I cook because I love to eat. I garden because I love to cook.
We haven’t had lettuce for salad in about a month. We’ve made other kinds of salads, with red cabbage and white cabbage, endive and radicchio, and cut vegetables, but we miss lettuce. We finally got some romaine the other day, and the salad I wanted …
Every Wednesday, starting in middle school, I made pizza. After school, I opened a package of yeast, got out the flour, and kneaded dough. While it was proofing, I simmered a can of tomato puree with garlic, oregano, basil, and sugar. I grated mozzarella, assembled …
My daughter, Ariana, is a first-year college student, and has become a master at creating meals using improvisation. With her “to go” container the college gives every student, she packs a wide range of items from the college cafeteria and whips up late night meals …
I have a degree in marine biology. Well, technically it’s a Master’s degree in Marine Environmental Sciences. There are many benefits of going to school for marine science. You get to check out all kinds of really cool things in the oceans and along the …
I used to think of cilantro as a hot weather crop. That’s because it is ubiquitous in food from the Tropics; sprinkled over Thai dishes; an essential component of Vietnamese banh mi sandwiches; the base of some Indian chutneys; and I wouldn’t make Mexican guacamole …
One summer in the late 1970s, when I was young and my brothers and I were away at overnight camp, my parents took a trip to Mexico. My father came back wanting to make two things: sandals and refried beans. For years we had boxes …
As the days get longer, the air warmer, and the early morning birds louder, I start to think of my garden. I think of seeds germinating and the first leaves emerging from the soil in the early spring sun. I think of the time I …
In my junior and senior years in college, I was a member of a couple of different cooking groups. About four or five different people, each cooking one night a week. It provided a meal much healthier than the college cafeteria, saved time and money, …
All I remember about eating breakfast at home as a kid is 1) a distinct paucity of sugary cereals, which probably led to 2) French toast with syrup and cinnamon sugar. I also vaguely remember my parents trying to sneak wheat germ into things like …
I didn’t grow up eating much Italian food. As a kid, I was under the false impression that Italian restaurants only served spaghetti and meatballs; in my mind, nothing else was available. Then I grew up and moved to Long Island. Italian food is the …
