• Dinner on Ellis Island (Molly O’Neill’s “One Big Table” Event)

    Dinner on Ellis Island (Molly O’Neill’s “One Big Table” Event)

    In college (at Emory Univeristy in Atlanta), I took a class called “The Modernization of Judaism.” The class was taught by a lesbian rabbi and, over the course of the semester, we studied the various divergent branches of the Jewish community (I attended an Orthodox Shabbat service, the women separate from the men) and learned…

  • Challah Bread French Toast

    Challah Bread French Toast

    This is a highly unnecessary post, especially if you’ve seen my post “Easy French Toast.” That’s my go-to French Toast recipe and the only difference between that recipe and this recipe is the bread. So why write this post at all? Because the difference between making French Toast with white sandwich bread (as I did…

  • In Praise of the Two Fat Ladies

    In Praise of the Two Fat Ladies

    Mr. Game Show was a Hanukkah gift that my parents bought me one year in the 1980s. It looked like a regular board game (small tokens that you moved around a large, printed board) except there, in the middle, was a plastic figurine that talked. “Hello!” it announced in a Guy Smiley voice, “I’m Mr.…

  • Making a Turkey of Myself

    It’s that time again…time for a new banner. For the record, I taste great with cranberry sauce and a side of mashed potatoes. Thanks, once again, to Lindy Groening for her brilliant work (note: the banner archive is fully updated, so check out all of Lindy’s previous work. Do you have a favorite?) Thanks, also,…

  • The Secret To Killer Pork Chops at Home

    The Secret To Killer Pork Chops at Home

    There’s a psychological phenomenon–and I’m not a psychologist, so cut me some slack here–by which, even though we know what’s good for us, we don’t do the thing that’s good for us. So, for example, let’s say we’re an aspiring journalist and there’s a convention downstairs, in our building, for working journalists who are looking…

  • What To Do With Jerusalem Artichokes

    What To Do With Jerusalem Artichokes

    The Jews have an expression: “Next year in Jerusalem!” The idea is that next year, whatever we’re doing or celebrating, we’ll do it in Jerusalem, the place where all Jews should aspire to someday go. (I do aspire to go there some day, though I think Rome may be higher on my list, if only…

  • Roasted Apple & Pear Sauce

    Roasted Apple & Pear Sauce

    No one gets very excited when you say “apple sauce”–well no one except, maybe, people who just had their wisdom teeth out–but throw the word “pear” in there and the word “roasted” and you start to whet people’s appetites. My appetite was certainly whet when I saw this recipe in The Barefoot Contessa’s newest book,…

  • Anatomy of a Pork Chop Dinner (A Three Part Series)

    9:24 PM, Friday, October 30th. The scene? My kitchen. In attendance? Myself and Craig. The event? The creation of one of the best plates of food I’ve ever made. It started like this, see, I was at the farmer’s market, taking pictures with my new camera when I spied these Jerusalem artichokes. Or was it…

  • My First SLR (& This Blog’s First Fancy Food Pictures)

    My First SLR (& This Blog’s First Fancy Food Pictures)

    It only took six years of food blogging for me to figure out that the images on a food blog are as important as the writing. And so it was, last week, that I went with my cookbook photographer, Lizzie Leitzell (see her website here) to B&H so she could help me pick out my…

  • Bourbon Chocolate Pecan Pie

    Bourbon Chocolate Pecan Pie

    So that dinner I made for my friend Alex’s birthday (the one with the soup) began a few days earlier when I e-mailed Alex a very important question: “Dear Alex,” I wrote, “what are your Top 5 favorite desserts of all time?” Alex wrote back: “Hmmm…top five favorite desserts…I’ll do this w/o thinking too much:…