Sitting by a cozy fire, curled up with a book and a nice hot bowl of soup? No way! Winter doesn’t get all the credit for this delicious and easy culinary delight. Soups are meant to be enjoyed year-round. If you think of soup as a light, refreshing meal that can be served warm, cold [...]
The Internet is a great place; anyone can set up a site or a blog, and write whatever they think—it’s the ultimate example of freedom of speech! There are too many sites about food to count; it seems that a new one pops up every hour. And with reposts on sites like Pinterest, the availability [...]
Beneath its hard, unforgiving exterior, winter squash offers a sweet delicious treat worth the preparatory efforts—on its own or combined with other fall flavors. Harvested in the fall, winter squash varieties include butternut and acorn squash (which are typically available year-round), as well as kabocha, Delicata, hubbard and other types that are a little more out [...]
I’ve had a long, slow introduction to Southern cooking—from my first trips to the South on summer vacations as a child, to my current “research” in restaurants and cookbooks about Southern cooking. I can vividly remember my first taste of spoonbread as a Midwestern preteen visiting a restaurant in North Carolina. My sisters and I [...]
The arrival of spring signals the beginning of home garden and market season. If we time it right, soon we’ll be buried in piles of fresh local fruits and vegetables. It sounds great on paper—until we have more than we can eat and things start to spoil! One way to extend the season is to [...]
‘Tis the season for houseguests and celebrations! Maybe you remember the stop-action scene of breakfast in the ‘80s movie “The Big Chill,” where the guests came and went in a big sunny kitchen, enjoying the food and the relaxed pace of the morning. I too love a slow morning, sipping coffee and visiting with guests, [...]
It’s never too late to make a resolution—or to follow through on a past resolution. We’ve all resolved to eat better (more fresh fruits and vegetables!), and are reminded to do so by recent changes to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s dietary guidelines—revised from the Food Pyramid many of us grew up with (check out choosemyplate.gov). Twenty years [...]
The American Heart Association recommends eating fish twice a week to help prevent heart disease, and to lower the risk of heart attacks and strokes. But like some other healthy choices we’re encouraged to make, many of us rarely choose to eat fish—mostly because we’re afraid of cooking it. In fact, about half of all [...]
Historically, asparagus has been a highly valued vegetable. If you’ve ever tried to grow asparagus in your garden, you may know why – it takes years for the plants to produce! It’s fascinating to grow – the spears emerge from the ground very quickly with no leaves or adornments. Asparagus should be held in high [...]
In the age of fast food and busy schedules, we seldom take time to spend hours cooking dinner. We’ve come to depend on dishes that can be cooked in thirty minutes or less—to squeeze in between work, carpool, homework and social obligations. The luxury of having a large chunk of time to spend cooking—or enjoying [...]
