Historic (rec.food.historic) Discussing and discovering how food was made and prepared way back when--From ancient times down until (& possibly including or even going slightly beyond) the times when industrial revolution began to change our lives.

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From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fat_Duck:

<quote>
As of March 2007 there are two menus; A la carte costs £80 per person and
the tasting menu costs £115 per person, excluding wine and an optional 12.5%
service charge.
</quote>

Optional service charge? What are the options?

--
Bob
http://www.kanyak.com


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In article >, Steve Wertz
> wrote:

> On Fri, 24 Aug 2007 22:13:43 +0300, Opinicus wrote:


> > Optional service charge? What are the options?

>
> "Optional Service Charge" and "Discretionary Service Charge" are
> becoming fairly common in England and some other parts of Europe.
> It's my understanding that you either pay it or not. It's
> usually added to your bill unless you specifically opt out of it.
> The menu must state this.
>
> For some reason 12.5% is standard. My guess is that's its a law
> of some sort, and 12.5 is the max.
>
> Looks like those Brits will be Americanized sooner or later ;-)
>
> [Crossposted to rec.food.restaurants]
>
> -sw


This is pretty well right, but I don't think that 'it's a law of some
sort.'. It's simply accepted practice that the work of paying the tip
is taken away. If you don't like the service, you cancel the service
charge. I've done this reasonably often.

12.5% is an average. Sometimes it might be 15, sometimes ten.

Service is a complicated thing in Europe. I've just come from England
(where it's normal, round 10-15% in posh restaurants, but non-existent
in bars) from Italy, where it doesn't really obtain, from Croatia,
where I wasn't in a position to know.

I've never been anywhere else with the very high, virtually compulsory
tips expected in the USA.

Lazarus
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PS I've never eaten at the Fat Duck but I think that the notion that
any British restaurant belongs in the first hundred (or thousand) in
the world is as farcical as suggesting that any American one does.

L
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On Tue, 04 Sep 2007 21:31:02 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
> wrote:

>PS I've never eaten at the Fat Duck but I think that the notion that
>any British restaurant belongs in the first hundred (or thousand) in
>the world is as farcical as suggesting that any American one does.


Well, since sewer workers seldom make enough money to dine at either the Fat
Duck or the French Laundry, your delusion is secure.

-- Larry
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In article >, pltrgyst
> wrote:

> On Tue, 04 Sep 2007 21:31:02 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
> > wrote:
>
> >PS I've never eaten at the Fat Duck but I think that the notion that
> >any British restaurant belongs in the first hundred (or thousand) in
> >the world is as farcical as suggesting that any American one does.

>
> Well, since sewer workers seldom make enough money to dine at either the Fat
> Duck or the French Laundry, your delusion is secure.
>
> -- Larry


I totally agree, Larry. In France or Italy or the middle east working
people can eat excellent food in excellent, cheap restaurants. Not in
the Anglophone world, I'm afraid.

Lazarus


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On Wed, 05 Sep 2007 21:25:39 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
> wrote:

>In article >, pltrgyst
> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 04 Sep 2007 21:31:02 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
>> > wrote:
>>
>> >PS I've never eaten at the Fat Duck but I think that the notion that
>> >any British restaurant belongs in the first hundred (or thousand) in
>> >the world is as farcical as suggesting that any American one does.

>>
>> Well, since sewer workers seldom make enough money to dine at either the Fat
>> Duck or the French Laundry, your delusion is secure.
>>
>> -- Larry

>
>I totally agree, Larry. In France or Italy or the middle east working
>people can eat excellent food in excellent, cheap restaurants. Not in
>the Anglophone world, I'm afraid.
>
>Lazarus



Well, not quite. Australia is Anglophone (or so it is believed). Their
working people can eat excellent food in excellent, cheap restaurants.
I've seen it.
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> >
> >I totally agree, Larry. In France or Italy or the middle east working
> >people can eat excellent food in excellent, cheap restaurants. Not in
> >the Anglophone world, I'm afraid.
> >
> >Lazarus

>
>
> Well, not quite. Australia is Anglophone (or so it is believed). Their
> working people can eat excellent food in excellent, cheap restaurants.
> I've seen it.


Occasionally perhaps, but not generally. I've had some of my most
miserable food experiences there. I remember working for a while in
somewhere (was it Port Lincoln?) which described itself as 'the tuna
capital of the world'. They caught lots of tuna there, sure, but it was
all immediately frozen and exported. There wasn't a single place that
served decently cooked fresh tuna.

This is unthinkable in a Latin country, or an arabic/farsi-speaking
country.

Lazarus
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In article >, Cape Cod Bob
> wrote:

> On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 15:09:07 +1000, wrote:
>
> >On Wed, 05 Sep 2007 21:25:39 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
> > wrote:

> ]
> >>I totally agree, Larry. In France or Italy or the middle east working
> >>people can eat excellent food in excellent, cheap restaurants. Not in
> >>the Anglophone world, I'm afraid.
> >>
> >>Lazarus

> >


> Nonsense. In the US any area around a college will have excellent and
> inexpensive food - often a UN of ethnic choices.
>
> In the hinterlands are many decent, down-to-earth restaurants and
> diners serving super local specialties.
> ------------


I've had a few, but only a few, good, cheap meals made from fresh,
local, seasonal ingredients in the US. In states such as Mississippi
and Texas I've had to travel hundreds of miles to find anywhere that
wasn't serving fast food.

