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Monthly Archives: January 2011

CustardQuest ’11: Part 1

I love baked custard. It’s sweet and milky, but substantial enough for breakfast or a good snack. There’s something very wholesome about it and it’s a great source of calcium and deliciousness. But after all my years of making and eating it, I still don’t have a go-to recipe. I figured I’d spend a little [...]

WWUBVD?

Earlier this week, Sarah McColl posted this fun visual style quiz on twitter. I have a hard time resisting that kind of thing, so I took it, and got Unpretentious Bon Vivant. I *love* Unpretentious Bon Vivant. I feel like Unpretentious Bon Vivant is a goal, an intention, an objective to keep in mind when [...]

Silk Purse Pasta

Last night on my way home from work, I made a deal with myself: I could skip yoga if I made a very long to-do list full of stuff I’ve been avoiding and then did everything on it. (I know this sounds vaguely insane, but I’m trying to train myself to schedule exercise and then [...]

New sweater

I cast on for a new sweater last week, using this batch of handspun wool/silk tweed. I had swatched for a couple of things, but nothing was quite right. I plied it fairly tightly, so it’s a little stringy and didn’t look great in stockinette. I did, however, like the way it looked in a [...]

Tiny luxuries

I’m a big believer in the idea of a tiny luxury, a thing or, most often, an experience that doesn’t cost much, but is just far enough outside my normal range of activity to be special. Taking myself out for a nice breakfast before work is a perfect example — it costs less than going [...]

Wednesday morning decadence

My office is opening at noon today to give us all time to deal with any snow-related delays. The late start has an additional benefit though: time to enjoy a leisurely, weekend-style breakfast: steel-cut oats cooked with a chopped apple and topped with brown sugar and buttermilk, eaten while reading and watching other people shovel.

Cloudy with a chance of meatballs

Considering that I’m technically a WASP (though I would think that the high concentration of peasant blood running through my veins would disqualify me in any real way) and didn’t have anything other than jarred sauce until I was in my 20s, I make a mean pot of tomato sauce and meatballs. No tricks or [...]

In which I bastardize a recipe and then complain about it

This recipe initially caught my eye because Japanese pumpkins, aka kabocha squash, are my current favorite kind of winter squash. They’re really dense and flavorful and rich tasting. I always have barley around and I’ve been wanting to experiment with cooking with miso. Ways in which I deviated from the recipe: I didn’t use the [...]

Odds and ends

1. I finished this sweater over the weekend. Still need to give it a final blocking and get a photo of it on me though. 2. I started writing a column for Serious Eats NY. Each week, I’ll be profiling a local food artisan and reviewing one or more of their products. I’m really excited [...]