Author: Catie

“Has this blog been abandoned, or moved elsewhere?” A few months ago I received this email from a reader.  My response was that, though it would very much appear that way, in fact no, not abandoned, just on hold.  At least that had been my plan when I finally allowed myself to take some time off  just before… Continue reading “Has this blog been abandoned?”

“One of the very nicest things about life is the way we must regularly stop whatever it is we are doing and devote our attention to eating.” – Luciano Pavarotti  

“Food is our common language, it’s important for people to pay attention to food, it’s not so much what we’re eating, as where that food comes from; people find money to buy anything they want, but when it comes to food it’s their last priority, and it should be their first” – Alice Waters  … Continue reading Chew on this.

  “Before throwing anything away, consider whether it might have a use.  For example, save vegetable remains to make soup stock or use them as compost to feed your garden.” – the fourth lesson of Mindful Cooking, from 3 Bowls Cookbook, by Seppo Ed Farrey (I’ll also add to be mindful of using every last… Continue reading Chew on this.

“I’ve always believed that the most important people on the planet are the ones who plant the seeds and care for the soil where they are grown” —Willie Nelson

“Cardamom is one of the most ethereal aromas.” –Harold McGee, “Thinking About Flavor” lecture, in the Alchemy of Taste and Smell conference, November 2010, Astor Center, NYC

  “Better than any argument is to rise at dawn and pick dew-wet red berries in a cup.” — Wendell Berry  

  Here are a few outrageously delicious recipes that I keep returning to, and plan to return to again this weekend.  Tried (and in some cases, tried and tried and tried) and true. Try them yourself and let me know what you think. Happy weekend!   Kathleen Claiborne’s Hot Cakes:  I first heard of these… Continue reading What I’m cooking this weekend.

“Crustacean flesh develops delicious aromas and flavors simply by spending a few minutes in boiling water.  Most meats can’t achieve such high levels of smell and taste without the application of flame or intense heat, and there are a couple of reasons for this.  Crustaceans counteract the osmotic pressure of saltwater with an especially tasty… Continue reading Chew on this.

“Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; and good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts.” – James Beard

“As for the people who do chemical cooking, all I can say is, Stop it.  The difference between homemade whipped cream, for example, and Cool Whip is enormous, what with all the preservatives and hydrogenated oils they put in it.  You don’t know what’s in those things, you can’t even pronounce the ingredients, and you’re… Continue reading Chew on this.

Some of the earliest cold-resistant crops available in the spring (or earlier if you have a farmer who has a fancy-schmancy greenhouse), fresh, vibrant salad greens are popping up now at farmers’ markets.  That first, crisp, lightly-dressed bowlful always feels like such an extraordinary luxury after months of pots of piping-hot long-simmered root vegetables and… Continue reading Salad Greens 101

“In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.” -Margaret Atwood 2011’s crop begins.

“I peered into the pots.  Irish stew.  A nourishing and economical dish, if a little indigestible.  All honour to the land it has brought before the world.” -from Malloy, by Samuel Beckett

Fernando, who turned two on Valentine’s Day, anxiously awaiting some signs of grass out in the pasture.

“A man taking basil from a woman will love her always.” -Sir Thomas Moore

“Learning another cuisine is like learning a language.  In the beginning, you know nothing about its most basic rules of grammar.  You experience it as a flood of words, or dishes, without system or structure.  When I first went to China, I was already fluent in the language of basic French cookery.  I could make… Continue reading Chew on this.

“To me, the farmers and producers who bring us wonderful foods are heroic.   Whatever they grow, I want to eat: they inspire me to crave variety.  Yet I have found that too many Americans have narrow taste horizons when it comes to trying new foods. Most of us have expanded our taste horizons at… Continue reading Chew on this.

So I too am now writing the “so sorry readers I have left you for weeks on end without hearing from me” blog post that I swore I would never have to write. As a farmer friend said to me, when he asked if we had eachother’s contact information, and I reminded him we are… Continue reading “I’m not inside much.”

“When you grow a vegetable yourself, you’re less likely to boil it to death.” — Irish chef Darina Allen, in the New York Times article “Reclaiming Ireland’s Culinary Heritage, One Roast Lamb or Sponge Cake at a Time“, March 30, 2010.