Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

i grew up not eating a lot of raw stuff, like raw oysters straight from the shell, sashimi etc, and lots more "exotic" and "fancy" food along those lines. i convinced myself (and told everyone else) that it was because i didn't like it, but since i've grown up, i've found it's really only because my mom hated the stuff and so even when i tasted any of it i was psyching myself up not to like it. so no, not a lot of weird food i'd eat that anyone else thought was odd.

except maybe this one dessert i'd whip up for myself any time of the day (or night) - i'd take about a 1 inch slice of frozen chocolate sara lee pound cake, douse it in half a cup of fridge-cold milk, and mash the hell out of it until it was like this blackish sludgy-soup. i LOVED it. and everyone i forced into trying it hated it to hell and back and told me i was insane.

i still eat it now (when i can sneak a sara lee pound cake into my groceries without anyone noticing), but i've long grown out of trying to convince anyone else to try it. :\

my favourite's pretty standard - sautéed bacon and ham! Sometimes with some onions that have been sweated down, but not caramelised.

A great sorta-vegetarian one I made for my mushroom loving friends was caramelised red onions (with some balsamic), wilted spinach, and mushrooms sautéed in butter, olive oil and a touch of garlic.

Shallot oil!! Slice them up and gently fry them in a little mild-flavoured oil (try canola or safflower) over a very low heat. They should just go translucent and very very soft - not brown at all. After about 10-15 minutes of the gentle heating, drain the oil, reserving it (you can now use your shallot oil as the basis of stir fries, or in salad dressings, or anything else you'd want to use shallots in but maybe don't want BITS of shallots or want a very mild fragrance instead of strong flavour).

Don't throw away the shallots either though - they too can be tossed into your guacamole or any of the other ideas above, or you can season them and stir through a little red wine vinegar (or reduce them with some red wine) to make some "shallot confit" which will keep in the fridge for a week or so and goes great on sandwiches, savoury tarts, or anything else you can imagine!

No way, you need to cook the rice in the rendered fat from the chicken, not canola oil! The best way to do it is to pull out the big lumps of fat from the cavity of the chicken before you start cooking it, and render that out. Top it up with extra oil only if you aren't able to render out enough fat to coat the rice grains well before cooking.

microplane and my knives. :)

I *love* strawberry shortcake! But I have to say - and I know this is going to get me slammed by the purists - that I prefer the versions done with home-made, fluffy sponge cakes, at least when it's in the 8 or 9-inch size. Otherwise, I normally make smallish ones using plain cream scones

haha, my favourite poster in one of these local-styled coffee places is one that goes, "Want a skinny latte? Stop at half a cup!" :)