What’s one of the biggest differences between a good cook and a great cook? They love herbs and they know how to use them. But let’s face it — getting those herbs just right can be intimidating. Not only do you have different varieties of herbs to choose from, but you also need to decide if you want fresh or dried. To get you started on your herbaceous education, here are seven of our favorite tips to master now.
What does healthy eating mean to you? Ask three people this question, and you’ll get five answers. More meat, less meat. Less sugar, less fat. No no, more fat! The recommendations from the nutrition industry come fast and contradictory.
In the midst of all the push and pull, I think we can all agree on one positive thing, and it’s that more vegetables are always good. There are many ways to pack more vegetables into your everyday meals, but here’s my favorite strategy: Flip the bowl!
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Get the dipping sauce ready — there’s a new fry in town. Avocados have had their time to shine on toast, but now it’s time to turn these bright green beauties into dreamy veggie fries. We’re talking super crispy and crunchy on the outside, and rich and creamy on the inside. It’s the instant-gratification way to use up that firm avocado sitting on your counter right now. With a few key steps, you can add a batch of crispy avocado fries to dinner.
If you’ve been following Smitten Kitchen outside this url recently, you might have noticed that a terrible, dangerous thing has happened: I revisited the epic, consummate even, chocolate chip cookies from David Leite via The New York Times, mostly because I was tired of looking at the unpalatably blueberry-ish photo of them atop the 2008 post, and eight years later, in basically the rom-com of cookie sagas, realized the thing I wanted most in a chocolate chip cookie was was there the whole time.
What, I wasn’t in love with them already? I mean, they did not go to waste. We are not monsters. They just felt too over-the-top to me to actually make a regular part of my life. They used expensive chocolate, demanded planning ahead and were in every way the very opposite of this salted chocolate chunk cookie, which I have since considered my go-to. For weekdays and such.
… Read the rest of the consummate chocolate chip cookie, revisited on smittenkitchen.com
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Earlier this week I asked from some help. While I’m naturally a night owl, I’ve been trying to find new ways to approach waking up in the morning. Could I possibly wake up earlier and actually enjoy the first hour of the day instead of feeling rushed? Was there a breakfast routine or an alarm clock that could have me jump out of bed instead of hitting the snooze button (again)?
Here are some of our readers’ best ideas for actually enjoying (or at least tolerating) the morning. From special coffee rituals to breakfast dates with friends, here are some of the tips I’m hoping to try out in the next couple months.
The most popular base for a dinner bowl in my household is always the same: pasta. My husband has the love of pasta in his blood, and he would be perfectly happy with a massive plate of spaghetti and meatballs every night.
While I share his love of pasta, I don’t want a big bowl of it every night. I’ve found that saucy meatballs and bolognese can be very good on vegetables instead. But you don’t have to give up the pasta entirely; just flip the bowl!
It’s always hard to plan for a fish meal around here, because it all depends on what the market has fresh. You can show up at the store with the best intentions of securing a thick halibut steak only to be disappointed with what clearly looks like it’s been sitting under the glass for a few days.
Fish is best fresh, there’s no way around it. The fresher the better! So, the best attitude to approach the fish section is, what looks best?
With whole fish, you can usually tell just by looking at the eyes—they should be clear, not foggy and sunken. With fillets, if the surface is dried out and tired looking, that’s not a good sign. The fillet should glisten, like it was just cut, and should smell fresh, not fishy.
Homemade granola just may be why breakfast is my favorite meal of the day and why I will always say yes to breakfast for dinner. After all, it’s toasted, crunchy oats tossed with a medley of nuts and seeds with just enough maple syrup and brown sugar for a hint of sweetness and flavor. What’s not to love? When you make granola in a slow cooker you get all that, plus the ability to make a huge batch at once with far less to clean up than when you make it the traditional oven-based way. And if you were concerned about the crunch, rest assured, we’ve discovered the simple solution for that as well.
If you’ve ever searched the internet for gluten-free recipes, you’ve undoubtedly stumbled upon Shauna James Ahern’s blog, Gluten-Free Girl, that she runs with her husband. The recipes and stories she shares online and in her many cookbooks are thoughtful and full of energy. She makes being celiac feel like an opportunity in the kitchen, rather than a burden.
Today Shauna shares her favorite pint of ice cream, which you can only find in her town of Vashon in Washington. Is it time to buy a plane ticket?
