A bright winter salad with radicchio, carrot ribbons, Cara Cara orange slices, and bulgar.
enjoying the quiet + buckwheat orange pancakes
Today seems like the first quiet day in months. It’s warm and sunny, the window is cracked, and the birds are singing. The Friday hum is beginning to pick up outside and the kids are just about to stream, happily screaming and shouting, by my building. But for now it’s peaceful, and finally, I have some time to think. [Read more…]
vanilla citrus cornmeal cake with poached clementines
Observing a person’s cake preferences is akin to peering into the very depths of their soul. Some people, for instance, appear to be impressed by a cake that is covered in impenetrable layers of marzipan has had the hands of about twenty bakers on it and looks very much like a 2013 Chevrolet Camaro. Some people will spend thousands of dollars on a cake like this and others will watch television shows about bakers who make such cakes. Those people–people who prefer the artifice of a well-decorated cake to the taste–are alien to me, not the least for the amount of time they have to waste. Spending hours making a cake look like a golf bag makes as much sense as spending the same time trying to make a golf bag taste like a cake. A cake is for eating, people! [Read more…]
maple-braised pork belly
Last week, things in my kitchen got real. Like, 13 pounds of pork belly–skin, hair, and all. I unwrapped the butcher paper, and there it was–an actual pig’s belly spread out on my kitchen table. Usually Brian deals with meat, but this time around, it was all me. So, I rubbed the belly down with sugar, salt, and paprika, and made it happen. Eight hours of braising later, the meat was supremely tender and my mission was accomplished.
The pork belly was for Brunch for Barack, an event that we co-hosted with Veronica Chan at the Chan Deck, Long Island City’s up-and-coming test kitchen for new and adventurous ideas in food. [Read more…]
butternut squash and sweet potato hash
When I first moved to Charlottesville, Virginia after ten years in San Diego, I was kind of shocked. With the heat and humidity and small town culture, I felt profoundly out of my element. I hated it and wanted to move back to the west coast. But one day in late September, everything changed. The mugginess gave way to crisp air and unending deep blue skies. The chilly winds blew the first of fall’s colorful leaves. I shivered, bought a wool scarf, and fell in love. And this morning, looking up at another glorious fall sky and snuggling into my scarf, I’m reminded of why I love the east coast and its lovely autumn. [Read more…]