The “UPS guy” has gone on the family text thread! 😆

LOL, Bumblebeez, that's funny. Almost too close to true, but funny...

I know that I'm in a unique position, being able to produce almost all my food and food for my extended family, so for that I'm thankful. I'm afraid my youngest daughter is more like Mary, and I haven't learned yet how to grow Fruity Pebbles!

Annie

"And make sure to lick the plate while they are watching, so they have something to talk about later......." LOVE IT!

And Islay's Dog poster..... soooooo true!

And the UPS story! LOL

Kate

Hilarious. She will spray you if you break the 6 ft rule.

@bragu_DSM 5, Someone said we should rename the pandemic COVID 15 to match our weight gains. I’m good with COVID 19. 😂 😩

bbstx - I had to look up French 75. I prefer gin with lemon over lime, so surely I would have liked that! Sounds great.

FOAS, my French 75 recipe is 1 oz gin, 1 oz simple syrup, 3/4 oz lemon juice, over ice, well-shaken. Strain into a glass, top with 4 oz of champagne. I think the genesis of this recipe is Ina Garten’s Cooking for Jeffrey. Ina uses cognac instead of gin. I prefer gin.

I buy Trader Joe’s Blanc de Blanc to use as a mixer for champagne based cocktails.

For the cocktail hour today, I’m having a gin and tonic made with FeverTree Elderflower tonic. The elderflower tonic is sooooo good.

Bumble beez Thanks for ending my post with a fun thing! I hope it ends it!

Wow! Bbstx, I hadn't heard of five buck, um, not-Chuck. :) I looked it up and found this in a review (which also said it was good): There is a some dry (non sweet) 7up or Sprite happening on the mid palate along with apple (core and all) and an unexpected slap of minerality. Not to mention the "bread and butter" in the nose. :)

Thank-you for the (indirect) laughs!

Too funny, plllog! Can’t wait to share that with my sister. Not something that sounds very appealing to drink on its own, but if you are pouring gin and lemon juice in it, good enough.

Really and truly it was a positive review. I am a massive champagne snob. There's a lot of really bad champagne out there, including legit French champagne with old, known names. Then there's wedding champagne, which I won't put adjectives to to save your delicate sensibilities. Considering a basic palatable champagne retails around $60, I think TJ's "white wine from white grapes" (i.e, wine lake, in the same manner as Chuck) sounds like a marvelous thing. The review, for all the entertaining words, was really very positive and made the TJ bubbly sound a lot better than any real champagne south of Tat. Vintners are so skilled, and their tools are so excellent, that while it lacks any pretension to class or tradition, these wines made from odd lots can taste very good. And I can't imagine anyone making a cocktail with Tat, Dom or Veuve Clicquot!

mmmmm, Veuve Clicquot is my fav champers. And you are right, I’m not going to be pouring gin and lemon juice into it. 🥂 The Widow Clicquot is a fascinating read. I knew next to nothing about the production of champagne and its history until I read that book. It is also a good tale about a young widow making a go of her late husband’s faltering business.

Dom is way too mineral for me. Probably I’m just too pedestrian to appreciate the taste of stars! ✨ 😀

I truly dislike the soup and onion soup mix that people recommend in slow cooking etc. As much as i love chips the salt overload in that meal just makes me cringe.

I've never tried the Mississippi roast for that reason, but it's wildly popular......dry ranch dressing, gravy mix and something else, hot peppers?

Jasdip, there are several that use the dry Italian dressing mix also. I tried them and they are also waaay to salty. Dad used to use the Lipton soup mix in his roasts. I do remember the roast being much bigger than they are now. Maybe that was why they didn't seem so salty. A beef roast was easy 10 to 12 pounds, or even more. It was huge and took forever in a Dutch oven. I am lucky to find a five pound roast.

Try Pioneer Woman’s Italian Beef sometime. It uses Italian Seasoning (herbs), not Italian dressing mix. consomme, and pepperocini peppers.

This is the champagne I like. No freaking way would I pay $60 for a bottle.

https://www.kingkeg.com/korbel-korbel-champagne.html

ETA: I MIGHT pay $60 for a tree, but not something I will drink in an hour or so, when what I like tastes fine!

ETA: That is a snob effect.

