15 Nov 2013
by scolgin
in Humor, Starlets, Yoga Students & Quinoa (stories)
Tags: cooking, fennel pollen, food, Groupon, humor, Milford Spice Company, saffron, salt, spices
It was a cold and rainy winter morning in March 2012 (actually it was so long ago I don’t remember, but “cold and rainy winter morning” always makes for a better story beginning) when the Groupon arrived — a new online spice company called Milford Spice. I browsed their website and found a lot of interesting things, and who can’t always use some spices — especially at 50% off? It was near my birthday, so I treated myself to the Groupon and got shopping.
Bourbon-barrel smoked sea salt, looks good doesn’t it?
Here were many things I could use — saffron, Malabar black peppercorns, Middle Eastern zahtar, vanilla beans — and interesting things I’d never heard of before like bourbon-barrel smoked sea salt and toasted onion cane sugar (!). I was like a kid in a candy store, and put my order in. More
12 Nov 2013
by scolgin
in Humor, Observations
Tags: blood pressure, cooking, exercise, food, humor, jogging, margaritas, Mark Bittman, nutrition, Vegan Before Six
After three months reducing my salt, I went triumphantly back to the doctor to check my blood pressure, sure that my elimination of kim chee, olives and anchovies and my new snacking regiment of walnuts would’ve done the trick. I hoped my blood pressure wouldn’t now be too low!
“Still the same,” she said. “I guess you’re not that sensitive to salt.”
The Omron 10 Series
How could this be? And then she broke the bad news: She wanted to try putting me on a low dose of blood pressure-reducing medicine. More
08 Nov 2013
by scolgin
in Observations, Starlets, Yoga Students & Quinoa (stories)
Tags: Charlie Trotter, chicago, cooking, Dar Maghreb, food, Henry David Thoreau, Mario Batali, morels, Pierre Dupart, Rene Redzepi
I was in the kitchen making breakfast for the kids when my wife came in with an alarmed look on her face.
“Charlie Trotter died.”
The name stalled in my head, it took me a moment to process the news. And then I was hit with a wave of shock: Charlie Trotter, the boyish Chicago chef whose smiling face grinned out at me from three or four cookbooks in my collection. More
05 Nov 2013
by scolgin
in Recipes, World's Best Sandwiches
Tags: bacon, burgers, food, hamburgers, Hawaiian onions, humor, Maytag blue cheese, Sierra Nevada, Sprouts market
I’m at war with myself.
In the past, I’ve made some great burgers — burgers that have won praises, burgers that have pushed the boundaries of the possible… burgers that have brought grown men to tears.
And yet, still, I am not satisfied.
There is always a better burger out there. And in here (pointing to my heart). I have but to find it, or to draw it out from within. More
25 Oct 2013
by scolgin
in Humor, Recipes
Tags: Catalan, Chris Waterman, deviled eggs, eggs, food, humor, jamon iberico, pa am tomàquet, pimenton
They’re one of the all-time cliché potluck contributions — deviled eggs. But the convergence of a party invitation from our neighbors Chris & Glennis’ with a surplus of eggs from our 20-some-odd chickens proved to be more of a temptation than I could resist. You could say the devil possessed me.
Catalan deviled eggs
The first time I’d done something like this was for one of my fancy XX-course New Year’s Eve dinners — a version a few years back with a Spanish theme. I created a deviled egg of sorts, the hard-boiled yolk blended not with mayonnaise and Dijon mustard but rather with those pillars of Spanish cooking: lots of olive oil, garlic and pimentón. More
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