I’ve been thinking about this space in the last few weeks: how it changes with time. Life, itself, isn’t static, so it would be intuitive to think of this as a dynamic space. A year ago, Friday’s links didn’t exist, and today they do. I’m all the happier for it – I hope you are too.

Sometimes I post frequently; other times, not so much. Last summer, when I was in the throes of finishing a cookbook, I didn’t post much. I was too immersed in heavy writing and editing, and my husband and I ate a lot of “toast with things on top” and eggs made whichever way, both of which grew tiresome rather quickly. This upcoming month, in addition to some work I’ve been doing (and loving), I’ve picked up a private chef gig, and there might be another fun project on the horizon. So I might not be posting frequently in June, or maybe I’ll post about what I’m cooking for the private chef gig because these will be the types of things that will reheat rather well and should be a boon for a busy home cook. Friends, I hope you’ll forgive me for poorly lit iPhone photos should I do that, because the last thing on my mind in June will be a well-shot, well-lit, well-composed photo.

The infrequent posting could also suggest lack of interest or commitment to this space. But it’s actually quite the opposite: I only want to write about things that I think you ought to cook right now, without any delays; delicious and, for the most part, straightforward food. Sometimes, I’ll test recipes all week and they’re fine and good, but not particularly blog-worthy. It’s just regular dinner, folks, protein, grain, veg – you know the drill. Sometimes, the testing of a particular recipe takes months to perfect (there’s one on rotation like this right now – grrr). On occasions when I come across fussy recipes that are well-worth the extra effort, I save them for the kind of leisurely cooking when I can spend the whole day puttering in the kitchen. They tend to be weekends, but even Saturdays and Sundays can suddenly become full of those weekend activities like picnics and museums and hosting friends, and being outside in this glorious weather, because who wants to slave over a hot stove on a gorgeous spring (or summer day)? What you need is a reliable arsenal of recipes that will produce stunning results with minimal time and effort. In other words the recipes will have high culinary ROI.

Continue reading spicy tunisian fish stew (chreime).

Hi friends, sorry for being quiet this week – I’m in San Francisco for work and it’s been one busy but super fun week! Last week, in the kitchen, I’ve had a somewhat disappointing recipe testing results. Things were fine, but were they notable enough to tell you about here? Not particularly. There’s one recipe, for example, a cake, I’ve been working on, and this one will take awhile, because I know exactly what I want to wind up with, and there will be lots more recipe testing to do. I’ve dug my heels and decided I’ll work on it as long as it takes (weeks! months! years, if I must!) but I’ll get there and won’t stop testing it until I do.

As trips to San Francisco tend to go, eating here has been fantastic. I highly recommend all three restaurants I tried with my colleagues: Prospect, Ame, and La Mar – were all absolutely amazing. And the conference I’ve been helping out with, was chock-full of great content. My favorite speaker was Anne Wojcicki, one of the founders of this incredible company, 23andMe, a personal genetic testing kit that anyone can buy for $99. I’m pretty sure that I am the last person to learn about personal genetic testing kits – I mean, it seems quite obvious now that I think about it – but I was riveted to Ms. Wojcicki’s presentation. Not only will the kit show you potential health risks embedded in your DNA, but part of what made me so engaged in her presentation was this message: if we all pool our genetic data together, we can learn so much more about not just one another, but how to help one another in helping to solve many diseases. This coming together bit, that we are all better off collectively together, sharing information, than being on our own – the power of that message – hit me like a tidal wave. It only reinforced what I’ve been thinking of and believing in for so long, but the presentation itself, Wojcicki’s passion, were incredibly powerful. I highly recommend everyone checking out the company.

Despite waking up before sunrise and going to be relatively late, I managed to pull these links together for you because there were some awesome things to read. I hope you like them and I hope you all have a lovely weekend ahead! I’m traveling most of the day today, so will be a bit off line. Also, for folks waiting for the results of the giveaway last week, I will get the results this weekend. Cheers!

Continue reading friday link love.

Happy Friday, folks. This weekend couldn’t come soon enough. Too much transpired over the last seven day – too much!