LOL! It's not like I'm drinking champagne regularly. :) I'd rather have a glass of Veuve Clicquot once a year than a bottle of the cheap stuff, ever. For a moderately priced California bubbly, Korbel isn't bad, but I'd still rather have one bottle of Veuve Clicquot than three of Korbel. OTOH, I don't have anything at all against anyone enjoying Korbel if they like it!!! I think cheap wedding champagne should be eliminated from the earth. It's expensive for the hosts and disgusting to even sip for the toast. I haven't tasted the TJ's, but trust Bbstx and the funny review that it tastes good. Why can't they serve that at weddings?

Re Salt: The big Lipton's packet was for a serving bowl of soup, rather than a cup, and I think the cup survived the shelf space wars because it's used mostly for onion dip and roasts. I use Knorr version for a couple of packet recipes, which really do need that much salt for a big piece of meat. In fact, one reason I like it is because it gives me courage to use that much salt.

If it's too much salt for your dish, it's easy to find a copycat recipe online, and it's not much work to assemble your own "soup mix" to suit your tastes. Keep a jar in the fridge or pantry if you want the ease of use. I've done it. I don't usually bother, unless I have to make something kosher, but it's not hard.

Ohhhhh, I like tossing in some pickled peppers with my slow Italian beef. Jalapeños are good if going more Mexican. I often splash in just some of the brine instead of adding the peppers too.

And yep, I do use dry onion soup packets. Not so much in a lot of "active" cooking. Though there are a couple big family sized dishes I use it in. Mostly using it as the flavored salt in the dish and don't add other salt. Big pan of pork chops, or large roast sorts of things.

I also like to use them for brining packets for meat. Specifically because they are so salty and basically seasoned salt. It's a good cheater base if I'm running low on other stuff or don't feel like putting together a bunch of stuff. Particularly for brining meat, dry packet is good for that. I also like Knorr a lot. The soup packets are nice.. but I really like their international bullion's as a brand in general. Maggi is good too.

I do also make my own mixes. The salt free stuff to add to those salty bases to oomph it right.

salty soup mix

I tend to buy the Lipton's or the generic store brand 2/$1, and sift off the powder so I can use the dried onion, given the price of McCrmk or Tones or penzey's dried onion.There's enuff salt in those thing to flavor a gallon of dip, IMHO

plllog if you're ever in the Sonoma Co area, Korbel has a wonderful tour that ends in a champagne tasting that goes from the gut wrenching to the Korbel and above to actual French champagne! Korbel was grandfathered in and is one of the only ones that can actually be labeled champagne rather than sparkling wine.

Funny thing is that they had all sorts of redwood stumps that would have cost $1000 each to remove, and Hollywood pulled in and offered to blow up the stumps for the series Kombat in the mid 60's. They ended up PAYING Korbel to blow up their stumps! Just a little history! ;)

Dave, look for It's Delish in the kosher section. Great big bottle (standard food service size) of dried chopped onion for about $6. They also have minced.

Nancyjane, that's wild about the stumps. :) I feel bad for the trees, though. And for those huge old trees they had in Ohio and the NE. But great story. The Korbel tour sounds great. I haven't done a direct comparison tasting between Korbel and the French stuff, but I know my reactions. Korbel is palatable, but I'm not disappointed if I don't get any. For an accessible bottle, I do like VC. The same price Dom isn't my thing, though some of their higher level ones are good. I'm always surprised when I'm served a moderate Tattinger, how well I like it. It would be fun to do a tasting at Korbel. When...if.

JC: we're lucky to have a semi-gluten free corner of the store. They put that where the big bags of dog food and the charcoal briquets once co-habitated ... there is NO kosher section. I'll have to go to the big city for that. Thanks for the heads up.

Champagne can only come from Champagne!

https://www.bostonmagazine.com/weddings/2015/09/25/difference-between-champagne-and-sparkling-wine/

My favorite sparkling wine is from a winery in Paso Robles, but I don't remember the name of it. It is a small winery, and they do not ship AFAIK. When possible, we will make another trip to Paso.

I also like Prosecco, but I am not a fan of real Champagne.

Freixenet Cordon Negro Brut is also good.

I'll make a point of visiting Korbel the next time we are in Sonoma. We were going to to this summer, but that has been postponed.

