Aw. I'm kind of bummed. I'd been counting on Tom Kovach to provide a nearly endless supply of amusement, or at least a weekly incentive to write.

But this week, Tom is *totally* phoning it in. His entire "column," even including the "documentary" footnote, is a mere 440 words! C'mon, Tom, you can do better.

I guess I'll just have to make fun of Tom at... not length. Here we go:

every person in the Bible has a name that carries a meaning relevant to the story. My favorite example is from 1st Samuel 15, where a man named Nabal picked a fight with David's militia. The name Nabal means "fool."

In what languague, Tom? Ancient Ligurian? Ancient Frankish? Ancient *something*, come ON, Tom. Hey, the word "Tom" means "He who pretends to do research but in fact only just whines about how he totally wrote a book but his enemies destroyed it, he swears he totally did write it" in ancient Cowfecesish. Those ancient Cowfecesians, they packed a lot of meaning into just a few letters.

I have written previously about the meaning of the name of Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmedi-Nejad. (Although it is commonly written as all one word, his family name is actually a compound word.) Every time the president of Iran signs his paycheck, he looks down and reads in Farsi: "the praiseworthy descendant of the one most highly to be praised." Is it any wonder, then, that he has such an enormous ego as to consider himself prophetically ordained to destroy Israel?

Well... kind of, yes. I do wonder. If we're assuming that the dude is taking his name as his life's mission, exactly where does "my awesome father had an awesome father (and so on)" have anything to do with Israel? I mean yes, Arabs and Islam are not fond of Israel, but also where the hell does it say anything about that in the dude's name? Honestly, what the heck does "My name is Mr. Awesome, Son of Awesomer, Grandson of Awesomest," have to do with the theoretical destruction of Israel? Pretty much nothing. It's also a setup to fail. Would you name your kid "The Best Running Back Ever Smith"? No way. If you're a truly badass Islamist, you name your kid "Too Weak and Puny and Faithless To Push Israel Into the Sea." That's a Boy Named Jihad, right there.

In most cultures of the world, the naming of children is taken very seriously. Many cultures do as the Hebrews did during Bible times, attaching prophetic significance to a person's name. That is also the case with the Luo people of the Nyanza province of southwestern Kenya.

As opposed to here, where naming children is a big ol' party game for everybody to enjoy.

Er, unless they are Latinos, who often name their male children Jesus. I'm pretty sure that Jesus is a pretty big name in Christianity. Oh wait, this could be awesome - maybe they'll all have a huge Jesus-off to decide exactly which one of them gets to rise and be at the right hand and stuff.

I'll buy a ticket for the Tournament of Jesuses, but only if it's going to be at Staples Center so I can take the train. Parking at the Honda Center totally blows.

That is the ethnic group from which American presidential candidate Senator Barack Hussein Obama descends. The senator's father, a Muslim, gave his son names from the Arabic language. The first name Barack means "blessing." (Oddly, in the Hebrew language, the same word, barak, means "lightning." For the Bible significance, see Luke 10:18.) The senator's middle name means "handsome." But, the last name Obama does not come from Arabic. It comes from the Luo language.

It means "crooked."¹ (I have provided the bizarre footnote below. It doesn't exactly shed a lot of light on things.)

Really. Obama means "crooked," "zigzag," or "not in a straight line." So, the meaning of his entire name — as it would be understood by diplomats from Africa or the Arab world — is: "the blessing from the handsome one that is crooked."

So... is his name prophetic, or mere coincidence?

Er... only if those diplomats from Africa or the Arab world - who you haven't particularly, Tom, I'm just noting, who you haven't really bothered to care about until now... only if they happen to know a language which you were unable to find any translation for until you were able to locate a theoretical Kenyan professor. So... what about the Arabs? Do they happen to speak an obscure dialect of Kenyan?

(All of this is assuming that Tom has actually done due diligence and isn't making this translation up. His maps don't exactly lend a lot of credence to that theory.)

Hey Tom, in the language of the ethnic group from which Yours Truly is descended, the word "craic," pronounced "crack," means "fun" or "a good time." So therefore, those of Irish extraction created crack to give people a good time, possibly. Damn you, Pipey McSmokeypants!