Last weekend I found out that my former boss and good friend (a young woman) was given a grave diagnosis of ovarian cancer. She was to have surgery on Monday and to start aggressive chemotherapy right away for six months. For the rest of the weekend, I was in a fog. I couldn’t make sense of it: she was so young – and the cancer was, supposedly, incredibly aggressive. She wasn’t even in the age group where this is a threat. This was someone I knew very well, worked closely with for four years, and remained friends with long after our company let most people go. She and her husband came to our wedding. I’ve babysat her dogs, played with her baby daughter, sat on her living room rug while we’d catch up on life. Like most cancer cases, nothing made sense. Black was white; white was black – the world flipped over onto itself. I was so angry this happened.

That same day, after we decided to walk home from Tribeca to Brooklyn Heights, we saw the would-be Brooklyn Bridge jumper, who, thankfully, didn’t jump in the end. But to be on the bridge surrounded by so many onlookers, seeing his tiny silhouette and the police on top of the bridge, talking, pleading – was chilling. The sound of the helicopters cutting through the air; the FBI agent who bumped into us, armed and grave. And the irony of timing: one of those perfect, crisp spring days with bright blue skies and not a cloud up above, and there was this charge in the air, like something bad was going to happen. We left before the police talked the man down. If he was going to jump, we didn’t want to see it. We took the subway home that day.

On Monday afternoon, while picking up some fruit at a nearby store, I saw a woman, a nanny, get hit by a car, while trying to cross a confusing intersection. In a millisecond, she opted to push the stroller out of the way so that the baby didn’t get hurt. But she got hit and was taken away in an ambulance after the little girl’s mother arrived.

That same night, I learned that my friend who had surgery, was cancer free and wouldn’t need chemo. When the surgeons went in, they discovered a very rare case of a benign tumor which they removed. And when her husband called me to tell the good news, “Are you sitting down?” he said before he told me. I thought to myself, “Something awful. I must sit down,” And I did. But instead of something awful, the news turned out to be amazing – a miracle. I was out to dinner with some girlfriends at the time in one of those Manhattan restaurants where everyone is way cooler than you. Standing in the middle of a busy room, I started to cry: it was, in all sense, the very best possible news. Servers and partons buzzed around me, giving me furtive looks – when strangers cry in front of us, best to just ignore it. But I didn’t care: my friend was alive and well and had another amazing shot in life. I cried happy tears.

When I saw my friend the very next day, while she was still recovering from full-body anesthesia, we celebrated instead! We celebrated another chance at life, and remembering what is truly, really important. And so, with that in mind, I hope your weekend is filled with joy and goodness. Take the time to make note of what’s truly important.

Here are this week’s links!

Continue reading friday link love.

Hi, friends. Today, let’s talk to one another, frankly, about money. Or rather how we worry about money in this economy; and let’s face it — most of us, in some way or another, have worried about money at some point especially since 2008. Am I right?

Money conversations are never fun and are almost always awkward. I’m not sure why, but in our culture, money conversations are considered bad form. We can talk about income disparity, socio-economics, income levels, but when the matter of personal income is concerned, the conversation pretty much stops.

But it would be unfair to write about food, eating well, shopping at farmers’ markets, seeking out the best ingredients, and not, implicitly, bring up money. No one’s going to give you a dozen eggs for free, never mind a dozen eggs from fancy hens with their own names. Ramps and fiddlehead ferns (the trendy darlings of spring) aren’t cheap. Go to the farmer’s market in mid-August and try to buy a few tomatoes – they’ll cost you.

Continue reading skirt steak with buttered radishes + giveaway!.

Happy Friday, friends! Quite an eventful week as I turned 35 on Wednesday, got more flowers that day than ever in my life, including that stunner of an arrangement above (that one’s from my husband who really outdid himself). The night before, we went out to dinner at Blue Hill (in the city) and ordered the tasting menu but we called it “untethered” or “free range”, as in we let the kitchen prepare whatever and with every arriving dish, it felt like a wonderful surprise. The day of my actual birthday was a huge success outside of me accidentally stabbing my hand with an oyster knife while trying to pry open a particularly stubborn Bluepoint. There was quite a bit of blood, but Andrew valiantly bandaged me up. Prognosis: I’ll live.

