Emile DeFelice and Tom Colicchio and a country ham at historic Anson Mills. Photo: Courtesy of Tom Colicchio
What, like you thought the host of "Top Chef" was gonna haul his cookies cross-country in a Kia? Porsche handed Tom Colicchio the keys to a brand new Panamera 4S -- into which he promptly stuffed his assistant Liz and Craft's executive chef Damon Wise. The trio set off on a 1,200-mile, six day food odyssey stretching from Atlanta to Columbia, Charleston, Chapel Hill, the Chesapeake, Washington D.C., rural Pennsylvania, Philadelphia and back home to New York.
Said Colicchio in the inaugural post of his six-day stint on Food & Wine's 'Mouthing Off' blog, "It was about paying visits to some of the food producers who make my restaurants what they are, and discovering new ones the old-fashioned way. On this trip, the stops were the destination."
Yo, Tom? Next time, we call shotgun. The ham is welcome to sit on our lap.
'Quick From Scratch Italian Cookbook'
Recipes from Food & Wine Magazine
Photographs by Melanie Acevedo Food & Wine Books -- 2009 Buy it on Amazon
Whether you're an avid subscriber to Food & Wine or you visit the website once in a while for a recipe, this is the book to add to your kitchen shelves. "Quick from Scratch Italian Cookbook" provides cooks of all levels with satisfying and healthy recipes. Classics are translated into practical weeknight meals with basic step-by-step instructions and there are recipes for every season.
And what would an Italian meal be without wine? There's a no-fuss wine-pairing recommendation for each and every recipe to take pressure off the cook.
Boasting everything from antipasti, soup and pasta, to fish, poultry and steak, recipes like linguine with cauliflower, garlic and bread crumbs and baked rigatoni with spinach, ricotta and Fontina will keep everyone at the table content. Finish the meal off with one of many tantalizing desserts such as honey-baked figs with ice cream or espresso granita with whipped cream.
See what we tested and find out whether the book's worth buying after the jump.
Couldn't swing a trip to Food & Wine Magazine's Classic in Aspen this year? S'okay -- we've got you covered. Kick back with a glass of bubbly and some schmancy nibbles, bookmark this post and keep on checking back for real-time Twitter coverage from the event. Keep up with pictures from the red carpet and around the festival here.
Strawberry milkshakes and juice boxes shaped like fruit: Two things that make us grateful for April heat waves.
Food & Wine's own Dana Cowin alerted us to this luscious milkshake on the Saveur Web site, accompanied by a recipe that calls for an ingenious combination of strawberry ice cream, strawberry sorbet and strawberry jam.
The juice boxes, meanwhile, are the brilliant invention of Naoto Fukasawa, a Japanese industrial designer who designed the boxes to mimic the look and texture of the fruit they contain: pictured here are banana and strawberry, along with soy, which rather uncannily mimics a block of tofu. We can't help but feel that these boxes blow the Capri Suns of our elementary school days out of the water, or at least the sandbox.
You do follow our Twitter @slashfood, don'tcha? The Food & Wine Magazine's Best New Chefs festivities commence at 6:30 p.m. on April 1, and Food & Wine Editor-In-Chief Dana Cowin has been dropping devilish little hints about the winners via Twitter all day long. First person to solve the mystery wins two tickets to tomorrow night's event.
Won't you Tweet with us? If we're really lucky, we'll even post some red-hot guest chef David Chang or "Top Chef" winner Harold Dieterle cell-phone camera action.
Twit-tip: Follow all Best New Chefs posts using #BNC
Nicole has been recommending a different cookbook every morning, but if you're looking for an encapulated list, the June 2006 issue of Food & Wine magazine has listed their picks for the Top 25 cookbooks of the year. They've grouped their choices into six categories: Chef Showcases, Everyday Experts, Global Exporters, Entertaining Helpers, Southern Stars, and Dessert Specialists. This is great place to start if you're looking for gifts for summer birthdays, graduations, Father's Day, and weddings! The article has a few recipes pulled from some of the cookbooks.
We're always happy to see the shiny happy food magazines and websites crumble under peer pressure to start blogs. In addition to Daily Dish, Epicurious' editor has her personal blog, Epi-Log, now Bon Appetit has their own blog, and we've seen the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle restaurant reviewers turn themselves onto blogs as well. While Food and Wine hasn't yet created their own blog, they have added Blog Watch to their main page on their web presence, which lists their five favorite food blog posts from the previous week.
But just give them some time. We know we'll see a blog from them soon enough. Just got to make sure its up to Pete Wells' standards...
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