Hashbrowns, ham and eggs

Ack! Life has interfered with Lori K's Cafe this week. To make up for it, here's the yummy hashbrowns I made this morning. They didn't look as neat as this picture, but I'm sure they tasted better.

Lori K's hashbrowns with eggs and ham

Serves 2

Ingredients

2 medium white potatoes

1 medium yellow onion

2 tablespoons oil

1 tablespoon butter

Garlic salt and pepper

2-4 free-range eggs

Sea salt

2 thin slices ham (I used ham-off-the-bone from the Harris Teeter deli)

Instructions

Grate the potatoes into a bowl of cold water. When completed, swish all the gratings around in the bowl and drain well. Chop the onion.

Heat a large cast-iron skillet to medium-high heat, then lower it to medium-low heat and add the oil. Swish it around so that all the surface and up the sides a half-inch are coated. Add the potatoes in a clump in the middle, then move them out to the sides. Sprinkle the onions on top. Cut the butter into small cubes and distribute evenly atop the potatoes and onions. Season with garlic salt and pepper.

Cook for 5-10 minutes until the edges of the potatoes are brown. Cut the round of potatoes into quarter sections by slicing across the pan with a metal spatula, then slicing again perpendicular to the first slice. Flip each quarter so the toasty side is now up. Make a little well in the center of each potato quarter and put an egg in each (or 2 of them, for 1 egg apiece). Season with pepper and a grind of sea salt. Cook for 10 minutes, or until the whites have set.

When almost ready to serve, heat the ham slices for 30 seconds in the microwave.

Put the ham on the plate, put the hashbrowns with the eggs atop them over the ham, and garnish with parsley. Add hot sauce if you'd like. Serve immediately with strong coffee.

Picture worth... not much

Americans must not expect truth in advertising. How else can one explain how food that looks so good in TV and magazine ads looks so bad when you unwrap it?

In the Guardian today, an interesting food feature:

The buccaneering spirit of the internet is never more evident than on sites and blogs where ordinary, blameless consumers take the manufacturers of dodgy, sub-standard or just plain rubbish products to task. In the world of food, this often means pointing out the subtle differences between the advertised images of products and the actual reality, hence the theme of our gallery this week.

Germany and the USA are the settings for most of the well-directed ire represented, but there are plenty of examples right here in the UK too just waiting to be exposed. So the next time you're served a particularly nasty-looking burger or buy something from a shop which doesn't live up to the picture on the package, take a pic and add it to our Flickr group, or just email it straight over. We'll compile the results to form a British rogues gallery in a few weeks' time.

To see the slideshow, click here. The photo is of a McDonald's sausage burrito.

Fight hunger by eating out this week

Want to fight childhood hunger in America in an easy way? Share Our Strength's Great American Dine Out is going on this week, Sept. 20-26. You go to a participating restaurant and the restaurant donates a portion of the proceeds to Share Our Strength. Couldn't be simpler.

The only local restaurant in Charlottesville that is participating is the Blue Moon Diner (where I've had several outstanding meals), although a few chain restaurants are participating as well. For a full list of restaurants across the nation, go here.

You can search for restaurants near you by zip code.

A nice place to hang out

We went for a late lunch to Guadalajara on Market Street in Charlottesville, and although it's not the best food I've ever had, it was passable - and sitting out in front, the music blasting and sipping on a margarita, it just felt right.

Better yet, I'm still full as I contemplate a happy night of sleep.

Animated food: "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs"

Can't wait to see this food movie! Check out today's Huffington Post review by Zorianna Kit:

The forecast for the animated feature Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs could very well be sunny with a chance of a big hit.

Based on the children's book of the same name about a town where food falls like rain, writer-directors Christopher Miller and Phil Lord took the basic premise and brilliantly crafted an origin-type story. The result is an intricate, colorful and delicious world that is strong on character, big on laughs and clever on plot.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/zorianna-kit/movie-review-cloudy-with_b_288102.html

Rubber rubs some the wrong way

Latex allergies are not common, but we should be aware that some do suffer from them and adjust accordingly when preparing food for strangers. I got this letter after my recent tips column on using thin latex gloves to protect the hands when making meatloaf and using the heavy ones for dishwashing to open jars.

