Chit-Chat: What's On Your Mind Today?

[crazycatlady58]

12 hours ago, StatisticalOutlier said:

If rare meat squicks you out, you might have trouble with some of the dim sum dishes.  The chicken feet, as PRgal mentioned--the ones I've seen on the carts, there's no mistaking them.  But they're usually on the bottom level, so you don't see them unless you look.

And some of the items are rather gelatinous, sitting in a thin dark brown sauce that doesn't stick to them and slides down into a pool on the plate.

Personally I love the gringo friendly dim sum (e.g. not chicken feet), but I know people who would not like it at all, so I've never even tried to get them to go.

While I would not eat chicken feet seeing the would not bother me. I grew up in the country and remember my grandmother using chicken feet to make a broth for chicken and dumplings. She pulled them out before she pit the dumplings and cooked meat in the pot. She said they improved the flavor of the broth.Yes, the gelatinous items might not work for me nut I would try one.

[shapeshifter]

48 minutes ago, lookeyloo said:

My grandma, an old Jewish woman to me back then, (she was about 50 back then) came from Russia when she was 6, in 1905, to Central NJ. suburb of NYC.  Back then when I was old enough to go with her, we went to the chicken store where she picked out a live chicken and the fellow killed it and mostly plucked it and we went back home and she finished the plucking and sometimes there were egg yolks inside that she boiled with the chicken.  She saved the feet for herself because she thought they were a delicacy.  None of us complained.  She also said they made the soup jell up better when cold.  Probably so.

My grandma and yours might've been neighbors in one country or another. 
On one of the very few occasions when we visited my Dad's family, we were served beef tongue; I thought it was delicious and gobbled up my portion. Then someone told me what it was and I had to run to the the bathroom due to a gag reflex. I was maybe 6-8 years old, but I still feel shame for my body-mind reaction. Nobody reprimanded me, but I have since not felt obligated to eat anything that might not sit well.
I'm not sure whether or not I would try chicken feet if offered. The claws might be off-putting to my always overactive imagination, having seen chickens scratching around the same place they poop. So probably not unless there was an apocalypse with little food (there goes that pesky imagination again).

[lookeyloo]

6 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

My grandma and yours might've been neighbors in one country or another. 
On one of the very few occasions when we visited my Dad's family, we were served beef tongue; I thought it was delicious and gobbled up my portion. Then someone told me what it was and I had to run to the the bathroom due to a gag reflex. I was maybe 6-8 years old, but I still feel shame for my body-mind reaction. Nobody reprimanded me, but I have since not felt obligated to eat anything that might not sit well.
I'm not sure whether or not I would try chicken feet if offered. The claws might be off-putting to my always overactive imagination, having seen chickens scratching around the same place they poop. So probably not unless there was an apocalypse with little food (there goes that pesky imagination again).

I have a "tongue" experience too!  Said grandma took me and younger brother to a hotel in Lakewood in the year 1952 over Thanksgiving because my mother was having a difficult pregnancy. I remember how lovely it was back then with the snow and horse and sled rides and bearskins to keep us warm.  The hotel restaurant served us a lunch of a slice or two of some yummy meat and then grandma said it was tongue!  I was grossed out.  My father worked in a slaughterhouse when he was young and said he could never eat tongue so it was never a thing in our house and no one ever ordered it "out" when back then it was available in some delis.  

[annzeepark914]

8 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

My grandma and yours might've been neighbors in one country or another. 
On one of the very few occasions when we visited my Dad's family, we were served beef tongue; I thought it was delicious and gobbled up my portion. Then someone told me what it was and I had to run to the the bathroom due to a gag reflex. I was maybe 6-8 years old, but I still feel shame for my body-mind reaction. Nobody reprimanded me, but I have since not felt obligated to eat anything that might not sit well.
I'm not sure whether or not I would try chicken feet if offered. The claws might be off-putting to my always overactive imagination, having seen chickens scratching around the same place they poop. So probably not unless there was an apocalypse with little food (there goes that pesky imagination again).

I couldn't believe it when I first heard that people ate tongue. Then, I saw them in a NC supermarket and was horrified. 😖

[shapeshifter]

11 minutes ago, annzeepark914 said:

I couldn't believe it when I first heard that people ate tongue. Then, I saw them in a NC supermarket and was horrified. 😖

Yes, having seen tongue in the supermarket (so large!) was probably what triggered my gag reflex at the dinner table after someone asked if I'd had tongue before. Maybe they did suspect I hadn't but didn't quite anticipate my literally visceral reaction?

[fastiller]

All this talk about dim sum is making me hungry (& I just had breakfast!).  Went for a dim sum lunch a couple months back for a birthday event; hadn't been in ages.   I used to work in Chinatown and dim sum & congee were staples for lunch.  Also, hot pot.  Essentially, below your table is a propane tank & on the table top is a small grill and a pot with broth (generally chicken or beef, but some places offer veggie or seafood), where you cook the stuff you get from a buffet style lineup.  It's usually all you can eat for a set $$ amount / time.  My first time was in the late 90s/early 00s with my late husband and a coworker of his who is Chinese.  Said coworker did all the selecting.  It was great: didn't know what we were having, but did know it wouldn't kill us.  Was my first experience with razor clams, sea urchin, thousand year eggs, and a couple other things I'd never have had were it not for coworker.

