Food news antipasto

Running out of things to watch in your Netflix or Amazon Prime queue? We have the answer with a new short film that dives into the world of Japanese cooking via one of its most iconic elements: dashi. The brainchild of chef Shinobu Namae and filmmaker Eric Wolfinger, the show explores each step of the dashi-making process through the eyes of the Michelin-starred chef.

A few weeks ago we reported on using popcorn to get extra corn-y flavor in cornbread. That’s not the only culinary use for the popular snack. J. Kenji López-Alt explains that using soaked, dried and milled popcorn is the secret to great Colombian empanadas. Kenji picked up this tip from Chef Carlos Gaviria of Bogotá, who has the technique down to a science.

Farmers in the Berkshires, an idyllic, hilly region in western Massachusetts, feed many farm-to-table restaurants. Area locals Robert Bildner and Elisa Spungen Bildner explore the bounty of the region in their recently-released cookbook called The Berkshires Farm Table Cookbook: 125 Home-Grown Recipes from the New England Hills. You can learn more about the Bildners and the cookbook on the northjersey.com website.

While most current restaurant news revolves around closings and layoffs, there are bright spots. Some long-planned restaurants are moving forward with grand openings. Restaurateurs opening during the midst of a pandemic are relying on the few advantages offered by the situation. According to Joe Pawlak, managing principal of Technomic, “…there isn’t much ‘newness’ in the industry and a new market entrant could offer differentiation and excitement for consumers who are relatively pessimistic right now. A new restaurant opening in this environment is news in of itself.” There is a lot of pent-up demand as well. We will know in a few months whether the bold move of opening an eatery during the pandemic is a brilliant strategy or a foolhardy venture.

Photo of Shiitake dashi (Shiitake no dashi) from Heirloom Gardener Magazine