¹Obtaining a reliable translation from the Luo language — which is spoken by only 13 percent of the people of Kenya — proved difficult. There is no complete Luo-English dictionary. Two professors of African studies at universities in the United States were not able to provide the translation. The staff of the Embassy of Kenya was reluctant to even discuss the Luo language with me, much less provide a translation. (As it turns out, there has been ethnic rioting in the street, because the supporters of the second-place presidential candidate believe the election was "stolen" by fraud. The second-place candidate, and the rioters, came from the Luo tribe. Hmmmmmmmm.) A reliable translation finally came from a professor of linguistics that grew up in Kenya and is a Luo speaker.

I have recently discovered a new source of truly wacky amusement: Tom Kovach. Tom Kovach, in (presumably) his own words, "is a former USAF Blue Beret, and has written for several online publications. In 2006, he published his first book. He is also an inventor, a horse wrangler, a certified paralegal, and a network talk-radio host. He is available to speak to your group."

My heavens, wherever does he find the time to write what is almost certainly an unpaid or almost nearly unpaid column for the mighty internet juggernaut that is www.renewamerica.us? In between the horse wrangling, inventing, and paralegaling? Also, I should note that in the Air Force, the Blue Berets are not Special Forces, they are military policemen. It just sounds cooler to call yourself a "Blue Beret."

Anyway, none of that matters. The dude is a total WACKALOON, a fundamentalist but who takes it a lot farther with numerological analysis of the Bible and wayyyyy farther. Amusingly so, if you are in the proper frame of mind. I refer you to his most recent column, of July 18 2008. I will reproduce much of it here, for purposes of sheer and utter mockery. So let's begin:

This writer has received an increased amount of hate mail for daring to proclaim that last month's "unprecedented" dry-lightning storm in California was an act of God that will precede another act of God.

Er... aren't all lighting storms, strikes, etc, acts of god? Even if not, don't all acts of God pretty much necessarily precede other acts of God? Never mind, never mind...

This writer also dared to proclaim the notable timing relationship between the lightning storm and California's resumption of same-sex "marriage." This writer also dared to proclaim that the lightning storm that triggered more than 800 wildfires in a single day — a day that had significance of its own, both in calendar position and in events — was part of a specific sequence of events predicted in the Bible as the start of the seven-year period called The Tribulation. This writer also dared to predict that the sequence — written in Revelation 8:5 — says that the next thing to happen would be an earthquake.

People scoffed.

I didn't actually scoff at that, but only because I only recently came upon this column. I was, if you will, a future scoffer. I continue to scoff, though, if for no other reason than your determination to refer to yourself as "this writer." It doesn't actually make you sound more journalistic, dude. Also, uh, the decision to resume same-sex marriage happened, like, a month ago. Almost exactly a month ago, as I read my calendar. So was God, like, too busy? I mean, if He'd wanted to make His point, wouldn't He have started whooping ass IMMEDIATELY? Or did God totally drop the Ball on That One, sorry, it won't Happen again?

The Holy Bible says that, in the End Times, people will scoff.

The folks who wrote the Holy Bible are pretty clever, because they were aware that people have *always* scoffed and will continue to do so. So hey, why not say that the existence of scoffers proves your point?

Skipping just a bit (I assure you I am leaving nothing of import out, and feel free to check the original column if you think I am)...

In previous columns, this writer posited that the wildfires could heat up the rock formations, thus creating geological instability. A later column showed that, indeed, the official US Geological Survey earthquake prediction maps indicated that the wildfire zone was more than three thousand times more likely to have an earthquake three weeks after the fires started that it was the day before the fires started.

I should note that the words "three thousand times" in that paragraph were hyperlinked. But the link was broken. HMMmmmmmmm. Of course, um... heating up the rock formations that exist several miles below the surface of the earth is maybe not all that scientifically proven. In fact, of course, it is lots of rain, which filters down to the geological rock formations and makes everything all slippy-slidy that *actually* causes earthquakes.¹

So now let's skip more of the boring crap and get to the really amusing part of this: The part where we get to draw! Or, as the wackaloon puts it, the defeat of a "strange god" that dares to defy the God of the Bible.

It starts with this image:

This is a map of earthquakes within the past few days in the area of Asti², California. And, as everyone knows, "Asti" means "Hill" in the ancient Ligurian language! ANCIENT! LIGURIAN!

