– Everyone has their own thoughts on the cookbooks/blogs/foodie magazines debate. Nicky:
Read More›I started out with Bon Appetit and Gourmet, but over the years I have fallen for Food and Wine and Fine Cooking. I absolutely love Fine Cooking. I can honestly say there isn’t an issue where I haven’t found a recipe to try. The last issue it was an amazing devil’s food cake. The extra cooking guides they did at the holidays were in my go to pile.
I have friends (plus baby) coming to town this weekend. It was just the push I needed to finally get to the store this year. Yea, that’s right. I haven’t been food shopping since 2009. 80P and I have been out of town, sick and lazy. I think 80 has grabbed some eggs, cereal and milk, but really – that’s it.
I grabbed some weekend snacks: tortilla chips, ruffled potato chips, avocado, feta and mozzarella. I’ve heard their one year old, Jack, loves polly-o string cheese. All I could find was a chunk of mozz, so I’m hoping if I cut it into cylinders, Jack will dig it.
Also in my cart, with no real reason: plantains, Kabocha squash, cilantro, mangoes, lemons and limes and other canned staples (beans, coconut milk, pickles, olives).
I got home and still had no clue what to make. I turned to The Flavor Bible, checked out mango’s flavor friends, but didn’t have the right ingredients. Making room for that on the shelf I saw a new cookbook – Alicia Silverstone‘s The Kind Diet.
The first few chapters detail the horrendous factory farming practices of our country. I skipped those pages because I’m still struggling to finish Eating Animals, which actually makes me never want to eat anything ever again.
Then a recipe calling for Kabocha squash, and barely any other ingredients, found me. Alicia directed her loving fans to simply boil the peeled and cubed squash (4 cups squash to 3 1/2 cups water), add salt, bring to a boil, cover and simmer for 10, add more salt, simmer some more, mash til smooth, finish with chopped parsley. Now simple sounds good to me, especially when I have to spend the rest of the night scrubbing the floors for a one year old’s visit.
But a soup only flavored with salt. I have a food blog. I must do better than that. I started off healthful – adding lime juice then crushed red pepper flakes and I subbed cilantro for the parsley. But 80. Oh 80. My grease loving boyfriend. How could he be enticed to sup on soup for dinner?
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Well we had a lot of good guesses for our most recent Name That Food contest. I especially liked Britannia‘s guess of velveeta cheeese, white bean hummus and hot sauce. As expected, no one knew exactly what this one was — I’d have to say Tracy‘s guess of lemon curd surrounded by white chocolate with raspberry swirls was probably the closest.
So what is this monstrosity? Full explanation after the jump…
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The latest and greatest news about celebrity chefs, served up buffet style.
– Who is more desirable, Padma or Giada? The Ask Men folks hash it out.
– Let’s all raise our chalupas in tribute — the founder of Taco Bell has died at the age of 86.
After the jump…taking shots as Emeril appears on another network, a sober look at a serious problem and a humorous look at a very chubby problem.
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I left an ominous post earlier this month. I wanted to explain further.
I’m lazy. My subscriptions to Gourmet and Bon Appetit were due the month before Gourmet’s last printed issue. I bought Gourmet’s Thanksgiving ode in the super market. I didn’t buy Bon App. I have not since renewed.
I look at my kitchen-dedicated bookshelf: with one row dedicated to old food mags. I look at my bedroom bookshelf: with one row dedicated to old food mags. I look underneath my bed: one fat mess dedicated to old food mags.
You will also notice this trend with my clothes. They’re old and everywhere. But I’ve been *trying* to shop within my own closet this season. Create different combinations. Wear shirts with different skirts and different shoes and different rings.
Do I try this technique with my Cooks Illustrated June 2007? And my Cooking Light March 2009? The mags I never made it through, some still adorned in shrink wrap.
Or do I try a new publication? Food and Wine? Saveur? Cooking with Paula Deen?
Will I miss out on the hottest new ingredient or trend or city or restaurant or microbrew if I limit my food reading to dated pages?
I also have counted about 50 cookbooks around my apartment. Do I try the “shop your closet” with my bookshelf and cook a new dish every week? (Although how much fun could that be?)
I haven’t cooked a fucking thing this year. I need some inspiration.
(And yes, I’m in on the joke. I’m so lazy that I’m trying to make New Year’s resolutions a month into 2010.)
Despite being total Williams Sonoma geeks, most of us ESers tend to live in tiny city apartments, which means we shy away from buying unitaskers. But that doesn’t mean you have to cook every meal in the same cast iron pan, because with a little creativity you can turn that unitastker into a multitasker.
Which brings us to our favorite new food blog, Waffleizer, in which blogger Dan and some friends answer the eternal question, Will It Waffle? That is, can foods traditionally cooked on the stove or oven be made in a waffle iron? And might that in fact make them better?
As you can probably guess, from hamburgers to hash browns to s’mores, the answer is always yes.
I think the first time I had smoked fish was in sushi, not the oft walked Jewish path of lox on a bagel with cream cheese. I had plenty of exposure to smoked salmon and smoked whitefish salad, mostly at bat mitzvah luncheons and funerals. Unfortunately, my personal smoked fish craze didn’t hit until I was living in DC, and we notoriously lack Jewish delis.
However, 80 and I just celebrated friends’ wedding in southern Florida, eating and partying our way through Sunny Isles Beach, Hollywood and West Palm Beach. And wow, it was nice to be around the Jews. I never can find the pleasure of smoked whitefish in the District. There are maybe 2 New York style delis in the area, and I haven’t fell in love with either of them.
But in Florida! Florida!
After the nuptials, 80 and I visited with my grandmother. While at lunch I schmeared smoked whitefish salad on a pumpernickel bagel (80 choose wrongly and ordered the *lean* pastrami sandwich and Mommom took down matzah brei, a bagel and hash browns). Whitefish salad is less pungent than smoked salmon, it’s creamier than a tuna salad consistency, but with a saltier, less generic taste. It also doesn’t reek of mayo.
Later that day at my aunt and uncle’s golf clubhouse, the free (!) snacks offered in the bar area were smoked whitefish salad right next to boursin cheese (It was actually quite funny, they had a chef in full whites slicing the boursin on a wooden cutting board akin to prime rib), swiss cheese triangles, broccoli florets, grape tomatoes and crackers. It was a mid-winter miracle.
So apparently we’re in week four of the New Year. I had this majestic resolution—obviously food related—but I haven’t started it yet. I will start making claims now. I will hopefully cash them in before 2011.
I will smoke a white fish. Whatever a white fish is. I will then take that smoked white fish and make a salad out of it.
There.