The coffee maker is the sun around which your kitchen orbits: The day waxes as the first cups brew in the morning, and wanes as the last pot of decaf is prepared.
That’s why buying a new machine can be a really big decision and feel like the whole house’s happiness rests in the balance. Here are some things to know before you do it.
Would this be a good place to admit that I only moderately enjoy sandwiches? I know, what kind of monster says such things! But, wait, come back. What I mean is, it’s the proportions: too much bread, too little filling. The obvious solution would be Dagwoods or sandwiches from one of those Jewish delis that are taller than your glass of Cel-Ray, but what if you didn’t want to have to unhinge your jaw just to take a bite?
My solution, as ever, is to serve them open-faced, piled high and with ideal proportions. If we were in Paris — and oh, I wish I were — we’d call them tartines. My brain is clearly already there because I modeled this “toast” on a croque monsieur (which I just learned, to my delight, translates as “gentleman crunch”), those cheese-coated, pan-fried ham and cheese sandwiches with frico for miles. I’m partial to the forestier-style croque at Buvette, where mushrooms take the place of ham and there’s a thick, Dijon-rich bechamel underneath (where a cold sandwich might enlist mayo or aioli). My open-faced version uses a whole-grain sourdough bread as a foundation and so much cheese on top that it spills down onto the baking sheet and lifts off in crispy flakes. I honestly don’t know why we’d ever want to eat anything else.
(Image credit: Dwell)
From Apartment Therapy → Savings Stretchers: 8 Times Inexpensive Materials Looked Really Great in the Kitchen
If you tend to open your kitchen cabinets with a sense of trepidation because you’re never sure what’s going to fall out on your head or feet, it’s time for an intervention.
Don’t feel too bad: Kitchen cabinets can quickly turn into a messy black hole — a place where things go in and never seem to come out, unless they’re avalanching. What can you do? Invest in some cabinet organizers. We’ve rounded up 10 of them that will make your kitchen (and your life) run more smoothly.
It’s a very particular kind of morning we’re talking about when we say this is the Cuban sandwich you want for breakfast — specifically the kind that starts closer to noon than it does to nine, and one where the night before might’ve included lots of dancing. That, or those mornings when you wake up ravenous and ready for something truly hearty to eat.
The Cuban medianoche is a close sibling to the more famous cubano. With an identical filling — Swiss cheese, pork, ham, pickles, and sharp yellow mustard — the one distinguishing element here is the bread. Often called pan medianoche or pan sauve, this bread is smaller, richer, eggier, and usually sweeter than the crusty, baguette-like bread used for cubanos. I think it makes for an all-around tastier sandwich, but then I really don’t care for bread that scratches up the roof of your mouth with every bite.
With its origins in Havana and a legacy solidified by the numerous shops, stores, and restaurants that offer it day, noon, and night throughout Cuban communities in the States, the medianoche is really the sandwich to sink your teeth into when you want to do breakfast Cuban-style.
Have you ever been subjected to “filler fruit” in a fruit salad? This wasn’t even a term I was aware of until a friend who served a truly gorgeous fruit salad at a brunch a while ago used the term to note the absence of melon and banana.
Now, I know some people like these fruits in their salad, but I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, for the most part, that bananas and cantaloupe are the least desirable additions to the whole of it. So now, when I come back to this minimalist fruit salad of papaya and mango tossed in a honey-lime dressing with a hint of mint, I know it’s better for being super simple with not a filler fruit in sight.
If you’re a lover of food, you probably spend most of your money on meals — whether it’s your fondness for the taco truck, your penchant for fancy cocktails, or your desire to eat at the newest, hottest restaurants.
Why not save up by using one of these appropriately food-themed piggy banks?
I feel like there are people who like all the food on their plate to touch and people who like the different dishes to maintain their own space into carefully managed sections of the plate. I am firmly in the first camp and unsurprisingly a great fan of food in bowls for this very reason. Breakfast is probably my favorite time for a bunch of things to get tossed together in a bowl, which is why this meal of cumin-spiced black beans, plantains, and a fried egg is everything I ever wanted from the first meal of the day.
(Image credit: Tending the Table)
Sometimes dinner inspiration starts with a side rather than the main dish. Case in point? This braised purple cabbage. With only three ingredients, humble cabbage is transformed into an outrageously delicious side dish that just might steal the show come dinnertime.
(Image credit: Julia Steele)
I am not a fancy hand soap kind of person. I did not grow up in a home with fancy hand soap. I did not know people with fancy hand soap. And I did not, as a fledgling adult, suddenly acquire a love of fancy hand soap. So, it is something of a mystery to me that I am willing to pay a small fortune for a particular Australian hand soap.
Do you know the one I’m talking about?