Rachael Ray’s ’30 Minutes Meals’ is coming back to Food Network

January 28, 2019 by
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Rachael Ray's Food Network program '30 Minute Meals' aired on Food Network for an impressive 11 seasons, from 2001 to 2012. Ray continued to cook on her daytime talk show, which is syndicated worldwide, and has published several cookbooks including a new title coming this October: Rachael Ray 50: Memories and Meals from a Sweet and Savory Life: A Cookbook. In an Instagram… read more

Cooking confessions

January 27, 2019 by
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I consider myself an experienced, adventurous, and up-to-date home cook. I've embraced new appliances and gadgets that promise to improve and streamline my cooking - I have an Instant Pot, a Thermpen, a spiralizer and a sous vide circulator. Although I enjoy trying all manner of new dishes and flavors, I have a confession to make. There is one trend… read more

Small things that bring huge satisfaction

January 26, 2019 by
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Today I celebrate a birthday ending in "0" that is large enough to result in serious introspection. As I take stock of all of the blessings and struggles I've encountered, a few moments stand out with enduring meaning. I wrote about one such event in one of my first blog posts here at EYB, nearly five years ago. Since that… read more

Tips for making the perfect pavlova

January 25, 2019 by
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It's Australia Day today (it's already January 26 there), and many Australians will be celebrating with a traditional dessert - pavlova. It can be intimidating to make a pavlova if you are not a seasoned baker, which is why Sydney baker Nadine Ingram of Flour and Stone has put together a primer on how to make a perfect pavlova.  First… read more

IKEA’s food lab set to release a new cookbook

January 24, 2019 by
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When you think about food and IKEA, what probably springs to mind are visions of Swedish meatballs and possibly lingonberry jam. However, since 2015 the global housewares giant has been taking a look at food. Space10, IKEA's global research and design lab, has been working diligently at identifying ways to make food more sustainable. This May, Space10 is coming out with a… read more

Celebrate National Pie Day

January 23, 2019 by
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Today, for reasons I will never understand, is National Pie Day (I believe the logical choice for the day is March 14). I've noticed in my Twitter feed that people from all countries seem to be celebrating this "holiday", so perhaps it should be renamed as International Pie Day. Regardless of where it originated, I am happy to join in… read more

‘The Naked Chef’ turns 20

January 22, 2019 by
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Can you believe that Jamie Oliver's first cookbook is 20 years old? That's right, The Naked Chef premiered two decades ago when Oliver burst onto the scenic as fresh-faced, exuberant young chef with something to say. He hasn't stopped since, building a veritable empire of restaurants, cookbooks, and television programs. To celebrate this milestone, Penguin are re-releasing Jamie's first five… read more

The behind the scenes work that makes cookbooks great

January 21, 2019 by
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When you crack open a freshly purchased cookbook, it can be like opening a window into another world. Everything you need is laid out before you, and you can just follow along on a journey of discovery. If the book is well written, this journey will be pleasant and satisfying. Writing a book that achieves that goal is tricky, and… read more

Singapore’s famous street food markets face an uncertain future

January 20, 2019 by
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Since the 1950s, Singapore has had a vibrant street food scene that draws on the many cultures of its varied inhabitants. While early on the city had vendors dotted on the street corners, they eventually consolidated into over 100 hawker centers, where stalls offer enticing foods ranging from Cantonese barbecued pork to Javanese tempeh to kopi tarik (sweet and rich pulled coffee).… read more

Kitchen items that spark joy

January 19, 2019 by
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If you weren't going through your house getting rid of unwanted items last year, you probably are this year. Marie Kondo's life-changing advice on tidying up has become a hit series on Netflix and it's got everyone in full KonMari mode. (If you are into thrift shops, you'll probably find a lot of gems now.) Kondo's advice to keep only… read more

Big change is coming to the World’s 50 Best Restaurants awards

January 18, 2019 by
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Each year we post the listing for the San Pellegrino listing of the 50 best restaurants in the world, highlighting cookbooks from the chefs that helm these fine dining establishments. The list of winners was starting to sound like a broken record - Noma landed at the top five different times, and the top five contained many of the same… read more

Is this the ultimate “Cake-Off”?

