Who remembers that jump rope ditty? "First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes momma with the baby carriage." So too goes the nutritional lexicon for plant-based foods, where first comes fruit, then come vegetables. But think, who ever talks about 'vegetables and fruits'? It's always 'fruits and vegetables', 'fruits and veggies'. But if we want to improve our health through our diets, vegetables must come first. So first off --

 You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life?”
- Rumi, 13th century Persian poet and theologian
New York City - There is a reason to crawl through life… appetizers. Appetizer Crawls. Winging our way from one restaurant to the next would be kind of cool if we had literal wings, I suppose, but then [...]

Marcella Hazan, who introduced an America familiar with red sauce joints to true Italian food, is a teacher and writer with whom every home cook should spend some time. She was born in Italy but immigrated to the United States as a bride. Though she had never cooked before, she had to learn to feed her husband (hey, it was the 1950s), and luckily for all of us it turned out that she was no slouch. She began teaching Italian cooking in New York City and eventually published several books of her beautifully simple, authentic recipes.  read more »

July 21 We really, really did not want Marcel Vigneron to win the cook-off last weekend. I was in Milan (MY-lun), Ohio at the Chefs Garden Food & Wine Celebration, the annual fundraiser for Veggie U , a program to teach elementary school kids how to grow vegetables. Its a great cause, you cant argue with it at all, and the Jones family, which runs Chefs Garden, are such nice people that you want to help them. So when they asked me to help judge the cook off, I said I would. Of course, they provided transportation and accommodation. And in fact it was transportation on Viking Corporations private jet, accommodation at the Cleveland Ritz-Carlton. So it wasnt a sacrifice. Veggie Us a charity, but Chefs Garden isnt. Its a very high-end purveyor of precious little herbs and vegetables. We (six other passengers and I, including two guys from the The Food Network , journalists from Saveur and Food Arts , chef Jol Antunes and my fellow judge, Jody Eddy, who is the brand new editor of Art Culinaire ) were picked up by Bob Jones, the family patriarch, who sets the aw-shucks tone of the family. The entire Jones family persona, you see, is so folksy and down-to-earth that it would be a parody if they werent absolutely sincere about it. Bob said something to the effect of Hi folks, gosh Im sure glad youre here. Im just a senile old man whos come here to pick you up. My kids dont let me out too often, so I hope I dont mess this up. See, Bob Jones is the founder of this multi-million dollar company that has something like 130 employees and charges a kings ransom for tiny little microgreens and precious little vegetables. And many, maybe most, of the top chefs all over the country gladly pay for it. They use top-of-the-line technology to analyze their soil quality, have designed their own ergonomically sound farm equipment for ease in working the land, and are starting to do DNA testing for dangerous types of salmonella and e. coli. They have weeding machines that shield their laborers Mexicans who are paid about $11 an hour, have work visas and are flown by Chefs Garden to and from Mexico annually from the sun as they lie on their stomachs inches above the soil and pick weeds as the machines move over the crops. Its quite cool. It was Bobs idea, after his more conventional vegetable crop was wiped out by a hailstorm and he was driven to bankruptcy, to rebuild by growing food to the specifications of chefs. Thats the story told by Lee Jones, Bobs son and the face of the company, whom Ive written about here before . His brother, Bob aka Bobby, does the planting while Lee does the marketing. Lee seems still to be under the impression that hes helping to run a small family farm. Again, this would be crazy if he didnt believe it. So thats the Joneses, this was the Veggie U Food & Wine Celebration (held near Chefs Garden, which is in Huron, Ohio, at the Culinary Vegetable Institute a sort of chefs retreat and test kitchen), and Jody and I (and a chef and writer named Fred Mensinga) were judging a cook-off.  read more »

Last Tuesday was a very special moment, one which we will recall with perfect clarity, years into the future, precisely where we were and what we were doing when we heard the news. Yes, that news. That change arrived. It's the moment we saw the very embodiment of our ideals. Whether you believe in the much-maligned notion of the American Exceptionalism, this was truly a uniquely American story. Where was I, you asked?  read more »

Well, it's Tuesday morning and we all know what that means now, that means it's Tuesdays With Dorie day, one of my most favouritest days of the week. The day that I get to join in with some bazillion of other bakers around the world and bake a recipe from our most bestest favouritest book of all time, Baking From My Home To Yours, by the bestest baker in the world, Dorie Greenspan! Whew! What a mouthful! If you want to know more about the group and how they got started, and how you yourself can join, you can go to their page Tuesdays With Dorie and it's all there in glorious Technicolour for you to read all about it, but to make a long story short . . . each week we all prepare the same thing, and once in a while we even get to pick which recipe it is we are going to bake. It's going to be a loooooong time before it's my turn, but that's ok . . . I am enjoying baking, not to mention eating, my way through the book! This week's recipe was Bill's Big Carrot Cake as chosen by Amanda of slow like honey . Ohh , what a delicious choice Amanda! Carrot Cake has to be both my and Todd's favouritest cake of all, and also one of the easiest types of cakes to make!! I had the chance this past week to get together with some friends for a bit of a coffee morning and a gab. I don't really drink coffee myself, but it is always nice to get together with people you enjoy and share in some refreshements and a nice chat. When I saw this weeks choice for the baking challenge I just knew it would be the perfect accompaniment. Carrot cake has to be one of most people's favourite cakes!  read more »

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Now I'm not normally one to hang out at Hooters on a Tuesday night but mention chicken wings and I'm all there In The Name of Research.

KIDS EAT FREE TUESDAY proclaims the huge banner outside, and I'm wondering whether families do actually head here for a different type of Happy Meal. Yes, they do, I discover, as we head inside, two families arriving shortly after us. Most patrons are male, as I'd expected, although it's not half as seedy as I'd dreaded.  read more »

Nancy Olson has traveled a long way from her hometown in Napoleon, North Dakota to her current mainstay as executive pastry chef at Gramercy Tavern .  With its unwavering devotion to bucolic compositions, this Danny Meyer haunt surely reeps the benefits of Olson's rural upbringing.  Nancy's father raised cattle, while her mother made jams and jellies from seasonal produce grown on their farm.  Her upbringing planted shaped a pastry career focused on the freshest, farm-grown ingredients.  read more »