Caramelized balsamic figs & ricotta mousse. Photo: YumSugar.

Each Thursday, we round up a selection of scrumptious links from our friends over at YumSugar. Here's what they've got cooking this week:

Balsamic caramelized figs make a prime topping for ricotta mousse.

Warming soups that are perfect for the season.

Eight tasty libations straight from the set of "Mad Men."

Macaroni and cheese goes TexMex with chiles and cilantro.

Even if you don't live in wine country, have a harvest party full of fall flavor.

Mixed-mushroom pizza makes for a fast and easy dinner.

Would you say yes if your significant other proposed via cupcake?

Cold spring rolls. Photo: YumSugar.

Each Thursday, we round up a selection of scrumptious links from our friends over at YumSugar. Here's what they've got cooking this week:

Cold spring rolls might seem fancy, but they're actually a quick and easy treat.

Cat Cora's baked beans mixes chickpeas, kidney beans and pinto beans.

Coffee is good for a whole lot more than drinking -- java can perk up many a dish.

A look at Paula Deen's uncomfortable visit to "The View" and Barbara Walters' loaded health question.

Figs in a Blanket is a "killer appetizer."

Do you prefer the grocery store or farmers' market?

Figs. Photo: Rubber Slippers in Italy, Flickr.

• Autumn baking leads A Good Appetite to fig tarts, tomato éclairs and ratatouille.
• Hot food carts and trucks like Schnitzel & Things score more cred after nabbing Vendy Awards at the fifth annual cook-off.
• A dip in the cold Maine waters with Barb Scully, a local fisherwoman.
• The Temporary Vegetarian finds orzotto to be easier to work with than risotto.
• GoMobo cuts the line and alleviates the food-gathering irks of office lunches with their order-ahead system.
• Before modern fast food, there were the quick pepperoni rolls of West Virginia coal country.
• Digging into Kevin Zraly and his "Windows on the World Complete Wine Course."
• San Francisco's Flour + Water boasts sophisticated Italian flavors.
• After years of critics espousing its virtues, Riesling has finally earned its spot in the U.S. wine market.
  
• Three years ago, Judith Jones (Julia Child's editor) started raising her own cattle for steak.
• Serving up fresh fare in school lunches is ideal, but it means a lot more than bringing quality ingredients into old and neglected school kitchens.
• The Minimalist makes roasted sweet potato salad.
• Restaurants: The meatpacking district's Standard Grill suffers some dining hiccups but is still a solid food experience, the Village's Joseph Leonard has "flashes of daylight" in otherwise so-so fare and Brooklyn's Bark Hot Dogs rests between chic eats and fast food.
• Food Stuff finds savory and sweet baked goods, simple jams and a Chilean food store.
• New York's openings and closings and dining calendar.

One person's haul from Food Fête. Photo: craigemorsels/Flickr

If New York City's annual Fancy Food Show is a hurricane of food-related items, occupying three vast floors of the sprawling Javits Center, then the tiny, cramped Food Fête is its spin-off tornado.

Hosted in a smaller space and likewise designed to get food writers and editors interested in new and interesting culinary products, the Fête was an interesting and slightly chaotic affair. High-end eats were hawked right up alongside lower-end food, from a very tasty slice of grass-fed steak to a Kikkoman "umami" demonstration in which we were subjected to a taste-off between a regular chocolate and one containing soy sauce -- a rather palate-numbing experience, that.

Former Top Cheffer Stephanie Izard was there with Lucini, the spicy olive oil she endorses, which she had drizzled on a very tasty panzanella. She told us she hadn't had a chance to roam the halls yet. But we had, and our faves are after the jump.

Photo: Hopkinsii/Flickr

Few fruits burst with the luscious, velvety sweetness of a ripe fig; there's a reason why the ancient Romans regarded them as sacred. To know how it feels to bite through a fig's smooth skin into the plush flesh underneath is to know that luxury is often synonymous with simplicity. This photo, snapped by Hopkinsii at Flickr, captures them at their plump, unassuming best, their cool green skin giving little hint of the earthy delights hidden just beneath the surface.

[Via Flickr]

While I was in California last week, I made a stop at the Santa Monica Farmers' Market. I was there mostly just to gawk, as I was getting on a plane later in the day. I did make a couple of small purchases, including a bag of sun dried tomatoes (more on those soon, as they may just be one of the best things I've ever tasted), a scant pound of local grapes and a basket of figs, which I ate while waiting for my flight. The figs were at the point of ripeness where they just beg to be eaten and I was happy to comply.

I prefer eating figs raw, mostly because I never have a enough of them around to satisfy my hunger for them and still use them in cooking or baking. However, if I happened to have a surplus of figs, I think I'd make these financiers. Check out the recipe here.

Eric Asimov discusses the new breed of lighter, subtler Napa Valley Cabernets.

Applebee's moves beyond the riblet in an effort to save itself from Bennigan's fate.

The Hamptons get real Mexican-style tacos. Yay?

The Minimalist makes tomato jam.

Recipes for icy summer mocktails. And not just virgin daiquiris - think homemade tonic with lavender, chamomile, fresh herbs and lime juice.

Meet the raspberry fig.

In ancient Greece, figs were eaten during frenzied sexual rituals. That fact alone should be enough to get some figs on the Valentine's Day menu!

However, the reason figs are associated with aphrodisiacs is that a fresh fig, when cut open, looks like (not too sound too clinical or anything) a certain part of the female reproductive system. Who wouldn't think of fertility when seeing all those tiny little seeds?!?!

