This has been a week of cooking missteps and averted crises in my kitchen. Last Friday night as I was assembling a huge batch of enchiladas for a large group of people, I ran out of tortillas. It was one of those moments of panic in the kitchen. How did I miscount the tortillas? How…
One of the foods that I recommend most often to clients is roasted vegetables. For the busy cook, they are great because they are easy to make, very forgiving in terms of cooking time, and can be made in bulk and then used throughout the week in various dishes. I also love them for how…
On Sunday I went to visit my in-laws who were preparing for a trip to Italy. As we were leaving, my mother-in-law presented me with baby spinach, red cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, a bunch of zucchini, and two pints of blueberries that she wasn’t going to be able to use up. I was a bit reluctant…
While this is a wonderful time of year for connecting with friends and loved ones, celebrating community, and giving gifts, it can also be a time of stress, rushing around, and sliding backwards when it comes to the foods we eat. For many of us, myself included, we can fall into the mindset of, “oh…
When I go to do kitchen and pantry evaluations with my clients, one of the things that they often complain about is that they don’t like to spend time in their kitchen. They find it stressful, cluttered, or too time consuming. What I tell my clients is that the secret to making cooking more enjoyable…
When I was a kid, roast chicken with potatoes and a green salad was one of my favorite dinners. It always felt so comforting and like such an expression of love. I also loved the ritual of it, the carving of the chicken, the fact that everyone had their favorite part—breast, drumstick, the pope’s nose….
In the past week or so there have been a number of articles floating around about the difficulties of cooking dinner every night. And let’s be honest, even for someone like me who loves to cook, there are days when I just don’t want to do it. I don’t want to have to think about…
These are all things that we know would make us healthier, but breaking out of our dependence on pre-packaged foods, take out, and sugar-laden beverages can be really hard. That is where taking advantage of the summer can come in. You may be saying, “But summer is the time to relax? It’s the time to…
When you hear leafy green vegetables mentioned what is the first thing you think of? Sad, limp steamed spinach? Bland broccoli? That thing that was on your plate as a kid that you either choked down to get it over with or pushed around your plate hoping that it would look like you ate some?…
Last week I had a great meal plan all planned out. The only problem was, I lost my momentum and excitement about some of the meals I had planned, which then left me looking at my pantry trying to come up with other ideas that would be more inspiring to me. Whenever this happens to…