January 17, 2019 by
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If you are a fan of either (or both) Cake Boss Buddy Valastro or Ace of Cakes star Duff Goldman, you are in for a treat. We just discovered that the two are set to face off against one another in a new six-episode Food Network series. The show premieres Sunday, March 10 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on Food Network.  Simply titled… read more

How chefs deal with ingredients they won’t eat

January 16, 2019 by
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We all have a few foods that we just do not care to eat, and chefs are no exception. Unlike the rest of us, however, they often have no choice but to use ingredients they find distasteful. Some chefs find alternatives to the despised items, while others search for ways to make the off-putting flavors more palatable. Elisa Ludwig of… read more

These new liquors are going against the grain

January 15, 2019 by
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Whiskey in the US must be made from grain, which is defined as corn, wheat, rye, or barley. That might be about to change, however, as distillers have asked the regulatory agency in charge of such definitions - the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) - to allow other plants to be used. Specifically, the manufacturers want to broaden… read more

Is aspic poised to make a comeback?

January 14, 2019 by
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What do you think of when you hear the word aspic? For many of us, the term conjures up garish concoctions from the 1960s: think hot dogs and macaroni in aspic. However, those applications are only one late-stage interpretion of a culinary classic. The tradition of setting meats and vegetables in aspic - a savory meat gelatin made with stock and… read more

Padma Lakshmi talks food and more

January 13, 2019 by
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You probably know Padma Lakshmi from Bravo TV's Top Chef, but there is a lot more to her than just judging Quickfire challenges. She's also written or co-written several cookbooks, including 2016's The Enyclopedia of Spices and Herbs, which we reference frequently in our Spice Support columns. E. Alex Jung of Vulture recently caught up with Lakshmi for an interview… read more

When the gadget bug hits

January 12, 2019 by
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It happens to all of us - you read about a technique and want to try it at home, so you purchase the necessary appliance or gadget to perform the task. But after you get said gadget home, it often gets used only a couple of times before it gets shoved to the back of the cupboard and gathers dust.… read more

The most popular cooking show by year

January 11, 2019 by
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Food Network's first broadcast aired in 1993, but the history of televised cooking programs stretches back decades prior to that. Before television was invented, there were cooking programs on the radio. People have watched and listened as a variety of hosts taught them how to make dishes both simple and complicated since the 1920s. The history of these programs is… read more

The joy of cooking

January 10, 2019 by
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Chances are good that a large percentage of EYB Members have made one of two viral dishes from cookbook author Alison Roman. Both her Spiced chickpea stew with coconut and turmeric (featured in The New York Times and shown below) and her Chocolate chunk salted shortbread from her smash cookbook Dining In went viral on Instagram. Tens of thousands of people posted their own… read more

Chefs step up to feed furloughed workers

January 9, 2019 by
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If you've been paying attention to US news reports, you will know that our federal government has partially shut down over a funding dispute between Congress and the President. There is an old African saying that seems appropriate to this situation: "when elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers." In this case, the grass is the federal workforce, who… read more

Is copper cookware really worth the expense?

January 8, 2019 by
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No one can deny that a rack of gleaming copper pots looks fantastic, but are copper pans worth their rather extravagant price? Daniel Gritzer of Serious Eats tackled this question recently and discovered that, as with many things in life, there is no clearcut answer.  There is no doubt that copper's thermal properties are unique, and that it is much more… read more

Items that even chefs don’t make from scratch

January 7, 2019 by
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Sometimes I like to dive deep into a culinary creation, making everything I can from scratch. However, there are a few items that I haven't really given much thought to making - ketchup immediately comes to mind. It turns out that even though they spend their days creating complex dishes where they tweak every flavor, chefs also take shortcuts, especially… read more

Are you all in for Veganuary?

January 6, 2019 by
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With a new year comes new resolutions, and for a growing number of people that means eating less meat. One trend that's been around for a few years now and that seems to be gaining momentum in this area is going vegan for the first month of the year. Known as Veganuary, the practice helps people jumpstart their healthy and… read more

Don’t throw away that avocado pit

January 5, 2019 by
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When you cut open an avocado, what do you do with the pit? For the vast majority of us, the answer is chuck it in the trash bin. But apparently we should not be so quick to discard the seed of the avocado, as it has culinary (and some say medicinal) uses as well. In this recent Guardian recipe for… read more

Norman Van Aken’s advice to aspiring chefs: read cookbooks

January 4, 2019 by
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Chef Norman Van Aken is known as the founding father of New World Cuisine, a celebration of Latin, Caribbean, Asian, African, and American flavors. He is also credited with introducing the concept of "fusion" to the culinary world. His restaurant, Norman's, was nominated as a finalist for the James Beard Foundation's "Best Restaurant in America," and the chef has also… read more
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