101 Cookbooks was one of the very first blogs I started reading, way back in the fall of 2004, when I was first discovering the wonderful world of the blogosphere. I was thrilled when Heidi released her gorgeously photographed and thoughtfully written book, Super Natural Cooking, in 2007.

If you're looking for a way to incorporate more whole grains into your diet (as all the studies say you should), this is a great book to turn to. Not only are there lots of recipes that include whole grains (as well as natural sweeteners, super foods and greens), Heidi is careful to tell include an exhaustive section that details the benefits, cooking times and flavor palates of the different grains that she uses.

If that bowl of soup on the cover of the book looks tasty to you, you're in luck, as the recipe for it appeared on Design*Sponge a couple of weeks ago. It's for Spring Minestrone (how appropriate!) and sounds delicious.

All the comments I've gotten on the Autumnal Casserole post have led me to believe that there are a lot of you out there looking for alternatives to the traditional Thanksgiving side dishes. So I thought I'd post another one of my favorites. This one originally came to me via 101 Cookbooks. Heidi found it in Artisanal Cooking by Terrance Brennan. It is a sweet potato puree that is flecked with vanilla and orange zest and it so good that you might think it belongs in a pie instead of along side your turkey.

I first made it two years ago to take along to my family's Thanksgiving buffet. I put the bowl down on the table and got hijacked into a conversation with my aunt. When I finally got back to the table half an hour later, the bowl was nearly empty. Last year I made it for Christmas dinner. While we were waiting for my dad to carve the turkey, my mom and I stood in the kitchen together and scraped the bowl of the food processor clean with our fingers, just so as not to let any of this puree go to waste.

Give up your sweet potato casseroles and try this puree. It will convert even the most devoted of the mini-marshmallow fans.

What exactly is a meringue? Would you consider it a cookie because technically you "bake" it? Or is it candy because it's mostly all sugar?

Whichever you call it, I'm including a photo of tiny little meringue ghosts from 101 Cookbooks because they're too cute to pass up on Halloween. Not only are meringues relatively easy to make with just a few ingredients, but this photo of white ghosts is spooky-cute against a black background, and with a hint of their reflection in front of them.

Then again, I didn't think ghosts cast shadows or made reflections!

I started reading blogs sometime around the beginning of 2003 (looking back, it seems inconceivable that there was ever even a time when I wasn't reading blogs, so thoroughly have they become part of my life). One of the very first food blogs I discovered and read consistently was 101 Cookbooks. Heidi's writing, creative recipes and gorgeous pictures kept me enthralled and I still shout a little internal 'yay!' when a new post from her pops up in my RSS reader. When her book, Super Natural Cooking, came out I tried to hold out for a major gift-giving holiday, but didn't last a week before placing my order.

I think the picture (that you see above) that she posted on Tuesday of a pan of madeleines, some of the molds empty and all the cookies flipped to show off their ridges is just gorgeous. I admit that my fascination with her (actually, her friend Lanha's) madeleines might have something to do with the fact that I read Swann's Way last semester for my Narrativity Theory class and so am very conscious of the madeleine's ability to evoke a taste memory. Proustian references aside, this recipe confirms what my next kitchen tool purchase will be. The only question is, do I buy the classic size, or the mini?

The 2007 Bloggies - more formally known as the 7th Annual Weblog Awards - have just been announced and, in amidst categories for the best sports blog, best regional blog (British, Australian, Asian, etc), best community blog and the best Weblog of the Year, is the best food blog category. I won't try to bias your with who I think should win in any of the categories, food blogging or otherwise, but I will run down the nominees for the food blogs here.

• 101 Cookbooks - Heidi Swanson's amazing collection of recipes, food photography and cooking adventures - and probably one of the most bookmarked food blogs there is, especially considering it's been running for about four years!
• Kathy Maister's Start Cooking - part blog, part business venture, K.M. offers recipes and video how-to's in this relatively new site
• Smitten Kitchen - another blog that is less than a year old, but brimming with recipes and tempting photography
• Help! I Have a Fire in My Kitchen - yet another newish blog, focusing on kosher home cooking. No pics from this one.
• Matt Bites - often cited for his pictures, this LA-based blogger has stories that are at least as appealing as each mouthwatering shot on the site.

