Remember Murphy-Goode, the Sonoma County, California, winery that gained widespread attention in the food blogosphere through its search for a social-media maven? The winery dangled a six-month, $60K job with free housing in exchange for someone's skills in marketing the operation via the interwebs. Fifty finalists have been chosen and now appear on the company's website. [via 7x7]
This week Serious Eats is giving away a different food-related Threadless t-shirt each weekday! For the chance to win today's shirt, Booty Fruit (ye know—fruit with butts), just tell us in the comments: What's your favorite fruit?
One person will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Entry is only open to U.S. residents. Comments will close Saturday, June 27, at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
This week Serious Eats is giving away a different food-related Threadless t-shirt each weekday! For the chance to win today's shirt, A Piece of Cake, just tell us in the comments: What is your favorite kind of cake?
One person will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Entry is only open to U.S. residents. Comments will close Friday, June 26, at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
This week Serious Eats is giving away a different food-related Threadless t-shirt each weekday! For the chance to win today's shirt, Lemon Aid, just tell us in the comments: How do you like to make lemonade?
One person will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Entry is only open to U.S. residents. Comments will close Thursday, June 25, at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
This week Serious Eats is giving away a different food-related Threadless t-shirt each weekday! For the chance to win today's shirt, Baron VonFunburger's Haunted Castle Cavalcade, just tell us in the comments: What is your favorite fast food item? (The assumption is that if you don't have a favorite, you probably wouldn't want this shirt.)
One person will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Entry is only open to U.S. residents. Comments will close Wednesday, June 24, at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Words by Robyn Lee | My wardrobe is about 50 percent t-shirts, and out of that 50 percent, 90 percent from Threadless. I've been buying t-shirts from them for over seven years and would safely say that there's no other online apparel store with as good designs available at as reasonable prices. Assuming you like t-shirts that aren't blank, you should be able to find something there that you like.
To spread the Threadless love around, this week Serious Eats is giving away a different food-related Threadless t-shirt each weekday! For the chance to win today's shirt, Pancake Mountain, just tell us in the comments: What is your favorite pancake dish?
One person will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Entry is only open to U.S. residents. Comments will close Tuesday, June 23, at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Last year's Threadcakes winner by Vapidintuition, based on "Insomnia"
From now until August 3, people who love wearing Threadless t-shirts and designing cakes can enter the Threadcakes baking competition. Make a cake that best resembles a Threadless design for the chance to win great prizes—mostly t-shirts and chocolate! Check out the gallery of previous submissions at their website.
Related
Cute T-Shirt Alert: Horror Story-Inspired Fast Food
'Playin' in the Sprinkler' T-Shirt
The Icecreamator T-Shirt
Cook the Book: Modern Spice: Catrona_sweeps, amylou61, mr guy, amaLosAngeles, and nsord33. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to all who entered.
Francis Mallmann is South America's most famous chef. He's a TV star and owner of several restaurants in Argentina and Uruguay. Mallmann was classically trained in French cuisine and opened his first restaurant, at 19, in the upscale beach resort of Punta del Este, Uruguay. Mallmann was so successful that he could afford to shut down the restaurant in the off season and travel to Europe to train with Michelin-starred chefs. After 20 years of South American–inspired nouvelle cuisine, Mallmann "tired of making French food for wealthy Argentines." He ditched the stocks and sauces and returned to his roots.
Mallmann embraced the cooking techniques that he grew up with, wood fires and cast iron pots. These basic tools paired with Argentine meats and produce comprise the cuisine that Mallmann calls Nuevo Andean. Seven Fires, co-written by Peter Kaminsky, is more than a guide to Argentine grilling. It's a love letter to Argentina, with all of its natural bounty and beauty. The recipes showcase the international influences that have shaped Argentine cuisine, from the Native Americans to the Spanish, Italian, German, and Irish.
Congrats to the winners of our caption contest: gastronomeg, jmartin235, hellomello, and FoodFetish. You each have won 2 festival tickets to the Great American Food & Music Festival. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
And the winning captions, in no particular order:
"Ed Levine's Serious Diet Week 72: I've been trying to wing it, but I may chicken out."—gastronomeg
"Mouth....burning...must keep...straight face..."—jmartin235
"Don’t look at me like that. I’m the missionary of delicious. Not the missionary of nutritious."—hellomello
"We are professionals... Don't try this at home."—FoodFetish
Cook the Book: Rustic Fruit Desserts: ky2here, malecki, lisasav5, jennusf, and ellephant. Winners were notified by email and appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to all who entered.
