Calibrate a Meat Thermometer / Roasted Red Pepper & Squash Soup / Ginger Scallion Noodles

Blog Post & Recipe: How to Calibrate a Meat Thermometer

The goal is to get your thermometer to verify a temperature you can already recognize without even using it—namely, freezing point (32°F) or boiling point (212°F).

Blog Post & Recipe: Roasted Red Pepper and Squash Soup

This is a very simple soup, with only 4 ingredients, but the results are beyond simple. Freshly roasted peppers are combines with sweet squash (butternut, buttercup, etc) with a flavourful stock and an onion, and you have a powerful soup.

Blog Post & Recipe: Cooking for Others: My Noodle Obsession

The noodles themselves are silky and deeply tasty, though the individual flavors of scallion and of ginger sort of melt away into a greater whole. They take well to practically any vegetable, protein, or seasoning sprinkled on top ...

Ginger Scallion Noodles ... Grilled Eggplant ... Picked Radishes, Carrots, or Cucumbers ... Bok Choy ... Fried Egg

Three Potluck Recipes / Collard Greens with Red Onion and Bacon / The Kitchn's Editor's Favourite Posts of 2009

Blog Post & Recipes: Potluck Recipes

Cauliflower Gratin ... Mushroom Pate ... Cranberry Sauce

Blog Post & Recipe: Collard Greens with Red Onion and Bacon

To kettle add broth, vinegar, brown sugar, red pepper flakes, and about half of bacon, stirring until sugar is dissolved.

Blog Post: Editor's Choice: Dana's Favorite Posts of 2009

One of the Kitchn editors picks her favourite posts of the year (and another editor picks hers, and another editor picks hers, and another editor picks hers, and here are the site's most popular posts of the year).

Ina Garten's Lemon Cake ... A Profile of Washed Rind Cheeses ... Whiskey Old-Fashioneds (With Really Good Fruit) ... Jamie Oliver's Chicken in Milk Recipe ... Tarragon-Strawberry Jam ... How to Make Pasta: Tips From My Italian Mother-in-Law ... Victoria Sponge Cake and What's the Difference? Clotted Cream, Devonshire Cream, Double Cream ... Our Food Lover's Guide [to some North American cities] series ... Acts of Kindness: Send Groceries Instead of Flowers ... Baking Soda and Baking Powder: Why Use Both? ... My Edible Escape: A Baguette Sandwich in Bayonne.

The sidebar has been updated.

I've added links, in the sidebar, to most of the blogs and newspaper food sections that I visit when I'm looking for something to post. A number of them have been judiciously left out, either because they haven't been updated in weeks, or because I find so little material there that I'm not sure it's worth it.

Hurricane preparedness. Cheap and Healthy. Crunchberries.

Blog Post: Reasonable Consumer Would Know "Crunchberries" Are Not Real, Judge Rules

On May 21, a judge of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California dismissed a complaint filed by a woman who said she had purchased "Cap'n Crunch with Crunchberries" because she believed "crunchberries" were real fruit.

Blog Post: How to Tell if a Recipe is Cheap and Healthy Just By Looking at it

... how can you tell if a dish is good for you, just by looking at it? How can you avoid the pitfalls of secretly fatty and financially unsound food? How can you err on the side of caution when it comes to cooking?

Article & Recipes: Hurricane preparedness for cooks

Right now, except for a few showers, [South Florida] truly is a tropical paradise. But that doesn't mean we can forget our annual rite of passage, preparing for Hurricane Season ... Gradually stocking your hurricane pantry will make the task less daunting and ready you to prepare healthy, nutritious meals even during a power outage ...


Related links

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Hurricane recipe: Moroccan Chicken and Couscous
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Hurricane recipe: Black Bean and Veggie Tortillas
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Hurricane recipe: Salmon Fettuccine
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Hurricane recipe: Gazpacho on the Rocks
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Hurricane: Stocking your pantry
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Hurricane: Kitchen tips

Las Vegas Uncork'd

The Guardian reviews restaurants in Las Vegas.