Now, what most people would take from this is that there are earthquake faults all throughout California and this particular area experienced some tiny, tiny quakes. Why, they might even be foreshocks. But nobody knows... except GOD of course! God is totally messing with your mind. Observe, and may I remind you of Mr. Kovach's reminder that this is all terribly coincidental with the "resumption of same-sex marriage" (which happened a month ago):

The above map shows a closer view of the Asti quake cluster zone. In the closer view, it is easier to see how many quakes have occurred recently in this small area. But, if a person had been watching this same map several times per day, for a month, then that person would see what this writer will now highlight for the reader.


Oh ho, scoffers! Looky there! God is drawing on the map! Also, God is very selective in which points He notes and which ones He ignores. And look further, ye scoffers:



Look, it's a crescent! If I draw on the map to include a couple of random events outside the big cluster that I'm citing as my evidence of a big earthquake to come, look! Look, I'm drawing on the map! It's a CRESCENT! You know how I know? Because I drew it that way!


It's totally a crescent! Or anyway it's a banana, and we know how God feels about South American "Banana" Republics.

But it gets even better, because now we're not even going to try to map things, we're just going to stick stuff on the map and say God did it.

The above picture shows the same two arc lines, only now connected and filled in with white color. Clearly visible is a crescent-moon shape. The crescent is the symbol of Islam. But, this crescent is oriented exactly upside-down and backwards of the Islamic crescent. Or, you know, a banana. In religious iconography, that would be the equivalent of a public slap in the face. Only an all-powerful God could have arranged earthquakes to appear on a map in the shape of an upside-down-and-backwards Islamic crescent. Er... why didn't He make it a perfect crescent shape, with exactly perfect, say, 4.0 earthquakes in an actual, y'know, CRESCENT shape? Never mind. But, wait, there's more. Islamic flags actually contain two celestial features: a crescent moon and a star. So, where is the star? Remember the mention of the idol worship at the Bohemian Grove? This writer maintains, as does the Holy Bible, that idol worship is an activity inspired by Satan — even if the participants do not recognize Satan, and think that they are praying to "someone else." Let's insert a Satanic star (point-down) over the location of the Bohemian Grove.



Well yes, let's just go ahead and do that, shall we? I mean why not? It could have been almost any other shape in the world, but why not a star? It's just you and me here, so let's go ahead and make up the rules! Only Satanists use star symbols! Nobody else has ever used a star symbol except Satanists. And you can tell because the Satanist star symbol is a sort of flabby star symbol, with the point down... wait... WHICH point down?

Anyway, the point is. If you've got photoshop and some USGS maps, you can draw on a map and say that God wanted them there as a warning about, apparently, gay marriage, which would possibly be... er... reverse Islam. And who, indeed, can gainsay your wisdom?

Now, I am well aware that I'm not God. I'm not a flying purple unicorn, either. But, let's just say for the sake of argument that I am an all-powerful being.

Now, as an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-controlling being, I decide that I am miffed about gay dudes getting it on legally (as opposed to in secret, which is how I really like it because hey, I'm a deity, but secret and illicit sex is *hot*).

So, now. How do I send My message?

A) Flinging lightning bolts to incinerate all gay people immediately

B) Telling people to stop being gay, then not bothering to do anything about it, just designating some assholes to talk for Me about how much it irritates Me

C) Creating everybody as they are and loving them no matter what

D) Sending a series of small earthquakes and forest fires which with a lot of imagination could look vaguely crescent-ish (NO, NOT like a banana, shut up), then Photoshop (yeah, I created Photoshop JUST FOR THIS) a star onto that map, to show an image equivalent to seeing a flag with the Islamic crescent and star on a flag from the wrong side: BOOYAH! Backwards crescent and star = deliberate if extremely complicated insult to Islam, designed to show My displeasure not about gay people getting it on, but about gay people getting married. 'Cause everybody knows that Islam is all about the gay-loving. MAN! If *that* doesn't show those homos, I don't know what will!

Don't trust anyone who plumps for "C." They're probably queer for queers. Stick with "B," it gets you donations from the faithful.



¹This is not even remotely true.

²"In 1881, Andrea Sbarboro established two communities, Asti and Chianti, as part of his Italian Swiss Agricultural Colony. Asti was named after the city in northern Italy." - from the Wikipedia entry on "Asti" (Not explained: What the heck is "Italian Swiss.")

