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 […]

I buy zucchini blossoms exactly once per year, and not because I want to. Sure, they look pretty, and I love the concept of fried zucchini blossoms – crisp and airy, redolent of fields of flowers – but I’ve never been able to deliver on that idea. Instead of light and crunchy my fiori come […]

It all started with an acute lack of pickles. As in, I had not a jar of pickles to my name, not even in the deepest back recesses of the middle shelf of the refrigerator. But golf-ball sized potatoes from yesterday’s Midtown Farmers Market were demanding to be made into potato salad and if there’s […]

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 […]

Perhaps you hadn’t noticed, but I haven’t been posting much lately. This is mostly for positive reasons: fun and interesting social engagements, steadily progressing training runs in anticipation of a marathon in October, excellent meals eaten outside the home, all working together to spare you of my culinary musings. Related to the aforementioned activities or […]

In mid-nineteenth century Italy, as power passed from one faction to another fighting to control the unification of the country, many lower-class people – ever ignored by political elites – resorted to brigantaggio, or brigandage, both as a means of securing a living and a form of resistance against occupiers foreign and domestic. In the […]

Eighty degree weather notwithstanding, I can’t shake the feeling that summer is soon to end and that a short fall will in no time at all be heralding in dark, cold winter. But as far as the farmers’ market is concerned, these fears are unfounded: fall might be around the corner, but there is still […]

After my surprise at seeing squash and brussels sprouts at the Midtown Farmers’ Market last week left me anxious about the coming of the end of the growing season in Minnesota, it was nice to notice this week that in spite of the appearance of these late-season vegetables the summer growing season remains in swing. […]

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 […]

If you haven’t seen it already, read the New York Times “Refreshing by Definition” on the essentials of summer cocktails. Lots of our favorites are there: mint, basil, lemons and limes, cola (specifically Coca-Cola, of course), and a muddler (thanks Mari) for all that mint and basil. Just as we’ll be using summer’s fruits in […]