Fresh figs are seasonal, and more than likely, not available during Valentine's day, but dried figs are available year round.

I have had some great figs this season (as well as a few stinkers, they can't all be perfect). While I admire people who make fig ice cream or fig galettes with their bounty of figs, my personal supply is typically fairly limited. So while I find myself gazing with longing at all the pretty recipes on the blogs and in the magazines, I can't bring myself to commit my few figs to any such endeavor. However, if I were to invest a few figs in the making of something, I think I would turn first to the recipe for Homemade Fig Newtons that Gena at Big City, Little Kitchen posted. The combination of pastry, cream cheese and fresh figs makes me salivate and wonder if the time has come to turn my humble little figs into some grander.

It's an endless summer in LA:

• He's a "kid" in LA, but Matt Molina is running the kitchen at the hottest restaurant in town, Mozza.
• For Labor Day, break out the keg
• The best way to chill out if you're Korean (or not) is with an ice cold bowl of naeng-myun
• Take advantage of the height of fig season with a Fresh Fig Tart
• Speaking of tarts, SOS gets its hands on the Walnut Praline Tart with Espresso Ice Cream from Hatfield's

Last night, just before heading to bed, I wandered into the kitchen to finish the last of the clean up and get a glass of water. I was a little hungry, so in search of one final nibble, I flipped open the plastic pack of figs I had purchased at Whole Foods earlier in the evening. They were green figs, and didn't look particularly ripe, but they were on sale and I've never been able to resist figs on sale, so they had gone into my basket.

Picking one up, it was softer and heavier than I had anticipated. There was a small pool of sweet, sticky fig nectar on the bottom of the container (I know that sounds gross, but it was wonderful). Suddenly, I knew that I was in for a treat. I took a bite and leaned back against the dishwasher, needing to just enjoy the deliciousness of it and think of nothing else. I stood there in my kitchen as minutes passed, wallowing in the taste experience of two really amazing figs. For those of you who think of figs as nothing more than the filling for pale, squishy cookies, I beg of you. Go get yourself some ripe figs. They are in season (at least in the Northern hemisphere) and they don't last long.

*Yes, I have been reading the new collection of essays entitled Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant. If you haven't been, you really should be.

Photo by Marisa McClellan

Forget about newtons. Fresh figs are taking over with new varieties and lots of new ways to use them, sometimes simply raw and cut open the best. Other recipes are: Pork Chops with Roasted Figs, Fig-honey Gelato, and Fig Salad with Prosciutto and Basil.

Bon Appetit magazine celebrates 50 years with its first ever cookbook. Three recipes from the book: Grilled Steak Salad with Green Beans and Blue Cheese, Spicy Roast Chicken with Tomatoes and Marjoram, and Giant Chocolate-toffee Cookies.

On the dining scene, little Delicious caters to Frank Gehry and other "creatives" in an industrial park in Playa Vista. SIV gives new Philippe Starck-designed Katsuya in Brentwood one star (*).

The feature story is a feast of figs, with recipes that showcase the fruit's role as both sweet and savory: Fig & Prosciutto Risotto, Grilled Figs, Foil-Wrapped Pork Chops with Whole Garlic & Figs, Chicken Breast Stuffed with Figs & Goat Cheese, Fig, Spinach & Arugula Salad, Rosemary-Glazed Figs, and Fig & Anchovy Salad.

In the kitchen, Fresh Tuna Casserole comes from the Kitchen Sense cookbook, and cauliflower is a surprisingly perfect addition to pasta. Olivia Wu shares a recipe for Poached Shrimp from her Shanghai Diary.

La Taza de Cafe earns one-and-a-half stars (* ½ ) for its Latin flavors.

A little slice of foodporn for yer - from last Saturdays London blogmeet. These were deliciously moreish and, I guess, surprisingly easy to construct. You just need the freshest of ingredients. In this case the ripest figs, the very best Parmesan and thin slices of prosciutto. Just one of ten or so superb dishes prepared by Jeanne and Johanna. [More images on flickr]

My version of a grilled cheese sandwich is inspired by the city where I lived up until a year ago—San Francisco, and the city where I live now—Portland, Oregon. It includes two of my favorite ingredients, raw milk blue cheese and figs. I particularly love Pt. Reyes blue for its "zingy," salty, sharpness that is instantly mellowed by its creaminess. Pt. Reyes is north of San Francisco overlooking the Pacific Ocean in western Sonoma county. Holstein cows graze in foggy pastures next to the salty Pacific, and you can certainly taste that in the cheese. Fritz Maytag of Maytag blue cheese fame (and Anchor Steam beer and Junipero gin fame. Oh, and washing machine fame, of course!) once told me that his former cheesemaker now crafts Pt. Reyes blue, so if you love Maytag blue (and I do) you might try Pt. Reyes blue cheese as a comparison.

I have blogged before about my love of fruit with savory things, so when I thought about what I wanted to do for a grilled cheese sandwich, I knew it would include some kind of fruit. At first I thought of doing a sandwich with some kind of aged cheese (like goat gouda) and thinly sliced tart apples. But in the end, my fig tree provided the inspiration. It's fig season, and here in Portland, trees are bursting and farmer's markets are exploding with different varieties. I chose the "Brown Turkey" variety of fig for my sandwich because of its lovely color and because they were so fat and fleshy that they were splitting open. I love that about a fig. So without further ado, allow me to present my San Francisco-Portland-inspired grilled cheese sandwich: