Until very recently, miso was an ingredient that I avoided. Miso paste, similar in texture to peanut butter, is typically a cultured mixture of soybeans, a grain (like rice or barley), salt, and koji (a mold). Really? Recently I began to notice that miso, with its deep umami flavor, was being embraced by chefs everywhere and was popping up in dishes as diverse as salmon filets, corn-on-the-cob, and even as…
Standing and frying doughnuts or sufganiyot at Chanukah time is a labor of love that I have chosen to forgo. After serving doughnuts that were raw in the middle on too many occasions, I abandoned my deep fryer and joined the line that snaked out the door of my local bakery. Twenty-five different flavors of sufganiot including Oreo crumb-covered donuts, Boston cream and salted caramel versions, are sold only at…
With a quiet tap on the front door, my son sails into the house on Friday afternoons, sometimes with a grandchild or two in tow, and we settle around the kitchen table to catch up on the events of the week and share a piece of fresh, hot potato kugel. It’s a no-frills event; disposable plates and cutlery are used to serve up portions of kugel that are crispy on…
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a hermit is a person who retires from society and craves solitude. Ironically, it’s also the name of a cookie that is going to make you the most sought-after guest at every holiday party and family gathering, provided that you bring along a heaped tray of these soft, chewy, treats. Sweetened with brown sugar that imparts a caramel flavor, subtly scented with cinnamon and nutmeg,…
If you have found yourself fruitlessly searching for romaine or iceberg lettuce at your local grocer, you are not alone. Faced with a shortage due to a dry growing season in California, followed by a virus that killed off a lot of the remaining lettuce crop, lettuce is in very limited supply and prices for the leafy greens have tripled. But there is no need to eschew your daily five…
Searching for a fresh head of cauliflower, I was disappointed at what was available in my local grocery store and had to go a little further afield. I stopped in at a small, independent fruit and vegetable store and caught my breath at the heaped pyramids of fresh, snowy white, deep amethyst purple, and cheddar orange, locally grown cauliflowers. This recipe for roasted cauliflower steaks with chickpeas, by the inspired…
Last Thursday morning we woke at 5:00 a.m. ready to head to the airport and were greeted with the disheartening news that our early flight to a family wedding had been cancelled. After missing all kinds of celebrations for the last two and a half years, I refused to accept that reversal lying down. We raced to Pearson in the predawn hours, whispering quiet prayers for success. With the assistance…
I stared at my motionless dryer in disbelief. Undoubtedly my fifteen-year-old clothes dryer had glimpsed the mountains of post-holiday used linens and towels heaped on every surface of my laundry room and decided that it was as good a time as any to bid me “sayonara”. After placing an emergency order for a new dryer, I headed to the local laundromat, lugging baskets (and baskets…) of wet laundry. In between…
You can hear it in a tent, you can hear it from a vent. You can hear it on a corner, you can hear it from a foreigner. You can hear it in an ark, you can hear it in a park. I have listened to the blasts of the shofar in almost all of these locations over the past two years. This Rosh Hashana, I was overjoyed to reunite…
The arrival of Rosh Hashana next week has caught me flat-footed. It’s been a wonderful summer. Almost unfailingly warm and sunny, it was a perfect time to visit with family and friends, smell the roses, and read my way through the stack of books beckoning from my bedside table. Regrettably (not really), none of these pursuits was conducive to filling my freezer with family holiday favorites, such as, split pea…