The devastating Gulf oil spill is no laughing matter. But at some point, you have to laugh to keep from crying.
A baker for the New Orleans grocery store Breaux Mart apparently feels the same way. Thanks to skooksie for sharing this on Flickr, and to Grist, via Cake Wrecks, for the tip.
-- Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch
Photo: skooksie via Flickr Creative Commons
--Hey y'all, Paula Deen is looking for some real Philly women -- not ladies who hail from the land of cheese steak and the Liberty Bell, but ladies who love to cook with Philadelphia Cream Cheese. You have until Sunday to submit your recipes for a shot to win $25,000. In the meantime, watch Nana P and Nana D make some cookie-and-cream-cheese concoction ... and scrub their teeth(!) with Philly Cream Cheese.
--I don't need a doggy bag, thank you. I've got my own.
--Moby -- DJ, songwriter and noted vegan -- joins Evan Kleiman on Saturday on "Good Food" to talk about the ethics of eating.
--The Obama administration has come back with its final program for restoring endangered salmon on the Columbia River -- a plan substantially like the last one.
--Looking for a new nightlife spot? How about 1642 near Echo Park. The former Lupita's space on Temple Street reopens with craft beer, wine and a dancing ghost.
--Watch your feet for broken plates and cries of "Opa!" at the O.C. Greek Festival in Anaheim. St. John Greek Orthodox Church, 405 N. Dale St., Anaheim. 3 p.m. Fri., noon Sat.-Sun. $3. www.ocgreekfest.com.
-- Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch
The artist collective Fallen Fruit continues Eat LACMA -- its yearlong project on food, art, culture and politics -- with the Tomato Hootenanny from noon to 3 p.m. Saturday.
Pick up a tomato seedling plant (arrive early — they'll go fast), dance a jig with the old-time string band Triple Chicken Foot and participate in a Mortgage Lifter Tomato Workshop with artists Anne Hars and Stephanie Allespach.
We're not sure what they mean by "mortgage lifter" but we're willing to believe this is yet another secret benefit of lycopene. LACMA, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., L.A., noon to 3 p.m. Saturday. (323) 857-6000.
The rest of your weekend Top 10 picks here:
Photo credit: Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times
Since the economy took a dive three years ago, more and more people like Cam Slocum show up unannounced at restaurants, local markets and small retailers, looking to sell what they've foraged or grown in their backyards.
No one keeps track of the number of people selling their homegrown bounty, but scores of ads have cropped up on Craigslist across the country, hawking local produce, home-filtered honey and backyard eggs. But one Los Angeles resident with a lemon tree posted an offering on Craigslist to let customers "save over 50% over Vons, Ralphs, etc. $1.00/pound."
At the Orange County Swap Meet, officials said the number of people selling home-canned beans and other homemade edibles grew to 30 vendors this month, up from eight vendors in early 2007.
In the South, hunters are selling venison and wild boar meat. In the Midwest, people are combing the forests for morel mushrooms, which can fetch $10 to $40 a pound.
Photo: Cam Slocum digs holes to plant tomatoes on his backyard farm. Credit: Katie Falkenberg / For The Los Angeles Times
Technically, summer doesn't begin until June 21. But the unofficial start of summer is Memorial Day. From here on through September, it's going to be all about chilling and grilling.
So this week's Project -- a recipe we hand pick from the L.A. Times archives that's perfect for weekend cooking -- bids an early farewell to spring. And we're trying something a little different this week. Instead of just a single dish, like we've done in the past, we're offering up a full menu. That's because the main entree, roast poussin with spring garlic-herb stuffing takes only about an hour to make, and most of that is oven-cooking time. Which should leave plenty of time to make two side dishes that also highlight fresh, seasonal produce: Baby artichoke and pea shoot salad with favas and pecorino Romano and chive-glazed baby carrots.
If you try it, let me know what you think. Better yet -- send me a picture of your finished dish at rene.lynch@latimes.com. And if you have any dishes -- or favorite L.A. Times Test Kitchen recipes -- that you'd like to see featured in future Projects, let me know and we'll dig through the archives for it.
