Mastering pomegranates

December 16, 2013 by
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One way to add holiday color (and great flavor) to a dish is to sprinkle some pomegranate seeds (actually, technically, they're "arils" not seeds) on top, especially along with some minced parsley or mint. (Try it on cauliflower - it's positively beautiful.) Of course that may be easier said than done, given that you need to have the pomegranate seeds… read more

Jazzing up slice-and-bake cookies without icing

December 10, 2013 by
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If you have a favorite plain, refrigerator-style cookie - or bought a package of slice-and-bake cookie dough - and want to jazz the cookies up without resorting to frosting or icing, Lynne Kasper in NPR's The Splendid Table has some excellent ideas in How to make store-bought slice-and-bake cookies more gourmet: "There are two approaches: the before-baking list and the… read more

Should breakfast be a time for innovation?

December 9, 2013 by
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The Guardian just asked an interesting question: "Breakfast: too early for culinary innovation?" Apparently in Britain an organization is running a contest asking for the best breakfast recipe, and one of the categories is for the most innovative breakfast. Of course, this leads to the first problem - defining innovation. Apparently it's being defined in the contest as "Something a… read more

Sorting out Mandarin oranges – tangerines, clementines, satsumas, etc.

December 5, 2013 by
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Just noticed that the satsumas have arrived in the store, which triggers an annual question - What is the difference among Tangerines, Clementines, Mandarins, Tangelos, Mineolas, Satsumas. etc.? So, if any of you are also curious, here's a brief primer: The master category that these fruits fall into is Mandarin oranges or "Mandarins." Compared to oranges in general, Mandarins tend to be… read more

A fun way to count down to the holidays

December 1, 2013 by
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Happy December 1 everyone! Thanks to The Guardian, we've found a fun version of an advent calendar to start the count down to Christmas. They've collected both recipes and gift suggestions from a variety of top chefs, including Heston Blumenthal, Raymond Blanc, Anissa Helou, Fergus Henderson, Tom Kerridge, Thomasina Miers, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Simon Hopkinson, Cerys Matthews, Nathan Outlaw, Fiona Beckett, Simon… read more

Which one of the 8 beef grades should you choose?

November 29, 2013 by
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With holiday parties revving up, we thought it might be a good time to help people choose their meat carefully by looking at what beef grades really mean (at least in the U.S.). The USDA uses eight grades of beef, which are rated by tenderness, juiciness, and flavor. With the help of an article from Fooducate, here's a quick run… read more

Taking the best possible food photos

November 26, 2013 by
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With the holidays almost here, there will be a lot of food photos. So we thought we'd compile some basic food photography tips from 3 excellent sources: First up, from Digital Photography School, are 11 Quick Food Photography Tips to Make Mouth Watering Images - here are some of the tips we especially liked: Pick the freshest ingredients Lighting is everything (natural,… read more

The mystery of the skinny turkey

November 20, 2013 by
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The blogosphere is full of stories about the fat turkey problem - or, more accurately, the lack of fat turkeys problem. Apparently, Butterball - the company that produces the largest number of turkeys for national sale - has announced that they've had problems getting turkeys to plump up for Thanksgiving. Therefore, the number of fresh, fat (over 16 pound) turkeys… read more

Is one type of cinnamon really better than the other? Plus 263 ways to use it

November 13, 2013 by
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If you had to choose one spice to be associated with the holidays, it would have to be cinnamon. From pies to squash to drinks to candles, it's omnipresent. So we thought we'd highlight some recent articles that add a bit to our common knowledge, or possibly our common confusion. On Epicurious, we have True Cinnamon, which explains that there… read more

Do you judge people by what they’re eating?

November 12, 2013 by
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In their article, Why do we judge people by the food they eat?, The Guardian provided some interesting material to think about. In particular, the idea of food profiling struck a chord. Back in the day (way back in the day) if someone ate muesli, they were immediately identified as a counter-revolutionary hippie - ditto for brown rice, soy beans, and… read more

The Thanksgivvukah face-off: Food 52 vs. Serious Eats

October 28, 2013 by
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  Two of our favorite online food sites are potentially entering into quite a culinary joust. To create recipes for the unique holiday of Thanksgivvukah (see our blog description if you're in the dark about this holiday), Food52 has challenged Serious Eats  to come up with the ultimate Thanksgivvukah recipe. The Food 52 campaign: In asking their members to help, Food… read more

The math proves that bacon is the single greatest ingredient

October 18, 2013 by
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  Opinions may count a lot, but Wired, working the Food Network, has mathematically proved that bacon is the single greatest ingredient. In Math Proves Bacon is the Miracle Food, they  crunched 49,733 recipes and 906,539 comments to prove that bacon added the greatest benefit of any single ingredient. The only categories that bacon did not work its magic on… read more

