Let's introduce ourselves and get to know one another better

1.San Francisco Parkside Neighborhood
2.I do not understand when people say that they have no time to cook. I come home every night after work and make a full dinner from scratch. Good food doesn’t always take a long time, just good ingredients and a generous heart. Really…

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10 posts were split to a new topic: No time to cook?

Where are you? NY

What food-related topic are you most passionate about, that you want people to ask you about and you can’t stop talking about it?
I am passionate about traditional, authentic cooking. “You may ask, how did this tradition get started? I’ll tell you. I don’t know. But it’s a tradition” I love making homemade breads with my husband who is the expert, especially authentic NYC style bagels - the kind my great grandfather used to make - that I love with my lox or chopped chicken liver for Sunday brunch. I have many bookmarks of youtube videos of old grandmothers from around the world in their kitchens (many with just a bowl and a wooden spoon), making incredible, traditional meals from scratch. Those are my favorite recipes to make and share.

What’s a great food experience you have had?
That is a great question. My Mom (who instilled in me the love for reading and writing), gave me a book many many years ago written by Laura Esquivel called “Like Water for Chocolate” which describes beautifully how all of our senses relate to foods that then mix into our life experiences (they have great recipes in the book as well!) For me, my favorite life experiences are related to food and reading from the above posts, it seems like it is for all of you as well.
My earliest memory was me standing on a stool in front of our tiny kitchen counter watching my mother make her schnitzel and feeling like I was the most important person in the world because she let me beat the eggs (when she was done, I used to eat the leftover egg/breadcrumb batter that the raw meat was dipped in - don’t ask me why… or why she was never worried that I could have gotten salmonella poisoning - which I never did btw). I couldn’t wait to have kids so I could pass down the joy of cooking with them. A great majority of our time as a couple, then as a family was (and still is) spent in the kitchen - although neither of my kids ever asked to eat the leftover batter :joy:

A little tidbit about you (a few)
I put vinegar on my fries; I love the smell of wood and spices; I soak basil in olive oil for a few days and sprinkle it on my pizza; I love garlic and I am a person who is not only passionate about food and life, but who loves to laugh and joke around so don’t take me too seriously, even if I forget the emoji.

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This book was one of my first ventures into understanding food and senses as well. Read it many times!

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The movie was excellent too!

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13 posts were split to a new topic: Making bagels at home

Hi! The bagel discussions are moved to this thread to help more people find the discussions:

Be still, my heart. . . .

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I really love being able to say I know somebody who moonlights as a torch singer

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I hope I didn’t do this already, and if I did, I REALLY hope I don’t contradict myself.
1- Tucson, AZ, USA
2- It changes around, but Mexican food is a favorite
3- A venison meal in a castle in Germany
4- I’ve been a ‘foodie’ since the '70s

Psssst. I’m also a delivery driver… but that may not sound nearly as interesting :stuck_out_tongue:

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Depends on what you are delivering.

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Where are you?

Long Island, NY - a bedroom community of Manhattan/New York City - and a culinary abyss.

What food-related topic are you most passionate about, that you want people to ask you about and you can’t stop talking about it?

Greek Cuisine. Not just the gyros and plain grilled fish, but the real Greek Cuisine of Greece and of the Greeks. The cuisine that requires culinary skill to prepare.

What’s a great food experience you have had?

Finally finding Greek Cuisine outside Greece, in Manhattan, once, some years back, and it was as fleeting as it was amazing.

A little tidbit about you:

Extraordinarily discerning, persnickety food oriented individual my whole life, since a toddler mom says. Home cooking rocks anything anywhere, restaurants are a necessary chore to suffer through.

Really? Including Brooklyn and Queens… and still an abyss???

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Lol… thanks… I’m in Nassau, on the south shore…
Brooklyn and Queens are, as I wrote, part of New York City…
Queens, and now Brooklyn, have good food, maybe better than Manhattan.
But, please, let’s talk about food.
Do you know of Any place on the south shore of Nassau County that serves food above what is served to the masses?

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ευπρόσδεκτη, συμπατριώτης.

I don’t know whether the Greek (from Google Translate) will print correctly. We have two outstanding Greek high-end Greek restaurants here in the Bay Area, only a few souvlaki-and-moussaka joints, and several good church festivals. Aren’t Michael Psilakis’s places (one in Roslyn) good? And my family has enjoyed Pylos on East 7th in the East Village (especially the mezes; when I visit we usually just make a meal from them).

Chef Michael Psilakis place “Onera” was the place I was referring to with the quip about being, “as fleeting as it was amazing.”
All his places now are good, definitely not great.
Pylos was such a huge letdown 10 years ago with Diane Kochilas and crap… latest word from a trusted friend says they are now sourcing high quality ingredients, but that doesn’t say much about the culinary skill of the kitchen staff.
As for the usual suggestion we all get about making a meal of mezedes, yeah, sure, usually. Not much of a choice, usually. But a sit down dinner of entrees that need culinary skill to prepare would be nice too. Even in Manhattan.
I’ve been looking to make a trip to the other coast just to try Kokkari. Hopefully someday…

Well, I grew up in Queens and don’t see where you specified Brooklyn and Queens as in NYC and not part of your world. My OCD side wasn’t comfortable seceding them from"Long Island". But… on to finding you some good chow. Sorry I can’t help as its been way too long.

Since you’re in New York, it would probably make better sense to just hop a plane to Athens instead of a special trip to San Francisco just for Kokkari. In Athens you’d have lots of other places to sample. Really, the Bay Area is kind of a desert for Greek cuisine.

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Ok. My last trip to the Bay Area was an eating extravaganza and it did not include Greek food from a Greek restaurant. But since I own the Kokkari book, I figured next time I make it out to the Bay Area I might as well try it. And you said there were TWO restaurants in your area. No?