As with all things, this one can be blamed on my wife, who recently purchased me several books, among which was Stephen J. Gould's Rocks of Ages.

And now follows a very long and boring rant about the meaning of science, religion, ethics, philosophy, and other boring stuff. ( Click at the peril of being deeply, deeply bored, but please don't complain that you were bored - You. Were. Warned. )

I wonder what's the amount of human hair (from haircuts^*) that is thrown away every day? Presumably the useful measure here would be weight. Not out of any particular environmental concern, I assume it's biodegradable. Just a random thought that occurred to me.

No, I'm not stoned, I'm just weird.

^*I'm sure quite a lot of it goes down drains, falls onto floors and sidewalks, and etc. But for sheer concentrated mass I bet most of it comes from barbershops and hair salons.

Here's something cool that I'd never heard about, that I think you might like to know about as well. I cannot vouch for the scientific accuracy of the following, but it's cool anyway. According to the authors of The Book of General Ignorance, John Lloyd and John Mitchinson, the loudest thing in the ocean is... shrimp. Not the loudest individual creature - that honor belongs on land or in air to the blue whale, whose incredibly low-frequency and loud song has been shown to travel up to 10,000 miles. But the loudest possible noise, they say, is the combined sound of shrimp.

The sound of the "shrimp layer" is the only natural noise that can white out a submarine's sonar, deafening the operators through their headphones.

...even adjusting for the fact that sound travels five times faster in water, equates to about 160 decibels in air: considerably louder than a jet taking off (140 dB) or the human threshold of pain. Some observers have compared it to everyone in the world frying bacon at the same time [and wouldn't that be a fine thing? World Bacon Day! -ed].

The noise is caused by trillions of shrimps snapping their single oversized claw all at once...

But it's even more interesting than it sounds. Video shot at 40,000 frames per second shows clearly that the noise occurs 700 microseconds after the claw has snapped shut. The noise comes from burst bubbles, not the shutting of the claw itself, an effect known as cavitation.

It works like this. A small bump on one side of the claw fits neatly into a groove on the other side. The claw is shut so rapidly that a jet of water traveling at 62 mph squirts out, fast enough to create expanding bubbles of water vapor. When the water slows down and normal pressure is restored, the bubbles collapse, creating intense heat (as high as 20,000 degrees Celsius) [that'd be 36,000 degrees Fahrenheit -ed], a loud pop, and light - this last being a very rare phenomenon called sonoluminescence, where sound generates light.

Shrimps use this noise to stun prey, communicate, and find mates. As well as ruining sonar, the sharp, hot intense noise makes dents in ships' propellers.

Preliminary web research would indicate that the shrimp layer is far from widespread, and in fact only exists in a few places. Also I really have to wonder at that 20,000 degrees Celsius figure - that's a temperature three times hotter than the surface of the sun (though admittedly well below the thousand of millions degrees produced, we think, in the center of the sun). Still, presumably the shrimp don't usually manage to produce quite so much heat, or they only manage to do it in sub-microscopic areas. And it's a good thing, or they'd boil the seas dry, at least in their local areas.

Also, can sound actually make a dent in a propeller, or are ships' crews blaming poor navigation on "well, I don't know... maybe it was the shrimps!" Nice try, Whiskey McScurvy... maybe? I dunno. Further research is necessary.

Nevertheless, it seems possible that shrimp can kick our ass just by being shrimp and doing their shrimpy thing. Just one more reason for the rest of you to get on with eating them. I'd help, but I'm allergic.

Also, this is pretty neat: http://www.autoblog.com/2007/12/18/virtual-cable-takes-your-gps-and-raises-you-a-heads-up-display/

Today as part of an "all-hands" meeting which I didn't belong at but had to attend anyway, I was treated to a presentation on health illiteracy. Most of you will probably be unsurprised to learn that a good 30% of the US population is functionally illiterate - they may, painfully, be able to read, but comprehension is nil. They couldn't find an intersection on a map. Etc, etc. Naturally, complicated health information or prescription instructions are even worse, and may be so for the more literate of us. Among the stories given to demonstrate this problem was that of the guy who received a bottle of 100 30-milligram blood pressure pills. The instructions were "take 30 mg. every other day." After 5 days he'd taken 90 of them, landed himself in the ICU, and died.

