Brought to you by the letter D

Who is making a resolution to eat healthier this year? If you are, Comfort Food Makeovers: Healthy Alternatives to Your Favorite Homestyle Dishes is a good place to find some better-for-you food ideas. Elaine Magee is the "recipe doctor" for WebMD. In other words, she is the one who makes over all the high fat, unhealthy favorites that users ask about into healthier, lighter versions that are just as flavorful.

The primary techniques that the book uses are using lower fat ingredients (low fat milk, light sour cream, etc) and simply eliminating some of the fat. The serving sizes are also slightly reduced, but the recipes usually have more fiber than the originals, which will help you feel fuller. The recipes sound pretty much like those you would find in a full-fat cookbook, but you'll probably enjoy Pecan Sticky Buns, Oven-Fried Buttermilk Chicken, Chicken Pot Pie Soup, Creamy Au Gratin Potatoes and Fudge Truffle Cheesecake just a little bit more knowing that they're better for you. Complete nutritional information, as well as information for a non-lightened recipe, is given for each dish.

When we did our decidedly inspired D day yesterday, we hadn't yet seen Nigel Slater's occasional series on the ABCs of food. He's in the middle of the alphabet, now, and is hitting the highlights between "F" and "L." Here's a rundown:

• F is for the Fairtrade mark and fish, especially fresh sustainable and (yes) Fairtrade fish.
• F is for farmer's markets.
• G is for game and grilling - Nigel suggests a stew of pigeon and rabbit with bacon, rough red wine and button mushrooms.
• I is for Internet shopping and Italy - "our second gastronomic home."
• J is for Japanese food. Nigel gives us a "recipe" for salted edamame beans.
• K is for kitchen; Nigel celebrates the movement to break down walls between kitchen and dining room.
• L is for lime, "the flavor of the moment," "most fashionable fruit next to the pomegranate," showing up in everything from "grilled garlic-infused scallops to ginger-spiked chicken soup" to lime zest in chocolates.

[Photo Sarah Gilbert]

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I ate my Danish for D-day but didn't get a chance to write about it. Now, I do.

This Danish is... literally... six inches across. It's the most decadent thing for breakfast within a good 17-mile radius, scented with cinnamon and butter, dotted with crumb topping crumbles, sparkling with icing and swirled with raspberry jam. These delectable pastries, in a variety of flavors and many studded with whole blueberries or sliced local peaches, are baked fresh every day by Bowers Bakery in Portland. Just wait until you see the height of this ultra-yummy pastry.

It's not our fault. It's evolution, man. When the days are short and the weather is cold, all we want to do is snuggle into our comfiest chair with a blanket, a steamy mug of hot chocolate, and maybe a nice slice of meatloaf or macaroni and cheese. Followed up by (naturally) chocolate layer cake with extra coffee ice cream.

But the magazines, the newspapers, heck, even the blogs, all they say is eat right! Lose weight! Get out of the house! And most importantly, lose that comfy chair, man!

We're left with the ultimate D-word: Dilemma. What's to be done when our biology is warring with our better judgment? Diet? Or give in to the Decadence of the season, fill our tummies with warm, fattening comfort food, and just wait 'til spring to follow through on those resolutions?

The place blows all business logic out the window.

Diddy Riese is a decently sized ice cream and cookie shop in a very high rent spot - Westwood Village. It is open until very late. There are at least four people working behind the counter at any one time. High rent, long operations, labor costs - and yet, Diddy Riese is able to sell two cookies slapped around a scoop of ice cream as a sadnwich for one dollar. And let me tell you, I am quite certian that 99% of the UCLA students who walk through Diddy Riese's front door spend...one dollar.

I just can’t see how $1 each can pay for the Westwood overhead and wages for four men behind the counter. Is there something else going on back there? Back behind those brown boxs with stacks and stacks of chocolate chip, white chocolate macadamia, oatmeal and M&M? How does Diddy Riese stay in business?!

But you know what, if there is some crazy stuff going on, I don't care because I love Diddy Riese. I love every permutation of cookie and ice cream, except mint chocolate chip because I think mint is nasty. I never understood how mint chocolate chip ice cream could pair with a cinnamon sugar but I saw someone order it once. That's just wrong. So is the parking situation in Westwood Village, since a Diddy Riese run means you spend one dollar for an ice cream sandwich, but seven dollars to park there.

Diddy Riese
926 Broxton Ave (at Le Conte)
Westwood, CA 90024
(310) 208-0448

Dill is a member of the parsley family and was originally found throughout the eastern Mediterranean and western Asia, though now it is grown all over the world, in places from California to Australia. The leaves and the seeds are edible and used as spices, flavoring everything from fish to pickles. Dill has a flavor that is a mixture between onion and caraway, but is quite unique. The flavor is most widely used in German, Russian and Scandinavian recipes, as well as being a favorite ingredient in pickling liquids.

Dill weed is the common term for the leaves of the dill plant. The plants themselves are tall with feathery leaves. The leaves can be chopped, kept whole or dried and added to any variety of dish or sauce. Fresh dill has a stronger flavor than dried, so much less is needed to flavor a dish. Dried dill has a distinct advantage for the home chef because it can be stored for several months.

