There's some great food blogs to add to the list.

julie/julia project Julie takes on Julia Child's recipes from "Mastering the Art of French cooking. All of them.

what we ate "A weblog of culinary experiences". Great recipes, photos and they're honest when something doesn't work. We'll learn more from that than from perfect recipes.

cooking with gas A food blog with a .fr domain just has to be good.

Pertelote I give this gracious English person a link, not only because she said nice things about me, but because she writes a darn good food blog.

I've come down with something that makes me not want to do stuff. So my cooking lately has become very simplified. I bought one of those huge slabs of non-descript salmon at a local supermarket (Dominic's) for $9 and will eat portions of it, sauteed in a non-stick pan, with a couple of mushrooms, a cherry tomato or two and some butter and cream (tablespoon of each) and some juliened spinach thrown in at the end. I will eat this meal over and over until the salmon flank is gone or too old, or until I think I have the energy to come up with something else. Perhaps at some point I'll photograph it, if I recover.

Too busy to do any actual writing, so I'll just let some other do it for me:

Some great stuff on winter squash, from Cooking with the Seasons.

JP's Restuarant a restuarant idea blog, inspired by The Making of a Restuarant. Is this a whole new genre of Food Blogs? What I really want to see is a blog about the day-to-day happenings in a working restuarant. Especially if it focuses on the creative process of the always changing menu of today's fine restuarants. I suppose doing such a blog would be difficult not just because of the lack of time, but also because of the whole 'honesty in blogging' issue. How can you describe what didn't work on the menu, or how you dealt with a problem customer without getting yourself or the restuarant in trouble?

Marketing trends and new packaged foods. Includes Popcorn Chips, bottled water that both you and your pet can enjoy and blue-colored SpongeBob SquarePants macaroni and cheese.

I though I'd reprint Matthew's comment from the last post and include some links:

1) The hamburger has its origin in a medieval culinary practice popular among warring Mongolian and Turkic tribes known as Tartars: low quality, tough meat from Asia cattle grazing on the Russian steppes was shredded to make it more palatable and digestible. As the violent Tartars derived their name from the infernal abyss, Tartarus, of Greek mythology, they in turn gave their name to the phrase "to catch a tartar" meaning to attack a superior opponent, and to the shredded raw meat dish, tartar steak. When this became popular in the seaside town of Hamburg, it became known as hamburg steak. (Panati's Extrordinary beginings of Ordinary things)

Hamburg Steak La Tartare recipe

Evolution of the Burger

"1916:

Short-order cook, J. Walter Anderson, later owner and creator of White Castle, creates the first hamburger bun. Prior to 1916, hamburgers were generally served between two slices of bread."

2)In 1862, Edmund McIlhenny, a successful New Orleans banker, fled with his wife when the Union Army entered the city. They took refuge on Avery Island, where her family owned a salt-mining business. Salt, though, was vital in preserving meat for the war's troops, and in 1863 Union forces invaded the island, capturing the mines. The McIlhennys fled to Texas, and returning at wars end, found their plantation ruined, their mansion plundered. One posession remained: a crop of cpsicum hot peppers. McIlhenny chopped them up, added vinegar, salt and let them stew in barrels for several days, poured them into emtpy cologne bottles and had invented Tabasco sauce. (also Panatis).

Here's a very complete history of the man and his sauce.

Excavating the Birthplace of Tabasco. Archealogy on Avery Island

A few War related Tabasco facts from Wacky Uses:

During the Vietnam war, the McIlhenny Company sent thousands of copies of the Charley Ration Cookbook, filled with recipes for spicing up C-rations with Tabasco pepper sauce, wrapped around two-ounce bottles of Tabasco pepper sauce in waterproof canisters.

During Operation Desert Storm, a miniature bottle of Tabasco pepper sauce was included in one out of every three ration kits sent to troops in the Gulf. The United States military now packs Tabasco pepper sauce in every ration kit.

Other food-war connections include the canning process which "is a product of the Napoleonic wars. Malnutrition was rampant among the 18th century French armed forces. As Napoleon prepared for his Russian campaign, he searched for a new and better means of preserving food for his troops and offered a prize of 12,000 francs to anyone who could find one. Nicolas Appert, a Parisian candy maker, was awarded the prize in 1809."

And for those of you looking for recipes: Civil War recipes including such favorites as hardtack and a coffee subsitute using acorns roasted with bacon fat.

It's amazing the connections you'll find on the Web. During our panel discussion yesterday AKMA mentioned a connection with Jonathon Delacour from Australia, that happened because of my Thai Curry recipe.

But in Delacour's comment to his mention of the connection, is a recommendation from the author of the Aardvark speaks, for The Curry House, "a Web magazine for curry fans" and a great resource for all things curry. Extensive FAQs on the site explains everything form the history and usage of the word curry to how to open a coconut.

We take a break in our normal programming to bring you a commercial anouncement:

Any readers in the Chicago area should come out to the Sulzer Branch of the Chicago Public Library at 4455 N. Lincoln, Saturday October 5, where I'll be attempting to explain what a weblog is, and how to start one. Also there will be a panel of some very smart and prominent bloggers that will no doubt tell me that I don't know what I'm talking about. Come on out, it's free it'll be fun.

Learn more at my weblog weblog

End of commercial

Nicely designed sushinyc has a good sushi etiquette page "Most chopsticks come attached together in a paper packet. After sliding off the paper, separate the chopsticks with a snap. Do not rub the sticks together to remove any splintered wood. Doing so implies that the chef is cheap."

Lunchboxes.com kind of food related.

Thank God for Bacon

coffeecorner a blog with recipes, but more importantly, a PHP script called findabeer. You enter the closest London tube stop for up to five friends, then enter the tube stop for up to five pubs, and it'll give you the closest one. Somebody will need to do this for the 'el'.

A few food blogs found recently.

A foodie by nature

tasting menu

beerblog

wineanorak This British wine blog actaully got Robert Parker's approval