Apart from Thanksgiving, when it’s pressed into service for stuffing and the relish tray, celery is the old maid of the crisper drawer. A few stalks are used here and there for soups or stews, or cut into thirds and filled with peanut butter or pimento cheese for a quick snack or down-home hors d’oeuvre. But […]

The little bivalve mollusks called cockles are found in sheltered estuaries and tidal flats throughout much of the world, and a flourishing cockle bed may be packed with more than a million of them to the acre. Most of those we see at American seafood markets are New Zealand cockles (Austrovenus stuchburyi; known to the […]

April mornings at the Union Square Greenmarket haven’t been quite as warm as the weather reports would have you believe. A light breeze still has the chill of winter behind it, and everyone hugs the sunny side of the street. Tempting pots of jonquils aside, my weekly expeditions remain more about foraging for the least-gnarly […]

The trick to pulling off a dinner party on the fly is the first course: Nail that, and you have everyone at the table in the palm of your hand. This year, my thank-you-Jesus starter (especially appropriate at Easter) has been asparagus mimosa. It is, as my great friend Rick Ellis says, “classic, classic, classic.” […]

The most efficient pantry I’ve ever had was in the smallest apartment I’ve ever lived in—a studio on the top floor of a brownstone on Berkeley Place, in Park Slope, Brooklyn. The kitchen, which was teensy but shipshape, boasted an old-fashioned porcelain double sink (luxurious suds up to my elbows was how a dinner party […]

Leeks are a slow-growing crop; the beauts you see here were planted last summer. They’re as stalwart and noble as whoever is outside this time of year, digging them out of the frozen ground. I bought plenty—enough for a pot of leek and potato soup and then some. Beneath that rugged appearance, you see, the leek […]

Unless you live in a part of the country where things are already green and growing, March can be a long slog, food-wise. I, for one, spend a good amount of time ginning up my own interest in ingredients that are far too familiar by now. There are a number of ways in which one […]

We have all been there: Trying to plan a company meal around a guest who is—well, not a picky eater, exactly, but a staunchly unadventurous one. This can be especially fraught when your idea of familiar food is not your guest’s idea of same. Take roast chicken, for instance. One of my favorite things to […]

Scratching together a nourishing, delicious meal at the end of the day is one of life’s greatest challenges. Two staples that make that easier in our household are lentils and sausage, especially the smoked Polish variety called kielbasa. Lentils are one of the greatest pleasures of the legume world. They cook quickly (and unlike most dried […]

I greatly admire—scratch that. I’m in awe of those who can talk to a roomful of people about a single subject without benefit of notes. I could practice from now to kingdom come and never achieve their ease, let alone their ability to synthesize complex material on the fly, avoid tangential to-ing and fro-ing, form […]