I wasn’t sure about buckwheat pancakes. But I was making pancakes for dinner, and I was out of frozen wild blueberries for our usual blueberry pancakes. There was some Bob’s Red Mill buckwheat flour in the freezer, so I decided to give it a shot, substituting half buckwheat flour for all-purpose. I made some sausage patties to go with them, and the sausage and pancakes came out exactly the same shade of brown.

Buckwheat pancakes are great, it turns out, with a meaty undertone that would go nicely with something savory. Or, since anything served on top of a pancake would probably turn it to mush, buckwheat waffles would probably be an even better foundation.

The pancakes were enough of a hit that when I wanted to make cornmeal-cranberry pancakes the other day, Iris insisted on “brown pancakes” instead. Now I’m thinking about trying a buckwheat gnocchi recipe from Biba Caggiano. And I’m not actually going to try this, but sausage and buckwheat were such nice partners that someone should really make a corn dog with a buckwheat-based coating.

Bad news from Trader Joe’s. The cornmeal pizza dough, the star of the second post ever on R&G, has been discontinued. This dough was the basis for one of the most delicious pizzas I know: bacon and pickled jalapeño. We ate it at least twice a month during the cornmeal dough’s brief life.

Now I’m going to have to develop my own cornmeal pizza dough. Anyone have a recipe to recommend, or a ratio of cornmeal to flour I should start with?

New York banned trans fats. I was telling my friend [Dan](http://www.dfan.org/) that I thought this was cool. He said, “Hey, aren’t you the guy who said that when someone is in favor of banning something, it always turns out that he is secretly doing that thing himself?” Presumably I said this as the Foley scandal was breaking.

I said something like, “Yeah, but that only applies to other people.”

Tonight while I was making dinner, the large tub of Kroger vegetable shortening on top of the fridge seemed to be staring at me.

One of the first things I can remember cooking is chili. In elementary school, one day a week the cafeteria served this great chili, and I would always eat two bowls. It turned out to be Stagg Country Chili from a can. Actually, Stagg chili is not bad (especially the all-meat Steak House Chili, which has kind of a weird color and texture but is great), and the little aseptic boxes it comes in are cute. When I first saw them I was sure it would be a trend that other canned soups would follow, like when they started putting computer games in little boxes instead of big boxes.

But no, the Stagg still stands alone.

I got interested enough in chili that my mom gave me a book, Chili Madness by Jane Butel, and let me pick a recipe from it and make my own chili. I think I made Carroll Shelby’s recipe from that book, and one called Amarillo Chili.

Nowadays I’m a chili snob, toasting and grinding anchos, pasillas, and guajillos, although I also go through plenty of [Penzey’s](http://www.penzeys.com/) chili powder making enchiladas and tacos. Sometimes I use ground beef, but more often I cut a chuck roast into one-inch cubes. I did this yesterday, and now there are many servings of chili in the fridge, ready for dinner tomorrow night, and the night after, and maybe a little extra for the freezer.

With the chili I’m going to serve some crunchy potatoes from the latest issue of Fine Cooking. They’re incredibly easy and great. Boil some baby potatoes. Drain and smash them each 1/2-inch thick (Iris took charge of this part). Then put them on a baking sheet and drizzle with lots of olive oil and roast until crunchy. I’ll be doing this once a week for the foreseeable future.

They finally fixed my shampoo. It’s been redesigned so it can sit upside-down, so you don’t have to endure the wait-and-shake, trying to coax the shampoo to the mouth of the bottle. I was so happy, I didn’t even mind that they raised the price, from $1.19 to $1.49. It’s Suave.

Similar work has been afoot in the food department. There’s inverted ketchup and grape jelly, and probably other products I haven’t noticed yet. I applaud this trend. Presumably there’s a slightly increased danger of leakage, but it’s totally worth it.

Now I’d like all of the other viscous ingredients get on the upside-down bandwagon. Sriracha and oyster sauce come to mind.

I love seeing a product redesign that is so obviously superior. The soda can “fridge pack” is another recent example. I don’t actually ever buy canned soda, but if I did, I would totally go for the fridge pack.

This isn’t exactly *packaging,* but the availability of individual celery stalks in the produce section is a major advance.

What are some other cool packaging redesigns I’m forgetting?