Photographic Lunch at FOOD

Roasted vegetables, beluga lentils with roasted corn.

Jalepeno corn soup.

Buckwheat noodles and fried bean curd

From Mitsuwa marketplace off of Venice. Perfect after a day spent writing about food you cannot afford.

Thanks Margy.

Halloween postage repurposed from the Gold Standard

There Will Be Blood (Shots) at Katsuya

Just Released: More Tickets to The Edison's All Hallows Eve Party
NOTE: the term "Baberaham Lincoln" was removed from this piece. Thus, so was my reason for writing it.

Rush Street Hosts Halloween Thriller Party

Leftover rice

They say that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Better yet, I'd say that when life gives you leftover rice and you're out of other things to eat for breakfast, make rice pudding. Much less elegant, but  much more filling.

No bread, no cereal. This morning, the situation looked grim. I made tea, worked for a bit, and avoided the thought of making breakfast. I googled "rice breakfast," thinking I might do something Asian with the leftover rice from last night, maybe throw a poached egg on top of some fried rice. The first results turned out to be rice pudding, which I was lucky enough to have the makings for.

I threw together what amounted to be probably a cup or so of leftover rice, a cup of milk, and a hand full and a half of raisins into a pot, cracked one egg, and stirred it well. For sweetness, I dripped in a few tablespoons of maple syrup (though honey or white sugar would probably do the trick), and sprinkled in a bit of cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. I brought it to a boil, stirred some more, and let it simmer for maybe 5-7 minutes. This is a really satisfying breakfast for very little work. Sweet, hearty, and it warms the cockles. Great for the winter, especially if it happened to be winter outside!

Gourmet mag lives on, sorta

The magazine's (former) editor is going to have a show on PBS. One can only hope that the show's cinematography will be as rich as Gourmet's photography.

Recent Ink

My posts lately have been infrequent and half-hearted. Forgive me. I'm hopeful that I'll learn to do better; today is the first time I've finished the newsletter before dark.

Food at Food: Amanda Broder's Fall Baking Class

Teach A Man to MAKE A Mojito, He'll Drink For A Lifetime: Caribbean Cooking Class at Ciudad

Capitol City Sports Bar Has Big T.V.'s, Cold Beers, And Now -- Ladies' Night

The Inaugural Taste of Abbot Kinney: A New "Taste" on the Block

New Happy Hours at Katsuya, comme Ça, and Cecconi's: Or, Where To Drop Moderate Coin

A HOT Date at Pourtal Wine Bar: Playmate Tasting Party

We r the un-mayo generation

Ok so, I know I posted like, ten minutes ago, but I had to share this one. It's too good to be true.

Like your mayonnaise nostalgic with just a hint of deliberate irony? Well, Miracle Whip has your medicine. Hipsters, meet your mayo.



You'll throw the coolest Brooklyn roof-top vegeburger parties EVER. Makes you wonder: Will the aging hipster really sell out for Miracle Whip, or will he still seek out a more upscale aioli?

Thanks, Lookatthisfuckinghipster.

Frozen Vegetables

From The Kitchn: which vegetables are good to eat frozen? Because I'm so poor at the moment, I eat mostly frozen haricots verts from Trader Joe's to add some green to my plate. For this I take flack from my ayurvedic mother, who tells me that these things have all of their prana, or life force, taken out of them. I always say better some green than none at all, especially when I prepare them with health in mind (in ghee, with indian herbs). But, I mean, DUH. Of course fresh is better.

So, it was funny when I found myself sounding a bit like my mother talking on this subject with Emma a few days ago. She had just gone to an Indian cooking class, and the Indian woman who ran the class called for two bags of frozen spinach in her recipe for Palak Paneer. "Not so ayurvedic," I said, a bit flippant, "especially coming from an Indian." Maybe they're all yogis in my mind. Anyway, Emma shot back at me, "It doesn't matter! The whole point is to make it easier for people to make the dish." I immediately conceded, of course, because I already agreed with her. Much easier to call in this dish to Hurry Curry than seeing what exactly goes into it (which you then see isn't so much that a mortal human can't make it). The food should be as accessible as possible, of course! I guess my only point was that, somewhere along the line of exploring this sort of cooking, you've got to consider the question of how nutritive your ingredients are. It's the other side of the same coin (heads is what what you eat, tails is how you eat it).


credit: Faith Durand@ The Kitchn

Anyway, I mentioned to Emma that some fruits and veges hold their nutrients better than others, but could only mention a few. So, this article gives a bit of advice in that arena. And look, frozen spinach is right there!

Week-old Blueberries

I've noticed a trend with my baking: it happens when something's about to go bad. My bread pudding came about when my multigrain was about to go stale. This time it was blueberries. I remembered driving home from school that some fresh ones had been sitting in the fridge for about a week. Shit, I thought. I have to make muffins.



They're ridiculously simple. I liked this recipe from allrecipes because people complained that it "wasn't sweet enough," so the blueberries took center stage (don't worry about the glaze). This whole process, prep and baking, took maybe 35 minutes. I had 3/4 cup of fresh berries, so I threw in an extra 1/4 frozen, and these muffins were packed with fruit. I'm just glad they didn't go to waste.

Julia on Letterman

Thanks to The Kitchn for this one. SOUPAIR FUNNY.



I won't spoil the surprise, but Julia can really ad lib.