smokers and making cheese or eating raw and foraging. What I haven't figured out is what they're eating for breakfast--maybe it's Starbucks. :)

Oohhh, that made me laugh! So true!!

And not just making cheese -- they're making vegan cheeses. My niece brought two of hers to Thanksgiving dinner.

Also, I remembered what they're eating for breakfast. Smoothies! Same niece has an immersion blender and a Vitamix, and both get heavy use, every day.

"------- He just shrugged and said, "That's because she never had to cook until we came to the US. We had servants to do that stuff for us!"----"

Something very interesting I saw when I traveled to Hong Kong. There are many wealthy people in HK. They all have servants, nannies. Many have more than one servant. Most servants are from other Asian countries.

There are not many parks or open spaces in HK, and the servants do not have big apartments. So every Sunday and holidays, you see massive gatherings of servants hanging out in public spaces.

They bring food and drinks, games, phones, music. Kind of like a big out door picnic party.

They dance, they have fun, but they are all very well behaved. They are not loud, and they are polite. They don't drink and get drunk.

They don't litter, At the end of the day after they left, the place is always very clean.

dcarch

http://assets.rappler.com/612F469A6EA84F6BAE882D2B94A4B421/img/FEFF4A8D9C174A23BC93FA972D8572AF/20141006-hk-occupy-central-1-afp_FEFF4A8D9C174A23BC93FA972D8572AF.jpg

http://media.philstar.com/images/the-philippine-star/world/Hong-Kong-thinner-crowd.jpg

http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/04/asia_pac_filipino_nanny/img/8.jpg

I enjoy Chinese food but my knowledge isn't deep. Growing up in California, Chinese food = Cantonese style. There was little variety because so much of the historical Chinese immigration was from that region. In the last 20+ years, with the opening up of China and also immigration from Taiwan, Chinese food has become significantly more varied and interesting. There are many terrific Chinese restaurants of various regional styles on the SF Peninsula and in the South Bay.

There's an old (and tired) expression that the Cantonese will eat anything (and any part of anything) with 4 legs except for tables and chairs. If you're a true lover of Cantonese food, I'd like to hear about your experiences with dishes prepared from parts of animals and also from animals that, shall we say, are not frequently found being prepared in a Western kitchen. I found myself in such a restaurant once in HK and as felt my stomach contents coming up to my throat, I left quickly.

jkom, you and I must have different tastes. I'll spare you and others details about which of your opinions I disagree with, but it's many of them. I will say that I think the food scene in the LA area is at least as exciting and perhaps more diverse than up here. I think there are a number of terrific Indian restaurants around the Bay Area but I agree there are also many that are mediocre.

That's what makes food interesting, different people can have different preferences and can come to different conclusions.

PS- the polite and accepted abbreviation for Japanese American is Japanese American, not what you used.

>>PS- the polite and accepted abbreviation for Japanese American is Japanese American, not what you used.>>

Sorry, but I'm a third gen JapAm, so I use it as a typing shortcut. Sorry if it bothers you.

The three letter J-word is no different than the N-word, the C-word and the many others. They aren't shortcuts or nicknames, they're intended as offensive racially pejorative epithets.

Don't be surprised to see strange reactions and expressions from people when you use that three letter word.

I think it's one of those things that the in group are allowed to say, but it's more polite, if you're describing someone else, to spell it all out. :)

Jkom, I didn't even think of smoothies! I'm so used to smoothies being the province of suburban dads who are trying to pretend they're still young athletes. :) I know that every demo has its own smoothie type, and I can certainly see the millennials obsessing over their gizmos and the new greens du jour. :)

Re Cantonese, I'm sure you're right. There used to be some really excellent Cantonese restaurants in SoCal, and especially in weird parts of L.A., but they do seem to be all gone. My local joint is more American than Chinese. Sort of an amalgam of traditional American Cantonese and Sichuan menu items but zero MSG, mostly low fat, and sort of trendy-aging-in-place. :) The owners speak a Chinese language, however, rather than Spanish :D, though I don't know which version.

>>Don't be surprised to see strange reactions and expressions from people when you use that three letter word.>>

Well, since I don't get any from my family when using it, and you're the first person who's said anything at all, it's pretty much a non-issue for me. If I prefer to describe myself as a JapAm, that's my privilege, right?

Really, a non-issue. No one says you have to use the term, written or verbal.

