There's the saying that you eat with your eyes. Nowhere is it more true in times of self-imposed ascetism, balancing out the bouts and binges of all the things we love to love in excess.
Some call it a diet. Others doll up the word "diet" with intended feelings of well-being and call it a "cleansing." Whatever the title, often, it's an integral part to eating and living. The spring clean was a long time ago, as my kitchen attests. But every so often between my lusty affairs with bacon and butter, my heart calls out for crisp precise bites of verdant things.
Continue reading "Cool As A Cucumber - Cuke, Chili, Peanut & Coconut Salad" »
One of my favorite food books is Home Cooking by Laurie Colwin. Not so much a cookbook versus a collection of essays that serves as a salve for anyone who feels alone in a plethora of recipes, entertaining tips and other general advice on tablewear and decor you'll never use.
Laurie Colwin talks to you and with you about cooking. Successes and failures. Foolproof, straightforward dishes and ways to elevate them depending on who's coming over for dinner. Some of her recipes didn't turn out well, but I can't hold it against her. The accompanying essay nourished me enough. The title of this post is also the title of one of my favorite chapters in the book and more recently, the title for another modern cookbook. In honor of Ms. Colwin, her writing and her recipes with varying degrees of success, I played alone in the kitchen with an eggplant. This is what happened.
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