Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

You also neglected to mention the sauces! I love the coffee bbq sauce, but the shasha spicy sauce is also terrific.

Knife skills... I feel like I am always chopping something!

Pasta for sure.

I have garlic that I planted in the fall plus arugula, carrots, peas, heirloom tomatoes, hot peppers, basil, lettuce, and Brussels sprouts that I started from seed. As with drunkenchef, more herbs on the way! It has been way too rainy the past few weeks (in Ohio) to accomplish much outdoors, but I had a sunny and productive weekend. :)

CSA and growing our own vegetables. We don't eat out often, but when we do, we are fortunate to have a lot of local restaurants who put some effort into sourcing their ingredients locally.

Pan-fried goetta (the mysterious meat/oat mixture particular to Cincinnati).

In Cleveland, OH: Bialy's Bagels. Excellent Italian-grandmother-style pizza in Little Italy (Mama Santa's, Valentino's) and (I hear) also at Geraci's on the East Side. Plenty of good food to help forget about the professional sports issues!

I've been going to the West Side Market (which is year-round) and Shaker Square Market (a traditional farmer's market) in Cleveland-- although to be honest I haven't visited either of them frequently thanks to my CSA and my own garden. Winter is going to be a sad, sad time for me. :(

I followed the recipe to a T and the cake is quite tasty! The polenta gives it an interesting texture. I'm eating it with strawberries on the side, which is a pretty good combo.

I like it. The strong reactions here are interesting, but I guess that's what happens when you take a food with so much tradition around it and do something drastic like switch out the toppings. Obviously everyone on Serious Eats loves their food; it's just that some love it in very specific configurations and others are more willing to break the "rules." :)

Monterey Jack!

I love the dramatic music that is playing as the omelette is pulled out of the oven and plated. And I do like the subway tile in the kitchen. What can I say, I'm not a cooking show person.

Thanks for the reassuring post. I thought I was unlucky when I tried a sfogliatelle from a bakery in my local Little Italy (not NYC) and was horribly let down. It's amazing how something that looks so tasty can be so disappointing!