I cook because I love to eat. I garden because I love to cook.
As the angle of the sun dips on the horizon and the first golden hues shine from leaves that are nearing their end, the harvest from my garden changes from summer to fall crops. The shift is not sudden. Summer green beans, peppers, and tomatoes …
Plants cannot live without sunlight. Photosynthesis converts light energy from the sun into chemical energy of glucose, the food that all plants need to survive. But too much sun might be a death sentence, depending on the plants one desires in their garden. As we …
Last year my daughter, Ariana, spent the spring semester of her junior year in college abroad. She went to Berlin. Of course being good parents of a child so far away, we had to pay a visit. The city was lovely; cultured, vibrant, and scenic, …
From a very young age, my siblings and I – three boys, about two years apart – were forced to do dishes. Our parents, in their great wisdom, told us the sprayer on the kitchen sink hose was broken. Perhaps they feared a flood or …
At Thanksgiving, the cranberry sauce doesn’t get a whole lot of respect. It’s different than the show off roast turkey, the over-achieving first child of the holiday. Nor is it like mashed potatoes, so smooth, buttery, and creamy, the youngest child who gets away with …
The story of Jimmy Nardello’s peppers is an immigrant tale. Giuseppe and Angella Nardello arrived from southern Italy in the late 1800s, immigrating to Naugatuck, Connecticut. With them they brought seeds from their Italian garden, including a sweet frying pepper. They grew these peppers to …
It’s been a doozy of a summer. Unbearably hot and humid on Long Island, where I live, we have been forced to use the air conditioner much more than usual. A passing hurricane this week, which fortunately did not amount to much, made things even …
Sometimes in the heat of the summer you need a simple and quick side dish. You want to add more vegetables to the menu. Tired of raw vegetables and already had enough grilled, it’s time to move on to something different. Something fast, easy, and …
I’ve always been an adventurous eater. From a young age I helped my father cook all manner of Chinese food and we ate homemade refried beans with tortillas for dinner twice a week. But as a kid, I was not enamored with Indian food. I …
There are some vegetables I don’t grow in my garden. It’s not for lack of trying or because I won’t eat the result. Rather, I just can’t get them to grow. I try for a few years. Nothing. Modify my technique. Failure. Finally, I give …
