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A key to this recipe is finding a good Italian Sausage that one is happy with. Being from Chicago, I have a preference for a sweet Italian Sausage. Johnsonville's Sweet in the US would be a good example of this. I have communicated with a few other home cooks over at PA and none of us have come up with one. I went so far as to try making my own. I came close, but it was a fair amount of work and I could only make a bulk package, as opposed to sausages. I am currently ordering a savory variety from Jet Italian and it is not bad, but still not quite what I want. https://jetitaliandeli.com/collections/sausages/products/salsiccia I was given a tip the other day, that Makro carries something called a Fennel Sausage that may be closer to what I am looking for. Supposedly this item is in the center freezer compartments just past where the milk is found. I will check out and report back.

Chicken Scarpiello This is a favorite recipe of mine to make at home a few times a year. The ingredients (chicken, mushrooms, bell pepper, garlic, capers, pepperochinos) can be cut up ahead of time and added as needed. I would treat this as a stir fry recipe where one has all ingredients ready to go before starting the cooking. The temp control is critical before putting into the oven. https://thisishowicook.com/chicken-scarpariello/ A few pics: Out of the the oven: Side dish of some Sea Shell Pasta (Conchiglie, Orecchiette works as well). Plated

So true. The Thais are paper happy. The Filipinos are paper insane.

Once upon a time I opened a bank account in the PI. It was a royal pain in the ass. Years later my reason for opening it was no longer valid, so I closed it. That took 4 months and the costs of what I had to supply cost me $200 US and at least two weeks of my effort over time. The later angers me the most. They would send me a form that could not be returned electronically, so I would have to send it back DHL. Then I would get a new message saying that the form had been replaced and I had to use the new form. On and on. And all of this occurred with an HSBC location, which is a modern bank. I also once upon a time, purchased an airplane ticket from Cebu Pacific. I paid with a credit card. The charge went straight through. When I got to the airport (in Manila for a flight to Tacloban), I was told that the credit card charge had not been accepted. Because I was meeting someone (ex-wife at this point who was already in-route to Tacloban) I had no choice but to purchase another ticket. I did not want for her to be standing in Tacloban figuring out what to do. It took me 6 months to work this out with Cebu Pacific. At one point they e-mailed me saying that they could not refund my money because their e-mail severer had crashed destroying my evidence. I was only able to finally recoup my money by presenting the evidence to CitiBank (my credit card bank at the time), who reversed the charge and went after Cebu Pacific. Short message is try not to get involved with any potential legal matters within the PI. They are out to get ya.

Agreed - I was not really aware of him utill he started recording with Slash (about 2013?). After that I began following his work. btw - I think that Slash is an under appreciated guitar player. I saw a recent video where Kennedy looked a little run down. I hope my worst thoughts are not true and he was just suffering from a little road fatigue.

Myles Kennedy with Slash - "Back from Cali".

Myles Kennedy does Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" with Jeff Buckley's guitar.

A lot of people like the "Disturbed" version of the Simon and Garfunkel classic "The Sounds of Silence" and it is good. The concert where Myles Kennedy joined "Disturbed" is much better.

And another

Up late tonight taking in some very oldy moldies.

Had it on my list. Good to hear.

New Mexico Chile Rubbed Steak In the US I enjoyed preparing both Latin and Southwestern US dishes. It is difficult to find some of the ingredients for these dishes in Thailand. The primary problem is the savory peppers (Poblano, Ancho, New Mexico) that are central to Latin recipes. Thailand most certainly has a complete arsenal of hot peppers, but nothing that I have been able to find in the way of savory Chiles. When I was in the US late last Fall, I brought back large bags of Anchos and New Mexico Chiles. Had to cry a little today, as I opened the cabinet to discover that my Anchos had gotten moldy. I have tried growing Poblanos on the balcony of my condo with no success. I am on the shady side of the building and on a higher floor that causes problems where the wind prevents the buds from forming. Any pepper needs plenty of sunshine and also must be out of the range of high winds. The high winds knock the flowers off of the plant before they can form a pepper. The good news was that I was looking for the New Mexico Chiles in the cabinet in order to make this dish. New Mexico Rubbed Steak.pdf I hope the pdf format is acceptable to those who might have interest. This recipe was originally published by America's Test Kitchen (ATK), but they have gone through some ownership changes so that their recipes are no longer available for free on the net. This is a write-up from some other guys and as near as I can tell is the same as the ATK recipe. The recipe turned out well and the GF gave me a thumbs up on it. I used Hangar Steak, which is an imperfect choice for this recipe. Strip (close to Hangar) or a thick Sirloin (could not find) are better choices. I had to play with the cooking times for the steak a little as I had a thinner cut of meat than what the recipe was written for. Obviously, I do not have a Weber living on an upper floor of a Jomtien condo. I think the neighbors might take issue with me if I drifted hot sparks their way. I use a Lodge Grill Pan on the stove top and that works reasonably well. A few pics. Cooking on the grill Off of the grill For a side dish I made what I call Spicy-Cheesy Potatoes. This is something I came up with myself Cut up a few Red Potatoes into 1.5 " pieces. Place within a large enough piece of aluminum foil to wrap them up with a seal and season with Salt, Black Pepper, Red Pepper Flakes, and Celery Salt. Roast in the oven at 375 F for one hour. Everyone's oven is different. Mine runs cool because it is older. Let it cool a little and then garnish with Sharp Cheddar Cheese. Re-wrap loosely and return to the oven at 200 F, until ready to serve.