Article: Dining in Vegas's gilded cage

And if the restaurants are pulling out the stops to get your custom (they've just this month announced "date nites" with $40 menu deals at Charlie Trotter's, Wolfgang Puck's and Mario Batali's), that doesn't touch what the troubled hotels will pull to bring you in - there were "pay the temperature" deals recently. So, if it's ever appealed, this is the time to go. And if it hasn't, and you're fond of food, perhaps it should, as I discovered on a whirlwind tour of some of the top spots participating in [the annual food festival] Vegas Uncork'd.

Blog Post: Vegas bites back

In preparation, I had asked the two greediest men I know where to seek out something a bit less Michelin and was advised by belly number one, Jay Rayner to visit a crumbling strip joint to try Lotus of Siam, which does sound bloody good (I think you can probably read more about that in some book he's punting), while mouth number two, Simon Majumdar, recommended Rosemary's. I didn't make either and it's been haunting me ever since, as they both look well worth the effort.

...

So go on, make me weep at this hungry hour of the day; what else did I miss out on from being such a flipping lightweight culinary woose?

Website: Vegas Uncork'd

Entertainment has always been the toast of the town in Las Vegas—that is, at least, until today’s hottest chefs stormed the city just a few years ago. Now, the Vegas fine dining scene rivals that of any other major metropolitan city in the world and provides just as much reason to visit the desert oasis as taking in a great headliner or the scintillating nightlife.

Potatoes. Spaghetti. Who's Cooking?

Article: Who’s Cooking? (For Health, It Matters)

Home-cooked meals are typically more healthful than those prepared at restaurants. But just how much more healthful depends on who’s doing the cooking, where the recipe comes from, and even the dishes in which the food is served.

Studies show that the biggest influence on family eating habits is the person who buys and prepares the food. These “nutritional gatekeepers,” as researchers call them, influence more than 70 percent of the foods we eat, according to a 2006 report in The Journal of the American Dietetic Association ...

Recipes: Five ways with a packet of spaghetti

1. Artichoke and mascarpone pasta

2. Spaghetti, sausages and mustard

3. Spaghetti and mussels

4. Chicken and pasta pie

5. A quick and cheap tomato and pasta soup

Recipes: New Potato Day: Eat and Plant Potatoes Today

Did you know that today is a big day for potatoes? Not only are they a featured part of most St. Patrick's Day menus, but this is also the day when potatoes are traditionally planted! Potatoes go into the ground earlier than most garden seeds, at least in the northern parts of the world ... Here are five fresh ways to eat new potatoes, which are turning up at the markets soon ...

• 1 Crème fraîche and chives

• 2 Saffron and parsley

• 3 Ginger, cumin and sesame

• 4 Honey and basil

• 5 Thyme and carrots

Related: Sixteen Kinds of Potatoes

Bacon, barbecued. The Bocuse d’Or.

Article: The Bacon Explosion

This recipe is the Bacon Explosion, modestly called by its inventors “the BBQ Sausage Recipe of all Recipes.” The instructions for constructing this massive torpedo-shaped amalgamation of two pounds of bacon woven through and around two pounds of sausage and slathered in barbecue sauce first appeared last month on the Web site of a team of Kansas City competition barbecuers.

Article: Norway Wins the Bocuse d’Or Competition

After a two-day marathon of cooking and judging that pitted chefs from 24 countries against each other, the chef from Norway won the Bocuse d'Or, the cooking competition known as the Olympics of Food.

Food on a Stick. Artichoke Gratin.

Recipe: The new vegetarian: artichoke gratin.

Recipe: World on a stick.

The recipes have been spread across two separate links.

Food on sticks is a "craze" many throughout the world have embraced, so what's holding you back?

Don't forget to soak bamboo skewers in water to prevent them burning when cooking.

Squid. Couscous and Spinach. Kohlrabi. World Food.

Recipe: Couscous salad with spinich.

Article: What the world eats.

Photographs of fifteen families and the food they eat in a week.

Article: Squid Tips.

Or: how to prepare fresh squid.

To prepare squid, grasp the body in one hand and pull out the tentacles firmly with the other. Pull any greyish membrane off the outside of the body, and take out the "quill", a clear plastic-like bone inside.