So naturally all this is bad and expensive for the health-care system and health-care professionals must take steps and all of that... but somewhere deep inside my evil lizard brain formed the thought "Well, maybe we're weeding out the stupid people." Immediately followed by the even more evil thought "Won't work - people generally reach breeding age before getting sick enough to need to see a doctor. Gonna have to try something else."

*sigh* They say confession is good for the soul. Maybe so, although I'm finding that it's definitely good for padding out my journal.

So. I asked Robert Wolke, author of the book What Einstein Told His Cook and What Einstein Told His Cook 2, about this crazy "putting oil in pasta water" idea. I didn't really expect a response, but it turns out that I actually got one.

What he had to say may surprise you (as it did me, just a tiny bit), though largely, of course, I was entirely validated.

According to Professor Wolke (and I trust him, as he is a teacher and writer of and about chemistry and physics as well as a great cook):

As you recognize, the surface tension theory is hooey. And so are the foam
theories, including those that say oil keeps the water from boiling over.
The only reason to add oil is to help keep the noodles from sticking to one
another during the early stages of cooking. They'll tend to stick if
(a)there isn't enough water or (b) it's not boiling vigorously enough to
keep them agitated, or (c) you don't stir them enough to keep them
separated until they lose some of their stickiness. If you have some oil on
the surface, you can use it to lubricate the noodles by lifting them up
through the oil layer a few times. But it's not necessary if you have lots
of vigorously boiling water and you stir the noodles for the first minute
or so.

I have to admit I was a bit surprised to learn that theoretically you *could* keep the pasta from sticking together IF AND ONLY IF you lifted the pasta out of the water some.

Which, honestly, if anybody had ever said they did, I would have grudgingly admitted that maybe there was some lubrication effect there, but people mostly just pour some oil on top of the water and expect things to be all lubed up. Lest you doubt, I have seen this exact scenario happen at least several times.

In any case, Dr. Wolke entirely, essentially, agreed with me, and that's what is important. If you have enough water, you may as well save your expensive olive oil. But even if you don't, for some reason, have enough water, just stir it some for the first minute or so. Problem freakin' solved - minus the oil. As for foam, the oil doesn't do a damned bit of good.

At long last, the answers to the Cooking 100 Mid-Term Exam. I also unscreened the comments, if you'd like to go back and see what people said.

#1: When cooking pasta, you should put a bit of olive oil into the water to help keep the pasta from sticking together.

Answer: False.

This is a pretty common myth, and I've gotten into arguments with people before about it. But oil and water don't mix. All you're doing is creating an oil slick on top of the water. The best way to keep your pasta from sticking together is to use a large enough pot and plenty of water, to give the starches that are released from the pasta a place to go.

#2: Speaking of boiling pasta, you should put some salt in the water because:

Answer: It seasons the pasta

Most of you got this right, but you'd be surprised at the number of people who really believe that putting salt in lowers the boiling point of the water and makes the pasta cook faster. As boffo pointed out, the first thing wrong with that is the physics. Salt raises the boiling point of the water, so theoretically the water would be hotter than it could normally get, thus cooking the pasta faster. However, a few teaspoons of salt in 6 quarts of water raises the temperature by an almost immeasurable amount - your pasta may cook faster by a few milliseconds. In plain English, "It doesn't do a damned bit of good." So salt in the water doesn't make the pasta cook faster, but it will definitely make your pasta taste better.

#3: When shopping for ingredients in the supermarket for a tomato sauce, you should almost always purchase:

Answer: Diced or crushed canned tomatoes

There may have been some confusion - when I said "Whole tomatoes," I was referring to whole, fresh tomatoes, not whole canned tomatoes. Sorry if I messed you up. Anyway. The reason to get canned tomatoes instead of the fresh ones is that canned tomatoes are picked at the absolute peak of freshness, and that tasty goodness is sealed into the can. Whearas except for a month or so out of the year, "fresh" tomatoes at the market are out of season, flavorless softballs.