Whereas virtually every small town/large village even in remote regions
from Spain to to the Afghan border will have delicious, freshly made
meals, made with fresh local seasonal ingredients, probably served with
excellent bread freshly made by a local artisinal baker.

I'm not being nationalistic here - my own country's food is wretchedly
bad on the whole.

I think the 'UN of ethnic choices' is significant. Cities in the US &
England are full of 'foreign' restaurants, whereas they're
comparatively unusual in, say, Italy or Turkey, where people
concentrate on using fresh, local seasonal ingredients well.

Lazarus
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On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 12:19:02 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
> wrote:


>.... In states such as Mississippi
>and Texas I've had to travel hundreds of miles to find anywhere that
>wasn't serving fast food.


Where in Texas were you?

Unless you were entirely remote from civilization (hah!), it's hard to believe
you couldn't find decently made Tex-Mex within a few miles anywhere in Texas.

-- Larry


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In article >, pltrgyst
> wrote:

> On Thu, 06 Sep 2007 12:19:02 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
> > wrote:
>
>
> >.... In states such as Mississippi
> >and Texas I've had to travel hundreds of miles to find anywhere that
> >wasn't serving fast food.

>
> Where in Texas were you?
>
> Unless you were entirely remote from civilization (hah!), it's hard to believe
> you couldn't find decently made Tex-Mex within a few miles anywhere in Texas.
>
> -- Larry


Hi Larry

I was based in Huntsville, where there was one of the best restaurants
I've come across in the entire USA - the Cafe Texan. Did brilliant
local meals at good prices, and was the first port of call every day
for those who were being released from the penitentiary. (It's the
world capital for executions.)

The trouble is... that was it. Everything else in town was abysmally
bad - mostly fast food joints, even though there was a college.
And when you went out and around in texas, it was the same string of
fast-fried frozen foods that we're all used to. For hundreds of miles.

In Clarkesville Mississippi (sorry if I spelt that wrong, but you must
admit it's a tricky one) I tried to find local food, and was told that
the nearest resaurant serving southern food was about ninety miles
away.

It ain't like that in my Algeciras-to-Afghanistan area.

Don't try looking for fast food joints in, say, Basilicata in Italy, or
in the remote islands of Croatia, or in inland Turkey. You'll be stuck,
even in the smallest village, with local, fresh, seasonal food, simply
but beautifully cooked.

I'm slightly concerned that those who disagree with me, from Australia
to America, are proud of their region but don't have that much
experience of eating regularly in remote areas in continents they
weren't born in.

I'm just waiting for a flood of posts from Egyptians, Lebanese,
southern Italians, and French people arguing that their own national
cooking is rubbish and that American, Australian, British and Irish
cuisines are much better.

When that comes I'll reconsider my view.

Lazarus
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Lazarus Cooke > writes:

>In article >, pltrgyst
> wrote:

....
>> Where in Texas were you?
>>
>> Unless you were entirely remote from civilization (hah!), it's hard to believe
>> you couldn't find decently made Tex-Mex within a few miles anywhere in Texas.
>>
>> -- Larry

>
>Hi Larry
>
>I was based in Huntsville, where there was one of the best restaurants
>I've come across in the entire USA - the Cafe Texan. Did brilliant
>local meals at good prices, and was the first port of call every day
>for those who were being released from the penitentiary. (It's the
>world capital for executions.)


I did a gig in Huntsville a couple of years ago, and my host and his
henchman took us to the Cafe Texan. On his recommendation I had their
chicken-fried steak, which I'd had just once before, 20 years
ago or so, I think in Amarillo--at that time, because Clavin Trillin had been
raving about the dish for so long that I though I should give it a try. I
didn't like it then, and I didn't much like it in Huntsville, though I
am sure it was very good of its kind. The rest of the meal was,
however, memorably good (particularly green beans drenched in butter,
and pecan pie). I can't vouch for the "good prices", since I was
a guest (on the other hand, I know from my gig that my host is tight-
fisted, so I can't believe it was very expensive).

I was told that it's also the "first port of call" for all the
foreign journalists who come to town to cover the executions.
We were the only customers that evening, however.

>The trouble is... that was it. Everything else in town was abysmally
>bad - mostly fast food joints, even though there was a college.
>And when you went out and around in texas, it was the same string of
>fast-fried frozen foods that we're all used to. For hundreds of miles.


God knows that's true of the straight strech (which drove the next day) from
Huntsville to Austin. A small dip off the route would have taken us to College
Station, but I see no reason to believe that the Aggies have surround3ed
themselves with good eats.

>I'm slightly concerned that those who disagree with me, from Australia
>to America, are proud of their region but don't have that much
>experience of eating regularly in remote areas in continents they
>weren't born in.
>
>I'm just waiting for a flood of posts from Egyptians, Lebanese,
>southern Italians, and French people arguing that their own national
>cooking is rubbish and that American, Australian, British and Irish
>cuisines are much better.
>
>When that comes I'll reconsider my view.


Lee Rudolph
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Lee Rudolph a écrit :
> Lazarus Cooke > writes:
>
>> In article >, pltrgyst
>> > wrote:

> ....
>> I'm just waiting for a flood of posts from Egyptians, Lebanese,
>> southern Italians, and French people arguing that their own national
>> cooking is rubbish and that American, Australian, British and Irish
>> cuisines are much better.
>>
>> When that comes I'll reconsider my view.