Ok, perhaps I am a little bit biased in favor of my favorite from this list, but I won't judge if your favorite is different than mine.

Even if I weren't already absolutely enamored of cauliflower soups, I would be fawning and sighing all over this photograph of Cauliflower and Gorgonzola Soup that Heidi Swanson has posted on her food blog, 101 Cookbooks. I think it might actually be the petal-shaped bowls, but I can't be sure, since if it were foie gras in there, I doubt I'd feel the same way.

The soup is fairly simple to make, as Heidi has written in her adaptation of the original from a cookbook called A Year in My Kitchen by Skye Gyngell. I am intrigued by the idea of adding some flavor punch with blue cheese, as I have made a cauliflower soup before, but relied fairly heavily on roasted garlic for flavor.

I don't know that I would have occurred to me to use some of the presentation tricks that Heidi, of 101 Cookbooks, used for her Gingerbread Man Cookies, but I'm glad that I've seen them now. A must-have on any holiday cookie plate, gingerbread men are fun to make, fun to decorate and, as long as you choose a good recipe to start with, fun to eat. Heidi said that she revamped her standard recipe this year to use white whole wheat flour and less refined sugar, instead opting to sweeten her cookies with a coarser natural cane sugar and molasses. The cookies are spicy, but sturdy, so they can hold up to decoration. Again, instead of going with a frosting that would use refined sugar, she simply sprinkled the cookies with very coarse grained natural sugar (turbinado). The giant crystals add a sparkle, a crunch and are a nice change of pace from cookies decorated with royal icing. Her motivation for using the stick was presentation: the cookies can be stood up in a container or small flower pot filled with sugar, which looks a lot more dramatic than laying them out on a serving platter.

In most cases, we look at finished products as Food Porn -- a colorful salad, a steaming soup, a steak with herb butter melting over the edges. In the case of food blog 101 Cookbooks, I suppose the first picture of the finished pizza topped with potatoes, cheese, and herbs in Heidi Swanson's post about pizza made of white whole wheat pizza dough is the natural pick.

However, I was totally drawn to the photo of the white whole wheat pizza dough -- perfect pillows of softly "buff"-colored dough flecked with herbs, resting, definitely qualify as "raw" porn. Heidi goes on to say that with this pizza dough, she got close to something she was looking for: "chewy, soft, and unstructured."

More on white whole wheat:
The definition of "white whole wheat"
Sara Lee's hot dog and hamburger buns made with white whole wheat

Grilled cheese? Sure, it's American cheese between two slices of buttered Wonder white, "grilled" in a frying pan, right? Not if you're Heidi from 101 Cookbooks, who grilled cheese, literally.

The cheese is called halloumi and originates from the island of Cyprus. Traditionally made from both goat's and sheep's milk, Heidi's find in San Francisco is all sheep's milk. She grilled the slices of cheese, which unlike regular cheeses, can somehow stand up to very high heats, then used the slices as a base for a green bean salad.

In summer, any dessert that involves fresh fruit is hard to resist. This is particularly true if the dessert is one made by Heidi of 101 Cookbooks. Her Champagne Summer Shortcakes combine some wonderful elements into a beautiful, end-of-the-summer dessert. The base is a buttery and ever-so-slightly salty shortcake biscuit, with a melting richness. The cakes are split and filled with black mission figs, pluots and nectarines, which have been tossed in a syrup made of honey, sugar and champagne. To bring the whole dish together, Heidi added scoop of vanilla ice cream to the side, but lightly sweetened whipped cream would probably work equally well if you prefer that ultra-light texture with your shortcake. Make sure to take a bit of each element onto your fork for each bite. And make extras, because you'll probably want seconds.