And enjoy. Summer is just around the corner ...
--Rene Lynch
twitter.com/renelynch
Photo credit: Los Angeles Times
On Wednesday night, Susur Lee stated that cooking was a sport, and that "Top Chef Masters" was the Olympics. If that's true, then Susan Feniger was the episode's Michael Phelps. No, I don't mean that the spritely chef consumes a whopping 12,000 calories per day; it's that our Feniger went 2-0 in both the
For the
No one opted to duplicate Michael Voltaggio's winning molecular chicken wing recipe for the challenge. Rather, the dishes prepared at the Coliseum were fairly mundane, giving Feniger's carne asada tacos an arena in which to shine.
When put up against Waxman's thickly sliced skirt steak tacos on stale tortillas and Mantuano's chewy grilled pizza, a simple street-style taco was enough for a win, bringing Feniger's total charity earnings to $32,000.
But does her dominance in the last episode have legs? Do you think she'll follow up Voltaggio's Season 6 victory, making Angeleno chefs 2-0? One thing is for sure: The pairing of our local lady's victory and another Lakers win sure made for a sweet night of TV.
-- Krista Simmons
Photo courtesy of Bravo
Noted food writer Deborah Madison has a new cookbook out called "Seasonal Fruit Desserts," and Times Food Editor Russ Parsons thinks it might be her best one yet. (He admits he's prejudiced: They've been friends for 25 years.) Read more about their friendship and why her new book is so outstanding.
RELATED:
Show off your fruit: 'Berry' good recipes from the L.A. Times' Test Kitchen
Photo: Veteran writer Deborah Madison. Credit: Laurie Smith
Under chef Victor Casanova, Culina at the Four Seasons Beverly Hills does a number of things well, particularly pasta. However, it may be playing things a little too safe in terms of flavors. Find out why Times restaurant critic S. Irene Virbila gave it two stars:
Photo: A crudo plate, as garnished by the chef. Credit: Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times
--My new favorite blog: My Food Looks Funny.
--Let's get stoned. And cook: Marijuana fuels a new kitchen culture. [New York Times]
--And nothing cures the munchies like pizza. Especially homemade pizza. [New York Times]
--AAARRRRGH. The most annoying part about eating out is.... [SFGate]
--Why you can't find real Thai food in Bangkok. [Time]
--Everything you'd ever want to know about baking with whole grains. 'Cause that makes it healthy, right? [Chicago Tribune]
--Hey, ever wonder why asparagus makes your ... er ... um ... well, just click here: [Mental Floss]
--Get your greens on: Recipe Girl is featuring 30 salad favorites, including Five-Minute Salad. In other words, if you cannot find it here, you just don't like salad.
--Rene Lynch
On Twitter @renelynch
"Congee is basically rice boiled with water until it has a porridge-like consistency. I know, it sounds pretty boring. But don't stop reading yet...."
Give Times restaurant critic S. Irene Virbila the chance to explain that the "genius is in the garnishes — which can be seafood, sausage, pork, duck, thousand-year-old egg and a kazillion other tidbits." Read more here, recipes included:
Photo: Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles Times
Apparently, there's more than one way to fry a chicken.
When I started researching the Food story, "Back to basics: Fried chicken, made at home," I was amazed at how many recipes there were for the classic comfort food.
I decided to test a bunch of recipes to see which methods worked, and why. I looked for every possible variation: Buttermilk versus brine versus rub. Complex versus simple seasoning. Size of bird. Type of fat. Deep fryer or pan (and if pan, what type). Lard or oil. Temperature. I even researched how to drain the fried birds: rack versus paper bags versus paper towels (and are the towels flat, or do you crumple them?).
I chose 11 recipes, ranging from classics to just-released cookbooks. There was Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock, Kansas City's Chicken Betty (courtesy of Jane and Michael Stern) and James Villas, the Lee brothers and the Bromberg brothers, Thomas Keller and David Chang. I included recipes and variations on the theme from David Rosengarten, Nancy Oakes, Frank Stitts, Gray Kunz and Peter Kamisky.
