What did you give your mother for Mother’s Day? My new-ish tradition is baking cookies (I know, shocking for someone who professes to hate baking cookies, but I make this sacrifice for some). Cookies have won out over other gifts because they’re easy to ship, and who doesn’t like a cookie? Really. Can you think [...]
Got a pulse? Try some lentil soup.
I think lentils, an ancient food, are the crop to save the future as we adapt to new weather patterns hastened by “global weirding.” The more I read about lentils, the more I wonder why I don’t eat them more often. As a crop, they can tolerate extreme temperatures and survive with minimal water and [...]
2 + 4 + 6 + 8 = The World’s Easiest Cake
Eaten any drupes lately? If you’ve nibbled on plums, cherries, almonds, mangos, pistachios or slurped down a cup of coffee, you’ve ingested drupes – defined as fleshy fruit with a stone pit. For the World’s Easiest Cake, I like “drupaceous” plums. It’s not exactly the season yet for plums, so keep this recipe top of [...]
La Mallorca: Puerto Rican Ham, Cheese and Egg Sandwich
Who knew that while I was eating a ham and cheese sandwich in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico I was connected by a thread to California, including San Francisco…a twisted, tenuous thread more than 250 years old, but a thread nonetheless. The ham and cheese sandwich in question was, of course, not just a ham [...]
Old Bay Dungeness Crab
Ah, the scent of pee. So romantic. At least, that’s what the male Dungeness crab thinks when a female is nearby during mating season. Dungeness crab, or Cancer magister, is named after the town of Dungeness, Washington – which is named after a headland on the coast of Kent, England. This “master crab” is fished [...]
Drowned Eggs: Huevos Ahogados
“I’m still here, El Guapo,” shouted the mustachioed bandit to his distraught jéfe, as they caught sight of the rest of their outlaw gang fleeing in panic, away from the tiny Mexican village defended hysterically by the Three Amigos (and a band of Three Amigos look-alikes). Never mind that after he said that he promptly [...]
Giant Butter Bean & Feta Gratin
I’m cursed by a total inability to cook the “magical fruit” from scratch. Every time I try, I end up with rock-hard nubbins that would be better as pebbles on the bottom of a fish tank than dinner. Fortunately, there is a wide selection of the canned variety at the store. While I like bacon [...]
Shanghai Soup Dumplings
Yes, Virginia, there is Jello in Chinese cooking. You say you don’t believe it, but indeed, it’s true. Are you having visions of quivering rings of Astro-turf-colored sugar topped with glistening slices of Peking duck? (Actually, I found this photo on Flickr, it might be worse: duck hearts in gelatin.) You of biting sarcasm and [...]
A Hearty Breakfast for Your Inner Mexican
Let’s face it, we all wish we were Mexican. Cinco de Mayo, margaritas, Caesar salad, Salma Hayek and, dare I say it Chihuahuas, are all a part of American culture. What would life be like without miniature, hairless dogs stuffed into purse-carriers and sweaters to keep them safe and warm?? And no Salma? That is [...]
Crepes with Kefir Cheese and Chai-Scented Pears
Mmmmmmm, bacteria. Of course, without it, we wouldn’t have one of life’s most perfect foods: cheese (as my brother-in-law can attest). One of these days, I’ll learn how to make it (anyone ever been to classes at the Cheese School of San Francisco?). Kefir cheese is made with a very particular, mysterious bacteria that grows [...]