Now that we're somewhat close to five digits I'm putting on my Ashton hat and want to reach 10,000 followers. To that end, we're doing a series of giveaways from now until Follower 10,000 shows up. We've picked 10 numbers at random, from 8,550 to 10,000. Follow us (@seriouseats), and if you correspond to one of the numbers, you'll get a choice of one of any number of food-related books we've got here on hand.
Most home cooks would think nothing of whipping up an Asian-inspired stir fry, some tacos, or a bowl of linguine with pesto for a quick weeknight dinner. Although these dishes are not American in origin, they have worked their way into our culinary vernacular over the years.
While Indian food is not exactly exotic, it has not really been widely adapted into most American home kitchens. I have a feeling that most of us are not familiar with the techniques, or stocked with the ingredients to make a batch of saag paneer and some chapati for dinner. But why not?
In the introduction to Modern Spice, Mark Bittman speculates that inaccessibility of ingredients is the primary reason why most Americans have shied away from cooking Indian food at home in the past. Thankfully, in recent years Indian ingredients have come to grace the shelves of most larger supermarkets all over the country. Bittman credits the increase of Indian products to Monica Bhide, author of the much anticipated Modern Spice.
Cook the Book: Endangered Recipes: oneperfectegg, april1p, velcerick, omnomnom, and tamsinite. Winners were notified by email and appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to all who entered.
There are so many ways to end a meal. Some people like a rich chocolate dessert, others prefer a cheese course, some might need nothing more than an espresso or a digestif, and some of us indulge in all of these. Although I have been known to take the cheese-chocolate-coffee-after-dinner-drink-route, there are times when nothing hits the spot like a fruit-based dessert. A simple pie or cobbler with a scoop of ice cream or a dollop of whipped cream is prefect, especially when the weather is warm and beautiful summer fruits and berries are in season.
Peaches, plums, apricots, and berries of all shapes and colors have been begun showing up in the markets—or will appear sooner than you think. What to do with this abundance? Rustic Fruit Desserts is a comprehensive guide to seasonal baking written by Julie Richardson, owner of Baker & Spice, and James Beard Award–winning chef Cory Schreiber of Wildwood. Both restaurants are located in Portland, Oregon.
Cook the Book: Well-Preserved: Geekbearinggifts, wmoss, syannelevovna, kuromu, hdasio1234. Winners were notified by email and appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to all who entered!
There are some foods that I have only to think about and a myriad of childhood memories come flooding back to me. Snapper soup is one example; those words instantly take me back to a seafood restaurant in northeast Philadelphia. I couldn't be more than six or seven years old, and I'm sitting with my grandparents in a wood-paneled room; there are decorative oyster plates on the wall alongside Victorian valentines. My grandfather is drinking a Harvey Wallbanger and orders snapper soup to start. He offers me a taste, and it's delicious.
"What's in it?"
"Turtle, sherry, and cream."
"Ohh..."
I'm pretty sure that Lari Robling, a fellow native Philadelphian, has had a few similar experiences. Endangered Recipes is an incredible collection of vintage recipes from another era. These recipes come from the stained index cards and handwritten notebooks of grandmothers and aunts. They are the foods that you fondly remember from family gatherings, church basements, and potlucks. Robling has traveled all over the country seeking out people who she calls "Recipe Rescuers," who are adamantly recording and preserving the recipes that are such a integral part of their regional and family traditions.
Cook the Book: Bottega Favorita: They are page48, piccola, rbear, Tara716, and evilchels. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Canning and preserving usually fall into the "shoulda, coulda, woulda" category of home cooking. There are many reasons that people are apprehensive when it comes to preserving: It's too labor-intensive, too time-consuming, and requires all of that special equipment. Why bother doing it yourself when your supermarket is brimming with cans and jars?
Eugenia Bone is on a mission to change your mind with her new book, Well-Preserved. A passion for preserving was instilled in Bone at an early age. She was fortunate to grow up with home-cured olives and prosciutto, canned tomatoes and canned tuna, all lovingly put up by her father. Although she thoroughly enjoyed her father's preserves, it was not until Bone was eight months pregnant with her second child that she attempted to try her hand at canning.
Over the years Bone has become an expert on all things pickled, cured, canned, and preserved; she even has a blog about it. As you would expect of someone who is constantly preserving, Bone's larder and freezer are loaded with cans and jars, so much so that her husband refers to them as "the bomb shelter." [Enter to win Well-Preserved after the jump.]