Dill seeds look very much like caraway and have a strong flavor, much stronger than that of the dill leaves. They are most commonly used whole, not ground, and are often used as an accent, rather than as a main flavor, when they are included in cooking. The strong flavor makes them a preferred ingredient in pickling liquids, as it is the dill seeds that give dill pickles their name. And, as a bit of trivia, 1 tablespoon of dill seeds has as much calcium as a glass of milk, though most people are not sitting around and eating dill seeds specifically for their health.

If you have never used dill, start by adding some dried dill to equal parts sour cream and mayonnaise, with splashes of pepper and lemon juice for an easy dip. Or try one of these recipes featuring dill.

• Feta and Dill Baked Mushrooms
• Tzatziki  (Cucumber and Yogurt Dip)
• Blini with Gravlax and Craime Fraiche
• Salmon Salad
• Southern Fried Dill Pickle Spears

We asked for it, and boy did we get it! Thanks to all of y'all delightful Slashfood readers and your delicious contributions to our theme day today! Here's the first 10 of what you guys are eating...with more to come later this evening, we're sure!

Alanna takes us on a Veggie Venture by making a salad with just about the only vegetable that I can think of that starts with D - Daikon and Pepper Salad.

Mental Masala gives us the grand tour through dal, the Indian term that refers to all lentils and beans. Marc shows us how to prepare dal in general.

Who knew you could bake brownies with beets? Bea from La Tartine Gourmand did! Her dark chocolate and beet root brownies are devilciously deep dark red.

We've all heard of the Denver Omelet, but at Kuchenlatein, we get a Denver Sandwich!

There had to be one, we just didn't know when, but here it is from Je Mange la Ville : Duck! This one's roasted and served with caramelized apples and onions. Quack quack!

What makes devilled eggs even better? Stephanie, the Happy Sorceress made deep fried her devilled eggs for her blog party.

Denise needs a Daily Dose of Ds, so she points to a few recipes for a lot of foods that begin with D. Not quite diet foods, though!

Looks like someone has a Chocolate Obsession with two posts: Dark Chocolate-dipped Cookies with Peppermint Cream and a revised version of Death by Chocolate.

The Laughing Gastronome went all out and made doggie ravioli! Not ravioli for your pet, but chorizo-stuffed ravioli shaped like dogs! How's that for Best in Show?

You've got to Cook Anything at Least Once, including a dolphin fish and udon in a dashi broth.

When it comes to TV cooks, people seem to either love or hate Rachael Ray, love or hate Emeril Lagasse, and love or hate Sandra Lee. But I don't know anyone who would even think of hating Dave Lieberman.

Lieberman is the young cook who had his own cable show (Campus Cuisine) while in college at Yale. He was then featured in a New York Times article by Amanda Hesser, and that led to his being signed to the Food Network, where he hosts Eat This. I picked up his book Young and Hungry: More Than 100 Recipes For Cooking Fresh And Affordable Food For Everyone  (yes, I'm slowly building up my cookbook collection). It's a hip, readable, and smartly put together book. He covers all the basis, including chapters on romantic dinners ("Dinner For Two"), breakfasts ("Lazy Mornings"), tail-gate parties ("Living Room Tailgate Parties"), even cooktails ("Happy Hour"). The book lives up to its title, and is a really nice gift if you know someone who needs an all-around guide to meals that the average person might want to make (unlike a lot of cookbooks, I can picture myself making almost everything in here).  

(And if I can say this here: speaking of Food Network, I really miss Sara Moulton's Cooking Live show. I don't know why I had to shove that in here, but I just had to say it. Go buy Lieberman's book though)    

Perhaps Scotland's most famous liqueur, Drambuie is based on scotch whiskey, usually 15-17 year old malts that are blended with heather honey essence and, as is usual with most such liqueurs, a "secret" herbal infusion.

Playing on the rich Scottish heritage, it is said that Bonny Prince Charlie himself handed the recipe to one Captain MacKinnon of Strathaird in 1746 in gratitude for his support during the Jacobite rebellion.

Commercial production didn't start until 1906 by a descendant - Malcolm MacKinnon. The name is taken from the Gaelic phrase "an dram buidheach" that translates as "the drink that satisfied."

More recent range extensions include Drambuie Black Ribbon, which is a premium version aimed at the duty-free market, and Drambuie Cream, launched in 2000. The aroma of the latter has been described as "hospital ward/elostoplast." Cotton plasters! It isn't terribly inviting but the flavour is creamy vanilla custard with cocoa powder and dark chocolate and honey.

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A dhaba, I learned last fall when working together with a few Indian co-workers, is a small, local restaurant, found off the side of the highways throughout India. Dhabas are typically open 24 hours a day, are usually located near fuel pumps, and besides serving food, they also have places to take a nap. In essence, it's an Indian truck stop. The kinds of foods that these dhabas make and serve are particularly home-y, so the word "dhaba" has become closely associated with homestyle Indian cooking.

In LA, I've tried two Indian restaurants now that have the word "dhaba" as part of the name, though they certainly aren't truck stops. They serve homestyle Indian food.