The broccoli stem is my favorite part, I always peel and slice them, great raw in salads, or diced in with other vegetables. DH said my mixed vegetables the other night looked like candy on the plate.

6 inches of snow and counting. Dinner depends on whether we have to use a camp stove or if power holds.

for your power Amanda. The house we just bought has a generator and it has already come in handy.

Ardesia - how far is Flat Rock from Blowing Rock? Me were down there with DH's ancient Porsche in September. Nice country around there.

Tom, thanks for the instructions. I used part of the most recent shrimp ring in a similar fashion with pasta and I sautéed it in butter with garlic. I just made sure that it wasn't much more than just heating it up.

Hoping all of you who are in the path of a storm continue to have power. I know now, that they are saying a gas cook top isn't great for the environment, but we've always been able to cook when the power isn't there. All you need is a match or candle lighter and you're in business.

pepper23 said: 6 inches of snow and counting. Dinner depends on whether we have to use a camp stove or if power holds.

Amanda, the storm is through here in the Topeka area. We managed to get through it without losing power, but it's a wet, heavy snow and it has brought dead limbs down from the trees to be cleaned up once the ground is clear again.

Lots of limbs down here as well. One landed on our deck yesterday and hit our table, damaging the wood top. Have more down as well but the birds are loving all the extra perches. More snow to come this weekend!!

One of my discoveries in the last year has been Nestle's "La Lechera" brand of sweetened condensed milk, which I believe started as something they made for the Mexican market. I like it, but have one problem with it-- it's hard to get it out of the can! My decrimping can-opener works occasionally but usually only manages to uncrimp part of the circumference. My metal-cutting can-opener works for part of the circumference, but the lid seems to be too deep for it to work consistently. If I punch an opening in the lid everything is fine until the opened can goes to the refrigerator, at which point it doesn't like to flow.

What I've started doing is opening the can as far as possible, then pouring into another container for storage in the refrigerator. Does anyone else have a trick or a tool for dealing with recalcitrant canned goods?

Ann, Blowing Rock is a few hours north of us. It is a very pretty area, many years ago we had a small place there and enjoyed the cool summer weather. Flat Rock is just north of the SC border.

Still snowing here and will continue through the night until about 3:00 a.m. then it's supposed to move on. I see the South East is getting hit hard with rain, and the New England states are getting rain too. I'm not sure how much we got as it's above the freezing temp so much has melted as it fell. It will get colder tonight and we will get some more accumulation.

It was a good night for a pot roast braised in red wine with mashed potatoes, carrots, with mushroom gravy. Feels warm in the tummy.

Tom, I would happily eat a plate of that.

Part of the massive East Coast storm is blowing by here. They say the worst of it will be between 10:00 & 3:00. That certainly works for me. So far it's just been steady light to moderate rain with wind singing through the trees. Not weather to be out and about (not that I have plans!) but nothing to write home about. Again, the hype is bigger than the bite.

I had a lovely choice of leftovers here. The decision was to go with the ham hock, cabbage, and diced potatoes -- made all the better with duck fat. Gotta' say, after an evening meeting, it was just a fine comfortable and easy night home. Really thankful for what I have.

It has been pouring here since late morning and since we had close to a foot of snow on the ground from the weekend the water has no place to go so we are even getting some flooded roads up here on the mountain. I would not mind driving in snow if other cars were not on the road , just way to many do not know how to drive on it. Most with SUV's think they can drive at regular speed , sorry they do not brake any better then a regular car. Tonight I added last nights sausage mix to some tomato sauce with some rigatoni.

Tom's shrimp reminded me of a question I've wanting to ask. What is the difference between linguine and spaghetti. A few years ago when I was having to drive my Mom to out of town doctor appts., we usually stopped and ate at an Italian restaurant because she loves pasta, esp. with tomato sauce. Not being fond of it so much, I ordered linguine with olive oil and garlic. It was a really simple dish that I liked a lot. I looked up and found a recipe for it that I'm going to try. When I went to the grocery store, they had stacks of spaghetti in varying sized packages. I finally found exactly two packages of linguine. The packages seem to be the same length and similar size which made me wonder about the difference between the two. Wondering if the shelves are bare of linguine would spaghetti be a reasonable substitute? I know one is flat and the other round and that the shape of pasta often makes a dish hold the sauces differently. In terms of flavor, I can tell (usually) the difference between pasta made with egg vs. those without. That's about it. Not very knowledgeable about pastas. I was an adult before I had exposure to anything beyond macaroni and spaghetti.

