A lot has changed over the last 102 years, both in and out of the kitchen, and nothing makes that hit home more than this gem, published in the New York Times in 1907. It's a letter to the editor, written by Gabrielle Stewart Mulliner, entitled: "Women Enjoy Cooking, A Pleasure, Not a Drudgery, Once the Art is Acquired."
Gabrielle was inspired to write her letter after reading an article that discussed training women in the art of domestic service -- you know, cleaning, cooking and doing all those other house things for your man.
Her claim: Women wouldn't hate cooking and serving men if they were trained properly. Man, if only men knew this ... they could have quashed that annoying Women's Lib movement in a blink! It wasn't about liberation, but an organized outcry of mediocre frustration! They just needed to learn how to do it right.
I'll let you read the letter in all its glory yourselves, but here are a few highlights:
"As long as the race exists, men will have to eat, and some one will have to do the cooking."
"Housework done intelligently is not drudgery."
"Anything a woman can do well, she enjoys doing."
2009 suddenly has a wonderfully sweet ring to it. 1907 can stay well in the past.
Until earlier today, I had no idea that the first Thursday in November held any particular significance (especially in light of the importance of the first Tuesday). However, during my regular trip through the blogosphere today, I discovered that there is a group out there that has declared the first Thursday in November to be National Men Make Dinner Day.
It's a 'holiday' designed specifically for those men who rarely get near the stove and know the refrigerator mostly as a place where the cold beer and soda is kept. The website that is devoted to this day offers a set of qualifications and perky guidelines in order to suss out whether 1). you're the type of man who should be participating and 2). whether you're really prepared to take on the evening meal.
I love cooking on Sunday morning. Sunday is usually the one day of the week I can do whatever I want, so they're pretty laid back and slow. It's only been a recent discovery that I enjoy cooking on my one easy day of the week, as opposed to a bowl of cereal, but I'm glad I finally did come to that realization.
Some of you may remember a post from earlier this week about Nazuki, a spice bread from Georgia. Well, everyone's been pretty busy this week, so the second loaf was starting to go stale. Of course one of the best ways to use up stale bread is a nice bread pudding, and that's what I made for my Sunday morning. My first thought was to make a savory bread pudding with some tomatoes that I need to use up, but I just couldn't see using a sweet bread in a savory dish. The flavors wouldn' mesh.
After breifly flirting with making French toast instead, I mixed up some milk and eggs with some cinnamon and brown sugar, then pourd it over the crumbled Nazuki in a baking dish. The bread pudding didn't take very long to bake, and it was delicious when it was done. It was a sweet dish, but not any more so than French toast and less so than sweet syrup on pancakes. If you don't have any Nazuki on hand, I bet this would be great with cinnamon raisin bread. The recipe is after the jump.
When I was in high school, I had a love-hate relationship with science classes. Geology was fine, biology was okay, and chemistry...well, chemistry was hell. Mrs. Olech, the troll who taught the class, regularly flunked half her students and had a teaching manner that made Alan Greenspan seem bouncy and exciting.
Ironically, while I flunked chem, I aced my cooking classes. Even at the time, I thought that this was a little weird; after all, what is cooking if not a chemical process? The subtle adjustment of flavors, the cultivation of certain bacteria, the measured combination of leavening chemicals are all, basically, a mix of applied chemistry and biology. However, cooking class captured my imagination and attention in a way that chemistry didn't.
Reading a recent profile of Alton Brown, I realize that the problem lay with Mrs. Olech and her ilk. The simple fact is that science can be a lot of fun, if it is applied in a way that is relevant and exciting. I was surprised to learn that, like me, Brown found his science classes "boring beyond words." Even now, as he has built his own store of scientific knowledge, he admits to having discarded academic journals and scholarly papers because of their inability to engage his interest.
If you're reading Slashfood right now, chances are that you're a foodie. In my experience, if there's anything a foodie likes besides eating/cooking, it's reading a book about eating/cooking. These are a few of the books I consider the best cooking books, but we all have strong opinions on this subject. What are some of the cooking books that you think should be on the list?
If you saw my post on Tuesday about One Local Summer, but were disappointed that you didn't live in the Mid-Atlantic region (the only area of the country that Farm to Philly had committed to handling), I have good news for you! Nicole at Farm to Philly has decided to open up One Local Summer to everyone (national and international). That's right, regardless of whether you live in Pennsylvania, Montana or Ontario, you can sign up to cook one locally sourced meal a week this summer and write about it.
Chef Paul Prudhomme was setting up his tent at the Zurich Classic (golf) in New Orleans when he felt something on his arm and thought he was stung by a bee.
When he opened his shirt sleeve, a .22 calibre bullet fell to the ground!
