Think long and hard before you make French fries this way. Once you start, there’s no looking back. Trust me. I was dubious when I saw Nigella Lawson starting potatoes in cold oil (she added whole garlic cloves and herbs near the end and called them Tuscan fries). I could only imagine soggy chips soaked […]
“I do not like broccoli. And I haven’t liked it since I was a little kid and my mother made me eat it. And I’m President of the United States and I’m not going to eat any more broccoli.” – George H. W. Bush All the more for us then. Because combining sweet, caramelized broccoli […]
Sex is good, but not as good as fresh sweet corn. – Garrison Keillor Hmm. I think maybe Garrison Keillor has been spending too many lonely nights up at Lake Wobegon or, perhaps I just need to find a different farm stand to buy corn from next summer. But, without going quite as far as […]
Slowly but surely, as the years whiz by, I am learning a thing or two. For example, I think I have finally driven into my thick skull the notion that making a grocery list first will prevent me from having to go back to the store for more ingredients. Three times. I have also learned […]
Part two of Super Bowls and Plates. This year’s football feast: Spicy, grilled chicken wings with blue cheese dip. Guacamole, because you have to make something healthy. The easiest barbecue ribs you’ll ever make.
(Loosely based on a true story) One bite. One timid, tentative bite and I wait. I wait for the deadly neurotoxins to wreak havoc on my nervous system, throwing my body into spasms of agony before, hours later, screaming and frothing at the mouth, my internal organs surrender to the inevitable and, one by one, […]
Saturday was hot and muggy. The kind of day that makes it hard to imagine it will get cold around here. But we’ve also lived here long enough to know that there’s a pretty good chance it will (in fact, I googled it and the average December sees zero (32 F) as a high. No […]
The annual appearance of the big yellow “Sweet Corn” signs on roadside farm stalls is always a moment tinged with sadness. When the corn is ready and the first crickets start to sound, you know it’s the beginning of the end of summer. The corn will be with us until the kids go back to […]
We’re just weeks away from fresh field tomatoes. But, I can’t wait. I have a craving for my favourite classic steakhouse salad – a dish served all year round at the restaurant but best eaten only when meaty, field-fresh beefsteak tomatoes are in season. Then, it’s a meal all by itself – sweet tomatoes with […]
There were only three plants that thrived in the tiny backyard behind the tiny house I grew up in. One was a vicious climbing rose that strangled the fence and lived to lacerate any children stupid enough to venture near (mostly me). The second was a pussy willow that had grown from a single stem […]
Meats, Roots and Leaves 