Testing food-saving gadgets

October 14, 2013 by
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  Prolonging the shelf life of produce makes sense for any number of reasons - saving money, miminimizing food waste, helping the environment, limiting trips to the grocery store, providing incentives to eat more fruits and vegetables. So food gadgets that promise to keep produce fresher longer are always tempting to buy. To help decide whether to invest in these… read more

The apple mystery story gets a little less mysterious

October 13, 2013 by
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With  apple season in full flower (at least in the U.S. and Canada), we wanted to bring attention to a great story that Mother Jones ran earlier this year. But, first, we wanted to wish all our Canadian brethren a very happy Thanksgiving. The article, Why Your Supermarket Only Sells 5 Kinds of Apples, profiles a modern-day apple detective. As… read more

Taking food instagrams may make the food less satisfying

October 11, 2013 by
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The Atlantic recently reported on  research done by the Journal of Consumer Psychology on the effects of taking photos of your food before eating it: "Study: We'll Enjoy Food More If You Don't Instagram It."* As has been proven by many diet studies regarding satiaty, the flavor of food decreases the more you eat it - the first bite always… read more

Fortuitous kitchen mistakes

October 9, 2013 by
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We think most people (at least secretly) love lists - especially those that involve food. And this list from First We Feast of 15 Delicious Things That were Invented By Mistake is one of our recent favorites. The invention of chocolate chip cookies is a fairly well-known story, and beer had to be a  great mistake (it was probably a… read more

Getting the inside scoop on the Food Network

October 8, 2013 by
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There's a new book out, From Scratch: Inside the Food Network by Allen Salkin, that describes the 20 years that the Food Network has been on. The Daily Meal has produced an interesting slideshow -  20 Surprising Facts about Food Network and Its Stars - that watchers may not be aware of. Here are five that we found  especially  interesting:… read more

The amazing popularity of chicken

October 6, 2013 by
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If you asked people (meat eaters) what meat they most often eat, it wouldn't be surprising if they answered "chicken." But, even so, we were really surprised with the information in Fooducate's article "Are Chickens Taking Over the World?" They, in turn, referred to an article in Mother Jones, Has the World Reached Peak Chicken?, which included a number of charts and… read more

The chicken-less egg & Bill Gates

October 1, 2013 by
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The L.A. Times recently asked - and answered: "What happens when Bill Gates attacks world hunger? Chicken-less eggs." In the article, they describe how Gates (founder of Microsoft) is now turning his philanthropic attention to world hunger. And one of his approaches is to encourage meat substitutes, "Raising meat takes a great deal of land and water and has a… read more

Quick ways to soften butter

September 29, 2013 by
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Among the most notable pet peeves in a kitchen has to be this overlooked description in a recipe: "butter, softened" - and all you have is cold, hard butter. So here's some quick ways on how to solve this problem with minimal angst: Cut the butter into small chunks and set out at room temperature Grate the butter (especially good… read more

Reviving 12 limp vegetables

September 19, 2013 by
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The Washington Post had a very useful item yesterday, How to Bring 12 Kinds of Vegetables Back to Life. Since we're sure that everyone has experienced limp asparagus spears, flaccid green beans, and anemic salad greens, this is a handy guide. Essentially, each procedure buys you 24 hours of extra vegetable life. They specifically deal with: asparagus broccoli carrots celery chives… read more

Quick tip:The two-step process to keep brown sugar from hardening

September 17, 2013 by
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No matter how long you've been cooking, it seems that brown sugar remains one of the kitchen's most aggravating ingredients. Poorly packaged - in a box that never seals tightly - it hardens and clumps easily. The key is to never let it dry out - a condition that requires two steps. The first step is to immediately transfer the… read more

The Neanderthal approach to spiced food

September 15, 2013 by
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A recent visit to Penzey's recently was quite enlightening in showing how adding spices to foods has been kicked up to the next level - about half the store was dedicated to specialty spice blends named after geographic territories (Northwoods, Bangkok), purposes (BBQ 3000, Apple Pie), audience (Salad lovers, Forward!) and others.  Apparently, a sprinkling of plain paprika no longer… read more

Cooking Light’s taste tests produce 41 winners

September 13, 2013 by
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Every year Cooking Light gives out its Taste Test Awards, an annual guide to the best supermarket and artisanal products in a variety of categories. After eliminating foods that didn't meet nutritional standards, they chose their top 41 supermarket foods in 20 categories. The categories are quite diverse, including some obvious ones such as popcorn, ice cream sandwiches, chicken broth, canned soup,… read more

The most popular recipe on the Internet

September 12, 2013 by
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Unlike television shows or books, it's hard to gauge the popularity of things on the internet because of the sheer volume - how do you compare? But there are indications - Twitter has Followers, Facebook has Likes, and recipes have views and ratings.  And by those indications, The Washington Post has dubbed this lasagna recipe on AllRecipes.com - with over 7,000 reviews, 10,000 ratings,… read more
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