Tue Sep 25, 2007
My flan on the left, Bon Appetit’s on the right…
Sometimes I forget I’m not a chef. When friends come over for dinner I spend hours planning the menu, littering the floor with so many back issues of Bon Appétit, Gourmet and cookbooks while trying to find the “core” recipe to build my meal around, that getting off my couch is like stepping into a mine field. Shopping becomes an hours-long ordeal—sometimes with the occasional realization that my budget doesn’t always match my palate (three pounds of organic beef tenderloin for $80?). Then there’s the prep, the slicing and chopping and tasting and measuring into ramekins for later. By the time I actually start cooking the meal, I’m imagining myself in a professional kitchen on a busy night of service.
But I’m not in a professional kitchen. I make mistakes. Some dishes are unsuccessful. And unlike a chef, I don’t generally take the time to work the kinks out of a dish before I serve it to people. And that pretty much explains Thursday night’s Sweet Potato Flan from the October 2007 issue of Bon Appétit. Continue reading
Wed Sep 19, 2007
Roasted Red Pepper Calzone
Anybody can order a pizza when the guys come over for football—and believe me, there are plenty of games where I will, but this early in the season I’m still motivated to make some game time treats. So, after going for an 18-mile bike ride with my boyfriend and father on Sunday, I took quick stock of what I had the fridge and decided to stop by Trader Joe’s to get the fixins’ for quick calzones. Continue reading
Fri Sep 7, 2007
I promised myself, when I first started cooking for friends, that I wouldn’t be a whack-a-mole hostess, always a pot on the stove or something else to retrieve from the fridge, popping up from the chair (always strategically chosen for its proximity to the kitchen) then barely having sat down, suddenly popping up again for something else. My mother’s done it. My grandmother’s done it. And I’m sure your mothers and grandmothers have done it, too. I could tell you this bothers me for the way it relegates women to some sort of subservient role, but really it’s nothing so lofty as that. It bothers me because the whack-a-mole hostess doesn’t enjoy her food. Continue reading
