Posted in alcohol, baking, British, butter, Christmas, culture, custard, Delia Smith, dessert, easy, England, festival, festivals, fruit, history, holiday, holidays, nuts, spices, tradition, winter on Jan 2nd, 2012
Most Brits associate mincemeat with Christmas – its intoxicating mix of fruit, spices, booze, nuts and mixed peel provide Pavlovian stimuli, stirring memories of cherubic choirs a-caroling, roasted poultry, and the Queen’s speech – whereas I associate it with Easter, because it was always around then that we finally ran out of mince pies. I [...]
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Posted in butter, cheap meal, France, French, game, Garlic, history, lemon, offal, parsley, pigs, pork, Potato, shanks, slow cooking, tourism, tradition, travel, trotter on Oct 4th, 2011
The largely unknown city of Compiegne, France, has the distinction of being the site of one of Louis XV’s most extravagant homes away from home. Under him, the Chateau de Compiegne became one of three distinctly opulent seats of government alongside Versailles and Fontainbleau. The latter French monarchs were hardly known for their desire to [...]
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For a while last year and earlier this year, bottarga, it seemed, was the new black. Like truffles, it had become, if perhaps more temporarily, the new foodie trend obsession and blogs everywhere were doing all kinds of inventive things with it, like this, this, even this. Never wanting to feel left out of something, [...]
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Posted in Alba, butter, cream, easy, French, indulgent meal, Italian, Italy, nuts, Pasta, Recipe, vegetarian, walnuts on Dec 1st, 2009
As with a few other fellow bloggers, we were lucky to receive one of my favorite “blog freebies” to try recently – truffle products by La Boutique de la Truffe. Cha-ching! As some know, for most of us, blogging will barely help us buy a cup of coffee at a year’s end – that is [...]
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We’re going to make this one short and sweet — the Phillies, my beloved Philadelphia Phillies, just couldn’t do it this year. What was even worse was that they played the Yankees and I live in New York City in a new apartment building surrounded by Yankees fans. I just couldn’t face to finish watching [...]
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Originally, I was going to simply write a one paragraph post helping people understand that they should not be afraid to use butter when necessary. Unfortunately, I realized how much emotional turmoil I have when it comes to this subject and others. A nice recipe for a Buttered Pea and Potato Salad had somehow turned [...]
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Posted in butter, cream, Garlic, herbs, Italian, Italy, liver, Meat, offal, Recipe, sage, shallots, tourism, travel, veal on Jul 14th, 2009
“Two households, both alike in dignity In fair Verona, where we lay our scene” – William Shakespeare, Prologue to Romeo and Juliet On our honeymoon, almost exactly two years ago today, we arrived in the fair city of Verona thoroughly pissed off. And then things got worse. It wasn’t as if the day had started [...]
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Ahhh, don’t you love a nice, cheesy pun in the morning? I know I do! If there was an emoticon (Omg, am I dating myself by using that word? Do people even use the word emoticon anymore? Do emoticons even exist anymore?! A quick search shows yes. Still, why do I feel like such a [...]
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Posted in butter, fava beans, gnocchi, herbs, mint, parmigiano reggiano, Pasta, Potato, Recipe, vegetables on Jun 20th, 2009
As you may be able to tell, if you are a regular reader of this blog, we love mint. We use it often in the summer because it grows like a freaking weed. Because we live in Brooklyn, we barely have any outdoor space (but are very fortunate to have any). Yet, in that small [...]
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Posted in blogging, butter, cheese, food TV, Italian, mushroom, mushrooms, Pasta, porcini, ravioli, Recipe, sage, shallots, tortellini, tortelloni on Apr 29th, 2009
“When the world turns its back on you, you turn your back on the world…” Recently, I’ve been noticing many, many food blogs posting recipes utilizing a certain brand of pre-made “fresh” pastas: nothing like a Foodbuzz promo to bring the best out of the food bloggers. Many came up with very creative recipes using [...]
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Posted in African, beef, bread, butter, culture, diversity, Ethiopian, flour, food magazines, kale, lentils, peas, Recipes, Saveur, spices on Feb 22nd, 2009
Last week I had off from work for our “midwinter” break. It wasn’t a very relaxing week but cooking, for me, is very relaxing. Five hours of cooking can actually be quite relaxing as well. And that’s what happened when I decided to take on the challenge that Joan of Foodalogue put in front of [...]
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Posted in America, appetizer, baking, butter, cheese, comte, delicacy, fish, French, herbs, Olive Oil, parsley, souffle on Jan 12th, 2009
Perhaps the day that both our teams (Manchester United & Philadelphia Eagles) won unlikely decisive victories in the realm of competitive sports, is the best day to dwell on the recent personal glory of our seafood soufflés staying up. However – even if (quite sensibly) you don’t give a rat’s ass about sports – anyone [...]
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