And because the only way to do a true comparison is to test variations side by side, I decided to test all the recipes at one time. Yeah, it sounded great in theory, but the execution turned out to be more than a little daunting.
Chefs of the roundtable: The DineLA Chef Roundtable is scheduled to take place June 8 at the REDCAT theater downtown. The forum will feature chefs Wolfgang Puck, Josiah Citrin, Susan Feniger, Karen Hatfield, Mark Peel and Joachim Splichal in a moderated panel discussion about the evolution and future of the L.A. dining scene. The panel will be followed by a reception hosted by downtown’s Starry Kitchen. 7 to 8 p.m. June 8, REDCAT theater, 631 W. 2nd St., Los Angeles. Reservations required; go to dineLA.com/roundtable. Seating is limited.
Quickie lunch: Chef Alain Giraud at Anisette Brasserie in Santa Monica has created a l'Express lunch menu for the summer. The two-item menu includes soup of the day or salad and either the grilled steak sandwich or the grilled fish brochettes (three different cuts of skewered and grilled fish served with ratatouille), for $18. For $21, you get the dessert du jour. Anisette Brasserie, 225 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, (310) 395-3200, anisettebrasserie.com.
$5 menu specials: To celebrate its fifth anniversary, M Cafe will offer specials next month, including a $5 menu on June 5 from 5 to 7 p.m. At all three M Cafe locations (the original is on Melrose Avenue, and the other two are in Culver City and Beverly Hills), everything on the menu will be just $5 (items that are less than $5 will be regular price). Yes, that means the Big Macro Burger, normally $9.75, and the M Chopped Salad, normally $11.45, will be five bucks. There also will be rotating $5 specials throughout June. Green tea roll cake made with green tea sponge cake and green tea tofu cream is $5 all month long. 9433 Brighton Way, Beverly Hills, (310) 838-8459; 9343 Culver Blvd., Culver City, (310) 838-4300; 7119 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, (323) 525-0588; www.mcafedechaya.com.
-- Betty Hallock
Photo: Anisette Brasserie. Credit: Liz O. Bayley / Los Angeles Times.
About a week ago, I introduced Michael Osborne, one of our Test Kitchen interns. Probably the most important thing we teach our interns is how to read a recipe from a recipe tester's standpoint. Unlike the latitude we might take when we tackle a recipe at home, formally testing a recipe in a test kitchen is a whole different thing. We follow a recipe step by step, ruler and timer in hand, making notes on everything from what size saucepan we use to what the consistency for a finished sauce might be and how many minutes it takes to get there. Any questions we might have go through the chef or restaurant; we make no assumptions.
Michael worked a lot on our most recent Culinary SOS, our weekly column where we adapt readers' favorite restaurant and bakery recipes for the home. He tested and retested the recipe, double-checking ratios and making sure every step worked -- literally -- as it was written. Here are his notes. -- Noelle Carter
A reader loves the caramel banana bread pudding from a hotel in Phoenix, and we just got the recipe from the chef. It's a potential Culinary SOS, but will need to be tested before we can run it.
The recipe looks a little complicated. As we read through the ingredients and steps, we quickly note that the recipe will have to be scaled down -- a home cook doesn't need three gallons of custard to make a bread pudding for a family of four. Calculator and red pen in hand, we quickly adjust the recipe proportions and reduce the amounts to a manageable size. Simple math. The directions look a little nebulous: What are the visual cues? And what does the chef mean by "overripe bananas?" Do we toast or dry the cubed croissants -- and how big are the cubes? Time to get the chef on the horn and break out the ruler.
In the Test Kitchen, our normal M.O. is to take the recipe quite literally the first time we make it....
It is hard to take Grenache seriously. Oh, sure, it's serious enough in august bottles of Châteauneuf-du-Pape and Priorat, where the grape fills out the lion's share of blends with an earthy depth and frequent profundity. But almost everywhere else the variety is grown, in Spain, Australia, southern France from Roussillon to the Rhône, it is a considerably more humble wine.