#4: Whether you are roasting, pan-frying, braising, or even stewing meat, you should always brown the meat on all sides first because:

Answer: The browned bits taste good

This one fooled quite a few people. Sometimes the simple, stupid-sounding answer is right. If I'd said "The Maillard reaction which occurs when meat proteins are exposed to high, direct heat creates complex flavor molecules" I bet a lot more people would have guessed that. No amount of crust will keep any of the juices in. Can't be done. But those brown crunchy bits on the outside sure are deeeelicious.

#5: You're just finishing a delicate sauce (probably involving minced scallions and cognac - yes, THAT delicate), but on tasting, you find it needs a bit of seasoning to be perfect. What kind of salt should you use?

Answer: Any of the above are fine

If it's a soup, a sauce, or anything where the salt is going to dissolve, it doesn't matter what kind of salt you use. NaCl is NaCl. Even fancy-ass Sea Salt With Minerals From The Finest Seas In France are generally about 99.85% pure NaCl. I don't care WHAT the minerals are, if they make up only 0.15% by weight in a pinch of salt, you aren't going to taste them. You probably wouldn't even taste them if you put the stuff directly on your tongue. (But you might fool yourself into thinking you do, because by god you did NOT just waste 15 dollars on a little bottle of salt.)

Note: None of this is to say that there aren't some times when you do want to use a specific kind of salt - table salt for baking, kosher salt for seasoning meat, sea salt if you want some crunchy salt bombs on your tomatoes, stuff like that. (But I still think it's dumb to pay extra for minerals, a.k.a dirt. Oh, and here's a dirty little secret the Salt Barons aren't telling you - a lot of stuff that's sold as Sea Salt actually comes from mines. Doesn't bother me any personally, but you foodies may want to rethink your salt purchases.)

#6: Speaking of salt, if you oversalt a soup, an excellent remedy is to throw a halved raw potato in for a few minutes to soak up some of that salt:

Answer: False

It just doesn't.

#7: Short-order cooks cooking burgers on the grill often press down or put flat weights on the patties. Why?

Answer: It makes the burger cook faster, at the expense of losing some of the juiciness

Most everybody got this one right. Short-order cooks don't really care how good your burger is, if they can get it onto a plate 30 seconds faster. Can't say as I blame them, but I shake my fist at them nonetheless.

#8: When cleaning mushrooms, you should only ever wipe them with a damp towel - rinsing them in water causes them to absorb water, which can make them rubbery when cooked.

Answer: False

A lot of people, people who should know better, believe this. As misskaz notes, just about every chef on every show on the Food Network will tell you to never wash your mushrooms. And every single one of them is wrong. The only way to get your mushrooms to absorb any significant quantity of water would be to leave them soaking in a bowl of water for half an hour or something similarly ridiculous. A quick rinse under the faucet will not harm your mushrooms in the slightest.

#9: In most applications, fresh herbs are better than dried herbs.

Answer: True

Yep. There are some places where you want dried - if you're making a rub, or in something that is going to slow cook for a long time, a few other times. But mostly, you want your herbs to have as much as possible of the oils they contain which give them, and your food, a distinctive flavor.

#10: Red wine is often called for in tomato sauces because the alcohol in the wine reacts with the tomatoes to release compounds which help to flavor the sauce.

Answer: False

This is another one that a lot of people believe. While there *are* compounds in tomatoes (called "esters," I think) that can be released by alcohol, the proportion of alcohol in wine is too low to do much, at least in the quantities you'd put into a sauce. You'd need something ridiculous like 10 bottles of wine to get any appreciable amount of the esters out. The same goes for vodka in tomato sauces - there just isn't enough alcohol to do the job. So why put wine or other booze in? Because it cooks down and tastes good. There's plenty of non-tomato sauces that benefit from a bit of booze.

#11: When grilling with charcoal, regular briquette charcoal is pretty much the same as hardwood chunk charcoal.

Answer: False

I'd actually meant for this to be true, but I neglected to mention that I was talking about "how it makes the food taste." However, the two charcoals certainly do not act the same as far as how hot they burn and how long they last, so as written this is totally false.

#12: ADVANCED EXTRA CREDIT #1: In five (5) words or less, what is the basic technique for making a roux?

Got some pretty amusing answers to this one, which you're welcome to see for yourself. Here's my answer, in four words: Cook flour in fat. That's the absolute basic technique. Depending on what you're doing with it, the proportions of flour to fat can be different, the fat can be anything from butter to vegetable oil to bacon grease, and you can cook it anywhere from barely any browner than the flour itself all the way to a deep rich brown.