French cuisine ain't no rubbish, but it ain't cheap either. Here in
France we can find Subway, McDonalds, and a lot of kebab, but for fine
fresh local products you got to pay 15-20 $ at least (15% compulsory
service charge included)
--
Greetings, Salutations,
Guiraud Belissen, Chteau du Ciel, Drachenwald,
Chris CII, Rennes, France
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In article >, Christophe
Bachmann > wrote:

> Lee Rudolph a écrit :
>
> French cuisine ain't no rubbish, but it ain't cheap either. Here in
> France we can find Subway, McDonalds, and a lot of kebab, but for fine
> fresh local products you got to pay 15-20 $ at least (15% compulsory
> service charge included)


salut Lee Rudolph.

I can't help feeling that you're nervously guarding your options (what
i believe, what I can say in public)

Tu (forgive me, but it's the internet) penses qu'on fait meilleur la
cuisine aux etats unis (?)qu' en france?

Et que vraiement quand tu arrives dans une petite villages dans les
montaignes, que tu vas manger mieux dans cette village aux etats unies
que dans une village francaise?

Probably filled with mistakes
but at least I tried.

Lazarus
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In article >, Lee Rudolph
> wrote:

> I did a gig in Huntsville a couple of years ago, and my host and his
> henchman took us to the Cafe Texan. On his recommendation I had their
> chicken-fried steak, which I'd had just once before, 20 years
> ago or so, I think in Amarillo--at that time, because Clavin Trillin had been
> raving about the dish for so long that I though I should give it a try. I
> didn't like it then, and I didn't much like it in Huntsville, though I
> am sure it was very good of its kind. The rest of the meal was,
> however, memorably good (particularly green beans drenched in butter,
> and pecan pie). I can't vouch for the "good prices", since I was
> a guest (on the other hand, I know from my gig that my host is tight-
> fisted, so I can't believe it was very expensive).


I was paying, so I know the prices were good. The food wasn't
wonderful, but it was decent, fresh and kind, and that was astonishing
in country where I felt that decent home cooking wasn't appreciated at
all. It seemed like, at least, a beginning.

>
> I was told that it's also the "first port of call" for all the
> foreign journalists who come to town to cover the executions.
> We were the only customers that evening, however.
>

Were you not there for the executions? I can't think of any other
reason to go there.

The first evening I arrived there my contact, a clever, thoughtful,
intelligent young wonan, arrived hot and fresh at some awful burger
joint near the highway having just watched someone being turned off.

It turned me off my ( already unappealing) meal.


Lazarus


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In article >, Christophe
Bachmann > wrote:

> French cuisine ain't no rubbish, but it ain't cheap either. Here in
> France we can find Subway, McDonalds, and a lot of kebab, but for fine
> fresh local products you got to pay 15-20 $ at least (15% compulsory
> service charge included)



Okay Christophe, are you going to say that if you were about to be
stuck for a couple of days in the middle of Nevada, or in, say, the
massif centrale, that you believe that, stuck in a small hotel meant
for commercial travellers, you'd eat better in the midwest of the usa
than in france?

Lazarus

ps are you biased? Are you a wee bitty american?
I am.
L
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On Fri, 7 Sep 2007 11:32:10 -0500, "TMOliver" >
wrote:

>I am comfortable admitting to eating better in France and Belgium than in
>most of the US, especially when it comes to French and Belgian food. The
>same is true in Italy, where I've been a frequent visitor since 1962. But
>on every visit to Europe it seems harder to find the same "good" cafes of
>yesteryear, replaced to often by the fast food morass. Obviously, I am far
>more likely to find good European food in any one of the US's larger cities
>than I might encounter "traditional US cooking" in Europe. As for Asian
>food in Europe, except in Paris, it's almost laughable compared to that
>available in Houston, SoCal, San Francisco or the Seattle/Vancouver area.


Another exception is Indonesian (or Indo-Chinese fuson) in the Netherlands.
And we have excellent Asian and middle-eastern food in the DC area as well.

>Nowhere in Europe is a traveler likely to stumble upon the sort of pleasant
>surprises found across the US in untoward locations, the little Basque
>places around the corner in some near deserted Nevada junction, or the
>upstairs Vietnamese seafood hangout in Kemah where the shrimp, squid and
>tiny octopi are sautéed on a harrow disc. No French village has anything to
>match the Napa with that old second rate winery with the grand deli, fine
>selections of area cheeses and cured meats (and a rack of baguettes) and
>plenty of shady tables outside to sit and enjoy them with the fruit we road
>food travel fans have learned to always carry along.


We've found lots of similar surprises in small French towns, such as Carnac and
Cahors.

>Fortunately, I am grandly happy with good Italian and French food,
>especially the "plain vanilla small town/family/cafe" sort, available with
>plenty of local and regional variety. But then I need to be, because in
>much of France and Italy, the alternatives to that cooking are unacceptable,
>either sad imitations of "foreign" recipes or a choice of grotesquely
>over-priced restaurants caught up in fleeting media frenzy. Just as I am
>pleased to add a name to my old directory of "Decent Italian Dining Rooms"
>circulated among my friends who travel there, I'm always sad to remove one
>of the great finds of yesteryear now departed (or worse ruined by trying to
>be fancy and popular). What we do not have in the US are many small hotels
>with good dining rooms, a tradition in much of Europe. Most hotel food in
>the US falls into the late-term abortion category, deserving of prevention
>on moral grounds alone. As for the UK, I'm never sure, but do note that
>every "improvement" in English food seems accompanied by a collateral
>increase in the number and spread of plastic ranks of fast food and what we
>used to call "Greasy Spoons", institutions that the British seem willing to
>not only tolerate but frequent


Nicely put, overall.