Cook the Book: Serious Barbecue: ilovebabynoah707, colengal, rmc1ra, meredycat, and jennywren. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Italians and Southerners have one important thing in common, a love and respect for food. Both cultures share the belief that nothing can compare with the food that comes from your land or out of your kitchen. Think about it: Georgia peaches, San Marzano tomatoes? Frank Stitt has taken this reverence for the best ingredients and opened three definitive restaurants in Birmingham, Alabama.
According to the late, great R. W. Apple, Stitt has turned Birmingham, Alabama, into a "sophisticated, easygoing showplace of enticing, Southern-accented cooking." In 1982, after studying philosophy at Berkeley and cooking all over San Francisco, and in France in Burgundy and Provence, Stitt returned to his hometown and opened the French-accented Highlands Bar and Grill. Cooking with Alice Waters at Chez Panisse and working as an assistant to Richard Olney helped Stitt realize that the agricultural bounty of the American South was ripe for the picking and ready to be put to use in something a little more refined than classic Southern cooking that he had grown up with.
Cook the Book: Tacos: moo1018, swatanabe, slcrose, pickledseeds, and Lvpierson. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Adam Perry Lang is a French-trained chef with years of experience at illustrious restaurants such as Daniel, Le Cirque, and Guy Savoy. With a resume like that you might assume that Lang would be more comfortable with squeeze bottles and a sous vide machine than tongs and a grill.
In fact, Lang has retired his proverbial toque and become a bona fide barbecue expert. In 2003 he opened Daisy May's BBQ and entered the professional barbecue circuit. Lang's pork shoulder won first place at the World Series of Barbecue and was named Grand Champion at the World Pork Expo.
With victories like these under his belt, it's obvious that Lang knows his barbecue. His next project is taking him across the Atlantic to team up with Jamie Oliver; together they're starting a chain of barbecue restaurants in England.
Serious Barbecue is one of the most comprehensive barbecue books available, a virtual barbecue bible.
Cook the Book: Real Cajun: iced_coffee, foodshethought, drala625, scooter7018, jcwest47. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Most people in the U.S. think of Cinco de Mayo as a great excuse to break out the chips and salsa and drink a bunch of Coronas or margaritas. It's a common misconception that Cinco de Mayo is Mexican Independence Day. In fact, the real Mexican Independence Day falls on September 16; the 5th of May isn't even a Mexican federal holiday. Cinco de Mayo actually commemorates the Battle of Puebla, in which an outnumbered Mexican Army defeated the French Army in an unlikely victory in 1862. That's enough history, let's move on to the tacos.
Tacos are quintessential Mexican street food, sold from roadside stands, and they are meant to be eaten on the go and out of hand. In the early twentieth century, tacos started their northern migration across the U.S. border. Tacos have become ubiquitous throughout the U.S., from authentic Mexican restaurants to Tex-Mex and Cali-Mex places to school cafeterias to fast food chains. The U.S. loves tacos.
Mark Miller, chef-founder of The Coyote Cafe, has written a book entirely devoted to tacos. Tacos features recipes for every type of taco filling imaginable: breakfast tacos like Potatoes with Chile Raja and Scrambled Eggs; vegetarian tacos with Squash Blossoms, Green Chiles, and Cheese; and some creative riffs on Mexican classics Ceviche with Coconut and Ginger. Each recipe in Tacos is annotated with suggestions for the appropriate type of tortilla, accompanying salsa, garnish, and beverage.
Cook the Book: The Asian Grill: lisagee, bearsarefree, bongeezer, christine1225, js2222. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Donald Link is a self-proclaimed "coonass," a true Cajun born and bred in Acadia Parish, Louisiana. As the chef and proprietor of Herbsaint and Cochon restaurants in New Orleans, Link's menus feature classic Cajun dishes with French and Italian twists. Louisiana's local produce, game, and seafood have been lifelong inspirations for Link's cooking.
Real Cajun features recipes from every stage of the chef's life—such as his aunt's Tomato and Bacon Pie, which he enjoyed on childhood vacations to the Alabama coast, or his Game Day Choucroute, eaten with his staff and friends during the first Super Bowl after Hurricane Katrina. Food plays a major role in every aspect of Cajun life, from holidays to family reunions, festivals to funerals; with that in mind, recipes for every occasion are lovingly laid out in Real Cajun.
If your summer cook-out repertoire is limited to hot dogs, hamburgers, and the occasional kebab, The Asian Grill might help you spice up the grilling season. Corinne Trang has put together a pan-Asian compendium of recipes using her "East meets East" concept of fusion cooking. Trang, dubbed the Julia Child of Asian cuisine, has taken flavor components from China, Vietnam, Thailand, Korea, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines and adapted them for the American grill.
