There Are Pandas, and Then There Are Pandas.
And this isn't either of them! The Pandas we're talking about here, are watches, not bears. And what got me thinking about them (again) was a link posted this morning by @cm.rook who pointed a few of us to the very attractive (and not terribly priced) Yema "Rallygraph" Panda which, in it's most traditional arrangement, looks like the one on the left, but can also be had in the version on the right: The model on the left is a true Panda, while the model on the right is called a reverse Panda. The reason for that distinction is clear--Panda bears, only come in the first arrangement. Now at this point, everyone should be thinking about the most well-know Panda, The Rolex Panda, which is actually a Daytona, and among Rolex Daytonas, the most famous of which is the Paul Newman Daytona, which was famous first, because it was Paul's, and second because it sold at auction for $17.8 million (US Dollars). The story of that auction is well-known so I'll only...
Nov 8, 2019
It's important to get real Shao Xing, which in some places you may need to go to a liquor store for. There is inferior non-alcoholic Shao Xing. If you can't drink it, don't cook with it (which goes for any cooking liquor, really).
My partner always has a freshly-opened white wine in the fridge which is super convenient for cooking. I'm more partial to beer as a libation and always have the bottom of the fridge stocked. Between that and the cheese drawer that really is full of cheese, I can always make a Welsh rarebit.
It's gose season, so in an experimental spirit, I deglazed caramelized pork belly with it. I figured the sour ale would jive with the Vietnamese sour soup it was eventually going into. Warmed, the saltiness becomes more prominent, so it needs to be balanced with the soy sauce. But it worked well with the taramind, adding another subtle dimension to it.