www.roanoke.com

Bringing beef back to life

Remember the barbecue-braised pot roast I wrote about a few days ago? Well, the chunk left in the fridge last night didn't look very appetizing, but I didn't want to let it go to waste. Hubby had a great idea: Why not make burritos out of it? I was a bit skeptical about the sweet, mustardy glaze working in a burrito format, but it turned out great.

I sliced the roast into pieces and warmed it with a little of the glaze, some sriracha and some chopped fresh cilantro. The sweetness of the glaze ended up marrying beautifully with the spiciness of the hot sauce. With a little black beans, some cheddar cheese, sour cream, lettuce, my first ripe yellow tomato of the season and some leftover grilled corn salsa, an unappetizing chunk of leftover meat turned into one of the best meals of the week. I hope this inspires someone else with a chunk of leftover meat!

On another note, my wonderful editor, Kathy Lu, turned up at work today with a bag full of chanterelles for me. She and her husband filled one and a half Kroger bags with the delicious delicacies while hiking this past weekend. I've heard from several people over the past couple of weeks that this has been an odd yet rewarding wild mushroom season. Chanterelles usually pop up much earlier in the season, so hunters had assumed they weren't going to find any this year. But all that rain we've been getting brought the forest to life again.

If you're an experienced mushroom hunter, you may want to take advantage of this. If you are not, you should be extremely careful before EVER, EVER eating a mushroom you picked in the woods. You'll definitely need your liver for the rest of your life.

... when it comes to chocolate consumption, that is.

Check out this chart on chocolate consumption per person the world over. I figured the United States would be up there in the top five, if for no other reason than our size. The size of the country is what I mean, not the size of American waistbands. Although that would probably work, too.

Switzerland is number one, of course. They make some of the best chocolate in the world. The Swiss consume 27 pounds of chocolate per person, per year, on average. And Belgium is number four, which is no surprise because they have superb chocolate over there, too. They clock in at 22 pounds per person, per year.

Then there's the U.S., where we eat 11.5 pounds of chocolate per year. And we are above only Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and Japan. Hmph!

How many of you think you actually eat 11.5 pounds of chocolate per year? Anyone consume MORE?

Wild thing... I think I love you

Well, it is the Monday after a holiday weekend, so being crabby is understandable. But I'm not talking about a bad mood, I'm talking about a state of mind -- a blue crab state of mind.

This Fourth of July found us in Kill Devil Hills, N.C., where my father-in-law, Bill, goes crabbing on the sound behind his house. On Friday night, we were treated to a big pile of fresh, steamed blue crabs with a heavy coating of Old Bay seasoning. Add a cold beer to the mix and it is sheer heaven. Even my 4-year-old nephew was cracking claws and grinning.

We love blue crabs so much that we decided to stop at a seafood shop on our way out of town to see if they had any in the case. We struck gold ... or bright orange, I guess ... when we found eight left in the case. I bought them all and we had another crabfest at home last night to usher out one of summer's most festive weekends.

Read more »

For those of you who had the opportunity to take the fun culinary quiz I posted yesterday, the answers are below the jump. I put them there on purpose in case others of you would still like to take the quiz and don't want the answers spoiled for you.

I wish I could report my own score on this quiz, but while completing it I noticed that I was a full three answers short. As it turns out, the wire story was missing three answers, so I had to call the Kansas City Star and get the missing answers. Well, that threw me all out of whack. But the best I can tell is that I got about 22 or 23 correct out of the 25. I did not know halloumi or cavolo nero.

I hope everybody had fun and learned something along the way!

Read more »

Are you "amused?" There's one bad hint.

This word quiz was published the other day in the Kansas City Star. It's based on culinary terms that get tossed around on Top Chef. I had so much fun doing it that I pulled it off the wire to share with you guys. I'm going to be a trickster and wait to publish the answers tomorrow. I trust no one to cheat! And if you are serious about the quiz, you may not want to read comments on this post until you have done it. Some of them may give certain answers away.

25 FANCY FOOD WORDS USED ON 'TOP CHEF'

(Do You Know What They Mean?)

See how many of these food words you can correctly match with their definitions. See definitions below!

1. Ganache (GAHN-ahsh)

2. Ceviche (seh-VEE-chay)

3. Risotto (rih-SO-toh)

4. Carpaccio (kahr-PAH-chee-oh)

5. Hamachi (hah-MAH-chee)

6. Remoulade (ray-muh-LAHD)

7. Chiffonade (shihf-uh-NAHD)

8. Panna cotta (PAHN-nah KOH-tah)

Read more »

If you drive through Fincastle very often, you may have noticed that the old Captain's Tavern and Bill's Seafood location is the site of a brand new Italian restaurant called Leonardo's. Botetourt County community journalist Cathy Benson has a little bit more info on her blog. Apparently, the new owners of this endeavor are related to the folks who run New York Pizza in Vinton. That's promising!

