April 24, 2012 | By Adam Roberts | 0 Comments
Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about sponges. Well: not actual sponges, but sponge-like behavior. Specifically the sponge-like behavior that occurs when you cook something–pasta, beans, vegetables–and then add them to an incredibly flavorful, incredibly potent mixture (a sauce, a dressing) allowing all that flavor to get sucked up inside.
This is why it’s always best to take your pasta out of the water a minute before its done and finish it in the sauce; it’s also why it’s best to toss boiled potatoes in a dressing for potato salad right out of the water–you went those pores to be open, to sponge up all that fatty goodness. And sucking up fatty goodness is precisely what I wanted the cauliflower to do when I set about making a marinated cauliflower salad.
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March 7, 2012 | By Adam Roberts | 0 Comments
I don’t follow sports, but I know that there are these people called scouts who go around to minor league events and look for future stars to recruit to the majors. Well, I never considered myself much of a chef scout, but that all changed on Sunday when food blogger Andy Windak–of the food blog The Wind Attack–invited us over for dinner. I was wary of this 25 year-old who talked a big game the first few times that I met him (he said something about marinated yucca blossoms) but what I didn’t realize was that he was the real deal: a self-taught, self-motivated prodigy who works wonders in the kitchen.
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November 21, 2011 | By Adam Roberts | 0 Comments
If there’s a time of year to break out Molly Stevens’s new Roasting book, this is it. Thanksgiving dinner is all about roasting. If you deep-fry your bird, you’re missing out on one of the great aspects of Thanksgiving–the lovely aroma of a slow-roasting bird wafting through your house or apartment. Keeping in the spirit of roasting, your side dish should be roasted too. That’s why butternut squash is a good choice.
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October 10, 2011 | By Adam Roberts | 6 Comments
What if you could make hamburgers for your whole family in a matter of minutes, without dirtying your stove or having to light a grill?
That’s the beauty of this game-changing recipe from Molly Stevens and her latest book, “All About Roasting.” I’ve been a huge fan of Molly Stevens ever since I bought her braising book (“All About Braising”) and, I’ll confess, that when the roasting book arrived (I was lucky enough to get a press copy) I dropped whatever it was I was doing and immediately tore into the pages. The recipes and pictures of glorious roasted meats all screamed out to me (I’ve got like 20 recipes bookmarked already) but the one that intrigued me the most was the one for roasted hamburgers.
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July 13, 2011 | By Adam Roberts | 0 Comments
When it comes to roasting vegetables, the question shouldn’t be: “What vegetables can you roast?” The question should be: “What vegetables can’t you roast?”
Last week, I had some leftover carrots, radishes and Jerusalem artichokes from the farmer’s market (and, sidenote: whoever says the farmer’s market is more expensive than the regular grocery store hasn’t purchased carrots, radishes, or Jerusalem artichokes there before…they’re cheap!) and, as a side for a roast chicken dinner, I decided to roast ‘em all in the same oven.
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May 11, 2009 | By Adam Roberts | 5 Comments
Certain foods are meant to be cooked at home: roast chicken, pot roast, spaghetti and meatballs. Other foods are meant to be eaten out: steak tartare, sushi, a flaming baked Alaska. Sure we can make those latter foods at home, but often times they’re not worth the hassle or the danger (raw steak at home? setting cake on fire? I’ll let a pro handle that, thank you).
Duck, I’d wager, is something most of us eat out. We expect the skin to be crispy and for there to be some kind of glaze. It’s a fancier food unless we get it in a Chinese restaurant and then it becomes a mysterious food: how do they make this duck taste so good? And why, when I try to make duck at home, does it either bomb dramatically or make me sick or both?
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