Which brings me to another friend of late husband's: this guy is so ONLY MEAT & POTATOES that he'll never venture to any 'ethnic' food other than Italian.  We offered to bring him for Indian, with the promise that we'd buy him a SECOND DINNER down the street at the Irish pub if he didn't like the Indian.  NOPE! He didn't even want to open his palate a tiny bit.  I feel so sorry for people like that.

Edited Wednesday at 03:33 PM by fastiller
clarity

[Yeah No]

51 minutes ago, lookeyloo said:

I have a "tongue" experience too!  Said grandma took me and younger brother to a hotel in Lakewood in the year 1952 over Thanksgiving because my mother was having a difficult pregnancy. I remember how lovely it was back then with the snow and horse and sled rides and bearskins to keep us warm.  The hotel restaurant served us a lunch of a slice or two of some yummy meat and then grandma said it was tongue!  I was grossed out.  My father worked in a slaughterhouse when he was young and said he could never eat tongue so it was never a thing in our house and no one ever ordered it "out" when back then it was available in some delis.  

I have a similar tongue story! If you had a Sicilian grandma (mine was born in Brooklyn in 1906 only 2 years after her parents came here) you're likely to have been exposed to quite a few gross-out foods as a kid. Like both you and @shapeshifter, I was served something yummy and was told much later that it was tongue. Too late to throw it up, but I never volunteered to have it again and told my grandma not to give it to me again without my knowledge, LOL. 

My grandma also used to go to the live market on Arthur Ave. in the Bronx to pick out chickens and rabbits (for her once yearly rabbit dish), but she at least had them plucked, skinned and prepped before taking them home! I was also exposed to live snails. I used to pick one for a "pet" for the afternoon before it was gently taken from me to cook, LOL. Yeah, gotta love Sicilian culture. 😉

Other kid-gross-out foods I was exposed to included whole calamari, because back in the day that's the only way you could get them. And cleaning them was not easy and could be very messy as I later found out as a young adult which was still before you could get them already cleaned, cut and prepped. There was squid ink everywhere....I am still not over that experience! Grandma made it sound so easy! 

I was around snails, sardines, whole, live octopus, anchovies, calamari, herring, baccala (salted cod), you name it, LOL. I couldn't be in the room when grandma was prepping most of that stuff. I didn't eat most of those things (except sardine sandwiches) as a kid but suddenly stared liking them in my 20s. I did love raw clams on the half shell as a kid and learned young how to shuck them. Meanwhile my non-Italian dad never ate anything raw his entire life, including sushi. He was very happy ordering California roll and tonkatsu pork cutlet.

Oh and I ate lobster, shrimp and crab as a kid too. No problem with those. I have a special memory of being in a Chinese restaurant when I was about 8 - My mother ordered me a whole lobster Cantonese and the entire wait staff stood around marveling at this little kid that could crack open lobster like an adult, LOL. It was very reminiscent of that Chinese restaurant scene in "A Christmas Story".

[PRgal]

HK immigrants call people like me "Jook Sing" (translates to hollow bamboo, meaning neither culturally Chinese nor ethnically Anglo-Protestant.  I suppose it's a slur) because many of us won't touch certain traditional foods and have odd (to immigrants) beliefs.  I also don't like shrimp (unless it's in fried rice), lobster (I'll never survive in Nova Scotia or Maine) or crab (BC'ers will dislike me).  I WILL eat fish and scallops though.  Younger immigrants (i.e. Gen X and below) won't use it and we Jook Sings sometimes claim it as an identity and/or use it in a joking sort of way.  It's almost exclusively used by Boomers and older people.  

[Dimity]

1 hour ago, fastiller said:

I feel so sorry for people like that.

I used to think this was the result of parents who catered to fussy little kids  (and most kids are fussy at one time or another) and these fussy little kids grew up to be fussy adults.  Then my anything but fussy daughter and son-in-law had a kid who basically ate about 3 or 4 things and that was it.  He's gradually been adding to his diet (happy to report he will now eat pancakes) but I am realizing now that you can lead a kid to a well balanced meal, or an adventure in dining, but you can't make him eat it.

[StatisticalOutlier]

We had tongue sandwiches pretty often when I was a kid.  I knew they were tongue but didn't really think about it, I suppose.  I don't remember ever seeing the actual tongue before it was in my sandwich, until I was in college and got a hankering for tongue so I called my mom to find out how to cook it.

The first surprise was seeing it in the grocery store.  Yikes.  Didn't resemble at all the smooth thick slices that were sandwiched between slices of grocery store white bread slathered with Miracle Whip. 

The cooking instructions were to cram that monstrosity into a pot and boil it until nothing red came out of it when you poke it with a fork.  Yum!

I may have done that one more time after that, but have otherwise limited my tongue consumption to when other people make it.  But they always slice it thin, and I have a fond memory of the thick slabs.