Where's TT? She'd save my lazy bones by finding it via a net search .

I'm not an expert, but I think it's just the shape.

Linguine is slightly flattened, I think?
At some level, pasta shape and the type of sauce put on determines how much sauce sticks. With there being a desired ratio, so I have read; that may be oversimplified.

Doesn't it also have to do with how the pasta is extruded? That extruded from copper plates has a rougher surface that holds more sauce as opposed to that extruded from plastic plates which is smoother.

needrain said: What is the difference between linguine and spaghetti.
...
Wondering if the shelves are bare of linguine would spaghetti be a reasonable substitute?

You've pretty much figured it out - shape. Spaghetti is long and round whereas linguine is a wider (about 3mm) flat pasta -though technically I think when cut, a cross section shows it to be a slightly oval noodle.
Yes, the shape of pasta does make a difference in how they hold sauce and how their textures play with other ingredients.
Yes, in the example you've given you could substitute spaghetti, the dish you ordered doesn't sound unlike the classic 'Spaghetti Aglio Olio e Peperoncino' , but the pasta to sauce ratio will be different. Would you be aware that you can't taste the pasta as well in your revised version? I guess it depends on how good a taster you are and how sensitive your comparison, I suspect most of us mightn't.
Remember, unlike many American cooks who view pasta as merely a tasteless vehicle to deliver gobs of sauce Italians treat pasta as the star and the sauce as a condiment.
Don't even get me started on how many (most?) home cooks overcook their pasta, throw it on a plate and heap sauce on top. In the name of all that is holy please finish cooking your pasta and sauce together.

Rant over.


Oh, and another thing...those people who rinse their pasta? Ohhh, stop me already, hold me back lest I go on with a l l of my pasta musings.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
This is a one pot pasta recipe where the pasta cooks in the sauce that is pretty good ,I do add a thinly slices chili pepper to it as I like the added spice.

Thank you everyone! @JBarstool - more pasta musings, please! I looked up multiple recipes online for 'Spaghetti Aglio Olio e Peperoncino', all of which were very similar without too much variation. They are similar to what I found and had with the big difference being linguine instead of spaghetti and the dish I had did not have the peppers. I like the sound of adding the peppers. Too bad it's winter and no fresh ones available, but I dried plenty of peppers and would have the option of either crushed (or basically powdered) and whole dried peppers. I bought the linguine so my first attempt will be that, but I may add the peppers to the recipe I found.

In a way, pasta is a mystery to me in the huge variation among shapes and sizes available. Egg noodles are clearly distinctive as is angel hair pasta. They bring a totally different profile to a dish. But among the rest, knowing which to choose for a dish isn't clear to me and as long as it's not a dish I think requires egg noodles, then I'm apt to use what I have on hand. I tried out an 'egg free' noodle once. Didn't much like it and did not find it an acceptible substitute for any recipe needing noodles, though it worked okay as plain pasta - not great, but okay. I had a nearly empty package and my sister decided I needed more and replaced it exactly. I laughed and told her I was trying to get rid of it. It eventually got used up. When she's here, there're a lot more pasta dishes served.

This was a meal earlier this week. The chicken leg was leftover and the flour tortillas were just handy so they got heated and buttered. The curried chick peas were the last of a couple of microwavable packages I bought just to try and see if I liked the curry addition. I did, but will make my own from scratch in the future. The little brown strips are some sauteed shitake mushrooms. Not sure whether I've ever eaten those before. Maybe at a restaurant, but the local generally don't carry them so when I saw them I got them to try. Pretty good. I used the rest of the mushrooms on a pizza I bought yesterday. Life events get in the way of actually planning and preparing a meal too often. Then you have a tortilla instead of bread . And a brown meal which could have used a bit of green on it. I should have snipped off the tops on some garlic I'm growing. I'm thinking those tops are going to be killed back with the cold predicted to arrive Sunday. Hope it doesn't take out the bulbs, too.

NJBob said: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
This is a one pot pasta recipe where the pasta cooks in the sauce that is pretty good ,I do add a thinly slices chili pepper to it as I like the added spice.

OK, I watched the whole video, though at 1.5 playback speed. Gauging my interest in trying this dish on a scale of one to ten, I give it a minus seven.

I guess there is a bit of 'novelty factor' but that's not why I cook. If you are one who would otherwise only ever make pasta using bottled or commercial sauce then maybe I could see this as an introductory step in learning to make better pasta and, thus, have some value.

Hmmm.