Came through pretty strong in Jomtien as well.

Moroccan Sweet Potato and Chicken Soup Usually, going into the weekend I make a pot of soup and then work my way through it for lunches during the week. This weekend I made the title recipe and it turned out very good. https://www.eatingwell.com/recipe/251278/moroccan-chicken-sweet-potato-soup/ I did change up just a little a few things in the recipe. I thought the cooking times were a little too brief. The author seemed to be going for healthier under cooked vegetables. Me I like a little softer veg product, certainly not mushy. I did not add the garlic to the first pass and instead cooked the onions for 5 minutes instead of 3 minutes. I added the garlic (doubling the stated amount) with the spices and cooked that for less than a minute more. I also increased the amount of Cayenne Pepper for 1/4 tsp to 1/2 tsp. I extended some of the remaining cooking times by a few minutes in the remainder of the steps. A key to this and any soup recipe is the quality of the broth that is used. I have found the canned broths available in the greater Pattaya area to be a little short of terrible. They are fatty and loaded with salt. I choose to make my own broth. Once or twice a month I make about 1.5 quarts, freezing what is not soon to be used. The recipe I use is from Alton Brown. https://www.cookingchanneltv.com/recipes/alton-brown/chicken-soup-la-pressure-reloaded-8750044 This recipe requires a 6 qt or plus pressure cooker, not an inexpensive piece of kitchen gear. I think I paid about 15,000 for mine at Lazada. I use it frequently. If one does not want to take the plunge on a piece of equipment like this, one could make chicken broth via a different method. I did this for years back in the US. This method is an all day affair, but with minimal labor IMO. Also from Alton Brown. https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/chicken-stock-recipe-1914051 An improvement to the second method is to brown the chicken in the oven at about 375 F for 30 minutes. This reduces the amount of fat that one has to eliminate later on in the process. Anyway, getting back finally to the topic, here is a pic of the title soup. It was delicious.

We were having lunch with some friends in Phuket at Kata Beach. This pic was snapped.

Schezwan Beef I tried a new recipe at home tonight. It turned out well, but needs a few adjustments and improvements. https://www.lovefood.com/recipes/58323/low-fat-sichuan-beef-recipe What I noticed just from reading through the recipe was that IMO it needed a little more punch to be called a Schezwan recipe, which are known for being spicy and flavorful. I did the following: I cut the marinade by 1 TBSP of Soy Sauce and replaced that with 1 TBSP of Fish Sauce. I went a little heavier (not much) on the ingredients of Ginger, Garlic, Schezwan Peppercorns, and 5 Spice Chinese seasoning. Be careful not to get too heavy with the Schezwan Pepercorns. They do carry. I added 1/2 tsp of Sambal Olak (Thai Red Chili Paste) to the marinade after the beef was removed. The recipe turned out very well. Both the GF and I really liked it except that the beef was a little too chewy. I used a decent Flat Iron cut from Sloane's. It needed to be tenderized before adding to the marinade. I usually do this by using an America's Test Kitchen (ATK ) method of placing the beef in a bath of 1 TBSP of water and 1 TSP of Baking Soda for 10 minutes and then rinsing before adding to the marinade I will do next time and report back. In any case a few pics. Finished Cooking Plated

I have 49 invites available. If FBWU runs out contact me, but I have to have some idea (board exchange is fine) as to who you are.

A temple in Isan

I use IPT to download content for the list of potential video entertainment that I maintain. This unlocks me from being dedicated to sources (Netflix, Amazon, etc.). IPT has a pretty decent inventory of material. Technically, this is illegal in some countries, but nobody seems to really give a shit. Anyway, I watched what I thought was a very good movie today. The Orphanage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Orphanage_(2007_film) The movie was filmed in Spain and has a Spanish audio track. There are copies that have English subs. I speak some Spanish, so that also made it more enjoyable. If anyone has difficulties getting a copy with hard coded English subs, I can usually find decent subtitles from these guys. https://subscene.com/browse/popular/all/1 I noticed in the credits that Guillermo Del Toro (Narcos and others) had some association with the movie. I usually like most any video project that he is part of. IMDB - 7.4

Oh wow, we disagree and that is perfectly fine. I watched this movie the year that Joaquin Phoenix was up for the Oscar for it, and I thought he should have won. I forget who did. Agreed, that all of the Batman and other super hero stuff is getting rather tiring (predictable might be a better word). I really did not love this movie, but I thought that Phoenix's portrayal of "The Joker" was very well done.

Personally, I would like the thread title to be changed to "Video Entertainent", so that more Movies/TV Series/ and Documentaries are included. I am a 73 year old retiree, who never had much time to watch video entertainment while I was working. Now that I am retired, I am catching up on the last 20 years of things that I have missed. I scan lists of recommendations and make my personal list of things that I might like. The other day I pulled a documentary from that list that just wow'd me. "Touching the Void" is well worth a watch. It has an IMDB of 8.0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touching_the_Void_(film) What these guys went through is an incredible story of human perseverance.