Article/Blog Post: How do you solve a problem like kohlrabi?

In scandinavian cooking kohlrabi is quite common. It is used in stews and soups, but my personal favourite is mashed kohlrabi. It has a more distinct taste than mashed potatoes, so it's a very good company to salty, smoked mutton and richly flavoured sausages. You make it much the same way as you would make mashed potatoes. Peel and slice it, cook it until its soft and mash it with an unhealthy amount of butter, cream/milk, salt and pepper. Some like a bit of nutmeg in and the more adventorous use vanilla. Good luck!

Woks. Eels. Sweet Potato Fries. Lamburger. Crap Food.

Article: Creating a stir.

How to use a wok.

Recipe: Sauteed Eel with Persillade.

Recipe: Sweet Potato Fries.

Recipe: The Inside-out Lamburger.

This is a flash video.

Article/Recipe: Homage to crap food.
The comments section of this blog post is full of suggestions for "crap food", the kind that means white bread, baked beans, and cheese.

You know, when in times of dire need/upset in college my best friend and I used to make a nutella and mild cheddar cheese sandwich, on white bread, and then fry it.

Round oatcakes topped with sliced cheese (I use red leicester) and sliced jalapenos, microwaved until the cheese is all melty and the oatcakes a bit bendy (about a minute)served with Rowatts Mixed Pickles - difficult to track down. Fantastic.

Also, cooked pasta (any kind) heated up with beans, mushrooms chilli flakes and veggie mince, covered with grated cheese and stuck under a hot grill until it's bubbly is genius.

I also pull out the stalks of closed cup mushrooms and fill the hole left with a mixture of english mustard and salad cream and eat them raw while waiting for things to cook.

For Hangover comfort food you can't beat tomato juice, lucozade, fried egg rolls with tomato & chilli ketchup and salt and vinegar macoys.

Key Lime Pie. Oatcakes. Can Flour Explode?

Recipe: Key Lime Pie.

Recipe: Joe's Key Lime Pie.

Recipe: Staffordshire Oatcakes.

Makes 10-12

900ml (1½ pints) Warm Milk and Water, mixed
225g (8oz) Fine Oatmeal

Article: Can Flour Explode?

Flour and many other carbohydrates become explosive when they are hanging in the air as dust. It only takes 1 or 2 grams of dust per cubic foot of air (50 or so grams per cubic meter) for the mixture to be ignitable.

Roast Lamb. Pot roast. Foodie?

Article: Lamb Roasts Made Easy.

A few cooking tips.

Article/Recipe: The Magic Pot.

Tips for a good pot roast. Includes three pot roast recipes.

There is, I think, a subtle art to pot roasting, or rather an understanding required of the method and careful attention to the amount of heat and liquid. However, once you understand the basic principles you are free to go ahead and make up different dishes and flavours without being tied to the exact quantities and measures of a particular recipe.

Start with a heavy casserole pot that will fit snugly around the meat you are using. The best choices are secondary cuts - the pieces of muscle with a little gelatinous matter and fat throughout, such as leg or shoulder. A whole chicken works beautifully but a small one is easier to turn in the pot.

Article: Are you a foodie?

Are you a Foodie?

1. Do you consider shopping for food and wine to be 'quality time'?

2. Do you take an enthusiastic interest in the preparation and consumption of good food?

3. Are you always searching for the newest food shops, restaurants, take away’s and ingredients?

4. Do you plan holidays and weekends away around food festivals, winery walkabouts and regional food experiences, good wineries and country restaurants?

Etc, etc. The people who set out this questionnaire are Australian food writers whose names are Allen Campion and Michele Curtis. I've added their website to the links bar. The website contains a brief guide to seasonal produce in Australia.

Website: Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation.

The Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation has been set up to seek funding for and oversee the development of Kitchen Garden projects in primary schools across Victoria.

Using the program at Collingwood College as a model, our aim is to pleasurably engage and encourage young Victorians in growing, harvesting, preparing and sharing delicious and healthy food in the belief that such skills are essential to the development of life-long joyful and healthy eating habits. Many young people have little sense of where their food comes from, and little experience of sharing a meal convivially with others around a table.