When I was a little girl, I lived in Seoul, South Korea for some time. My family sometimes ate at the Italian restaurant at the Seoul Hilton–foreign food was a delicacy to us back then (early 90’s), and sometimes real cravings surfaced. Since my mom is a pretty accomplished home chef (and has managed some [...]

Including: How to make fresh pasta for tortelloni and other stuffed pastas & ravioli
Most of us who are at least a little enamored with Italian food realize and recognize the vast and unending code for Italian pasta shapes. They range from fairly consistent (spaghetti is spaghetti just about anywhere you go) to the incredibly confusing [...]

Wheat Bread
Organic Roast Pork Loin slices
Raw Pumpkin Seeds
Mixed “Rainbow” Microgreens
Swiss Cheese slices
Deli-style mustard
Green Fig Jam (in this case, from Liguria)
Throw it together, stick it in the panini machinie.

For Two:
140 grams spaghetti
1 large bunch basil
olive oil
1/3rd cup pine nuts
8 cloves garlic
1 lemon
1/2 lb Rockfish Fillet (or substitute sea bass or red snapper)
salt
pepper
Start a large pot of water boiling, meanwhile using your food processor to combine washed basil, pine nuts, juice of one lemon, several tablespoons of olive oil and salt & pepper to [...]

Let’s make this simple: Today I finally gave in and decided I ought to give domestic prosciutto a second chance. This was my first mistake.
My second mistake was buying into the blerb on the back of the pre-cut (but very fresh, moist looking) proscuitto container at my high quality local butcher: it talked about how [...]

One of my favorite summertime ingrediants is zucchini flowers–they are relatively difficult to find in the US, but common in many parts of Italy. If you are lucky enough to be in the SF bay area, you may find them at farmer’s markets, and often Berkeley Bowl has them but admittedly they are never as [...]

This is a Sardengna style recipe for the classic Italian dish of “zuppetta di mollusca,” or, mussels in a light stew. This is relatively inexpensive to make and very fast to cook, though I don’t recommend eating bottom-feeders like mussels and clams often. You can also add clams to this dish though I’ve found its [...]

I’m seeing a lot of repeat visitors from the bay area, and sometimes I wonder who they are that aren’t leaving any comments. I think I know some of you, and don’t want to know some of you, and wish I knew others who I haven’t met. It’s a little disturbing when someone takes a [...]

A few nights ago, as a gift to my good friend Eugene, I cooked the leg of lamb he had bought (Eugene can cook himself, but having someone prepare the meal & clean up is something else).
Traditionally, Abbacchio alla Romana is parts of a baby lamb that has only had mother’s milk cooked in a [...]

About a week ago I bought a black truffle from Alba (.85 oz) and cooked two dishes with it. I first had a dinner party for three friends where I made
seared scallops with champagne-vanilla sauce on a bed of bitter greens (baby kale, frisee, arugula) with ginger-yuzu dressing
and then we had
black truffle risotto with crimini [...]