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Every culture has its New Year’s Eve dishes that are traditional for bringing luck in the coming year: in my family it was mincemeat, in Italian culture it’s cotechino and lentils, and in Japanese culture it’s toshikoshi (“year-crossing”) soba noodles. Although they have a special name, there is no specific recipe for toshikoshi soba; you [...]

The Christmas season is a time of tradition, whether our own family traditions or wider cultural traditions that connect us with our forebears. Foods and drinks that are otherwise defunct come out of hiding to adorn festive tables, and people nostalgically quaff eggnog while partaking of goose and chestnuts, fruitcakes and mincemeat pies. I’ve always [...]

This fall has been another excellent season for cookbooks. The ones I’ve been most excited about include Paula Wolfert’s The Food of Morocco, Jennifer McLagan’s Odd Bits, and Ed Behr’s The Art of Eating Cookbook. Those have all been on my wish list since long before they were released. There are a handful of others [...]

It’s no secret that I’m a fan of the “fifth quarter” in meat cooking. Historically, the organs, heads, hooves and other unusual parts of food animals were the province of the poor, but nowadays these cuts are more likely to serve as a marker of one’s rarefied taste – an icon of “true foodieness.” Well [...]

Are there any dishes more Canadian than split pea soup? Certainly Canada isn’t the only place it can be found, but pea soup is definitely part of the fabric of Canadian, and especially Québécois, cuisine. I mean, the brand I grew up with was called Habitant! It’s a great dish for a region with a [...]

OK, so this isn’t a cocktail at all; it’s a whisky. Fall is whisky season, and sometimes all you need is a simple glass. I acquired this particular whisky last weekend while visiting the distillery, Kittling Ridge, for their “whisky weekend” event. Every fall for the past few years, they’ve released a new small-batch whisky [...]

One of the many hats I wear is as a recipe tester for Michael Ruhlman on his last couple of books, first Ratio and now the upcoming Ruhlman’s Twenty. Throughout the testing process, hosted by the inimitable Marlene at Cook’s Korner, I got to see a number of the recipes in the book, but by [...]

For years, the only way I’d ever experienced squid was in its fried form – a form that has long been a favourite of mine and my husband’s. So I still remember the first time I ever had grilled squid, because it was so different from my previous experiences and so, so delicious. It was [...]

Today is Victoria Day, which marks the unofficial start of the planting season for most gardeners in Southern Ontario. I have yet to see much in the way of local farmed spring vegetables. On the other hand, foraged foods have abounded: fiddleheads, ramps, morels and, lately, spruce tips. Spruce tips are exactly what they sound [...]

I have no more intention of making this blog about TV than I do of making it about restaurant reviews: frankly, I try to limit my TV consumption, and when I do watch, it’s rarely food programming anymore. But I’ve been a longstanding fan of the Top Chef series, so I was intrigued to see [...]