Lori,
I caught your tips on using natural rubber latex gloves or plastic when preparing food, washing utensils, or opening a tough jar lid. It would be great for us with natural rubber latex allergy if you would promote the use of plastic, vinyl, or nitrile gloves when preparing food or handling dishes and utensils used to prepare foods. It really is unnecessary to use latex when there are so many alternatives available. There are latex free heavy duty nitrile dishwashing gloves made that serve the same purpose as the regular latex dishwashing gloves without the possibility of inducing a severe latex allergic reaction. Many with this allergy do not discover it until it has become life threatening. Often it mimics food poisoning, or a bad case of stomach flu after eating latex contaminated food.

Most people understand the severity of peanut allergies, and would not let a peanut allergic person eat a food prepared on a counter or off dishes that had been contaminated with peanuts. Likewise, those of us with natural rubber latex allergy react with life threatening anaphylaxis if we are served foods contaminated with latex proteins.

I wanted to let you know that NIOSH publications recommends that latex gloves not be used routinely when other options are available.
http://www.cdc.gov/Niosh/98-113.html

Six states have passed laws to ban the use of latex gloves in food service due to the allergens present that are transferred to food, utensils, and dishes that cause severe allergic reactions to latex. The gloves also sensitize individuals resulting in workers compensation claims due to developing an allergy to natural rubber latex.
http://www.latexallergyresources.org/Newsletter/newsletterArticle.cfm?NewsletterID=18

Information at:
The American Latex Allergy Association: Provides resources for people allergic to natural rubber latex, including latex free alternative product lists, informational packets, support groups, and a newsletter. http://www.latexallergyresources.org

Latex Allergy Links
Comprehensive current data base of resources, msg. board,
"What's New" is a good link to check
http://latexallergylinks.tripod.com/

Many of us are devastated after developing natural rubber latex allergy, I wasn't a healthcare worker, or someone who thought they were at high risk of developing this allergy. I did have a few surgeries that exposed me to this allergen, now I am totally disabled due to the severity of this allergy. I can no longer even attempt to eat at a restaurant due to the many foods bought from suppliers that use latex gloves, or the use of latex gloves in restaurants that contaminate my food.

My mission is to keep others safe from developing this allergy, and to offer safe places to eat for others not as severely affected by this allergy as I am.
I own a web based support group for those allergic to natural rubber latex, sadly our membership continues to grow: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LAForum/

~ Ora Ruppel
Owner/moderator LAForum
lafer@sbcglobal.net

Korean BBQ in Charlottesville

I haven't ventured to Bamboo House or the other Korean restaurants in town yet, but I did pick up an astoundingly good batch of Korean barbecue at a most unlikely place: a booth selling grass-fed beef at the City Market Saturday before last. Not only were the thin slices of beef so tender that they practically melted in our mouths, but the seasonings were exquisite. We ate the meat so quickly that we forgot the little container of hot sauce (a sweet-hot kind of bean paste) that came with it.

I bring up Korean barbecue not because I have any expertise in judging a good batch from bad, but from noticing that Korean-influenced cuisine is on the rise in the United States. According to today's National Restaurant News, Charley's Grilled Subs, an Ohio-based chain of about 300 eateries that has mainly featured Philly-style cheese steaks, has added a Korean-inspired Spicy Asian BBQ sub to its lineup. That's pretty mainstream America, folks. (The closest Charley's to Charlottesville is in Fort Lee, by the way.)

And add these developments to the equation:

• The Kogi BBQ to Go chain of taco trucks have become something of a sensation in Los Angeles.
• New York-based Korean-American chef and restaurateur David Chang won last year’s James Beard Foundation Award for best chef in New York, and his fine-dining restaurant Momofuku Ko won this year’s Beard Award for the country’s best new restaurant.
• Corey Lee, chef de cuisine of The French Laundry in Napa Valley, is stepping out (finally!) from the shadow of Thomas Keller. Lee, who also is Korean-American, plans to open a Korean-influenced fine-dining restaurant in San Francisco, according to NRN.