If you've ever run a race - or missed a meal - you know the name "Clif Bar." Packed with protein and carbs, these pocket-sized portions can get you through a tough race or a long meeting.
Between energy bars, sports gel, and even kids' granola bars, the Clif family has sure made a name for itself. So now that they've conquered the sports food arena, why not go for something a little more...laid-back?
Clif Bar's owners, Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford, fueled by motivation, entrepreneurial spirit, and probably a few bites of Maple Nut-flavored Clif bar, are now pouring their energy into wine. The Clif Bar Family Winery focuses on sustainably-farmed and organic grapes, and the collection includes a white and red both named "The Climber," as well as a zinfandel, a syrah, and others.
Energy bar to wine might not be the most obvious transition, but since they opened up shop in 2004, things seem to be going just swimmingly for the Clif Bar family.
Jim Mamary and Alan Harding were Brooklyn restaurant pioneers, opening a dozen restaurants in the past decade. But now people are mad because they say their restaurants are chains. Chains are bad. Yuppie fight!
If the above item makes you roll your eyes at New York, consider this: the city has roaming "Sweetmobiles" serving cookies, hot waffles, and crème brûlée. I heart New York indeed.
Eric Asimov gives poor, maligned dry sherry some love.
After all the in-season produce and lucious desserts we've seen in this column lately, I thought it was time to feature some good, old-fashioned meat. For some reason, the topic of pastrami comes a lot around my apartment (my boyfriend is something of a fan) and so I searched the Slashfood Flickr pool for some good pastrami pics.
Happily, Vanessa took some amazing pictures of pastrami on rye from Katz's Delicatessen last February during a Thorough Borough Crawl and added them to the pool so that we could feast our eyes on some delicious, meaty goodness. Thanks Vanessa!
1080 Recipes is the classic Spanish cookbook, akin to the Joy of Cooking in this country. It's not quite as old as Joy, but is similar in the way in which it instructs both beginning and experienced cooks. The English version was released in October 2007 and is a fascinating glimpse into traditional Spanish cooking.
If you are looking for a book to instruct you on how to make all the dishes from your favorite tapas restaurant, this isn't necessarily the best book for you to buy. However, if you want something comprehensive that will offer up a variety of recipes that will inject new life into your home cooking, I'd recommend giving this one a shot.
One section that is particularly helpful is the section on rice (I know that sounds crazy, but stay with me). I admit to often getting stuck in the same pattern of steamed brown or jasmine rice, without much in the way of flavor or interest. This section of the cookbook has helped me spice up my side dishes (I realize that makes me sound like a 1950's housewife). I also love the vegetable sections, because they've gotten me to think about new spices and cooking techniques (I would never had thought to stuff and roast cucumbers but it sounds delicious).
Baking Bites is a really great baking blog. I always enjoy reading it, and Nicole usually has great recipes and cool gadgets. As I was perusing the blog today, I was especially attracted to this post about the non stick oven spill catcher.
My first thought, being a sucker for kitchen gadgets, was "ooooh, neat!" My next thought was "is that really necessary?" Why not just put a foil lined cookie sheet under whatever it is that you're baking? It would be less expensive just to utilize products you already have on hand, not to mention easier to just toss the foil when you're done.
However, at just five dollars, and with it being non stick and all, the spill catcher could be an economical and easy way to avoid making more garbage while you're trying to keep your oven clean. How do you feel about the non stick oven spill catcher?
Looking for a good, slightly boozy way to beat the heat? If so, consider checking out the Mojito Granita recipe that Rob at the Foo(d) Bar Blog has concocted. He'd been considering making one of the granita recipes featured on NPR last summer, but an overgrown backyard mint patch convinced him that he needed to devise a way to use what he had. Thus the Mojito Granita was born.
He cooked up a simple syrup that he infused with several sprigs of mint, mixed that with freshly squeezed lime juice, rum and chopped mint leaves and froze it in a glass baking dish (although metal is preferred). As it spent time in the freezer, he'd stir it every so often to ensure that it didn't become just one giant ice cube. Head over and check out the full recipe (which is accompanied by a series of step-by-step pictures).
I've never made granita myself, but I do have a big bunch of mint sitting on my kitchen counter, even as I type. I may have to devote some of that mint to making this recipe for myself. Thanks Rob!
I often think about cheeses according to where they're from. Lately, I've been trying different Ossau-Iraty cheeses. These sheep's milk cheeses come from the French Pyrenees between the Ossau valley and the Iraty forest, hence its name. They are produced from the milk of basco-béarnaise sheep, a breed that yield a limited amount of milk. My favorite cheese from the Ossau valley is Brebis Pardou.
Brebis Pardou's texture and flavor are flawless, because they are so well balanced. Biting into a piece of Brebis Pardou seems to transport you to a pastoral paradise with bright green rolling hills and statuesque mountains. It tastes wonderfully fruity without being overly sweet. The slightly nutty tang towards the finish gently tickles the back of your throat and leaves you craving more. Affineur Christian Pardou handcrafts Brebis Pardou in the age-old tradition passed down from béarnais shepherds. It is one of the few fermier style Ossau-Iraty wheels available in the United States. Suggestions on the best way to relish Brebis Pardou's complexity can be found after the jump.
The only challenge in making super-fresh pizza is refraining from piling it so high with goodies that there is no way you could possibly pick it up and eat it because even the best doughs will crumble to the weight. I started my own pizza obsession with those thick, cheesy, and tasty flatbread starters that's just waiting for the ten tons of toppings. From there, I moved into bread machine dough, then no-knead dough, and now my personal favorite -- Robbie's Thin Crust Pizza Dough.
