Sometimes you just have to start. I have been wanting to make beef jerky for a while now, but had always stumbled on how I was to actually dry out the meat. I don’t have a smoker, and it didn’t sound like any of the other methods were going to work. But hey, I thought, cowboys did this; I can do this. So I bought some lean beef, sliced it thinly, and coated it with some salt, onion...
Welcome to 2008! Abby and I spent New Year's Eve constructing the ultimate meal. We spent a small fortune at Whole Foods and walked away with a lot of shellfish and a fillet mignon or two. Since we weren't going to some fancy black tie event, we felt okay about spending more money than we would for a weeknight meal. We sort of had a carte blanche to create whatever we could dream up. He...
I torture myself with spicy food. This can take form in many various cuisines and dishes, but they all have one thing in common: unbearable heat. It’s not that Abby doesn’t like food with spice in it, it’s just that I usually push things way too far. Like I imagine people do with certain dangerous drugs, I plan an evening when I’m home alone with nothing to do and nowhere to go...
As you may or may not remember, I’m attempting to go somewhat local. Click back to Week 1 to see how it got started.
We’ve written about short ribs twice before and I’ll be honest in saying this isn’t the master recipe. Part of the problem is that both previous recipes were really Blake’s babies. It was his pot and his enthusiasm that spurred the effort. While I was ther...
I tend to spend way too much time researching what I'm going to eat. Nearly every recipe is cross-examined against other works I have, just to make sure I'm doing things correctly. But I was on to this recipe the moment I saw Alton pull out his steaks. I didn't check if this was the authentic way to make this, I just went for it.
What could cause me to go into such enthusiastic fits? S...
I eat a lot of tacos. I keep a pack of corn tortillas around at all times. Thanks to folks like Rick Bayless, I’ve even branched out to mushroom and swiss chard tacos, huevos rancheros, shrimp, and the granddaddy of them all, our very own Fish Tacos . Glorious, ethereal fish tacos.
This is all rather strange coming from someone who only ate hard shell tacos for the first 16-17 years...
We don't usually have hot dogs on Sunday night. I've got nothing against the sausages, but Sunday night is usually dedicated to my more adventurous cooking escapades. You know, Shrimp Etouffee, and other meals that take hours and hours. But tonight was going to be different. We needed some time, so we planned ahead and got perhaps the easiest comfort food to prepare.
Why such a hurry? ...
Last weekend, some of Elin’s friends that she met while getting her master’s degree in England came for a visit. Max and Chris are both from South Africa. They spent a long weekend with us and we did our best to show them our way of life in New York—playing the good hosts. Often, guests find New York overwhelming, or they find the idea of it overwhelming. “Where do I start?”...
By some miracle, my girlfriend and I have recently moved into a beautiful, spacious, freshly painted apartment with a backyard, a washer/dryer, and a dishwasher: three luxuries that most New Yorkers offer up onto the pyre of compromise very early on. It’s simply assumed: you won’t have those things. You live in the city because the people that live here are interesting, and there are o...
Lest you all forget my infatuation with the pickled cabbage , it is powerful. When I worked in Manhattan, the attraction to the stuff had me trudging over to the Korean buffet at least once a week. But I no longer work in Manhattan, and while I'm very happy with my new job, I do miss my kimchi.
I’m not sure why it never occurred to me until now to secure my own stash. Like a lot o...