Harmony House is a good source for dried onions, as well as other dried vegetables. I like dried vegetable and add them to rice and soups. It makes the rice more interesting and is particularly handy during these times. I stocked up on them a while ago as emergency food, and so now we have the emergency. The dried cabbage is especially good and is crunchy when added to soups. Dried broccoli is very good when added to rice while it is cooking. I have to add a tiny bit more water, but I do not rehydrate the vegetables before adding them. I also love dried wakame.

Lars, thank you for the link. Have you tried any of their dried fruits?

For comparison, here's the dried fruit from Its Delish. All around, veg, fruit, spices, nuts, the quality is very good. I haven't used their candy, however.

https://itsdelish.com/collections/dried-fruit

I thought of this thread as I shopped this weekend.

I was at Gelson's - inherently snobby but well stocked! As I grabbed a wedge of Cypress Grove's Truffle Tremor cheese, I felt very spoiled and snobby. But I soldiered on and bought it.

And it was delicious! I love their Humboldt Fog, but if you like truffles, this is also fabulous.

Judge all you want - it was worth it (and we might have even had champagne with it).

We went to Gelson's last week-end also (the one in Rancho Mirage), and I do not see what is snobby about it. I go there (or Bristol Farms) for the fish, which I cannot get at other markets, and also for Brie and other cheeses. We bought a 2/3 pound swordfish steak, which I grilled yesterday, and it was very good.

One of the things I like about Gelson's is that everyone there is well-behaved, there are no children, and everyone wears masks and respects social distancing. Also, there are no lines, and they are extremely well stocked, which is a big plus.

In L.A. I go to the Marina Del Rey Gelson's, as that is the closest one, but Bristol Farms in Westchester is even closer, and so we usually go there instead. The Bristol Farms in Palm Desert is not as good as the one in Westchester, however, which is why we go to Gelson's here. They are not good stores for buying grits, however, and so I go to Ralphs in Ladera Heights for that - they have a huge section just for grits in that store.

I do miss going to Cárdenas in Cathedral City, but it's just not civilized enough for me to feel safe. I go there for bolillos, tosados, tamales, guacamole (made in house), and Mexican cheeses. They have the freshest tortillas as well.

I need to learn how to make good grits. I know it exists, I've eaten it a few times in my life. But for the life of me most of the grits I've had held up to their name of grits- as in gritty.

I can make a decent polenta- but that does not seem translate the same as to the really good grits I've had a few times. I do rather loathe the cream of wheats, malt o meals, breakfast mealy.. but also have had some of the most wonderful creamy stuff with shrimp. The thing that eaten with greens and fried eggs is sublime.

I'm not sure if that's snobbery, or just wanting what I know is a darn good food cooked well thing.

Creamy grits are cooked a long time and have lots of filler: cream, butter, cheese, etc. Probably not stone ground either.

Lars, do you think you could call in your order (and offer to e-mail/fax/text it) to Cárdenas and get curbside (parking lot) delivery? Offer a good tip, and to come when they're least busy?

I find the best way for me to get everything I want is to order from a different store each time. They may carry the same things, but they don't all have them in stock.

@beesneeds, I am not a grits fan, but I love Gruyere Grits. I’m not terribly sure of the genesis of the recipe. I think it is from a Junior League cookbook from somewhere in the South, maybe Little Rock. Note that in this recipe, you beat the grits with a mixer. It makes them creamy. Of course, the milk, butter, and cheese add to the creaminess too! This recipe freezes. There is a note in the instructions on where to stop and freeze.

Ask a hundred people from the South and you will get a hundred answers. I like these cooked exactly as on the back of the package. I use them for my cheese grits also, for shrimp and grits. I do not like stone ground grits, as you said, to me they taste gritty, like rocks or sand. I add butter for breakfast and my husband adds butter and sugar.

https://www.publix.com/pd/jim-dandy-grits-quick-enriched/RIO-PCI-102898

@Sherry8aNorthAL, my recipe calls for quick grits. Are they perhaps ground more finely than regular grits or stone-ground grits? I heartily dislike grits. Without a lot of cheese or cream, I think they are pretty tasteless. My momma never cooked grits although Daddy like them.

I see you use Jim Dandy grits too! I sometimes have a gluten-free friend for brunch. Last time I looked, Jim Dandy were the only brand that said they were GF.

Yes, that is why they cook faster. Use the salt called for when cooking them and add more salt and pepper and butter when eating. Grits are like potatoes in that they need a lot of salt.