[shapeshifter]

1 hour ago, fastiller said:

Which brings me to another friend of late husband's: this guy is so ONLY MEAT & POTATOES that he'll never venture to any 'ethnic' food other than Italian.  We offered to bring him for Indian, with the promise that we'd buy him a SECOND DINNER down the street at the Irish pub if he didn't like the Indian.  NOPE! He didn't even want to open his palate a tiny bit.  I feel so sorry for people like that.

If he's older (like me) he just might not be able to tolerate spicy foods anymore?
 

[Ohiopirate02]

18 minutes ago, Dimity said:

I used to think this was the result of parents who catered to fussy little kids  (and most kids are fussy at one time or another) and these fussy little kids grew up to be fussy adults.  Then my anything but fussy daughter and son-in-law had a kid who basically ate about 3 or 4 things and that was it.  He's gradually been adding to his diet (happy to report he will now eat pancakes) but I am realizing now that you can lead a kid to a well balanced meal, or an adventure in dining, but you can't make him eat it.

Many people with autism or ADHD also suffer from AFRID where they just cannot eat certain foods. Sometimes its a texture thing, sometimes it's the taste, whatever the reason they cannot eat the food. Plus other genetic things like having the cilantro tastes like soap gene or being a supertaster which makes eating certain foods literal torture. 

 

17 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

If he's older (like me) he just might not be able to tolerate spicy foods anymore?
 

My body started rejecting foods in my late 20s. I had to choose between starting my day with coffee or orange juice because I could no longer do both. I chose coffee. Then it was raw onions. Too much garlic can also cause some reflux, but that is why OTC antacids and proton-pump inhibitors exist. 

[Anela]

15 minutes ago, Ohiopirate02 said:

Many people with autism or ADHD also suffer from AFRID where they just cannot eat certain foods. Sometimes its a texture thing, sometimes it's the taste, whatever the reason they cannot eat the food. Plus other genetic things like having the cilantro tastes like soap gene or being a supertaster which makes eating certain foods literal torture. 

 

My body started rejecting foods in my late 20s. I had to choose between starting my day with coffee or orange juice because I could no longer do both. I chose coffee. Then it was raw onions. Too much garlic can also cause some reflux, but that is why OTC antacids and proton-pump inhibitors exist. 

My stomach started rejecting almost everything, fifteen years ago.  I’m doing a lot better now, and I can finally drink some orange juice again (I blend a supplement into it), but I’m still dealing with some reflux, too. 
 

I’ve never liked seafood. I did like beef heart when I was little, until I asked mum what it really was, and she said it was really a beef heart. 

[PRgal]

In addition to foods I already mentioned, I will also reject silken tofu (unless blended into, say, a smoothie), anything spicy (I'll do flavour, but not spicy.  Cantonese cuisine (which is the majority of my heritage) isn't spicy at all (unlike Szechuan) but very flavourful.  Chili sauce is used as a condiment, not in its cooking).  I DO like garlic and ginger though.  

[Bastet]

5 hours ago, lookeyloo said:

She also said they made the soup jell up better when cold.  Probably so.

Definitely.  I use a lot of bones in my chicken stock for that reason.

[Anela]

37 minutes ago, PRgal said:

In addition to foods I already mentioned, I will also reject silken tofu (unless blended into, say, a smoothie), anything spicy (I'll do flavour, but not spicy.  Cantonese cuisine (which is the majority of my heritage) isn't spicy at all (unlike Szechuan) but very flavourful.  Chili sauce is used as a condiment, not in its cooking).  I DO like garlic and ginger though.  

I have silken tofu in the fridge, to try in smoothies. I only use extra-firm tofu, if I'm looking to make vegan breakfast burritos. I haven't tried it in anything else, except for a soup that I started making ten years ago, from 101 Cookbooks. I like a lot of broth in my soups, and this one had something like ten cups of water, some mushrooms, onions, radishes, tofu, and white pepper. It's been a long time since I made it. I fixate on different soups. My favourite for years, was from The First Mess, only using chicken broth. This was the soup: https://web.archive.org/web/20190321200434/https://plus.google.com/110539697183616905118/posts/HxSsDncuHaG only I also use less orzo, because it soaks up all of the broth. I'll post the recipe in the food forum, in case the wayback archive disappears. But it's in The First Mess cookbook.

I just came back here, because I was looking up new hydration supplements. I don't like most of them, but I do like lemon dripdrop, and strawberry Liquid IV, but they've bumped that price up to at least $21, and I can't find the lemon dripdrop in most places. They have variety packs, and I don't like watermelon flavour, so I can't buy that variety pack, because I'm wasting them. Unless I could donate the individual packets somewhere, like the food pantry. That might be an idea. 

This was the recipe from 101 Cookbooks: https://www.101cookbooks.com/immunity-soup/

I was just thinking that I didn't like ginger, in the past. I add the powder to that one soup, but the soup I've been addicted to, this year, also has chopped fresh ginger in it, and I like it now. I also like to add ginger juice to lemon and honey, in a tea, if I'm sick (like a cold). 

[shapeshifter]

My Amazon package is showing as "6 stops away" on an animated green sled with red-wrapped presents.
Now "3 stops away."
It's a hard-to-find eyeglass case to replace the one that broke. 

