I didn’t set out to veganize Cook’s Illustrated’s ‘Sichuan Stir-Fried Pork in Garlic Sauce’ – it just sort of happened. It’s not that I have anything against vegans, and if you are vegan and ever come to our house for dinner I would enjoy the challenge of preparing a strictly plant-based meal. Personally though, I’ve […]

To paraphrase Sara Bareilles, I’m not gonna write you a ratatouille recipe. (I promise that will be the last Sara Bareilles reference – ever – on this blog.) I’ve done it before, and with farmers markets overflowing with more zucchini and eggplant than a blogger knows what to do with, you can be sure you’ll […]

Cookbooks have a life cycle: when a book is new, it’s exciting, it might get cover to cover, torn bits of paper sprouting up like so many shoots in the spring marking promising recipes. Then comes experimentation: making each of those recipes, seeing which work and which don’t. And finally – tragically – the third age […]

And sometimes you don’t. An idea for dinner, that is. It sounds odd, coming when the fields of the midwest are at their most bountiful, producing innumerable varieties of colorful, ripe produce. Mother Nature is providing to her fullest. But Mother Nature threw us a curveball this week, in the form of 90ºF+ day after […]

The light chill today was a reminder that fall – my favorite cooking season – is upon us. Fall brings many hearty possibilities ruled out by summer’s heat; suddenly it is possible, even desirable, to have the oven on for a few hours. Enter the braise–meat and vegetables stewed in rich liquid until tender. This […]

We’re really on the brink between two seasons at the Farmers’ Market: looking in one direction there are enough ripe tomatoes, ears of sweet corn and red peppers to make you think it’s high summer. But the next stall down is stocked with the winter squash, storage onions and gnarly root vegetables that make you […]

The abundance of the summer season can be quite exciting, but also daunting. I try my best to make a plan each week after my trip to the farmers’ market about what I am going to do with all my produce, but given the quantities sold at the farmers’ market and life rearing its ugly […]

For the salad, prepare and toss the following in a large bowl. 1/2 purple cabbage, shredded 5 small carrots, fine julienne 4 green onions, thinly sliced on a bias Handful of basil leaves, chiffonade For the dressing, process together: 1 egg yolk 1 chipotle in adobo, chopped 1 clove of garlic, minced a few dashes […]

I don’t know if it was the blue skies, all the rain we’ve been getting lately, or all the wine I drank last night, but there was magic in the air at the Farmers’ Market today–vegetable buying magic. The produce on offer was for the most part the same as last week, with a few […]