Blanch just harvested fresh vegetables to set their color and seal nutrients and flavor. Blanching is a method of partially cooking vegetables in boiling water or steam—usually for a few minutes; it’s also called parboiling. Blanching is used to seal the flavor and set the color of vegetables before freezing. Blanched and frozen vegetables can […] More
Orange marmalade is the most popular marmalade. Marmalade is a soft translucent jelly preserve quite simply made from fruit, water, and sugar. Marmalade looks like jam but it contains thin fruit slices or diced fruit suspended in the jelly. Many say the fine flavor of the Seville orange makes the best marmalade. But you can […] More
McIntosh and Granny Smith are two apples that are slightly tart and juicy and well suited for cooking and applesauce making. (Once I have the applesauce, it’s hard to resist the baking up a dozen applesauce muffins.) McIntosh is an East Coast and Midwest favorite. Granny Smith, originally from Australia is a West Coast favorite. It’s […] More
The secret to making delicious homemade grape juice is to never boil the grapes. Grape juice reduces bad cholesterol, helps maintain healthy blood pressure, prevents damage to blood vessels in your heart, and reduces the risk of blood clots. Do you see a down side to drinking fresh-made grape juice? Concord grapes are great for […] More
Strawberry jam, plum jam, peach jam, blueberry jam, grape jam—any fruit can be cooked with sugar to make jam. Late summer is home-made jam season—unless you grow apricots and then mid-summer is jam season. My Santa Rosa plum tree is a jam factory in September. Whatever fruit you grow or buy at the farm market […] More
Fresh corn, herb, and tomato relish is a mix that comes together naturally as the summer harvest peaks. When sweet corn kernels can be cut from the ears and popped in your mouth as a garden snack—well, that is the same time you are going to find meaty tomatoes ripe on the vine. For this […] More
Vegetables—unlike fruits–are low in acid so it is important to use prescribed methods and equipment when canning the overflow of summer and fall harvest. Use a steam pressure canner for vegetables. Low acid foods must be processed in a pressure canner to be free of botulism and other bacteria, mold, and yeast growth risks. (You […] More
The sweet flavor of watermelon is well matched to herbal and sour flavors and to other sweet flavors. The key to matching watermelon to other foods is to find a taste complement or counterpoint. The way to do that is to taste, taste, taste! Once you find the watermelon flavor matches right for you, you’ll […] More
Calabaza en Jarabe is pumpkin in syrup. This is a tasty old-fashioned Mexican dessert that you can serve for Halloween or any time in late summer or autumn. Piloncillo is the traditional cone shape of unrefined sugar commonly used in Mexican cooking. Piloncillo (which means little pylon) is made when sugar cane is crushed, the […] More
Melon en Surprise was Auguste Escoffier’s title for a five line description of a tasty combination of melons and other fresh fruits in his 1903 masterpiece Le Guide Culinaire. Of course, Escoffier was working from the notes and techniques of Antoine Carême, an earlier codifier of French Haute cuisine. But as you will see here, […] More
Seviche is a blend of fresh raw saltwater fish, lime juice, and the addition of vegetables and spices. Seviche is popular as both an appetizer and main course in many Latin American countries. Seviche–which is also spelled ceviche or cebiche–is said to have originated in the ancient Inca civilizations of Peru and Ecuador. The essence […] More
Cocido is a Spanish meat and vegetable stew that is slowly cooked and then served in three courses or vuelcos (singular vuelco) from the same pot. There are several regional variations of cocido throughout Spain and Portugal–and in other countries where Spaniards have immigrated. While chickpeas are essential to every cocido, the combination of meats […] More
Stephen Albert