I’m a tomato soup junkie. It’s been a comfort food of mine since I was young. The finest tomato soup I ever had was at Le Marais in New York. It was a Tomato Fennel Soup. I tried for years to recreate it, until I realized they had lied. So I make a Tomato Star Anise Soup that is on my list of restaurant recipes.

I was paging through Mollie Katzen’s Still Life with Menu when I came across her recipe for tomato soup with coconut. A quick search in the pantry revealed that I had all of the ingredients, so I made the recipe.

I want to like cumin. I really do. It has an earthy bass that balances brighter flavors. but so help me, I can’t get over the fact that it tastes like armpit. (more…)

Over the years I’ve had several different kitchen scales. The first one I remember was a cheap spring-driven one that almost never got used. It sat on the shelf with the glasses, and sometimes we used it to weigh letters (like emails on paper; you remember those).

My current kitchen scale is a fairly inexpensive electronic scale. But it does an amazing job of making sure that I’m giving you recipes that are easily replicated and scalable. It’s usually only the small stuff (1/4 tsp. black pepper, etc.) that I resort to volumetric measurements. (If you have trouble with amounts when you have to multiply by 20, let me know.) (more…)

Which is your favorite salsa? Crushed Tomato Salsa, mild Crushed Tomato Salsa, hot Fresh Tomato Salsa, mild Fresh Tomato Salsa, hot Corn and Black Bean Salsa Salsa? Isn't that a dance? View Results  Loading ...

It’s always fun to take the same ingredients and turn them into very diverse products. In my Sauteing & Frying II class, it was almost the same mise en place for each of the dishes. This week, it was salsa for the Game Day Gourmet class. I prepared two versions of tomato-based salsa. The principle for the dishes was to make it thin enough to be used for a dip, dry enough so that it didn’t make the chips too soggy, and to add the heat in layers so that it was flavorful and fiery.

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