That seems to be its fate in California soils too, even though few red varieties are better suited to the state's congenial climate: It's one of those rare reds that stays in the game no matter what Mother Nature throws at it, as long as it's sunny and warm.
Grenache in California has four great virtues: its deep garnet color, its abundant bright red berry fruitiness, its bracing acidity and a tannic payload that tends to strike as soon as it hits the mouth. But these can feel like a few spindly chairs in a sparsely furnished room: functional but hard to integrate. An American Grenache can feel a bit primary, as if missing a dimension. It simply doesn't fill the room.
"Grenache grows beautifully and easily, makes wonderful components for wines," says Jason Haas of Tablas Creek Vineyards in Paso Robles, which employs Grenache in two of its blends. "But it's hard to make a great wine with it on its own, or almost on its own."
That doesn't stop some wineries from trying, however, and the grape shows promise in a number of Central Coast locales, where, one way or another, winemakers are finding ways to bring out the gravitas in Grenache. Read more here.
-- Patrick Comiskey
Photo: Sashi Moorman checks a glass of Grenache at the Stolpman Vineyards tasting room in Solvang, May 20, 2010. Credit: Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times
Chef John Rivera Sedlar and his partners Bill Chait and Eddie Sotto say they plan to open a casual restaurant this fall in the soon-to-be-former Grace restaurant space on Beverly Boulevard. The small-plates menu at R26 (its working name) will be inspired by 26 nations or regions in Central America, South America, Mexico, the Hispanic Caribbean and Spain.
“The menu celebrates the pan-cultural, pluralistic spirit of those 26 locales and its continuing efforts to draw connections between diverse peoples through the communal experience of cooking and eating,” Sedlar said in a news release.
The cocktail program will be developed by Julian Cox and Kristina Howald, along with Sedlar, and architect Osvaldo Maiozzi and designer Eddie Sotto are signed on to design the restaurant.
R26 will be located at 7360 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles.
Photo: John Sedlar of Rivera. Credit: Ringo H.W. Chiu / Los Angeles Times
There's a part of me that's ashamed at how hard and loud I laughed watching this collection of videos of people dropping cakes, assembled over at the Amateur Gourmet. Luckily, there's another part of me that couldn't wait to share it with the rest of you.
Enjoy! And make sure you've got a Flip handy at the next cake event.
-- Rene Lynch
On Twitter @renelynch
Red O by Rick Bayless -- Bayless' first restaurant outside of Chicago -- is set to open next Wednesday on Melrose Avenue in West Hollywood. Bayless, chef, author and TV personality (whose restaurants include Topolobampo and Frontera Grill in Chicago), created the modern Mexican menu and trained the kitchen staff. The menu features a ceviche selection (served on tortilla chips, toasted baguette, plantain chips or jicama slices); family-style cazuelas to share such as albondigas al chipotle; enchiladas and tacos; entrees including striped bass with Veracruz-style rice; and snacks such as pork belly sopes. Dodd Mitchell and G + Gulla Jonsdottir designed the restaurant. A glass tequila tunnel between the dining room and lounge features the tequila selections. 8155 Melrose Ave., (323) 655-5009, www.redorestaurant.com.
Echo Park raw and vegan restaurant Mooi is scheduled to open Thursday in a two-level corner space of the Jensen Rec Center on Sunset Boulevard. Monday to Saturday, the restaurant will be open 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., serving juices, desserts and Intelligentsia coffee, with a limited menu of breakfast and lunch dishes. Dinner is offered Wednesday to Saturday from 6 to 11 p.m. (Sundays are for brunch.) Desserts are a specialty of proprietor Stephen Hauptfuhr; expect a vegan ice cream bonanza. 1700 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, www.mooifood.com.