I can be snobbish when it comes to grocery store made brownies/cakes and cookies. SWMBO purchased some brownies for MD. They were quite excellent, but most likely because I have not made anything that rich in a L O N G time. It hit the spot, but notsomuch that I will run back and get more ... *must resist*

I agree that about the grocery store baked sweets in general. But back to Gelson's - they have amazing chewy chocolate cookies. Seriously amazing.

I've never had a grocery store baked sweet that I thought was any good at all, but my grocery stores are limited to Meijer, Walmart and Aldi, so that limits my experience. I just like to bake, and so I bake my own and everyone else's too!

We do have a small bakery, although it's closed now, apparently donuts are not essential, LOL. They make a "bear claw" that's pretty good and an even better carrot cake donut.

Grits? Nope, won't eat them, they are a branch of the "mush" family. Elery doesn't care for them either but my stepmother LOVED them, with cheese and lots of butter. She just used the instant packages from Quaker. I didn't try them.

Annie

In Los Angeles, donuts are considered essential, as Randy's Donuts is still open, although only for take-out. Their main store is less than a mile from my house.

I was surprised to find that Nothing Bundt Cake is considered an essecial here in Fresno. I was quite happy to recently buy a couple of their little cakes to satisfy my occasional sweet tooth.

So, food is a broad category. In California, generally, though some counties and other localities may have more restrictions, any food service has been allowed to be open for pickup or delivery. If you consume it, it's considered food, even if it's junk food or sweets. Also, doughnut shops and similar small bakeries are usually workplaces where few people are working face to face or side by side. Yeah, the kitchens are small, but usually the tasks are divided, if not by the full six feet, and it's only a few people working together.

NYC and surrounding areas it has always been a choice. Except for bars and dining inside. That was banned. Any food service is open for delivery or pick-up. But an individual choice. Even Junk foods. Those that had business well in place for delivery/pick-up before covid have maintained ok. Maybe not profitable but staying afloat like pizza joints. Mid-range eateries are just scaling back the menu. High end fine dining tweezer food restaurants are mostly history. Time will tell if they restructure or just walk away. Most of those are investor driven. Some billionaires just lost some pocket change.

Our local bakery just ten miles away is open for pick-up but way scaled back production. They supplied over half of the city restaurants. What a blow to them. I'm convinced they will survive.

Some of the higher end places near me are still going, but, of course, we weren't hit like NY. The ones that I know of aren't doing tweezer food, even if they did before. One that had an amazing, innovative chef is doing a lot of pasta and simple proteins. Another has shut the fine dining but is selling sandwiches and burritos, and selling supplies. A third, better known for traditional, continental fine dining, where we ordered from for a celebration, has a full menu, with some adjustments (the menu said loin lamb chops and they came double cut ribs (which I prefer!). I almost wept to see beautiful plating in to-go boxes. They also (always did) have pasta. I think a lot of the "Covid 19" lbs. are coming from pizza and pasta...

I found some 'gourmet' Mac n cheese at the grocery. Didn't get any, but am re-thinking that. Had so much cheese on it that I figured I could easily add more Mac and divide/freeze into portions. Could eat for days ...

*getting tugged back to the store*

maybe tomorrow on my tiny paycheck ...

The donut shop could be open, apparently, but has decided that they can't make enough to cover expenses of doing that. The bakery has been in the same family for a couple of generations, was named one of the 10 best donuts in Michigan by MLive. They do have good donuts, so I hope they make it through this.

Here most restaurants are open for curbside pickup or take out, but with very limited menus, which I do understand. Not everything will translate well to take out.

Annie

Also, a restricted menu cuts down on inventory costs, prep, wastage, etc.

some real prima donnas took over the sub shop.

Should I choose to never go back, it would not bother me, I hate to say ...

Some of our restaurants opened thus week but mostly the chains. There is one that is local that as soon as we can I want to support. It's next to our grocery store and when I had to stop the other day, it looks like they're taking everyone's temperature before allowing them in. They have the best deep-fried dill pickle chips. Like I need more calories LOL.

Can anyone point me to tips for picking up food? FWIW, I have “food-grade” alcohol (PGA 190 proof) to clean anything.

@ bbstx - I think you might want to start a new topic about that. I was about to type a reply, then realized this subject would make a better stand alone thread, since this one is almost up to 100 replies.

I'd put it on Kitchen Table too.