It’s considered rude in France to ask people who you’ve just met—“What do you do?” It’s kinda like asking someone how much money they make. We Americans are used to freely discussing money, or anything financial, and have no qualms about admiring someone’s new shirt, and in the next breath asking them how much it cost. Or walking into someone’s apartment and asking them how…
[Update: As of October 2019, City Bakery has closed.] Here’s what I like best about The City Bakery: anything you order is going to be first-rate. There’s a thin, flaky apple tart with a hint of tangy lemon and lots of crackly sugar. The chocolate cookie is soft and bursting with deep, dark chocolate flavor. And the dreamy chocolate tartlet is simple and direct: a…
We’ve been doing quite a bit of shopping here in New York. Romain has been here before, but never with an ‘almost’ local. (I grew up next door.) Sure, he’s been all the museums, but he’s never been to places as uniquely American as Bed, Bath & Beyond, TJ Maxx, and Old Navy, where we saw the woman who played Janice on The Sopranos loading…
If there’s anyone out there who likes homemade candy more than I do, I would like to meet that person. I used to have a dream about opening a shop that sold nothing but confections made by my own two hands: chocolate-covered marshmallows, twisty peppermint sticks, naturally-flavored lollypops, sugary orange slices (god, I love those…), and chewy red licorice whips. I even went so far…
It’s a very good sign, when I’m handed a menu in a restaurant, and everything on it looks so good to me, I can’t decide what to order. Such was the case with the menu at ubuntu, one of the most highly-lauded restaurants in America, which wasn’t just famous for creating innovative food, but also because it’s entirely vegetarian. Luckily there were six of us,…
Donuts! Now there’s a new concept. Actually there’s nothing new about donuts, and places like Krispy Kreme have come, and (almost) gone. But tucked away in a sunny corner of 24th Street in the Mission is the Dynamo Donut & Coffee shop.
[UPDATE: Citizen Cake is now closed.] I feel like I deserve a majority of the credit (or blame…depending on how you look at it) for the cupcake craze. I was eating them decades ago, when no one gave them a second thought. And now, as someone who teaches baking told me, making and selling cupcakes in America is like printing money. I’m not much for…
Stop the presses! Although I think in this day and age of online publishing, what do we now say—stop the downloading? Somehow, that doesn’t have the same sense of urgency to it. Still, this is important. I know you’re going to find this hard to believe, but my search for the perfect burger was not to be resolved in Paris.
Is PPQ the best Vietnamese restaurant in San Francisco? I used to be in the camp of Vietnam II for the longest time, mainly because when I worked at a Southeast Asian restaurant, that’s where almost all of my co-workers ate. That is, until I discovered Pho Phú Quôc, otherwise known as PPQ. Which is funny: I always guessed that they had to shorten their…
Join me on my Spring 2026 book tour for my latest book, The Great Book of Chocolate
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