I’ve been reviewing kitchen equipment for more than 30 years and I’ve seen it all, from potato-peeling mitts (fuhgettabout ’em) to cooking robots (for those who don’t actually like making dinner). It takes a lot to impress me, and yet this month at the Smart Kitchen Summit in Seattle, I saw something that made me think, I want that in my own kitchen!
The real gift of pumpkin season is what’s hiding inside: the (all-too-often-discarded) seeds. When toasted in the oven with a little olive oil and some salt, the soft seeds from inside pumpkins turn into the crunchiest, savory snack of the season. They certainly make sticking your hand inside a squishy pumpkin worth the hassle, anyway. Here’s the simplest, easiest method for cleaning pumpkin seeds and roasting them in the oven.
If sweet potatoes aren’t regularly found in your pantry, let’s change that today. These tubers are a little more rugged on the outside than their Russet and Yukon Gold friends, but their sweet, amber-hued flesh makes them an easy side dish for nearly anything you’re cooking.
In this cooking lesson, we’re covering the basics of how to peel and chop sweet potatoes three different ways and share some tips on when is best to use each cut.
Today my second cookbook, five years in the making, Smitten Kitchen Every Day: Triumphant & Unfussy New Favorites, at last leaves my noisy, messy kitchen and, perhaps, makes its way into yours. I am, as ever, a nervous wreck. I hope you love it. I hope you find a new favorite recipe (or 5) in it.
I hope you make the granola biscotti and have them on hand for breakfasts and snacks for weeks; I hope your weekend is filled with sticky toffee waffles and breakfast potato skins. I hope you make a big batch of the dressing and the crumbs tonight for the kale caesar right away and keep them in jars in your fridge so that you can make more every night, as we do for weeks on end throughout the year and when you need a break, move onto the sushi takeout cobb. I hope you’re as excited as I am that there’s a soup section this time (including a mini-matzo ball soup that’s completely vegetarian and a grandma-style chicken noodle soup that’s cozy and economical and the only way I’ve made it since). I hope you find that the artichoke galette tastes a whole lot like that retro parmesan artichoke dip and it’s not an accident; I hope you don’t roll your eyes when you read about Debröd (but I’ll understand if you do); I hope you see why I make that herby baked camembert for every party and probably always will. I hope you’re excited that most of the mains are vegetarian again (halloumi sheet pan roasts and puffy dinner pancakes and a wild mushroom shepherd’s pie) but the meat dishes are ones I couldn’t shut up about (meatballs marsala with buttered egg noodles, street cart-style chicken and rice and short rib carnitas). And I hope you know that one of the most bonkers parts of this book is the Party Cake Builder, 7 different one-bowl, dead-simple cakes and 4 easy frostings (think: The ‘I Want Chocolate Cake’ Cake and then some) you can mix and match and present as cupcakes or sheet cakes or layer cakes without a lot of planning because I know — believe me, I know — most birthday cakes are made with love, devotion, and good intentions, but also at the last minute. And I hope you’ll see why I think the cookie section has some of my favorite recipes yet, because we’re finally going to crack the code of those bakery cookies so they at last taste even better than they look.
Halloween is right around the corner. If you don’t have a costume yet, we have a few ideas. The only catch? There’s a trick before you get to the treat.
Can you figure out what these punny costumes are? They’re all things you can sip, nibble, or chew!
Everyone knows that person who refuses to recycle because they say it doesn’t actually do anything. Maybe you even are that person. Does recycling actually make a difference to our environment?
We talked to top experts in the recycling space to find out what we can really know about the impact recycling has on our planet.
Do you know the difference between a yam and a sweet potato? Most grocery stores offer two similar-looking tubers — some labeled as yams, and some as sweet potatoes.
Would you be surprised if I told you that all those times you thought you were eating yams, you were likely eating a sweet potato, and that you probably haven’t ever actually had a true yam? And yet yam and sweet potato do mean different things in grocery stores. Here’s the scoop on these tubers, with tips for getting the one you want at the grocery store.
I make vinaigrettes every day — seriously. I change them up with different vinegars and different oils, and add some sweeteners like honey now and again. Sometimes I replace about half of the vinegar with citrus juice. As a corporate caterer who makes a billion lunches, classic oil-vinegar-salt-and-pepper vinaigrettes sometimes just get boring — trust me. Which is why I reach for this sauce when I want to something new and different to add to salads, pastas, and every cooked meat.
Head to the fridge and grab the butter and a small saucepan, and read on for how to make the sauce that might just change how you cook.
One of my strategies for keeping our budget in check is to have about a 50/50 mix of meaty and meatless dinners each week. But when I’ve busted my budget — say, after moving into a new house and splurging on a new dining table — a week of meatless dinners can save me.
This week’s meal plan is full of new-to-us vegetarian recipes that use inexpensive staples to keep our grocery budget low. Each recipe is hearty enough for cool fall weather and will satisfy both adults and kids alike.
One bite of this saucy, cheesy casserole and I was instantly transported back to junior high and the carb-filled dinners where my basketball team squeezed around a table with paper plates piled high with the requisite homey baked pasta. Only those team dinners never included a meal as good as this!
Reminiscent of classic pepperoni pizza, this weeknight casserole is made with a mess of curly noodles in place of the doughy crust, just the right ratio of sauce to melted cheese, and thin slices of pepperoni that crisp up as they bake. You’ll also love that it comes together in a pinch with just five ingredients.