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Cool Tip: Everything's Ducky...

One of the most luxurious and impressive meats you can prepare, share and enjoy is fresh magret, the breast of a fattened duck.  The texture is like velvet, the flavor is like heaven, and the preparation is like child's play!

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Cool Tip: Make Salad like the French...

I have salad envy; specifically French salad envy.  You can go into any little bistro in Paris and get a salad that is simple, beautiful, light and delicate.  And try as I might, I couldn't reproduce that at home.  Now of course the greens are an issue, but you should be able to get good greens from a good green grocer, a farmer's market or your own garden.  The elusive element has always been the dressing.  Even with the best olive oil and vinegar, mine never tasted the same.

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Cool Tip: Make Your Own Preserved Lemons

Preserved lemons, salt-cured lemon rinds, are a key ingredient in many Moroccan dishes, but they also provide a wonderful hit of flavor in many other dishes as well.  We sometimes take a few preserved lemon quarters, some confited garlic (future Cool Tip) and some chipotle in adobo, pulverize them together in a food processor, and use that as a wet rub on a pork loin roast that we finish on the grill.

Preserved lemons are available in speciality food stores, but with a little planning (they take a while to get to cure) you can easily make them yourself.  Here's how...

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