I have wanted to make this tart since 2004. That is the year that Frank Stitt’s Southern Table, one of my favorite cookbooks, was published. I find the book very inspiring and I return to it regularly. Early on I noticed this tart which sounded and looked SO good, but then, without fail, I would forget to make it every time strawberry season rolled around. Major frustration. But not this year!

read more+++

I am here to tell you about a recipe for pasta that you cook in one pan. One pan, people! Dried noodles, sauce ingredients, water—they all get thrown into a big pan and boiled for less than 10 minutes. You end up with a totally delicious dinner, and a party trick.

read more+++

It has been a while since I wrote about a cocktail on these pages. What’s wrong with me? Am I avoiding the word mixology?

This little beauty features rhubarb juice, a juice I didn’t know existed. At least I had never given it any thought. You puree a bunch of rhubarb in a food processor and then strain it through cheesecloth. You get a mind-blowing amount of juice. Like, basically rhubarb are all liquid. It is crazy! Science! Anyway, you get a measuring cup full of ruby-red liquid (or not, depending on the color of your rhubarb). You need to let the liquid sit overnight so that the pulp can sink to the bottom and then you pour off the crystal clear red juice and discard the sediment. Then, you make this very delicious drink.

read more+++

This is the best recipe for the day.

Asparagus with Parmesan Pudding and Prosciutto

It is one of those recipes that is so perfect you kind of don’t know what you did before it. It is something I will look forward to serving every spring from now until forever.

The recipe comes from April Bloomfield’s beautiful book, A Girl and Her Pig, which is a book that always makes me want to cook. In this recipe, Bloomfield brilliantly combines the eggs and Parmesan that pair so naturally with asparagus in a pudding. Add some toasted bread and thin slices of prosciutto and you have everything you need. I made this platter for lunch on Saturday and Bryan and Katie and I all ate it up while almost constantly remarking on how good it tasted. It is one of those recipes that makes it hard to talk about much else. read more+++

There are as many recipes for cold Asian noodles as there are people in the world. That isn’t true. But it sometimes feels true. Versions of this vaguely Asian (pan-Asian?) dish (does anyone know the origins? or when this because popular in the states?) pop up on restaurant menus and recipes for it make regular rotations through food magazines. They always remind me of the 90’s and eating at restaurants that felt cosmopolitan because they had this or Chinese Chicken Salad on the menu (Wolfgang Puck, yo!). I love these type of noodles and am on a life-long quest to put together the perfect recipe. Whenever I find a new version to try, I consider it a research opportunity.

read more+++

Summer might be my least favorite season in Chicago. I know! I know! I feel very conflicted about it, too. Admittedly, there is much I like about summer, especially as it relates to food: farmers markets! local everything! hot dogs! The thing is, I really dislike being hot. My thermostat is off, I run hot already. And the humidity in Chicago really gets me down. So, unlike every other Chicagoan who cant wait for summer….I am ambivalent. Of course, there are those dry sunny days in the 70’s that I too love, but they’re pretty rare. Mostly it is too hot and too humid. So, I look for ways to cool off. This lassi does the trick.

read more+++

I am a Zoe Nathan superfan. She and her husband, Josh Loeb, own a bunch of really rad restaurants (Rustic Canyon Wine Bar, Huckleberry, Milo and Olive, Sweet Rose Creamery) in Santa Monica that I eat at whenever I am in town. Zoe also grew up with a bunch of my dearest friends (hi Tini!) and worked at Tartine with another dear friend who happens to own my favorite bakery in Chicago. It is a small world of wonderful people. I convinced Zoe to stop by L + D to share a recipe and answer the ole L+D food quiz—remember that thing? read more+++

Deborah Madison has published a new cookbook, and the food-universe is rejoicing. With good reason, it is a beautiful book. The food-trend pendulum has swung back to vegetables, and so a resurgence in Madison’s popularity makes perfect sense. Vegetable Literacy is one of a slew of new books focusing on vegetables. The recipes are organized by plant families and you get good information about the growing and care of each vegetable. In some ways, it is the American version of Tender. It is fresh and bright and perfect for spring. read more+++

Stop the World I Want to Get Off, is the name of a musical I have never seen. It is also how I feel. I’m having hard time being a person this week. Things keep exploding. And flooding. And being shameful. And being racist. And being anti-gay. And being irresponsible. And being ridiculous. And all anyone does is complain about it on Facebook.

***

My best friend had a baby last week. Best friend doesn’t really do it justice. We are kin, and the most powerful kind of kin because we adopted each other—there were no obligations. She and her husband made the most beautiful baby that I have ever seen. Yes, I am biased but he really is perfect and I can already sense his extreme intelligence and creativity. He is currently experiencing his 7th day of life. Everything is new to him. Life is stretched out before him—The Future.

There are weeks (like this one) when the future seems completely terrifying to me. My initial response is always flight. I want to move to a forest (I can’t really explain this one). I want to move to another country (What is the name of that country that doesn’t have any problems?). I want to watch American Idol (the final three better be Kree, Amber, and Candice— otherwise I’m coming for you America). Then, I get angry and scream about fucking politicians or those idiots to Bryan who is overwhelmed by my intensity, but sympathetic. read more+++

What is the future of publishing?

LOL, how would I know?!

But maybe one thing might be more independently published books, which I am down with if they are all as beautiful as Lark, Cooking Against the Grain by John Sundstrom, chef/owner of Seattle’s Lark restaurant. The cookbook was funded through Kickstarter and produced entirely in Seattle, taking the whole local movement up a notch. The book is beautiful to the extreme, in fact, it is more beautiful than most of what is coming out of the major publishing houses in our country. So there’s that. I think the secret to that beauty is, in part, a singular, very personal vision. Lark tells the story of a way of cooking and interacting with the earth that draws you in and makes you want to be a part of it. It is comprehensive, not only including recipes, but also ways of dealing with ingredients and sourcing food.

read more+++