You’re Invited

There’s room in the car; we’ll stop by soon to collect you. The more, the merrier, right? Not that tonight isn’t going to be ecstatically fun already, what, with everybody being in such a good mood. Optimistic and happy to greet the new year. Perfect setting for a party, really. Plus, there’s sure to be…

How Novel

Books feed our hunger for intellectual sustenance, quite often with a savory flourish, but what of real, stomach-growling cravings?  They do, perhaps, when the book is James Patterson’s thriller about a cook on the lam, titled, unexpectedly, The Chef.   A friend read the tome, noticed a small collection of recipes in an appendix, and immediately…

Party Tonight in Quezon City

Must be quite the occasion, as today introduces not just one, but two types of lumpia,  a Filipino egg roll of sorts typically served at parties and at other celebrations.  There’s the classic pork, carrot and water chestnut variety, pictured above on the right, and a newer crab, pineapple and ginger version from Hawaii, which…

Now, This Is How You Treat Guests

You can be sure to receive comments like this one, lots of them, when you serve Crab Toasts at your next dinner party.  They’re a wonderful combination of textures and flavors that provide a bright, vibrant crunch, even in January.  Loads of avocados, tomatoes and lemons pair well a generous helping of crab to put…

Where to Begin?

There’s so much happening in a soup like Cháo Bôi it’s difficult to decide how exactly to classify it.  Sure, broadly speaking, it’s Vietnamese, the recipe found among the pages of a great gift one of you sent a few years back, Andrea Nguyen’s Into the Vietnamese Kitchen. What kind of soup is it, though? …

Just Across the Bay

The best crabs around these parts (the US mid-Atlantic region) reside in the Chesapeake estuary, and Baltimore celebrates them better than do most other places.  Among the bounty of shellfish preparations the city offers, none matches Crab Cakes.  Particularly not when the leading ingredient is crab.  Astoundingly huge nuggets of sweet, flaky crab. It’s a…

Along Italy’s Pacific Coast

Wait, what?  There’s the Adriatic and the Mediterranean, but when did this whole Pacific thing happen?  About 150 years ago, actually, when Italian immigrants to the U.S. made their way westward and those of a more nautical disposition found work is San Francisco’s fishing industry.  While many in the Bay Area discovered wealth inland extracting…

Timing Has to Be Perfect

Otherwise, Tomato and Crab Soup wouldn’t deliver the garden’s glorious flavors with quite such style.  Certainly, the soup would be memorable any time of year, but in early August, when high summer vaults garden vegetables past each other in pursuing perfection, the results approach the divine.  Ambrosia. Soup now, though?  While the humidity gives vegetables…

Colder than a Virginia Summer

Most things are, actually, as the mercury vaults beyond comprehension by late June and heat makes the roads bubble.  Add the dripping humidity especially prevalent in southern Virginia and everything becomes a sauna; it’s inescapable.  Before air conditioning, the British Foreign Service considered Washington to be a tropical posting and compensated its diplomats accordingly.  This…

Look What Was Under the Tree!

Today’s entry started its way to us Christmas morning, when gift cards were among the presents.  Over the couple months that followed, those cards produced mail-order merchandise, including King Crab legs and tamarind paste.  Their selection had a purpose, as they’re the headliners in Kdam Char Umpey, or Cambodian Tamarind Crab. As with so many…