[Caoimhe]

On 12/17/2024 at 4:10 PM, Mindthinkr said:

I went to the post office to mail something today. As I was standing there with some ready to go Christmas cards the postal lady said “Are those square cards?” I replied yes. Evidently square cards cost an extra 28 cents to mail. I had no idea, but now all my cards will require the extra postage. 

I did know that. One recent year my Christmas cards were square BUT I went out and bought rectangular envelopes to post them in. I made them myself so at least I didn’t have envelopes I couldn’t use and they went through with normal postage.  The odd thing is that square cards are everywhere in Ireland and they’re about all we get from the family, An Post doesn’t care but for whatever reason USPS does.

1 hour ago, shapeshifter said:

My Amazon package is showing as "6 stops away" on an animated green sled with red-wrapped presents.
Now "3 stops away."
It's a hard-to-find eyeglass case to replace the one that broke. 

My toothpaste just went from “3 stops away” to “delivered”. The little sleigh is so cute! Yes, my toothpaste has to come from Amazon because I didn’t buy enough when I was last in Ireland and the stuff I want isn’t in shops here.  Amazon and eBay are my saviours when I run out of things the US decides we can’t be trusted to use properly.

Edited Thursday at 01:03 AM by Caoimhe

[shapeshifter]

This was basically me 20-30 years ago:

• 

It must've been good enough. LOL

[Yeah No]

10 hours ago, StatisticalOutlier said:

We had tongue sandwiches pretty often when I was a kid.  I knew they were tongue but didn't really think about it, I suppose.  I don't remember ever seeing the actual tongue before it was in my sandwich, until I was in college and got a hankering for tongue so I called my mom to find out how to cook it.

My father used to buy something at the German deli called head cheese. He'd fry it up in a frying pan and we'd eat it together. I never asked what was in it, but it's basically all kinds of beef or pork offal (heart, liver, tongue, kidneys, cheek, head, ears, feet) suspended in aspic. Good thing I never asked! 😉

[Yeah No]

10 hours ago, Ohiopirate02 said:

Many people with autism or ADHD also suffer from AFRID where they just cannot eat certain foods. Sometimes its a texture thing, sometimes it's the taste, whatever the reason they cannot eat the food. Plus other genetic things like having the cilantro tastes like soap gene or being a supertaster which makes eating certain foods literal torture. 

I've known people like that. I once knew a man that was definitely somewhere on the spectrum (although he never admitted to being diagnosed), who only ate a few things. He'd eat hamburgers, steak, fries or mashed potatoes, spaghetti and red sauce, pizza, grilled cheese and of all things, New England style clam chowder (he was from Rhode Island). And that was literally IT. By the time he was 35 his doctor was begging him to add some vegetables to his diet, but he couldn't tolerate them. He managed to branch out into tomato juice and V-8 because they were similar to spaghetti sauce, which he ate on pasta. But his bloodwork was going in the wrong direction and he was gaining weight. I lost touch with him after that about 20 years ago but I always wonder if he ended up on those veggie pills that many people take today. I don't doubt that whatever he had it was not psychological but genetically caused.

My DNA tests have told me I'm a supertaster and that was no shock to me. When I was a kid I thought a lot of things tasted bitter and I avoided them but as I got older that changed a lot. I also found the taste of some foods too overwhelming but I think as we age that also dulls a bit.

10 hours ago, Ohiopirate02 said:

My body started rejecting foods in my late 20s. I had to choose between starting my day with coffee or orange juice because I could no longer do both. I chose coffee. Then it was raw onions. Too much garlic can also cause some reflux, but that is why OTC antacids and proton-pump inhibitors exist. 

Coffee and orange juice are both very high in acid so putting them together would be rough on anyone with acid reflux. I actually can't drink coffee at all thanks to a rare sensitivity to one specific acid that's found in coffee and pretty much nothing else. I found out that coffee has many rare acids in it and I just happen to be sensitive to one of them. I always knew I couldn't drink coffee but I never knew why until several years ago I found an article on it online. I am not alone, I found out. A lot of people that can't drink coffee are also sensitive to that one rare acid. So I have to buy acid free coffee online. I love coffee but that's the only way I can drink it. I can get away with the low acid stuff once in a while but even that would start to bother me if I drank it every day.

Interestingly, completely unrelated to that I became a tea drinker at a very tender age thanks to a pediatrician who recommended it to settle my stomach after a stomach bug. I instantly loved it and have been drinking it every day ever since. It wasn't until I got to be about 10 years old that I attempted to drink coffee and found out it bothered my stomach. Only back then no one knew about this sensitivity so it was a mystery to me for decades. And of course I love coffee. I used to be able to get away with a latte at Starbucks once in a while on a full stomach. I later found out that it was because a lot of the acid is roasted out of dark roast coffee and of course it's mixed with milk which buffered it. But I haven't had any lattes out of my house in a few years now.

[shapeshifter]

5 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

So I have to buy acid free coffee online.

Is it "peaberry" coffee? I use to get that.