There were, also, some fabulous links this week, and I was able to collect some of them. I hope you like them, and I hope you’re all looking forward to the weekend.

Continue reading friday link love.

I had my first Dark and Stormy when I was on my first (and only) vacation in Mustique with my then-boyfriend’s father’s family. It’s a gorgeous, lush island in the Caribbean, close to St. Vincent island, and it’s the kind of place where, unless you own a house there, you must rent one for an astronomical price. The house comes with staff who will wait on you, cook for you, tend to your every need. All you have to do is buy groceries and fly them over there. No big deal, right? Not if you like to live “like a [fill in the blank] raja” — my ex’s father’s words, not mine. At the time, I found the phrase to be funny, and he (the father) was always lovely to me.

Anyway, Mustique was kind of a surreal place, and our rental house, one of the swankiest on the island, opened to a kind of a panoramic view where you see so much of where water meets the sky that you see the horizon beginning to curve on the ends. It’s a simple thing, but it’s the kind of thing that never fails to take my breath away. That curve, that hazy glow of water meeting sky, when I think about it even now, I get a little light-headed. It was truly, breathtakingly gorgeous there. It was also the island where I got to stand, one foot away, from Mick Jagger while we waited out a quick shower on the beach.

Continue reading dark and stormy.

Happy Friday, everyone! Even though we’ve only returned from our vacation a week ago, Jamaica seems so far away now. We want to go back! Some interesting links this week – I skipped some of the more obvious news items because I figured given the events of the last two weeks of so, folks are keeping up with some more high profile stories. I hope you find these interesting and engaging, and as always, wishing you all a wonderful weekend ahead!

Continue reading friday link love.

Funny how the first thing I write about post honeymoon isn’t some tropical drink or dish (though those are coming some time soon), but about pasta with a somewhat obscure name – fregola sarda. From Jamaica to Sardinia in one fell swoop. How’s that for globetrotting?

Fregola sarda’s name hints at its origins, the island of Sardinia (hence “sarda”). It’s sometimes spelled as fregula and even though it’s a little tricky to find, I can’t recommend it enough. Visually, it looks just like Israeli couscous, which you can certainly swap in its place, should its Sardinian cousin be difficult to find. The only difference that I can think of (and please correct me if I’m wrong) is that fregola sarda is toasted, which gives the pasta a lovely, nutty flavor, while Israeli couscous is not. Curious, I’ve tried toasting Israeli couscous and it makes for a decent close substitute.

Continue reading fregola sarda with peas, zucchini, feta, and almonds.

Good Friday morning to all! See that picture above? That’s me rewarding myself for resourcefully using what we had in the pantry to make dinner: chile-cumin turkey burgers, smoky-chile sweet potato wedges with lime, and a giant salad. Also, I was getting into honeymoon mode, except I suspect I’ll be drinking Red Stripes while in Jamaica. Our flight tomorrow is so early, that we might be waking up when some of you (some of the hipper, cooler of you) will be just getting to sleep. I don’t expect to have much internets there, and I’m kind of looking to being untethered, so I don’t expect to post any links next Friday – I hope you understand. And since it’ll be well over a week until we speak again, I wish you a wonderful weekend, a stress-free week, and another great weekend following. Cheers!

Continue reading friday link love.

I wasn’t initially going to post this – after all, is avocado on toast or vegetable juice such novel ideas? But I started to think about how it’s probably not just me who is under the gun in trying to use all of the produce at home before going on a trip. Personally, I hate it when things go to waste, and inevitably, I do find an old bag of yellowing parsley in the back of the crisper. It happens to the best of us.

So what to do when you find yourself in a rather bountiful abundance of fruit and vegetables and only two days left to consume them? In my lack of proper planning, our crisper runneth over. Still. And we leave very early on Saturday morning. What to do?

Continue reading avocado toast and vegetable juice – using up produce before a trip.