Out in Salem, there are plans for a new Mexican restaurant in the space that used to house Fast Freddy's. It sure was a shame to see Fast Freddy's go after so many successful years on that corner. But fans of Rancho Viejo will be pleased to see Jenny Boone's report here.

Prefer to cook at home? Well, check out the cooking classes on offer to the general public this summer at the Culinary Institute at Virginia Western Community College. That's the campus located at 109 Henry Street, behind the Roanoke Higher Education Center. The classes are $40 per person. Topics are:

* July 20, 6-9 p.m., "Sassy Sushi."
* July 24, 9 a.m.-1 p.m., "Mediterranean Tour."
* July 27, 9 a.m.-1 p.m., "Going, Going, Gone! Meals in Minutes."
* July 30, 6-9 p.m., "Party Panache."

To find out more about these classes and to register for them, go to http://www.virginiawestern.edu/bet/culinary/. For questions, contact Lacey Carey at (540) 857-6210.

June is National Iced Tea Month, and who understands iced tea better than Southerners?

Obviously, sweet tea is a staple in the South. But I'm going to go out on a limb here and say you don't have to like your tea sweetened to be a true Southerner. In fact, my grandparents often had a pitcher of freshly made iced tea in the refrigerator, but it was never sweetened.

Come time for dinner or supper, Grandma would put the pitcher on the table along with whatever she had prepared, which usually included good home-cooked foods like meatloaf, roast beef, green beans, potato salad or just tomato sandwiches. If you wanted sweetened tea, you had to add sugar and stir pretty much the entire rest of the meal to get it to dissolve. Even then, there was always a clump of sugar at the bottom of the glass.

Read more »

A blog reader named Paul commented yesterday on a new bakery's move to downtown Roanoke that "parking could be an issue."

Parking is frequently an issue downtown. It's something we've never discussed on this blog even though some of the best restaurants in city limits are located downtown. If you don't work within walking distance of the heart of it all, it can be difficult, if not impossible, to find a parking space, eat lunch and get back to work within an hour.

Maybe some say, "park in a parking garage!" To which I say, I refuse to pay to stop my car someplace to eat lunch in a city the size of Roanoke. It's true that some parking garages are free after hours, and that's worth looking into.

Pay lots have a few lucrative spots on downtown Roanoke's food map. Between 202 Market and Mill Mountain Coffee, for example; across from Corned Beef & Co. (and beside Frankie Rowland's); across from the bus station on Salem; closest to Macado's on Second Street.

But for the most part, when I have to drive downtown at any time of day, I just keep circling until I find a spot. It helps to have lived in a city for 10 years, and have a husband who has lived here all of his life, when checking each and every spot. But as downtown continues to be revitalized and we (hopefully) gain more successful restaurants, this could become an even bigger issue.

Anyone have thoughts or tips for those who are discouraged from making the trek?

Have you ever heard someone say "I'd love to eat fresh, local foods, but it's just too expensive?" Now imagine how cost-prohibitive it would be for someone who can barely afford groceries to begin with.

But according to a Washington Post story today, an organization called the Wholesome Wave Foundation is giving grants to farmer's markets in different places around the country, including the Abingdon market, which is run by the non-profit group Appalachian Sustainable Development. The way I understand it, the grants will allow the markets to give low-income mothers and senior citizens twice the amount of fresh food they could usually buy with the food stamps they have. It does, in essence, double the value of their food stamps.

The Wholesome Wave folks figure it is a win-win situation: not only will underprivileged families have greater access to nutritional foods, but farmers, another hard luck group, will benefit from increased sales. On its surface, it sounds like a pretty cool idea to me. Read the whole story and let me know what you think.

In other Web news:

Read more »

Yesterday, I saved $19 on my grocery bill at Kroger. And it was all because of coupons.

Lots of people don't use coupons because they think it is a nuisance to clip them, or because it just isn't worth all of the extra time and planning in the end. But I have grown to be a big coupon user over the years, particularly with the recent plunge in the economy.

A few of my co-workers and I recently started up a little coupon exchange. On Sundays, we go through the coupons from the newspaper and clip out what we want. On Mondays, we bring the leftover coupons to work and tell each other which ones we were interested in. Then, we trade off. And it works out well because while some of them have children, I don't. And while I have cats, some co-workers don't. And, of course, everyone has their own preference for name brand food products.

Photo editor Natalee Waters delivered a small stack to me last week with the words, "that's nine dollars worth of savings!" Indeed, much of my savings at the store yesterday came from the exchange. Three dollars off some contact lens solution, three dollars off some disposable razors, a free tube of Crest, 45 cents off cheese, 25 cents off juice... it all adds up in the end!

If you are looking to save money on the grocery bill, consider a coupon exchange with coworkers, neighbors, church members or other members of your moms' club. If you find a better way to do it than we have, please pass that on. And if you have other great coupon tips, please share!