• Blue Plate Oysterette

    Blue Plate Oysterette

    See the way the light is hitting the white wine in my glass? That’s a summer moment, a California moment; it’s a moment that transcends anything critical I might say about the restaurant where this moment took place. Not that I have anything critical to say. Blue Plate Oysterette is situated on Ocean Blvd. in…

  • Yes, I Fried Leftover Cornbread in Bacon Fat

    Yes, I Fried Leftover Cornbread in Bacon Fat

    Ok, so you read the last post, you read to yourself “vegetarian chili, sweet corn bread” and thought “eh, I’m not that impressed, I’m moving on with my day, I’m going to read about Anderson Cooper’s gayness and Katie Holmes protecting her kids from Tom Cruise’s Scientology.” That’s your prerogative. I won’t judge. But you…

  • Summer Black Bean Chili with East Coast Grill Corn Bread

    Summer Black Bean Chili with East Coast Grill Corn Bread

    My cookbook photographer Lizzie Leitzell is in town for a wedding and, of course, I had to have her and her fiance Kyle over for dinner to catch up, to reminisce about our cookbook travels and to talk about what we’re working on now. The nice thing about having Lizzie over for dinner is that…

  • Joe: The Coffee Book (Plus, an Interview with Jonathan Rubinstein)

    Joe: The Coffee Book (Plus, an Interview with Jonathan Rubinstein)

    I hate repeating myself on my blog, so if you’ve been reading for me a while, you know that Joe is my favorite coffee shop in New York. The location on Waverly is where I wrote my first book and most of my second; it’s where I’d meet friends to chat about projects or lives,…

  • The Day That I Baked 144 Red Velvet Cupcakes for Librarians in Anaheim

    The Day That I Baked 144 Red Velvet Cupcakes for Librarians in Anaheim

    When my cookbook publicist Molly mentioned, earlier this year, that I’d be speaking at the American Library Association conference in Anaheim in June, she casually mentioned that I should bring samples of a recipe from the cookbook. I said, “sure,” and forgot all about it. Then the conference crept up and it was time to…

  • Brooklyn Bagel & Mexicali Taco

    Brooklyn Bagel & Mexicali Taco

    As many of you know, since moving to L.A. I’ve been coping with a loss of decent bagels. My coping led me to Everything Bagel Bombs (which were an enjoyable but unrealistic substitute) and to frozen Murray’s bagels, over-toasted in my toaster to compensate for their cross-country staleness. Commenters in both posts asked if I’d…

  • The Palm Springs Date Shake

    The Palm Springs Date Shake

    We found ourselves back in Palm Springs last week and after asking my Twitter followers what we missed last time, the consensus seemed to be: a date shake. A date shake. Ok. I like dates. I like shakes. So after eating dinner at Wang’s (which I wrote about in this week’s newsletter), we found ourselves…

  • Farmer’s Market Wild Rice Salad with Miso Dressing

    Farmer’s Market Wild Rice Salad with Miso Dressing

    It’s funny how, when a partner goes away on a trip, you start to cook things that you wouldn’t cook if they were there. For many people, that might be something really decadent (rib-eye for one, for example) but for me, lately, I move in the other direction: I go healthy. Which is not to…

  • Key Lime Pie

    Key Lime Pie

    It’s Father’s Day this weekend and no dessert makes me think more of my dad than Key Lime Pie. The association isn’t based on any particular memory; it’s based on a series of memories of dinners at steakhouses or seafood restaurants where my mom would be taking too long tearing apart her lobster, my dad…

  • Dijon and Cognac Beef Stew

    Dijon and Cognac Beef Stew

    Cooking out of season is a little more acceptable on the west coast, where seasons are peripheral. Yes, it got a little chilly out here in L.A. in January and February; I was wearing long sleeves in March, but life didn’t change the way life changes so dramatically when it gets cold back east. So…

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