Author: cia
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On the flight back from Vancouver, I watched one of Jamie Oliver’s farm episodes. The guy is living the life: hanging out in the English countryside, gardening, taking care of his own chickens and cooking simple and healthy meals in his adorable kitchen. He made a few dishes during this one episode, but this bresaola…
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Here’s one thing I rarely cook or eat: salmon. Now, salmon is a perfectly good fish but I think I’ve been traumatized with the way they prepare it at weddings. Salmon is like shrimp: a few minutes too much and it’s overcooked, dry and devoid of taste. But I haven’t given up on it. I…
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Watermelon rind pickles are apparently a Southern thing. But I first had them at Fatty Crab, a Zak Pelaccio restaurant here in New York City devoted to Southeast Asian cuisine. I’ve been wanting to recreate their dish served with crispy pork belly at home, and the opportunity finally came when Cameron and I started planning…
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Remember the rhubarb sauce I made a couple of weeks ago? I’ve stir-fried it with fish and braised pork belly with it and I still have half a tub leftover. I searched through my recipe archives and thought, well, I can make panna cotta with it, yeah? It’s a simple sauce with a subtle flavor…
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Anna sent me a pack of sundried tomatoes from her recent trip to Argentina so I went searching for recipes using them as the main ingredient. There were a lot of proven recipes for spreads and pastes, so I stuck with one of them and just used it on fish I bought for my weekly…
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65 East 55th Street between Park and Madison Avenues 212/593.0287 about $90 each for six, with several drinks, with tacked on 20% tip ♥ ♥ I dragged five others to the Aquavit Cafe earlier this week to take advantage of Herring Week, the annual celebration for all things herring. I had such a fun time…
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When Jen first showed me the link to OctoDog, I squealed. I didn’t care if the toy was $16.95 apiece; I wanted one. A few weeks later, I squealed again when a box came in the mail and my red OctoDog was in it. I immediately wanted to try it, but to be honest, I…
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The two Rs of spring–ramps and rhubarb–came and went but I was fast enough to get my yield in this year. With the ramps, I pickled and sautéed; with the rhubarb, I made dessert and this sauce. I was craving fish after an hour-long workout in the pool and I ended up taking home a…
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The pork chops from DeBragga.com glistened in the morning light coming through the kitchen. I couldn’t get over how beautiful the marbling was. Pork chops are easy to find but they’re never beautifully cut like these, almost like lamb. I’ve cooked a lot of tried and true pork chop recipes for this Web site but…
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East Harlem, the neighborhood bordered by 96th and 125th Streets between Fifth Avenue and the east river, is referred to as El Barrio because it has been a predominantly Puerto Rican enclave. It literally means “the neighborhood”. Some people would even say it goes all the way to 142nd because Dominicans and other Caribbean groups…
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It felt like Christmas morning when I received a Styrofoam box in the mail that was filled with two racks of lamb, four pork chops, four rib steaks and a container of fleur de sel. The Rack Pack grill kit from DeBragga.com was the only thing I was waiting for before I could begin my…
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Seriously, what did people do before Google? When I bought several squid from Chinatown, I wasn’t exactly sure if they were squid or cuttlefish. They looked bigger than the squid I’m used to and if you’ve been to any of the stores in Chinatown, you know it’s hard to get a straight answer from any…