Month

05/31/12 • SPRING’S GREEN HEART From Canal House Cooking, Vol. No. 3 (Winter and Spring) I fear I’m a little late with this one. After all, Memorial Day has already come and gone, and even if the calendar still says “spring” for another three weeks or so, in most people’s minds it’s already summer. But before you get distracted by that display of corn at your local farmer’s market, let me call your attention ov

05/24/12 • THE SOFT-SHELL SELL Adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook, Vol. II (1972)  Sometimes a craving demands immediate satisfaction. In the case of a donut, or a piece of chocolate, or even a pastrami sandwich, often the easiest way to resolve this condition is by getting yourself to the nearest quality purveyor, loading up, and moving on—freed, at least temporarily, from that distracting state otherwise known as de

05/17/12 • A CASE FOR ASPARAGUS From the May, 2012 Bon Appetit (click here to view the recipe) For weeks I’ve been looking for a way to feature asparagus on these pages, in large part because nothing says “spring!” like those emerald green spears with the purple-y tips (and yes, also because I simply felt like eating them). The problem was that while the vegetable may find its way into my kitchen with some consistenc

05/10/12 • CHICKEN, CUBAN-STYLE! From A Taste of Old Cuba (HarperCollins) Last night Alfredo and I hosted a small dinner for our good friend Scott who was celebrating one of those big birthdays that only come around a few times in your life—the kind with a nice round number that the celebrant generally prefers not to linger on (and so I won’t either). It was a great night with good friends, good food, and too m

05/03/12 • THE WAFFLE, FULLY-LOADED From the March, 2012 Bon Appetit (click here to view the recipe) As you’ve probably figured out by now, it’s often the simplest recipes that call out to me the loudest. In fact, when people ask what kind of food I tend to make, I’ve taken to describing it as “salt-and-pepper” cooking—a phrase I borrowed from Christopher Hirsheimer, one-half of the Canal House team, and a duo