Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Melamine

International Herald Tribune Says this
"SEOUL, South Korea:
Two more Chinese-made food products — including Ritz crackers — were found to contain high levels of melamine, South Korean investigators said Tuesday.

The chemical was found in Nabisco's Ritz cracker cheese sandwiches and in rice crackers made by Danyang Day Bright Co., the Korea Food and Drug Administration said.

The maker of Nabisco Ritz crackers, Northfield, Illinois-based Kraft Foods Inc., did not immediately return messages left seeking comment.

Melamine has now been found in six imported products in South Korea, including Misarang snacks made in China and in Chinese-made nondairy creamer imported from Hong Kong. South Korea has banned imports of all Chinese-made food products containing powdered milk.

Melamine — used to make plastics and fertilizer — can be deadly in high doses and is blamed for killing four babies in mainland China and sickening thousands of others"

ZenKimchi
Gives us this list Of foods to avoid
  • MiSarang 미사랑 snacks
  • Ritz Cheese Crackers
  • Cadbury Chocolate
  • Danyang Day Bright Rice Crackers
  • Non-dairy creamer imported from Hong Kong (includes instant coffee packs)
  • Lipton Milk Tea Powder
Korea Beat
Talks about how we cant avoid Chinese food.

Sago soup - Javarisi payasam


Ingredients:

Sago - Javarisi - 1 cup
Sugar - Sarkarai/Cheeni - 1 cup
Cardamom - Elakkai - 1 no.
Cashew nuts - Munthiri paruppu - handful
Raisins - Dratchai - half of cashew nuts
Ghee - Nei for frying
Saffron - Kunguma poo - 1 tea spoon
Milk - Pal - 1 cup
Water - Thaneer - 2 cups

Method:

  1. Cook sago in a vessel till it becomes transparent. Some soak for 1 hour. It depends on the quality. Once it is cooked in water, add sugar and keep stirring till it resolves.
  2. Then add cardamom powder. In the mean while fry cashew nuts and raisins in ghee and add this to payasam. Soak saffron in milk and add this to the payasam. Add milk and keep stirring.

Sago payasam is delicious and ready to be served. It requires some 20 minutes to cook. It can be served for 4 persons. It can be served hot or cold. It is especially prepared during special occasions like Navarathiri, Pongal, Deepavali, etc., It is also served in functions like engagement and wedding and even for party.

Note: Sago must be transparent, it indicates it is cooked. It can be soaked in water for some time or it must be allowed to cook till it is boiled. Milk and saffron must be added in the end.

Optional: Ingredients can be added/removed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sago

What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child?
Lin Yutung

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Tomatillos (Raw) curry - Thakkali kai kootu

Ingredients:

Tomatillos (Raw tomatoe) - Thakkali kai - 3 nos.
Red gram - Thuvaram paruppu - 1 cup

Mustard seeds - Kadugu - 1 tea spoon
Curry leaves - Karuvepilai - small quantity
Black gram dal - Ulutham paruppu - 1 table spoon
Asafoetida - Perungayam - a pinch
Red chillies - Kaintha milagai - 3 nos.
Grated/shredded coconut - Thuriviya thengai - 2 table spoons
Salt to taste
Oil for frying

Method:

  1. Wash and cook the dal and keep it aside. Cut tomatillos into small pieces.
  2. Heat oil in a pan/kadai, fry bengal gram dal, asafoetida, red chillies and coconut gratings and grind them to a paste.
  3. Cut tomatilloes and heat oil in a pan/kadai, splutter mustard seeds, black gram dal, curry leaves, add asafoetida and add tomatilloes and little salt. Fry for some 5 minutes. Now add cooked dal and the paste and mix them well.

Tomatillos curry is delicious and ready to be served. It can be served with any rice item. It requires some 20 minutes to cook. It can be served for 3 persons.

Note: Always use fresh vegetables.