The Asian Grill utilizes the five-flavor concept, combining sweet, sour, salty, spicy, and bitter elements to create depth and complexity of flavor. Taking a cue from most Asian cuisines, meat is not the main focus of the menus outlined in The Asian Grill; instead one protein is accompanied by several vegetables, various sauces and garnishes and plenty of healthy starches, such as rice and homemade flat breads.
Every day this week we will be sharing a recipe from The Asian Grill: pseudo sushi rolls with wild salmon, grilled country ribs with hoisin sauce, and sweet summer corn and edamame salad with walnut-miso dressing. If you are a fan of banh mi (and who isn't?), we are going to give you a recipe for pork patties and pickled daikon, carrots, and cucumbers that are perfect for making at home. —Caroline Russock
We are giving away five (5) copies of The Asian Grill. All you have to do is tell us about your funniest grilling mishap in the comments section of this post.
Five (5) people will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Comments will close Monday, April 20 at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules appy.
Cook the Book: Urban Italian: SSG Snuffy, tgrabler, wmoss, shoneyjoe, MeganCochran. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Tom Colicchio is everywhere. On top of reigning over his kingdom of Craft, he's on your television in Top Chef, in the kitchen with Tom: Tuesday Dinners, and now he's bringing his sandwich mini chain 'Wichcraft home with 'Wichcraft: Craft a Sandwich into a Meal and a Meal into a Sandwich. Written with Sisha Ortuzar, a sous-chef and partner in 'Wichcraft, Colicchio brings together recipes for sandwiches and condiments in a tidy package with vibrant color photographs accompanying each sandwich recipe.
For those unfamiliar with 'Wichcraft (locations in New York City, Las Vegas, and San Francisco), it's not a place that turns out sandwiches like the ones you used to brown bag in middle school. This is "real food, hand-crafted." Certainly, some of these recipes are more time-consuming than you would expect, but this is the quality and care that goes into these sandwiches at 'Wichcraft. Take the book's subtitle to heart. These sandwiches are complex and flavorful enough to be a meal, so you can expect to spend a little to a lot more time making them than your usual cheese sandwich. (That's not to say that the cold American cheese sandwich doesn't occupy a cozy corner in my heart.)
This week our Cook the Book selection is 'Wichweek, so get ready for a new recipe every day to upgrade your sandwich repertoire and introduce some interesting flavors. Look out for fried eggs with bacon, gorgonzola, and frisée, and a vegetarian asparagus, red onions, basil, and Vacherin. Longing for the classics? The PBJ from 'Wichcraft has a surprisingly easy rhubarb jelly to try your hand at. —Grace Kang
Courtesy of Clarkson Potter, we're giving away five (5) copies of 'Wichcraft. In the comments below, tell us the upscale sandwich that you wish 'Wichcraft would make.
Cook the Book: Ten: missbelle60, mannabsn, PeanutButter, kimberlymac, squidlette. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
For the first time in his life, chef Andrew Carmellini found himself cooking at home every night in his three-by-nine-foot kitchen. Instead of an army of sous chefs and dishwashers, it was just him and his food-writer wife, Gwen Hyman. Carmellini has worked at establishments like Lespinasse, Cafe Boulud, and, most recent, A Voce. Faced with doing his own prep work and grocery shopping and equipped with the standard New York–sized kitchen, Carmellini found himself cooking Italian with an urban twist. And so, Urban Italian: Simple Recipes and True Stories From a Life in Food was born.
This book is basically the story of my life. Well, minus the part where I'm a respected professional chef. But I, too, am my own prep cook, dishwasher, and grocery shopper. Reading through Urban Italian made my mouth water and made me laugh too many times to count. There are about 30 pages preceding the recipe section that are filled with stories highlighting the crazy, mixed-up adventures that Carmellini managed to get himself into on his way to creating Urban Italian. The amusing anecdotes captivate the reader and bring Carmellini's life to the table, where we can savor all the high jinks.
Cook the Book: Beyond the Great Wall: lilyk, Ragdoll, cranberrycheese, bobcatsteph3, blisseau. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Have a craving? It's probably in Sheila Lukins' cookbook Ten: All the Foods We Love and Ten Recipes for Each. Co-author of the beloved Silver Palate Cookbook, Lukins anticipates any food craving any reasonable (or even unreasonable) person might have. The recipes are grouped under general titles like Sunday Suppers, Mashed Potatoes, Chocolate, etc. There's even a section on Seafood Salads for those inclined to have cravings for them.