-- Larry
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Lazarus Cooke a écrit :
> In article >, Christophe
> Bachmann > wrote:
>
>> French cuisine ain't no rubbish, but it ain't cheap either. Here in
>> France we can find Subway, McDonalds, and a lot of kebab, but for fine
>> fresh local products you got to pay 15-20 $ at least (15% compulsory
>> service charge included)

>
>
> Okay Christophe, are you going to say that if you were about to be
> stuck for a couple of days in the middle of Nevada, or in, say, the
> massif central, that you believe that, stuck in a small hotel meant
> for commercial travellers, you'd eat better in the midwest of the usa
> than in france?
>

Nope, I'm not saying that either, because I've never been in the
mid-west and so cannot compare, and I never meant to say it, but what I
want to say most emphatically is that even in France if you want to eat
cheap you will most often have to resort to some form of fast food,
there are still quite a lot of good little restaurants, (and often in
small hotels too) but they are increasingly rare and increasingly
pricey. The little worker's restaurants are dying out, even in Europe.

> Lazarus
>
> ps are you biased? Are you a wee bitty american?
> I am.
> L


--
Greetings, Salutations,
Guiraud Belissen, Chteau du Ciel, Drachenwald,
Chris CII, Rennes, France

I'm not biased at all because I've not set foot in the US for thirty years.
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"TMOliver" > writes:

>Laughably, one example of the dearth of edibles cited was College Station,


Now, Tom, I didn't "cite" that, I stated that my guess had been that
College Station was unlikely to be particularly good--and that guess
was an extrapolation from my (not hitherto expressed, here, lately
at least) opinion that, contrary to Cape Cod Bob's opinion, "college
towns" are likely to have good restaurants. That's never been my
experience (not counting large conurbations like NYC or Boston/Cambridge
which have colleges in them but aren't in any sense "college towns").
Bob, if you're there, do you maintain that the environs of Cape Cod
Community College have particularly good food (better than what you
might find elsewhere on the Cape)? Certainly my neighboring college,
UMass-Dartmouth (formerly Southeastern Massachusetts University, and
before that the New Bedford Textile Institute) hasn't contributed a
damned thing to local cuisine (which has fine exemplars). And in
Worcester, MA, though there happen to be a decent Ecuadorian restaurant
and a quite good Vietnamese restaurant within a few blocks of Clark
University, both are too far outside the pusillanimous students' comfort
zone to have any significant number of Clarkies eating in them. Etc.,
etc.

I'm glad to hear that I *could* have had good eats in College Station
(if I hadn't had a riproaring cold that made the prospect of getting to
the Austin airport more important than almost any other goal at that
moment).

But I swear that on the direct route fron Huntsville to Austin,
there didn't appear to be a damned thing.

>As for Asian
>food in Europe, except in Paris, it's almost laughable compared to that
>available in Houston, SoCal, San Francisco or the Seattle/Vancouver area.


What always astounds me is that I can't find decent Asian food in Geneva.

>Let's face it folks....Those of you for whom the Cafe Texan is any more than
>a routine stop for "Southern Road Food", who have not eaten sliced brisket
>off butcher paper at the market in Lockhart, and don't understand that there
>are two mutually incompatible regional versions, "East Texas Dipped and Deep
>Fried" and "West Texas Pounded and Pan Fried", of Chicken Fried Steak (the
>West Texas version authentically descended from Central European cooks who
>have pounded cutlets for centuries and still do and a cousin to all those
>"Milanesas" on menus from Buenos Aires to Monterey), are as terminally
>unaware as are the silly Americans who claim to be unable to find good eats
>in Paris.


So I assume both my (probably) Amarillo CFS and my Huntsville CFS were
East Texan? What's its roots, then?

I wasn't (as long as I'm being defensive) holding the Cafe Texan up as
an examplar of other than "Southern Road Food"--I did eat better in both
Austin and Houston, but don't remember the names of the places my hosts
there took me on that trip. Still, the well-buttered beans were memorable.

Lee Rudolph


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Lazarus Cooke a écrit :
> In article >, Christophe
> Bachmann > wrote:
>
>>
>> French cuisine ain't no rubbish, but it ain't cheap either. Here in
>> France we can find Subway, McDonalds, and a lot of kebab, but for fine
>> fresh local products you got to pay 15-20 $ at least (15% compulsory
>> service charge included)

>
> salut Lee Rudolph.
>

(No the writer was Christophe Bachmann quoting Lee Rudolph)

> I can't help feeling that you're nervously guarding your options (what
> i believe, what I can say in public)
>
> Tu (forgive me, but it's the internet) penses qu'on fait de la meilleure
> cuisine aux Etats-Unis qu'en France?
>
> Et que vraiment quand tu arrives dans un petit village dans les
> montagnes, que tu vas manger mieux dans ce village aux Etats-Unis
> que dans un village francais?
>

Non, mais en France tu ne trouveras plus de restaurants dans les
villages, et de moins en moins dans les petites villes, la tradition
gastronomique se meurt lentement, malheureusement. Je ne sais pas où la
situation en est aux USA.

> Probably filled with mistakes
> but at least I tried.
>

I took liberty to correct the french silently, by the way village is
masculine where ville is feminine but that apart it is quite good.

> Lazarus

--
Greetings, Salutations,
Guiraud Belissen, Chteau du Ciel, Drachenwald,
Chris CII, Rennes, France


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Cookie Cutter > writes:

>TMOliver wrote:
> Czech-American cooking is easy to find...
>
>Where?


West of Houston (for one example that I'm sure of;
certainly there must be others). Just start driving...

Lee Rudolph
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"Lee Rudolph" > schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...
> Cookie Cutter > writes:
>
>>TMOliver wrote:
>> Czech-American cooking is easy to find...
>>
>>Where?

>
> West of Houston (for one example that I'm sure of;
> certainly there must be others). Just start driving...
>

Yabbut, what's "Czech - American" cooking supposed to be ?
What are some typical dishes ?

Cheers,

Michael "just czeching" Kuettner








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"Michael Kuettner" > wrote

> Yabbut, what's "Czech - American" cooking supposed to be ?
> What are some typical dishes ?


http://www.csafraternallife.org/jour...c=February.pdf

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Opinicus a écrit :
> "Michael Kuettner" > wrote
>
>> Yabbut, what's "Czech - American" cooking supposed to be ?
>> What are some typical dishes ?

>
> http://www.csafraternallife.org/jour...c=February.pdf
>

Yeouch ! 8.1 MB, please everybody post a warning when you link to such
big files !

And there's exactly one recipe, for jidaski, a type of cookie on one
quarter of page 12 out of 36.

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"TMOliver" > schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...
>
> "Michael Kuettner" > wrote in message
> ...
>>
>> "Lee Rudolph" > schrieb im Newsbeitrag
>> ...
>>> Cookie Cutter > writes:
>>>
>>>>TMOliver wrote:
>>>> Czech-American cooking is easy to find...
>>>>
>>>>Where?
>>>
>>> West of Houston (for one example that I'm sure of;
>>> certainly there must be others). Just start driving...
>>>

>> Yabbut, what's "Czech - American" cooking supposed to be ?
>> What are some typical dishes ?
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Michael "just czeching" Kuettner
>>
>>

> Kolace, Kolaches.....
>

Ah, Golatschen.
Bohemian "Mehlspeisen". Stolen by us wily Australians, refined and passed
back to the benighted Masareks & Beneses.
So I guess that the so-called "Czech-American" really is "K.u.k. - American" ?

> In West (Station), Texas near Waco (along with a dozen Czech American
> whatevers) are the "CzechStop" convenience store and bakery, plus the local
> motel, the Czech Inn.

Thank you,

Cheers,

Michael "your czech is in the post" Kuettner




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"Christophe Bachmann" > wrote

>> http://www.csafraternallife.org/jour...c=February.pdf

> Yeouch ! 8.1 MB, please everybody post a warning when you link to such big
> files !
> And there's exactly one recipe, for jidaski, a type of cookie on one
> quarter of page 12 out of 36.


Sorry 'bout that. I was misled. The file was not what it was purported to
be.

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"TMOliver" > schrieb
> "Michael Kuettner" > wrote


<snip>
>> Michael "your czech is in the post" Kuettner
>>

> No, no, Michael, that's the Sodomite who claimed that the Czech was in the
> male.....
>

I've just czeched my malebox. Nothing in it.

>>

> A century plus of Southwestern farm life has heavily altered what seems to
> have been (at least among those who came here) a fairly standard Central
> European rural diet.
>

Over here similar changes, though maybe because of different reasons.
Old recipes (like Gulasch or Sauerbraten) were invented to use fatty meat.
Nowadays, fatty meat ends in cat and dog food; and lean meat in Gulasch
just tastes <ahem> ...

> Baked goods survive somewhat altered, but I fear that your "Golatschen" would
> be hard to recognize....Today, the bakery varieties are...cherry, apricot,
> pineapple, apple, prune, and rarely any more a sweet poppy seed filling sure
> to make one fail a test for opiates.


Well, Golatschen are of the quadratic persuasion over here.
Take puff-paste, cut it into quadrats, spread a little molten butter over them,
add filling. Now fold the edge points towards the middle. Spread egg-yolk
over the dough and put it into the oven. Voila, Golatschen.

Apart from pineapple all those variants have been known for a long time.
The sweet poppy seed Golatschen has survived as well.
Plus the original one with curds and raisins (Topfengolatsche).

Hmm, I'll have to try a mix of pineapple and curds, I guess.

> There are both "cottage cheese" and "cream cheese" filled, neither I suspect
> "original", and now popular, using the sweet risen pastry, smoked sausage,
> sausage and kraut, sausage and cheese, none of which are open topped, but with
> the filling rolled/encased in the pastry.


Ah, here we enter the realm of Krautgolatschen; the other side of the coin.
As "Strudel", Golatschen are either made as a pastry or a pie.
Like meat-pie and apple-pie.
Although, contrary to youse Merkins, we don't sweeten the dough when we
plan to pack sausage in it.

