This is another Dave invention, but of course. It’s sweet and spicy and we’ve made it a bunch of times over the past year, so it’s way past time for me to share it with you! The spicy awesomeness of these beets comes from wasabi oil, which you can find locally if you live in […]

East African Sweet Pea Soup (adapted from Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant: Ethnic and Regional Recipes from the Cooks at the Legendary Restaurant by the Moosewood Collective) Hurry, hurry, you have to make this soup! I took a Hipstamatic photo just so I could post it for you all the sooner! I adapted this from one […]

God, look at those charred peppers! They’re the long, vaguely gnarly, kinda slender but not really, fairly spicy but not very, probably Italian ones I find at my local organic Korean grocery store. I love them with a deep and abiding love. Dave, however, is pretty sure that nightshades give him stomachaches, so I don’t […]

Dear people who live in or visit London, Have you stopped by Ottolenghi yet? You should. It is a happy place that makes people happy. I spent about 2 hours fighting through insane crowds and delayed buses to get there during a London tube strike once (not counting the time spent flying across the pond […]

Perhaps you’ve perused the fridge at Kam Man or some other Chinatown grocery store and seen jars of this crazy awesome mushy liquid that looks like rotting rice in cloudy water. It’s sweet and boozy, a tasty precursor to more refined sakes. You can brew your own using Chinese wine balls (actually, yeast balls), but […]

We’ve served this sauce at the restaurant twice now, and I’m not tired of it yet, which is an absolute miracle for me. It was another one of Dave’s brilliant sauces, where he came up with the main idea and all I had to do was taste and give him a few suggestions for rounding […]

I’ve been focusing so much on heavy, rich winter dishes lately, it’s really time to switch gears and try something different. Something clean and fresh and light to clear the palate. So instead of a braise, why not a try a nice quick pickle to go with a simple dinner? Crunchy, salty, spicy, and satisfying, […]

I love Momofuku, especially now that the Noodle Bar has moved to a larger location where Dave and I can actually bring our friends and chat with them at a table over dinner instead of just hoping to find one or two spaces at the bar. The food is amazing, and being the devoted carnivore […]

For my first attempt at making this sweet, salty, spicy, satisfyingly crisp bite o’ banchan, I followed this recipe from one of my favorite Korean food blogs, Evil Jungle Prince. Unfortunately, it turned out to be way too fishy for me. (This may have something to do with my misreading the measurement for anchovy sauce […]

This started out as a mint chutney, until we chanced upon some gorgeous persimmons at the store. And I have been craving cucumbers lately. (To be fair, I am almost always craving cucumbers.) As we combined our key ingredients, we realized that it would be a shame to cook or overspice them. And so a […]

I know, I know, I am posting too many recipes which call for urfa-biber lately. I am almost at the point where I will have to offer to mail a package of urfa-biber to anyone who wants it and has something interesting to swap for it. This recipe was adapted from Paula Wolfert’s The Slow […]

My partner, Dave, wanted to make brownies last night. “Fine,” I said. “Make them with urfa-biber!” Urfa-biber is our latest thrilling spice discovery. It’s a Turkish pepper, spicy and just extraordinarily flavorful. The literature all says that it tastes a bit like raisins, and I tend to agree. It has that depth of fruitiness to […]

My partner Dave and I spent a fun evening a few weeks ago making green curry paste over at a friend’s new apartment, a portion of which was ours to take home and freeze. It’s always fun trying to follow recipes with our fussy friends – does the recipe call for ginger? Pfeh, we have […]

This is my entry for The Spice is Right VIII: Frankenstein’s Monster, where we are creating culinary mash-ups using spices from one cuisine in recipes or with techniques from another. Here, I have used Sichuan peppercorns to add a tingle to a bowl of classically American shrimp chowder. The deadline to post your entries is […]

This is my entry The Spice is Right VII: Seasons of Love. If you would like to join in, please do! Today is the last day to post entries for this month’s challenge, which is all about family spice mixes. One of the flavor bases Dave and I have been using a lot since we […]

I just purchased a copy of Land of Plenty: A Treasury of Authentic Sichuan Cooking by Fuschia Dunlop. It came very highly recommended, and rumor has it that this is the best text on Sichuan cooking available in English today. I’m very excited and looking forward to trying out a whole lot of Dunlop’s recipes. […]

I have the most amazing new cookbook – A Drizzle of Honey: The Life and Recipes of Spain’s Secret Jews, by David M. Gitlitz and Linda Kay Davidson. It is full of recipes for foods cooked and eaten by Jews and conversos in the Iberian Peninsula during the time of Inquisition. To my great delight, […]

This is my contribution for The Spice is Right IV: It’s Too Darned Hot!, though, in truth, I am probably the only resident of New York City who is not completely sick of the heat by now. I am cold-blooded and reptilian, and nothing makes me happier than soaking in the warmth. I am trying […]

A friend and I were once on a bus to Boston, discussing the origin of ketchup (a/k/a catsup). I insisted that it had to be a relatively recent invention, because the tomato is a New World fruit. She thought it was older. So I called up my brother, asking him to look it up for […]

I must confess: I’m off to a bad start. For my first post in this beautiful new blog that Lisa and Dave worked hard to create for me, I am showing off a recipe that I neither invented nor cooked alone. My partner, Dave, adapted Martha Stewart’s marshmallow recipe into something suitable to bring to […]