Fans of Silver Palate and New Basics cookbooks should think of Ten as a condensed version of the two. There's endless variety here with a preparation for every mood and season. Every day this week, we'll be fulfilling your cravings with recipes for "mashed" sweet shell peas, simple honey spareribs, Lukins' famous chocolate mousse, and more. —Grace Kang
Courtesy of Workman Publishing, we're giving away five (5) copies of Ten: All the Foods we Love and 10 Perfect Recipes for Each. In the comments below, share the strongest food craving you've ever had and the lengths to which you had to go to satisfy it. Only awesome stories allowed.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, March 30, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Cook the Book: Food Matters: honeypie411, anyang, ilikecitylights, foobie, bibliothecaire. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
After traveling throughout Asia for more than 25 years, Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid created something more than just a simple cookbook with Beyond the Great Wall: Recipes and Travels in the Other China. Although this is the first instance in which the six-time authors have focused on a single country, the book is an homage to the various rural regions of China and their respectively distinct culinary traditions.
Acting as cooks, writers, and photographers, Alford and Duguid traveled through Tibet, where they first met; the steppelands of Inner Mongolia; and a host of other remote areas, documenting food traditions and snapshots of daily life. With hundreds of beautiful photographs and vivid stories of their journey accompanying the recipes, the book invites the reader to come along for a ride through the other China. Expect to learn about the breadth and depth of Chinese cuisine beyond the Great Wall.
While this may all sound intimidating, there are plenty of recipes in the collection that will help bridge the gap between making an omelet and making your own tsampa. Every day this week, we'll be giving you a peek into Alford's and Duguid's quest, from homemade pork jerky and cucumbers in black rice vinegar, to a vibrant herb salsa and a comforting dish of pork with chives. The recipes offer plenty of helpful notes and fascinating back stories that enrich the cooking process. —Grace Kang
Courtesy of Artisan, we're giving away five (5) copies of Beyond the Great Wall: Recipes and Travels from the Other China. In the comments below, share your favorite story from traveling in a remote, foreign country, wherever that may be for you.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, March 23, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Cook the Book: Kneadlessly Simple: Roxanne, pamstar, oshngrl, honeyandjam, and AnnieNT. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
"Eat fewer animal products and more plants." Mark Bittman's motto for responsible eating is the heart of his new book, Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating. A mix of recipes, philosophy, and how-to, Bittman reveals the hows and whys of his newfound lifestyle and diet. Think of Food Matters as a more realistic and solutions-oriented Michael Pollan-like book with lots of doable recipes thrown in for good measure.
In typical Minimalist fashion, the collection of recipes spans the globe and includes a multitude of variations. Along with the recipes, there's also a month's worth of meal plans and a primer on stocking a Food Matters pantry to get you started. Despite its how-to nature, the book is neither stern nor pedantic, though Bittman certainly calls it like he sees it, and he is unafraid to venture an unpopular opinion or some unconventional wisdom. His common sense approach to cooking and living shine through and the straightforward recipes sound in typical Bittman fashion delicious and empowering.
With over seventy five recipes and endless substitutions to mix it up, both the beginner home cook and the amateur gourmet can find something to start eating responsibly and smartly in Bittman-like fashion. We'll be posting a recipe from Food Matters everyday this week, including spinach and sweet potato salad with warm bacon dressing, a classic Thai beef salad, an interesting hybrid quick bread, and a decadent chocolate semolina pudding with raspberry puree. Thankfully, there's no need to sacrifice bacon or sweets on Mark Bittman's eating plan.
Courtesy of Simon & Schuster, we're giving away five (5) copies of Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating. In the comments below, tell us what healthy changes Mark Bittman has inspired you to make with your own diet.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, March 16, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Last year's winner, "The Tomb of King Peepankhamun."
Some would argue that Peeps are edible, others would say they're perfect objects for arts and craft projects. Behold the Washington Post’s Third Annual Peeps Diorama Contest, now accepting entries.
The diorama should encapsulate a famous event or concept, whether past, present, or future. Judging by the last two years, timely is good, but not too predictable (SlumPeep Millionaire could be overblown). Since it's judged by the D.C.-area hometown paper, any D.C. references are good. Punny titles are also appreciated.
