Secrets to Super Simple Meals
Last Christmas, Michael’s mom bought us some loose-leaf black tea from Mariage Frères. The blend smelled sweetly intoxicating with strong vanilla and caramel notes. Mary got it with ice cream in mind, and her idea was dead on. Problem was I looked to a recipe that called for eight egg…
Tonight, with my parents out for the evening and my little brother satisfied after a bowl of Cap’n Crunch, I set out to make dinner for my sister and I. My mom had suggested we make some BLTs, and though that sounded more like lunch than dinner, the idea stuck….
I don’t even like beer most of the time, but this cookie recipe is a keeper. You start with two bottles of beer then boil it down with honey until you only have 1/3 cup of liquid. Then mix it with standard cookie ingredients, plus ground coriander and orange zest….
An added benefit of roasting a whole chicken is having the bones to make stock afterward. So last week I found myself with a flavorful broth but little else in the kitchen besides carrots and potatoes. Good thing anything can be made into soup. I found a BBC recipe for…
As part of my continued “culinary homeschooling,” as I like to think of it, I have been trying to understand how acids work in cooking. I wrote a bit about citrus, vinegar and wine before, but since then I have learned a lot and begun experimenting much more. Part of…
There’s something seductive about the chocolate hazelnut spread, Nutella. Just say it, Nutellaaaaahhhhh. It’s no wonder the LA Times focused on the stuff for its Valentine’s edition food section. Photo by Jordan Smith Luckily I’d gotten my Nutella fix before seeing the Times’ centerpiece on Wednesday. Who knows how long…
The great thing about empanadas is that anything goes. Whatever you have in the kitchen can be sealed in dough, then baked or fried. It’s a fun way to play with flavor combinations. I knew I wanted swiss chard and ricotta together. I had some shallots, so in those went….
For whatever reason, my brother has been bringing home absurd amounts of fruit from his school cafeteria. One day we found ourselves with way more pears than we could eat before they went bad. Conveniently, an issue of Sunset Magazine came with a recipe for a unique pear crisp courtesy…
I love Indian food, but sometimes those curries can be heavy. This dish, on the other hand, is more brothy than saucy, and still has that flavor I love. It has tomatoes, spinach and chicken breast, but it would be good with garbanzo beans instead, if you wanted to make…
I spent most of college in campus housing. My meals in Missouri and Sydney were mostly prepared for me. (Missouri had a network of dining halls serving thousands a day. Where I lived in Sydney had one chef for lunch and one for dinner, cooking for 50 people at most.)…