I took a bread baking class at a virtually unknown cooking school, long gone and forgotten now, with my mother in the 1980s and learned this Italian whole wheat bread. It is called a traditional pane integrale.

Read More »

Dont have time to make a pie dough? Phyllo to the rescue. Keep a package in your freezer and you are ready to fill with any number of delicious savory fillings, such as goat cheese and herbs, spinach and ricotta,…

Read More »

Hummus is a mashed purÈe of chickpeas, olive oil, and lemon that is immensely popular in the Middle East. And America so it seems.

The traditional way to serve hummus is to spread it on a plate and drizzle it with flavorful olive oil. That’s fine for spreading, but if you are going to dip veggies into the hummus, it’s more practical to pile it into a bowl.

Read More »

Sweet, succulent, and slightly briny, shrimp is America’s favorite seafood. Delicious cooked all kinds of ways—poached in shrimp cocktail, battered and deep fried, sautéed, broiled, and grilled—this crustacean is quick-cooking and incredibly versatile. Most of the shrimp available in the continental US is frozen right on the boat to preserve the freshness and for convenient shipping, so fresh is rare unless you live on the Gulf or on the coast of Mexico. So how to know what to eat and what not? Here is some information to help you decide.

Read More »

A well-made combination salad is an irresistible delight. Especially on a hot night. It is healthy eating at it’s best and appeals to all types of eaters, fitting all palates (those on special diets appreciate lusty main dish salads they can dig into with abandon as well).

Read More »

There are an entire world of rustic ethnic breads that are easily reproduced in your modern home kitchen. These are breads that were once only available regionally, tasted by the adventurous traveler. But no more. The invisible family boundries are down and the light is rushing in. What is old is now new. What was hidden by geography and religion, is now open to interpretation. Bakers are pushing the envelope. They want to master the techniques.

Read More »

Main dish salads are good all year round and yet reflect seasonality by their components. There are many exceptional main dish salads and you only need to know two and you are a wiz in the kitchen. Here is a very special main dish salad with spring in mind and its source of protein is duck.

Read More »

Granola certainly has become one of the most touted of healthy breakfast cereals and what we are experiencing now commercially has grown straight out of its roots in the hippie whole grain oat-nut-and-seed kitchen of the 1960s. The name granola is a take on granula, a toasted wheat cereal touted by whole grain movement of Sylvester Graham in the 1900s. Since it is tremendously versatile, it takes to all sorts of additions and variations on the basic recipe.

Read More »

Winter is time for a warm salad of fresh greens. So often there are no recipes for one serving. And that is all you want to make. The baby spinach is so easy to find now in the supermarket produce section and organic to boot!

Read More »

On my first visit to France so long ago in 1977, I was invited to dine in a 200 year old country house of hand-cut stone in a truffle-oak orchard south of Albi. I had just left Paris in August, the month Paris is virtually empty with the natives all abroad or in the country to escape the heat.

Read More »