Though the contest is open to anyone in the U.S., the five finalists must reside in D.C., Maryland, or Virginia. Photo submissions are due by 11:59 p.m. March 15; send in no more than two as high-resolution JPEG attachments to peeps@washpost.com. The semifinalists and winners will be published on Easter Sunday, April 12. Look at last year's slide show for inspiration. Start warming up the hot glue gun.
Related
Sugar-free Peeps [Talk]
Inside the Mind of a Peep Poet
Photo of the Day: Easter Island (With Peeps)
Cook the Book: On the Line: jh70095, Erinay77, hannah_phi, riceandwheat, and jenjw4. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
I'm not sure where the stress goes, but I sure hope Nancy Baggett's last name is pronounced "baguette." For an author who's made it her mission to demystify breadmaking, it would be only fitting.
Kneadlessly Simple's recipes draw from many countries and many styles of breadmaking. What they all have in common is Baggett's kneadless, cold-rise method, clear and precise instructions, and a skill quotient. Also included are a detailed troubleshooting section and instructions for "making over" traditional recipes to the kneadless method. If you can read, measure, and stir, you can bake delicious bread at home—guaranteed.
Every day this week, we'll be posting a tempting bread from Kneadlessly Simple, from French walnut bread and fruited pain d'epice to a four grain-honey bread and a Cyprus-style herbed olive loaf. —Michele Humes
Courtesy of Wiley, we are giving away five (5) copies of Kneadlessly Simple. In the comments below, just tell us what's your favorite bread to bake.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, March 9, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
You’d think that a chef with three Michelin stars would guard his secrets. But Eric Ripert, with Christine Muhlke, has written the restaurant equivalent of a tell-all memoir—well, minus the sordid love affairs. The establishment in question is Le Bernardin, the phenomenally successful fish restaurant now in its 23rd year; the book is On the Line.
The sweeping narrative takes you all the way from the front of the house to the back of the pantry, providing “day in the life” timetables for everyone from the porter (“8:41 a.m.—Sorts and smells squid, turning plastic gloves inky”) to the pastry cook (“10:30 .a.m—One hundred dozen petits fours are finished for lunch.”) Dishes are described in detailed play-by-plays (“1:37:54—Flips fish”), kitchen jargon decoded (“Giuliani” is slang for “julienne"), and enormous quantities of raw ingredients recorded (250 pounds of butter and 500 pounds of black bass a week).
And then there are the recipes, more than 40, straight from Le Bernardin’s kitchen—scaled down but in no way simplified, for the home cook. We’ll be posting one of Ripert’s dishes every day this week, from meaty braised halibut with asparagus and wild mushrooms and filler-free crab cakes with Dijon mustard emulsion to an Asian-influenced tuna tartare “sandwich." Come back, too, for pastry chef Michael Laiskonis's dark chocolate, peanut, and caramel tart.
The dishes are pretty heavy on the mise-en-place, but are as rewarding as they are challenging. —Michele Humes
Courtesy of Artisan Books, we are giving away five (5) copies of On the Line. In the comments below, just tell us your favorite way to prepare or eat seafood.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, March 2, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
If meat has always been the star of your meal, and vegetables, grains, and starches merely supporting acts, it can be a real challenge to redistribute the roles. But there are many good reasons to switch to an ensemble cast mindset, from environmental health to your own, and Joy Manning and Tara Mataraza Desmond are here to help. Almost Meatless is a collection of recipes in which modest quantities of meat—if meat is used at all—enhance, rather than dominate, dishes.
Despite its focus on healthy and responsible eating, the book is neither puritan nor militant in tone. If you've followed the authors' Meat Lite column here on Serious Eats, you'll recognize in Almost Meatless their gentle, persuasive voices and eminently practical approach to cooking and eating. Budget-conscious home cooks themselves, Manning and Desmond have carefully annotated their recipes to include tips on getting the best cut of meat for your dollar, making your freezer your friend, and, where possible, converting their almost meatless recipes into entirely meatless ones.
We'll be sharing an Almost Meatless recipe with you every day this week, like almond gnocchi with a (lamb-optional) lamb ragu, creamy smoked trout chowder, and a rustic lentil soup that uses just a little Italian sausage. And from my favorite chapter in the book, which urges us to liberate eggs from their breakfast classification, we'll be posting spicy chilaquiles and Parisian bistro classic, oeufs en meurette. —Michele Humes
Courtesy of Ten Speed Press, we are giving away five (5) copies of Almost Meatless. In the comments below, just tell us your favorite dish that's big on flavor but easy on the meat.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, February 23, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Thank you all for the awesome acrostics. They made for fun LOLs at SEHQ (and probably wherever else Serious Eats is read). There were congratulations to our winner, hootspa:
Robust praise
In circles culinaire for
Porcine pleasures
Without compare
Imbibe! Your
Lardoons culled from
Bellies round with
Unctuous
Richness, pound for pound
The judges said: Points for originality, humor, and the rhymes. Well played!