I found that video on Dabbawalas fascinating. I need to read more about it as I've never heard about it before.

"---Don't be surprised to see strange reactions and expressions from people when you use that three letter word.--"

Also don't be surprised if people are not insulted if insulting words are used.

I asked if my Asian friends if they are insulted when are called Orientals. They started to laugh, "What? When did this start? I like being called an oriental. The Orient Express was a showcase of luxury and comfort, how is that insulting and pejorative? I don't like to be called an Asian at all."

dcarch

I know I don't like being called a JAP, even if I am a Jewish American Princess! Sorry, I couldn't resist that one! :) Call me whatever you want, just don't call me late for dinner! (I used to say that to my campers back in the day when I was a camp counselor, and they would always respond with, "Late For Dinner! Late For Dinner!")

This post was edited by lpinkmountain on Tue, Jan 13, 15 at 15:12

I showed DH video on dabawalas. He actually knew about this already from a co worker. Anyway he doesn't understand why they don't just bring food with them (made the day before if needed) and heat it up in a microwave. His view is that it just makes the streets more crowded having 5000 delivery people running through the city. I have no answer. He is an engineer which means he looks at everything from a very practical view.

I think the dabbawalla thing comes from a combination of customs from bygone days when there was much less congestion, caste issues, and feelings about unknown food supplies.

In the caste system, you can only eat food prepared by someone of your own caste or higher. I don't know the underlying origin. To give high born women the occupation of cooking for the family? To prevent lower castes from poisoning their masters? Because only one's own can be trusted to know good hygiene? So women can control their families diets? So the tradition is to deliver home cooked food from home. Perhaps the theory is that there are plenty of people who need employment, and it wastes the time of those working in the city if they have to go home and come back... As opposed to Siesta, where people rush home for a couple of hours in the middle of the workday. This is a status quo that way predates microwaves!

I know a couple of people who run small businesses out of their homes delivering lunches to people. As I recall, that was how Paula Deen got her start. These are obviously people of means who don't cook or don't have time to cook, and have no one at home to make the lunches, in advance or otherwise. I do know that 20 years ago already, a Spanish visitor I befriended was appalled at how Americans ate lunch at work hurriedly at their desks. Not sure if the Spanish have caught up with us or not.

Ummm ... I live in a smaller town that is sneered at by people in bigger Florida cities. We don't have a lot of the opportunities offered by cities. After all, the only reason this place is on the map is because of one big honking NASCAR speedway. Anyway, carryout basically doesn't exist. I thought.

Hubs called an hour ago, all excited. He's waiting for a cyber friend to meet for lunch and he was wandering around the 40 yr old run-down strip center next to the restaurant. Anyway, he called to tell me there is a new small business--it's a carryout with a good menu. The chef is experienced and wanted his own place. They will cook to order given some lead time. Hubs will bring a menu home. I am absolutely dedicated to supporting local businesses. During this last recession, we had the feeling that in some instances we were doing it by ourselves! Anyway, this is a wonderful option for spring/summer days when I work outside and forget to come inside in enough time to cook dinner. He said the place is clean and staff is nice. Hope the "chef" can cook!

The Lunchbox is an interesting movie based on a Dabbawalla mixup (so rare that nobody in the film believes it could have happened).

Lpink, I smiled at your "Not sure if the Spanish have caught up with us or not.".

It wouldn't be catching up, at least not in a good way. It would be more like falling behind if they are now doing what we do.

~Ann

I think that eating at desks is a huge problem and may be contributing to obesity. I like to take my time eating lunch and eat more slowly when I am sitting in my pergola watching the hummingbirds. It's been so warm lately that I have been eating lunch outside almost every day, although I did eat inside yesterday so that I could watch Giada visiting Ina Garten. Giada was making gnocchi, but as it turned out, I did not like her recipe.

When I lived further from work (a 12 minute commute instead of 4 minutes), I would bring my lunch and often assemble it in the lunchroom at work. For example, if I wanted pasta with pesto, I would being the pasta and pesto in separate containers, heat the pasta in hot water, drain, and then add the pesto. Pesto gets gummy if microwaved (due to the Parmesan cheese), and I wanted to avoid that. If I made Shrimp Udon noodle soup, I would put the shrimp in a separate container and heat the soup in the microwave and then add the shrimp, so that the shrimp would only get reheated and not overcooked. I also would bring garnishes such as cilantro separately.

I agree with Ann about the Spanish!

Lars