6 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

a lot of the acid is roasted out of dark roast coffee

Good to know,

[Yeah No]

2 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

This was basically me 20-30 years ago:

• 

It must've been good enough. LOL

This reminded me that when I was younger I had a crippling fear of interviews and public speaking. I know that it probably cost me a few jobs, especially the ones I wanted the most. I took a course on interviewing techniques in grad. school (this was in a counseling program which could include career counseling) and it actually helped me somewhat as did therapy and anti-anxiety drugs but it still wasn't enough. I really wanted to beat it and did whatever I could to overcome it! Unfortunately by the time I suddenly got over it I was not in the job market anymore, although I think both situations would still pose a challenge for me. Yet another reason I didn't live up to my potential!

[shapeshifter]

2 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

This reminded me that when I was younger I had a crippling fear of interviews and public speaking. I know that it probably cost me a few jobs, especially the ones I wanted the most. I took a course on interviewing techniques in grad. school (this was in a counseling program which could include career counseling) and it actually helped me somewhat as did therapy and anti-anxiety drugs but it still wasn't enough. I really wanted to beat it and did whatever I could to overcome it! Unfortunately by the time I suddenly got over it I was not in the job market anymore, although I think both situations would still pose a challenge for me. Yet another reason I didn't live up to my potential!

I got over fear of public embarrassment after giving birth with half a dozen people staring at what was coming out of my vagina.

[Yeah No]

6 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

Is it "peaberry" coffee? I use to get that.

I have never heard of that but when I looked it up it turns out that peaberry refers to the unique round shape of the coffee bean and the fact that it has only one bean instead of two in it. It's a rare mutation. Other than that it's the same as regular coffee so I think the answer to that is "no". Acid reduced or acid free coffee can only be made after the fact in processes probably similar but different than those used to decaffeinate coffee.

9 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

16 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

a lot of the acid is roasted out of dark roast coffee

Good to know,

Yes, also the darker the roast the less caffeine too. People always assume that dark roast coffee is "stronger" than lighter roasts but it's actually the other way around for both caffeine and acid content.

[ebk57]

Just now, Yeah No said:

Yes, also the darker the roast the less caffeine too. People always assume that dark roast coffee is "stronger" than lighter roasts but it's actually the other way around for both caffeine and acid content.

We discovered this when we went to Italy and couldn't figure out why we had headaches after a day or so when we'd been drinking espresso non-stop.  So we made sure to start the day with a Cafe Americano and continue to drink espresso for the rest of the day.  Between glasses of wine.

[Yeah No]

5 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

I got over fear of public embarrassment after giving birth with half a dozen people staring at what was coming out of my vagina.

I actually think I could deal with that better if you can imagine that. This is pretty much a phobia with me. And I don't really have too many other true phobias. I had a phobia for going under anesthesia but I was forced to get over it when I had a very bad arm break about 8 years ago and needed surgery. Now I still have a little fear but it's nowhere near the horror it was for me in the beginning. I was literally resigned to dying the first time I was put under.

[Anela]

34 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

I've known people like that. I once knew a man that was definitely somewhere on the spectrum (although he never admitted to being diagnosed), who only ate a few things. He'd eat hamburgers, steak, fries or mashed potatoes, spaghetti and red sauce, pizza, grilled cheese and of all things, New England style clam chowder (he was from Rhode Island). And that was literally IT. By the time he was 35 his doctor was begging him to add some vegetables to his diet, but he couldn't tolerate them. He managed to branch out into tomato juice and V-8 because they were similar to spaghetti sauce, which he ate on pasta. But his bloodwork was going in the wrong direction and he was gaining weight. I lost touch with him after that about 20 years ago but I always wonder if he ended up on those veggie pills that many people take today. I don't doubt that whatever he had it was not psychological but genetically caused.

My DNA tests have told me I'm a supertaster and that was no shock to me. When I was a kid I thought a lot of things tasted bitter and I avoided them but as I got older that changed a lot. I also found the taste of some foods too overwhelming but I think as we age that also dulls a bit.

Coffee and orange juice are both very high in acid so putting them together would be rough on anyone with acid reflux. I actually can't drink coffee at all thanks to a rare sensitivity to one specific acid that's found in coffee and pretty much nothing else. I found out that coffee has many rare acids in it and I just happen to be sensitive to one of them. I always knew I couldn't drink coffee but I never knew why until several years ago I found an article on it online. I am not alone, I found out. A lot of people that can't drink coffee are also sensitive to that one rare acid. So I have to buy acid free coffee online. I love coffee but that's the only way I can drink it. I can get away with the low acid stuff once in a while but even that would start to bother me if I drank it every day.

Interestingly, completely unrelated to that I became a tea drinker at a very tender age thanks to a pediatrician who recommended it to settle my stomach after a stomach bug. I instantly loved it and have been drinking it every day ever since. It wasn't until I got to be about 10 years old that I attempted to drink coffee and found out it bothered my stomach. Only back then no one knew about this sensitivity so it was a mystery to me for decades. And of course I love coffee. I used to be able to get away with a latte at Starbucks once in a while on a full stomach. I later found out that it was because a lot of the acid is roasted out of dark roast coffee and of course it's mixed with milk which buffered it. But I haven't had any lattes out of my house in a few years now.