Mesa -- in Costa Mesa -- announced that new executive chef Jason Travi has added spring dishes to the restaurant's menu. The restaurant is kicking off the arrival of Travi, formerly of Fraiche in Culver City and Santa Monica, with a Tuesday-to-Saturday cocktail party. “House Party ‘til Sundown” runs from 6 p.m. until the sun sets, with free small bites of the chef’s additions. New items include salt cod fritters with romesco, wood-fired roasted shrimp with kale and chickpeas; and Port Brewing "Old Viscosity"-braised short ribs. There's a new cocktail menu (take for example, the Clash, house-infused tangerine vodka with arbol chiles, Tuaca, lime and cilantro) and something called "flask service" -- your choice of spirit in a 9-ounce vintage flask, along with two house-made mixers for $100 (for $125 guests may keep the flask). 725 Baker St., Costa Mesa, (714) 557-6700, www.mesacostamesa.com.
-- Betty Hallock
Photo: Mango, avocado and strawberry salsa in corn tortilla at Mooi. Credit: Mooi restaurant.
-- If you want to drink raw milk, is that your business? Or the government's business?
-- The alleged murder-for-hire plot involving TV chef Juan-Carlos Cruz takes another twist, with the suspicion that fertility problems were partly to blame.
-- Wynonna hearts the Cracker Barrel Old Country Store: The pair have joined forces to raise money for the Wounded Warrior Project. [Cracker Barrel]
-- Press releases are usually "filed" immediately upon receipt. But this was too cute too keep to myself: The Land O'Lakes people suggest diploma cookies for your favorite grad. I totally get that. But they also suggest that you tuck one of these downloadable fortunes inside. Not sure what fortunes have to do with graduation, unless it's a "you'll need all the good fortune you can get in this economy, kid" kind of message. You'll find more, plus other recipes, at the Land O'Lakes website.
-- The Popcycle -- L.A.'s newest traveling food, with flavor combos such as Salty Cucumber Lime, Lemon Mint Blueberry and Cantaloupe with Anise -- goes for a test spin. [LAist]
-- You have to click on this link just to see the dog picture. That, and to find out what nutrition guru Marion Nestle thinks you should be feeding Fido and Fluffy. [Time]
-- Rene Lynch
twitter.com/renelynch
Photo: Diploma cookies. Credtit: Land O'Lakes
We're been warned for years to lay off the salt. Now, under growing pressure from doctors, consumers, states and advocacy groups, big-name food companies are slashing sodium from soups, potato chips, sauces, condiments and other products.
Last month, the Food and Drug Administration announced its intent to reduce salt in the American diet, beginning with a call for voluntary cutbacks from the food industry. New York City has spearheaded a National Salt Reduction Initiative, and, as part of it, 16 companies (including Starbucks, Subway, Boar's Head and Mars) so far have signed on to voluntarily reduce sodium levels in their foods by 25% over the next five years. Read more here, and tell us what you think. Is this a good idea? Or should the FDA mind its own business?
Photo credit: Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times
Anyone who wants to try making soba -- not just boiling noodles from a package, but mixing the buckwheat-flour dough, rolling it and cutting the noodles by hand -- might seek the guidance of Akila Inouye of Tsukiji Soba Academy in Tokyo and writer Sonoko Sakai. They've launched a series of cooking classes; check out mazumizu.com. From June 12-27, Inouye and Sakai will be teaching workshops about soba and Japanese home cooking in L.A. and San Diego.
The tricky thing about making soba is that the dough is not easy to handle. Mixing it is one thing, but rolling it out to a thickness of one-sixteenth of an inch takes some work. (I've personally seen Inouye work up a sweat while rolling out sheets of buckwheat dough.) Cutting the dough into thin strands isn't as easy as it may seem, either. It takes a practiced hand to make even, elegant noodles. But Inouye is adept at teaching beginners and has even come up with an easy way to make soba.
Workshops include soba for beginners; basic handmade soba; kikouchi gluten-free soba; and a comprehensive workshop on handmade soba and traditional side dishes. Other workshops feature a farmers market tour with Inouye and Sakai; a vegan dinner party; Japanese knife skills; a seafood dinner; and easy Japanese summer entertaining. To sign up, go to the Mazumizu website.
-- Betty Hallock
Photo: Mark Hanauer / For The Times
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