Why would you do this? To thicken stew, or gumbo, or soup, or sauce, or etc. If you don't cook the flour before adding liquid ingredients, it tastes floury and is likely to clump up on you. It won't cook in a dry pan, either. The fat and cooked flour also add flavor and color to your concoction. The darker you cook it, the more flavor is developed, but the less liquid it can thicken.

ADVANCED EXTRA CREDIT #2: What's in a mirepoix?

Celery, onions, and carrots. All chopped up. Props to the few of you who gave the proportions, which are 1 part carrots, 1 part celery, and 2 parts onion. I guess it's quicker to say "mirepoix" than all of that. Plus you feel all chef-ly saying "And now, I make the mirepoix." Laughing Gallicly through your nose is optional.

It's the usual French veggies used as aromatics (er, as flavoring) in just about everything. Sometimes you eat them, sometimes they're only there to give up their flavor and are removed.

Interestingly, a lot of cultures have a similar "trinity" of veggies that are commonly used - Cajun cooking uses onions, bell peppers, and celery that they actually call the Holy Trinity. Spanish cooking has the sofrito, which is garlic, onion, and tomato. Indian, Chinese, and many other cultures have these trinities.

So there you have it, the answers! Let the kibbitzing commence.

That may be the best title I've ever had in all my years of LiveJournal entries.

Anyway. I'm not grading this "exam." In fact the less you know about cooking, the more I hope you'll answer as many of these questions as you can. In a day or two I'll post the correct answers and explanations (and unscreen the comments).

Poll #1054050 Cooking 100 Mid-Term Exam
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 36

When cooking pasta, you should put a bit of olive oil into the water to help keep the pasta from sticking together.

Speaking of boiling pasta, you should put some salt in the water because:

When shopping for ingredients in the supermarket for a tomato sauce, you should almost always purchase:

Whether you are roasting, pan-frying, braising, or even stewing meat, you should always brown the meat on all sides first because:

You're just finishing a delicate sauce (probably involving minced scallions and cognac - yes, THAT delicate), but on tasting, you find it needs a bit of seasoning to be perfect. What kind of salt should you use?

Speaking of salt, if you oversalt a soup, an excellent remedy is to throw a halved raw potato in for a few minutes to soak up some of that salt:

Short-order cooks cooking burgers on the grill often press down or put flat weights on the patties. Why?

When cleaning mushrooms, you should only ever wipe them with a damp towel - rinsing them in water causes them to absorb water, which can make them rubbery when cooked.

In most applications, fresh herbs are better than dried herbs.

Red wine is often called for in tomato sauces because the alcohol in the wine reacts with the tomatoes to release compounds which help to flavor the sauce.

When grilling with charcoal, regular briquette charcoal is pretty much the same as hardwood chunk charcoal.

EXTRA SILLY CREDIT #1: Real men don't eat quiche.

EXTRA SILLY CREDIT #2: Which of the following are appropriate reasons to cook bacon?

ADVANCED EXTRA CREDIT #1: In five (5) words or less, what is the basic technique for making a roux?

ADVANCED EXTRA CREDIT #2: What's in a mirepoix?

Please leave Abraham Lincoln alone. It is not necessary to continue trying to find new things that were apparently wrong with him. Anyway, glowing health is no guarantee of other Presidential qualities.

Not only is PZ Myers turning 50 today, he's also trying to fix his leaky faucet. It's turning out to be more difficult than you'd think...

Hey, Los Angeles people: Is it just me or do all the traffic signals in LA suddenly have a counting-down feature? When did this start happening? It must be an easy change, because it seems to have happened to a lot of signals, just within the past couple of weeks. In my neighborhood, anyway.

For those of you who have noticed it (or for whom it's old news), what do you think? Do you like it? Is the countdown helpful? Is it a useful enough feature to justify the cost?

Aha. I found a press release on the City's website about the conversion. Apparently they're converting all traffic and pedestrian signals to LEDs, which use less power, last longer, and are eventually expected to save the city $2.2 million per year in electricity. So they say. The countdown feature is just a side benefit. No word on how much it's costing now, of course.