I don’t like coffee. I like the smell of it brewing, but not the taste. I’m drinking a constant comment, with milk and sugar, right now, because it isn’t as strong as my usual Yorkshire gold. This was a favourite, almost twenty years ago.  

after I was really sick, six years ago, I couldn’t handle my tea for a while. I had to go back to constant comment, and also iced chai.  My first trip out, I asked for one of those, because I had no appetite, and wasn’t going to buy any food.  It was gentle on my stomach, so I was able to keep it down. 

[Quof]

4 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

I got over fear of public embarrassment after giving birth with half a dozen people staring at what was coming out of my vagina

I hate when people say "Oh, by the time you get to that point, you don't even care who is looking at your business."

That's like saying "By the time you've been shot and stabbed, you don't care if you get kicked in the head."  

Getting to a point where you are so bereft of privacy and dignity that you just don't give a damn anymore who is looking at your genitals?  Don't try to convince me that is acceptable or even tolerable.

[EtheltoTillie]

23 hours ago, lookeyloo said:

My grandma, an old Jewish woman to me back then, (she was about 50 back then) came from Russia when she was 6, in 1905, to Central NJ. suburb of NYC.  Back then when I was old enough to go with her, we went to the chicken store where she picked out a live chicken and the fellow killed it and mostly plucked it and we went back home and she finished the plucking and sometimes there were egg yolks inside that she boiled with the chicken.  She saved the feet for herself because she thought they were a delicacy.  None of us complained.  She also said they made the soup jell up better when cold.  Probably so.

My aunt would also want to get the chicken feet to make the soup better.  My mother did not bother with that.  Neither of them still plucked live chickens, but their mother, my grandmother, did.  Grandma would have come to the US from Galitzia around 1912.  I like the chicken (and turkey) neck, myself.  No one else in the family likes them, so it's all for me me me!

17 hours ago, Bastet said:

Definitely.  I use a lot of bones in my chicken stock for that reason.

Extra wings are good for this.

Edited Thursday at 12:20 PM by EtheltoTillie

[EtheltoTillie]

I really miss my favorite dim sum restaurant.  There was a huge three-story palace in NYC Chinatown for years.  The kind of place with carts and special buffet tables.  It closed during the pandemic.  It used to be mobbed every weekend.  It was great for lunch if you worked at the courts.  The first time I went there I was on jury duty in the early 80s.  It's typical to make quick friendships with others in the jury pool.  An older Chinese gentleman took me and a young man there and helped us order.  

This restaurant has an outpost in my neighborhood now, but no carts! 

[Yeah No]

2 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

My aunt would also want to get the chicken feet to make the soup better.  My mother did not bother with that.  Neither of them still plucked live chickens, but their mother, my grandmother, did.  Grandma would have come to the US from Galitzia around 1912.  I like the chicken (and turkey) neck, myself.  No one else in the family likes them, so it's all for me me me!

Extra wings are good for this.

My mother used to take that giblet packet that came with turkeys and whole chickens and cook it up and we'd eat it together. It included the neck, heart, liver and I forget what else.

2 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

I really miss my favorite dim sum restaurant.  There was a huge three-story palace in NYC Chinatown for years.  The kind of place with carts and special buffet tables.  It closed during the pandemic.  It used to be mobbed every weekend.  It was great for lunch if you worked at the courts.  The first time I went there I was on jury duty in the early 80s.  It's typical to make quick friendships with others in the jury pool.  An older Chinese gentleman took me and a young man there and helped us order.  

This restaurant has an outpost in my neighborhood now, but no carts! 

I used to eat at a place very much like that in Chinatown all the time that I know closed although the name now escapes me. It sounds very familiar, although I know there were a few places like that that closed because of the pandemic. The last time I ate there about 8 years ago they still had the carts. What was the name of yours?

[fairffaxx]

5 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

My mother used to take that giblet packet that came with turkeys and whole chickens and cook it up and we'd eat it together. It included the neck, heart, liver and I forget what else.

Gizzard.  That was my dad's favorite part because it was full of gristle, which he described as "chewy".  We always gave the raw liver to the cats, who loved it.

[StatisticalOutlier]

2 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

The first time I went there I was on jury duty in the early 80s.  It's typical to make quick friendships with others in the jury pool.  An older Chinese gentleman took me and a young man there and helped us order.  

That's a perfect story that I bet wouldn't happen these days because everybody would be on their phones during every second of downtime.  And scrolling "restaurant near me" when the lunch break came.

[Yeah No]

33 minutes ago, fairffaxx said:

Gizzard.  That was my dad's favorite part because it was full of gristle, which he described as "chewy".  We always gave the raw liver to the cats, who loved it.

Thank you! The caffeine hadn't kicked in yet, lol. 😉 The funny thing is you couldn't get me to eat gizzard today. I'd eat the rest of it but not that. I can't explain that because usually it's the other way around, that you'd be less likely to eat stuff like that as a kid.

[Yeah No]

14 minutes ago, StatisticalOutlier said:

That's a perfect story that I bet wouldn't happen these days because everybody would be on their phones during every second of downtime.  And scrolling "restaurant near me" when the lunch break came.

