Trends

If New York has given it up for whoopie pies, San Francisco is a city that has sold its soul for a box of macaroons. And I don't mean the coconut kind that get stuck in your teeth – I mean French-style macaroons (often called macarons); little, round, pastel-colored puffs of perfection. If you've ever fantasized going to San Francisco with some flowers in your hair long after the Summer of Love turned to fall, I'm here to tell you: This is where the magic went. Tune in; turn on; add ten pounds.

Like the whoopie pie in NYC, French macaroons have been dubbed "the next cupcake" here, though I don't think the fair cupcake has to pack her bag quite yet. Macaroons are cookie sandwiches made with almond meal (or flour), powdered sugar, egg whites and food coloring, surrounding a filling of buttercream, ganache or jelly. Compared to the humble cupcake, the macaroon is rarefied – and at $1.60 each, they still go faster than Oreos, and are not the kind of snack you'll be buying for your ten-year-old's birthday party.

But forget the children for a moment, and get over your French-bashing and savor the flavor of these macaroons from Paulette San Francisco. First, dig the pretty colors, man. Caribbean chocolate, lemon, Sicilian pistachio, violet cassis – each box is like a rainbow, and lasts about as long. I brought six of them to the movies with me (The Blind Side) and had to stop myself from eating the whole sample set before the film was over. (And yes, I could discern the flavors in the dark.)

At some point in the last year, America's love affair with cupcakes started to cool off. We as a nation weren't thinking about cupcakes all the time. We didn't return the cupcake's calls as quickly as we used to. We just weren't that into cupcakes anymore.

It might have had something to do with cupcakes putting on airs. We could still recall a time when cupcakes were what your mom made for a kid's birthday party -- and not even her favorite kid. They were what you made when you couldn't be bothered to make a proper cake. How on earth could someone charge five dollars for one?

So we moved on. Sure, we still saw cupcakes sometimes, shared some jokes, maybe even a few nibbles. But when we went home and wiped that cream off our lips, we didn't feel that old frisson anymore.

Now we were making whoopie.

In honor of the 2010 Olympic winter games, which kick off Feb. 12 in Vancouver, at least three hotel lounges in British Columbia, Canada, are mixing Olympics-themed cocktails for sports fans.

At Fairmont Chateau Whistler's Mallard Lounge, the Triple Lutz is practically all-Canadian. It contains Victoria gin, Ontario ice wine and Crystal Head vodka (from Newfoundland). The hotel also offers the Bobsleigh Slider smoothie for designated drivers, which mixes strawberries, bananas, yogurt and honey with wheatgrass and a dash of cinnamon. Doesn't that make you want to bundle up, head outdoors and zip down a snow-covered mountain in a bobsled?

Yew Restaurant + Bar – inside the Four Seasons Hotel Vancouver – offers the Silver, a unique take on the Caesar (and inspired by the Calgary 1988 Winter Games). It's a spicy blend of buffalo jerky-infused vodka, house-made Clamato juice, chili peppers and horseradish.

Monday may still be red beans and rice day in New Orleans, but an increasing number of home cooks are now making the traditional dish with canned beans.

"At my house, it's real convenient for us to open a can," says Luis Ramos, plant manager for Blue Runner, the legendary Gonzales, La., company that's been canning Creole cream-style beans since 1950. "We even do Minute Rice now."

But the sudden shift to precooked beans doesn't just reflect busier schedules in south Louisiana. Blue Runner's sales have increased 10 to 15 percent a year since 2005 – the same year Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast.

"During Katrina, because you didn't have electricity, a lot of people started realizing canned goods are good," Ramos explains.

No matter how low the mercury dips, Boston locavores still hope for a year-round farmer's market, like Seattle's dreamy Pike Place Market or Cleveland's treasured Westside Market. But the fact is, groups like the Boston Public Market (founded in 2001 to achieve that goal) have yet to make that vision a reality, despite years of fund-raising and public ribbon-cutting celebrations.

But there's been no dithering for Boston's vibrant neighbor to the south. Farm Fresh Rhode Island, a not-for-profit whose mission is to promote locally grown food, is in its third season of its Wintertime Farmer's Market at Hope Artist Village in Pawtucket on Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. through May.