Category: Chef Ben Cooks!

Our family’s all-time favorite appetizer at DiSalvo’s is the grilled octopus. It is served with potatoes over a bed of greens that are dressed in a lemony vinaigrette. There may be bacon or pancetta involved, too. Our Ben’s Day Wednesday meal this week was inspired by DiSalvo’s awesome dish. You know what’s easy? Eating octopus…

This year, Lycoming College has its first baseball team in 52 years! We went to watch the opening home game and Ben wore his old Challenger League baseball jersey for the event. Is it possible that the Dunkin’ Donuts sponsorship of his team means more to him than cheering for his “Dad’s college”? Maybe. Let’s…

Ben and Phil were in Kansas for a week, returning today from their visit. While I’m delighted to see them both again, I’m downright overjoyed to post what Uncle David (Phil’s brother) sent me from their time cooking together. Enjoy David’s fantastic account below! On Friday, we had a packed schedule of financial meetings and…

Yesterday, our morning began with every school district in the area (except mine) running on a two-hour delay because we had this crazy, big, wet March snow that clung to trees and power lines, making everything look like a beautiful cartoon. It covered the playground at 10:00, but was completely gone by 11:30. Ben hates…

Ben’s cheese of choice is always pepper jack, these days. He’ll settle for shredder (as he calls shredded cheddar), but his heart belongs to pepper jack. I love it too, so I don’t attempt to tamper with his cheese compass. For weeks, Ben has been asking for “branding meat” for Ben’s Day Wednesday. As our…

Some weeks, it feels like we are swimming in jello. Everything is so much harder than it has to be. To start, our Ben’s Day Wednesday meal was delayed a day. Was Ben happy? He was not. He kept his powder dry, however, so he could demand 3 dishes with various moving parts, by which…

This week, high off our Reuben sandwich win from last week, we decided to do another toasted sandwich. We switched up every possible element with Benwich counterparts. The marble rye bread became sourdough. The thousand island was swapped for ranch. The pastrami made way for shredded chicken. The bacon appeared because, well, it’s bacon. The…

In our house, we have so many obscure quotes that we laugh at uproariously, that sometimes, a subtle one slips past, forgotten — for awhile — but when it resurfaces and we latch on? Forget about it. We can, and will, go the distance. One such quote, which we find endlessly amusing, is “You little…

Phil is an avid reader of the local paper, in addition to several newspapers with national circulation. When we still got print copies of everything, Phil occasionally clipped something out (a well-established family tradition) and posted it on the fridge. There were two such clips that were there for so many years that they are…