> The Texas "Czech Belt" extends from Ennis, South of Dallas, down through the
> Brazos and Middle Colorado Valleys almost to the coast, with a number of small
> towns and farm areas in which much of the population have Czech roots, mixed
> with similar communities of strong German roots, often with towns only a few
> miles apart, separated farther by the region of Central Europe from which the
> founders had arrived.
>
> My wife is part "Hrabal" and by some quirk I served a term as President of the
> family reunion group, members all over the US, but gathering each year at the
> SPJST Lodge in tiny Cottonwood, a few miles from West. I suspect that the
> Hrabals may have been ethnic Germans of the Sudeten/Bohemian sort.


Well, ethnic Australians until Fritz decided to wage war against Maria Theresia
....
Speaking of Hrabals, defenestration is well and alive in Prague.
http://www.servus.at/hillinger/1997/...ben/leben.html
Although Bohumil Hrabal defenestrated himself ...

> Even in Waco, our phone book is cluttered with all sorts of Czech family
> names. Towns like West were large enough to house both the RCatholic majority
> but Protestant minorities large enough to have their own church. Compared to
> other immigrant groups, the Czechs tended to build their churches in town,
> while among some of the Germans, the churches would rise on convenient bits of
> high ground unsuitable for farming.
>

Well, a look into the phone-book of Vienna (Australia) would show you Mareks,
Posbischils, etc. And Czernys, Molotovs and whatever else was once part
of the empire.
While Australia isn't as big as Merka, we are more thoroughly *******ized;
we've been at it for more than a thousand years ...

> In my youth, the generic "Bohemian" was used to describe a variety of the
> cultures, but the use has declined.


I know the term and the meaning in English; after WWI it would have been
politically incorrect to use "kuk" or even "Austrian" culture; Wilson's "Vae
Victis" - treaty ...

<snip>
Thank you for the picture of the part of the world where you're living, Tom.
It's always a pleasure to read your posts (be it here or elsewhere).

> In my case, I can still go to dinner at my wife's cousins, the Alfons Soukups,
> and face a dinner little changed from that served on feast days by Georgie
> Soukup's great grandmother, the first Mrs. Hrabal here (except I suspect we
> have a lot more meat today), and on the way home stop by Nemecek the Butchers
> for a limited variety of cured meats of Central European heritage.


Ah, "Speck" ?
Smoked, cured, etc.

> The accents alone on the streets of West are enough to make one question where
> in the world one is, and if listening closely, Czech expressions still dress
> up conversations between older residents. Beer is still "Pivo" at Pareya's
> Domino Hall.
>

Ah - Kruglje Pivo (half a liter beer).

<snip>
Again, thanks for a glimpse into Texas.

> The local "German" restaurant food is in some cases pretty good, but owes more
> to modern German cookbooks and restaurant kitchens than to the


Could you name some dishes typically served there ?
Thanks.

> traditions of those first settlers who arrived lured by greedy con-men in at
> least one case masquerading as a "German Nobleman", no more noble than was
> that former drill sergeant, "Baron von Steuben" who contributed as much to the
> US Revolutionary Army as any except George W.


He wasn't the only con-man. There were several other "companies" who
promised a new life in America. The people shipped there ended up like
nowadays Chinese slaves ...

> Coming back from visiting with clients in Bastrop and Elgin yesterday, I
> stopped into one of Elgin's to sausage factories, Meyer's and Southside, for
> some "dry-cure", pure and simple "Jaegerwurst", likely pretty familiar to Mr.
> Kuettner, to


Depends. "Jaegerwurst" was originally made from deer. Nowadays it's a variant
of Salami.

> carry home and a couple of "German Americanisms", "sandwiches" of hot
> "Southern" biscuits encasing a segment of Meyer's "smoked sausage" rings.


That's a Merkanism, right.

> The biscuits might be strange, Mike, but the sausage would likely look and
> taste familiar.

Well, since we have a metric buttload of various sausages over here, I guess
it would.

> Had I stayed for lunch, with sausage, barbecue brisket or smoked porkchops for
> entrees, the side dishes were a quaint blend of cultures...boiled potatoes
> with bacon dressing (obviously "German Potato Salad" in the big city),

Hmm, potato salad.
Boil potatoes. Peel them, cut into slices.
Put them into a bowl and pour hot beef-soup mixed with vinegar over the slices.
Chop onions finely. Add and mix.
Let mix rest for 20 minutes.
Cut fatty bacon into little cubes and fry until crunchy.
Pour over salad and mix well.
Sprinkle finely chopped chive on top and serve.
Was that the one ?

> Collard Greens (Southern), Kraut w/caraway seeds


Kraut is always made with caraway/cumin seeds.

> (Central Europe), Pinto Beans (Mexican), "Dumplings" (which are a sort of
> chicken and dumplings without the chicken, only the stock for flavor, an
> adaptation of a European tradition).


Well, "dumplings" are supposed to mean "Knoedeln", which is wrong.
The most apt translation would be the Northern-German "Kloesse".
"Knoedel" in the Southern German area can be anything from pastry
(Marillenknoedel),
inlets for soups (Leberknoedel), side-dishes (Semmelknoedel or Kartoffelknoedel)
up to meals in their own right (Selchknoedel).
TW(OK)IAVBP ;-)


> That's about as multi-cultural as life gets. There were cornbread and
> biscuits, and for dessert the venue was purely American, a choice of pecan pie
> or banana pudding. Had I spent a cold morning in pasture hunting deer or
> walking behind a bird dog in crop stubble, I could have dealt with the
> calories implicit in the menu, but with it close to 90F and early September,
> the prospects were less than healthful.
>

That I can believe easily.

