The cooking class that I’m teaching at Mills College started today. I devoted the first class to tasting different salts, sugars, vanilla’s, and butters. I wanted everyone to get an overview of the variation of flavors in these products so they can see how these differences can enhance their end product and hopefully [...]
In the Bay Area our weather can go from summer to winter in a range of eight hours…or less. Last weekend we had some cold foggy days that stayed that way for most of the day and with the edge of crisp in the air I found myself thinking of pot roast. My family [...]
I decided to reconstruct a coconut. There was a trend a few years back about creating deconstructed desserts. German Chocolate Cake would come as a wedge of chocolate cake with a pitcher of ganache and a wall of candied pecans or some such stuff! With this recipe I decided to take all the components [...]
I love the classic Italian dish of grilled steak over arugula with shaved parmesan. This is my version of this. I wanted a kind of Caesar’s dressing for this salad, hence the salted anchovies. For those of you who haven’t tried them I highly recommend salted anchovies as a staple in your kitchen. Whole [...]
I love melons. They’re in season now and they linger into fall. We’re all tempted to eat melons at other times of the year, but really this is the time to eat them. They’re ripe and juicy now. Since we’ve had a hot spell recently I started reminiscing about a cold melon soup that [...]
This is one of my all-time favorite recipes to take to parties. I love it for its flavor as much as its brilliant green color (I think I want to paint my bedroom this color). Of course you can make this with fresh fava beans. It will take a lot of patience to shell [...]
Way back in the 80’s when Prego was the hot new Italian place on Union Street, and when Union Street was the hot neighborhood in San Francisco their signature dish was rotisserie chicken with a mustard sauce. I never have been able to replicate the sauce and since Prego is closed I won’t have [...]
Nothing seems to shoot me back to being a kid more than a nice big freshly baked chocolate chip cookie. Still warm from the oven with the chocolate chips still melted and dotting my fingers with warm chocolate the follow up unmistakable flavor of good quality butter and the almost caramelized hint of the [...]
We are in full summer now, my favorite season, and the best time to have salad for dinner. Avocados and corn have been exceptionally good this summer and I wanted to incorporate them into my salad. I wanted my chicken grilled with a kick, and the rest of the salad cool and creamy. [...]
We are heading into tomato season and since we’ve had many good hot days I’m guessing it will be a good year. I can only guess about that since I have a black thumb! I may have come from a family of farmers but I’m a city dweller on my father’s side and did [...]
