I’ve gone most of my life thinking I don’t particularly care for cooked carrots. Give me the raw crunchy ones any time but why bother with the cooked mush? But then I encounter them roasted or braised, cooked slowly until they are burnished with deep dark spots and a concentrated carrot flavor, and I remember …
Winter
We’re in the long slog part of winter. The holiday season is far behind us, and spring in Chicago is still months away. This is, for me, the toughest time of year. I get stir crazy. I long for sunlight that stays past five o’clock and for sidewalks that don’t end in ankle-deep gray slush …
If you’ve made the best pizza dough ever, you might as well top it with the best pizza sauce. Especially when the best pizza sauce is also a 5-minute pizza sauce. I mean, I don’t blame anyone for going with a premade sauce. I’ve done it myself loads of times. But I used to think …
The best pizza dough is a bold claim. I know. And it’s obviously highly subjective. At any given time there is a heated argument on the Internet on the relative merits of New York style pizza versus Chicago style pizza, with some arguing the latter isn’t pizza at all. So, I’m here to say I …
We’re headed into the holiday season. That time of year when those of us who enjoy spending time in the kitchen tend to run ourselves ragged. We brine turkeys, we peel apples, we challenge our upper body strength with rolling pins and potato mashers, we test the fortitude of our mixers as we churn out …
Who wants chicken for dinner? It turns out I do. At least if it’s crispy and rubbed with a spicy garlicky cashew sauce. I was a vegetarian for a long time, and most of what I eat is still plant-based, but it’s meals like this that make me appreciate my carnivorous side. This recipe comes …