h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

reminds me of two of my friends who ordered rijstaffel in a chinese restaurant in berlin

the waiter told them 'i'm sorry, gentlemen, but we only cook this for at least four customers'

'that's all right', my friends quickly answered. 'our wives will join us shortly'

after eating the lot they said 'the wifes must have gone to the wrong restaurant', paid for four and left

From the restaurant's standpoint, no one has lost anything in that transaction. The food was prepared and served, it all got eaten, and customers paid for it.

But what is rijstaffel? Somehow, I've never seen that recipe on a menu in a Chinese restaurant.

As it would mean 'rice platter', I suspect something with lots of rice and different toppings?

This is where my meager knowledge of German becomes a hindrance.
In French, rice is "riz."
In Spanish, it's "arroz."
The Italians have a dish called "risotto," which contains rice.
I didn't expect German to use the Latin root, which oriza.

'rijstaffel' is dutch

and yes, it means rice with a lot of different toppings - well, meals, actually

i believe you need at least 17 different meals in order to call it rijstaffel. 42 would probably be better

the dutch had quite a few colonies in the far east and like the british and french imported a lot of food, traditions and whatnots from their colonies

Yes, I forgot to mention that 'rijs' was Dutch.

The German word is 'Reis'.

I remember a Dutch Indonesian meal with rice and fried eggs, very tasty.

'rijs' and 'reis' are pronounced almost yet not entirely the same

whereas the danish word 'ris' is pronounced more or less like reese - as in reese witherspoon

this concludes todays lesson on pronouncing rice in different north european languages

Rice is nice, but candy is dandy and liquor is quicker.

this reminds me, i still haven't tried Risotto alla Milanese

Ah Pierce the

Wish there were sober ies to bring one home now. !!

Go well,

Christiane Ar80

10/I/2010 13.00 GMT

Much of New England was clearcut in the 18th and 19th centuries so the fields could supply enough hay for the that people depended on for their transportation. The discovery of oil and the invention of autos eliminated that need, so forests grew back on most of those fields. What do we do when the oil runs low, though? I doubt that we'll bring back the ...

Why not? It's fun to have transportation you can talk to.

Of course, as I am a very poor rider, I'd be in trouble - but Elektra's good with horses, she could drive the carriage, and I could ride in style...

i've never sat on a - but i have eaten some (well, bits and pieces of some, really)

as for transportation you can talk to i have talked to a lot of cars in my time

thanks, christiane. i hope to go to milan one day and taste the real thing. did you know that italy is by far the largest rice producer in europe? it was news to me when i first heard it. i thought it was all about pasta

turns out that when they built the cathedral in milan they imported saffron to colour the stained glass windows of the cathedral. saffron was added to a risotto dish only as a joke

Yellow rice was a joke?

What you need for rice is a flooded field, at least where I come from. Which leads to little tiny frogs, among other things...

Flooded fields, yes. Leonardo da Vinci is known for his contribution to the building of channels to drain the marshlands of the Po river plains. Camillo Cavour championed the construction in the late 19th Century of a canal that brought water from the Po River and Lake Maggiore to support the production of rice and other crops in Vercelli-Alessandria, Pavia and Novara. The canal is now called Cavour Canal.

The Italians do not eat much rice (about 8.5 kg/person in 2000), but Italy is famous for its risotto and a number of rice varieties have been developed for this purpose, especially Arborio and Carnaroli. The Italians have a saying "Rice is born in water but dies in wine".

Whereas Mississippians are only known for 'dirty rice'.

The East indians also eat dirty rice.

they should. when people started cleaning rice people developed the much feared sickness beriberi

beriberi may be found in people whose diet consists mainly of polished white rice, which is very low in thiamine because the thiamin-bearing husk has been removed

This is true, although at least in the lower Mississippi, 'dirty rice' refers to a recipe.

But so does East Indian "dirty rice."