Optional: Ingredients can be added or removed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomatillo

The breakfast slimes, angel food cake, goughnuts and coffee, white bread and gravy cannot build an enduring nation
Martin H. Fischer

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Curry leaves kuzhambu - Karuvepilai kuzhambu


Ingredients:

Curry leaves - Karuvepilai - 1 bunch
Tamarind - Puli - lemon size
Red gram - Thuvaram paruppu - 1 table spoon
Bengal gram dal - Kadalai paruppu - 1 table spoon
Red chillies - Kaintha milagai - 5 nos.
Black pepper - Karuppu milagu - 1 table spoon
Mustard seeds - Kadugu - 1 tea spoon
Fenugreek seeds - Vendayam - 1 tea spoon
Asafoetida - Perungayam - a pinch
Turmeric powder - Manjal thul - a pinch
Grated/Shredded coconut - Thuriviya thengai - 2 table spoons
Oil for frying
Salt to taste

Method:

  1. Soak tamarind in hot water and make a paste out of it. Dust particles has to be removed using filter. Keep other ingredients ready.
  2. Heat oil in a pan/kadai, fry asafoetida, fenugreek seeds, red gram, bengal gram dal, curry leaves and grind them to a powder once it is cooled. Grind coconut to a paste. Care must be taken not to fry fenugreek for long since it will taste bitter.
  3. Heat oil in a pan/kadai, splutter mustard seeds, add asafoetida, curry leaves, red chilly and add tamarind paste and required water and salt. Mix them well, add turmeric powder and the grinded powder. Finally add grinded coconut.

Hot curry leaves kuzhambu is delicious and ready to be served. It can be served with white rice. It can be served for 3 persons. It requires some 20 minutes to cook.

Note: Remove dust particles from tamarind. Wash curry leaves before using.

Optional: Ingredients can be added/removed. Pearl onions and garlic can be added while frying.

Nobody seems more obsessed by diet than our anti-materialistic, other wordly. New Age spiritual types. But if the material world is merely illusion, an honest guru should be as content with Budweiser and bratwurst as with raw carrot juice, tofu and seaweed slime
Edward Abbey

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212-400-6495

September 30

That is the number to call to try to get the most difficult restaurant reservation in New York City. It’s for Tom: Tuesday Dinner, a 32-seat restaurant opening on October 14 in Craft’s private dining room. Chef-owner Tom Colicchio has cleared every other Tuesday for the next year and will be cooking seven- to eight-course tasting menus for $150-$250. He has only cleared every other Tuesday because those are the only days he needs to clear to cook in the restaurant: Those are the only nights it will be open. The rest of the time it will still be Craft’s private dining room.
Tom said he, like so many other chefs in New York City, wanted to get back to cooking in a cozy little restaurant, but the economics here make that very difficult — that is unless you already have a private dining room that's booked most weeks from Wednesday through Saturday, because of course private dining, catering and alcohol are where virtually all the profit in most fine dining restaurants comes from. On a relatively quiet night on Tuesday, why not make it a restaurant?
And although New York's an expensive place to do business, it’s also a place where, even with an economy that has completely fallen on its ass, you can scare up 80 people a month who are willing and able to spend a few hundred dollars on dinner.
You’re so not getting into this restaurant.
The food will be very seasonally oriented — there will be farm maker’s dinners, like winemaker’s dinners but showcasing the products of a particular farm — reflecting the food Tom cooked at Mondrian and Gramercy Tavern, plus some new things.
Three chefs apart from Tom will be working in the kitchen. He’s bringing in a rotisserie.
He’ll post each night’s menu on his web site, tomtuesdaydinner.com, once it’s ready — probably a week out. People with reservations who have dietary issues can e-mail the restaurant and they’ll adjust. An image gallery of food will go up there as well.
Every once in awhile guests chefs might pop in to join Tom and send out a course, just for fun.
So now you know.

Oh, and one small plug: You would have known slightly more than an hour before this entry was posted if you were receiving my Twitter messages. It’s something we’re experimenting with here at NRN. Check it out if you like.