> From a food history standpoint, the classic West Texas version of "Chicken
> Fried Steak" (in my view the original) is a thin cut of beef, seasoned with
> salt and pepper, into which flour is "pounded" with the edge of a plate or
> other object used to break down the fibers


Yep. We have a special hammer (Fleischklopfer) for that purpose over here.
It looks like that, although mine has a wooden handle :
<http://www.intergastro.de/artikelnummer/178324/pgruppe/2271/rp/-1>

> of what was originally "range beef", tough and stringy by today's standards,
> then "pan fried" in a modest amount of grease, not deep fried as in East Texas
> and much of the South (where the meat after tenderizing is dipped in a heavy
> batter). "Chicken Fried Steak" as I grew up with it is clearly a dish of
> Central European origin, a Schnitzel in anybody's cookbook.


Yep. Good meat became Wiener Schnitzel or Kotellette, tough meat would be
fried and served with sauces, or be made into Gulasch.
One of my favourite dishes, Sauerbraten mit Kartoffelknoedeln, was invented
to use tough meat.

> Our regional tendency to use "Brisket" as a popular cut of beef seems equally
> borrowed from Central European kitchens. "Barbecue" for us is certainly no
> more than adapting a cut once oven-cooked to use, untrimmed and fatty, to be
> very slowly smoked, and one still encounters altered versions of "boiled beef"
> from the same cut in family homes and the occasional restaurant (although the
> traditional sauce/gravy I recall from childhood, diced celery and carrots
> which had been cooked with the meat, a white roux, the pan juices plus stock
> as needed, and fresh horseradish, has been lost in time).
>

Ah, "boiled beef" covers a great variety of dishes here.
From the famous "Tafelspitz" down to "Siedfleisch" (the meat which is used to
make
beef-soup).
The diced celery and carrots hint to Tafelspitz - where you simmer prime beef in
bouillon
for a short time; serve with cooked and pan-roasted potatoes, cream-spinach &
cie.

Thanks for a most informative post; I hope I mentioned something which makes up
for the time you invested to show me some aspects of Texas.

Cheers,

Michael Kuettner


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On Thu, 13 Sep 2007 01:45:16 +0200, "Michael Kuettner"
> wrote:

<snip great discussion of delicious sounding food>
>
>Well, ethnic Australians until Fritz decided to wage war against Maria Theresia
>...

<more snippage>

>Well, a look into the phone-book of Vienna (Australia) would show you Mareks,
>Posbischils, etc. And Czernys, Molotovs and whatever else was once part
>of the empire.
>While Australia isn't as big as Merka, we are more thoroughly *******ized;
>we've been at it for more than a thousand years ...
>
>
>Michael Kuettner
>

I'm confused, Michael. In this and a previous post in this thread you
refer to "Australians" (people from Ausralia). It seems to me you
might mean "Austrians" (people from Austria, in Europe). Which is it?
Has your spellchecker gone nuts? 'Cause it doesn't sound like the
Australia in which I live :-)
CJ
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> wrote

> I'm confused, Michael. In this and a previous post in this thread you
> refer to "Australians" (people from Ausralia). It seems to me you
> might mean "Austrians" (people from Austria, in Europe). Which is it?
> Has your spellchecker gone nuts? 'Cause it doesn't sound like the
> Australia in which I live :-)


I count 18 Viennas in the US and one in Canada. Oddly there's not even one
in Australia, which is a shame. Someone missed a potentially good joke.

If I were an Aussie I'd found town called "Vienna" just for the hell of it.

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> schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...
> On Thu, 13 Sep 2007 01:45:16 +0200, "Michael Kuettner"
> > wrote:
>
> <snip great discussion of delicious sounding food>
>>
>>Well, ethnic Australians until Fritz decided to wage war against Maria
>>Theresia
>>...

> <more snippage>
>
>>Well, a look into the phone-book of Vienna (Australia) would show you Mareks,
>>Posbischils, etc. And Czernys, Molotovs and whatever else was once part
>>of the empire.
>>While Australia isn't as big as Merka, we are more thoroughly *******ized;
>>we've been at it for more than a thousand years ...
>>
>>
>>Michael Kuettner
>>

> I'm confused, Michael. In this and a previous post in this thread you
> refer to "Australians" (people from Ausralia). It seems to me you
> might mean "Austrians" (people from Austria, in Europe). Which is it?
> Has your spellchecker gone nuts? 'Cause it doesn't sound like the
> Australia in which I live :-)


Since George Bush stated that the Austrian army is in Afghanistan, I
feel a craving for roo-steak a la Vienna and am constantly checking
in which direction the toilet drains ...;-)

The Austria<->Australia confusion is one of the oldest Usenet-jokes.
Esp. Merkins seem unable to keep the two apart, as demonstrated by
Bush recently.

G'day matey,

Michael "Bruce" Kuettner















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On Thu, 13 Sep 2007 16:37:08 +0200, "Michael Kuettner"
> wrote:

>
> schrieb im Newsbeitrag
.. .
>> On Thu, 13 Sep 2007 01:45:16 +0200, "Michael Kuettner"
>> > wrote:
>>
>> <snip great discussion of delicious sounding food>
>>>
>>>Well, ethnic Australians until Fritz decided to wage war against Maria
>>>Theresia
>>>...