Actually, we went to an initial bar opening night last Saturday in Rompho. The complex looked to be trying to make a bit of a comeback. It was nothing like the pre-Covid days, but there were a fair number of people around. The more active places were the ones closer to Jomtien Second Road. The back is still pretty dark.

Beef Bourguignon This write-up was started in Word. When I brought it into 24x7, a few formatting errors showed up that I could not edit out. It looks a little sloppy in a few places, but I think that the overall content does not suffer. I always liked this dish. It is a fair amount of work, so I only prepare it once or twice a year. My preparation is based on Ina Garten’s version of the recipe, which is much easier than some others that I have tried. https://theviewfromgreatisland.com/beef-bourguignon-ina-garten-39-on-gourmets-list-of-women-game-changers/#recipe I had a prolonged exchange with one of the guys over at PA who is a retired chef. Claims he hates cooking now and goes out most of the time. However, he offered some experienced advice and I incorporated his suggestions into the version of the recipe in the link above. If you do not want to go through this effort, L’Auberge over on third road (about 1 km South of Pattaya Tai) makes a very good version of this dish. If you visit L’Auberge, be sure to try his Potatoes Au Gratin as a side dish. If you make the full version of the recipe, you will easily have enough food for 6 people. I only had 2 people, so I cut everything in half. I still had plenty of leftovers. The changes from the recipe in the link are as follows: Soak the cut-up Beef pieces in red wine for two hours before beginning. Since I am using a lesser amount of Beef, I only used 1/2 a bottle of wine. I do this in a sealed plastic bag that I put into the fridge. \ Drain the wine but save it for later in the overall process. Pat the beef with paper towels and then sprinkle with salt and pepper. Then lightly coat the beef with flour before browning the beef. Tossing each of 3 batches of beef each with 1 TBSP of the flour in a plastic bag works well for me. I remove the veggies from the pot before flambeing the Cognac. Also, move the pot to an open area before the flambe. Otherwise I follow the recipe. A few tips to keep in mind are: u · Cut up your veggies (mirepoix) to a moderate size. This is a French country stew. Do NOT drown the stew in wine. The beef pieces should show above the liquid when it goes into the oven. · This is a lengthy overall process, so I break it into many steps. As an example, I prepare the ingredients a little at a time throughout the day. Things you can do like this are cut-up the beef, slice the mushrooms, cut-up the bacon lardons, cut up the veggies, and get your cooking gear and non-frigerated ingredients on the counter ready to go. Do not get yourself to the dining table all worn out. It detracts from enjoying time with your guests. · Do NOT put the cooked bacon and even more so the browned beef on paper towels. You want those liquids in the stew. Overall this turned out really well. The GF loved it. The only disappointment was the pearl onions. If one can find frozen pearl onions in the Pattaya area, you are doing better than me. I tried some cocktail onions that I bought from Lazada. They were just wrong. The good news was that the taste did not really get into the stew and I just pushed them to the side of the plate. The GF seemed to like them. in any case I can get around the pearl onion problem with the following recipe. https://www.finecooking.com/ingredient/pearl-onions? T This is once again a little more labor, but could be done the day before. I have used this method before and it works well enough. A few pics The Flambe Ready to go into the oven. Notice that the beef tops are above the liquid for the most part. Ready to eat I made egg noodles from the US as a side fish. I brought back a few packages of these late last year. Plated

Chinese Chicken Wraps I have made a dish based upon this recipe a dozen or so times over the years. https://myyearwithchris.wordpress.com/2012/05/05/chinese-chicken-lettuce-wraps/ The link is a review of an America's Test Kitchen (ATK) recipe by the same name. The ATK version is no longer available for free on the internet. I have made a fair number of changes to this recipe. These are: I no longer make the lettuce wrap version. I have made these and they are good in their own right. The lettuce wraps version is healthier (lettuce vs rice), but they were always falling apart and I really like the way the sauce tastes over some Jasmine Rice. For the sauce I use only 50% of the soy sauce and replace the reduction with fish sauce. For the sauce I use a tsp of Sambal Olek (red chili garlic sauce) instead of the red pepper flakes. I double the garlic in the stir fry portion. I do not use water chestnuts in the stir fry portion. I do not like them all that much. I increase the celery a little to maintain the crunch factor. A few things to note. The author of the article in the link above said that the recipe tasted a little bland, but that may have been due to his being out of Hoisen Sauce. The Hoisen Sauce indeed is a critical ingredient. It's flavor greatly heightens the other subtler seasonings. In order to make this recipe, I use a high end Kitchen Aid food processor to grind the chicken. This is an expensive piece of equipment. There are smaller much less expensive ones available from Lazada (1200 THB I think). If you use one of the less expensive ones, you will need to process more than 2 batches of chicken and also scrape down the sides of the grinder after every few (3 or 4) pulses. The GF really likes this dish as well. A few pics: In the pan Plated

Here is a pic of my American Chicken Soup.