“Vegetable Literacy” by Deborah Madison has quickly become my go-to reference when I want to explore a familiar or unusual produce item. I like it so much that I'm making it a Friday Link.
Madison takes her years of expertise in vegetarian topics, divides the veggie world into twelve families, and then provides background, recipes, and kitchen and garden tips for each family member. She makes you look at the offerings at your local market in a new way.
Speaking of local markets, I decidead to buy the Kindle version of Vegetable Literacy. That allows me to call up a recipe on my phone when I'm shopping to be sure I have what I need to make it. Or, if I want to know what I might do with some parsnips or fennel, I can search for those and even have tips on buying them.
Great photography is always a bonus in a cookbook or reference book and this one has wonderful photos spinkled among its pages. The photos are by the Canal House team, Christopher Hirsheimer and Melissa Hamilton.
This time of year, when many readers are looking for gift ideas, this book would make a great present for many people on your list. Anyone who loves to cook or collect cookbooks would treasure this edition. Even someone like me who has far too many cookbooks considers this a major reference, must-have.
It's an ideal gift for a vegetrian or someone who has to feed a vegetarian or anyone who needs to add more vegetables to their diet to get their 5-per-day!
Do you have an Amazon Gift Certificate to use? Or do you need to buy one for a Holiday Gift? Remember to click over to Amazon from here to support this site!
Note on Comments: We monitor comments constantly and anything that is pure spam, inappropriate, or nasty is swept away. In addition to readers' comments, we welcome hearing from the people, places, and services we cover. Often, those add great insights for our readers. As long as it doesn’t become a pure ad, we’d love to hear from you. We do reserve the right to edit ads and links out of comments.
Think of the things you use all the time in your kitchen but had to think about before buying, because they were little luxuries. We bet there are a few that fall into "things you don't know how you did without."
These items can give you ideas for great gifts for those close to you or something to splurge on with a gift certificate. Please tell us what falls into that group for you in the comments section or on twitter.
For us, here are 5 things that we love and don't regret spending the money on for a single moment. In fact, some of these have saved us money in the long run.
If you are chopping coffee beans with a blade coffee mill, think about saving that for spices and trading up to a burr grinder. We decided on the Capresso 565 Infinity Conical Burr Grinder. You can pay more for a more serious grinder or you can use more human power and buy a hand cranked item. Those are also great to use on the road. One example is the Hario Mini Mill Slim Coffee Grinder.
3. Good Quality Heavy Pots and Pans
Over the years, we've replaced the thin-walled pans we thought were a great buy when we set up housekeeping, with heavy, substantial pans from Le Creuset and All-Clad. No more burnt, scorched food or pans, and more home cooking which does save cash.
4. Great Wine & Barware Glasses
This is one area where we've gone a bit overboard and have too many great wine glasses for people who live in a small space. We have Riedel wine glasses, Schott Zwiesel Tritan Crystal glasses and Reed & Barton barware. We both use crystal double old fashioned glasses as our daily water glass and it really gives drinking your water a lift. Anyone want to buy some glassware? One 2013 resolution is to thin our collection.
5. Wedgwood Nantucket Basket Bone China for our everyday dinnerware. You've seen it all over these pages in our food photos. We were tired of replacing our everyday dinnerware every few years because of chips, crazing, and broken dishes. But, since Penny had once sold china for a living, she knew that bone china is vitrified like steel and is highly resistant to these problems.
We invested in a service for 8 about 16 years ago and have only had two or three pieces replaced since then. Since it's all white with no gold, silver, or pattern to damage, it is totally dishwasher safe. And, it looks great on our table. A little luxury with a long life span.
Remember, we'd love to hear what's on your list of the top 5 kitchen luxuries that you don't regret buying. Send us a tweet or post a comment.
Do you have an Amazon Gift Certificate to use? Or do you need to buy one for a gift? Remember to click over to Amazon from here to support this site!
Details:
Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Note on Comments: We monitor comments constantly and anything that is pure spam, inappropriate, or nasty is swept away. In addition to readers' comments, we welcome hearing from the people, places, and services we cover. Often, those add great insights for our readers. As long as it doesn’t become a pure ad, we’d love to hear from you. We do reserve the right to edit ads and links out of comments.
Think of the things you use all the time in your kitchen but had to think about before buying, because they were little luxuries. We bet there are a few that fall into "things you don't know how you did without."
These items can give you ideas for great gifts for those close to you or something to splurge on with a gift certificate. Please tell us what falls into that group for you in the comments section or on twitter.
For us, here are 5 things that we love and don't regret spending the money on for a single moment. In fact, some of these have saved us money in the long run.
If you are chopping coffee beans with a blade coffee mill, think about saving that for spices and trading up to a burr grinder. We decided on the Capresso 565 Infinity Conical Burr Grinder. You can pay more for a more serious grinder or you can use more human power and buy a hand cranked item. Those are also great to use on the road. One example is the Hario Mini Mill Slim Coffee Grinder.
3. Good Quality Heavy Pots and Pans
Over the years, we've replaced the thin-walled pans we thought were a great buy when we set up housekeeping, with heavy, substantial pans from Le Creuset and All-Clad. No more burnt, scorched food or pans, and more home cooking which does save cash.