Fortunately for Chef Prudhomme, the bullet was apparently not aimed at him, but had simply fallen, probably shot from somewhere within a mile-and-a-half radius of the golf course.The chef's shirt was torn and his skin was cut, but he was back to cooking within five minutes.
So he wasn't shot at, but I still like to think that chefs, given what they do in their tiny restaurant kitchens, are invincible.
We all know that when it comes to baking, it's important to be exact in your measurements. There's a world of difference between a heaping teaspoon and a perfectly leveled one. Too much baking powder in your cookie batter will potentially result in bitter cookies and odd leavening. And while the old system of using a butter knife to level your measuring spoons does work, the lazy among us often skip this step, haphazardly leveling their spoons with a finger or a few well-placed taps.
However, salvation has arrived, in the form of Self-Leveling Measuring Spoons. These measures have a sliding lever that scrapes off the excess and ensures that you always have the exact amount of baking powder, soda or cinnamon. I have about ten sets of measuring spoons, so I'll probably skip this set for now. However, for the people who do a whole lot of precision baking, I can see how these would make a great addition to their array of tools.
I've always scoffed at specialty spices, trusting that my supermarket-brand basil is just as capable as any fancy French or California variety. I mean, can there really be that much quality variation if there's only one ingredient?
It turns out: yes. I recently visited Penzeys Spices, a national chain of spice stores featuring multiple versions of every spice and herb imaginable – all available for smell-testing in "smellevision" jars.I whiffed Spanish and Hungarian paprika, Chinese and Viennese cinnamon, and about 15 different chili combinations.Additionally, the store concocts its own rubs for meats and fishes, and even a sandwich spice to sprinkle on hoagies. If you don't live near one of the store's locations, no worries – you can visit the catalog and place orders online. Plus, the goods seem to cost a bit less than they would at a regular supermarket.
I left Penzeys with a headache from smelling too many whole pepper varieties, a bag of amazing spices and a newfound appreciation for some specialty food ingredients that I'd long overlooked.
Every time I get on the phone with my mom these days, we find ourselves in a political conversation, weighing the pros and cons of the candidates running in the Democratic primary (I come from a long line of registered Dems). Neither of us have made up our minds, mostly because we're still mourning John Edwards' exit from the race. However, for the rest of you out there who have made up your minds, you can tell the world which candidate you're supporting with a kitchen apron. Both the Hillary and Obama aprons are available on Cafepress.
There aren't as many good aprons for the Republican candidates out there. The Kitchn (where I learned about all these cool aprons) featured one sporting Romney's (although as of yesterday, he is out of the race) face as well as one that pairs New York City Mayor Bloomberg with Ron Paul. That picture is after the jump.
It's just a concept right now, but I am very much looking forward to the day when a very bad chicken pisses me off and I can just do a quick draw Dirty Harry-style, point and blow that bird to Kingdom Come. With oregano.
The Spice Gun has a trigger that, when pulled, compresses the air in the air bag. The handspike will push the bottom of the seasoning bottle to make the nozzle in the turntable retract and spray the seasoning. Sure, it seems like a lot of machine effort for something we normally do with our bare hands, but hey, what's the fun in that? There's a reason we love those giant flavor injector syringes, too.
In case you haven't figured it out by now, I am a football fan.
However, I have to admit that at least one third of my interest in football is not about the game. Sure, I can follow the game, thanks to four years on the high school cheerleading squad (please, spare me all the comments about cheerleaders -- I already hate myself enough about it). I most certainly appreciate the athletics of the sport, and love giving all my love and adoration to Peyton Manning a team, but I think one of the reasons why I love football so much is the lifestyle around football. I'm not talking Friday Night Lights lifestyle (well, maybe I am a little). Like Paula Deen, I love the food and parties and the Super Bowl, for me, is like, Thanksgiving.
Now I know that buckeyes have everything to do with Ohio and pretty much nothing to do with New England, New York, or even Phoenix, where the Super Bowl is taking place, but for me, they are a peanut buttery, chocolate-y representation of football. I didn't post about it much here at the beginning of January, but I went to New Orleans to watch the Ohio State Buckeyes and the LSU Tigers play in the Championship Game for college football. So for now, let's just say that tiny peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate are a great sweet snack to serve your guests during a football party.
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When I was in high school, I had a love-hate relationship with science classes. Geology was fine, biology was okay, and chemistry...well, chemistry was hell. Mrs. Olech, the troll who taught the class, regularly flunked half her students and had a teaching manner that made Alan Greenspan seem bouncy and exciting. 
The feature story this week is on the 
If you saw 
Chef Paul Prudhomme was setting up his tent at the Zurich Classic (golf) in New Orleans when he felt something on his arm and thought he was stung by a bee.
I've always scoffed at specialty spices, trusting that my supermarket-brand basil is just as capable as any fancy French or California variety. I mean, can there really be that much quality variation if there's only one ingredient? 
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