Winter Squash Wontons, Two Ways

A good gourd goes a long way. So does a package of wonton skins. Both ingredients have been known to travel afar, to unlikely juxtapositions and international cuisines. So when you’ve got a lot of them, it’s tempting to try em a number of ways. But how do you know—before you’ve tried it—whether two seemingly disparate ingredients will go together in one dish?

A New Podcast, and Kale Ice Cream

I’m not sure which is more surprising: hosting a new podcast about food, or making kale ice cream. But they have a lot to do with one another this week. The new podcast is called Why We Eat What We Eat, and the first episode, out tomorrow, tackles the strangely swift rise in popularity of kale. Last weekend, I decided to make kale ice cream, since one of the discussions around the leafy green in the episode had to do with its versatility. It’s easy to grow, … Read More

Chicken and Lime Soup with Corn and Poblano Peppers

I had an earth-shattering sopa de lima (lime soup) a couple years ago in the Yucatan Peninsula, near Tulum. My friends and I had just swam in a cenote, an underground sinkhole created by the natural collapse of limestone bedrock. After emerging from what felt like a scene in Fraggle Rock, we looked for lunch nearby, and came to a small roadside restaurant. Having not consulted any guidebook or website, we didn’t have any grand expectations when we sat down at a … Read More

Peach Sherbet

posted in: Desserts, Ice Cream, Recipes | 9

I am not sher what happened to sherbet. As a kid in the 80s and 90s, it was always playing second fiddle to ice cream. It wasn’t pungent like frozen yogurt, which made some people dislike the latter. It wasn’t full-on fruity and as tart as sorbet, its nondairy cousin. And it didn’t have, at least in my recollection, too many fat-free or otherwise health-conscious claims attached to it, whether or not those were true (like poor Elaine learned of her … Read More

Fried Shrimp with Corn, Tomatoes and Okra

It’s the season of no recipes needed. In winter, we might pore over splatter-pocked cookbooks, braising a stew or simmering a ragu just the right way. In the summer, things get a lot more loosey-goosey: we unsheathe the barbecue, dig into dirt, invent salads from overflowing refrigerator crispers and lounge around barefoot catching seafood, perhaps. All this fun and the peak quality of seasonal ingredients leads to a quick and effortless cooking session, if you can even call it that.

Mussels with Zucchini and Paprika

Over the winter, I had fun making long-simmered pots of chicken paprika and goulash, Eastern European dishes that pull at my childhood memories. You see, my next-door neighbors growing up, an elderly couple from Poland the Kieslowskis, would often make these in their home and it filled my backyard with delicious scents as I scurried about in the yard, sometimes playing tetherball with my brother, sometimes helping my parents with yard chores like weeding, or sometimes wandering into the Kieslowskis’ own backyard … Read More

Paccheri Pasta with Green Puree and Peas

The tournament is on! The contenders? You versus Harvest Season, in a game of you trying to cook and eat up CSA veggies, garden veggies, or veggies that looked too good not to pick up at the farmers market before the next batch swarms into your kitchen. Because it’s summer, and that means everything looks good, and is plentiful (and relatively cheap). So it’s easy to have too much of a good food during summer harvest season.

Granola with Ginger, Almonds and Hemp Seed Hearts

I’m not much of a granola-eater unless I get around to making it myself. Something about most store-bought granolas, crackling with sugar like crisp toffee, makes the whole eat-healthy endeavor seem fruitless. But I do love some oats, nuts and other whole grains and whatnot in the morning. And the fact that you can use any combination and ratio of them when you’re making granola yourself.

Chilled Potato, Leek and Parsnip Soup with Asparagus

Recipes are a lot more flexible than you may think. Soups are especially welcome to additional ingredients, adaptable to changing seasons, and open to subtractions in the case of allergy or just preference. I’m of the opinion that in most cases, a recipe is a mere guideline for a certain idea rather than a strict set of instructions. And as such, I usually don’t follow them too closely. But to indulge one early-morning’s random obsessions about vichyssoise, I cracked open Julia Child’s Mastering … Read More

Carrot Salad with Cumin, Mint and Preserved Lemon

Good winter carrots are like a good idea left alone for a while as it silently, snugly, digs deeper. At least, I think this is what happens with ideas that I leave beside for a whole season—or year perhaps. They develop and grow more legs—or roots—as time goes by, so that when you’re ready to finally pull them up, they’ll be more matured and robust. Even if you did not consciously think about them.

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