Chicken salad is a staple for sandwiches, brunch, and the like. Sometimes it is pretty boring though! Saw a version of this Venezuelan chicken salad on a cooking show and started salivating. That means research and build a recipe so I can make this at home. Arepas are cousins to […]
When you cook a big pot of red beans, you aren’t done till you serve up a bunch of rice. Here’s how to do that….
The very first thing that comes to mind when it’s a grey, rainy day — or a snowy mess of a day — is a big pot of red beans and rice. I have a ridiculous pantry, so I have the ingredients for this dish on hand pretty much all […]
The big storm requires us to eat good food so we keep up our strength and our spirits. That means comfort food to me. One of our favorite dishes reminds Chris of his summers excavating a Roman cemetery and a circus (racecourse) in Carthage, now a suburb of Tunis, Tunisia. […]
The ultimate comfort meal is a simple roast chicken. When I first saw the original version of this recipe in Santa Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, I was terrified: never having tried to roast a whole bird, this looked intimidating. Then I cooked it. It was very easy, […]
Porchetta is a roast, seasoned pork – I think of it as Italian BBQ. It’s well-loved in Rome and you can get spectacular porchetta sandwiches all over town. My favorite version was from Aristocampo, the most amazing sandwich joint in Rome. Theirs was porchetta on ciabatta, with Brie cheese and […]
The Spouse was in London for two weeks leading a study abroad program, and when he returned, it was crazy cooking time. I usually cook simple stuff for just myself, and he was eating in restaurants the whole time away, so first dinner is a big deal for us both. […]
I love soup in all its forms and varieties. I make soup regularly and make up recipes for soup almost as often. Soup is just good stuff in a broth, so anything goes. And when it’s cool or cold (and let’s be real, sometimes in the middle of the summer, […]
Well, good bye to 2025. It was a mess of a year in so many ways. I look forward to a more compassionate, purposeful year in 2026. I owe it to myself and to you hearty souls who read these things to be more focused, and more regular in my […]
My mother found a version of this recipe in a magazine in the early 1970s and we had it every year at the holidays, along with date nut bread. It really isn’t the season to me without one or both of these old school treats being on the table. I […]