Writing about food since 2004.
Category
Recipes
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You Know You Want To Stir Ricotta Into Your Pasta
You’re going to start calling me a broken record on here. In fact, me saying that “I’m a broken record on here” feels like something I’ve said before. Essentially, I’m going to hit a few of the same themes in this post I’ve been hitting lately: (1) watching cooking shows on PBS; (2) going to…
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Berry Blasted Oatmeal
There are two kinds of childhoods to have in America: the one where you’re allowed to have sugar cereal and the one where you’re not. I’m the product of the former sort of childhood and Craig’s the product of the latter. If scientists were to study us to see how my consumption of Lucky Charms,…
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Tahini Chocolate Chip Cookies
I know I’m late to the party with this one (the party being the “put tahini into your desserts” party) but I’ve also not been blogging for two years, so cut me some slack! The truth is, during my blogging hiatus, I was much more likely to make recipes that I’d already made before than…
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A Most Excellent Breakfast Taco
One reoccurring theme you’ll discover on Amateur Gourmet 2.0 is that I watch a lot of PBS cooking shows. I learned how to make a daiquiri watching Simply Ming, and then, watching Rick Bayless’s show, I learned how to make a most excellent breakfast taco. If Ned Flanders became human and grew obsessed with Mexico,…
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Pappa al Pomodoro (Or: How To Eat Tomato Sauce and Bread For Dinner)
I’ve been really into tomatoes this summer. Every Sunday I’ve been going to the Atwater Village Farmer’s Market, buying some juicy heirlooms, and using them in sandwiches, salads, tomato baths, you get the idea. You might think that now that August is over, tomato season is on the way out… but you’d be wrong! Most…
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Spaghetti with Crispy Chickpeas and Preserved Lemon
Tom Colicchio’s always like “you didn’t develop any flavor” on Top Chef and most people are probably like “what’s he talking about?” My quick answer is: “He’s talking about making things brown.” Generally speaking, when you’re cooking something, you want it to turn brown (or, to use a prettier word, you want it to “caramelize.”)…
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Oatmeal with Toasted Coconut, Almonds, and Golden Raisins
I’m no oatmeal expert, but I do make a lot of oatmeal. OK, maybe I am an oatmeal expert. For a while, I was toasting the oats in butter (a trick I once wrote about here) which kind of makes the oatmeal taste like buttered popcorn. When I’m feeling indulgent, I’ll cook Irish oats and…
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Meaty Mushrooms on Cheesy Polenta
Mushrooms are scary. Eat the wrong one, and it can kill you or make you think you’re Jesus (luckily, if you think you’re Jesus and it kills you, you can raise yourself from the dead). As a child, I absolutely loathed raw mushrooms in salads at pizza restaurants. That was my first impression of mushrooms:…
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Raspberry Ricotta Cake
You’ve heard of one-pot meals, but have you heard of one-cake desserts? That’s not a thing, but it should be. Here’s the idea: instead of an elaborate cake that you have to frost or decorate or slice in half, a one-cake dessert is one where a batter goes into a cake pan, the pan goes…
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Wham-Bam Cauliflower Gratin
Nothing sets me off like sanctimoniousness; that holier-than-thou, self-righteous, sermon-on-the-mount style of food writing. Often the sentiments are well-intentioned but everything is done so humorlessly, it’s hard for the average person to connect. And so it goes with vegetables. The general take, these days, seems to be that we should eat less dead bodies and…
