Paneer is the star ingredient in some of my most favorite Indian dishes — and probably yours too! I often find myself scooping just one more nibble of chewy, milky-tasting paneer from the dish long after I’m officially full. Sure, you can buy this firm cheese at the store to make your own homemade curries, but where’s the fun in that?! If you have a pot, a strainer, and some cheesecloth, you can have fresh homemade paneer cheese in about 30 minutes.
Raquel admits she and her husband were “victims of first time reno naiveness.” They thought their down-to-the-studs kitchen renovation would take six weeks. Five months later (!) they have the kitchen of their dreams, complete with new floor, cabinets, countertops, and a lovely shimmery tile backsplash. See what this kitchen looks like now!
Blogging about food is a tricky thing. In order for something to be post-worthy, it usually needs to be a pretty wonderful and delicious thing to eat. If it’s not, then there has to be some kind of story about that. Or it should be a new discovery. Or have some meaning in our lives and culture. But we seldom write about ordinary, everyday food or eating. We don’t sit down at the table to an ordinary PB&J lunch, and then move over to the computer and blog about it
Everyday food isn’t always fabulous, or revelatory, or new. It’s often not worth writing home (or a blog) about. It’s usually just lunch or breakfast or dinner, plain and simple. And that’s just fine.
Happy weekend everyone! What’s cooking? We’re celebrating weather that actually feels like spring (if you close your eyes and ignore the wind) plus the conclusion of our first-ever Cooking Cure! How did it go for you? Even if you didn’t follow along all month we hope it was fun and refreshing for some of your cooking routines.
And what’s cooking in your kitchen? I’m making a big family lunch for my mother and grandmother and all my siblings; I’m making deviled eggs and torn between these, these, and these. What about you? What are your spring cooking plans?
Three square meals are important and all, but let’s get down to the fun stuff: snacks! This weeks we covered all your daily nibble needs. If you have a sweet tooth, be sure to try the raw chocolate chip cookie dough bites or the frozen chocolate-dipped banana bites. If you’re more of a savory person, try the curry-roasted pistachios or whipped feta dip. Whatever you do, make sure you try this peach lambic and rye sangria. Seriously –– it’s kinda important.
Day 20: Friday, March 28
Today’s Assignment: Plan next week’s meals, and then keep it going!
The Cooking Cure: See all assignments so far here
Grab the confetti and start the parade — Congratulations! You’ve made it through 4 weeks, 20 meal-“curing” assignments, and all the way to the finish line of our first-ever Cooking Cure. It feels pretty good, doesn’t it?!
We’ve talked a lot these last few weeks about setting goals, kicking old habits and finding new ones, and ways to get ourselves out of cooking ruts. The challenge going forward is making sure these new habits really stick.
Day 19: Thursday, March 27
Today’s Assignment: Inventory your leftovers and make a plan to use them
The Cooking Cure: See all assignments so far here
We’re nearing the end of the week — and the end of our 21 meal Cooking Cure challenge! — and that probably means that the leftovers have started piling up in your fridge. Today, we’ll take stock of that fridge situation and work on developing one more good meal-planning habit: dealing with the leftovers.
I knew hosting my board game night gathering on a Friday meant that I needed some quick ideas and tricks to make my apartment at least appear clean and put together. After all, an unkempt apartment shouldn’t keep you from spontaneous entertaining!
This guide to a guest-ready home requires that your place isn’t in total disarray: I can’t help you if your living room needs serious deep-cleaning. But if you (like me) are reasonably neat but too busy to tidy until just before guests arrive, here’s your last-minute cleaning plan.
Five years ago, we hosted our ten full-time staff members for a weekend retreat in the country, and I was in charge of the cooking. We were hungry worker bees, stretching our brains all day, decoding the secrets of site design, traffic analytics and reader satisfaction. Tried as I did to push the healthy snacks on my co-workers, it was a plate of dark chocolate walnut cookies that won for best snack.
Digging back into the archives, I found the post about these cookies with some broken code and one of the worst food photographs I ever made, so I decided to resurrect the piece for you this week, because five years on, these are still one of my favorite tea-time snacks.