4. Great Wine & Barware Glasses
This is one area where we've gone a bit overboard and have too many great wine glasses for people who live in a small space. We have Riedel wine glasses, Schott Zwiesel Tritan Crystal glasses and Reed & Barton barware. We both use crystal double old fashioned glasses as our daily water glass and it really gives drinking your water a lift. Anyone want to buy some glassware? One 2013 resolution is to thin our collection.
5. Wedgwood Nantucket Basket Bone China for our everyday dinnerware. You've seen it all over these pages in our food photos. We were tired of replacing our everyday dinnerware every few years because of chips, crazing, and broken dishes. But, since Penny had once sold china for a living, she knew that bone china is vitrified like steel and is highly resistant to these problems.
We invested in a service for 8 about 16 years ago and have only had two or three pieces replaced since then. Since it's all white with no gold, silver, or pattern to damage, it is totally dishwasher safe. And, it looks great on our table. A little luxury with a long life span.
Remember, we'd love to hear what's on your list of the top 5 kitchen luxuries that you don't regret buying. Send us a tweet or post a comment.
Do you have an Amazon Gift Certificate to use? Or do you need to buy one for a gift? Remember to click over to Amazon from here to support this site!
Details:
Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Note on Comments: We monitor comments constantly and anything that is pure spam, inappropriate, or nasty is swept away. In addition to readers' comments, we welcome hearing from the people, places, and services we cover. Often, those add great insights for our readers. As long as it doesn’t become a pure ad, we’d love to hear from you. We do reserve the right to edit ads and links out of comments.
Think of the things you use all the time in your kitchen but had to think about before buying, because they were little luxuries. We bet there are a few that fall into "things you don't know how you did without."
These items can give you ideas for great gifts for those close to you or something to splurge on with a gift certificate. Please tell us what falls into that group for you in the comments section or on twitter.
For us, here are 5 things that we love and don't regret spending the money on for a single moment. In fact, some of these have saved us money in the long run.
If you are chopping coffee beans with a blade coffee mill, think about saving that for spices and trading up to a burr grinder. We decided on the Capresso 565 Infinity Conical Burr Grinder. You can pay more for a more serious grinder or you can use more human power and buy a hand cranked item. Those are also great to use on the road. One example is the Hario Mini Mill Slim Coffee Grinder.
3. Good Quality Heavy Pots and Pans
Over the years, we've replaced the thin-walled pans we thought were a great buy when we set up housekeeping, with heavy, substantial pans from Le Creuset and All-Clad. No more burnt, scorched food or pans, and more home cooking which does save cash.
4. Great Wine & Barware Glasses
This is one area where we've gone a bit overboard and have too many great wine glasses for people who live in a small space. We have Riedel wine glasses, Schott Zwiesel Tritan Crystal glasses and Reed & Barton barware. We both use crystal double old fashioned glasses as our daily water glass and it really gives drinking your water a lift. Anyone want to buy some glassware? One 2013 resolution is to thin our collection.
5. Wedgwood Nantucket Basket Bone China for our everyday dinnerware. You've seen it all over these pages in our food photos. We were tired of replacing our everyday dinnerware every few years because of chips, crazing, and broken dishes. But, since Penny had once sold china for a living, she knew that bone china is vitrified like steel and is highly resistant to these problems.
We invested in a service for 8 about 16 years ago and have only had two or three pieces replaced since then. Since it's all white with no gold, silver, or pattern to damage, it is totally dishwasher safe. And, it looks great on our table. A little luxury with a long life span.
Remember, we'd love to hear what's on your list of the top 5 kitchen luxuries that you don't regret buying. Send us a tweet or post a comment.
Do you have an Amazon Gift Certificate to use? Or do you need to buy one for a gift? Remember to click over to Amazon from here to support this site!
Details:
Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Note on Comments: We monitor comments constantly and anything that is pure spam, inappropriate, or nasty is swept away. In addition to readers' comments, we welcome hearing from the people, places, and services we cover. Often, those add great insights for our readers. As long as it doesn’t become a pure ad, we’d love to hear from you. We do reserve the right to edit ads and links out of comments.
The best Valentine gifts are the ones that are part of your life throughout the year. It can be as simple as a special place where you feel happy together.
Ed and I were out in that little snow storm we had in January shooting some potential cover shots for The Back Bay Sun when this couple, strolling hand-in-hand, appeared.
A kiss was followed by…
…a few playful snowballs, and then they picked up sticks and drew valentines in the snow.
Naturally, we asked permission before we used these photos. Back Bay residents, Andre Sibilsky and Morgan Maglich are from down South, so snow is special to them. They ventured out to enjoy the snow in one of their favorite spots along the Muddy River. Now that is romantic!
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We're gathering all our Valentine posts at the bottom of this one:
Okay, if you need a more material Valentine's Day gift idea, click over to Amazon and do some planning, and if you do buy something there, they'll put a few coins in our tip cup.
Note on Comments: We monitor comments constantly and anything that is pure spam, inappropriate, or nasty is swept away. In addition to readers' comments, we welcome hearing from the people, places, and services we cover. Often those comments add great insights for our readers. As long as it doesn’t become a pure ad, we’d love to hear from you. We do reserve the right to edit ads out of comments.
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