Celebrating life’s milestones with family and friends is one of my greatest pleasures. Last Thursday, I was thrilled to host a dinner party for my remarkable mother’s 90th birthday. Ida Menage Olah (known as Eda to her Cleveland family and friends) doesn’t like to be the center of ...
Bitter Melon Proved Me Wrong
I have a boundless curiosity about food and am always willing to try something new. In fact, I'm a big believer in trying any new food three times before deciding not to eat it again. So, I approached bitter melon with eager anticipation. I'd been seeing those green squash-like veggies, covered ...
Spiderbite Pasta
One of my favorite Easy Weeknight Meals is Marcella Hazan's Bell Pepper and Goat Cheese Sauce for Pasta from her wonderful book Marcella Cucina. In fact, I've made this dish so many times that my hard cover book has cracked in that very spot. I've tried many variations over the 18 years that I've ...
Panko Crusted Fried Chick’n
There are a ton of blogs and recipes on the internet about how to make vegan fried chicken using Gardein Chick’n Scallopini. Almost all of the recipes use cashews, soaked overnight, and then pureed and strained to create a cashew cream. Sounds intriguing – but with organic cashews running $ ...
8-year-old NC Chef Attending Kids’ State Dinner
Congratulations to Alex Tschegg of Matthews! He's the 8-year-old chef-in-the-making from Matthews, North Carolina who was the winner from North Carolina of the 2015 Healthy Lunchtime Challenge. Alex is one of 55 talented young people who will be dining with First Lady Michelle Obama at the Kids' ...
What makes vegetarians stray?
I've called myself a vegetarian since 1994 and have been pretty consistent, year after year, about maintaining a vegetarian diet. However, since I have lived in Hilton Head Island and Baltimore, two fabulous places for eating seafood, I long ago came to terms with the fact that there would be ...
Life happens between blogs . . .
Wow - it's been a month since my last post. Life sure has gotten in the way of my blog! Let's see - our son graduated from college, we celebrated his 22nd birthday, fulfilled business and family obligations, and took our annual scuba diving trip to Pirates Point at Little Cayman - that will take ...
Slow cookers are not just for winter meals
I bought a lovely organic cabbage at the farmers market a couple of weeks ago with the intention of making coleslaw. When I found the aging cabbage in the bottom of my produce bin the other day (remember, I have three refrigerators), I knew that my only viable option was to use it in a ...
