Challah French Toast Torta with Black Beans, Smoked Cheddar, and Pineapple Ok, I know I haven’t posted on this blog in years. I wasn’t really planning on restarting. But this was crazy delicious and I figured I’d go ahead and write it down, however briefly. Everyone knows challah French toast is the best French toast. The soft, eggy nature of the challah makes tender, irresistible toast. I had a couple slices cooked and leftover from family breakfast, and I needed something tasty but also wanted protein, not a big plate of just carbs. And then inspiration struck. If you aren’t familiar with to ..read more

Chanterelle Tostada These tostadas had a very simple inspiration: wildly inexpensive chanterelles. Although they grow prolifically in the Pacific Northwest, I’ve never learned how to hunt them, so I’m typically stuck paying retail when I want my fix – unless, I’m hanging around with my friend Lang, whose new book The Mushroom Hunters just came out. And retail price can easily be $20 or even $30 per pound. So I kind of freaked out when I saw them for under $10/pound at a few local markets, and snatched up several pounds. Not only were they cheap, but they are beautifully plump and dry, not the ..read more

Porcini, Potato, Apple When you have beautiful ingredients like the fresh porcini mushrooms (aka cèpes or king bolete) that I found at Pike Place Market the other day, it isn’t necessary or desirable to do much to them. In this case, all that is needed is cook them through thoroughly  to concentrate the flavor and then brown their exterior, collecting the juices to make a profoundly umami-rich broth. The crispy  potatoes give way to a fluffy interior that is perfect for sopping up that broth, and the sweet crunch of apples adds color and a textural counterpoint. It is a nice ch ..read more

Roasted Pumpkin Ice Cream The ultimate plan for this roasted pumpkin ice cream is a plated dessert with grilled mochi, miso butterscotch, and a black sesame crumble; I haven’t finished the other components yet, but thought I would go ahead and share the ice cream recipe with you. Because it is intended for a dessert with Japanese flavors, I didn’t add any of the pumpkin pie spice flavors you might expect, and kept the pumpkin itself a bit subtle. Although I’m calling this “roasted” pumpkin, I actually use a pressure-cooker technique cribbed from the Modernist Cuisine caramelized carrot soup ..read more

Italian Plum Upside-Down Cake I’m a an absolute sucker for Italian plums, to the point of being a bit heartbroken that my incredibly generous neighbors’ tree seems not to have fruited this year. Picking them warm off her tree is a highlight of late summer around here. So I was happy as could be when, on vacation, I found a pile of them at a farmer’s market near Lake Chelan, and for just $1 per pound. I bought a big bag, and then was promptly disappointed when the flavor and texture wasn’t up to snuff. Fortunately, Italian plums tend to work better when cooked than most other varieties I’ve tri ..read more

Perfect Roasted Green Beans The problem with roasted green beans, whether you do them in the oven or in a hot skillet, is to get those beautiful, caramelized brown spots on the surface of most of the beans without either over- or under-cooking the insides. Run the heat too high and you’ll burn the outside before the inside is done; run it too low and you’ll end up with mush. The solution is simple, but it involves a two-step cooking process and a tool so feared, hated, and misunderstood that I’m almost afraid to whisper it’s name. Because every time I do, I get comments telling me that I’m po ..read more

Fried Pita Bread with Fava Beans and Zucchini Good pita bread (usually from Basson Bakery) is a staple in our house, which sometimes means we end up with a few stale loaves. I’ve gotten in the habit of tearing them into bite sized pieces, fry-toasting them in olive oil, then garnishing them with whatever is to hand for one of those late night snacks that an uncharitable person might call a good-sized meal. This dish is infinitely malleable. Change the beans to chickpeas if you like, or change the vegetable to cauliflower. Heck, change the pita bread to corn tortillas and you are well on your ..read more

Mission Chinese Food-Style Tofu with Radish and Shiso When my wife and I were in New York for the James Beard awards a few months ago, we were wandering around the Lower East Side, and I was hungry (as usual). We turned a corner, and I spotted Mission Chinese Food’s New York outpost and I knew my life was about to get a lot better. I’d eaten at Danny Bowien’s San Francisco location a year ago and had been depressed because I was by myself and could only try a couple of dishes, so stumbling into a chance to eat his food again was a happy moment indeed. One thing that stands out on the Mission ..read more

Baby Zucchini and Blossoms with Sofrito Every gardener loves to lament that they get overrun with zucchini and have to resort to baking too much zucchini bread or, worse, ringing the doorbell, dashing and leaving them on people’s doorsteps. Well, let me tell you: you’re doing it wrong. The way to avoid being overrun with zucchini is pick them when they are tiny and delicious. This recipe can easily use a dozen of them, along with most of the blossoms! Using up a dozen woody, pithy, flavorless giant zucchini is an unpleasant chore indeed. So get out there, grab a bunch of baby zukes and cook t ..read more