Few things are better than a tall stack of pancakes on a lazy Sunday morning. Waffles, scones, omelets and bacon are all nice, too, but light pancakes dripping with syrup are hard to resist. If those pancakes are anything like the Whole Grain Pancakes with Blueberry Maple Syrup from 101 Cookbooks, the task might be near to impossible. The pancakes are light and flavorful, due to the buttermilk that Heidi used to make them, and the maple syrup is mixed with whole, fresh blueberries and cooked into a smooth topping. The syrup is a long way from the blueberry-flavored pancake syrups that are stocked in many diners, much lighter and fresher.

As if the sound along weren't enough, Heidi actually thinks that these are the best pancakes she's ever made. Given that the published cookbook author has been blogging for more than 3 years, that's saying something.

Do you have a container of liquid nitrogen laying around your house and are not sure what to do with it? Probably not. Liquid nitrogen is a clear liquid that has some unique properties and many uses, though its primary property is its extreme cold. Its boiling temperature is -196C, so it will evaporate immediately if you simply place a drop on your hand. It will also evaporate when exposed to just about anything, which means that it is safe to use with food because no nitrogen will be left by the time you go to eat it. You can still suffer some serious freezer burns from liquid nitrogen if you are not careful, so make sure to handle it safely.

It is very inexpensive to purchase at medical and laboratory supply stores, but you do need a special container to store it. Fortunately, you can often rent one from the supply store. The most popular culinary use for liquid nitrogen is ice cream because it freezes the base so fast the ice crystals are very tiny, making the ice cream very smooth. Heidi, of 101 Cookbooks, recently tried an ice cream made in this way, but she isn't the first nor the last, as this is a reasonably popular (and tasty) experiment in science classrooms. If ice cream isn't enough, there are many more fun things to do with the stuff once you have it.

[Photo 101 Cookbooks]

Over at 101 Cookbooks, Wayne Bremser recently did a great post about his experiences tasting olive oils at this year's San Francisco Fancy Foods Show. I was glad to hear that I'm not the only one that over-uses the word "grassy" to describe olive oil. Wayne goes over some tasting techniques used by exhibitors at the show to get beyond "the 'G' word." Along with some humorous talk about lots of people making strange slurping noises, there's a good list of imported and domestic olive oils, including several rising Australian producers.

[Photo: The Cook's Thesaurus]

I just tried the Vanilla Sweet Potato Puree recipe from Heidi at 101 Cookbooks as a side to my holiday meal. After cooking the sweet potatoes until soft and tender, I placed them in a large bowl with cream, vanilla extract, a bit of orange zest and a bit of butter and whipped them with a hand mixer until they were smooth and fluffy.
You can see Heidi's batch in the photo above because her styling of this side is far more appealing than any of my attempts. Somehow, it seems that purees look much less glamorous than they taste. No matter, because this tasted fantastic. The vanilla flavor, though I used extract rather than infuse my cream with real vanilla beans, as Heidi did, came through very well. Its delicate flavor brought out the sweetness of the potatoes without having to add a lot of sugar. Whipping the whole mixture, combined with the cream, no doubt, makes it incredibly light and fluffy. This is a standout dish and is definitely worth a repeat. Or two.

It's Christmas evening and I'm sitting around the fire at my parent's house with my favorite baking partners: my sister Abby and my babysitter Katie, a family friend. We're mulling over that question that irks every girl who got a couple of new baking toys and has a Costco bag of chocolate chips to use up: what, exactly, should I bake?

That's when I remembered Heidi's recipe for peppermint bark chocolate chip cookies. What a great way to use leftover Christmas candy! (Or, an excuse to hit those post-Christmas 50%-off sales.) You needn't stop at peppermint bark, either - try chopping up any number of leftover chocolate-based confections. We're planning on experimenting with the recipe over the next few days. Anyone else out there baking tonight?