When less is more and when more is more…

I’ve only been to the one, so I wouldn’t be speaking from experience.

I like to make up shit all the time.

You don’t say.

I’ll see your steamed broccoli and Brussels sprouts and raise you a raw cauliflower. I have come to prefer the raw florets, and thinly sliced core, drizzled with a wee bit of salad dressing, to any cooked form. I also like most vegetables lightly steamed, or raw shredded or mandolined, then kept refrigerated in rice vinegar, sweetened, plus mandolined onion and a dry herb/spice blend. If I buy or make bean salad, I use the leftover liquid for a batch of raw cold-pickled vegetables.

Yup, much as I love cheese, I don’t understand the reason for using cheese in lobster thermidor. Like the Italians, I don’t like cheese with seafood.

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Big +1 to this. A family friend used to work at a fish store, and I was excited to cook (wild) salmon with them for the first time, thinking I’d learn something new. They put AT LEAST seven things on it, and then wrapped it in foil and put it on the grill and I was like NEWP.

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With exceptions for tuna melts and shrimp parm, I agree with you.

and yet, thousands upon thousands of plates of salmon/shrimp/crab alfredo are served in Red Lobsters (and even FANCIER places!) year in and and year out.

No one asks my opinion on this. But if they did! Alfredo sauce should be limited to pasta only, and eaten sparingly.

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Exactly!

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The more things I love:
Ottolenghi recipes (I usually omit half the ingredients)
Crack brownies
Jambalaya
Jenga Ribs
Russian salad / Olivye

The less recipes I love:
Fasolakia
Caprese salad
Cacio e Pepe
Mac & Cheese (Martha’s Perfect for a special occasion)
Lobster with drawn butter and lemon
Fish and chips

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Rhodes-style shrimp / shrimp saganaki with feta is delicious.

Also, Hairy Bikers’ fish pie topped with cheddar or gruyere mash, Coquilles St Jacques with Parmesan, and Oysters Rockefeller.

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I have had the former - and concur - but not the latter. Well, I’ve had Coquilles St. Jacques and Oysters Rockefeller, but I don’t think there was cheese involved.

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I’ve had Coquilles St Jacques with cheese as often as I’ve had it without. I really liked a Peruvian Coquilles St Jacques that was topped with Parmesan. Might be more of a South American variation, but I liked it. I’ve also made this version with gruyere.

I often do a quick variation on Rockefeller with spinach and Parmesan. https://www.seriouseats.com/oysters-florentine-recipe

I’ve had something like this at Morro Bay. Quite simple. https://www.pacificseafood.com/recipes/parmesan-crusted-charbroiled-oysters/

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FASOLAKIA swoon

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I think a case can be made for harmony
Quite often you don’t know something is in a dish, but if it wouldn’t be there, something would be missing/lacking.
I’m thinking esp about SE asian & Indian food

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This (there’s a cornish game hen perched on top), or almost anything that is gimmicky. The over the top bloody marys that you sometimes see never seem to be an improvement on the classic. Not a fan of stunt food where ‘more is less’.
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We have had a few places serving gimmicky brunch Caesars in Toronto, too.


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I’ll admit to one time thinking Maillard was everything. Then I had a Chinese white chicken dish and wanted to emulate it it by gently barely boiling the bird. Still do that, among many lamb stews/shepards pie.

Gotta agree with Linguafood on cheese. Good cheese needs no help, like nuts and berries. I don’t want wasabi nuts; just the nuts, thanks. For the longest time, it seemed BBQ needed all sort of sauces, and prep, but the best brisket on earth (according to very many) is salt and pepper dry rub. There ya go.

I now steam a ton. Chicken and rice, to me, is the prefect meal. No Maillard in a steamed chicken and rice. I think utilitarian dished like “boiled lunch” have given water a bad name. I like a boiled lunch just fine, but it’s what I do with leftovers. That boiled lunch was once a beef roast, or lamb roast. So that boiled lunch comes pre Maillarded.

In the Americas the perfect food is the tamal. All over the Americas it exists in different styles, but it’s masa in a corn husk or banana leaf, sometimes even plastic wrap, with something mixed in with the masa, often. But, almost always steamed. First fast food, me thinks. I do sauce mine, though. The peppers and corniness are love in action.

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I think pemmican would’ve been one of the first fast foods! Tamales are a pain in the butt to make. Not fast enough for me!