Who needs cookbooks, when you've got food blogs? For a delicious dinner, tonight:
Last Monday, May 25th, the annual Cooper's Hill Cheese-Rolling and Wake was held near Gloucester, England. In a tradition that dates back at least 200 years, possibly much longer, groups of fearless competitors chase an 8 pound (3.5 kg) round of Double Gloucester Cheese down an extremely steep and uneven hill, with a 1:1 gradient in some parts.
This is fantastic. I feel that this is the sort of urgency that everyone should feel about cheese.
A recent New Yorker had a story about Fred Franzia, the CEO/co-founder of Bronco Wine Company, the makers of the Charles Shaw wines you'll find at Trader Joe's and other places. To be honest, I'm not much a fan of the Charles Shaw wines; nor am I much a fan of Franzia, after reading the article.
However, I'm all for cheap wine: over the past couple of months, I've been drinking boxed wine pretty much exclusively (the NY Times approves, for environmental reasons).
Of the boxed wines I've tried, I like Bandit and Bota Box. Bandit makes a 1-liter TetraPak wine (as well as kid-size packages that remind me of the juice packages that I used to drink after soccer games) in a couple of varieties; I like the Cabernet best. Bota Box makes a 3-liter box (equivalent to 4 standard 750ml bottles of wine), again in a couple of varieties. I've had the Cabernet and the Merlot, and I like both.
As the New Yorker article puts it (and I'm paraphrasing, because I'm lazy), there are Sunday wines, and there are Wednesday wines, and there's a need for both. I just happen to really like Wednesdays.
I am indescribably hungry after reading about bahn mi in the NY Times this morning.
Michael Ruhlman discusses his new book, Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking
I like the bread dough ratio mentioned in the video (5 parts flour, 3 parts water) because it shows how a ratio takes the mysterious art of bread baking, and by paring it down to the essential balance of two ingredients, renders it the opposite of mysterious, and therefore, I hope, not so intimidating. With this bread dough ratio, you don’t have a single recipe, you have a thousand. Ratios are the launching point for infinite variations.
Ruhlman's "__ of a Chef" trilogy of books (Reach of a Chef, &c.) are some of my favorite books ever about food and cooking.
I'm 100 pages in to David Wondrich's wonderful Imbibe!
For instance, from the history behind the Philadelphia Fish-House Punch, in describing the Colony of Schuylkill, a private club started in the early eighteen-hundreds that would meet weekly to, well, eat and drink:
Every other Wednesday from May to October, year in and year out for more than two hundred years [they] ... would gather to execute the club's business. ... That "business"? Eating and drinking and precious little else. But what set the State in Shuylkill apart from other rich-people's clubs is that its "citizens" traditionally did all the work. There was no staff to do the marketing, sweep out the Castle, gut the fish (the Coroner did that), build the fire, plank the shad, truss the pig, grill the steaks, or brew the Punch. All pitched in, each according to his abilities, the citizens instructing the apprentices. And when guests came (each member was allowed one), the pitched in, too. In 1825, Marquis de Lafayette turned steaks on the grill. I don't know what they had George Washington doing when he visited in 1787, but rumor has it that in 1882 Chester Arthur--the only other sitting president to be a guest--donned an apron and shelled peas.
I love risotto, so it's no surprise that I also love pasta cooked as if it were risotto.
And, so, this gemelli pasta cooked risotto-style with carrots is one of my favorite new pastas: the pasta ends up with a delicious chewy texture, and it's sweet from the carrots and salty from the cheese and, err, salt. I also usually toss in a bit of fresh thyme and some chile de arbol with the onions, because they give it some extra depth. It's really good! We love it.
Photo from Well Fed, one of my favorite Lucques-loving food blogs
This was another fantastic recipe from Sunday Suppers at Lucques
I have terrible college-food associations with carbonara: gluey, overcooked strands of pasta held together by half-cooked pieces of ham. This orecchiette carbonara is completely different, obviously, and it's absolutely delicious and fresh: it's spring, now, and we found fresh English shelling peas at the farmers market this morning. Combined with diced bacon and pancetta, and thyme, onions, and garlic, and eggs, &c., it's so delicious. And isn't Suzanne Goin charming talking about the dish?
And, of course, Penelope loves it.