People sometimes ask about our cooking process. I would call it an evolving partnership. Ben thinks of a meal he loves, or he looks through his cookbooks, and usually comes up with something that is not practical to make together. Sometimes, it is too complicated, and requires techniques he certainly doesn’t have, and I can’t…
Category: Chef Ben Cooks!
Coq Au Vin
We have been making this French dish for years, and though it sounds a little like “Cocoa Van” when we say it, there isn’t any cocoa involved, just delicious chicken in a red wine sauce. This week’s batch was particularly delicious, and we got to eat it with Charlie, who was here painting. Ben kept…
Give a Man a Fish…
…and he eats for a day; show him how to glaze a whole salmon fillet, and serve it with a dill mustard sauce, and he eats very well for a day! This week’s Ben’s Day Wednesday meal was mustard dill salmon with crushed rosemary potatoes, and a side of Grandma’s applesauce from the freezer. The…
Tapas Tuesday!
Years ago, my sister-in-law gave me a tapas cookbook, which explains that tapas, small dishes served in Spain, are snacks to be enjoyed sociably before a meal, but we decided to do it up last night with a whole meal of tapas. For the week leading up to our “Tapas Tuesday,” we planned what dishes…
Fajitas and Corn Salad – A Meal Forged in Mayo
We started this week’s cooking adventure with high, serene hopes that we had not bitten off more than we could chew. Who could know that the simple act of spooning a cup of mayo into a mason jar would nearly bring down the operation? Now, you might be wondering what a cup of mayo is…
Hot Dogs – Can we be frank?
Hot dogs have always been a favorite of Ben’s, as the following two stories illustrate. The first is a cautionary tale, so skip a few paragraphs if you have a weak stomach. When Ben was about eight, he had just started playing Little League Challenger Baseball, and we were at a team picnic held in…
Tuna Poke Bowl
Our family loves sushi, so it was only a matter of time before we started making our own poke bowls. For Ben’s Day Wednesday, we swapped in udon noodles with peanut sauce for the sticky rice. To the base of noodles, we added tuna, avocado, mango, cucumbers, sugar snap peas, mint, bang bang sauce, scallions,…
When Life Gives You Lemons – Get Cooking!
Today’s Ben’s Day Wednesday is brought to you by lemons. We found ourselves at the tail end of a grocery cycle, but with careful use of what we had on hand in our fridge, pantry, and freezer, we were able to pull off a pretty good meal. Every dish we made today featured lemons: Caesar…
Sweet Soy-Braised Pork
This week we adapted a recipe from Christopher Kimball’s cookbook, Milk Street Tuesday Nights. These days, we use what we have, and a giant pork shoulder was the meat on offer at Wegmans. I cut off pieces for this recipe before slow-cooking the rest of the pork shoulder to use in various ways throughout the…
Shake it Off!
Corona Blues gotcha down? Follow Ben’s lead, and adhere to Taylor Swift’s advice to “Shake it Off!” Ben wanted to play this video from the fall while we cooked tonight. I think his desire to reminisce came from a chance meeting outside (at a safe social distance, of course) with Cate and her parents. We…