The recipe is easy, incredibly quick, and creates the perfect crispy, thin crust. But, if you happen to like it thicker, it's also pretty darned tasty rolled out thicker and smaller. For the pizza above, I started the dough, and got the other ingredients going while the yeast and water rested for 8 minutes. To make it extra crispy, I even threw the dough in the oven for a few minutes as I finished gathering the toppings. What came out was pizza heaven.
Another quick tip: If I don't have sauce, I mix together whatever I can find into a pseudo sauce. the tasty concoction above came to be from a small amount of frozen meat sauce, leftover vegan pesto, some jarred salsa, and olive oil.
Ah, the sweet floral aroma and the spicy tang of a sherry wine vinegar! This summer, when craving fresh green crunchy lettuce, I think of drizzling vinaigrette made with sherry wine vinegar all over it. Sherry wine vinegar, called vinagre de Jerez in Spain, is aged in a similar way to balsamic vinegar. In Spain, you can find sherry wine vinegar from Jerez de la Frontera aged for 75 years. The aged sherry wine vinegar can be used similarly to an aged balsamic -- as a condiment for desserts and even cheese.
Below are 8 ways to savor sherry wine vinegar:
Kohlrabi Slaw: Broccoli's milder and sweeter cousin, kohlrabi, is a delicious vegetable. When young, its stem tastes sweet and crunchy like an apple. Enjoy it mixed with sherry wine vinegar in this heavenly slaw!
Gazpacho salsa - This summer, when entertaining, make sure to accompany your tortilla chips with this incredible salsa. Just two tablespoons of sherry wine vinegar spice up this salsa and make it an absolute necessity at any party.
One of the dishes I look forward to making when summer rolls around is the tomato salad you see above. It's nothing particularly special, just some chopped tomato (I use whatever I have on hand that is ripe, this time it was a bunch of sweet grape tomatoes) tossed with some roughly minced onion (I like red, but you can use whatever you have around) and some shredded basil. It gets dressed with salt, pepper and a glug of olive oil. And that's it.
The thing is that when you let this salad stand around for half an hour or so before serving, it becomes something far greater than just a collection of modest ingredients. The salt draws the liquid out of the tomatoes, which blends with the oil, creating a heavenly dressing. The basil softens and releases fragrant oils, which gently permeates the other ingredients. I can not possibly begin to describe how good it tastes.
Another nice thing about this salad, is that while it is wonderfully simple, it can also be elevated. Sometimes I'll add some cubed cucumber to it for added crunch, along with some small, halved mozzarella balls. It also takes to homemade croutons really nicely. If that's too much work for a simple meal, just grab a hunk of bread to mop of all the juices that will be left at the bottom of the bowl.
The one problem with this dish is that you can only make it during the summer, when tomatoes are ripe. It is bland and unexciting when made with those pale pink orbs that imitate tomatoes during the rest of the year. So do yourself a favor and make it when tomatoes are in season and your basil plant is growing like a weed. And enjoy a perfect summer dish.
Do you love fresh bread? Are you thinking about some for dinner tonight? You could always go to the local bakery and pick up a loaf baked that morning. Or you could pull some out of your oven about five minutes before you sit down to eat.
King Arthur's blog Baker's Banter has a post about a loaf it's calling Blitz Bread. They claim the bread is done in two hours from start to finish, and the trick is to use a lot of yeast. Using extra yeast will speed up the process. The only downside is that you lose the complexity and flavor that smaller amounts of yeast creates. However, if you're having something that involves tomato sauce, then the super fresh bread is a great option.
The blitz bread looks a lot like a focaccia loaf, and since it only takes a couple hours to make (most of which time will be spent on letting the bread rise and then baking it) it's a great week night dinner option. Baker's Banter walks you through the process, from start to finish, with great photos for every step. Don't be afraid and have some fresh bread with dinner.
Healthy officials say celebrity chefs often fail to maintain basic hygiene standards, according to an article by BBC news.
Interestingly, however, the article only cites one health official, but it states that the issue was brought up at a medical conference in Edinburgh. Crimes by the celebrity chefs include not washing lettuce and using the same utensils for raw meat and cooked foods. Guilty shows include BBC's Ready Steady Cook and Celebrity MasterChef, which I've actually never seen.
I'm not sure whether the problem, if it exists, happens here in the U.S. as well, as I have never thought about the issue while watching food TV. I guess I always presume that ingredients are pre-washed, or that the washing is edited out of programs like Top Chef and Iron Chef America. Your thoughts?
I never thought I'd come across a candy that didn't sound at least somewhat appetizing. I've heard tell of the vomit flavored jelly beans, but I've never encountered them, so it doesn't quite count. However, this review of Chum Bucket candy from Candy Addict was enough to give me sympathy nausea.
The seafood flavored candy is made by Archie McPhee, whose company mission it must be to create candy that's only fit for gag gifts. I'm sure they don't intend their products for actual human consumption.
I know that I would not ever willingly eat sea food flavored "candy," but I'm glad that some people will for the sake of a candy review. So I say thanks, Candy Addict. How about the rest of you? Would you be willing to try the sea food flavored candy?
Soups and stocks are some of the easiest and tastiest ways to get into the world of cooking, but there are still tips that can make the experience even easier.
If you've ever run a race - or missed a meal - you know the name "Clif Bar." Packed with protein and carbs, these pocket-sized portions can get you through a tough race or a long meeting. 
1080 Recipes
Healthy officials say celebrity chefs often fail to maintain basic hygiene standards, according to 
I never thought I'd come across a candy that didn't sound at least somewhat appetizing. I've heard tell of the vomit flavored jelly beans, but I've never encountered them, so it doesn't quite count. However, this 
Cheese Course: Brebis Pardou
A transcendent summer tomato salad
Sliced bread turns 80 today
