Pecans have a special place in Karen Voss’s heart. “I should have known what I was getting myself into when my husband and I were dating 44 years ago. We’d often go out and pick up pecans on nice fall Sunday afternoons.” The hobby grew into a family business, and Karen and her husband, Ralph, […]
Food & Drink
Posted inFood & Drink
For something different, Cassoulet
High atop the kitchen cabinets in my apartment sits a pottery bowl known as a cassole. It is quite large – about the size of a basketball. It is wide at the top and is tapered down to its base. My cassole is glazed in its interior and rim but is unglazed on the outside. […]
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The savory side of pumpkin spice
For warm, autumnal meals that manage to feel cozy while still staying light and fresh, look no further than your spice cabinet. Cinnamon, ginger, allspice, nutmeg, ginger and cloves are the standard players in most pumpkin pie spice mixes, and while these sweet spices are standard additions to many of our favorite baking recipes, they […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Clean your plate
Comfort Food Week is making a timely arrival just as the autumn air takes on a bit of a nip. These chilly days go hand-in-hand with steaming pots of bean soup, savory mashed potatoes and gravy and creamy macaroni and cheese – all the stuff that’s good for the soul – and some area […]
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Sunchokes
I was 17 years old in 1970 when Joni Mitchell released her album Ladies of the Canyon. I’ve always found her music to be very impactful, and her early recordings are among my favorites. A line from the album’s track “Big Yellow Taxi” has always stayed with me: “Don’t it always seem to go that […]
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Sweet potatoes. Dig it.
I should know never to go into the vegetable garden without a basket and shears. I’d ended up there with my toddler, following her as she wandered aimlessly about our property on a sunny autumn afternoon. Several days had passed since I’d last been out in the garden, and in that time we’d had the […]
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Economies of a scale
Has the experience of spending my first six months of retirement working in a restaurant kitchen made me a better home cook? It definitely has, but not in the ways I would have expected. Much of my time in the kitchen is spent picking little leaves off of thyme sprigs or cutting a basket of […]
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Springfield-grown mushrooms
Now that cooler fall temperatures have finally set in, foodies in the know will soon be enjoying one of autumn’s most delectable seasonal offerings. Wild mushrooms pop up seemingly overnight in local woodlands and farm fields, waiting to be plucked by an experienced mushroom hunter and taken home to be fried in butter or stirred […]
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A fond food memory
While attending dental school in Chicago back in the 70s, I was on a limited budget and always on the lookout for good but cheap dining experiences. One of my favorite discoveries was a small storefront restaurant in suburban West Dundee called Mama di Pinto, named after its chef owner, Virginia Pinto, who died last […]
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Apple goodness in every bite
Over the years I’ve made a lot of pie. I grew up with multiple generations of pie bakers, all of whom had very high standards, especially where crust was concerned. I still use my great grandmother’s recipes, though as I’ve gotten older and more confident I’ve had the audacity to tweak them slightly. It was […]
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Finding connection and comfort over cauliflower
On this day 18 years ago I was on a plane flying to New York City to spend a weekend with my daughter, Anne, who was attending law school at Columbia. The flight had been rescheduled from a week earlier due to the Sept. 11 World Trade Center attack. The mood on the plane was […]
Posted inFood & Drink
To make a global difference, eat local
As fires raging in the Amazon rainforest dominate recent news, the global importance of eating local has never been more apparent. While public attention to these wildfires is new, the fires are not a sudden phenomenon, nor are they accidental. For years, cattle ranchers and loggers have been setting fires to sections of the rainforest […]