>> <more snippage>
>>
>>>Well, a look into the phone-book of Vienna (Australia) would show you Mareks,
>>>Posbischils, etc. And Czernys, Molotovs and whatever else was once part
>>>of the empire.
>>>While Australia isn't as big as Merka, we are more thoroughly *******ized;
>>>we've been at it for more than a thousand years ...
>>>
>>>
>>>Michael Kuettner
>>>

>> I'm confused, Michael. In this and a previous post in this thread you
>> refer to "Australians" (people from Ausralia). It seems to me you
>> might mean "Austrians" (people from Austria, in Europe). Which is it?
>> Has your spellchecker gone nuts? 'Cause it doesn't sound like the
>> Australia in which I live :-)

>
>Since George Bush stated that the Austrian army is in Afghanistan, I
>feel a craving for roo-steak a la Vienna and am constantly checking
>in which direction the toilet drains ...;-)
>
>The Austria<->Australia confusion is one of the oldest Usenet-jokes.
>Esp. Merkins seem unable to keep the two apart, as demonstrated by
>Bush recently.
>
>G'day matey,
>
>Michael "Bruce" Kuettner
>

Ah, yes. Mr Bush. At the recent APEC conference he thanked the
organisers of the "OPEC" conference. He obviously has the Middle East
on the brain :-)
An Aussie comedian had his "George Bush" thanking the Australian Prime
Minister, Ron Howard, for his contribution to cinema ;-)
CJ
"Bruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuce......................... ..........."
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"TMOliver" > schrieb
>
> "Michael Kuettner" > wrote


<snip>

> Interesting that the meat-filled pastries havea different name (at least for
> Austrians).

Err, no, they don't.
I guess I was imprecise in my wording.
Golatschen (aka Teigtascherln) are as varied as Strudel.
They range from meat and kraut over curds with raisins to apricot
fillings.

> I suspect that the local bakers who found kolace popular in the larger market,
> kept the name to avoid customer confusion. The local versions less delicate
> than your, simply a square of yeast-risen, egg-enriched bread-type dough,
> slightly sweetened, in which the filling is placed in a depressed center.


That sounds depressing.

> Your "curds", our "cottage cheese", and the continued existence of poppy seed
> for traditionalists shows that some facets change less than others.
>

Yep.

> For us, different folks make different krauts, and the local homemade version
> is served slightly sweetened (a classic alteration of ethnic cuisines landing
> in a place where sugar was cheap and plentiful) and usually has caraway/kummel
> seeds, unlike some of the "deli" versions that come seedless or with dill
> seed.

<shudder>
Dill has it's place with pickled gherkins, but should be kept a long way from
kraut.
Unlike the Germans, we don't use sauerkraut too much in the kitchen.
It's mostly just served as a salad.

> One of my childhood favorites, always served at the weddings of the nursing
> students who had come to the local Catholic hospital (and to which my family
> was often invited, because Dad taught the surgical procedures class and was
> much admired for his gallantry - and much recommended to their families and
> friends, sources of "payment in kind" in lean years, a feature of a doctor's
> household) was a "salad" of beets and hard-boiled eggs which I see no more,
> vaguely Russian?


Ah yes, Rote-Beete-Salat (eggs are optional).
More common (in Styria) is green salad with vinegar and "Kernoel" (pumpkin-
seed oil) and thin slices of boiled egg on top.

> There are dozens of recipes for "German" potato salad. Yours, using the beef
> stock is interesting, and seems closer to the local "rural/Czech" version
> than the fancy kitchen recipes.


It's an old recipe.
Tomorrow I'll cook "Faschierte Laiberl" (the Austrian urversion of the
hamburger) with potato salad (made with Kernöl and the beef-vinegar
mix).

> The post-wedding meals usually held at one of a number of "lodge halls"
> (SPJST, the Czech fraternal group and insurance provider) in the crossroads
> communities, were and still are "groaning boards", outdoors in good weather,
> bicultural blends of Central Europe meets the US South.
>

Well, the "groaning boards" are still alive in rural areas all over Europe.
They aren't typically Central E.

> We have no Vienna that I know of, but Tokio, Warsaw and Moscow, as well as Old
> Dime Box, Dime Box and Notrees (where there are no trees).
>

Well, and us Australians even have a ****ing (sadly now incorporated into
a greater town).

<snip>
>> The Austria<->Australia confusion is one of the oldest Usenet-jokes.
>> Esp. Merkins seem unable to keep the two apart, as demonstrated by
>> Bush recently.
>>
>> G'day matey,
>>

> In fact, for regular contributors to alt.folklore.urban, the Antipodean
> subcontinent is clearly Austria, while Australia is cradled in the Alps. Of
> course, Austrians may be easily identified on the street. Their watches have
> the 12 at the bottom and the 6 on top.
>

Except when they visit Australia. Then the Coriolis force causes the watches
to spin ccounter-clockwise ...

Cheers,

Michael Kuettner







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> My wife is part "Hrabal" and by some quirk I served a term as President of
> the family reunion group, members all over the US, but gathering each year
> at the SPJST Lodge in tiny Cottonwood, a few miles from West. I suspect
> that the Hrabals may have been ethnic Germans of the Sudeten/Bohemian sort.


It's a Czech name. See

http://members.tripod.com/~zlimpkk/G...hsurnames.html

Some very odd names in there.

What *does* "Nasralvhrnec" mean?

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