Ina Garten has done it again. Her 12th cookbook in 20 years is considered to be her best ever. Titled “Modern Comfort Food: A Barefoot Contessa cookbook”, the new book arrived in October of last year.  As Katherine Gillen of PureWow.com wrote, “Maybe it’s because…

Rome’s favorite and most famous pasta dish gets a major makeover. When I lived in Rome, I can’t count how often I would order this dish. At least once a week, I would sit down to a bowl of this pasta.  Just four ingredients made…

The allure of the Sheet Pan Dinner is on full display here. The convenience factor isn’t the only thing this cooking technique has going for it. Food actually tastes better when you use a sheet pan. Flavor intensifies because you are using three cooking techniques:…

A New Way to Cook a Favorite Ingredient and an end of Summer Salad to serve alongside. Andrew’s sister Lauren and I have a great time finding comments on recipes that are off the wall.  These are from people who cooked an entirely different dish.…

Of all the foods we miss, simple Mexican food is high on our list. We are spoiled in the city living just a block from a Tacqueria that turns out Mexican favorites so good and so inexpensive, I seldom bother making them at home.  But…

The Astonishing Allure of Thai Cooking Combined with the Irresistibly-priced Costco Rotisserie Chicken I cannot seem to pass up Costco’s Rotisserie Chicken.  At $4.99, I marvel at how it’s actually priced lower than its raw counterpart a few yards away in the store.  But regardless…

Is there any easier way to cook than on a Sheet Pan? Whoever invented Sheet Pan Recipes deserves a medal.  There is likely no more simple way of cooking than this.  All the ingredients cook at the same time in the same pan. And once…

As much as I love Chicken Pot Pie, I was looking to kick things up and bring some new flavors to this old family favorite.  And old is an appropriate word.  Pot Pies have a history going back to ancient Greece.  The Greeks cooked meats…

An old favorite takes on new flavors in just about 60 minutes Out here in the Hamptons, the day after Labor Day is called “Tumbleweed Tuesday”.  It is the day when the place completely clears out as everyone heads back to school and work. It…

I realize I am a bit late to this party.  For a while I thought Martha Stewart had given up cooking any other way than by using a sheet pan. She created 17 sheet pan suppers for Pork alone. She made everything from Pizza to…

What I love about this recipe, which is from Bon Appetit Magazine, is that it’s the perfect escape from winter.  The dish looks like it was made in high summer with its cherry tomatoes, pickled red onion and fistful of parsley leaves.  Then there’s the…

Melissa Clark’s “Dinner. Changing the Game” (Clarkson Potter 2017) arrived just a little late.  The Instant Pot epidemic was fully underway and so this book took a back seat to her “Dinner in an Instant.75 modern recipes for your Pressure Cooker, Multi Cooker Instant Pot”…

         I confess to being a tomato junkie.  I adore the fruit, and yes, botanically it is a fruit.   Nothing made me happier than the arrival of great little tiny tomatoes variously called ‘cherry’, ‘grape’ and most recently, ‘heirloom mixtures’.   They arrived in this country…

         A braise may not strike you as a Spring preparation at all.  Aren’t braises hearty affairs that build flavor by the hours they spend in the oven?  Aren’t they winter warmers and not something you’d expect to see any time after May 1st?  Well…