Winter is just about here. And no, it doesn’t have to suck. True, there’s not much – if any – snow in Paris – which is something I miss. (When we’ve had it, it makes Paris more luminous and pretty.) But there’s no shortage of cold. In addition to being the time to unpack all one’s winter gear, and sadly pack up the t-shirts and…
This dish came together rather serendipitously on a Sunday afternoon. I was up to my elbows testing recipes and was looking for something savory for dinner that didn’t require too much prep, or dishes afterward. I’d brought home some colorful radicchio from the market, I had some bacon (don’t I always?), and there was a packet dried mushrooms in a kitchen drawer. So I gathered…
I don’t make risotto nearly as much as I should. I never order it in a restaurant unless I’m absolutely sure they’re going to do it right because there’s nothing worse than a not-very-good risotto. But there’s nothing better than a good one. Especially a good one with bacon in it. One night, back when I was working at Chez Panisse, Paul Bertolli, one of…
I eat a salad almost every day. I grab a big bowl, make dressing in it, then toss in whatever ingredients I have on hand. It might be a hard-boiled egg, miscellaneous greens, bits of roast chicken, slivered carrots, shredded cabbage, toasted nuts, cherry tomatoes, crumbled cheese, and so forth – whatever I have on hand. (But hold the alfalfa sprouts; does anyone really like…
Before I started working at Chez Panisse, way back in the early 1980s, I didn’t really know all that much about the restaurant. Prior to moving to California, I’d read an article about “California Cuisine” and of all the places listed, the chef of each one had either worked at this place called Chez Panisse or cited it as inspiration. So I’d picked up a…
In August, most of the businesses in Paris shut down while a vast number of people take their annual holiday vacations. And in case you think that’s a grammatical error, in French one says les vacances, in the plural. So if you have a problem with that, I would tell you to take it up with them yourself, but right now most of them are…
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