I thought I'd usher in a new month by making you some muffins.I've never used a mix before, but I was in the store yesterday and this bag struck me.For several reasons.First, it is called a Killer mix.Second, there is a woman with nice red high heels on squished by a killer piece of chocolate…
It's entirely possible I've lost my mind. But I prefer to call it investigative blogging. It has a better ring to it.I was talking to Grandma Pellegrini the other day about Easter, and food, and food, and Easter, and she started telling me about these jello eggs she used to make."Wait, what?!?!" I replied very…
A while ago I uncovered a recipe book from my great-great grandmother. It was full of recipes for brown bread. She was mildly obsessed with it I think. Maybe it tapped into her Puritan nature and she felt satisfied by its simplicity.Then a while after that, I got the latest edition of our family recipe…
We all had them at one point. For some of us, they're right below the surface. For others, it requires some deep digging.But pioneer skills are a wonderful tool to have, because you can interact with the world in a more fluid, more satsifying way.One of my favorite things about having this little site 'o…
As you can tell, I’m on a bit of curing kick these days. I’m conjuring my Italian roots. It's just that I had these duck breasts that were just begging to be turned into prosciutto.And I couldn't help myself.Duck prosciutto is simple to make at home, and is a perfect way to store the meat…
I just returned from L.A. L.A. land, and it was a lot of fun. It was a very successful trip and I saw all kinds of new things that you can only expect to see in a new place... for example, this culinary experience that I had while walking to my car one evening:Somewhere right…
These are hell's chicken wings.My darling skillet produced the hottest bits of food I've eaten in quite some time.My mouth still hurts.Surgeon Generals Warning: They will make you have psychedelic dreams. For example, after I ate these chicken wings I dreamt three different short stories that went like this:1. My brother committed a murder in…
I'm 1/8 Irish.I couldn't let St. Patrick's Day go by without a nod. It is beloved by so many after all. It's a passport to drink a month's worth of beer in one day. And to wear buttons demanding to be kissed.But I can't say it's a holiday that celebrates my favorite foods.I thought about…
The first time I saw a wild boar smoking slowly under the soot-blackened eaves of a dome-shaped grill I was mesmerized. I was standing 100 yards from the banks of the Mississippi, deep in the beating heart of the Arkansas Delta. The body of the pig was cloaked in thick slabs of bacon which were…