Picnic reports?
well, I must admit to being disappointed. Jerry, Steve and I had the longest drive home from the picnic, yet when I arrived here I eagerly logged on to find whatever comments had already been posted....to find nothing. So, any reports? I do want to say how much we enjoyed the day, despite the cold and fog (do you realize that it was sunny five blocks west of there? Maybe next year's picnic should be in the panhandle....:-) Anyway, great food, great company, enjoyed the chocolate....I was really impressed with Steve knowing the last sample was Cadbury until I realized he had read the word Cadbury on one of the pieces...lol. My favorite dishes were probably the sausage stew, the squid salad, and the appetizer with the pate and fig spread on toast. Yum!!! I think we should do a recipe exchange sometime....
janet of reno
Sep 18, 2005 12:13AM
I got home and passed out in a long nap and just woke up, thus my failure to post before you did!
I had a great time, and I propose a recipe exchange on the Home Cooking board so we keep this part local, and share the recipes with everyone.
I specifically wanted to ask isimmer for her eggplant, lemon and tahini soup, and I think it was Jack? who brought the carrot pudding, those were great and there's no way I'd figure out how to make them on my own.
Glad to know the sausage stew went over well. That was mine. :} My favorites included (but were not limited to, I keep remembering other tasty things!) the appetizer you mentioned but also the eggplant and feta and the tuna empanadas and the lumpia (I'd never had them before!), the lasagne, the sticky rice!, the peanut noodle salad, the above mentioned soup and pudding. I was really impressed by the squid salad - every other time I've had that, it's been overcooked, but this was perfectly tender. Thumbs up whoever made it! I didn't get any of the corn, but I had a bite of the herbs at the bottom, yum. Need that recipe too. I loved a couple of the fruity salads, but I think they went less appreciated than they might have been due to the weather. Dessert wise, I think my favorites were some of the Mexican sweets and one of the rice things (not the one in the banana leaves, though that was good, but the other one).
One thing I noticed this year was the lack of creativity with the drinks. The wine was excellent, but we didn't seem to have anything homemade this year. Last year, I remember a Mexican corn drink that was really unusual, and I had been looking forward to something like that again. Not that this was a big deal, I was way too busy eating my way through everything else.... Maybe next year I'll make an agua fresca or something.
Thanks again to Stephanie for the chocolate tasting! I'd been wanting to do this on my own for a long time. Turns out, my favorites were ones I'd never heard of before (11 and 13). I'll have to track them down. I had a great time helping with the tasting last year, and I think I'd like to do that again next year.
Overall, what a great time! There was nothing I didn't like, I could have been happy eating a much bigger serving of pretty much everything. I particularly enjoyed meeting isimmer, Rochelle (sp?), and Jenny? (the person I chatted with about communications), and it's always fun to get a chance to talk with Windy and Melanie. Like the food, I wished I could have spent more time with everyone!
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The carrot pudding was made by David Boyd. Squid salad by Al@Fairfax. Hopes that helps.
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The CH picnic was the second stop to a long trifecta of a day for me (I had to drive to San Leandro from Vallejo in the morning to drop off some stuff for another picnic that my parents were attending, then I had to rush off after the CH picnic to babysit my sister's kids afterward), so it took awhile to get online to post here.
I do want to say that as a first-timer to any of the CH events, I want to say it was a pleasure talking to many of you and finally putting faces to many of the handles on the board here.
I appreciated all the wonderful food, not to mention the efforts by some to get some things to the picnic (such as the folks who came from overseas to bring Mexican Independence Day sweets and the bibingka pinipig right from the Philippines.) While I'm not particularly into chocolate, Stephanie's tasting event was really well done.
I thought the appetizers as a whole shined, with my faves being the tuna empenadas, sausage stew, and the lumpias. I also particularly loved the lasagne and the freshly wok-fried corn (I'm gonna' be looking to purchase some of that Hawaiian salt soon to try it at home.)
I also definitely won't forget the revealing of the formerly year-long frozen Central Grocery muffaletta courtesy of Melanie (it looked like only a few brave souls decided to sample the thing, from what I saw.)
Lastly, I'm glad you liked my mom's biko recipe, Autumn - I admit it's a lot better coming hot out of the oven than sitting around chilled by the SF weather for several hours (which was probably the biggest bummer of the whole event.)
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Linked below is the thread I've started on the Home Cooking board for recipe requests and exchanges from the picnic. That is the place to ask for all those wonderful recipes.
Link: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/...
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I just got home from a fund raiser dinner. Will post tomorrow, after I had a good night sleep. Too much great food not enough energy.
Steve would make a great reporter in dugging up the facts. Oh yeah, he is a reporter.
But I will say the two longest trip made by desserts at a hounds pinic has to be the sweet rice pudding from the PI's and Mexican candies from Mexico City.
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just reread my post and I hope it isn't misunderstood: I was NOT disappointed in the picnic, only in the fact that it took five or six hours for the first reports to appear....lol. Interesting that the things autumn wanted recipes for were all things I never got to taste....maybe I'll have to make them sometime! Forgot to mention how much I loved the fried chicken! I'll post a recipe a little later on for the powa (I'm not really even sure how to spell it!) if I can get Jerry to part with it. Jerry chose powa (the Indian dish that was yellow in color: it contains rice flakes and potatoes, among other things...) because he figured that not only does it travel well, but also no one would know if it wasn't made correctly :-) Autumn, I would love that stew recipe.....
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Of course, I meant it was sunny six blocks EAST of the picnic area.....I exaggerate, but not much. To keep the discussion local, I just wanted to point out that I'm not totally confused when it comes to Bay Area geography. I grew up there, afterall.
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well, some of us actually got hungry and went to dinner afterwards (Hubby thought we were crazy! :-)) But that is a topic for another post!
Anyway, to help future Googlers, I am linking to Caitlin's post above, and hope folks will respond there with your thoughts on the picnic and on home cooking with recipes and recipe requests!
Link: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/...
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Hey, it's hard work, sitting out in the fog and eating paté and drinking wine all afternoon. Those noodles and fried chicken hit the spot.
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I just wanted to say I enjoyed to picnic as well and I appreciate all the work that went into it, by both the organizers and the people who brought food. It's hard to pick out a favorite food since they were all so good. I would have to say that watching the corn being cooked may be my favorite thing because it was so simple. Even a bachelor like me can make it. Like I said at the picnic, gourmet cooking for me means first I bring the water to a boil, *then* I drop in the hot dog.
I learned on the way home that Melanie Wong was the person who brought the wine. I thought it was from several lpeople. So I'd like to give a shout out to Melanie for providing hundreds of dollars worth of wine. I tried several and enjoyed them, especially the Le Cigar Volant from before Randall Grahm got bored with Rhones. After I had my wine quota for the afternoon, I spied the 1995 Rioja reserve (Or was it a grand reserve?) and was sorry I hadn't seen that earlier. I was ready to steal, er, decant it into a bottle with a cap to try later. My plans are next year at the picnic to grill authentic Basque chorizo and Rioja would be perfect with it.
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I don't think Randall Grahm has lost interest in Rhone wines. He's still making Cigare Volant (plus half a dozen other Rhone-style wines), and it's still good.
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