Folks overwhelmingly wanted to have a vote for our COTM selections, so here it is. I am using the poll feature for this. Please select up to TWO choices from the list. Please vote with the intention of cooking along if your choice is selected.
There is no way to change your vote on the poll once it is cast. If you want to change your vote, please make a comment on this thread explaining how you want to change it. Also, if for some reason the poll doesn’t work for you, you may vote in the comments.
Voting will close Monday, June 24, at 10pm EDT. Reporting threads will be posted on July 1.
Dishoom is also a quarter, it’s just that it’s the one choice that’s a single book, whereas the others encompass all of an author’s work, so it’s just descriptive. You could mentally augment it to “Dishoom Quarter,” if you see what I mean.
We have just recently switched to this quarter system. We have kept, for now, the COTM name. This is really still a trial for doing quarterly selections.
Yeah, this is only the second time we’re doing a quarter, so we’ve already got the cotm tag with all the attached precedent (plus there’s an existing cotq tag for Cuisine of the Quarter). Happy to clarify, though, we definitely want people just tuning in not to feel shut out by the shorthand and procedural issues we’ve hashed out over time.
That’s what we are trying for this quarter. Last quarter we did three, but most of the group felt that two was enough, so we’re trying it that way. Like I said, this is a new format for us and we’re still tweaking it.
Voting is now closed. Our selections for July, August, & September of 2024 will be Andrea Nguyen quarter and Pati Jinich quarter. Reporting threads will go up on July 1. Until then, use this thread to discuss the books.
This is an interesting combination — (mostly) Vietnamese and Mexican.
I borrowed Ever-Green Vietnamese from the library, which is Andrea Nguyen’s most recent book.
Interested to go back to her older books which I haven’t cooked from.
Vietnamese Food Any Day was one of my favorite COTMs, so I’m interested to see what appeals from Into the Vietnamese Kitchen.
From The Banh Mi Cookbook I want to see if there’s a recipe for Xiu Mai (meatballs) that can get close to what we ate in a banh mi in nyc chinatown last year
I’ve never tried Pati Jinich recipes so I’ll rely on others for recs of their favorites, and watching for reports.
Years back I once found myself having an issue with an Andrea Nguyen recipe. I tweeted her with a question and she answered very helpfully and kindly. But it’s rare to have problems because she writes her recipes clearly. I’m on vacation until mid-July, and then flying mostly solo for a couple weeks, but once things settle down I look forward to some fun cooking.
towards the end of his ten-year journey to bake authentic banh mi rolls, my friend chau published the meatball recipe below. During the pandemic, fearing that I’d never have another banh mi, I joined the thread and leveraging chau and other’s discoveries, was able to bake credible rolls and produce pretty good sandwiches. The meatballs are different than the one’s we had in Chinatown and not Nguyen’s recipe, but they are delicious, (scroll down a couple of posts on the pizzamking forum to see the recipe).
at some point forum member Bill, like chau, a master baker but also a cookbook author, took up the challenge and tried Nguyen’s roll recipe:
I once messaged her on IG to ask about vegetarian substitutions and she messaged back very promptly and helpfully — and told me she’s going to be writing a vegetarian cookbook next