Winner has been notified by email and also appears on our Contest Winners page.
And if you're still interested in the Praise the Lard package, remember you can buy this gift box or anything at Zingerman's for 10 percent off on anything $75 or over. Use the promo code LOVE when you call or check out.
Itzy Bitzy Patisserie Macaron V-Day Giveaway: Nemis
and calliope are our winners. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Our macaron giveaway just ended, but that's OK. We've got another sweetheart of a contest for you to enter today. This one gives you the chance to win a Praise the Lard Gift Box from Zingerman's. Here's what's in it:
And if you don't happen to win the Praise the Lard Gift Box this time around, remember you can buy this gift box or anything at Zingerman's for 10 percent off on anything $75 or over. Use the promo code LOVE when you call or check out. —Ed Levine
In late 2008, Robert Steinberg, co-author of this week's Cook the Book selection, finally succumbed to a two-decade battle with leukemia. Written with business partner John Scharffenberger, The Essence of Chocolate acknowledges Steinberg's bittersweet debt to the disease. For it was his diagnosis with the illness that drove the physician to apprentice himself to a small chocolatier in Lyon, to follow the trail of the cacao bean to Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago, and, in 1996, to co-found Scharffen Berger.
The Essence of Chocolate is an extraordinary book. It covers the history, cultivation, and lore of chocolate—and it does it in deft and lucid prose (before he was a doctor or a chocolate maker, Robert Steinberg was an English Literature major at Harvard) and with an appreciation for flavor and terroir that could only come from John Scharffenberger's experience as a winemaker. Add to that an all-star cast of recipe contributors, from Sherry Yard to Rose Levy Beranbaum, and you have a book that's unrivaled in richness and breadth.
We first tried Mitzy Budiono's French macarons last September before her macarons were even on the market. Since then we've watched Budiono's business grow as she established Itzy Bitzy Patisserie and started selling macarons at the Brooklyn Flea and Tafu in New York City. This week, for the first time, she is offering overnight shipping so macaron lovers around the country can enjoy her creations.
For Valentine's Day, Budiono is offering a box of a dozen macarons with two of each of her February flavors, plus an additional non-macaron treat, to two Serious Eats members. February's flavors are Champagne, chocolate strawberry, chocolate hazelnut, coffee, Earl Grey, and houjicha. If you want to buy her macarons at her website, mention code SEFEB09 to get 10 percent off all orders that are shipped in February. Since she's a one-woman operation, she only has five boxes of a dozen macarons to sell each week. Get those orders in fast.
To enter to win, tell us what macaron flavor combinations you would most like to have. Remember, there's a filling and a cookie component, and fillings can involve two flavors. Budiono might even make your macaron a reality.
Since the macarons need to be shipped on Wednesday to arrive at winners' homes in time for Valentine's Day, please watch your inbox when the contest closes so we can pass on your information to Budiono as soon as possible.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Tuesday, February 10, 2009. One entry per community member. Winners are limited to U.S. residents. Standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Cook the Book, 'Baking Unplugged': momtimestwo, lisaxp, ConcordiaSalus, bobfole, arm1970. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
The colder the weather, the more I crave bold, straightforward flavors. And if they're delivered with lashings of rich, warming sauce, so much the better. This is just the sort of food that restaurateur Rick Tramonto delivers with his fifth cookbook, Osteria. Written with Mary Goodbody, it's a collection of more than 150 Italian country-style recipes from Chicago's Osteria di Tramonto, laid-back sister restaurant to the award-winning Tru.
In Tramonto's kitchen, laid-back doesn't mean simplistic or slapdash. It does mean flavors that are more comforting than delicate, and portions that are meant to be ladled rather than stacked precariously. Think of the dishes in this book as very high-end family food—food, that is, for a family celebration and not a school-night supper.
And what gathering of family or friends wouldn't rejoice at a meal of pecorino custard with tomato sauce (essentially an intensely cheesy bread pudding) followed by red wine-braised short ribs? Speaking for myself, I've already earmarked Tramonto's spicy skillet-baked eggs—cheerfully named "eggs in hell"—and goat cheese and ricotta pancakes for my own brunch among friends. We'll be posting these recipes and more, every day this week.
