The funny thing about travel is that sometimes the smallest discoveries stay with you longer than the grand monuments. Aboard Scenic Pearl, I spent several wonderful days sailing through Holland and Belgium, exploring places that have drawn travelers for centuries. Scenic takes its food seriously.…

WE JUST CELEBRATED A GLORIOUS 4TH OF JULY WITH ONE SENSATIONAL BLUEBERRY UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE. Blueberries are in season here and Andrew created this all-blueberry version of Gail Simmons’s original recipe (see https://chewingthefat.us.com/2018/08/gail-simmons-bumbleberry-buttermilk-upside-down-cake.html)  In a blatant act of civil disobedience we didn’t want to see red…

This easily adaptable recipe is a perfect showcase for fresh fruit. When I asked Andrew for his recipe for this wonderfully homey dessert, he handed me one for Apricots and Blackberries.  His version had neither. Instead, the glorious peaches, blueberries, and raspberries that are at…

Now is the perfect moment for making these rustic pastries. Last weekend, Andrew was delighted to be back baking after a long winter hiatus. And the first thing he baked was a stone fruit galette.  It brought back memories of the individual galettes he had…

This Week, Bake this Versatile Almond Cake with Yotam Ottolenghi Andrew thinks that this cake would be an ideal breakfast cake, replacing coffee cake with its coconut, blueberries, and almonds.  All I can say is the cake is perfect, the berries juicy, the coconut and…

Two doyennes of home cooking’s recipes are combined in one spectacular dessert. Ina Garten gives great credit to her Easthampton neighbor, Martha Stewart for launching Ina’s publishing career.  They met when Ina was still running her food store, The Barefoot Contessa. It was Martha who…

Ah, the scone! Perfectly made it’s a thing of joy at tea time or coffee hour.   But the greater likelihood is that the scone most people encounter comes off as heavy as a hockey puck and just about as appetizing. No matter how much…

There’s no bad time for these little bits of heaven that use just 6 ingredients and take under 15 minutes to bake Truth be told, in good times and bad, it’s always time for a financier. The little French almond cakes, leavened with egg whites,…

The Food World suffered a great loss last month.  Molly O’Neill, one of the best food writers in the country died at just 66 years of age.  Molly O’Neill was the heir to a great legacy of food journalism that includes such luminaries at M.F.K.…

If you’re looking for a great cooking magazine, you really should look into Fine Cooking. It’s a wonderful learning tool. It would make a great gift for the Graduate or anyone starting out on their own. Its recipe directions are not shorthand. They’re written to…

It’s been quite a while since the baker in our house appeared on Chewing The Fat.  Truth is, Andrew does almost all his baking in Bridgehampton.  That’s where the stand mixer is and all those other baking necessities. But to make these scones didn’t require…

I’ve been working on Chewing The Fat’s first book. It’s a compendium of Andrew’s masterful baking.  The very last recipe was for homemade Granola.  The mere thought of it brought back memories of just how good it was.  It was so far superior to any…

Gail Simmons is such a glamorous presence on “Top Chef” that it’s easy to forget she’s first and foremost a great cook.  She’s also a fellow Canadian so I took a great deal of heat from Andrew for not knowing what a Bumbleberry was.  I’d…

Salad lovers are in sheer heaven now and will be through the rest of the summer.  The ingredients for perfect salads are everywhere. And the earliest part of the season yields the tenderest of greens. Arugula has its bite but it’s far from bitter which…