There are few things as delicious as a slice of sourdough bread with a generous layer of almost-cold-butter. But making it is not quite as simple as the pleasure of a piece of bread—but because this kind of stuff excites me, I wanted to share just how awesome sourdough bread is. Sponge-Worthy Starter What makes…
The Imperfect Pretzel: A Beastly Bavarian Treat
I don’t like pretzels in general, but I do love a good Bavarian soft pretzel. I’ve never made them and they’ve been on my list for a while. But last week, after a trip to Milwaukee where they’re already celebrating Oktoberfest (German roots are anchored deep in Wisconsin), pretzels climbed to the top of my…
How to Make Labneh
My new obsession is Labneh. It’s lebanese yogurt — I’ve actually never had it in a restaurant in Chicago let alone in Lebanon so I don’t know exactly what it’s supposed to be like, so I don’t know if my end-product is quite right or not — but I use it as a dip or…
Repurposed Thanksgiving Turkey: Ramen
I’m not a huge fan of Thanksgiving turkey, but I was sent home from our big holiday dinner with two pounds of turkey. I was very generous with my turkey by giving a portion of it to my cat but, selfishly, I used the rest to make my dream bowl of ramen. I don’t know…
Raw Nerves: Recipes for the Courage to Eat Raw Vegan
I am outraged over the unretouched pictures of Lena Dunham’s cover debut on Vogue that were exposed by Jezebel. OUTRAGED. Not because, as Jezebel intones, it misleads readers on what a woman like Lena Dunham really looks like, but because — and it’s not very feminist of me to say — I’m jealous. They airbrushed…
Surviving the Polar Vortex: Bread on the Fly (sort of)
The winds in the Polar Vortex are allegedly slowing down and temperatures in Chiberia are jumping from -14F to a balmy 14F. One can only hope. I fed the last bit of bread in my apartment to the birds who apparently didn’t seek warmer temperatures at a lower latitude.  Since my courage has only allowed…
Don’t Take My Word: Sable Cookies
Oh dear, Shia Labeouf, thank you for giving me something to think about. The Transformers actor and complete goofus spent the holidays doing damage control for a series of plagiarism accusations: once for an apology he lifted from an Esquire feature, another for completely ripping off a graphic novel to make a film short, and…
Bread Worth Stealing from an Old Lady: Marble Rye
I was watching Seinfeld again… and I just couldn’t get marble rye out of my head (Episode #117: George’s parents took back the marble rye they brought to Susan’s parents’ house and George came up with a plan to replace it so Susan’s parents wouldn’t think even less of the Costanzas than they already did…
Beans are Better with Bacon
Last updated on December 6th, 2020 at 02:58 pmYesterday I made fresh pasta. Awesome. It’s easy to make (3 cups of flour, 4 eggs gently mixed together with a fork to form a dough, rest for twenty minutes and then run it through a noodle cutter — my Kitchenaid pasta attachment is super fast). I…
How to Turn One Old Banana into Magic
Running with the idea of cooking things I’ve kept a little past their sell by date, I’m making coffee cake. Banana coffee cake. I had exactly one banana that had too many speckles for my taste and because the holidays are here and there are so many times of day to entertain, I decided to…