—Michele Humes
Courtesy of Broadway Books, we are giving away five (5) copies of Osteria. In the comments below, just tell us your favorite cold-weather comfort food.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, February 9, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
A Black Label burger at City Burger in New York City.
Congrats to our La Frieda Burger limerick winner. We held a live reading at the office tonight after assessing all the entries. Drum roll, please. Here's the winning bit of poetry:
There was a sad cow named Jay
Who was feeling down and blase
So he went to a pyre
Threw himself in the fire
And we all had burgers that day.
—qwill
And the runner-up, who sadly gets no beef, but a lot of beef poetry street cred:
There once was a Burger named King
Who had a quite scandalous fling
With a queen from a dairy
In white castle they'd marry
And used a Duncan Donut for a ring.
—aisli
The winner has been notified by email and also appears on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered. Once again, the number—and quality—of poems made this another tough one to judge.
The Great Wings Book: beano, Rottenmom, sdsliberty, dglitter, finsbigfan. Winners have been notified by email and also appear on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered!
Congrats to our Snow's Barbecue haiku winner. We stayed after hours last night to read all the entries and deliberate (and laugh). Drum roll, please. Here's the winning bit of poetry:
Hindu, Muslim, Jew
What religious restriction?
Insert Cow/Pig here
The winner has been notified by email and also appears on our Contest Winners page. Thanks to everyone who entered. The number—and quality—of haiku made this another tough one to judge.
I'm not much of a baker. Still, there are times, especially during these cold months, when I'd like my kitchen to come alive with the cozy smells of tarts browning and buns rising. The trouble is, I don't have a KitchenAid mixer, and I'm a little intimidated by yeast. So I'm absolutely delighted that Nicole Rees has come up with Baking Unplugged, a book that assumes neither fancy equipment nor in-depth pastry knowledge on the part of the reader.
It's amazing what you can make without a stand mixer or years of practice, and Rees' thorough instructions will hold your hand all the way. Her recipes are clear and simple without sacrificing appeal, and most of them include a number of variations—dried sour cherries figure heavily—to try once you've mastered the basic recipe.
Each day this week, we'll be posting an "acoustic" recipe from Baking Unplugged , from a moist vanilla pound cake with three variations and fragrant almond paste scones, to an easy bread-and-butter pudding and a 20-minute brunch clafouti. —Michele Humes
Courtesy of Wiley, we are giving away five (5) copies of Baking Unplugged. In the comments below, just share your funniest baking disaster.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, February 2, 2009. One entry per community member. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Serious barbecue freaks (like me) were shocked, not to mention curious, when a little-known, only-open-Saturdays barbecue joint, Snow's BBQ, was named the best Texas barbecue joint in Texas Monthly Magazine's "100 Best Barbecue Joints in Texas" issue. Soon after Snow's started shipping nationwide (Calvin Trillin's piece in the New Yorker on Snow's tipped us off) the Serious Eaters ordered some Snow's brisket, which turned out to be powerful good.
With the Super Bowl coming up, we're giving away 3 pounds and 7 ounces (a big old hunk) of Snow's fantastic brisket. Thanks to the good folks at Snow's, one lucky serious eater (and the seriously lucky friends) will score the tender, smokey meat for the big game. To enter to win, just leave your best barbecue haiku as a comment on this post. A panel of judges/wordsmiths at Serious Eats HQ will select the winner.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Monday, January 26, 2009. One entry per community member. Winners are limited to residents of the continental U.S. Standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
A Black Label burger at City Burger in Manhattan.
Even before we knew what teams were going to play in the Super Bowl, the crew at Serious Eats World Headquarters was thinking about what food we'd want to eat before, during, and after the game. This year, because we like to give away seriously delicious food whenever we can, we're giving away a couple fantastic Super Bowl party packages, starting with five pounds of what must be the world's juiciest, tastiest hamburgers, La Freida's Black Label.
You've read about this proprietary blend of chopped aged prime beef cuts, and now, thanks to the food folks at La Freida Meats in New York, we're giving you a chance to serve your Super Bowl buds these most magnificent burgers. A Black Label burger on a lightly buttered and griddled potato bun with some Dark Russet potato chips—oh, yeah. That would be good big game eatin'.
To enter to win this Seriously Delicious Super Bowl Party Giveaway, leave your best hamburger limerick here as a comment. A panel of judges/wordsmiths at Serious Eats HQ will select the winner.
Contest will end and comments will close at 3 p.m. ET, Wednesday, January 28, 2009. One entry per community member. Winners are limited to residents of the continental U.S. Standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.