As we head into winter, what could be better than a Yankee Pot Roast for dinner one of these weekends.  Slow-cooked over a period of hours, the relatively inexpensive cut of meat used in the dish becomes meltingly tender. The sauce created lends itself to…

         Who doesn’t love a great pot pie?  Meat and vegetables and gravy under a blanket of pastry, these pies are American Classics.  But they go back in culinary history considerably longer. In the Roman Empire, the pastry was banquet fare.  Sometimes the crust revealed…

Basilica de Santa Maria del Fiore The story behind Peposo, a rich stew that owes its flavor to just two key ingredients –Chianti and Black Pepper—is as fascinating as the finished dish.   I read it in Cook’s Illustrated, which, in its usual fashion, went to great…

Here’s true comfort food that you can play with to your heart’s content.  It’s virtually impossible not to make something warming and filling out of this recipe because the recipe is as flexible as can be.  It’s also a great way to empty the fridge,…

Jill Clark, Redhead and Cook  My friend Jill Clark introduced me to Melissa Clark’s recipe for “Counterfeit Porchetta” at the dinner party she and her husband Steve threw right before Christmas.  Like Jill, I’d seen the recipe in the New York Times the week before…

         Who can forget Carla Hall? Twice a contestant on Top Chef, she was voted “Fan Favorite” her second time around, which is equivalent to being named “Miss Congeniality” in the old Miss America days.  She was lots of fun to watch…

         Growing up in Canada, the Sunday Roast was a tradition in our house.  An enormous piece of beef would appear on the dinner table and our extended family would dig in.  And it was almost always beef because my parents had…

         At the risk of people believing I must be going steady with Melissa Clark, I am rushing this out in advance of the latest winter storm.  Even though I just shared Melissa’s superb Pork Chop recipe the middle of last month, I could not…

                    As most of my readers know, I am Canadian by birth and mighty proud of it.  I am also mighty proud that Canada racked up a total of 10 Gold Medals at the Sochi Olympics.  This…

         Bangers and Mash I have a weakness for English dishes with picturesque names. Even the simplest of these is a riddle.  “Bangers and Mash”, or Sausage and Mashed Potatoes, is the simplest to understand.  The sausages used in the original recipe,…

Catherine de Medici Mother of 3 French Kings        As far back as the 16th century, Lyon, not Paris, has been the gastronomical capital of France.  It was then that Catherine de Medici, the Queen Consort of King Henry II, an Italian noblewoman by birth,…

Sometimes when I write a post, the food gods seem to be hovering overhead.  This recipe came to my attention when it was posted as a great idea for a Mother’s Day meal. Talk about timely.  Mother’s Day is Sunday, May 12th this year.  Since presumably…

It’s awfully close to putting-away-the-pot-pie-recipes time.  But this one is so good, I hope it gets in under the wire and if not, do save it for a rainy day.  It’s that good.  The reason I rushed to make it was that I’d managed to…

Last week, I had the strongest craving for a Patty Melt.  I confess that the Patty Melt is far and away my absolute favorite chopped meat sandwich. You must never call a Patty Melt a hamburger because to purists, the Patty Melt is emphatically not…