The last time I served on jury duty up here in Hartford about 9 years ago it was like that, sadly. So I had nothing to do but become just like them.

I have a jury duty memory from around 1984 in the Bronx that was classic and wonderful in that old fashioned way. I served as an alternate on a case that probably should never have come to trial and just about everything about it and every person in it could have been part of a movie or a TV crime show. I made friends right away and when it went for deliberation I exchanged phone numbers with a few people to find out what happened (they found the defendant not guilty).

During the trial we all used to go to a deli that some here might know - the Court Deli right near the Bronx County Courthouse. I also remember playing cards every day with a group of older, southern Black men who used to call clubs "puppy toes", LOL. We'd talk about our lives and they'd give me their often touching, sage advice. I'll never forget it. This is the kind of connection we sadly don't have much of in our society anymore. Everyone is isolated from everyone else even in the same room. Online interactions are often shallow, one dimensional and give the wrong impression. It's no wonder our society is more polarized today than ever. 😢

[fastiller]

3 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

I really miss my favorite dim sum restaurant.  There was a huge three-story palace in NYC Chinatown for years.  The kind of place with carts and special buffet tables.  It closed during the pandemic.  It used to be mobbed every weekend.  It was great for lunch if you worked at the courts.  The first time I went there I was on jury duty in the early 80s.  It's typical to make quick friendships with others in the jury pool.  An older Chinese gentleman took me and a young man there and helped us order.  

This restaurant has an outpost in my neighborhood now, but no carts! 

=&=

59 minutes ago, Yeah No said:

 

I used to eat at a place very much like that in Chinatown all the time that I know closed although the name now escapes me. It sounds very familiar, although I know there were a few places like that that closed because of the pandemic. The last time I ate there about 8 years ago they still had the carts. What was the name of yours?

 

Jing Fong?  It's pretty big (like I think it takes up/took up a full city block and goes multi-story).  But it's still open, on Centre Street (maybe closed down during pandemic and reopened?) & has an uptown location too.  House of Joy on Pell does service by cart.

 

30 minutes ago, StatisticalOutlier said:

That's a perfect story that I bet wouldn't happen these days because everybody would be on their phones during every second of downtime.  And scrolling "restaurant near me" when the lunch break came.

The last jury I was on: Federal Criminal (RICO case), in Brooklyn; they made us leave our phones at the security desk in the courthouse lobby.
Quick story/comment about that: when the prosecution asked a witness how he knew the defendant was the one driving the getaway car at one of the two murders, the witness answered 'because I'm the one who shot the guy who died, and I jumped into defendant's car'.  It's weird having someone admit to having murdered someone in such a matter-of-fact way.

[EtheltoTillie]

41 minutes ago, fastiller said:

=&=

 

Jing Fong?  It's pretty big (like I think it takes up/took up a full city block and goes multi-story).  But it's still open, on Centre Street (maybe closed down during pandemic and reopened?) & has an uptown location too.  House of Joy on Pell does service by cart.

 

The last jury I was on: Federal Criminal (RICO case), in Brooklyn; they made us leave our phones at the security desk in the courthouse lobby.
Quick story/comment about that: when the prosecution asked a witness how he knew the defendant was the one driving the getaway car at one of the two murders, the witness answered 'because I'm the one who shot the guy who died, and I jumped into defendant's car'.  It's weird having someone admit to having murdered someone in such a matter-of-fact way.

Yes, Jing Fong.  Did it reopen?  I have to check this out!  But I do go to the one one the Upper West Side.

[Ohiopirate02]

45 minutes ago, fastiller said:

The last jury I was on: Federal Criminal (RICO case), in Brooklyn; they made us leave our phones at the security desk in the courthouse lobby.
Quick story/comment about that: when the prosecution asked a witness how he knew the defendant was the one driving the getaway car at one of the two murders, the witness answered 'because I'm the one who shot the guy who died, and I jumped into defendant's car'.  It's weird having someone admit to having murdered someone in such a matter-of-fact way.

One of my employees had jury duty at the local federal courthouse earlier this year, and the instructions told all prospective jurors to leave their phones in their cars or in the lockers provided. So, they do not even allow for you to scroll on your phone while waiting in the jury pool let alone if you actually get picked. 

I have only ever served on one jury and that whole experience was a ride. I wish I had a smartphone back then because then I would have a picture of me legally (I guess) holding a big** bag of cocaine. It was a drug case and in the state of Ohio all evidence goes into the jury room when the jury deliberates. We did allot some time before beginning the deliberations to peruse the evidence because when else are 12 law abiding citizens ever going to see that** much cocaine? 

 

**it was a gallon sized Ziplok bag about 2/3rds full inside of an evidence bag. 

[shapeshifter]

2 hours ago, fastiller said:

when the prosecution asked a witness how he knew the defendant was the one driving the getaway car at one of the two murders, the witness answered 'because I'm the one who shot the guy who died, and I jumped into defendant's car'.  It's weird having someone admit to having murdered someone in such a matter-of-fact way.

