One of my culinary shortcuts is called compound butter. Well, truthfully, just plain ‘ol butter is my shortcut to a better dish, but I want to show you how easy it is to make some fancy schmancy butter with some spices and fresh herbs. Compound butter is just butter + stuff mixed in. Though calling [...]View Post →

  Restaurant chains like California Pizza Kitchen or Wolfgang Puck’s make a killing out of gourmet pizza creations, and it is pretty fun to explore different flavor combinations that veer off the standard pepperoni and cheese combo. The problem is, most of these gourmet pizza creations are not by the slice. So, if you’ve got [...]View Post →

  It’s Memorial Weekend, and do you know what that means? Time to lounge at the pool and hang out by the BBQ. We’re grilling this entire weekend; the weather is perfectly straddling between warm and hot (when it gets hot we jump in the pool … when it gets warm, we EAT!). This week, [...]View Post →

  I think everyone should have a magical butter sauce recipe up their sleeves. One that you can pull out of a hat in an instant, without even looking the recipe up. Don’t know what to make for dinner and don’t have time to think? Take any ingredient, sear, steam, broil, grill or even microwave [...]View Post →

  My younger son, Nathan, who is 5 years old, absolutely loves oysters. Now honestly, I don’t know if he really enjoyed the taste of oysters or if it was the crowd of adults clapping and congratulating my little tot for being brave enough to down the oyster on his very first try a year [...]View Post →

  Say hello to one of my favorite cuts of beef of all time: The Skirt Steak. Yes, even more than filet mignon (which, in fact, is my least favorite cut of steak because, though buttah-tender, I think it has the least flavor). So now that you know I’m all about the flavor, it’s no [...]View Post →

  The moment I decided that this column was going to be dedicated to “my favorite things,” I just couldn’t get that song out of my head! Yes, that song. You know, crisp apple strudels and even schnitzel with noodles! Isn’t it a lovely song to have stuck in your head all day? Originally, I [...]View Post →