I was speed-reading through the comments here and had to go back and reread this when I thought you said the prosecution was asking a juror (instead of witness) “how he knew the defendant was the one driving the getaway car at one of the two murders” (because I thought the juror had improperly gotten info from their cell phone)…
and then I read: “the [juror] witness answered 'because I'm the one who shot the guy.”
Now that would be a twist on the usual L&O plot, LOL!!

ETA:
And now I'm imagining George Costanza (Seinfeld character) as one of the jury members, standing up and yelling at the confessing killer/jury member: “No Dim Sum for you!” (like the “Soup Nazi” episode guy).

Edited Thursday at 06:02 PM by shapeshifter

[EtheltoTillie]

Federal courts don't allow the jurors to bring in phones.  In NY the state courts allow anyone to bring in phones.

[StatisticalOutlier]

12 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

Federal courts don't allow the jurors to bring in phones.  In NY the state courts allow anyone to bring in phones.

Yeah, federal courts and state courts operate very differently.  The high-handedness of federal courts has always bugged me (although I agree with them about the phones). 

A loooong time ago a friend of mine served on a federal grand jury and men had to wear suit jackets.  This guy next to my friend warned her, "If this button goes, somebody's going to lose an eye."

[Yeah No]

14 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

Federal courts don't allow the jurors to bring in phones.  In NY the state courts allow anyone to bring in phones.

It's pretty much the same in CT according to my lawyer friend although cell phones are prohibited for use by jurors in the state courts while in court or deliberation.

[EtheltoTillie]

 

It's pretty much the same in CT according to my lawyer friend although cell phones are prohibited for use by jurors in the state courts while in court or deliberation.

Yes, no court will permit you to use phones while court is in session.  But you can have it in your bag, and of course use it while in the jury waiting room.

Apparently, there is a new policy for the NYC federal court.  The jurors CAN bring in their phones!

The federal court in the Southern District of New York used to be so extreme that until recently even the lawyers could not bring in phones.  This was a tremendous inconvenience.  If you were there for a conference, you could not even look at your calendar to schedule the next hearing.  One time I had to wait for the judge to call us for a special TRO hearing.  We had to wait in the street instead of being able to wait inside in the cafeteria.  Someone finally realized they had join the modern era. 

Edited Yest. at 03:11 PM by EtheltoTillie

[oliviabenson]

Russians eat tongue all the time. it even has a salad dish dedicated to tongue. I eat pork tongue a few times a year. cooked and sliced it makes a great cold cut sandwich. tastes better than you'd think.

chicken feet are common to eat in a popular dish: jellied meat... 

I'd eat anything once. 

 

 

Edited Friday at 03:01 PM by oliviabenson

[oliviabenson]

On 12/18/2024 at 10:42 PM, Yeah No said:

My father used to buy something at the German deli called head cheese. He'd fry it up in a frying pan and we'd eat it together. I never asked what was in it, but it's basically all kinds of beef or pork offal (heart, liver, tongue, kidneys, cheek, head, ears, feet) suspended in aspic. Good thing I never asked! 😉

I still buy head cheese in a Russian grocery store. I love it. my mom loved that and blood sausage! liverwurst was also a staple for both of us. mustard and tomato and liverwurst yum.

 

[oliviabenson]

all these good posts brought out my food memories!

my mom made soup with beef hearts and kidneys with barley and beans. it was delicious. boy food in Russia was whatever you found you ate. tongue included. my mom even used to roast goat of pig heads I don't remember. the brains she made into a spread for sandwiches. 

meat was a luxury there. boy I miss my mom's cooking especially matzo ball soup and home made pelmemi. she even made fresh pasta. I miss my mom. 

thank you USA for accepting me here as a kid.

chicken gizzards plus beans= chili lol 

 

[annzeepark914]

On 12/18/2024 at 11:48 AM, Dimity said:

I used to think this was the result of parents who catered to fussy little kids  (and most kids are fussy at one time or another) and these fussy little kids grew up to be fussy adults.  Then my anything but fussy daughter and son-in-law had a kid who basically ate about 3 or 4 things and that was it.  He's gradually been adding to his diet (happy to report he will now eat pancakes) but I am realizing now that you can lead a kid to a well balanced meal, or an adventure in dining, but you can't make him eat it.

My hairdresser was telling me about her 6 year old *very* picky eater. She thinks it's a texture issue. She said if things don't improve in a couple of years, she'll take her to an OT (my hairdresser's mom is a psychologist so she gets really good professional advice). 

[Anela]

It’s my dad’s day off, so I’m showering, and getting out of here.  I haven’t been able to go out all week.  He did the rest of the dishes. I’ve been fighting them for weeks, it feels like, but that’s partly because it took me a week to get the dishwasher going (twice).  

I’ve just remembered a few books I wanted from the library, too.  The last three from a series I started reading a year ago, by Susan Cooper? I need to look them up again.  

[PRgal]

2 hours ago, annzeepark914 said:

My hairdresser was telling me about her 6 year old *very* picky eater. She thinks it's a texture issue. She said if things don't improve in a couple of years, she'll take her to an OT (my hairdresser's mom is a psychologist so she gets really good professional advice). 

There's a little girl named Hannah who has ARFID.  She and her mom have an Instagram account where they bring awareness to the condition (and where she shows the world new food challenges to overcome ARFID).